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person1960s-1994

Christopher Lasch

Disciplines:
history
political philosophy
social criticism

Summary

American historian and social critic who developed a communitarian critique of liberal individualism and consumer capitalism — arguing that both left and right had abandoned the traditions and virtues sustaining democratic life.

Core Contribution

The Culture of Narcissism: American culture has produced a pathological narcissism — the self-absorbed, anxious pursuit of personal fulfillment — as capitalism undermined traditional communities. The True and Only Heaven: a defense of the lower-middle class moral tradition against progressive liberalism.

Key Spikes & Highlights

  • Was a socialist who defended religion, the family, and bourgeois moral standards — a combination that fit no political category and allowed him to criticize both capitalism and liberal progressivism.
  • The Revolt of the Elites: democratic institutions are undermined not by mass populism but by the withdrawal of upper-middle-class elites from common life — a diagnosis prophetic of the 2010s.

Notable Works & Achievements

The Culture of Narcissism

The Minimal Self

The True and Only Heaven

The Revolt of the Elites

Historical Influences

Thorstein Veblen Richard Hofstadter Antonio Gramsci

Intellectual Lineage

American Social CriticismCommunitarianism

Contemporaries & Peers

Michael Walzer Christopher Lasch

Minds Influenced

American PopulismCommunitarian Left

Intellectual Posterity

Social CriticismCommunitarian Politics

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