Saruman the White was the wisest and most powerful of the wizards of Middle-earth, the head of his order, the one chosen to lead the resistance against Sauron. His fall descends the furthest because it begins the highest. And it does not happen all at once: Thornberry's interactional theory lets us see his corruption for what it is —a spiral in which studying the enemy becomes admiration, admiration imitation, and imitation betrayal—. Each concession to Sauron's power weakened his loyalty to good, and each weakening made the next concession easier. There was never an instant when Saruman "decided to become the villain": there was only a succession of steps, each one reasonable in the light of the one before.
// The theoryThe slope of concessions
Interactional theory holds that deviant behavior and bonds to conventional good erode one another over time. Saruman illustrates this in the realm of power. His bond with good was his mission: to fight Sauron. To fight him, he began to study him —to look into the palantír, to analyze the rings of power, to understand the enemy's strength—. That study was legitimate, but it opened the first turn of the spiral: understanding the power led to admiring it; admiring it, to desiring it; desiring it, to justifying small concessions ("allying with the force in order to steer it toward good"). Each concession weakened his original loyalty, and the weakened loyalty made the next concession easier. When Gandalf visits him at Isengard, Saruman no longer proposes fighting Sauron but joining him "to control him" —a step that, in isolation, would have been unthinkable, but that the spiral made seem merely one more logical move—.
No single turn seems decisive
What makes Saruman so instructive for the theory is that at no moment does he cross a single visible line. If we asked him when he turned evil, he could not answer, because there was no when: there were a thousand turns of a spiral, each of which seemed smaller than it was. This is the central operation of dynamic corruption: to fragment the fall into steps so small that none sets off the moral alarm. Studying the enemy is not betrayal; admiring his efficiency is not betrayal; desiring a little of that power is not betrayal; accepting a "temporary" alliance is not betrayal… until, added together, all those steps are the betrayal. Interactional theory teaches us to distrust precisely that fragmentation: corruption rarely asks for one great yes, because it knows we would refuse; it asks for a long succession of tiny yeses, each of which weakens the capacity to refuse the next. Saruman is lost not through a decision, but through the absence of a single decision to stop.
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// The subjectThe sage who believes himself immune
The irony of Saruman is that his very wisdom makes him more vulnerable to the spiral. He believes himself too intelligent to be corrupted: "I study power, it does not rule me; I bargain with Sauron, I do not submit to him." That illusion of control is the engine of his fall, because it keeps him from recognizing each turn for what it is. While Gandalf keeps his bond with good through humility —he does not seek power, and so power does not trap him—, Saruman loses his through pride. Here interactional theory qualifies an important idea: no one is immune to the feedback by being clever; on the contrary, intelligence can accelerate the spiral, because it supplies ever more sophisticated justifications for the next step. Saruman builds an entire philosophy —"power is the only possible order," "one must ally with the inevitable"— that is not his starting point but the product of his descent: the rationalization that each turn needs in order to take the next. He is responsible for each of those steps, and his eloquence does not excuse him: it aggravates him.
Saruman
// The flawNeither "Sauron corrupted him" nor "he was always a traitor"
The flaw with Saruman is to attribute his fall entirely to Sauron —"the palantír dominated him," "he could not resist"—, as if he had been the victim of an external force. But to explain is not to exonerate: Saruman chose to look into the palantír, chose to study instead of fight, chose every concession. The spiral describes how he fell; it does not absolve him of that he fell. The opposite flaw is to read him as a traitor who "always was one," a villain of a single piece with no history —which erases the most valuable lesson: that he began on the side of good and descended by steps—. The honest reading sees the whole trajectory: a noble being whose pride led him, concession by concession, to betrayal, being responsible for each rung. Reducing him to Sauron's puppet forgets his choices; reducing him to an innate villain forgets that his fall is a warning about how anyone —even the wisest— can descend without realizing it.
That the wizard charged with resisting power was precisely the one who succumbed to it, while the humble Gandalf stood firm, is the lesson The Lord of the Rings sets against pride: the one who falls is not the one who is tempted, but the one who believes himself above temptation and therefore stops watching each turn of his own spiral.
Watch the first concession
Saruman matters because he teaches that the corruption of the powerful —and of the intelligent— is almost never an act but a slope. Every time someone justifies a small step toward the very thing they ought to fight ("I only study power," "I only bargain temporarily," "I control the situation"), interactional theory warns that this step is not isolated: it weakens the bond with one's own purpose and makes the next step easier. Prevention does not consist in resisting the great final temptation —which arrives when it is already too late— but in watching the first concession, the one that seems harmless. Saruman would have saved himself not at Isengard, by refusing Sauron, but much earlier, by refusing to admire what he studied. The lesson for any real trajectory, in politics, in institutions, in life, is the same: descents do not begin with the great act of betrayal, but with the first turn that no one —starting with oneself— thought it important to stop.
Three key takeaways
- Saruman falls from the very top through a spiral, not a leap: studying Sauron in order to fight him becomes admiration, admiration imitation, imitation betrayal. Each concession to power weakens his loyalty to good and makes the next one easier.
- No single turn seems decisive: corruption fragments the fall into steps so small that none sets off the moral alarm. His pride —believing himself immune because he is wise— accelerates the spiral, because it supplies ever more sophisticated justifications for the next step.
- Neither "Sauron corrupted him" (to explain is not to exonerate: he chose every concession) nor "he was always a traitor" (he began on the side of good). The lesson: watch the first concession, the one that seems harmless, not the great final temptation that arrives when it is already too late.
Sources · further reading
- Thornberry, T. P. (1987). «Toward an Interactional Theory of Delinquency». Criminology, 25(4).
- Zimbardo, P. (2007). El efecto Lucifer. Random House.
- Sampson, R. J. y Laub, J. H. (1993). Crime in the Making. Harvard University Press.
Case-file questionsFrequently asked questions
¿Quién es Saruman?
Saruman («—») es un villano de El Señor de los Anillos, analizado en KRIMINIS con la lente de la criminología. He began by investigating Sauron in order to defeat him.
¿Por qué Saruman (—) se convierte en villano?
Saruman and dynamic corruption: the wizard who studies the enemy to fight him and ends up imitating him. Each concession to Sauron's power weakened his loyalty to good and made the next one easier.
¿Qué teoría criminológica explica a Saruman?
El caso de Saruman se analiza desde la Control Dinámico e Interaccional. Interactional theory (Thornberry) sees corruption as a self-reinforcing spiral. Saruman, of The Lord of the Rings, falls from the very top: the head of the wizards studies Sauron's power in order to fight it, but each concession —admiring that power, imitating it, desiring it— weakens his loyalty to good and makes the next concession easier. There is no leap from good to evil, but a descent step by step until open betrayal.
