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Individualism, Decadence and GlobalizationIntroduction: Individuals-in-Relation

Individualism, Decadence and Globalization: Introduction: Individuals-in-Relation [This book began with points to which I kept returning since I began to write on the nineteenth century and social theory. These included, first, Holbrook Jackson’s description of the 1890s as “a decade singularly rich in ideas, personal genius and social will” whose “central characteristic was a widespread concern for the correct — the most effective, most powerful, most righteous — mode of living.”1 Second, the compatibility in that period of individualism and socialism that has been increasingly difficult for later generations to comprehend. Third, polarized reactions to the excesses of modernization that could culminate, on the one hand, in political action to the point of physical force (William Morris) and, on the other, in hagiography and religious conversion (J. K. Huysmans). And fourth, the intricate dissection of relationships of symmetric and asymmetric mutuality. It also began with the experiments of people who attempted to live their lives creatively, as if they were works of art, and treated decorum as formed behavior, civility as formed interaction, beautiful objects as formed labor, beautiful Nature as formed matter, games as formed competition, ascesis as formed self, and, often, socialism as formed society, forming self-interest for the social good: people, that is, who embodied and performed detachment as both critical and aesthetic.] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

Individualism, Decadence and GlobalizationIntroduction: Individuals-in-Relation

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References (13)

Publisher
Palgrave Macmillan UK
Copyright
© Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited 2010
ISBN
978-1-349-31995-4
Pages
1 –27
DOI
10.1057/9780230277540_1
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[This book began with points to which I kept returning since I began to write on the nineteenth century and social theory. These included, first, Holbrook Jackson’s description of the 1890s as “a decade singularly rich in ideas, personal genius and social will” whose “central characteristic was a widespread concern for the correct — the most effective, most powerful, most righteous — mode of living.”1 Second, the compatibility in that period of individualism and socialism that has been increasingly difficult for later generations to comprehend. Third, polarized reactions to the excesses of modernization that could culminate, on the one hand, in political action to the point of physical force (William Morris) and, on the other, in hagiography and religious conversion (J. K. Huysmans). And fourth, the intricate dissection of relationships of symmetric and asymmetric mutuality. It also began with the experiments of people who attempted to live their lives creatively, as if they were works of art, and treated decorum as formed behavior, civility as formed interaction, beautiful objects as formed labor, beautiful Nature as formed matter, games as formed competition, ascesis as formed self, and, often, socialism as formed society, forming self-interest for the social good: people, that is, who embodied and performed detachment as both critical and aesthetic.]

Published: Nov 30, 2015

Keywords: Nineteenth Century; Methodological Individualism; Philosophical Anthropology; Ethical Society; Formed Competition

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