Postmodernism
Modernity and Globalisation
- Part of the enlightenment project- idea that society can progress through human
reason.
Modern Society
- 18th C in Western Europe
- The nation-state- key political unit (a bounded territory rules by powerful
centralised state, whose population usually share the same language and culture).
State is focal point of society/ source of identity for citizens, symbols e.g., flag.
- Capitalism: nation-state regulates capitalism (Lash/Urry ‘organised capitalism’
- Modern industry: production organised on Fordist principles(after Ford Motor
Company’s system): mass production of standardised products in large factories,
using low skilled labour -> rise living standard
- Rationality, science, and technology- science dominate, religion declines
- Individualism- Tradition less important, greater personal freedom
Globalisation: interconnectedness of people across national boundaries.
1. Tech Changes
- Internet -> time-space compression, closing distances between people.
- -> risk on global scale e.g greenhouse gases
- Beck: we live in ‘risk society: threats to well being human-made
2. Economic Changes
- Instead of producing physical goods, activity involves production of info( TV) ->
distributed through global electronic networks.
- Trans-national companies: organise production on global scale: western based
(coca-coal)
- Sklair: now form a separate global capitalist class.
3. Political Changes
- Globalisation undermined power of nation-state
- Ohmae: now live in ‘borderless world: TNCs have more economic power than
national governments.
- States less able to regulate activities of large capitalist enterprises
- Lash/ Urry describe a ‘disorganised capitalism’.
4. Changes in Culture and identity
- Globalisation -> harder for culture to exist in isolation due to communications (mass
media spread Western culture to world)
- Economic integration encourages global culture Eg: TNCs (Nike: sell same consumer
goods in many countries, promote similar tastes across borders.
- Increased tourists, refugees create globalised culture.
- Globalisation undermines traditional sources of identity (class)
, - Eg: shift of manufacturing from West to developing counties -> fragmentation/
decline of WC communities that gave people their class identity.
Explaining the Changes
Postmodernism
- Unstable, image and reality indistinguishable, we define ourselves by what we
consume
Knowledge
- Foucault: anti-foundationalism: no objective criteria we can use to prove if theory is
true/ false, 2 consequences:
1. Enlightenment project: progress through scientific knowledge is dead as cannot
guarantee our knowledge is correct.
2. Any theory that claims to have truth about how to create a better society
- Eg: Marxism: meta-narrative -> oppressive totalitarian states (Soviet union ->
political repression/ slave labour camps)
- Relativist position: rejecting meta-narratives that claim absolute truth, should
celebrate diversity of views, all accounts of reality are equally valid
- Lyotard: postmodern society: knowledge is ways of seeing the world.
Postmodernity allows marginalised groups to be heard.
Baudrillard: Simulacra
- Baudrillard: society now based on buying/ selling knowledge in form of images/
signs
- Signs not real: called simulacra Eg: Kylie Jenner selfies
- Describes as hyper-reality: signs don’t represent anything real (meaningless) ->
hard to distinguish between image and reality.
Culture, identity, and Politics
- Media -> ever-changing versions of truth -> culture fragmented/ unstable (no
longer fixed set of values shared by society)
- Undermines faith in meta-narratives: hard to find truth
- Failure of meta-narratives to deliver better society -> lose faith in progress.
- Identity becomes destabilised: we construct own identity from images in media
- -> changes consumption patterns
- Baudrillard: if we cannot grasp reality, we have no power to change it ->
Enlightenment project is unachievable.
Evaluation of postmodernism
- Miller (Marxist): Ideas that media images unconnected with reality ignore ruling
class’s use of media as a tool of domination
- Overlooks effect of poverty in restricting consumption opportunities.
- Wrong to claim people cannot distinguish between reality and media image.
- Believes all views are true -> denies Nazis murdered millions
- Criticised on logical grounds: Lyotard’s theory is self-defeating: why should we
believe a theory that claims to have no truth?
