Home › Books › The Decadent Society: How We Became the Victims o…
The Decadent Society: How We Became the Victims of Our Own Success
by
5/99
Critics' Rating Index
26/99
Readers' Rating Index
89/99
Scholars' Citation Index
77/99
Volume of Reviews
64/99
Volume of Reader Ratings
Sign in to add to your shelf, rate, or review this book.
About This Book
Today the Western world seems to be in crisis. But beneath our social media frenzy and reality-television politics, the deeper reality is one of drift, repetition, and dead ends. The Decadent Society explains what happens when a rich and powerful society ceases advancing—how the combination of wealth and technological proficiency with economic stagnation, political stalemates, cultural exhaustion, and demographic decline creates a strange kind of "sustainable decadence," a civilizational malaise that could endure for longer than we think..
Reviews
"And he repays our consideration with a glittering stream of associations and distinctions, resonances and rhymes that reinflect the world we thought we knew in fascinating ways ..."
"An earnest analysis buoyed by debatable evidence."
"Douthat is writing for Americans, which means that rather than simply stimulating readers to think harder about the present — which he excels at — he feels obliged to search for a redemptive happy ending."
"There's something for everyone to agree with, here, as well as to disagree with ..."
"The result is a trenchant and stimulating take on latter-day discontents."
"It relies, too often, on feelings ..."
"If Douthat's account ever managed to compass the extent to which global suffering is a structural precondition of upper-class stupor, he would be far more likely to see that the problem he describes in fact contains its own solution."
Preview
Reader Reviews
0 reviewsSign in to write a review.
No reader reviews yet. Be the first!