Charles Derber S5E3

Charles Derber, Professor of Sociology at Boston College, discusses his latest book Bonfire: American Sociocide, Broken Relations, and the Quest for Democracy (Routledge, 2025) and why sociocide is a most relevant and pressing societal issue facing our societies, what Derber views as a collective suicide of society by the “we” and the rise of the “me” superceding all social connections. Covering the disappearance of labour unions and their participation in the United States, Derber details the vanishing of vital social spaces, such as family and work, resulting in the breakdown of social relations and a conterminous increase in authoritarianism. Historicising the sociopathy of early American capitalism with the rise of the “robber barons” such as John D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, and Andrew Carnegie, Derber notes how capitalism skewed society’s dominant values towards the antisocial, leading to the breakdown of society. Derber also notes how, despite the exploitative nature of employment throughout the 19th century, workers could count on a certain measure of continuity. With the rise of neoliberalism and Big Tech in the late twentieth century, Derber details how today’s worker exploitation by far surpasses the exploitation of previous eras, as the employment relationship today is now largely contingent, with workers burning out much more quickly whilst being paid less than survival wages, making the exploitation of the 19th century look almost desirable by comparison.