Foreign Rights

Emotion has invaded social and political space to the detriment of other means of understanding the world, notably reason. Of course, as Hegel would say, «nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion», but the empire of affection has become a threat to democracy. It transforms human beings, broken by inequality, into their own executioners, inviting them to weep instead of taking action. After Naomi Klein demonstrated how the « shock doctrine » enables capitalism to thrive in the face of catastrophe, Anne-Cécile Robert analyses how social control is exerted through emotion and studies its most poisonous manifestations: compassionate narcissism on social networks, political discourse reduced to preachiness, expansion of the crime and miscellaneous news sections in the media, the staging of silent marches etc. This is a much-needed reflection on the mind-numbing expansion of teardrop territory and a civic appeal to a return to reason.