Expectations and Double Contingency
Given the flexibility this suggests in multiplex relationships, it might appear that such relationships are being taken as less useful in accomplishing the particular tasks that make up life than simplex relationships are. In fact, this is not so. Simplex relationships are based very substantially on specific expectations, but they are easily ruptured and are not very flexible. Multiplex relationships are more lasting and more flexible, but the very flexibility, based on the less specific nature of the expectations involved, makes them seemingly less useful in getting specific things done. This, however, is countered by the process Parsons calls "double contingency" (1964 [1951]:37 passim). This has been referred to here with respect to identifiers, but it also operates to achieve at least some sharing of expectations.
Thus, for example, in a Swahili family I know, an unmarried daughter got a job, partly prompted by her understanding of what her mother expected her to do given the family need for money. The mother responded in part to the daughter's having done this by taking the major part of the daughter's earnings in accord with what the mother views (she says) as her right. She also leaves part of her daughter's earnings for the daughter's own use (as well as supplying the daughter with a place to live and food) in part in line with her understanding of what she says her daughter expects her to do. When the mother forbade the daughter to use the household telephone because she thought the bill was too high, the daughter objected and said her earnings entitled her to use the telephone when she needed to. The mother acceded to the daughter's wish but increased slightly the proportion of the daughter's wages she took.
The mother-daughter interaction proceeds in this way with each behaving in a way that is partly contingent on what the other does and partly on what the other is thought to expect. So long as both mother and daughter continue to adjust their behavior to the other's response as well as to their view of the other's expectations, interaction can continue without necessary disruption.
In the case cited, the daughter confided that her mother took too much of her pay, but she continued to supply it since, as she said, her mother wanted it and "what else could I do?" Similarly, the mother said that her daughter wasted money foolishly but was, mainly, a "good [girl], not like some 'others.'"
There may be minimal sharing regarding each other's specific expectations, but if each finds the other's actual behavior broadly acceptable (as in Wallace's [1970:27–36] "equivalence structures"), the relationship can continue despite the initially limited agreement on expectations and salience even if the low level of agreement continues. The mother and daughter are by no means fully satisfied with each other's meeting of expectations, but both agree the other continues as a central figure in her life and continues to satisfy the broad expectations that go with being a mother and a daughter.
At a minimum, however, despite double contingency and the existence of some sharing, people do not, indeed cannot, meet all the expectations in their multiplex relationships with one another. That this is so would hardly seem surprising. It does not surprise the Swahili. Every Swahili I talked to about this agreed that no one, "not even a saint," does everything that is expected of him or her. No one, it was often noted, is perfect; only God is.
The proverbs quoted at the beginning of chapter 4 are quite explicit in saying that a bad relative is better than no relative at all. In the terms being used here, an acceptable partner in a multiplex relationship is preferable to having no such relationship. In multiplex relationships, so long as behavior can reasonably be interpreted as meeting their broad expectations,[7] the relationships usually proceed despite imperfect sharing of some of their expectations and salience understandings.