Technocratic totalitarianism
Gunnar Kaiser and dissident discourse in pandemic-era Germany
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21409855 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Thomas Crew (University of Warwick, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 54 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 110-131 |
| Publication date | 2024-03-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of European Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0047-2441 • E-ISSN: 1740-2379 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/00472441241232671 |
| OpenAlex | W4392003259 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 4 |
This article examines the ideas, reception and social role of Germany’s most prominent cultural critic of lockdown politics, Gunnar Kaiser. In contrast to the majority of European intellectuals, Kaiser took an early public stand against the naive adoption of science as a social authority and the unprecedented overturning of core democratic principles. He argued that without vigorous, open debate, the worldwide state of emergency threatened to usher in a fundamentally new (bio)political era, in which liberal democracy would be replaced by an increasingly totalitarian technocracy. Yet despite his voluminous philosophical output, which included a highly creative and increasingly professionalised YouTube channel as well as two best-selling books, Kaiser found himself largely excluded from mainstream German discourse. Crew analyses the full range of Kaiser’s interventions while also situating him within the broader landscape of European dissent
Democracy · Dissent · Mainstream · Media studies · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · State (computer science) · Technocracy · Communism, Protests, Social Movements · German Social Sciences and History · Italian Fascism and Post-war Society · Law
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |