Paolo Gerbaudo’s book >The Mask and the Flag: Populism, Citizenism and Global Protest<, whose approach is reflected in his Crosscurrents piece in the issue of >Media, Culture & Society< at hand, is a response to these societal, political and academic challenges. This Cross Currents comment asks, I ask, the following: Why is it that right-wing authoritarian populism in recent times has become much more popular than left-wing movements? How do right-wing authoritarian movements communicate? Why is it that right-wing political communication strategies seem to garner and result in mass support? The critical theory of authoritarianism advanced by the Frankfurt School and related authors on fascism, Nazism, and the authoritarian personality help us to critically analyse the communication of authoritarianism. In this context, particularly the works by Franz Leopold Neumann, Erich Fromm, Theodor W. Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, Leo Löwenthal, and Willhelm Reich are relevant.
埃里希·弗洛姆是马克思主义精神分析学家、哲学家和社会主义人道主义者。本文探究的问题是:在数字和交往资本主义时代如何运用和修正弗洛姆的交往批判理论,以提供一种批判的视角。为了给出这一问题的答案,本文从交往、意识形态和技术等三个方面讨论了弗洛姆的一些观点,这些观点使我们能够更好地理解人类的交往过程。弗洛姆的研究方法可以从多个方面为交往批判理论提供参考:他的社会性格概念为这种理论提供了批判心理学的基础。他对权威主义性格与人道主义性格的区分可以用来区分权威主义的交往与人道主义的交往。弗洛姆的作品也可以为意识形态批判提供参考:占有的意识形态塑造了资本主义的生活、思想、语言和社会行为。在资本主义社会中,包括数字计算在内的技术被奉为拜物教的神明,量化逻辑塑造了社会关系。弗洛姆对人道化的技术和参与式计算的追求可以为当代关于数字资本主义及其替代方案的争论提供参考。