Expectations-Based Culture and Post-Expectations Society
We can lower our economic, psychological, and social barriers to liberation
We are entrenched in an expectations-based culture—a system where our personal and professional identities are dictated by external markers of success, appearance, and behavior. These expectations create a narrow path for individuals to follow, often limiting creativity, personal growth, and freedom.
From education to corporate structures, and even in our social interactions, we are conditioned to conform to this rigid framework. These pressures aren’t just cultural—they are deeply embedded in the economic, psychological, and social systems that surround us, creating barriers to true fulfillment and well-being.
Expectations-Based Culture and Personal Evolution
Erving Goffman’s social role theory provides insight into how individuals perform roles that meet societal expectations, creating a limited range of behaviors that are deemed acceptable. From childhood, individuals are conditioned to achieve externally validated forms of success—high grades, prestigious careers, and material wealth. Schools and universities often focus on measurable outcomes like test scores and diplomas, reducing education to a pathway for economic productivity rather than a platform for self-discovery or critical thinking (Goffman, 1959). This conditioning continues into professional life, where individuals are expected to follow a predefined career trajectory.
In this context, Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital highlights how individuals are encouraged to accumulate social and cultural assets that align with societal standards (Bourdieu, 1986). These forms of capital, such as education, wealth, and social networks, are seen as investments that promise success, but only if individuals conform to expectations. Those who deviate—whether by pursuing unconventional careers, rejecting materialism, or prioritizing personal well-being—are often marginalized or dismissed as failures.
However, this framing misses the transformative potential of questioning these roles. By stepping outside these constraints, individuals can begin to chart new paths that challenge the economic, social, and even political status quo. While Goffman’s role theory explains how we are often complicit in playing expected roles, it also opens the door to subversive actions—where playing the "wrong" role could expose the artificiality of the entire framework.
Economic Investments and the Myth of Progress
Society invests heavily in maintaining this expectations-based culture, particularly through economic structures like education and corporate environments. Human capital theory, as outlined by Becker (1964), frames education and professional development as investments in future economic returns. This view reduces individuals to financial assets whose worth is measured by their productivity, salary, and job title. Universities, once seen as places for intellectual and personal growth, now operate as gateways to financial success. Students are encouraged to view their education as a transaction, where the goal is not personal fulfillment but securing a high-paying job to justify their investment.
Corporate environments are similarly structured around this logic. Companies invest in employees with the expectation that they will conform to corporate goals and objectives, prioritizing profits over personal well-being. The rise of hustle culture—the glorification of overwork and burnout—only exacerbates these pressures. Employees are expected to constantly prove their value by working longer hours, achieving promotions, and maintaining loyalty to the company. Deviating from this path, whether by pursuing passion projects or taking time off for mental health, is often seen as a failure to meet expectations.
The student debt crisis is a clear indicator of how this transactional view of education is failing. With tuition costs rising and job markets becoming more competitive, the return on investment promised by higher education is increasingly elusive. Many individuals are left burdened by debt, stuck in jobs that do not align with their passions, but necessary to pay off their loans. This creates a cycle of dissatisfaction, where individuals are trapped in careers they did not choose for themselves, but rather to meet societal and financial expectations.
What is often overlooked in this analysis is the larger economic system that sustains this cycle—capitalism’s obsession with perpetual growth and productivity. The idea that individuals should continuously work harder, achieve more, and push beyond their limits serves the broader interests of a capitalist economy that thrives on extracting maximum value from each individual. Challenging expectations-based culture therefore requires questioning capitalism’s very framework. If personal worth could be untethered from economic productivity, entire industries would need to rethink how they measure success and create value.
Social Capital and Gender Norms: The Invisible Cages
Beyond economic investments, society also invests in individuals through social capital—the networks, relationships, and status that provide access to opportunities and social standing. This concept, rooted in Bourdieu’s social capital theory, suggests that social connections are assets that must be cultivated and maintained to gain status and power (Bourdieu, 1986). However, these networks are often tightly controlled by societal expectations, particularly around gender.
Judith Butler’s theory of gender performativity explains how societal expectations around gender roles limit personal expression and behavior (Butler, 1990). Women, for instance, are expected to conform to traditional roles of beauty, nurturing, and compliance, while men are pressured to pursue dominance, emotional stoicism, and professional success. Social media and advertising amplify these pressures, creating a constant comparison culture where individuals are judged by how well they meet these externally imposed ideals. Nonconforming individuals—whether women prioritizing careers over family, men expressing vulnerability, or nonbinary individuals rejecting gender norms altogether—face social penalties, exclusion, or marginalization.
This reinforcement of gender norms also perpetuates harmful power dynamics, particularly around sexual violence and rape culture. The expectations around masculinity—where men are taught to dominate and women are objectified—fuel entitlement and toxic behaviors. This culture normalizes harmful actions, reinforcing power imbalances that allow sexual violence to go unchecked. In this sense, expectations-based culture doesn’t just limit personal freedom; it actively harms individuals by upholding dangerous norms around gender and power.
It’s also crucial to acknowledge that gender norms intersect with other systems of oppression, like race and class. Women of color, LGBTQ+ individuals, and those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds face compounded expectations that further marginalize them. For example, Black women are often expected to meet both traditional gender roles and racialized stereotypes around strength and resilience, leaving little room for vulnerability or self-care. These intersections deepen the challenges of escaping the invisible cages that expectations-based culture creates.
Psychological Consequences: Anxiety, Perfectionism, and Burnout
The psychological toll of living within an expectations-based culture is significant. Social comparison theory (Festinger, 1954) explains how individuals constantly measure themselves against others, leading to anxiety, perfectionism, and chronic dissatisfaction. Social media platforms have only intensified these pressures, creating a 24/7 culture of comparison where individuals are bombarded with curated images of success, beauty, and happiness. This culture of perfectionism leads to mental health crises, particularly around body image, performance anxiety, and fear of failure.
Burnout, recognized by the World Health Organization as a medical condition, is another consequence of this culture (Schaufeli et al., 2009). People are working longer hours, sacrificing personal relationships, and pushing themselves to the brink, all in the pursuit of success that often feels hollow once achieved. The relentless pressure to meet societal expectations—whether in terms of career, appearance, or social standing—leaves little room for vulnerability, imperfection, or self-compassion. Individuals are conditioned to believe that their worth is tied to their ability to perform and succeed, leading to cycles of overwork, exhaustion, and dissatisfaction.
But we must also question the individualistic framing of these crises. The expectation that mental health is a personal responsibility—that individuals alone should cope with the pressures of burnout, perfectionism, or anxiety—obscures the systemic nature of these issues. The workplace environments, educational institutions, and social norms that perpetuate unrealistic expectations are rarely held accountable. To truly address the mental health epidemic, we must not only provide support for individuals but also dismantle the systems that create these pressures in the first place.
Power Structures and Control: Who Benefits?
The power structures within society—whether political, corporate, or cultural—benefit from maintaining expectations-based culture. Michel Foucault’s concept of disciplinary power (1977) explains how societal institutions, from schools to workplaces, impose norms that ensure conformity and predictability. These structures thrive on control, using expectations to discipline individuals and keep them in line. Similarly, Antonio Gramsci’s theory of cultural hegemony (1971) reveals how dominant groups maintain power by controlling cultural narratives and making certain behaviors and values appear natural or inevitable.
These power dynamics are also reflected in the perpetuation of rape culture, where societal expectations around gender and power normalize harmful behaviors like objectification and entitlement. The expectations-based system rewards conformity to these norms, making it difficult to challenge or dismantle them without facing backlash or exclusion. Those who deviate—whether by resisting traditional gender roles, challenging capitalist values, or advocating for systemic change—are often marginalized or punished, to the point where incelism has emerged.
Resistance, however, is not impossible. By critically engaging with these systems of control and using tools like counter-hegemony (Gramsci, 1971), marginalized groups can challenge and subvert dominant narratives. Collective action, such as labor movements, feminist organizing, or anti-capitalist resistance, can disrupt the structures that rely on conformity and obedience. It’s through these counter-hegemonic efforts that a more liberating future can be imagined.
Toward a Post-Expectations Society
To move beyond an expectations-based culture requires a radical reimagining of how we define success, value, and power. In a post-expectations society, individuals would be free to pursue intrinsic motivations, personal fulfillment, and community well-being without the pressure to conform to external standards. Educational systems would prioritize creativity, emotional intelligence, and critical thinking over standardized testing and career readiness. Workplaces would foster collaboration, innovation, and well-being rather than demanding overwork and burnout.
In this post-expectations society, the emphasis on intrinsic value would challenge industries and systems that profit from external validation and societal pressures. Higher education would become a place for intellectual exploration, encouraging students to pursue knowledge for its own sake rather than as a means to an economic end. The curriculum would shift to emphasize critical thinking, ethical decision-making, and emotional intelligence—qualities that enrich both individual lives and collective society. Similarly, the corporate world would need to rethink its focus on productivity metrics, prioritizing workers' well-being and creative potential over sheer output.
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The workplace of the future in this post-expectations world would prioritize psychological safety, flexible work structures, and holistic personal development. Work would not be a zero-sum game of climbing a corporate ladder but rather a cooperative endeavor where personal fulfillment and team success are equally important. This shift could create a more equitable distribution of power, where marginalized voices—those often excluded from the corridors of power in today's corporate hierarchies—are empowered to lead and innovate.
The industries that thrive on status and comparison—luxury fashion, cosmetic surgery, and even social media—would either have to adapt or disappear. The commodification of beauty, for instance, would face a cultural backlash as people begin to reject narrow beauty ideals in favor of self-expression and authenticity. Social media platforms, which currently fuel much of the expectations-based culture through curated images of success and status, would need to evolve into spaces that promote connection, empathy, and collective growth, rather than fostering comparison and envy.
Reimagining Power and Value
Moving toward a post-expectations society is not just about individual well-being but also about challenging systemic structures of power. Michel Foucault’s concept of biopower (1976) can be applied here—societal norms dictate the ways in which bodies, time, and labor are controlled, often to the benefit of capitalist, patriarchal, and white supremacist systems. A post-expectations culture would involve dismantling these forms of biopower, reimagining how individuals relate to their own bodies, labor, and relationships with others.
For example, the care economy—often undervalued and underpaid because it does not fit within traditional capitalist measures of productivity—would be elevated. Jobs like teaching, nursing, and caregiving, which emphasize emotional labor and communal well-being, would be recognized as essential components of a thriving society. By shifting how we value work, we can create a more just and equitable economy that rewards the contributions that sustain our communities, not just those that generate profit.
Furthermore, in this reimagined society, community and solidarity would take precedence over individual competition. Economic systems would be decentralized, with a focus on cooperatives, worker-owned businesses, and other models that emphasize collective ownership and shared responsibility. Antonio Gramsci’s theory of cultural hegemony would be reversed, with marginalized communities gaining the cultural and political power to challenge dominant capitalist structures. This shift would be accompanied by the dismantling of systems that rely on racial, gender, and class hierarchies, leading to a society in which equity and collective empowerment are the core principles.
Psychological Liberation and Mental Health in a Post-Expectations Society
A post-expectations society would also have profound implications for mental health. The relentless pressure to conform to societal ideals, the constant comparison with others, and the fear of failure are major drivers of anxiety, depression, and burnout today. By rejecting these pressures, individuals would experience psychological liberation. No longer would they feel the need to prove their worth through external measures; instead, they would be free to define success on their own terms, fostering a culture of self-acceptance, compassion, and authenticity.
In this new paradigm, mental health resources would be more accessible and integrated into everyday life. Instead of viewing mental health as an individual issue, we would understand it as a collective responsibility, recognizing the ways in which societal structures contribute to psychological distress. This could lead to a more compassionate society that actively supports emotional well-being, both through community care systems and through a work-life balance that prioritizes mental and physical health.
The Role of Technology in a Post-Expectations Society
The role of technology in this transformation cannot be ignored. In today’s world, algorithms and AI systems are designed to perpetuate engagement-driven behavior, reinforcing expectations-based culture by pushing content that feeds into comparison, competition, and anxiety. However, a shift in cultural values would necessitate a radical transformation in how technology is developed and deployed.
Rather than creating technologies that manipulate users into deeper participation in consumer capitalism, AI could be used to foster human flourishing. For example, AI could help individuals understand their emotional states better and provide insights that promote self-reflection and growth rather than reinforcing insecurities. Social platforms could be restructured to promote authentic connections and community support rather than amplifying status symbols and performative behavior.
At the same time, ethical AI governance would become crucial. Instead of prioritizing data-driven profits, a post-expectations society would demand that technology be designed to serve humanity’s collective well-being, ensuring that advancements in AI, automation, and machine learning contribute to social equity rather than exacerbating inequalities.
Resistance and Potential Backlash
Of course, the transition to a post-expectations society would not be easy. Entrenched systems of power—whether capitalist, patriarchal, or racialized—are deeply invested in maintaining the status quo. Corporations and governments benefit from an economy that thrives on consumerism, productivity, and status, and would likely resist any significant cultural shift that threatens their profit models.
Moreover, individual resistance to this change could arise from those who have internalized these societal values. People who have built their identities around external markers of success might struggle to redefine their self-worth in a world where these measures are no longer relevant. The transition from an expectations-based culture to one grounded in intrinsic values would require not just structural changes but also deep personal transformations.
The Radical Imagination: What Comes Next?
Ultimately, moving toward a post-expectations society requires a radical reimagining of what it means to live well. It involves redefining power, success, and value in ways that prioritize human dignity, creativity, and well-being over material wealth and status. This vision asks us to embrace a more holistic view of human potential, one that recognizes the complexity and diversity of individual desires, needs, and aspirations.
To create such a society, we must cultivate a culture of collective liberation, where everyone—regardless of gender, race, class, or ability—is free to pursue their own version of a fulfilling life. This involves not just rejecting societal expectations but actively working to dismantle the systems that uphold them. It requires us to imagine new ways of organizing our economies, workplaces, schools, and social lives—ways that value authenticity over conformity, collaboration over competition, and well-being over productivity.
