Neutralism

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As Neotribalism is called an ideology , according to which people are intended in a tribal society (as opposed to modern living society) and therefore not happy can be as long as no resemblance to "archaic" lifestyles has been created. Of this, the concept of urban tribe ( Engl. For City tribe ') delimit the largely synonymous with subculture or youth culture is used.

General ideology

The neutralist ideology is based on the social philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the evolutionary principle of the anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss , which states that a species becomes pathological when it moves away from its original environment. Certain aspects of industrial and post-industrial life, including the need to live in a society of strangers and interact with organizations whose membership is well above Dunbar's , are believed to be detrimental to the human mind as it has evolved . In his 1985 essay Psychology, Ideology, Utopia, & the Commons , psychologist Dennis Fox named 150 people. Some proponents of neutralism claim that their ideas have been scientifically proven by evolutionary psychology ; however, this claim is very controversial.

Those who see neutralism as a political or quasi-political movement differ from the conservative tribalism that is present in many parts of the world in that it emphasizes the need for a global (or at least national) network of cooperating tribes as opposed to the isolated, arguing groups of traditional tribal society. The criticism of proponents of contemporary culture suggests that tribal societies are almost always more violent and repressive than modern ones.

Sociological Implications

The French sociologist Michel Maffesoli was arguably the first to use the term "neutralism" in a scholarly context. Maffesoli predicted that with the decay of the culture and institutions of modernism, societies would seek guidance from the organizational principles of the distant past and that postmodernism would become the era of neutralism.

Critics such as Ethan Watters have recognized or blamed the growing momentum of neutralism for contributing to the decline of marriage in the developed world as "modern tribes" provide alternative ways of satisfying social interaction.

Moderate tendency

Moderate neutralists believe that a tribal society can coexist with a modern technological infrastructure. This attitude is also known as "urban tribalism". In this scenario, for example, people could live in large houses and other buildings in a community of 12 to 20 individuals who all adhere to a set of rules, cultural rituals and intimate relationships, but on the other hand lead a modern life by going to work, driving a car, etc. By trying to harmonize two seemingly contradicting cultures, namely modern existence and tribalism, the moderate tendency can be considered syncretistic in the cultural or even political sense .

This orientation is associated with critics like Ethan Watters and an optimistic attitude towards the possibility of a peaceful and non-destructive transition to neutralism. Its proponents interpret the environment mentioned in the evolutionary principle as mainly social.

Radical tendency

Radical neutralists like John Zerzan or Daniel Quinn believe that a healthy tribal life is only possible if technological civilization is either destroyed or significantly reduced. Quinn formulated the concept of "walking away", in which civilization as a whole is abandoned and a new tribal culture emerges in its periphery. Others like Derrick Jensen call for more violent action because they consider it appropriate and necessary to actively accelerate or bring about the collapse of civilization. The association The Tribe of Anthropik thinks only of survival, believing a collapse is inevitable no matter what is said or done, and focuses its efforts on survival and the subsequent creation of tribal cultures.

In general, the radical neutralists agree that current humanity is untenable and that a cultural change is absolutely necessary and not just desirable, with tribalism being the preferred or perhaps inevitable form of society after this change. The call for revolution is either to achieve change or to survive. The primitivism is considered influence or even a variant of radical Neotribalism.

The radical representatives interpret the environment mentioned in the evolutionary principle mainly as physical and economic.

criticism

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Critics point out that membership in modern tribes is voluntary and superficial, not based on deep cultural traditions and family ties. That is why they interpret neutralism as a fad - if it exists at all outside the minds of certain experts.

This accusation is considered unfounded in cultural studies. Both the subculture research by Dick Hebdiges and Graham St. Johns and the postmodern tribal theory of Maffesoli prove neotribal structures in postmodern societies. Maffesoli devises a system of changing, fluid tribal structures in society, Hebdige proves subcultures as postmodern tribes. Since these structures and groups exist, their very existence is evidence of the concept of neotribalism that characterizes them.

literature

  • Sue Heath: Peer-Shared Households, Quasi-Communes and Neo-Tribes . Current Society, 1994
  • Michel Maffesoli: Le Temps des Tribus . Meridiens Klincksieck, Paris, 1988 (English translation by Rob Shields: The Time of the Tribes . Sage Publications, London, 1996)
  • Ethan Watters: Urban Tribes: Are Friends the New Family? , 2003

Web links