The key to the understanding of the main currents of thought-ways and work-ways in the world of today is the phenomenon of modernity. The principal defining characteristic of modernity is the assertion that it is man qua natural man who is the source of meaning and order in the world. The consequent dedivinization has meant, among other things, the organization and functioning of political life and relations in India, as it is elsewhere else in the world are inspired by, grounded in and informed by secular values. This, as it turns out, proves only a chimera and a hope that ever slips out of the greedy hands of man in the modern times. The search for virtue through the process of modernization proves only elusive since the constitutive principle undergirding the management of pragmatic affairs of man today is the pursuit of private passions. This pursuit introduces a mismatch between what is good for one individual and what is good for all individuals. This mismatch is reflected in all the areas of human existence: in culture, in social life and relations, in the functioning of the government, etc. Efforts to overcome this mismatch or, at least neutralize its effects on personal lives and collective relations prove ineffective. It is the character of this mismatch as well as futile efforts to overcome it that forms the subject-matter of Politics and Society.
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