A theoretically rich strand of Enlightenment’s critical inquiry about global oppression, which comprises texts by (among others) Rousseau, Diderot, Adam
Smith, Kant, and Cugoano, diagnosed a deep set of pathologies at work in the modern, interconnected, commercial globe from the 1490s onward, well before
the emergence of the modern world. In these eighteenth-century texts, the global condition is best considered as a contemptuous self-criticism that can be
characterized as self-hatred. The dystopic quality of these writings consists not of an imagined and feared future, but first and foremost of the realities of the
past and the present. I will discuss three levels of self-criticism: The first is about sedentary, agrarian societies (sometimes known as civil societies or as ‘civilizations’), which analyzes both their internal hierarchical characteristics and external (usually bellicose and imperial) relations. The second level concerns modern Europe’s global relations with the non-European world; the focus is often upon the development of oceanic, transcontinental practices. The third level considers humanity itself as a species at every moment of its history, in particularly inflamed and corrupted ways as a result of the first and second levels of analysis, humanity’s proclivity to engage in—and to institutionalize—various forms of de humanization.