Fix ‘broken windows’ ahead of General Election

In 1969, Philip Zimbardo, a Stanford psychologist, conducted an experiment. He had two similar cars branded X and Y. They were both in a relatively good condition. He went ahead to cause some defects on car X.

He removed one of the headlights, interfered with two of the wheel caps, cracked the windscreen as well as smashed one of the back windows. Inside, he tampered with the car stereo as if he was trying to remove it but left it hanging.

He however did not interfere with car Y. He then parked the two cars slightly far apart on a not so busy street. He placed hidden cameras to monitor the cars.

Car X, with slightly shattered windows was attacked by “vandals” within minutes of its “abandonment”. Zimbardo noted that the first “vandals” to arrive was a family — a father, mother and a young son — who removed the radiator and battery.

Within 24 hours of its abandonment, everything of value had been stripped from the vehicle and children were using the car as a playground. At the same time, vehicle Y sitting idle on the other side of the street sat untouched for more than a week.

Then Zimbardo himself went up to the vehicle Y and deliberately smashed the windows with a sledgehammer. Soon after, people joined in for the destruction. Zimbardo observed that majority of the adult “vandals” in both cases were respectable people.

It was this experiment that 13 years later, guided two criminologists James Q. Wilson and George Kelling to write an article titled 'Broken Windows', which appeared in the March 1982 edition of The Atlantic Monthly.

In it they argued that considering a house with broken windows that went unrepaired for some time, the tendency would be for vandals to break a few more windows. Eventually, they could even break into the building, and if it’s unoccupied, perhaps become squatters or light fires inside.

The argument, likewise aptly captured by Malcolm Gladwell in his best-seller Tipping Point, points out to the fact that crime is the inevitable result of disorder.

If a window is broken and left unrepaired, people walking by conclude that no one cares and no one is in charge. Soon, more windows will be broken, and a sense of anarchy will spread from the buildings to the street, sending a signal that anything goes.

In the Kenyan context, the memories of the 2008 post-election violence are still fresh. In as much as history repeats itself, one fervently prays that this piece of history doesn’t dare repeat itself. For a moment of madness, the nation lost itself into a spate of violence that left thousands either dead or displaced.

For a country that had seen relative space of peace for more than four decades, the descent to chaos was in many quarters a bit of a surprise. But it shouldn’t have been. The writing has probably been on the wall all along.

As established from retired South African judge Johan Kriegler’s report on the post-election chaos, although the Electoral Commission of Kenya was primarily responsible for the flaws of the 2007 General Election, the society had for long condoned and actively connived at perversion of the electoral process.

The culture of electoral lawlessness had developed over many years and could not be easily reversed without a determined, non-partisan commitment on the part of the political leaders.

In short, what we can infer from the Kriegler report is that the society had for long suffered its fair share of broken windows. And broken windows abound.

When we instil a culture of parents obeying their children instead of the vice versa happening; when we run to accident scenes to loot instead of helping the victims; when we cut queues because we think we are more important than others; when we speak in our mother-tongue even when there are people among us who do not understand our language; when we do not know the name of our neighbour but we have a Facebook friend a continent away with whom we chat daily; when we look at everything as “we” versus “them” — those my friends are the broken windows that sink a society.

We may be quick to blame our politicians for not delivering and inciting us to violence but let’s not forget to look into the mirror and see the real culprit. We are busy becoming a society of broken windows.

We celebrate disorder and are quick to rush to the streets and ‘demonstrate’ in a show of utility of our civic freedom. In fact, we have those who have made activism not a calling but a commercial activity — a career.

Such miscreants, for that is how I will refer to them us, blossom much when there is disorder and anarchy so that they can be hero worshipped as having shaped humanity while misusing donor funds.

Of course this is not a blanket condemnation and there are those who are genuinely seeking order. Such are heroes and should be celebrated. But they are few and far in between. This is but a direct attack to those who promote disorder in the name of seeking order.

These are those who throw stones at our society’s glass windows and are surprised when we end up with chaos and destruction.

In short, even as the General Election nears, gather and reflect upon yourself just how much you are contributing to the peace of the nation. It starts with that broken window which we do not repair. That sweet wrapper you throw out of your car window. That disparaging remark or heckle we use to describe another Kenyan who is not from our tribe.

Once we get down that slippery road, we never know where to stop. 2008 left us with enough broken windows. Unless we repair them, perhaps none of us shall survive to see the debris of full destruction after March 4.

Mr Sissey is a management and communication consultant. www.marvinsissey.com. Twitter: @marvinsissey