ΑΝΤΙΩΦΕΛΙΜΙΣΜΟΣ

Anti-utilitarianism is a school of thought that critiques the hegemony of the epistemological postulates of economics in the humanities and social sciences. Anti-utilitarians assert the crucial importance of the social bond when compared to self-interest. They outline a gift exchange paradigm that aims to overstep two major frameworks of the social sciences: holism and methodological individualism. In 1981, the French sociologist, Alain Caillé, and the Swiss anthropologist, Gérald Berthoud, gave birth to MAUSS – Mouvement anti-utilitariste dans les sciences sociales (Anti-utilitarian Movement in the Social Sciences). This brilliant acronym reproduces the surname of the author of The Gift (1924), Marcel Mauss. Most anti-utilitarians reproach Latouche for the choice of the term “degrowth”: it implicitly embeds the alternative into the economic imaginary. They call, instead, for a “political” critique of boundlessness and excess, uprooting the discourse from an ethical level.