Heere we go... this is from a book called "Work Abuse", by Drs. Judith Wyatt and Chauncey Hare. I'm paraphrasing, and the bits in parens are my take on each point.
Nine characteristics of Norms:
1. they are the rules for behaviour in groups and are mostly unconscious. (unwritten - and unacknowledged! - rules)
2. people must follow them in order to belong to the group (compulsory)
3. they define the group reality (conformity is more important than honesty)
4. they take on a life of their own (persist despite changes in group membership - which means the norms outlast the people!)
5. they may contradict the stated goals of the group (pretend you believe what I say, but damn well do what I do, instead)
6. they sustain the system (status quo uber alles)
7. they may vary from group to group within the larger group (your clique or mine?)
8. they may be positive or negative (according to the same authors negative norms predominate, and looking at this list it's not hard to see why - none of these things seems exactly healthy)
9. they are protected by a norm of silence. (how the hell can you fight city hall when you aren't even supposed to admit it exists?)
According to these same authors, in order to change the norms of a group, the majority of the group must be committed to change, it takes a group effort to bring it about... but given those things, change can happen extremely fast.
So there is always hope.
