Critical Perspectives in Happiness Research : The Birth of Modern Happiness

"This book presents an interdisciplinary exploration of the origins of happiness in the modern Western culture and makes the argument that happiness is not universal but is instead a culturally and historically specific experience, characteristic only to the Western world. It begins with an overview of the main research approaches to happiness and then studies the important but elusive theme in the context of culture and relations of power. The second part of the book analyses the social, religious, ethical and political processes that lead to the emergence of the experience of happiness, including consumer culture in contemporary societies. It presents an analysis of the medieval Christian experience which concludes that the modern experience of happiness only emerged in the 17th and 18th century, when the ideal of human existence increasingly started to be pursued in the present life. In its conclusion, this book explores the concept of modernization as the collective pursuit of happiness."--Publisher's description Introduction: Towards a Critical Perspective in Happiness Research 6 Acknowledgements 10 Contents 11 Part I 13 The Return to Happiness 13 Chapter 1 14 Overview of Happiness Research 14 Happiness and Philosophy 14 The Science of Happiness 17 The Economy of Happiness 21 Chapter 2 23 Happiness, Culture and Relations of Power 23 Cross-National Measurements of Happiness and Culture 23 Universal Notions of Well-Being and Culture 24 The Cultural Perspective in Happiness Studies 26 Ethnocentrism and Universal Notions of Well-Being 27 Criticism of Survey Happiness Research 30 Happiness as Culturally and Historically Specific Experience 32 Happiness and the Promise of Neuroscience 33 Problematic Issues with the Cultural Perspective in Happiness Studies and Anthropology of Well-Being 34 The Consequences of the Cultural Construction (of Happiness) Thesis 35 Happiness, Relations of Power and Cultural Studies 40 Happiness and History 42 Chapter 3 45 The Return to Happiness: A New Interdisciplinary Approach to Happiness Research 45 Towards a New Interdisciplinary Approach to the Study of Happiness 47 The Specifics of the Foucauldian Approach 48 Foucauldian Subject and Experience 52 The Relationship Between Subject and Experience 55 Power (Relations) 58 Truth (and Power) 64 Active Subjects, Freedom and Relationship to the Self 68 Part II 72 The Birth of Happiness 72 Chapter 4 73 Middle Ages: The Time Before Happiness 73 Methodology: Genealogical Approach and Archeological Method 73 The Critique of the Modern Relationship to Truth 76 The Foucauldian Understanding of Experience of Happiness 81 Chapter 5 84 The Origins of Happiness in Renaissance and Reformation 84 Truth About Salvation in the Late Middle Ages 84 The Reformation Movement 88 The Affirmation of Mundane Life 92 The Attack on the Privileged Position of Suffering 95 The Culmination of Struggles Around the Pastoral Power 98 The First Steps Towards the Birth of Happiness 99 Chapter 6 102 The Birth of Modern Happiness 102 The Truth About Happiness 102 God as the Foundation for Happiness on Earth 103 Enlightenment and the Birth of Modern Secular Happiness 109 The (Infinite) Progress Towards Individual and Public Happiness 117 Economic Progress and the Birth of Consumer Culture 121 The Modern Subject of Happiness 123 Practices of Pleasure and Happiness 126 Modern Experience of Happiness and Power 130 Raison of the State and the Birth of Modern Experience of Happiness 131 The Biopolitics of Happiness 138 Chapter 7 142 The Evolution of Happiness: Development of Happiness from its Birth to its Contemporary Manifestations 142 Contemporary Compulsory Happiness and Consumer Culture 144 The Freedom to Consume and the Freedom to Desire 145 Can Consumption Really Bring Happiness? 148 Chapter 8 150 Conclusion: Modernization as the Collective Pursuit of Happiness 150 Bibliography 156 Index 164 Front Matter....Pages i-xiv Front Matter....Pages 1-1 Overview of Happiness Research....Pages 3-11 Happiness, Culture and Relations of Power....Pages 13-34 The Return to Happiness: A New Interdisciplinary Approach to Happiness Research....Pages 35-61 Front Matter....Pages 63-63 Middle Ages: The Time Before Happiness....Pages 65-75 The Origins of Happiness in Renaissance and Reformation....Pages 77-94 The Birth of Modern Happiness....Pages 95-134 The Evolution of Happiness: Development of Happiness from its Birth to its Contemporary Manifestations....Pages 135-142 Conclusion: Modernization as the Collective Pursuit of Happiness....Pages 143-148 Back Matter....Pages 149-158