Queueing

Although humans are animals, some kinds of behaviour are typical of humans and we don’t find them in other animals. It’s not surprising. If every kind of human behaviour were also found in other animals, what then would make humans human? (and similarly, what would make a certain animal that animal?) Okay, it could be the combination of behavioural characteristics, but I doubt whether it’s only this that makes humans human. For example, you are walking in the street and you lose your handkerchief. Then you hear someone behind you calling: “Sir, you have lost something”. Can you imagine that an animal would do something like that? Or have you ever seen a queue of animals waiting their turn? Indeed, sometimes animals are waiting for each other; for example, the great tits and blue tits that eat from the string with peanuts in my garden do. But in the animal world the general rule is “the strongest first”, while in the human world waiting rules are more subtle. Let me have a look at them.
Queueing or lining up can take place in many ways. In my blog “Cultural misunderstanding” I explained that queueing is not necessarily physical. It can also be mental, while it still is queueing: the waiting people simply watch when it is their turn without physically standing behind each other. Another alternative for queueing is giving numbered tickets to people as soon as they enter the waiting space, so that there is no need for people to stand behind each other to know who’s next. In this blog I’ll pay attention only to physical waiting lines and take it for granted that my explanation also applies to other kinds of waiting.
I think that the phenomenon of queueing is so common that it doesn’t need further clarification. Following David Fagundes, four rules for proper queuing are essential:
1) Form a line
2) No cutting
3) First come, first served
4) Wait your turn.
The first rule says that you must stand directly behind the last person who arrived. It is the basic form of queueing. More important is the second rule. It says that it is not allowed to cut the waiting line. You must wait till it is your turn to be served. If you don’t, you are at least frowned upon, or people make remarks about it, maybe they try to stop you, and in the extreme case it can lead to a fight. In other words, everybody in the queue claims the right to be served in the order of their spot in the queue (rule three), and cutting the line is seen as violating this rule. Nonetheless, sometimes rule three is ignored, while this is not seen as a case of line cutting. It can happen that a service person picks you from the line to treat your case before you have arrived first; disabled persons and pregnant women may be allowed to go to the top of the line; people whose case can be handled “within a minute” may ask to be served first; and the like. This is not seen as cutting the line if the other waiting people (or often the next to be served only) and/or the service person consent. Rule four says that you’ll forfeit your place in the line when you leave it. Also to this rule there are exceptions, for example, if you need to go to the toilet or, in a supermarket, if you are waiting to check out and you forgot to take something. Then you ask the person behind you in the queue for permission, which is usually automatically given with an affirmative look.
This briefly about what queueing involves. I’ll ignore the sanctions for not applying the queueing norms (see Fagundes), but such sanctions illustrate that from a sociological point of view queues can be seen as a kind of mini-society or mini-system with their own rules or “laws” in which those waiting are connected by the goal of waiting for the same service or whatever it is that they are waiting for. As in a “real” system or society, violations of the rules or laws may be sanctioned. However, a queue is a very loose society or system. You don’t belong to it anymore as soon as you have left it, and probably you’ll never recall anymore that you were lining up there, or it must be for a special reason. Why should you? Moreover, you must have committed a crime to be held responsible for your behaviour in the queue once you have left it. If someone cuts the line without consent, for instance, it can be very annoying at the moment it happens, and sometimes it leads to comments, reactions and exceptionally even to a row, but in the end it’s indecent behaviour and not a crime. Laws specifying line protocol and imposing penalties for cutting in are exceptional (Wikipedia describes such a case). Anyway, usually queueing people wait orderly and basically they stick to the rules. Queueing seems to be a phenomenon that exists in all cultures, though this doesn’t mean that in all cultures always and everywhere people line up when two or more people are waiting for the same. It depends on the situation. And not in all situations and everywhere people queue physically, and other queuing systems exist as well, as said.
I think that queueing is typically human, although probably it is not an innate but a cultural achievement. Sometimes, like in the animal world, power can give you priority in a waiting line. Authorities often can pass the line and go first, although, this is also a cultural phenomenon. In the Netherlands it is not so that a burgomaster or cabinet minister simply can go first, because he or she is a burgomaster or cabinet minister. There must be a special reason for that (like security measures). In other countries power counts.
Why do people queue in the absence of formal rules or laws? Several investigators have tried to answer this question (see Fagundes pp. 1191 ff). I think there is one main background reason: Human societies are so complicated, compared to animal societies, and waiting together with others is such a common phenomenon that situations of waiting easily would escalate and lead to serious disagreements if not fighting, if no cultural norms would have developed that regulate how to wait. An obvious norm is queuing.