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Philosophical Writings
followed the decline of feudalism in Western Europe. It sees modern societies now as a global phenomenon and modern world as the unexpected and unpredicted outcome of, not one, but a series of major historical transitions."25 The term, in its common sense, means recent or up-to-date. India and all most all the developing countries of the world, is passing through a number of emigrant social forces and contradictory processes which are radically reshaping its societies into modern societies, today.
The three key cultural themes in transition to modernity, as mentioned in the formation of Modernity Volumes, are : First, the shift from a religious to secular world view, and from 'sacred' to a ‘profane' foundation for social and moral values; Second, the role which religion played in the formation of the spirit of capitalism - the protestant ethics; and Third, the growing awareness among western philosophers and social theorist at the costs of modern culture - what Freud - called civilization's discontent'. This has made us notice the following main characteristics of the modern society, i) The dominance of secular power political power and authority and conception of sovereignty and legitimacy; ii) A monetarized exchange economy, based on the large scale production and consumption of commodities for the market, extensive ownership of private property and accumulation of capital on a systematic, large term basis, iii) the decline of traditional social order and the appearance of a dynamic social and sexual division of labour; iv) the decline of religious world view typical of traditional societies and rise of secular and materialistic culture, exhibiting those individualistic, rationalist and instrumental impulses now so familiar to us. To these we can add two more: v) the emergence of modern societies was marked by the birth of a new intellectual and cognitive world; and vi) construction of cultural and social identities as part of the formation process”. 26
Today, “the post modernism” is challenging the old “modernism”. “It seems, society is seized with and pervaded by the idea of ceaseless development, progress and dynamic change.
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