Planet Utopia: Utopia, Dystopia, and Globalisation

260 Pages·2017·1.03 MB·English

by  Mark Featherstone

We live on planet utopia. The very ideas of utopia and dystopia, how we
understand cultural politics, the means by which we historicize capitalism, com-
prehend global fi nance, the city, and the state, Mark Featherstone’s extraordinary
Planet Utopia argues, have all become invested in, and developed through uto-
pianism. Yet, in many ways, he suggests, multiple utopias have replaced utopia
as the defi ning feature of our broken national identities, and together they have
become a global specter that haunts contemporary sociology. Featherstone’s
creation of what might be called “spectral social studies” is thus set to become
a key area for examining the issue of utopia.
Professor John Armitage, Winchester School of Art,
University of Southampton
Planet Utopia is a truly lucid and prophetic analysis of contemporary society
symbolized in all its spirit of negation and rage by the new revolt of the masses
that is politics in the age of Brexit and Trump. For Featherstone, the sudden
collapse of the savage utopianism of the frictionless economy of the neo-capitalist
imaginary results in a future that is as undecided as it is consequential. Thinking
philosophically, seeing cinematically and interpreting sociologically, this important
book inquires whether the future will be caught up in a nativist trajectory of
murderous violence and revenge-taking or something else entirely, namely a
vision of human creativity and imagination that takes root in the very bleakest
ruins of the present.
Arthur Kroker, author of Exits to the Posthuman Future

Planet Utopia
The key fi gure of the capitalist utopia is the individual who is ultimately free.
The capitalist’s ideal society is designed to protect this freedom. However,
within Planet Utopia: Utopia, Dystopia, Globalisation , Featherstone argues that
capitalist utopian vision, which is most clearly expressed in theories of global
fi nance, is no longer sustainable today.
This book concerns the status of utopian thinking in contemporary global
society and the possibility of imagining alternative ways of living outside of
capitalism. Using a range of sociological and philosophical theories to write
the fi rst intellectual history of the capitalist utopia in English, Featherstone
provokes the reader into thinking about ways of moving beyond this model
of organising social life through sociological modes of thought. Indeed, this
enlightening volume seeks to show how utopian thinking about the way
people should live has been progressively captured by capitalism with the result
that it is diffi cult to imagine alternatives to capitalist society today.
Presenting sociology and sociological thinking as a utopian alternative to
the capitalist utopia, Planet Utopia will appeal to postgraduate and postdoctoral
students interested in subjects including Sociology, Social Theory, Cultural
Studies, Cultural Theory and Continental Philosophy.
Mark Featherstone is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at Keele University, UK.
Routledge Studies in Social and Political Thought
For a full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com/series/RSSPT
112 Jürgen Habermas and the European Economic Crisis
Cosmopolitanism Reconsidered
Edited by Gaspare M. Genna, Thomas O. Haakenson, and Ian W. Wilson
113 Genealogies of Emotions, Intimacies, and Desire
Theories of Changes in Emotional Regimes from Medieval Society to Late Modernity
Ann Brooks
114 Modernity and Crisis in the Thought of Michel Foucault
The Totality of Reason
Matan Oram
115 Crisis and Critique
On the Fragile Foundations of Social Life
Rodrigo Cordero
116 China in Early Enlightenment Political Thought
Simon Kow
117 Elementary Forms of Social Relations
Status, Power and Reference Groups
Theodore D. Kemper
118 Groundwork for the Practice of the Good Life
Politics and Ethics at the Intersection of North Atlantic and African Philosophy
Omedi Ochieng
119 Theories of the Stranger
Debates on Cosmopolitanism, Identity and Cross-C ultural Encounters
Vince Marotta
120 Deciphering Goffman
The Structure of his Sociological Theory Revisited
Ramón Vargas Maseda
121 Planet Utopia
Utopia, Dystopia, and Globalisation
Mark Featherstone
Planet Utopia
Utopia, Dystopia, and Globalisation
Mark Featherstone
First published 2017
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business
© 2017 Mark Featherstone
The right of Mark Featherstone to be identifi ed as author of this work
has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or
other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying
and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identifi cation and
explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-i n- Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Featherstone, Mark, author.
Title: Planet utopia : utopia, dystopia, and globalisation / Mark Featherstone.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2017. |
Series: Routledge studies in social and political thought ; 121 | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2016043233 | ISBN 9780415997706 (hardback)
Subjects: LCSH: Utopias. | Dystopias. | Globalization. | Capitalism.
Classifi cation: LCC HX806 .F378 2017 | DDC 335/.02—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016043233
ISBN: 978-0 - 415- 99770-6 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-3 15-2 1250- 0 (ebk)
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by Apex CoVantage, LLC
For Paddy

Contents
Acknowledgements x
I ntroduction: On the Seashore: Utopia, Dystopia, and
Cultural Politics 1
1 Back to the Future: Utopia and Dystopia in Greece 23
2 The Origins of the Capitalist Utopia 52
3 The Late Capitalist Utopia in Power 81
4 Global Finance, Utopia of Beautiful Numbers 109
5 The Minor Utopia 138
6 The Lost Child of the Dystopian City: Nicolas
Winding Refn’s D rive and Only God Forgives 171
7 Dis-U nited Kingdom: Division, Encounter, and
Utopianism in Heterotopic Britain 198
Conclusion: The Spectre of Sociology 220
Index 240