This essay, on the roots of the “loneliness epidemic”, was published in the Observer on 24 March 2024, under the headline “We think loneliness is in our heads, but its source lies in the ruin of civil society”. “The hope that political action will gradually humanise industrial society has given way to a determination to survive the general wreckage or, more modestly, to hold one’s own life together in the face of mounting pressures.” American historian and cultural critic Christopher Lasch’s pessimistic […]

Categories: Culture & Books, Human • Tags: christopher lasch, loneliness, psychology, social disconnection, social fragmentation