We want out/We're staying put

 In the opening essay of his collection A Propensity to Self-Subversion, social scientist Albert O. Hirschman offers a variation on his famous theory of "exit" and "voice." These terms, for Hirschman, refer (perhaps self-explanatorily) to two different methods of responding to dysfunction in an organizational setting. The first, "exit," means picking up and leaving. The second, "voice," means staying put and protesting. Both are ways to register discontent with an existing state of affairs. But the two are not necessarily complementary. In fact, they can undermine one another. As Hirschman summarizes the original, "hydraulic" model of his theory, "exit" can operate as a "safety valve" that "lets off steam" that would otherwise find expression in voice. In other words, if people can simply leave, they may be less motivated to stay and try to improve conditions where they currently are. 

In turning to the example of the collapse of the German Democratic Republic, however, and the country's 1989 reunification, Hirschman sees a far more complex dynamic at work. Here, exit or the threat of exit served to delegitimize the regime, while also providing a sense of "empowerment" to others to make freer use of their "voice." Ultimately, in Hirschman's telling, the two demands—for free movement and free expression—coalesced into two kindred chants of the East German protest movement. Wir wollen raus ["We want out"]—a call for the GDR authorities to let discontented citizens "vote with their feet"—was heard alongside chants of Wir bleiben hier ["We're staying put"]—connoting something like: "you can't get rid of us so easily." While the two messages may appear opposite and contradictory, they often came from the same dissenters at the same rallies.

I'm glad that Hirschman chose to introduce more complexity into his original theory; for as much as the simple hydraulic model of "exit" and "voice"—according to which the two are mutually exclusive, with each detracting from the strength of the other the more it is used—may explain some domains of human life, it can also lead to some dark places. The worst kind of application of the theory is the sort that proposes limiting human mobility for the purpose of compelling people to use "voice"—thereby perhaps improving the status quo where they are, but putting themselves in danger. The most extreme version of this idea would be the one proposed by Rick Santorum on the campaign trail back in 2016. The then-contender for office described the deportation of immigrants as a "blessing," recall, because supposedly the deported people would be able to "go home and save their countries." 

It seems unlikely, and would be a cruel historical irony if so, that Hirschman intended this application of his "exit"/"voice" theory. Hirschman himself, after all, chose "exit" under the most dramatic and necessary of historical circumstances. As the later autobiographical sections of the Propensity collection recount, Hirschman left Germany shortly after Hitler's rise to power, and he was displaced multiple times over by subsequent fascist occupations. Of course, as both an aid worker who served with American rescuer Varian Fry, as well as a lifelong writer of politically-committed social theory, Hirschman also made robust use of his "voice." In his own life, the two methods of dealing with discontent do not seem to have been in conflict with one another. And regardless, the notion that people should be "forced" to stay put, even if it puts them in danger, is obviously an insult to human freedom. 

It is particularly indefensible to hear such a notion promulgated by people who themselves would not have to face any of the dangers involved in staying put (Santorum, e.g.). It is somewhat more compelling when the people who themselves chose to stay and try to improve things—often at great person risk—make this point. Anna Akhmatova, for instance, who remained in the Soviet Union throughout the period of the Stalinist terror, at a time when most writers critical of the regime had long since fled into exile. "I’m not of those who left their country /" she wrote in one of her poems, "For wolves to tear it limb from limb." (Thomas trans.) These are brave words coming from one who actually faced potential arrest, torture, and murder for her willingness to reject "exit" for "voice," and are to be taken more seriously than the callous proposals of U.S. politicians who have no experience of persecution and violence. 

But still, I don't think the historical evidence rests with Akhmatova's implicit claim. Dissidents who stay put are not always able to be more effective enemies of the regime in power than critics operating in exile. While regimes in power may boast at times (as the GDR authorities did, in Hirschman's telling) "good riddance," and posture as if their opponents by leaving were doing them a favor—and while those who stay behind may, with Akhmatova, feel a kind of resentment at those who escaped, and even regard their departure as a kind of dereliction or as doing the tyrants' work of repression for them—the record suggests the opposite can be the case in practice. Departure can be the ultimate form of Gandhian "non-cooperation"—a form of nonviolent resistance to oppression that creates its own pressure on the regime. More importantly, it allows dissidents to achieve the first pre-condition of any continued dissent: survival.

And finally, as our GDR example suggests, "exit" can actually have a salutary impact even for those who stay behind. Hirschman gestures toward this with his language of "empowerment," but doesn't spell out the mechanism by which it works in detail. I would suggest it proceeds as simply as follows: when people know that exit is an option—when they have the example ready to hand of others who have escaped and survived by doing so—they will be more willing to take risks where they are to confront the regime in power. If there is no possibility of escape, by contrast, and therefore dissent will mean certain imprisonment or death, very few would have the courage to attempt it. But if escape is still there as a Plan B, the thought of taking these steps is less daunting. I am reminded of a passage in Philip Roth's The Human Stain, which illustrates as well as anything this aspect of human reverse psychology: 

Roth describes a father talking to his daughter about her periodic intention to quit her job ("exit.") So long as she feels exit is not an option, she has an overpowering desire to leave. Knowing, on the contrary, that she does in fact have the freedom to exit gives her the strength of will to carry on with her current situation—to choose "voice," in Hirschman's terminology; to contend with the status quo and try to improve it to the best of her ability from where she is. “[Her mother] was sure to tell her to forge ahead,” writes Roth, “leaving [her] overwhelmed and feeling trapped; with [her father] there was the possibility that, if [she] made a compelling case against her own persevering, he would tell her that, if she wished, she could cut her losses and quit – which would, in turn, give her the gumption to go on.” Some similar dynamic unfolds, I would suggest, wherever forces of suppression impinge on human freedom.