The future has become a problem for the present. Almost every critical issue is now understood and experienced through the prism of the future since this is the primary focus for the playing out of crises.
Senses of the Future offers a wide-ranging discussion of theories of the future. It covers the main ideas of the future in modern thought and explores how we should view the future today in light of a plurality of very different and conflicting visions. The key contribution of this book is to bring together the different approaches with an account that is grounded in sociological and philosophical analysis as opposed to visions of the future that are inspired by extreme visions of catastrophe or approaches that see the future as only the continuation of the present. Given a revival of apocalyptical visions of the ‘end times’ and dystopian views of the future of human societies, there is urgent need for a new approach on how we should imagine the future. The author explores the future as a field of tensions that is revealed in narratives, utopian desires, hope, imaginaries, and social struggles concerning the potential possibilities of the present: the future does not just arrive; it has to be fought for.
This book is an important contribution to a critical sociology of the future. It is both a work of reconstruction and critique grounded in a historical and philosophical hermeneutics of the future.
Table of Contents
Chapter One Introduction: Conflicting Visions of the Future Contested Visions of the Future Today Return to the Future Outline of the Chapters References
Chapter Two When is the Future? The Problem of Time and the Human Condition Time in the Physical World: Lessons from Physics Has the Future already Begun? Time and History Time, Life, and the Human Condition: Biology, Evolution, and Culture Conclusion References
Chapter Three Lessons from the Past: What Does the Past Tell Us about the Future? The Future in the Past Failed Societies and Civilizational Collapse Catastrophes and History Conclusion References
Chapter Four Modernity and the Concept of the Future: Utopia, Progress, and Prophecy The Future as Expectation The Future as an Imaginary and the Emergence of Utopianism The Future as Possibility The Future as Experience Conclusion References
Chapter Five Ideas of the Future in the Twentieth Century: Futurism, Modernism, Sociology, and Political Theory New Political Ideas of the Future after 1945 Responses to the Future: From Fear of the Future to Futurology Sociological Theory and the Future Conclusion: The New Sociology of the Future References
Chapter Six Critical Theory and the Future: The Sources of Transcendence The Intellectual Origins of Critical Theory: A Brief Outline The Idea of the Future in the Critical Theory of the Early Frankfurt School Habermas and the Communication Paradigm The Responsibility Paradigm and Cosmopolitanism: Jonas and Apel Critical Cosmopolitanism and the Idea of the Future Conclusion: Cultural Models and the Future as Possibility References
Chapter Seven Conclusion: In The Shadow of the Future Do We Need a Theory of the Future? Are we already in a New Historical Era? AI and a Posthuman Future Struggles for the Future References
Index
By:
Gerard Delanty
Imprint: De Gruyter
Country of Publication: Germany
Dimensions:
Height: 230mm,
Width: 155mm,
Spine: 13mm
Weight: 337g
ISBN: 9783111242217
ISBN 10: 3111242218
Pages: 223
Publication Date: 04 March 2024
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Contents Chapter One Introduction: Conflicting Visions of the Future Contested Visions of the Future Today Return to the Future Outline of the Chapters References Chapter Two When is the Future? The Problem of Time and the Human Condition Time in the Physical World: Lessons from Physics Has the Future already Begun? Time and History Time, Life, and the Human Condition: Biology, Evolution, and Culture Conclusion References Chapter Three Lessons from the Past: What Does the Past Tell Us about the Future? The Future in the Past Failed Societies and Civilizational Collapse Catastrophes and History Conclusion References Chapter Four Modernity and the Concept of the Future: Utopia, Progress, and Prophecy The Future as Expectation The Future as an Imaginary and the Emergence of Utopianism The Future as Possibility The Future as Experience Conclusion References Chapter Five Ideas of the Future in the Twentieth Century: Futurism, Modernism, Sociology, and Political Theory New Political Ideas of the Future after 1945 Responses to the Future: From Fear of the Future to Futurology Sociological Theory and the Future Conclusion: The New Sociology of the Future References Chapter Six Critical Theory and the Future: The Sources of Transcendence The Intellectual Origins of Critical Theory: A Brief Outline The Idea of the Future in the Critical Theory of the Early Frankfurt School Habermas and the Communication Paradigm The Responsibility Paradigm and Cosmopolitanism: Jonas and Apel Critical Cosmopolitanism and the Idea of the Future Conclusion: Cultural Models and the Future as Possibility References Chapter Seven Conclusion: In The Shadow of the Future Do We Need a Theory of the Future? Are we already in a New Historical Era? AI and a Posthuman Future Struggles for the Future References Index
Gerard Delanty Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Sussex University. His recent books include (with Neal Harris) Capitalism and its Critics (Routledge, 2022) and Critical Theory and Social Transformation (Routledge 2020).
Reviews for Senses of the Future: Conflicting Ideas of the Future in the World Today
"""Do we have a future? Does it matter? Our present is being defined and redefined by the future. Enlightenment confidence in reason and progress has evaporated and our sense of catastrophe has produced multiple responses including dystopia, and retrotopia. However, Gerard Delanty argues that we must not see the future only as our fate. In his masterly overview of past and present visions of the future, Delanty's diagnosis and prescriptions are indeed timely."" Bryan S. Turner, Catholic University Australia, Sydney (Australia) ""Ideas of and about the future are as necessary now, in our own transformative times, as they were in earlier epochs of great transformation, as during the Axial Age or the 18th-century birth of modernity. Delanty's critical examination of some dominant theories and approaches is an instructive and illuminating guide to current thinking about the future. An exemplary book, as timely as it is necessary."" Krishan Kumar, University Professor and William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of Sociology, University of Virginia (US) ""This very important book combines a vast range of historical reference with a sustained set of arguments about how we have conceived the future in the past and how we should do so today."" William Outhwaite, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, University of Newcastle (UK) ""This is the right book at the right time. Behind the modest methodological habitus of a scrupulous, however hitherto unmatched mapping of the most pertinent visions of the future stands a radical thesis: That a total reorientation of social theory toward the future is underway and demands to be openly affirmed. Systematically drawing on phenomenology and critical theory, this new 'critical hermeneutics of the future' asserts the inevitable orientation toward transcendence, centrally positioning the categories of possibility and potentiality, and thereby breaks open the horizon of agency and transformation so badly needed now. It convincingly serves as a counter-poison to any dystopian, negativistic, or simply neo-realist apologetics of the status quo in our challenging times."" Hans-Herbert K�gler, University of North Florida/Alpen-Adria University Klagenfurt"
