Offended Freedom

Carolin Amlinger is a sociologist and Research Associate at the University of Basel.Oliver Nachtwey is Professor of Sociology at the University of Basel.

"This is a truly remarkable work. The authors expand an initial interest in anti-vax protesters into a highly insightful and comprehensive study of almost all that is strange and paradoxical about the contemporary world. They trace the way in which the Enlightenment idea of freedom as something expansive and life-affirming has become distorted into the anti-social, paranoid idea of the sovereign individual fighting against everyone around them."Colin Crouch, University of Warwick"In this brilliant study, Amlinger and Nachtwey have merged an impressive empirical undertaking with considerable theoretical boldness. Their explication of “libertarian authoritarianism” makes new sense of our puzzling historical moment, and will change the way you think about contemporary politics in many countries."Adrian Daub, Stanford University

• AcknowledgementsIntroductionChapter 1. Aporias of Enlightenment: the Critical Theory of freedomChapter 2. Freedom in dependenceChapter 3. The order of disorder: social change and regressive modernisationChapter 4. Social aggrievement: on the social character of aversive emotionsChapter 5. Libertarian authoritarianism: a movement for a reified freedomChapter 6. The demise of the truth seekers: fallen intellectualsChapter 7. The re-enchantment of the world: “diagonalist” protestsChapter 8. Subversion as a destructive principle: regressive rebels Conclusion