Media Review: The Power of Being Divisive: Understanding Negative Social Evaluations

Expressing one’s approval or disapproval with a thumb up or down on Facebook or YouTube has origins at least as far back as Ancient Rome, two thousand years ago. Although we no longer seal the fate of defeated gladiators, our evaluations can be consequential as they spread, find echoes, and contribute to rankings. Moreover, even if social evaluation has been around for a very long time, its current prevalence seems unprecedented. Everything around us is evaluated, compared, and ranked, and we are all permanently evaluating and being evaluated. Unsurprisingly, this phenomenon has attracted considerable attention, and a vibrant community of researchers devotes itself to understanding it. The new book by Thomas Roulet falls squarely within this body of research. More precisely, it focuses on negative social evaluations (hereafter NSEs), broadly defined as ‘any assessment of an actor that has negative valence’ (p. 10). Importantly, Roulet’s purpose in this book is not to offer a review of previous work on the topic, nor a roadmap for future research. Rather, the book offers a kind of provocation by arguing that NSEs can end up benefitting more than harming the organizations and individuals facing them.

Given how much research has focused on negative consequences, Roulet’s argument is quite bold, as he is aware. Accordingly, he organizes chapters to make the argument as compelling as possible. Roulet embraces the full phenomenon, from its antecedents to its consequences, and tackles the different levels at which it occurs, from individual to organization to field. The result is a book which covers lots of ground despite its supposedly narrow topic. There is a commendable effort to organize all this, following a model presented early on (p. 22). The drawback is that some of the many sections can be frustratingly short for a reader eager to learn more.

The book opens with a 26-page long Introduction which Roulet qualifies as ‘the cornerstone of the book’ (p. xv). It indeed plays an important role in two ways. First, it defines the object under study – negative social evaluations – and presents previous work on the topic. Importantly, the concept of stigma (Goffman, 1963) serves as the main anchor organizing Roulet’s thinking. He also uses three important elaborations from Hudson (2008): (1) we can transpose stigma at the organizational level; (2) we need to distinguish between core stigma (resulting from core attributes) and event stigma (resulting from episodic events); (3) we need to account for audiences since stigma is culturally situated. The second important role played by the introduction is in providing an integrative model of NSEs (p. 22) upon which the rest of the book is mapped. The model aims at ‘answering the following research question: How can negative social evaluations be beneficial?’ (p. 21). It starts with antecedents of NSEs, moves to resilience, and then to capitalizing. It includes three layers set at the individual, organizational, and field levels.

Chapter 1 is devoted to antecedents of NSEs. In a nutshell, this chapter argues that we emit NSEs as we seek to discipline fringe actors, or punish them, or out of jealousy or malevolence. As for those on the receiving end of NSEs, Roulet brings agency into the picture by differentiating between infringement by nature or by choice. This echoes the distinction between core and event stigma. Turning to how NSEs spread and endure, Roulet points to literature on diffusion models and on scandals. I found this chapter helpful, albeit making a rather uncomfortable read when being reminded of our schadenfreude, the pleasure we feel upon writing or reading devastating comments on TripAdvisor or Facebook. Interestingly, because the chapter rests on prior work, it implicitly allows identifying gaps. For example, whereas the distinction between ‘natural’ and voluntary deviance is analytically useful, I think it fails to account for cases where such dichotomy blurs into a grey area. Similarly, the idea that NSEs are fuelled by jealousy hides other motives such as resentment or moral outrage.

The ‘raison d’être’ (p. 28) of NSEs having been established, Roulet turns in chapter 2 to another building block for his argument: how individuals and organizations resist NSEs. This chapter explores where resilience comes from, and points to identity as an important driver. Identity work indeed fosters resilience to stigma (Gray, Johnson, Kish-Gephart & Tilton, 2017). Roulet starts by explaining how distinctiveness forges identity, and notes that as we join similar others, intra-group cohesion boosts self-esteem. Roulet draws from Leon Festinger’s cognitive dissonance theory to explain how group members change reference points and discard conflicting information. The reasoning, including at the industry level, reminded me of the groupthink phenomenon elaborated by Janis (1972). I found the chapter lacking a clear structure, probably because of its too many sections. Another minor quibble would be that one important mechanism seems to be missing, namely ‘stigma diversion’ (Siltaoja et al., 2020), or how stigmatized groups pass on the blame to another marginalized group. Taken individually, these sections are very informative though. I particularly enjoyed the one on stigmatized occupations, drawing from literature on dirty work. It highlights interesting insights from how stigmatized features can be reframed as acts of bravery and ‘larger purpose’ values (p. 74).

Chapter 3 holds the gist of the argument as it aims to address how recipients can capitalize on NSEs. Some of the arguments seem to follow the common simplification of the Nietzschean idea that ‘what does not kill us makes us stronger’ (p. 99). I understand the argument but can’t help feeling uncomfortable because it seems to me that this reasoning downplays the fact that some people do end up dead (from bullying-related suicide, for example), and more generally because it places the onus on the victim. One interesting mechanism in this chapter draws on signalling theory to highlight how audiences take hints from proxies when assessing unobservable characteristics. In a fascinating study with Yuliya Shymko, Roulet has shown how Russian theatres hide funding from corporations to avoid being seen as inauthentic (Shymko & Roulet, 2017). An additional take in the chapter is that multiple audiences will react differently, opening possibilities for recipients of NSEs to play off audiences against one another. This chapter closes with a much-needed section on boundary conditions. Indeed, as Roulet acknowledges, ‘in a large share of cases, being negatively evaluated has substantial adverse consequences’ (p. 128). As a consequence, he offers that for targets to end up better off after receiving NSEs, there need to be positive consequences that offset the negative ones. In addition, NSEs should not be uniformly shared, meaning that there must be heterogeneity across audiences. Other qualifiers in this chapter make for a more balanced, and I think more compelling, argument. Somewhat watering down previous bold statements, the core argument seems to be recast as follows: NSEs are bad, but they don’t have to be a disaster for recipients, and there are ways to mitigate damage and even turn the situation around so as to benefit from it through increased visibility or increased internal cohesion.

In chapter 4, Roulet turns to practical implications. At various points in this chapter, the author cautiously reminds us that NSEs can bear overwhelmingly bad consequences. Accordingly, organizations facing negative reviews or comments on social media shouldn’t ignore them but rather ‘create intimacy with disgruntled customers’ (p. 142), especially if employees’ self-esteem is at risk (p. 144). This is in line with our observation that London hoteliers use justification to answer negative reviews on TripAdvisor (Wang, Wezel, & Forgues, 2016). At the individual level, the advice is to try and avoid receiving negative reviews. Faced with mean or envious supervisors, one should be nice and unthreatening (pp. 134–135). This was another instance where I was uncomfortable (onus on the victim again), all the more so since, later on, a paragraph explains that some people denouncing all-male panels do so instrumentally to gain visibility without intention to change the status quo (p. 148). Well, I’m sure there are such people and, to be fair, in the same paragraph, Roulet insists that ‘gender imbalance in panels (. . .) is (. . .) widespread (. . .) and deserves to be pointed out’ (p. 148). Still, I’m not sure what purpose this snippet serves.

A short Conclusion starts with a very clear and useful recap. Two additional points stood out for me. First, going back to research, Roulet engages with the ethics of NSEs, differentiating between stigmatization aimed at ostracizing vs. stigmatization aimed at re-integrating. He also offers a helpful panorama of the very many methods used in prior research on the topic, and emphasizes a process perspective for future research. Second, an interesting point is made in section 3, which focuses on how we internalize being permanently evaluated, just as stigma has been internalized for a long time. As Roulet reminds us from Goffman, ‘internalization is partly what makes stigma a mechanism of social control’ (p. 163). Interestingly, Roulet notes that although individual evaluations are distributed and decentralized, power is concentrated in the hands of the few platforms hosting those evaluations (p. 163).

Overall, reading Thomas Roulet’s book was an exciting and enjoyable experience that I’m sure will be shared by scholars interested in social evaluation. The writing style is engaging, the pace is energetic, and arguments are well rooted in a wide variety of research, ranging from classics to latest developments. Roulet is an expert on the topic, as we knew from his many excellent scholarly contributions in the best journals, and as we can now see as well from this book.

One topic in the book that I have failed to address in this review is divisiveness as a political phenomenon and weapon. With Trump gone, it felt outdated already. I reckon it’s most probably wishful thinking from my part, but I couldn’t muster the courage to face yet more depressing thoughts. So, just to let you know that Roulet does discuss the topic along the way. The one take-away as far as I’m concerned is that he suggests, to my relief, that divisiveness has diminishing returns. Incidentally, this is an important qualifier to the very title of the book.

The first audience for the book that Roulet identifies is PhD students (p. xiv). Well, they won’t find a review or roadmap here but will no doubt be energized by a firework display of research ideas, intuitions, and examples. Much remains to be done in the area of social valuation and evaluation (Lamont, 2012), and this book provides lots of inspiration. Its emphasis on stigma also leaves room for other angles awaiting further research.