The Decline of Public Figures: A Historical Perspective

On The Fall of Public Man.

[Patreon Exclusive]

We continue working through the 2024/25 syllabus and the first theme, The Future of Place. We ask is politics possible without a sense of place. Here we discuss chapter 13, "Community becomes uncivilised", and deal with listener questions.

• How does the changed relationship between public and private impact notions of community and of place?

• How does the maintenance of impersonal relations signify 'civility'?

• Is impersonality really the summation of all the worst evils of industrial capitalism?

• What is wrong with yearning for community, or specifically “love of the ghetto, especially the middle-class ghetto”

• How does "fratricide" become "logical" when people use intimate relations as a basis for social relations? Why is fratricide "system-maintaining"?

Links:

• 2024/25 Bungacast Syllabus (with links to readings)

• Safe Space: Gay Neighborhood History and the Politics of Violence, Christina B. Hanhardt

• The Making of a New Political Subject, George Hoare, Café americain