Now that the Enron verdicts are in, you might be lulled into thinking that likely incarceration, financial ruin and public humiliation might dissuade other corporate leaders from behaving badly.
That would be naïve. Human nature is not so easily amenable to fundamental change. Neither the stupidity of others nor the new rules of the game (most notably Sarbanes-Oxley) have done–or will do–much to slow the wrongdoing.
Why, for instance, do leaders who are already raking in huge sums of money risk everything to rake in more? Why do people, especially those with so far to fall, act so irrationally? Why do leaders with power to spare still stay power-hungry?
The short answer is that we, and men especially, are hard-wired to always want more. Woven into male genes is a primal code: To have more than the rest is to dominate the rest. In his 2005 book, Our Inner Ape, leading primatologist Frans de Waal makes it clear that there are plenty of peaceful and tolerant animals. But, he adds somewhat ominously, “Consciously or unconsciously, social dominance is always on our minds.”
For men in particular, having more of everything is equated with being more potent. Bigger really is better. In the jungle of corporate culture, it’s best to have bigger domains over which to rule, as well as bigger bucks, a bigger house and car, and of course, bigger stature.
This drive to acquire and dominate has led to the capitalist system’s greatest success stories. America’s legendary corporate executives have hardly been laggards as far as ambition and drive are concerned.
But there is also an evolutionary principle at work that explains the downside. Most obviously, to hold high status benefits men in the sexual domain. That is, high-status men are more likely than their lower-status brethren to, in de Waal’s words, successfully “lay claim to fertile females.”
But the converse is not true. In fact, since men are not particularly attracted to powerful mates, high-status women do not profit from their rank, at least not in so far as it affects their access to men.
I am not suggesting that gender differences alone account for why, with the single exception of
Consider the following examples, all of recent vintage:
The nation’s leading class-action securities law firm, Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman, and two of its name partners have just been charged with, among other things, racketeering, money laundering and obstruction of justice. The 150 lawsuits cited in the indictments have generated some $216 million in legal fees.
Neither the men at Milberg Weiss nor those at Toyota have had their day in court. But it’s clear that the drumbeat of wrongdoing is destined to continue, regardless of the consequences for those who, like the folks at Enron, are ultimately punished for their crimes. As de Waal makes clear, the enormous advantages of high status are ubiquitous in the animal kingdom, and the obsession with sex is similarly universal.
Constant vigilance can slow the tide of transgression. But even this is no remedy for our inner ape.
Barbara Kellerman is research director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. Her most recent book is Bad Leadership: What It Is, How It Happens, Why It Matters.