Do Drivers Make Way In Your Country?

This about Society, tagged , was written by for on August 22, 2012 .3 Comments

Alexey Kovalev, a moderate Russian liberal, writes:

[tweet https://twitter.com/Alexey__Kovalev/status/237514146453786624]

“When I left [Russia], each time I crossed the road could have been my last. But now almost everybody makes way. So things are changing.”

You don’t often hear such positive sentiments from liberals, who tend to be negative and critical (which is not always a bad or wrong thing). But that is besides the point.

I think that in general having its drivers make way for pedestrians is a pretty good gauge of a country’s overall levels of civility and even social cohesion. Here is what I noticed:

(1) The Brits almost always make way; the Americans make way about 75% of the time; the Russians made way (last time I was there) about 10% of the time.

(2) That said, road civility was definitely on the decline in Britain when I was there, albeit from a very high base. Young people and immigrants just aren’t the same psychologically as older Brits. As for the US I have definitely noticed a majorly downhill trend even during the few years I’ve been here. It is good to hear from Kovalev that Russia is heading in the opposite direction, albeit from a very low base.

(3) Obviously, there are geographic factors too. People in America are definitely a lot more civil in small towns than in metropolises. I also suspect that Americans inland are somewhat more civil than on the coasts, although I haven’t really spent near enough time in the former to make any definitive judgments.

Anatoly Karlin is a transhumanist interested in psychometrics, life extension, UBI, crypto/network states, X risks, and ushering in the Biosingularity.

 

Inventor of Idiot’s Limbo, the Katechon Hypothesis, and Elite Human Capital.

 

Apart from writing books, reviews, travel writing, and sundry blogging, I Tweet at @powerfultakes and run a Substack newsletter.

Comments

  1. AM says
    August 23, 2012 at 2:29 am

    True that about Britain, except for London where drivers can be quite impatient (especially taxi drivers)

  2. georgesdelatour says
    September 2, 2012 at 12:26 am

    As a Brit who’s often in America I think we have exactly opposite attitudes to motorists and pedestrians. In the US jaywalking has serious law enforcement consequences – as historian Felipe Fernandez-Armesto discovered:

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/6251431.stm

    In the UK it’s almost compulsory to jaywalk.

    Bear in mind that in Los Angeles, a car is still probably the best way to get from A to B; in London it’s much slower than the tube.