Byung-Chul Han

Han's argument is that we have transitioned from a disciplinary society in which we are pressured to conform by external forces, into an achievement society in which we are pressured to conform by the introjected requirement to "live your best life", and so exploit ourselves in the impossible task of seeking ever-receding, pointless and illusory life goals, set by Capital. Consumerism requires that we are never satisfied, and so we can only fail to achieve, expending our energy in a show more fruitless aspirational quest for a sense of worth and self-fulfillment deliberately withheld from us, resulting in burnout, and the descent into depression. That "being happy" has become a requirement makes unhappiness a personal failing, rather than an appropriate response to adverse circumstance, further eroding self-worth. My takeaway message: Give yourself a break, you are good enough as you are. show less

Warning: I feel the urge to shock, because it's been a long time since I saw so much nonsense so concentrated together! This was the first time I read the German-Korean philosopher and cultural scientist Byung-Chul Han (°1959). It is a collection of essays, in which Han reveals himself as a mercilessly sharp critic of our society. Nothing against that, on the contrary. But this clearly went on deaf ears with me.
It starts with the pushy tone of his argument: Han launches proposition after show more proposition, without nuance, declaiming to the point of being pushy, and almost without exception in very negative terms. So much assertive negativity always arouses my suspicion, and almost automatically provokes resistance in me. In one of the chapters, Han laments the disappearance of the playful and the festive; well: his bone-dry text lacks any form of humor and playfulness. And the mantra that always returns: it is capitalism in its neoliberal phase that is to blame for everything that is going wrong in our society today. On almost every page, neoliberalism figures as a demon that has ruined our idyllic life of the past. Such simplistic thinking makes me angry. Be careful, the concept of neoliberalism is a useful instrument to explain certain (ideological) aspects of our political-economic system, but it is no more than an instrument, a tool, not an acting being in itself, as Han seems to suggest.
And while we are at it: what Han lists as the ills of the time is of course recognizable (production and authenticity compulsion, hyper-individualism, disenchantment of the world, etc.), but it is a particularly one-sided, exclusively negative reading of the time.
The biggest annoyance when reading this book is its a-historical nature. Han is clearly irritated by the disenchantment of the world, and acts as if this phenomenon only became active with globalization and neoliberalism, which is of course not the case. Many of his examples seem to be recent phenomena (attributed to neoliberal capitalism), while most of them are the result of centuries of evolution (see Charles Taylor). And then there is his ambiguous reference to the good things of the past: the Japanese tea ritual, life in a Hungarian rural village, fashion in the 19th century (the era of industrial modernity par excellence?). And what do you think of this statement: “In a society determined by rituals, depression does not occur. There, the soul is completely absorbed, indeed emptied, by ritual forms.” The author apparently has an idealistic view of rituals, which can of course be valuable, but which according to him are (should be) ‘empty’, mere form, no meaning. And that is strange, because in my opinion rituals can certainly also have a dominant and dehumanizing effect.
No, Han seems to me – based on this booklet – to be yet another representative of a romantic cultural pessimist, who is only able to mourn the decline of what once was, and is unable to sketch a sound alternative. Such analyses are usually so one-sided that the ultimate consequence of their thinking can only be a return to reactionary times. What a waste. show less

Short book that is mostly the author using Zen concepts to dunk on Western philosophers. I'm not actually sure that Byung-Chul Han intended for this to be a book of Zen apologia or a more objective depiction of its differences with Western concepts. Either way, the Zen ideas always seemed the most convincing to me. It's telling that over the span of these handful of essays, most time is spent explaining the ideas of the Western philosophers that Han sets in dialog with ancient Zen texts. show more After several paragraphs breaking down Schopenhauer, Hegel, or Nietzsche, a quote from 無門關, or Basho, or 碧岩錄 and a brief explication (or often an appreciation for the lucidity of the text) is sufficient. Zen texts and ideas have an explicit way of evading the sort of extremely logical, dialectical pathways mapped out in analytical philosophy; reality and "truth" as such are meant to be intuited rather than calculated. As such, Zen texts retain much of the mystique and power of great art, whose path towards meaning is much more "scenic", shall we say. ]No background in philosophy is necessary to approach the Zen texts, though it may be helpful to understand especially how Zen differs from other philosophical and religious traditions. At the center of the difference between the Western philosophers and Zen texts dealt with here is an essential disagreement over the utility of "understanding" as the word is normally defined. A better goal for Zen might be to "comprehend" with the root of the word meaning "to hold in the hand" a key component.

The last chapter on friendliness especially stood out for me, because I think the concept of friendliness presented in Zen is the hardest for me to imagine integrating into my life. Throughout the book, Han continually returns to the idea of emptiness underpinning everything Zen has to teach us. In the last chapter, he contrasts Western conceptions of friendliness, which focus on a mutual recognition of the "I" in another, or otherwise trace the feeling towards another person as a kind of referent to the ultimate "other", God, and the idea of friendliness in Zen, which springs from a radical conception of openness that dissolves the boundaries between the self and the other. This dissolution of barriers between things is a key concept in Buddhism, and relies on no teleology as it does in other religions that might press their adherents to do good unto others because they were all created by the same god. Breaking down boundaries forces the adherent to Zen to see no difference between a close family member and a complete stranger, a human being and an insect, the idea of what is "mine" and what is "yours". The true adherent to Zen must be ready to meet everyone, no matter who, with a smile and a willingness to treat them amicably, even if this means self-sacrifice and loss. Unlike in Christianity, this sacrifice (it mat be inappropriate to even use the word) cannot be understood as a kind of holy "meekness" or martyrism. Nor can it be seen as deigning to do a favor for those below you. Han contrasts this kind of friendliness with that of Nietzsche, who as usually comes up with the most assholish way to do the right thing. Nietzsche describes the man filled with a "dark glow" of inner passion, that can sometimes be moved to do well for others, but only in a rather cold way, as if "gazing out the windows of their castle". I'm afraid to say that this definition of friendliness is much closer to the way I inhabit the word than the Zen version. To greet humanity with an open heart, to understand that the frontiers of individuality and ego are mere illusion - this is very difficult for me (rather shy and aloof) to do. Furthermore, this radical destruction of barriers risks the loss of what is "mine" (and by extension what is that of my wife and infant child) in a way that I can't accept if it means dispossession and poverty for myself and my family. Of course, the true follower of Zen wouldn't let themselves be encumbered by such worldly relationships, because to have them means having desired them in the first place, which in turn, means having something to lose.

Though it's controversial to call Zen a religion, it seems to me that these essential contradictions between the scripture and the practice are a part of every belief system. Followers of Christ will never be completely Christ-like, otherwise he wouldn't be special. The radical affronts to the way we actually live our lives in 2025 presented by Zen seem as cogent to me as they must have to those who spread the word hundreds of years ago. With that being said, I'm not quite ready to give it all up and head to the mountain cave quite yet. show less

Before starting to read this slim volume, I looked up the author, whom I’d not previously heard of. The titles of his other books reinforced my first impression based on this book: like Professor Wagstaff of Huxley College, whatever it is, he’s against it. A cultural pessimist à la Oswald Spengler, even the rediscovery of the power of narrative is, for him, a further indication of the decline and fall of civilization.
Despite my initial skepticism, I found the book interesting and his show more points worth discussing. He is not against narrative, it turns out. On the contrary, it is a powerful force for creating and perpetuating community. What he decries is the way narrative is used. To distinguish the two forms, he refers to one with the usual German word family “erzählen/Erzählung” and calls the other “storytelling”. With this use of “Neudeutsch,” he stacks the argument in his favor.
His thesis: “Die existenzielle Krise der Moderne als Krise der Narration ist dadurch bedingt, dass das Leben und das Erzählen auseinanderfallen (46). We either live or we tell; life itself is no longer capable of being told.
For much of his argument, he cites Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), a German Jewish philosopher. The repeated references mostly demonstrate Benjamin’s continuing relevance. On one point, I disagreed, or at least felt that Benjamin’s claim was overstated. This is in a passage cited on page 15. The founder of Le Figaro claimed that for his readers, a fire in an attic in the Latin Quarter was more important than a revolution in Spain. For Benjamin, a bad thing. Eighty years on, we live in a time when more people inform themselves through social media than the local newspaper. As Matthew Yglesias points out, they receive information about symbolic conflicts far away instead of useful information about what’s happening in their own neighborhoods. They live under the illusion that they are politically active, but this “activity” is not in a way that contributes constructively to people in their own area.
Han’s sweeping generalizations irritate, and he refrains from prescribing solutions. I’ll concede, though, that this spurs the reader to reflect on their own use of modern technology—Smartphones are a particular target of his polemic—and on ways to deepen relationships and strengthen a sense of community. show less