CHURCHILLS COGNITIVE AND RHETORICAL STYLE - THE DEBATES OVER NAZI INTENTIONS AND SELF-GOVERNMENT FOR INDIA

Many scholars view integratively complex reasoning as either cognitive ly or morally superior to integratively simple reasoning. This value j udgment is, however, too simple to capture the complex, subtle, and ev en paradoxical linkages between integrative complexity and ''good judg ment'' in historical context. Our case studies add to the growing lite rature on this topic by assessing the integrative and cognitive comple xity of policy statements that Winston Churchill and his political adv ersaries made during two key foreign policy debates of the 1930s-the a ppeasement of Nazi Germany (where contemporary opinion overwhelmingly, favors Churchill) and the granting of self-government to India (where contemporary opinion overwhelmingly favors Churchill's opponents). In both private and public, Churchill expressed less integratively compl ex but more cognitively complex opinions than did his opponents on bot h Nazi Germany and self-government for India. The results illustrate ( a) impressive consistency in Churchill's integrative but not cognitive complexity in both private and public communications over time and is sue domains, and (b) the dependence of normative judgments of styles o f thinking on speculative counterfactual reconstructions of history an d on moral-political values. We close by arguing that, although integr ative complexity can be maladaptive in specific decision-making settin gs, it can still be highly adaptive at the meta-decision-making level where lenders ''decide how to decide.'' Good judgment requires the abi lity to shift from simple to complex modes of processing in timely and appropriate ways.