Page 48 - The ISA Handbook in Contemporary Sociology

9781412934633-Chap-02 1/10/09 8:40 AM Page 19

ALIENATION: CRITIQUE AND ALTERNATIVE FUTURES 19

According to Salerno (2005; see also cults, and academic schools of thought.
Sennett, 1994, 1998), alienation is a core Looking at the social interactions that consti-
problem of American communities, with tute solidarity as Buberian I-thou rather than
roots going back to colonial times. He shows I-it relationships, he shows that Elias (1987)
that American communities have been char- comes closest to theoretically integrating
acterized by different permutations of alien- macro and micro levels of isolation, solidarity,
ation at different stages of their history. The and engulfment. More specifically, following
Puritan ‘cities on the hill’ were notable Goffman, he suggests that the interactional
emblems of cooperation because they were level of alienation comprises ‘mutual aware-
ruled by strict church authorities. Their word ness’ as well as emotions, especially pride
was law; their iron hand was feared, and they and shame. Scheff’s analysis supplements
imposed cooperation on their alienated and expands the Marxian notion of alienation
flocks pitilessly. Communities that sprouted and community and has quite provocative
in the West during the nineteenth century implications. Allied to Hegel’s description of
were from the first riddled with structural the struggle between bondsman and lord, and
conflict. Devoutly religious people, living following Goffman, Scheff’s (2006) analysis
side by side with people whose only law was shows that inegalitarian relationships pre-
the rule of the gun, created communities that clude genuine recognition. Where there are
were chaotic – the milieu of competition blatant inequalities, mutual recognition of
often driven to the point of small-scale war- the humanity of the Other is not possible,
fare. By a curious turn of the wheel, the and people are denied recognition of their
5
‘gated communities’ of the twentieth and own humanity. We would suggest that under
the twenty-first centuries proclaim alienation conditions of capitalism, most people are
from the surrounding threat of invasion by shamed and humiliated when personal status
‘everybody.’ At the same time, they provide is regarded as an indication of merit and abil-
an environment in which pseudo-identities ity (see Sennett and Cobb, 1972). We have
can be staged and restaged in different ways – already seen how humiliation has been
an environment where people’s alienated turned into a commodity. But further, as
selves can pretend to find authenticity. Sennett (2003) has noted, even those who
Community, then, can be recognized as an achieve a modicum of ‘success’ within the
attempt to find a compromise between the system are alienated both from larger com-
inherent psychological need for connected- munities and from the kinds of ideals of self
ness and solidarity, and the fear of losing they might prefer to the ‘corroded’ notions of
one’s individual identity. The solution of character they experience.
geographical proximity does no more than Given the concern with the micro-social
underline the inevitability of alienation – and interpersonal aspects of alienation,
among the sub-groups that make up the com- Kalekin-Fishman (2000, 2005) also notes that
munity, between the community and the the pervasiveness of alienation is underlined
environment, as well as within the conflicting by its migration into what would normally be
orientations to which individuals are prone. thought of as the stronghold of authentic inti-
Scheff (2006) has pointed out that it is macy, the face-to-face encounter. Here, too, it
impossible to grasp the nature of social rela- can be shown that the alienation produced in
tionships by thinking in terms of an alienation- macro-structures is reproduced in the micro-
solidarity polarity; he insists that in social realm of consciousness and in the prac-
theorizing and researching alienation, we need tices of daily life. Because it facilitates reason
to consider both ‘inner and outer aspects of without having to rely on individuals’ability to
solidarity and alienation.’ It is possible to be think rationally about how to begin to solve a
engulfed within one set of relationships and, multiplicity of problems (Habermas, 1998),
because of that, isolated without, as in sects, communicative action has been held to further