Both, the authoritarian and the submissive, develop standards which assure them that their survival never again will be threatened. Since this is the second level ethic derived from the second level need system, the roles of both are based on a need for safety and for security from the vagaries of nature and of man. The submissive chooses to do as he is told. The authoritarian chooses to do as he pleases. The ’haves’ spawn, as the raison d’etre for their behavior, the concept of the rights of individualism. But actually, these rights become the divine rights of kings, the unassailable prerogatives of management, the inalienable rights of those who have gained a position of power. What happens to such ways of proper behavior, when one king perceives his rights are being infringed by what another king perceives as his right?

Or, what happens when one manager of a business sees his prerogatives threatened by what another business manager or labor leader sees as his prerogative? War in all its forms ensues. The ‘have-not’ is but a pawn in this power ethic of the few. If he goes off to war for the right of his king, and gives his life in this endeavor, he is honored for allowing the king to live, but he is dead. If he produces as his manager demands, he is rewarded by paternalistic gratuities, which eventually he comes to hate, because again, the price, subservience, is too great a price to pay.

The theory proposes that the Machiavellian stage is a necessary step toward the moral freedom of man, but that it too is doomed to decay, doomed to discard. Heredity does not place intelligence solely in the brains of the powerful.

The ‘have-nots’ will get their share, and soon these intelligent ‘have-nots’ revolt, and the ethic is consumed in revolution. But this, one would theorize, is not the sole motivating force in the breakdown of the Machiavellian ethic. The ‘haves’ find soon that power alone does not please man. Man wants, also, to be liked, and so both the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ see weakness in this ethic, and reach for a higher level.

Now, man moves to the belonging level of need, and man moves to the conformistic ethic. The many want to be accepted into the privilege club of the few, and the few want to be liked, not hated by the many. Thus, if this conception has substance, the team concept of behavior, the organization man, the we-are-all-buddies-let-us-all-break-bread-together system of proper behavior develops. The rules created for proper behavior are the prescribed ways for people to operate so that groups may function smoothly. When these rules evolve, man in his group eats alike, dresses alike, talks alike and sleeps alike. The Emily Post and the Amy Vanderbilts lay out the rules. The Company demands the thought and the action. The Princeton man is a Princeton man, but the human man is an automaton.

When the conformistic ethic dominates man’s behavior, incentives and directiveness stem from others. Man is able to respond, able to do the right thing, as the group sees it, but he is not able to choose. The conformistic ethic is typified by passivity to what others expect one to do. It is proper to be passively receptive, non-questioning and non-thinking. He is good who passively does as the group demands, and quietly accepts the directive that he get in no trouble with the group or get the group in trouble.

The conformistic ethic argues that the group is the source of all that is right and that belongingness is the ultimate need of the organism. It promotes that the only purpose of knowledge is to provide substance for the group, and it promotes that communication is the means to the end. Things will be perfect and all men will behave properly when communication is complete. Decide what is good behavior, and find the proper way to communicate this, and all our behavioral problems will be solved, because there will be no conflict between men who all perceive alike.

Again, within this theory, the price of proper behavior is too great. Acceptance costs the man his individuality, and this he cannot pay. He cannot pay the price because the law of nature is that he is a person, not a machine. And so, man moves to the next level of behavior, and strives to become something - - - anything - - - but something more than a machine. He reaches on and beyond to a higher, more human level.