Utopia

Nowa Huta in Kraków, Poland, serves as an

unfinished example of a utopian ideal city.

A utopia (/juːˈtoʊpiə/ yoo-TOH-pee-ə) is an

imagined community or society that
possesses highly desirable or nearly
perfect qualities for its citizens.[1] The
opposite of a utopia is a dystopia.

Utopia focuses on equality in economics,

government and justice, though by no
means exclusively, with the method and
structure of proposed implementation
varying based on ideology.[2] According to
Lyman Tower Sargent,

there are socialist, capitalist,

monarchical, democratic,
anarchist, ecological, feminist,
patriarchal, egalitarian,
hierarchical, racist, left-wing,
 right-wing, reformist, Naturism
/ Nude Christians, free love,
nuclear family, extended family,
gay, lesbian and many more
utopias [...] Utopianism, some
argue, is essential for the
improvement of the human
condition. But if used wrongly, it
becomes dangerous. Utopia has
an inherent contradictory
nature here.[3]

Sargent argues that utopia's nature is

inherently contradictory, because societies
are not homogenous and have desires
which conflict and therefore cannot
simultaneously be satisfied. If any two
desires cannot be simultaneously
satisfied, true utopia cannot be attained
because in utopia all desires are satisfied.

The term utopia was created from Greek

by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book
Utopia, describing a fictional island society
in the south Atlantic Ocean off the coast
of South America.

Etymology
The word utopia was coined from Ancient
Greek by Sir Thomas More in 1516.
“Utopia” comes from Greek: οὐ (“not”) and
τόπος (“place”) which translates as “no-
place” and literally means any non-existent
society, when ‘described in considerable
detail’. However, in standard usage, the
word's meaning has shifted and now
usually describes a non-existent society
that is intended to be viewed as
considerably better than contemporary
society.[4]

In his original work, More carefully pointed

out the similarity of utopia to eutopia,
which is from Greek: εὖ (“good” or “well”)
and τόπος (“place”), hence eutopia means
“good place”, which ostensibly would be
the more appropriate term for the concept
the word “utopia” has in modern English.
The pronunciations of eutopia and utopia
in English are identical, which may have
given rise to the change in meaning.[4][5]

Interpretations and definitions

Famous writers about utopia:

There is nothing like a dream to create

the future. Utopia to-day, flesh and blood
tomorrow. - Victor Hugo
A map of the world that does not include
Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for
it leaves out the one country at which
Humanity is always landing. And when
Humanity lands there, it looks out, and,
seeing a better country, sets sail.
Progress is the realisation of Utopias. -
Oscar Wilde
Utopias are often only premature truths.
- Alphonse De Lamartine
None of the abstract concepts comes
closer to fulfilled utopia than that of
eternal peace. - Theodor W. Adorno
I think that there is always a part of
utopia in any romantic relationship. -
Pedro Almodovar
In ourselves alone the absolute light
keeps shining, a sigillum falsi et sui,
mortis et vitae aeternae [false signal
 and signal of eternal life and death
itself], and the fantastic move to it
begins: to the external interpretation of
the daydream, the cosmic manipulation
of a concept that is utopian in principle.
- Ernst Bloch
When I die, I want to die in a Utopia that I
have helped to build. - Henry Kuttner

Utopian socialist Etienne Cabet in his

utopian book The Voyage to Icaria cited
definition from contemporary Dictionary of
ethical and political sciences: "Utopias and
other models of government, based on the
public good, may be inconceivable
because of the disordered human
passions which, under the wrong
governments, seek to highlight the poorly
conceived or selfish interest of the
community. But even though we find it
impossible, they are ridiculous to sinful
people whose sense of self-destruction
prevents them from believing." (The
Voyage to Icaria)

Marx and Engels used the word utopia to

denote unscientific social theories.[6]

Philosopher Slavoj Žižek told about utopia:

"Which means that we should reinvent
utopia but in what sense. There are two
false meanings of utopia one is this old
notion of imagining this ideal society we
know will never be realized, the other is the
capitalist utopia in the sense of new
perversed desire that you are not only
allowed but even solicited to realize. The
true utopia is when the situation is so
without issue, without the way to resolve it
within the coordinates of the possible that
out of the pure urge of survival you have to
invent a new space. Utopia is not kind of a
free imagination utopia is a matter of inner
most urgency, you are forced to imagine it,
it is the only way out, and this is what we
need today."[7]
Philosopher Milan Šimečka told: “...
utopism was a common type of thinking at
the dawn of human civilization. We find
utopian beliefs in the oldest religious
imaginations, appear regularly in the
neighborhood of ancient, yet pre-
philosophical views on the causes and
meaning of natural events, the purpose of
creation, the path of good and evil,
happiness and misfortune, fairy tales and
legends later inspired by poetry and
philosophy ... the underlying motives on
which utopian literature is built are as old
as the entire historical epoch of human
history. ”[8]
According to the Philosophical Dictionary,
proto-utopian ideas begin as early as the
period of ancient Greece and Rome,
medieval heretics, peasant revolts and
establish themselves in the period of the
early capitalism, reformation and
Renaissance (Hus, Müntzer, More,
Campanella), democratic revolutions
(Meslier, Morelly, Mably, Winstanley, later
Babeufists, Blanquists,) and in a period of
turbulent development of capitalism that
highlighted antagonisms of capitalist
society (Saint-Simon, Fourier, Owen, Cabet,
Lamennais, Proudhon and their
followers).[9]
Philosopher Richard Stahel told: "... every
social organization relies on something
that is not realized or feasible, but has the
ideal that is somewhere beyond the
horizon, a lighthouse to which it may seek
to approach if it considers that ideal
socially valid and generally accepted."[10]

Social philosopher Lukáš Perný, author of

texts about the history of utopia and
utopians[11], according to Szacki, Berdyaev,
Levitas,[12] Wallerstein,[13] Žižek, Bloch,
Marcuse and Jameson)[14] defines utopia:
“In general, utopia has a positive meaning
as a unit that represents an ideal human
society, a normative social ideal
(regulatory idea) of perfect quality. Utopias
approach the moral, social ideal of
particular societies. Every society
necessarily presents certain notions of
social good, which only proves the
existence of utopianism as a universal
idea for all cultures that have certain
written or unwritten rules."[15]

Varieties
Left panel (The Earthly Paradise – Garden of Eden)
from Hieronymus Bosch's The Garden of Earthly
Delights.

Chronologically, the first recorded Utopian

proposal is Plato's Republic.[16] Part
conversation, part fictional depiction and
part policy proposal, Republic would
categorize citizens into a rigid class
structure of "golden," "silver," "bronze" and
"iron" socioeconomic classes. The golden
citizens are trained in a rigorous 50 year-
long educational program to be benign
oligarchs, the "philosopher-kings." Plato
stressed this structure many times in
statements, and in his published works,
such as the Republic. The wisdom of
these rulers will supposedly eliminate
poverty and deprivation through fairly
distributed resources, though the details
on how to do this are unclear. The
educational program for the rulers is the
central notion of the proposal. It has few
laws, no lawyers and rarely sends its
citizens to war but hires mercenaries from
among its war-prone neighbors. These
mercenaries were deliberately sent into
dangerous situations in the hope that the
more warlike populations of all
surrounding countries will be weeded out,
leaving peaceful peoples.

During the 16th century, Thomas More's

book Utopia proposed an ideal society of
the same name.[17] Readers, including
Utopian socialists, have chosen to accept
this imaginary society as the realistic
blueprint for a working nation, while others
have postulated that Thomas More
intended nothing of the sort.[18] It is
believed that More's Utopia functions only
on the level of a satire, a work intended to
reveal more about the England of his time
than about an idealistic society.[19] This
interpretation is bolstered by the title of
the book and nation and its apparent
confusion between the Greek for "no
place" and "good place": "utopia" is a
compound of the syllable ou-, meaning
"no" and topos, meaning place. But the
homophonic prefix eu-, meaning "good,"
also resonates in the word, with the
implication that the perfectly "good place"
is really "no place."
Ecological

Ecological utopian society describes new

ways in which society should relate to
nature. These works perceive a widening
gap between the modern Western way of
living that destroys nature[20] and a more
traditional way of living before
industrialization.[21] Ecological utopias
may advocate a society that is more
sustainable. According to the Dutch
philosopher Marius de Geus, ecological
utopias could be inspirational sources for
movements involving green politics.[22]

Economics
Particularly in the early 19th century,
several utopian ideas arose, often in
response to the belief that social
disruption was created and caused by the
development of commercialism and
capitalism. These ideas are often grouped
in a greater "utopian socialist" movement,
due to their shared characteristics. A once
common characteristic is an egalitarian
distribution of goods, frequently with the
total abolition of money. Citizens only do
work which they enjoy and which is for the
common good, leaving them with ample
time for the cultivation of the arts and
sciences. One classic example of such a
utopia was Edward Bellamy's Looking
Backward. Another socialist utopia is
William Morris's News from Nowhere,
written partially in response to the top-
down (bureaucratic) nature of Bellamy's
utopia, which Morris criticized. However,
as the socialist movement developed, it
moved away from utopianism; Marx in
particular became a harsh critic of earlier
socialism he described as utopian. (For
more information, see the History of
Socialism article.) In a materialist utopian
society, the economy is perfect; there is no
inflation and only perfect social and
financial equality exists.
In 1905, H.G. Wells published A Modern
Utopia, which was widely read and
admired and provoked much discussion.
Also consider Eric Frank Russell's book
The Great Explosion (1963) whose last
section details an economic and social
utopia. This forms the first mention of the
idea of Local Exchange Trading Systems
(LETS).

During the "Khrushchev Thaw" period,[23]

the Soviet writer Ivan Efremov produced
the science-fiction utopia Andromeda
(1957) in which a major cultural thaw took
place: humanity communicates with a
galaxy-wide Great Circle and develops its
technology and culture within a social
framework characterized by vigorous
competition between alternative
philosophies.

The English political philosopher James

Harrington, author of the utopian work The
Commonwealth of Oceana, published in
1656, inspired English country party
republicanism and was influential in the
design of three American colonies. His
theories ultimately contributed to the
idealistic principles of the American
Founders. The colonies of Carolina
(founded in 1670), Pennsylvania (founded
in 1681), and Georgia (founded in 1733)
were the only three English colonies in
America that were planned as utopian
societies with an integrated physical,
economic and social design. At the heart
of the plan for Georgia was a concept of
“agrarian equality” in which land was
allocated equally and additional land
acquisition through purchase or
inheritance was prohibited; the plan was
an early step toward the yeoman republic
later envisioned by Thomas
Jefferson.[24][25][26]

The communes of the 1960s in the United

States were often an attempt to greatly
improve the way humans live together in
communities. The back-to-the-land
movements and hippies inspired many to
try to live in peace and harmony on farms,
remote areas and to set up new types of
governance.[27] Communes like Kaliflower,
which existed between 1967 and 1973,
attempted to live outside of society's
norms and create their own ideal
communist based society.[28]

Intentional communities were organized

and built all over the world with the hope
of making a more perfect way of living
together. While many of these new small
communities failed, some are growing,
such as the Twelve Tribes Communities
that started in the United States. Since its
start, it has now grown into many groups
around the world.

Religious utopias

New Harmony, a Utopian attempt; depicted as

proposed by Robert Owen.

In the United States and Europe, during the

Second Great Awakening (ca. 1790–1840)
and thereafter, many radical religious
groups formed utopian societies in which
faith could govern all aspects of members'
lives. These utopian societies included the
Shakers, who originated in England in the
18th century and arrived in America in
1774. A number of religious utopian
societies from Europe came to the United
States from the 18th century throughout
the 19th century, including the Society of
the Woman in the Wilderness (led by
Johannes Kelpius (1667–1708)), the
Ephrata Cloister (established in 1732) and
the Harmony Society, among others. The
Harmony Society was a Christian
theosophy and pietist group founded in
Iptingen, Germany, in 1785. Due to
religious persecution by the Lutheran
Church and the government in
Württemberg,[29] the society moved to the
United States on October 7, 1803, settled
in Pennsylvania. On February 15, 1805,
about 400 followers formally organized
the Harmony Society, placing all their
goods in common. The group lasted until
1905, making it one of the longest-running
financially successful communes in
American history. The Oneida Community,
founded by John Humphrey Noyes in
Oneida, New York, was a utopian religious
commune that lasted from 1848 to 1881.
Although this utopian experiment has
become better known today for its
manufacture of Oneida silverware, it was
one of the longest-running communes in
American history. The Bruderhof was
established in 1920 and has 23
communities across the world.[30] They
claim to follow the example of the
apostles in Acts and the Sermon on the
Mount.[31] The Amana Colonies were
communal settlements in Iowa, started by
radical German pietists, which lasted from
1855 to 1932. The Amana Corporation,
manufacturer of refrigerators and
household appliances, was originally
started by the group. Other examples are
Fountain Grove (founded in 1875), Riker's
Holy City and other Californian utopian
colonies between 1855 and 1955 (Hine),
as well as Sointula[32] in British Columbia,
Canada. The Amish and Hutterites can
also be considered an attempt towards
religious utopia. A wide variety of
intentional communities with some type of
faith-based ideas have also started across
the world.

A new heaven and new earth[Rev 21:1] , Mortier's

Bible, Phillip Medhurst Collection
The Book of Revelation in the Christian
Bible depicts an eschatological time with
the defeat of Satan, of Evil and of Sin. The
main difference compared to the Old
Testament promises is that such a defeat
also has an ontological value (Rev 21:1;4 :
"Then I saw 'a new heaven and a new
earth,' for the first heaven and the first
earth had passed away, and there was no
longer any sea...'He will wipe every tear
from their eyes. There will be no more
death' or mourning or crying or pain, for
the old order of things has passed away")
and no longer just gnosiological (Isaiah
65:17 : "See, I will create/new heavens and
a new earth./The former things will not be
remembered,/nor will they come to
mind").[33][34] Narrow interpretation of the
text depicts Heaven on Earth or a Heaven
brought to Earth without sin. Daily and
mundane details of this new Earth, where
God and Jesus rule, remain unclear,
although it is implied to be similar to the
biblical Garden of Eden. Some theological
philosophers believe that heaven will not
be a physical realm but instead an
incorporeal place for souls.[35]

Science and technology

Utopian flying machines, France, 1890–1900

(chromolithograph trading card).

Though Francis Bacon's New Atlantis is

imbued with a scientific spirit, scientific
and technological utopias tend to be
based in the future, when it is believed that
advanced science and technology will
allow utopian living standards; for
example, the absence of death and
suffering; changes in human nature and
the human condition. Technology has
affected the way humans have lived to
such an extent that normal functions, like
sleep, eating or even reproduction, have
been replaced by artificial means. Other
examples include a society where humans
have struck a balance with technology and
it is merely used to enhance the human
living condition (e.g. Star Trek). In place of
the static perfection of a utopia, libertarian
transhumanists envision an "extropia", an
open, evolving society allowing individuals
and voluntary groupings to form the
institutions and social forms they prefer.
Mariah Utsawa presented a theoretical
basis for technological utopianism and set
out to develop a variety of technologies
ranging from maps to designs for cars and
houses which might lead to the
development of such a utopia.

One notable example of a technological

and libertarian socialist utopia is Scottish
author Iain Banks' Culture.

Opposing this optimism is the prediction

that advanced science and technology will,
through deliberate misuse or accident,
cause environmental damage or even
humanity's extinction. Critics, such as
Jacques Ellul and Timothy Mitchell
advocate precautions against the
premature embrace of new technologies.
Both raise questions about changing
responsibility and freedom brought by
division of labour. Authors such as John
Zerzan and Derrick Jensen consider that
modern technology is progressively
depriving humans of their autonomy and
advocate the collapse of the industrial
civilization, in favor of small-scale
organization, as a necessary path to avoid
the threat of technology on human
freedom and sustainability.
There are many examples of techno-
dystopias portrayed in mainstream culture,
such as the classics Brave New World and
Nineteen Eighty-Four, often published as
"1984", which have explored some of these
topics.

Feminism

Utopias have been used to explore the

ramifications of genders being either a
societal construct or a biologically "hard-
wired" imperative or some mix of the
two.[36] Socialist and economic utopias
have tended to take the "woman question"
seriously and often to offer some form of
equality between the sexes as part and
parcel of their vision, whether this be by
addressing misogyny, reorganizing society
along separatist lines, creating a certain
kind of androgynous equality that ignores
gender or in some other manner. For
example, Edward Bellamy's Looking
Backward (1887) responded, progressively
for his day, to the contemporary women's
suffrage and women's rights movements.
Bellamy supported these movements by
incorporating the equality of women and
men into his utopian world's structure,
albeit by consigning women to a separate
sphere of light industrial activity (due to
women's lesser physical strength) and
making various exceptions for them in
order to make room for (and to praise)
motherhood. One of the earlier feminist
utopias that imagines complete
separatism is Charlotte Perkins Gilman's
Herland (1915).

In science fiction and technological

speculation, gender can be challenged on
the biological as well as the social level.
Marge Piercy's Woman on the Edge of
Time portrays equality between the
genders and complete equality in sexuality
(regardless of the gender of the lovers).
Birth-giving, often felt as the divider that
cannot be avoided in discussions of
women's rights and roles, has been shifted
onto elaborate biological machinery that
functions to offer an enriched embryonic
experience, When a child is born, it spends
most of its time in the children's ward with
peers. Three "mothers" per child are the
norm and they are chosen in a gender
neutral way (men as well as women may
become "mothers") on the basis of their
experience and ability. Technological
advances also make possible the freeing
of women from childbearing in Shulamith
Firestone's The Dialectic of Sex. The
fictional aliens in Mary Gentle's Golden
Witchbreed start out as gender-neutral
children and do not develop into men and
women until puberty and gender has no
bearing on social roles. In contrast, Doris
Lessing's The Marriages Between Zones
Three, Four and Five (1980) suggests that
men's and women's values are inherent to
the sexes and cannot be changed, making
a compromise between them essential. In
My Own Utopia (1961) by Elizabeth Mann
Borghese, gender exists but is dependent
upon age rather than sex – genderless
children mature into women, some of
whom eventually become men.[36] "William
Marston's Wonder Woman comics of the
1940s featured Paradise Island, also
known as Themyscira, a matriarchal all-
female community of peace, loving
submission, bondage and giant space
kangaroos."[37]

Utopian single-gender worlds or single-sex

societies have long been one of the
primary ways to explore implications of
gender and gender-differences.[38] In
speculative fiction, female-only worlds
have been imagined to come about by the
action of disease that wipes out men,
along with the development of
technological or mystical method that
allow female parthenogenic reproduction.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman's 1915 novel
approaches this type of separate society.
Many feminist utopias pondering
separatism were written in the 1970s, as a
response to the Lesbian separatist
movement;[38][39][40] examples include
Joanna Russ's The Female Man and Suzy
McKee Charnas's Walk to the End of the
World and Motherlines.[40] Utopias
imagined by male authors have often
included equality between sexes, rather
than separation, although as noted
Bellamy's strategy includes a certain
amount of "separate but equal".[41] The use
of female-only worlds allows the
exploration of female independence and
freedom from patriarchy. The societies
may be lesbian, such as Daughters of a
Coral Dawn by Katherine V. Forrest or not,
and may not be sexual at all – a famous
early sexless example being Herland
(1915) by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.[39]
Charlene Ball writes in Women's Studies
Encyclopedia that use of speculative
fiction to explore gender roles in future
societies has been more common in the
United States compared to Europe and
elsewhere,[36] although such efforts as
Gerd Brantenberg's Egalia's Daughters and
Christa Wolf's portrayal of the land of
Colchis in her Medea: Voices are certainly
as influential and famous as any of the
American feminist utopias.
Utopianism

The Golden Age by Lucas Cranach the Elder.

In many cultures, societies, and religions,

there is some myth or memory of a distant
past when humankind lived in a primitive
and simple state but at the same time one
of perfect happiness and fulfillment. In
those days, the various myths tell us, there
was an instinctive harmony between
humanity and nature. People's needs were
few and their desires limited. Both were
easily satisfied by the abundance provided
by nature. Accordingly, there were no
motives whatsoever for war or oppression.
Nor was there any need for hard and
painful work. Humans were simple and
pious and felt themselves close to their
God or gods. According to one
anthropological theory, hunter-gatherers
were the original affluent society.

These mythical or religious archetypes are

inscribed in many cultures and resurge
with special vitality when people are in
difficult and critical times. However, in
utopias, the projection of the myth does
not take place towards the remote past
but either towards the future or towards
distant and fictional places, imagining that
at some time in the future, at some point
in space, or beyond death, there must exist
the possibility of living happily.

These myths of the earliest stage of

humankind have been referred to by
various cultures, societies and religions:

Golden Age

The Greek poet Hesiod, around the 8th

century BC, in his compilation of the
mythological tradition (the poem Works
and Days), explained that, prior to the
present era, there were four other
progressively more perfect ones, the
oldest of which was the Golden Age.

Plutarch, the Greek historian and

biographer of the 1st century, dealt with
the blissful and mythic past of the
humanity.

Arcadia

From Sir Philip Sidney's prose romance

The Old Arcadia (1580), originally a region
in the Peloponnesus, Arcadia became a
synonym for any rural area that serves as
a pastoral setting, a locus amoenus
("delightful place").
The Biblical Garden of Eden

The Biblical Garden of Eden as depicted in

the Old Testament Bible's Book of Genesis
2 (Authorized Version of 1611):

"And the Lord God planted a

garden eastward in Eden; and
there he put the man whom he
had formed. Out of the ground
made the Lord God to grow
every tree that is pleasant to the
sight and good for food; the tree
of life also in the midst of the
garden and the tree of
knowledge of good and evil. [...]

And the Lord God took the man

and put him into the garden of
Eden to dress it and to keep it.
And the Lord God commanded
the man, saying, Of every tree of
the garden thou mayest freely
eat: but of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil,
thou shalt not eat of it: for in the
day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die. [...]

And the Lord God said, It is not

good that the man should be
alone; [...] And the Lord God
caused a deep sleep to fall upon
Adam and he slept: and he took
one of his ribs and closed up the
flesh instead thereof and the rib,
which the Lord God had taken
from man, made he a woman
and brought her unto the man."
According to the exegesis that the biblical
theologian Herbert Haag proposes in the
book Is original sin in Scripture?,[42]
published soon after the Second Vatican
Council, Genesis 2:25 would indicate that
Adam and Eve were created from the
beginning naked of the divine grace, an
originary grace that, then, they would never
have had and even less would have lost
due to the subsequent events narrated. On
the other hand, while supporting a
continuity in the Bible about the absence
of preternatural gifts (Latin: dona
praeternaturalia)[43] with regard to the
ophitic event, Haag never makes any
reference to the discontinuity of the loss of
access to the tree of life.

The Land of Cockaigne

The Land of Cockaigne (also Cockaygne,

Cokaygne), was an imaginary land of
idleness and luxury, famous in medieval
stories and the subject of several poems,
one of which, an early translation of a
13th-century French work, is given in
George Ellis' Specimens of Early English
Poets. In this, "the houses were made of
barley sugar and cakes, the streets were
paved with pastry and the shops supplied
goods for nothing." London has been so
called (see Cockney) but Boileau applies
the same to Paris.[44]

The Peach Blossom Spring

The Peach Blossom Spring, a prose

written by the Chinese writer Tao
Yuanming (c. 220-589 CE), describes a
utopian place.[45][46] The narrative goes
that a fisherman from Wuling sailed
upstream a river and came across a
beautiful blossoming peach grove and
lush green fields covered with blossom
petals.[47] Entranced by the beauty, he
continued upstream.[47] When he reached
the end of the river, he stumbled onto a
small grotto.[47] Though narrow at first, he
was able to squeeze through the passage
and discovered an ethereal utopia, where
the people led an ideal existence in
harmony with nature.[48] He saw a vast
expanse of fertile lands, clear ponds,
mulberry trees, bamboo groves and the
like with a community of people of all ages
and houses in neat rows.[48] The people
explained that their ancestors escaped to
this place during the civil unrest of the Qin
dynasty and they themselves had not left
since or had contact with anyone from the
outside.[49] They had not even heard of the
later dynasties of bygone times or the
then-current Jin dynasty.[49] In the story,
the community was secluded and
unaffected by the troubles of the outside
world.[49] The sense of timelessness was
also predominant in the story as a perfect
utopian community remains unchanged,
that is, it had no decline nor the need to
improve.[49] Eventually, the Chinese term
Peach Blossom Spring (桃花源) came to
be synonymous for the concept of
utopia.[50]

Datong

Datong is a traditional Chinese Utopia. The

main description of it is found in the
Chinese Classic of Rites, in the chapter
called "Li Yun" (禮運). Later, Datong and its
ideal of 'The World Belongs to
Everyone/The World is Held in Common'
'Tianxia weigong/天下为公' 'influenced
modern Chinese reformers and
revolutionaries, such as Kang Youwei.

Schlaraffenland

Schlaraffenland is an analogous German

tradition.

All these myths also express some hope

that the idyllic state of affairs they
describe is not irretrievably and irrevocably
lost to mankind, that it can be regained in
some way or other.
One way might be a quest for an "earthly
paradise" – a place like Shangri-La, hidden
in the Tibetan mountains and described by
James Hilton in his utopian novel Lost
Horizon (1933). Christopher Columbus
followed directly in this tradition in his
belief that he had found the Garden of
Eden when, towards the end of the 15th
century, he first encountered the New
World and its indigenous inhabitants.

21st century
In the 21st century, discussions around
utopia for some authors include post-
scarcity economics, late capitalism, and
universal basic income; for example, the
"human capitalism" utopia envisioned in
Utopia for Realists (2016) includes a
universal basic income and a 15-hour
workweek, along with open borders.[51]

Scandinavian nations, which as of 2019

ranked at the top of the World Happiness
Report, are sometimes cited as modern
utopias, although author Michael Booth
has called that a myth.[52]

Utopia in art

See also
Ideal city
 Ideal town

Notes
1. Giroux, Henry A. (2003). "Utopian
thinking under the sign of
neoliberalism: Towards a critical
pedagogy of educated hope" (PDF).
Democracy & Nature. Routledge. 9
(1): 91–105.
doi:10.1080/1085566032000074968
.
2. Giroux, H. (2003). "Utopian thinking
under the sign of neoliberalism:
Towards a critical pedagogy of
educated hope". Democracy &
Nature. 9 (1): 91–105.
3. Sargent, Lyman Tower (2010).
Utopianism: A very short
introduction . Oxford, UK: Oxford
University Press. p. 21.
doi:10.1093/actrade/9780199573400
.003.0002 . ISBN 978-0-19-957340-0.
4. Sargent, Lyman Tower (2005). Rüsen,
Jörn; Fehr, Michael; Reiger, Thomas
W. (eds.). The Necessity of Utopian
Thinking: A cross-national
perspective. Thinking Utopia: Steps
into other worlds (Report). New York:
Berghahn Books. p. 11. ISBN 978-1-
57181-440-1.
5. Lodder, C.; Kokkori, M; Mileeva, M.
(2013). Utopian Reality:
Reconstructing culture in
revolutionary Russia and beyond.
Leiden, The Netherlands: Koninklijke
Brill NV. pp. 1–9. ISBN 978-90-04-
26320-8.
6. Frederick Engels. Socialism: Utopian
and Scientific.
7. http://maquinasdefuego.blogspot.co
m/2011/08/slavoj-zizek-on-
utopia.html
8. ŠIMEČKA, M. (1963): Sociálne utópie
a utopisti, Bratislava: Vydavateľstvo
Osveta
 9. Filozofický slovník 1977, s. 561
10. SŤAHEL, R. In: MICHALKOVÁ, R.:
Symposion: Utópie. Bratislava: RTVS.
2017
11. PERNÝ, L.: The idea of a social justice
in selected utopia concepts;
Triumvirát utopického socializmu:
Charles Fourier, Saint-Simon, Robert
Owen; Babeuf zvaný Gracchus,
organizátor sprisahania rovných;
Étienne-Gabriel Morelly, komunitárny
filozof, ktorý možno (ne)existoval;
Gabriel Bonnot de Mably, prirodzeno-
právny filozof osvietenstva, ktorý bol
vyškrtnutý z dejín filozofie.; Z knižnice
utopického socializmu: Tommaso
Campanella a utópia v znamení
Slnka; Z knižnice utopického
socializmu: Thomas More – Vizionár
utópie; Notes and Epilogue in Slovak
 edition of Francis Bacon's “New
Atlantis" In:
https://unipo.academia.edu/Luk%C3
%A1%C5%A1Pern%C3%BD
12. LEVITHAS, R.: The Concept of Utopia
13. WALLERSTEIN, I.: Utopisticks
14. JAMESON, F.: Archaeologies of the
Future
15. PERNÝ, L. (2019): Utópie a utopizmus
– univerzálny produkt ľudského
myslenia, kultúrno-umelecký text
alebo plán na spoločenskú reformu?
In:
https://www.pulib.sk/web/pdf/web/vi
ewer.html?
file=/web/kniznica/elpub/dokument/
Olostiak15/subor/14-SVUK-
zbornik.pdf , ISBN 978‐80‐555‐2236‐
4, s. 33–47
16. More, Travis; Vinod, Rohith (1989)
17. "Thomas More's Utopia" . www.bl.uk.
Retrieved 14 May 2017.
18. "Utopian Socialism" .
www.utopiaanddystopia.com. The
Utopian Socialism Movement.
Retrieved 14 May 2017.
19. Dalley, Jan (30 December 2015).
"Openings: Going back to Utopia" .
Financial Times. Retrieved 27 August
2018.
20. Kirk, Andrew G. (2007).
Counterculture Green: the Whole
Earth Catalog and American
environmentalism. University Press
of Kansas. p. 86. ISBN 978-0-7006-
1545-2.
21. For an example, see: Marshall, Alan
(2016). Ecotopia 2121: A vision of our
future green utopia. New York:
Arcade Publishers. ISBN 978-1-
62872-614-5.
22. de Geus, Marius (1996). Ecologische
utopieën - Ecotopia's en het
milieudebat. Uitgeverij Jan van Arkel.
23. "the Thaw - Soviet cultural history" .
Retrieved 14 May 2017.
24. Fries, Sylvia, The Urban Idea in
Colonial America, Chapters 3 and 5
25. Home, Robert, Of Planting and
Planning: The Making of British
Colonial Cities, 9
26. Wilson, Thomas, The Oglethorpe
Plan, Chapters 1 and 2
27. "America and the Utopian Dream –
Utopian Communities" . brbl-
archive.library.yale.edu. Retrieved
14 May 2017.
28. "For All the People: Uncovering the
Hidden History of Cooperation,
Cooperative Movements and
Communalism in America, 2nd
Edition" . secure.pmpress.org.
Retrieved 2017-04-26.
29. Robert Paul Sutton, Communal
Utopias and the American
Experience: Religious Communities
(2003) p. 38
30. Wollaston, Sam (2019-07-23). " 'Just
don't call it a cult': the strangely
alluring world of the Bruderhof" . The
Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077 . Retrieved
2019-08-01.
31. Quinn, David (2019-08-01). "A radical
experiment in Christian living" . The
Irish Catholic. Retrieved 2019-08-01.
32. Teuvo Peltoniemi (1984). "Finnish
Utopian Settlements in North
America" (PDF). sosiomedia.fi.
Retrieved 2008-10-12.
33. Joel B. Green, Jacqueline Lapsley,
Rebekah Miles, Allen Verhey, eds.
(2011). Dictionary of Scripture and
Ethics . Ada Township, Michigan:
Baker Books. p. 190 . ISBN 978-1-
4412-3998-3. "This goodness theme
is advanced most definitively through
the promise of a renewal of all
creation, a hope present in OT
prophetic literature (Isa. 65:17–25)
but portrayed most strikingly through
Revelation's vision of a “new heaven
and a new earth” (Rev. 21:1). There
the divine king of creation promises
to renew all of reality: “See, I am
making all things new” (Rev. 21:5)."
34. Steve Moyise, Maarten J.J. Menken,
eds. (2005). Isaiah in the New
Testament. The New Testament and
the Scriptures of Israel . London:
Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 201 .
ISBN 978-0-567-61166-6. "By alluding
to the new Creation prophecy of
Isaiah John emphasizes the
qualitatively new state of affairs that
will exist at God's new creative act. In
addition to the passing of the former
heaven and earth, John also asserts
that the sea was no more in 21:1c."
35. Inc., Internet Innovations,. "The Book
of the Secrets of Enoch, Chapters 1-
68" . reluctant-messenger.com.
Retrieved 14 May 2017.
36. Tierney, Helen (1999). Women's
Studies Encyclopedia. Greenwood
Publishing Group. p. 1442. ISBN 978-
0-313-31073-7.
37. Noah Berlatsky, "Imagine There's No
Gender: The Long History of Feminist
Utopian Literature," The Atlantic, April
15, 2013.
https://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/a
rchive/2013/04/imagine-theres-no-
gender-the-long-history-of-feminist-
utopian-literature/274993/
38. Attebery, p. 13.
39. Gaétan Brulotte & John
Phillips,Encyclopedia of Erotic
Literature, "Science Fiction and
Fantasy", CRC Press, 2006, p. 1189,
ISBN 1-57958-441-1
40. Martha A. Bartter, The Utopian
Fantastic, "Momutes", Robin Anne
Reid, p. 101 ISBN 0-313-31635-X
41. Martha A. Bartter, The Utopian
Fantastic, "Momutes", Robin Anne
Reid, p. 102
42. Haag, Herbert (1969). Is original sin
in Scripture? . New York: Sheed and
Ward. German or. ed.: 1966 .
43. (in German) Haag, Herbert (1966).
pp. 9, 49ff.
44. Cobham Brewer E. Brewer's
Dictionary of Phrase and Fable,
Odhams, London, 1932
45. Tian, Xiaofei (2010). "From the
Eastern Jin through the Early Tang
(317–649)". The Cambridge History
of Chinese Literature. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press. p. 221.
ISBN 978-0-521-85558-7.
46. Berkowitz, Alan J. (2000). Patterns of
Disengagement: the Practice and
Portrayal of Reclusion in Early
Medieval China. Stanford: Stanford
University Press. p. 225. ISBN 978-0-
8047-3603-9.
47. Longxi, Zhang (2005). Allegoresis:
Reading Canonical Literature East
and West. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press. p. 182. ISBN 978-0-8014-4369-
5.
48. Longxi, Zhang (2005). Allegoresis:
Reading Canonical Literature East
and West. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press. pp. 182–183. ISBN 978-0-
8014-4369-5.
49. Longxi, Zhang (2005). Allegoresis:
Reading Canonical Literature East
and West. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press. p. 183. ISBN 978-0-8014-4369-
5.
50. Gu, Ming Dong (2006). Chinese
Theories of Fiction: A Non-Western
Narrative System. Albany: State
University of New York Press. p. 59.
ISBN 978-0-7914-6815-9.
51. Heller, Nathan (2018-07-02). "Who
Really Stands to Win from Universal
Basic Income?" . ISSN 0028-792X .
Retrieved 2019-08-25.
52. "Are Danes Really That Happy? The
Myth Of The Scandinavian Utopia" .
NPR.org. Retrieved 2019-08-25.

References
Two Kinds of Utopia, (1912) by Vladimir
Lenin. www.marxists.org/archive/lenin
/works/1912/oct/00.htm
Development of Socialism from Utopia
to Science (1870?) by Friedrich Engels.
Ideology and Utopia: an Introduction to
the Sociology of Knowledge (1936), by
Karl Mannheim, translated by Louis
Wirth and Edward Shils. New York,
Harcourt, Brace. See original, Ideologie
Und Utopie, Bonn: Cohen.
Utopian Thought in the Western World
(1979), by Frank E. Manuel & Fritzie
Manuel. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 0-674-
93185-8
California's Utopian Colonies (1983), by
Robert V. Hine. University of California
Press. ISBN 0-520-04885-7
The Principle of Hope (1986), by Ernst
Bloch. See original, 1937–41, Das
Prinzip Hoffnung
Demand the Impossible: Science Fiction
and the Utopian Imagination (1986) by
Tom Moylan. London: Methuen, 1986.
Utopia and Anti-utopia in Modern Times
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The Concept of Utopia (1990), by Ruth
Levitas. London: Allan.
Utopianism (1991), by Krishnan Kumar.
Milton Keynes: Open University Press.
ISBN 0-335-15361-5
La storia delle utopie (1996), by
Massimo Baldini. Roma: Armando.
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The Utopia Reader (1999), edited by
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Sargent. New York: New York University
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Spirit of Utopia (2000), by Ernst Bloch.
See original, Geist Der Utopie, 1923.
El País de Karu o de los tiempos en que
todo se reemplazaba por otra cosa
(2001), by Daniel Cerqueiro. Buenos
Aires: Ed. Peq. Ven. ISBN 987-9239-12-1
Archaeologies of the Future: The Desire
Called Utopia and Other Science
Fictions (2005) by Fredric Jameson.
London: Verso.
Utopianism: A Very Short Introduction
(2010), by Lyman Tower Sargent.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Defined by a Hollow: Essays on Utopia,
Science Fiction and Political
Epistemology (2010) by Darko Suvin.
Frankfurt am Main, Oxford and Bern:
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Existential Utopia: New Perspectives on
Utopian Thought (2011), edited by
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London & New York: Continuum. ISBN 1-
4411-6921-0
 "Galt's Gulch: Ayn Rand's Utopian
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Utopia

 "Utopia"  . Catholic Encyclopedia.

1913.
Utopia – The Columbia Encyclopedia,
Sixth Edition, 2001
Intentional Communities Directory
History of 15 Finnish utopian
settlements in Africa, the Americas,
Asia, Australia and Europe.
Towards Another Utopia of The City
Institute of Urban Design, Bremen,
Germany
Ecotopia 2121: A Vision of Our Future
Green Utopia – in 100 Cities.
Utopias – a learning resource from the
British Library
Utopia of the GOOD An essay on
Utopias and their nature.
Review of Ehud Ben ZVI, Ed. (2006).
Utopia and Dystopia in Prophetic
Literature. Helsinki: The Finnish
Exegetical Society. A collection of
articles on the issue of utopia and
dystopia.
The story of Utopias Mumford, Lewis
[1] North America
[2] Europe
Utopian Studies academic journal
Matthew Pethers. "Utopia" . Words of
the World. Brady Haran (University of
Nottingham).
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