Aufhebunga Bunga
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/309/ Sack of Potatoes ft. Anton Jäger
🕑 Added 2022-12-20 07:00:02 +0000 UTCOn atomisation and association.
Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone came out 22 years ago and the structural changes he identified then – increasing atomisation – have only worsened. Everyone now blames the internet, and though it may have accelerated some aspects, the problem goes deeper. The social consequences – loneliness, mistrust, depression – are widely discussed, but the political ones less so.
Does the decline of associationalism open the door to authoritarianism? Are 'right-wing' associations (say, churches or homeowner groups) just as threatened as left-wing ones (like unions or labour clubs)? What are the political valences of growing atomisation?
And are we now like the peasants that Marx described in his 18th Brumaire: just potatoes in a sack - and does this explain the crazy politics of our time?
Links:
- Fill out our 2022 Listener Survey: tinyurl.com/bunga2022survey
- From Bowling Alone to Posting Alone, Anton Jäger, Jacobin
- Bowling Alone (2020 revised edition), Robert Putnam
Comments
Aufhebunga Bunga
hahahahaha
Ceren Temizyurek
i remember him mentioning something about Serbia once? i'm not too sure though
John O'Riordan
i got an irl girlfriend due to bunga/podcast fuelled internet parasocial relationships and we want to get a dog and name it philip cunliffe. so dont knock it too hard
Andrea
What a cringe episode. At the umpteenth mention of "social science" I wanted to just give up. PolScis have very weird ways of misusing their brain when they deal with "cultural" or microsocial stuff. Just stop.
NigelBOpinion
Did I hear Phil correctly? He didn't live in "the West" until his undergrad? Where did he live?
