When you can’t force people to do things, social signaling like this becomes really important for fostering cooperative relationships. You would be right! It is totally absurd that anyone would “listen” to the cheap plastic cones, but I think that is exactly the point. My neighbor accepts some legal authority, because they know people can be ticketed or towed, and they accept some traditional authority, because orange cones and traffic markers have long been a way we mark restricted spaces.Īt this point, it is easy to say this is silly or superficial. If people accept that and choose not to run over the cones, they have successfully conveyed some authority even if I actually have none. What I can do is use a symbol, like a traffic cone, that indicates this situation is special, there is a problem, and we need space to deal with it. I can’t make anyone choose not to park where my plumber will need to be. Saving parking spaces like this is a great case of social theorist Max Weber’s distinction between power and legitimate authority. The same thing happens when a neon vest and an unearned sense of confidence let people go wherever they want. The point of these cones wasn’t to deceive anyone, just to signal that there is something important going on and that people might want to stay clear for a little while. There was nothing official about them (they even still have the barcode stickers attached!), but people were still worried that they were trespassing. I reassured them that I was the only one having a horrible day, and I started thinking about how much authority two cheap plastic cones had.
They were worried their car was going to get towed. The other day, in the middle of saving space to address said plumbing fiasco, a neighbor walked up to me and politely asked what was going on. These cones have gotten me through multiple moves and a plumbing fiasco, and they work like a charm.
In our car-centered culture, the rare days you absolutely need a large truck in a precise place can be a total nightmare. “Traffic Cones” by Jacqui Brown, Flickr CC
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