ASTK18122U The Rise and Fall of Utopian Thinking

The aim of this course is to provide an introduction and critical analysis of utopian thinking in Western political thought. The theme of utopia – a perfect human society – has fascinated and sent chills down spines since Thomas More’s “Utopia” saw the light of day in 1516. As More’s masterpiece attests to, utopia (“non-place” or “nowhere”) is an ambivalent concept, which at once represents a hope of living in a better, more human condition beyond misery and injustice, as well as the totalitarian nightmare of a completely administered society cleansed of all fissures and conflicts. In dreams of utopia, the spectre of dystopia is never far behind.

In the modern political imaginary, the idea of utopia has served as a wellspring of dreams for progress and a better future, as a resource for radical social critique, as an engine of revolutionary revolts, and as a fig leaf for the most brutal kind of repression imaginable. In recent decades, however, utopian thinking is often observed to have disappeared from our political consciousness. Why did utopian thinking thrive in earlier historical periods, and why do – in the words of Jürgen Habermas – utopian energies seem exhausted today?

The course will examine the origin and central strands of utopian thinking in Western political thought, with an emphasis on the ambivalence that seems to lie at its core. Moreover, the course will continuously reflect on the historical and intellectual conditions for utopian thinking to flourish or disappear, situating texts in their historical context (the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, early industrialization, the first half of the 20^th century, etc.). Finally, the course will ask, what we may have we lost with the disappearance of utopian thinking; whether it really is the case that we live in a post-utopian (if not necessarily post-dystopian) age; and if we still have need of utopia today.