Manufacturing Happy Citizens

Contents Introduction 1. Experts on your well-being 2. Rekindling individualism 3. Positivity at work 4. Happy selves in the market shelves 5. Happy is the new normal Conclusion Notes References

Edgar Cabanas is Professor at Universidad Camilo José Cela in Madrid.

Eva Illouz is Director of Studies at École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris.

'excellent... a clear-sighted critique of capitalism's current obsession with happiness and of the shaky science allowing a well-meaning ideal to be so easily subverted by governments and companies.'
New Scientist 'This brilliantly researched and beautifully argued book offers a devastating critique of the contemporary obsession with happiness. Edgar Cabanas and Eva Illouz interrogate the flaws, inconsistencies and generalizations of happiness "science" and positive psychology, showing how it has become central to a blame culture in which structural inequalities are made over as psychological deficits. Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the way that neoliberalism increasingly operates through psychological modes promoting confidence, resilience and "positive" feelings.'
 
Rosalind Gill, City, University of London
 
'How have the science and industry of happiness transformed our expectations about what a good life means, and at what cost? In their critical inquiry, Edgar Cabanas and Eva Illouz powerfully demonstrate the pervasive neoliberal logics and pernicious social consequences of the contemporary politics of happiness.'
Didier Fassin, Professor of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton