Offended Freedom

COVID deniers with flower necklaces, artists questioning scientific findings, journalists staging themselves as rebels against alleged gags: Libertarian authoritarians have found their way into political discourse. They do not long for a glorified past or the strong hand of the state but argue vehemently for individual freedoms such as being free from consideration for others, from social constraints – and free from social solidarity.

According to Carolin Amlinger and Oliver Nachtwey, libertarian authoritarianism is a consequence of the promise of freedom in late modernity: the individual is supposed to be mature, authentic and extremely self-reliant. At the same time, the individual experience is that of being increasingly powerless and without influence in the face of an increasingly complex world – which is perceived as a slight and manifests itself in resentment and a hostility towards democracy.

On the basis of numerous case studies, Amlinger and Nachtwey create an outline of a new social figure. They explain the social reasons that led to a change in the authoritarian figure as imagined by critical theory. Late modernity produces a type of protest whose call for individual sovereignty is a threat to a society of the free and equal: the denial of a shared reality.

»The originality and great relevance of Amlinger’s and Nachtwey’s book are due not only to the fact that they make the logic and dynamics of a new protest tangible. They nuancedly and circumspectly explain how what they describe as libertarian authoritarianism is not an individual pathology or a syndrome of mere scattered individuals, but a diagnosis of the present.« Novina Göhlsdorf, Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung

»In their book Offended Freedom, Carolin Amlinger and Oliver Nachtwey deliver what is probably the most thorough and cogent analysis of this new social figure to date.« Jens Buchholz, Frankfurter Rundschau

»The strength of the book lies in the instances where the authors, drawing on their interviews, trace these new characters of the authoritarian, trace their origins in milieus of late modern society and characterise the two main types.« Herfried Münkler, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

»Offended Freedom offers far more than a merely sociologically based psychogram of the new social figure drifting from the left to the right; or of the ›fallen intellectual‹ who compensates for the pain of losing the privilege to participate in the discourse by fighting gender consciousness. ... [Amlinger and Nachtwey] meticulously work out how general social change can charge values that were considered progressive yesterday in an authoritarian way.« Christoph David Piorkowski, Der Tagesspiegel

»Amlinger and Nachtwey have a sense for ambiguity and see the anti-authoritarian in the authoritarian. Scepticism about power, which is good in and of itself, is escalated into a destructive, permanent opposition.« Robert Misik, taz. die tageszeitung

»Illuminating books like Offended Freedom are a contribution to the ongoing conversation of an enlightened society with itself.« Arno Frank, Der Spiegel

»Original theory and substantial empirical evidence ...« Christian Marty, Neue Zürcher Zeitung

»... those who want to fight for their own freedom must read this book ...« Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung

»What is so stimulating about Offended Freedom [is] that it really wants to get serious about the dialectic of the Enlightenment.« Daniel Binswanger, Republik