The Retreat from Autonomy: Post-modernism as Generalised Conformism

This article, after periodising history on the basis of the imaginary significations created by and dominating each period, argues that the period after the Second World War is characterised mainly by the waning of social, political and ideological conflict and the eclipse, after the movements of the 1960s, of the project of autonomy. The decadence in the field of spiritual creation, which marks this period, is reflected in the development of post-modernism that simply mirrors and - worse - rationalises the prevailing trends through a high brow apologetics of conformity and banality.