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Chapter 7 - The Built Environment and Behavioral Continuity

from Part I - Political Plasticity and Behavioral Continuity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2023

Fathali M. Moghaddam
Affiliation:
Georgetown University
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Summary

The built environment represents a continuity that also supports continuity in human behavior. The major schools of psychology are in agreement about the important role played by the built environment in shaping behavior, although some schools (e.g., behaviorism) give more importance to environmental shaping of behavior than do others. Some aspects of the built environment, such as heritage buildings, last over centuries and even thousands of years. As discussed in this chapter, heritage buildings often become integral to the collective memory and collective identity of a group; for example, the Tower of London is part of the national identity of Britain. Because of the important role played by the built environment in sustaining behavioral continuity, revolutionaries often attempt to radically change the built environment after they have achieved regime change and come to power as rulers. Renaming streets, buildings, and other places and making other such surface-level changes are easily done, but more substantial changes in the design of the built environment take much longer and are far more difficult to achieve. For this reason, the influence of the built environment on behavior tends to continue unchanged even after revolutions.

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Chapter
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Political Plasticity
The Future of Democracy and Dictatorship
, pp. 72 - 84
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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