Habit
One reason why men obey is that obedience has long been the practice of humanity, and it has become a habit. In the opinion of some, the habit of obedience is in fact “the essential reason” for continued obedience. David Hume said that habit consolidates what other principles of human nature have imperfectly founded. Once accustomed to obedience, he wrote, men “never think of departing from that path in which they and their ancestors have constantly trod, and to which they are confined by so many urgent and visible motives.”
Gene Sharp
The Politics of Nonviolent Action
Part One: Power and Struggle
