In The origins of totalitarianismHannah Arendt writes: “What prepares humanity for totalitarian rule in a non-totalitarian world is the fact that loneliness, after liminal experiences is usually suffered in certain marginal social conditions such as old age, has become a daily experience». Arendt wrote this in 1951, fifty years before Robert Putnam published it Bowling Alone: ​​​​​​The Collapse and Rise of the American Communityin which he theorized about the end of associationism in United States of America and the dominance of neoliberal individualism. Previously, Americans bowled as a team; then they went alone.

Putnam’s thesis, published in 2000, is somewhat out of date today; he wrote the book in the glorious nineties, when we thought we had reached the end of history. There is still optimism and growth expectations. Maybe we are alone but at least we are getting prosperous. Right now, in the immediate aftermath of the Great Recession, populism and a pandemic that has killed millions and affected the mental health of millions of others; today, in an age with social networks and hysterical information cycles, this is a thesis that needs updating. Things have changed. As an example, There are theorists who speak of solutions to the lack of associationismto the lack of places to meet in the community (churches, parties, unions), we have it, more or less: is on social media. People who live stream games on Twitch, when talking to other gamers on Discord, feel less alone than when playing games. offline. But I don’t know if it’s a replacement.

«The coming epidemic of loneliness will become an ideal breeding ground for authoritarianism»

What is certain is that as loneliness increases, so does our perception of it. Hector Barnes said in Confidentialbased on the CIS survey, that «currently About five million Spaniards live without friends. Nearly half, 41.9%, were over 65 years old, and three quarters were women. According to INE, he said, that number would continue to grow every year. And those surveyed knew it: “81% of those surveyed believe that in 10 years there will be more loneliness and alienation.”

Loneliness is a political problem. First, because this concerns public health. But it is also, back to Arendt, who links loneliness with totalitarianism, a problem of democracy. “Totalitarianism uses isolation to deprive people of human friendship,” wrote philosopher Samantha Rose Hill, “making action in the world impossible, and at the same time destroying space for solitude. The iron band of totalitarianism, as Arendt calls it, destroys the human capacity to move, act, and think, pitting each individual in this isolation against others and against himself. The world becomes a wasteland, where neither experience nor thought is possible.

Not that loneliness will lead us to totalitarianism. But heThe combination of loneliness and distrust of democracy is dangerous. In countries like the UK, France or the United States, distrust of the political class quickly turns to distrust of the liberal democratic model, and a preference for more authoritarian models. And that was something the youngest had also thought about. The looming epidemic of loneliness would become an ideal breeding ground for authoritarianism and ideological politics at all costs. Because, as Rose Hill puts it, “ideological thinking separates us from the world of lived experience, starves the imagination, denies plurality, and destroys the spaces between people that allow them to relate in meaningful ways.”