It is no longer news – democracy finds itself in its deepest crisis since the end of the World War II. Many reasons are cited for this, such as globalization, growing inequality, migration and the change in standards of equality around which the new culture war is raging. However, the individual findings miss the essence of the drama of the present: the citizens of Western societies have begun to scorn liberalism. They have developed regressive, authoritarian mentalities and, in certain parts, a new openness – sometimes as indifference, sometimes as affirmation – to fascist fantasies. It is a lustful destructiveness, a democratic nihilism that fights liberal society in the name of a peculiar freedom of possessive individualism. Anti-liberal destructiveness results from the crisis of progress in modern capitalist societies and authoritarian liberalism. Regressive mentalities and the associated affective structures seal themselves off through zero-sum thinking against solidarity and project social problems onto migration or social liberalism. Frivolous appropriations of categories of progress characterize this new destructiveness, which exhibits a nostalgic and radical identification with the status quo.
moderated by: Stipe Ćurković
Oliver Nachtwey is Professor of Sociology at the University of Basel in Switzerland. His research interests are processes of social modernisation and individualisation as well as the transformation of work. His research and work also explore the development of social conflicts, political representation, protests and social movements. In 2024, Polity press will publish his book “Offended Freedom: Aspects of Libertarian Authoritarianism” (with Carolin Amlinger). He’s also the author of “Germany’s Hidden Crisis: Social Decline in the Heart of Europe” (Verso, 2018).
