Alienation in social and political theory

The term alienation has a long background that is found in the works of numerous theoreticians. In Hegel's and Marx's thought, the concept of political alienation is interpreted broadly, and it includes all forms of severing social relations. According to Claude Fischer, alienation is "a condition in which the agent fails to perceive a positive connection between itself and another object" (Fischer, 1974, p. 12). In the 20^th century, the phenomenon of political alienation acquired a somewhat different connotation. Thus, theoreticians such as Erich Fromm, Herbert Marcuse and Alain Tourin interpret alienation as a condition or process that entails a lack of material resources, which results in a lower socio-economic status, inferiority in terms of power relations and the absence of autonomy in working relationships, consequently leading to a degradation of living conditions (Gabriel, 2011, p. 57). For functionalists, the relationship between anomie and entropy is even more direct and easily discernible. Therefore, social anomie is explained as a "contradiction, discrepancy between the function of a system, i.e. the area of the balance of forces, due to which regulatory capacity of the very system is undermined, as well as control within the system itself " (Zindović & Stanković, 2012, p. 20). When observed from a broader perspective, alienation is interpreted through a prism of multiple humanities and disciplines, such as philosophy, psychology, sociology and political science. In the context of political science, the concept of alienation is interpreted more narrowly and entails devious political behaviour and alienation from politics caused by negative and critical positions on politics, i.e., estranging citizens from the political elite. The first marked trends of citizens estranging from politics in established democracies were identified in the early 1970s. This is when a report pompously entitled The Crisis of Democracy was compiled for the needs of the Trilateral Commission. What was noted in the report was indicative of a large number of difficulties with which democratic regimes were faced, mainly in terms of diminishing support for political institution and alienation of citizens from politics and the very decision-making process (Crozier, Huntington & Watanuki, 1975).

According to many authors, the phenomenon of political alienation is at the very core of discourse and analysis contained in the "Critical Theory", whose leading representatives are Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse and Max Horkheimer. To them, the existence of alienation that is the result of modernity forms the essence of human existence (Honneth, 2014, p. 2). Although the term political alienation was used as early as Marx's and Hegel's thought, some authors believe that this phenomenon is relatively new and that it first emerged in the 1930s. They connect political alienation with political circumstances of the time, which led to depersonalisation and transformation of man to an object (Pappenheim, 1959, p. 45). What particularly contributed to such pathological social phenomena is the expansion of the bureaucratic apparatus, excessive role of state administration, hierarchisation and specialisation, thereby gradually leading to atomisation and strengthening of individuality as opposed to collectivity within mass society.

There is a dichotomous division among many theoreticians who have studied the phenomenon of alienation. The first group consists of those who see alienation as a phenomenon typical of mass, urbanised and developed industrial societies, whereas, on the other hand, there is a group that sees alienation as a universal phenomenon existing within every society (Twining, 1980, p. 147). The position of the authors is that the latter group is correct in their views because alienation is present and particularly pronounced among those who adopted the paradigm of the neoliberal pattern of social and political organising that reduces the potential for acting collectively.

What is introduced as an alienation-related and most commonly used phenomenon is the phenomenon of anomie. The term "anomie" itself is first found in Émile Durkheim's writings.

"Durkheim defined anomie as insufficient control of passions and desires, painful restlessness and tension of the individual in society, which he used to explain suicide rates whereas for the purpose of explaining mental illnesses he was more inclined towards biologistic and psychological explanations (Opalić, 2006, p. 191).

In such a situation, anomie also manifests itself as the absence of solidarity between members of society, which is at the same time accompanied by the absence of stability of interpersonal relationships. Some authors have even tried to measure anomie empirically. Thus, Srole introduced multiple indicators with the aid of which he attempted to measure quantitatively the level of anomie in society (Srole, 1956, p. 709-716). Srole included the following in these indicators: level of trust in public officials, i.e. to which extent it is possible to believe their actions; focus on the present rather than the future and resigning to fate; that people are getting worse over time; that it is not necessary to have children because the future does not seem to be bright; and also that nowadays it is increasingly difficult to find a person one can rely on.

During the past three decades, there has been substantial estrangement of citizens from politics and political processes. Late 20^th and early 21^st centuries were marked by a dramatic change globally. Democratisation processes, democratic transformations, and consolidation of democracies included former totalitarian communist regimes of Central and Easter Europe, and then took hold in other parts of the world as well. The process of globalisation opened new horizons in expanding and promoting democratic values and ideals. Nevertheless, in many cases it has been confirmed that de-democratisation is not a one-way process. Many countries have been de-democratised during certain periods and returned to various forms of authoritarianism. This is the reason why new patterns for strengthening existing democratic institutions have been introduced. In many developed democracies, a trend of diminishing public trust in political institutions is discernible. This trend is especially distinctive in election processes as well as in ever-growing citizens' scepticism regarding elected officials. Concurrently with such tendencies, there are increasingly pronounced requirements for a broader engagement of citizens in political processes. Consequently, there is a growing number of initiatives and referenda, but also attempts at establishing certain forms of deliberative and consultative democracy. These are followed by de-evolution and decentralisation processes, while the local decision-making level is perceived as a foundation for a broader civil participation in public affairs. Modern democracies are faced with a crisis that manifests itself in the estrangement of citizens from politics: citizens do not understand political processes, nor can they take active part in them. This is the effect of degraded political socialisation, whereby citizens do not have a keen interest in politics and political processes. The consequences are a disruption of the political game and crisis of legitimacy of the democratic political system. This threatens the gist of democracy, which is seen as a struggle between different and conflicting ideas and ideologies. The political parties in Serbia have become featureless and lacking ideology in their attempts to attract as many voters as possible, and in doing so not infrequently relying on populism and striving through symbiotic and ideological hybridisation to include the maximum possible range of the electorate (catch-all parties).

Creating new forms of alienation in modern society

With a combination of capitalism and digitisation, new forms of alienation are being created. Hassan notes that, in this sense, digital culture is embodied as commodification, instrumentalisation and time-space compression. "Commodification works dynamically within a neoliberal market system and gives it the broadest possible liberty to form the basis of culture, which is almost entirely commercial" (Hassan, 2020, p. 163). The typical Marxist form of alienation has suffered certain modifications over time. Some changes have occurred in developed capitalist societies and these changes have had a significant impact on how alienation manifests itself: (1) in the absolute amount, alienation from labour is significantly lower among factory workers; (2) in relative terms, it significantly increased among service workers and IT experts; it is given that (3) the mentioned inequalities in alienation have entirely reversed among strata of professions from the 1970s to date; that is, service workers and knowledge workers are now more alienated from their work than factory workers" (Archibald, 2009, p. 152). At the same time, such a turn has brought a turn in how workers treat their spare time. In modern post-industrial societies, spare time has become the most important part of life, although the individual is during this time exposed to alienation. Individuals have high expectations from spare time, which has become commercialised and in which they have been reduced to consumers, whereas work itself is of lesser importance. This is how alienation of spare time from the individual occurs, which in turn leads to a collapse of all the values of the social system.

Colin Tyler notes that modern pluralistic societies are based on a simultaneous acceptance of three conflicting statements.

"Firstly, social systems are authoritarian to the extent they respect every individual as an agent who lives in equally thick frameworks of meaning and values and which, in economic, civil, and political terms, is respected as a free and equal citizen. Secondly, no innate morally or publicly advocated hierarchy should exist between subcategories of human beings (based, e.g. on gender, economy or genetics)… Thirdly, qualities which give value to life of an individual according to his/her own assessment have not simple been 'there' since he/she was born, and they have not been fully shaped but instead they should be given substance as a specific idea or practice through persons' individual experiences (Tyler, 2011, p. 163).

Social alienation, as Bertell Ollman emphasizes, as a descriptive concept, may improve our understanding of relationships which dialectically constitute society. As Ollman states,

“the concept of alienation effectively allows to shed light on how people acquire their conception of reality from what they experience […], and [how] their conception of reality helps determine what they experience (the metamorphosis of value only occurs through the reification of the forms of value” (Choquet, 2021, p. 111).

This psychological-perceptive dimension of man denotes his ability to independently create ideas and his own perception of the world and society in which he exists.

Alienation from government institutions at the same time means a lack of sense of political action, which is associated with free and equal citizens. When they are isoformically aligned and mirrored from outside examples, while they are inappropriate in a traditional and social context, then they act as a catalyst for social deviations which lead to alienation. This is best described by a position that

"if our government institutions are alien to us, then we will perceive them as a force of oppression rather than guarantors of our rights or as channels of collective selfexpression. A representation of unbiased justice, sensitive to differences, requires that the political constitution needs to warranty that all citizens are treated with equal dignity, within their own context that forms identity" (O'Neill, 2003, p. 371).

Alienation is inevitably preceded by political inefficiency in situations when decisions are made, or it is belated or inadequate for social needs. Thus,

"political inefficiency may lead to political alienation, which includes not only apathy or indifference as a response to one's awareness of powerlessness but also a widely spread indignation over powerlessness and distrust in those who are in the positions of power" (Thompson & Horton, 1960, p. 190).

Given the opportunity to be expressed, this may be manifested as organised voting against those in power or, which is the case more frequently, boycotting elections and election processes, less intensive social interaction and devastation of the potential for collective action. Such response, along with weakened relationships among citizens and overall individualisation, results in what some authors conceptualise as a "social trap" (Rothstein, 2005; Matić & Vučićević, 2013). If we observe Serbia as a reference framework, we can identify estrangement from politics, disinterest in participation in political processes with the broadest weakening of "political support" (Matić & Stojanović, 2011). In this context, political support is not interpreted as support to certain options, in the sense of political organisations and political party activities, but as a concept which entails support to a type of regime, institutions and overall political community (Easton, 1975). If we see the findings shown in Table 1, we can see that, generally speaking, there is a striking polarisation in Serbia when it comes to key social and political institutions.

Table 1. Поверење грађана Србије у институције, политичке субјекте и установе / Trust of Serbian citizens in institutions, political entities and institutions

	Имам велико поверење / I have a lot of trust	Углавном имам поверења / I mostly have trust	Углавном немам поверења / I mostly do not have trust	Уопште немам поверења / I do not have any trust at all	Немам став / I have no position
Влада / Government 2016. 2018.	9.5% 10.3%	27.6% 33.9%	30.9% 30.1%	24% 20.1%	7.9% 5.5%
Председник / President 2016. 2018.	7.7% 17.4%	24.8% 31.4%	27.7% 24.6%	31.9% 21.5%	7.9% 5.1%
Скупштина / Parliament 2016. 2018.	7% 8.9%	25.7% 31.2%	33.3% 32.3%	27.1% 22.2%	6.8% 5.5%
Судство / Judiciary 2016. 2018.	6.6% 9.2%	26.2% 32.9%	36.9% 34.7%	24.2% 19.3%	6% 3.9%
Војска / Army 2016. 2018.	22.4% 30.7%	41.2% 42.2%	21.3% 16.1%	9.9% 7%	5.3% 4%
Полиција / Police 2016. 2018.	9.2% 16.7%	31.4% 41.1%	35.7% 27.6%	19.2% 10.9%	4.4% 3.7%
Тужилаштво /Prosecutor’s Office 2016. 2018.	4,9% 7.4%	25.5% 30.3%	38.3% 38.2%	23.4% 19.2%	8% 4.9%

Извор / Source: Đurić, Stojadinović (2018).

If observed longitudinally, we can see a slightly upward trend in the category of trust in political institutions, while polarisation still remains at a high level. Typically, citizens' views are the most polarised when it comes to trust in political institutions, while for broader state institutions, such as the army or the police, this polarisation is somewhat smaller. The army ranks slightly higher while trust in the police is lower than in the former case (see Table 1).

Citizens' incapability of taking their fate in their own hands, as a reflection of dependence from political elites, is best described with the words that

"political alienation is a form of sociological concept. Although it probably refers to 'quasi-paranoia' of misanthropy, it is not a variable of personality in the most traditional sense. Nor is it a direct expression of cultural values or interests per se, although it obviously entails the acceptance of a cultural recipe according to which, in civil relations, every man has the right to vote. Instead, political alienation is the most accurately understood as an emerging response to social structure in action, a reaction to identified relative incapability of the citizens to influence or control their own social fate" (Thompson & Horton, 1960, p. 191).

Inability to control representatives and political elites estranged from preferences and interests of those they should be representing, undermined legitimacy to an enormous extent and led to the alienation of citizens who strive to shift their actions to new forms of political action, whose ultimate goal is to widen the scope of responsibilities of political agents.

Political alienation - Serbian experience and consequences of alienation

When dealing with alienation from the political system, Marvin Olsen noted that one could distinguish two categories of alienation. The first one is political incompetence, while the other one is political discontentment. In the former case, citizens have a sense of incompetence to efficiently participate in social interactions. As far as citizens are concerned, the entire system is against them, which makes them absolutely desperate. The main features of this condition are:

"sense of the absence of leadership - […] the person wants certain goals but does not know and cannot identify means of legitimately achieving them; powerlessness - […] the person knows and tries to undertake all appropriate activities which will lead him/her to achieving his/her objectives but in practice they turn out to be inefficient; futility […] although the person is aware of what actions he/she should undertake for the purpose of achieving his/her goals and has the capability of completing them, he/she fails to see logical connections between the means and objectives of his/her activities" (Olsen, 1969, p. 291).

As regards political discontentment, alienation is voluntarily chosen by the citizen, as a reaction to the condition in a system that does not provide him/her circumstances which are necessary for accomplishing his/her individual potentials. The main positions in regard with this are: sense of being different; discontentment; disappointment (Olsen, 1969, p. 292). When we speak about political incompetence and citizens' incompetence, one could notice that in the era of technological-information revolution and more extensive digital literacy throughout the world, political information becomes available to a large majority of citizens. Serbia does not deviate from this general picture either, since new ways of political communication have emerged. New matrices, such as the social media, are also included in the manners of discursive presentation of political ideas, which take up more space in both classical and digital communication.

All of the above mentioned can be seen in Ada Finifter's typology, which distinguishes four ways in which alienation towards politics may express itself: the first is political powerlessness of the citizen, who may not have an impact on society in which he/she lives; the second is political powerlessness in which the citizens sees the entire system of political institutions as chaotic, without any possibility to have an impact on them; the third is political immorality, seen in Durkheim's manner of using anomie, which leads the citizen into a situation where, due to the absence of basic social norms, he/she lives in a chaotic state; the fourth is political isolation in which participation of the public in creating public policies is significantly diminished (Finifter, 1970). The fourth model has a cause-effect relationship with all forms of political participation, be it in election or directly, since In many systems over the past decades, as an alternative or supplement to the representative system, the institutes of referendum, civic initiative or impeachment have been institutionalised or empowered, thus placing focus on strengthening legitimacy (Matić, 2015). In this case, we may also conclude that modern information-communication technologies have played a significant role in Serbia as well since we have witnessed a growing number of online initiatives, which should ideally improve and harmonise citizens' preferences with the existing legal framework.

One of many indicators correlating with social capital and at the same time serving as a component of political alienation is the degree of interpersonal trust. Robert Putnam used this indicator to conceptualise the idea of the theoretical framework itself in relation to social capital and its consequences on economic and political development (Putnam, 2001). Based on Figure 1, these degrading tendencies of growth in interpersonal distrust are more striking in the case of Serbia.

Figure 1 Да ли се већини људи може веровати? / Can most people be trusted?

Извор: / Source: World Values Survey (2020).

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As many as 71% of the population believe that they should be very cautious with people, while 27% of the population believe that in the majority of cases people can be trusted. These data unequivocally illustrate the level of distrust in the order that produces chaotic and devious phenomena in society, which then unequivocally lead to all forms of alienation. When seen from a comparative perspective, what is noticeable is that in those states with a higher level of social capital and interpersonal trust, there is also a higher level of satisfaction with the state and society, which consequently reduces alienation levels.

Accepting dominant political models and patterns for the purpose of harmonising the normative-institutional framework in the context of European integration, without any critical deliberation on the social-cultural milieu in which the said norms should be incorporated, would cause citizens' alienation from the existing order in Serbia. It is true that the principle of the rule of law which includes all social spheres has been established. In practice, however, we find an opposite situation: "Rather than guaranteeing political freedoms at the developmental level of modern society, which also means de-monopolisation of political parties as factors of political power, what we have in place in Serbia is the party state" (Šuvaković, 2013, p. 64). Reforms and their pace, which goes hand in hand with dramatic and radical globalising forces, do not keep up with changes in social structure and social-cultural dimension of society. Cultural changes also require a slower transformation, while the continuous acceleration of transformation and interventions in the institutional sphere quite often becomes rejected by society as being inappropriate to the existing social stratification and structure. The weakening of the middle class, the ever-growing gap in the economic sphere, which is reflected in the paradigmatic neoliberal approach that imposes and forces itself as a "remedy" to all weaknesses of the previous system, additionally complicate relationships between citizens and institutions, thus intensifying a sense of isolation and exclusion that leads to alienation. An example of democracy and open society, trust in the system which ultimately affects higher forms of political organisation and de-alienation is not the USA, as the most prominent advocate of political ideals but instead these are mainly Scandinavian countries with the strong middle classes and prominent policies of well-being. By creating such a milieu, they have ensured that their citizens feel accepted by the state and that they are incorporated into society, with an awareness that there is strong solidarity and potential for acting collectively (for example, there is Denmark, which for quite a number of years has ranked first in terms of general satisfaction of its citizens with the quality of life). To be politically alienated in this way means having a relatively permanent sense of alienation from the existing political institutions, values and leaders.

"At the ultimate end of the continuum, the politically alienated feel like outsiders, trapped in an alien political order; they would welcome fundamental change in the political regime. Contrary to this, the politically faithful feel an integral part of the political system; they belong to it both psychologically and legally. The faithful citizens regard the regime positively, see it as morally worthy and believe that it has a legitimate claim to their loyalty" (Citrin, McClosky, Shanks & Sniderman, 1975, p. 3).

Individualisation and general atomisation of society lead to numerous resistances to the existing norms and manner in which individuals express their discontentment not only with those who rule but with the entire state structure. The neoliberal concept, from which deviations can be noticed in those states and among those individuals who are its most recognised advocates, is an attempt at political re-socialisation and return of the alienated citizens to the very core of politics. A "real-life" example from the political life of the USA is the emergence of Bernie Sanders which, according to its consequences, may be even more significant than the populist activities and Donald Trump's serving as president. In a system which traditionally rejects or resists leftist ideas and ideologies, the emergence of such a person shows a tendency to return to the "policies of wellbeing" which were characteristic of America during the 1960s. In the academic environment, a blatant example is Francis Fukuyama, one of the strongest promoters and advocates of the neoliberal concept, creator of the idea of the "end of history", who himself deviated from his own view of the world and social relations after the Cold War. In his papers and speeches, he went back to the ideas which did not have much to do with liberal understanding of the state and politics. Thus, he speaks of the necessity to build a strong and stable state as a prerequisite without which there is no stable and adequate development (Fukuyama, 2005) and returns to the leftist concepts by criticising the growth of global inequalities, which according to him, is a catalyst to all illnesses of modern society (a series of lectures he gave during his visit to Belgrade in 2018). Given the fact that inequalities in the material position are one of the pillars of the neoliberal doctrine (rights-wise, there should be equality) and that we have been witness to ever more compelling discrepancy and gap in the economic sphere and social hierarchy, the question that is posed is the following: Is there actually equal chance for all? In this manner, societies become unequal to all or at least unequally inclusive. Such deviations are also present in Serbia, either accepted to an extent or imposed by the neoliberal pattern of action, inevitably leading to further alienation. This is manifested in multiple ways, whereby politically alienated individuals express their alienation in different ways, some of which are behaviours and others are positions.

"Cynicism is an example of alienation expressed through a view rather than behaviour. Generally speaking, ways of expression include participation or withdrawal. Participatory manner is an activity whose objective is to transform particular object that causes alienation. Protests or demonstrations whose aim is to oust alienated governments would be examples of this. On the other hand, withdrawal, as a result of the decision not to be included in activities which are pertinent to the object of alienation, for example, to vote, as a symbolic withdrawal of support" (Nachmias, 1974, p. 479).

Contaminated political environment, negative campaigns and anti-advertising among political rivals to a large extent sway the citizens towards the decision not to participate in election processes. By rejecting such classical principles of democracy, through modalities of expressing one's views in election, the citizens of Serbia are becoming more inclined to the policy of protests and various of forms of civil disobedience, thus negating not only constructed relationships with the political elite but also expressing distrust in the existing system and order. There are two alternative answers which could provide a clearer picture of the tendency towards a lower election turnout. The first model is the theory of rational choice, whereby citizens choose to give up election since they believe that their vote cannot significantly change the existing political balance (Todosijević, 2020). The second model is characterised by the absence of alternatives, i.e., belief that casting vote for certain political parties and persons will not change or will even undermine the existing condition.

When all of the presented factors are taken into account, one can conclude that alienation in Serbia has led to the forming of a polarised society. This state of affairs is caused, on the one hand, by the neoliberal pattern that has deepened social differences and ruined the middle class as a bearer of social structure. In political activities, on the other hand, antagonisms and rivalries among many players have led to mass political discontentment, in the broadest of senses. The result is that we have a low level of political culture and emancipation of both citizens and practicing politicians. Such anomalies and deformities are also the result of failed expectations which are supposed to be accomplished through the broadest social transformation and shift to today's predominant forms of state and social organisation.

Conclusion

All of the above presented arguments and views show that political alienation is predominant just in societies that are at lower levels of economic and social development. They may be even more pronounced in developed democracies than in the transition and post-transition systems. Substantial empirical research unequivocally shows that we are living in the times when the citizens are not only becoming more estranged from political processes but from one another as well. The consequences of such condition are mainly reflected in the diminished potential to act collectively, which should significantly reduce the decision-making capability of elites, such made decisions not being in keeping with the citizens' expectations. Fragmentation of the social structure, which occurred through a decay of the middle class as the bearer and pillar of all social change in Serbia, is a direct consequence of the accepted and imposed model of neoliberal capitalism as the predominant model of economic and political organisation. In Serbia's political life, as well as in the media discourse, antagonistic discourses are predominant, and they are based on negative campaigns and anti-advertising in political processes. Such radical positions, which polarise the political game, are continuously present even when there are no election campaigns and therefore deepen political alienation. The described condition is caused by both internal and external factors. As the internal level, we have already discussed indicators such as the deteriorated potential for acting collectively, the issue of interpersonal trust and social capital and trend for the polarisation of society in terms of trust in political institutions. External factors, primarily globalisation, have additionally widened the gap between the elite and citizens. Additionally, accepting the model and patterns typical of developed democracies has conditioned the "implementation gap", which has then led to discrepancies between policies and the citizens' real preferences. The search for innovative models and institutions which the citizens would put back at the core of political decision-making is the subject of substantial research and is well in the stage of being developed throughout the world. The purpose of these reform interventions and the "democratic turn" towards the citizens is to restore legitimacy, which would ultimately have to contribute to alleviating the circumstances of political alienation. In this context, Serbia, as a relatively "recent" democracy, should base and focus specifically on various forms of participation in order to bring its citizens closer to the political system. Institutions must become inclusive and responsive so as to close gaps and reduce polarisation among the citizens, in terms of the way they perceive the institutions. In this context, such a form of democratic innovation in our political system would consequently lead to alleviating the effects of political alienation.

Dodatak

Acknowledgement

This paper was written as part of the research activities of the Institute for Political Studies and was funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of the Republic of Serbia.