Deviance and Social Control in an Alternative Community: The Unique Case of the Rainbow Family of Living Light

Abstract

This article employs ethnographic fieldwork and interviews to examine social control and redefined deviance in a utopian countercultural group, The Rainbow Family of Living Light, to answer the question of how socially marginalized groups create and maintain collective identity. Working within a symbolic interactionist paradigm, and drawing on theoretical perspectives on reintegrative shaming, the authors examine the experiences of Rainbow Gatherers during a national gathering in the summer of 2010. Through interviews and observations, we illustrate how Rainbow Gatherers redefine deviance, use covert informal social control, create new definitions of proscribed behavior, and construct an internal hierarchical structure. We note a key paradox, in that although the very existence of a hierarchy and rules runs counter to their stated ideology, participants nonetheless acknowledge, observe, and culturally transmit rules and social norms. To navigate this paradox, Gatherers frame control within a familial reintegrative shaming paradigm, exerting covert informal social control within a milieu of family, peace, and cooperation. By drawing on members’ sense of collective harmony, belonging, and family (including often using sibling references), Gatherers can both foster integrations and reaffirm power-symmetry, and thus foster “appropriate” behavior in non-authoritarian ways. This framework allows them to simultaneously control the behaviors of their participants while maintaining their collective anti-control ideology. Findings show that the use of covert informal social control fosters collective identity in the group.