"How societies can preserve democracy with a human-directed social contract
In Homo Empathicus, Alexander Görlach interprets thecurrent crisis of democracy and how to respond to it. The book's focus on the 2007-2008 global financial crisis underscores how the promises of liberal democracy were repeatedly broken by financial and political elites, with a backlash emerging in the form of "us-against-them" populism. By undermining the hopes and livelihoods of millions of people, the crisis created its own narrative, with consequences capable of causing lasting damage to the liberal world order.
To restore the values of liberal democracy, Görlach proposes a "truly human social contract" supported by a narrative of empathy. The basis of such a contract is a new view of civil and social rights asan expression of human dignity, with economic factors understood as moral concerns, not just as a matter of who gets the most.
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Inhaltsverzeichnis
Contents:
Acknowledgments
1. Introduction
2. The Financial Crisis Sounds the Death Knell of the Liberal World Order
3. What Constitute(d) a Liberal Democracy
4. The New Populism and the Crisis of Democracy
5. "Us against Them"-Economic Separatism
6. The Tectonic Tremor
7. The Common Good and the Ethic of Participation
8. Strongmen Are Not Strong: What We Really Need Now
9. A New Social Contract
Epilogue
Index
