When Rules Live in People, Not In Power

By Abidemi Adebamiwa

Driving in an American city, I once came to an intersection where the traffic lights went out. There was no police officer around, yet cars slowed down and took turns. That is usually how it works. People already know what to do.

What matters is what happens when the system pauses. Order does not disappear. Drivers still cooperate, not because anyone is watching, but because the rule is familiar.

Look around you in Nigeria and you will understand what I mean. In Lagos, for example, stopping at a stop sign can feel like signing a death warrant or collecting a ticket to Yaba Left (what Lagosians call a psychiatric hospital). You either get crushed from behind or people look at you like something is wrong with you. Doing the right thing feels out of place because the system does not expect it.

Over time, people adjust to what actually works. Driving becomes negotiation rather than coordination. Everyone pushes forward because that is how survival on the road is learned.

One cannot put an officer on every corner, so societies depend on functional systems and shared habits. Where rules are predictable and consistently applied, people carry them with them. Where they are not, behavior becomes improvised.

That difference explains why order survives in some places and collapses in others. Rules endure when they live inside people, not in power.

Abidemi Adebamiwa is the Managing Editor @ Newspot Nigeria