Schoeck_2010_EnvyATheoryOfSocialBehaviour.pdf

ENVIOUS BUILDING 137
students, typical of the mid-fifties, have now, ten years later, reached the
colleges. The emotional roots, in many cases, appear to be the same.
It is true that in the United States cases of vandalism involving
children of the middle and upper classes are also becoming more
frequent. Even here, however, the culprits may be turning against too
perfect an environment which they did not themselves help to create.
They are trying to see how much grown-ups are prepared to stomach.
The increasingly broadminded 'understand-all, forgive-all' attitude of
judges in juvenile courts where near-adult youths may appear might
well, I believe, have some bearing on the increase of acts of vandalism by
children from good homes.
Typical vandalistic behaviour is manifested by the culprit who, in
November 1952, in Bridgeport (Connecticut) set fire to eight cars and
said to the police: 'I couldn't afford to own an automobile ... and I didn't
want anyone else to have one. ,12 This seemed to him more satisfactory
than stealing a car.
An almost tragi-comic variation of the envy-motivated delinquent was
the English trade-unionist who habitually started wildcat strikes in his
factory. When called to account by his union he explained his action: 'I
shut the works down on several occasions because it was a nice day and I
wanted to go fishing.-I did not want the other fellows to have more
money in their pay packets than I did. ,13
Envious building
Early German legal terminology actually recognizes the case of the
envious man, who, in certain circumstances, is prepared to incur expense
in damaging another person. Grimm's Dictionary quotes the
following definition from the Augsburg building regulations: 'It is held
to be envious building [Neidbau] when a prospective building is planned
clearly to the detriment of a neighbour and without pressing need, or
where such a building has little or no purpose, while representing great
damage, and loss of light and air, to the neighbour. '
The self-destructive element in envy is plainly apparent. Just as the
12 Time Magazine, November 3, 1952.
13 Fortune Magazine, July 1952, p. 60.