Scholarlink

<p>Liberal democracies are divided—and increasingly so. Yet precisely what divides them remains a matter of ongoing dispute. According to Hunter’s classic “Culture War” thesis, the core cleavage is that between secular modernists and religious traditionalists. Norris and Inglehart, by contrast, stress the split between highly educated, younger post-materialists and less educated, older cultural conservatives. While Goodhart frames the conflict as pitting “Anywhere” cosmopolitans and “Somewhere” communitarians. In this article we offer a cultural sociological account of the cultural-cum-moral landscape, which integrates and builds upon the insights of these prominent accounts, while at the same time departing from them. In our view, the “Culture War” that characterizes liberal democracies in the twenty-first century, far from being dualistic, is best conceived as <i>triadic</i> in nature. What is more, we contend that many of today’s most heated cultural conflicts derive less from the clash of incommensurable moral visions, than from a clash of distinct iterations of the <i>selfsame</i> cultural-cum-moral tradition—<i>romantic expressivism</i>. Specifically, we maintain that the fault lines track the differences between a <i>liberal romanticism</i>, a <i>left-wing radical romanticism</i>, and a <i>right-wing reactionary romanticism</i>. Leveraging the tools of cultural sociology, this article seeks to bring to light the remarkable extent to which romantic expressivism suffuses the cultural imaginary of twenty-first century liberal democracies.</p>

错误：搜索内容不能为空，请输入英文关键词
错误：关键词超出字数限制，请精简
高级检索

Warring Expressivisms: Mapping Romanticism Across the Liberal Centre, Radical Left, and Reactionary Right

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2026年3月19日

查看全文
  • Miloš Broćić,
  • Galen Watts

摘要

Liberal democracies are divided—and increasingly so. Yet precisely what divides them remains a matter of ongoing dispute. According to Hunter’s classic “Culture War” thesis, the core cleavage is that between secular modernists and religious traditionalists. Norris and Inglehart, by contrast, stress the split between highly educated, younger post-materialists and less educated, older cultural conservatives. While Goodhart frames the conflict as pitting “Anywhere” cosmopolitans and “Somewhere” communitarians. In this article we offer a cultural sociological account of the cultural-cum-moral landscape, which integrates and builds upon the insights of these prominent accounts, while at the same time departing from them. In our view, the “Culture War” that characterizes liberal democracies in the twenty-first century, far from being dualistic, is best conceived as triadic in nature. What is more, we contend that many of today’s most heated cultural conflicts derive less from the clash of incommensurable moral visions, than from a clash of distinct iterations of the selfsame cultural-cum-moral tradition—romantic expressivism. Specifically, we maintain that the fault lines track the differences between a liberal romanticism, a left-wing radical romanticism, and a right-wing reactionary romanticism. Leveraging the tools of cultural sociology, this article seeks to bring to light the remarkable extent to which romantic expressivism suffuses the cultural imaginary of twenty-first century liberal democracies.