Enemies of Freedom: Understanding Right-Wing Authoritarianism

by Bob Altemeyer

This book provides important insights into the authoritarian personality, revealing why right-wing authoritarian tAndencies develop in some individuals and not in others. It also shows how a person's predisposition toward right-wing authoritariansim can be measured, and more.

Genres: Politics, Psychology

378 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1988

About the author

Robert "Bob" Altemeyer is a retired Professor of Psychology at the University of Manitoba. Born in St. Louis, he earned a B.S. at Yale University in 1962 and a Ph.D at Carnegie-Mellon in 1966.

He has written extensively on authoritarianism and refined the theory into the concept (and measure) of Right Wing Authoritarianism. His first book, Right-Wing Authoritarianism, was published in 1981 and reports the results of fifteen years of research on the 'pre-Fascist personality' in North American society.

Reviews

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enemies of Freedom was published over 30 years ago yet has remained relevant because the authors warning about right-wing authoritarianism has proved prescient. RWA refers to a psychological trait not a type of political system. Hence there are left and right wing authoritarian regimes but to date attempts to find a left wing authoritarianism using psychometric approaches has failed. RWA is composed of three co-varying traits submission to authority, right-wing aggression and a dislike of non-conformists. These traits are measured using surveys on University students which is a limitation of the book as these results lack external validity nevertheless the results are interesting as Altemeyer highlights the behaviour of those with high levels of RWA including that they are unaware of the fact that they score uniquely high on this measure, they assume they are normal. The book will likely face criticism in the fact that the author is not neutral on the fact that he sees this trait as dangerous and thinks we must be concerned with the large pool of subjects high in RWA. The book covers many areas of relevance to anyone interested in RWA and is very readable.