![]() Levitas makes a very interesting assertion when considering More’s etymology of Utopia: Yet it does not define how the utopian society controls social conflict, and this question can be the difference between what we denote as utopian and what we denote as dystopian. In this understanding, Utopia is an economic practice to insure proper distribution of a society’s resources and control social conflict. This is a very interesting definition of Utopia as it does not conform to the common understanding that Utopia represents an idyllic paradise. Ruth Levitas also suggests that in some cases a utopian society is one that ‘sets in place social and institutional processes to manage production and distribution and any social conflict that may emerge as a result of the scarcity gap.’ Yet, what is the product of this aspiration or radical constructions. To these critics utopia is not defined by the ideal but by the action, or as Ruth Levitas suggests, ‘the aim for something better.’ It is the aim, the aspiration, the revolution that defines utopia. These definitions all share in one aspect, the describe the representation of societal construction. This is not the same as ‘a moral education’ towards a given end: it is rather, to open a way to aspiration, to ‘teach desire to desire, to desire better, to desire more, and above all to desire in a different way’. And we enter into Utopia’s proper and new-found space: the education of desire. This affects the manner in which one understands the function of utopia:Īnd in such an adventure two things happen: our habitual values. In a reading of News from Nowhere Abensour suggests this text is not to be read literally or didactically but instead heuristically, as a presentation of radically different values. This concept is supported by Miguel Abensour’s understanding of utopia. Utopia is the construction of a radical alternative. To these theorists the ‘no place’ is more important than the ‘good place’. ![]() Bloch considers Utopia to exist in two forms, either concrete or abstract, the former being expressive and instrumental in its transformative narrative and the latter a wishful of non-pragmatic transformative narrative. ![]() This perspective is similar to that of another leading Utopian theorist, Ernst Bloch. Instead, Mannheim believed that Utopia was defined by its transformative function, its power to transcend reality with the intended effect to disrupt the prevailing dominant ideology of the time. Myths fairy-tales, other-worldly promises of religion, humanistic fantasies, travel romances, have been continually changing expressions of that which was lacking in actual life. Such as Karl Mannheim who suggests that the presentation of an idealistic alternative is not a theme special to Utopia: Many believe that idealism is not the definitive factor of what constitutes utopia. However, many critics find the definition of utopia an area of contention. These often form the basis of utopian fiction which is why it is unsurprising that much utopian fiction in inherently socialist. To be free from the anxiety of poverty, starvation or pain. ‘Nobody owns anything but everyone is rich – for what greater wealth can there be than cheerfulness, peace of mind, and freedom from anxiety?’ Furthermore, the suggestion within More’s Utopia is that happiness and comfort are the foundations of utopia: This is suggestive that the envisaged world of a utopia is an ideal place that has been constructed outside of reality. The term ‘utopia’ derives from Thomas More’s play on two Greek words eutopos and outopos, a combination of the good place with the no place. ‘Kneel down, move your lips in prayer, and you will believe.’
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