Bio: (1932–1994) American social historian. Christopher Lasch received master's and doctoral degrees from Columbia University and taught at the University of Iowa and later at the University of Rochester.

Christopher Lasch wrote extensively on the history of the American Left before turning to psychoanalysis—particularly the concept of narcissism—as a framework for criticizing modern American culture. In The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy, he argues that the nation’s political and economic elites have withdrawn from meaningful engagement with the broader public. Shielded by wealth and institutional power, they no longer feel accountable to either the working class or the middle class.

According to Lasch, this estrangement has far-reaching consequences: urban decline, the marginalization of minorities, the trivialization of political life, rising crime, and a general drift toward social disorder. He attributes this deterioration both to the ideology of economic liberalism and to what he saw as a left-leaning academic culture that had abandoned the teaching of concrete knowledge in favor of fashionable theories couched in politically correct and often obscure language.

In response, Lasch defends traditions of American populism and communitarianism. He praises the lower middle class—“small proprietors, artisans, tradesmen, and farmers”—for sustaining a moral culture that esteems community over individual ambition. In his view, this tradition embodies a “moral realism”: an awareness that everything has its cost, a respect for limits, and a healthy skepticism toward unqualified notions of progress.

Main works

The American Liberals and the Russian Revolution (1962);

The New Radicalism in America 1889–1963: The Intellectual As a Social Type (1965);

The Agony of the American Left (1969);

The World of Nations (1973);

Haven in a Heartless World (1977);

The Culture of Narcissism (1980);

The Minimal Self (1984);

The True and Only Heaven (1991);

The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy (1995);

Women and the Common Life: Love, Marriage, and Feminism (1997).