45 min listen
William Davies, “The Happiness Industry: How the Government and Big Business Sold Us Well-Being” (Verso, 2015)
William Davies, “The Happiness Industry: How the Government and Big Business Sold Us Well-Being” (Verso, 2015)
ratings:
Length:
45 minutes
Released:
Aug 18, 2015
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Are you happy? In his new book The Happiness Industry: How the Government and Big Business Sold Us Well-Being (Verso, 2015), William Davies, a senior lecturer at Goldsmiths’ College, University of London, critically investigates this question. The book offers skepticism towardsthe demand that economy and society be happy, skepticism founded in an interrogation of the practices of contemporary government and businesses. A whole range of our everyday experiences, including ‘nudges’ for citizens and staff, the perverse incentives of metrics, through tothe consequences of how psychiatry classifies depression, are subject to critical scrutiny.Moreover, the book acts as a primer on economics, psychology and organizational theory, clearly articulating the roots and the consequences of our current economic and social settlement. The book concludes with the possibility of a more democratic way of organizing the world, in contrast to our impersonal, oppressive, and data driven present. Dr Davies is a co-director of Goldsmiths’ Political Economy Research Centre and blogs at Potlatch.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/psychology
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/psychology
Released:
Aug 18, 2015
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Lawrence R. Samuel, “Shrink: A Cultural History of Psychoanalysis in America” (Nebraska UP, 2013): Before the Second World War, very few Americans visited psychologists or psychiatrists. Today, millions and millions of Americans do. How did seeing a “shrink” become, quite suddenly, a typical part of the “American Experience? by New Books in Psychology