People have often been known to find comfort in numbers and to therefore enter into social contracts with others living around them. People feel safer in groups and so they choose to give up certain rights and privileges for protection from their peers. This inevitably leads to domination of man over man. People choose leaders to make their decisions for them, or they do as the majority says. It is very rare for people to make rational decisions and carry to them to their full potential once they have entered into a social contract. The desire to follow the crowd which is created by this social setting is deplorable and is therefore the main object of critism in Henrick Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People.
             The characters in this play all live together in a town ruled by what is known as the compact majority. This majority is led by a group of town officials who come up with plans and policies on which the people may vote. This system offers no chance for the freedom of individuals. Beginning with a speech discussing ". . . the colossal stupidity of the authorities," Doctor Stockmann deconstructs this appalling social system. This speech criticizes the lack of intelligence the authorities have shown and the need for their destruction. If freedom is to exist for individuals, the first step must be to do away with worthless officials and authorities that force the people to make a choice from the narrow selection they provide. What is right in one situation may not hold true in another, but the authorities force all people to live under the same laws with the same punishments instead of allowing for diversity. However, Stockmann does not stop there. In fact, he says that the authorities are not the main problem, but that instead "The most dangerous enemy of truth and freedom among us is the compact majority." This majority follows its leaders blindly without ever giving thought to any alternative...