Abstract

This article argues that Mannheim's work contains three distinct accounts of utopia. Two of these - utopia in its classical meaning as opposition to the given and utopia in its association with democratic planning - are well known. The third is found in Mannheim's reflections on the problem of ecstasy. In suggesting a utopia of individualist self-defnition and `pure relationship' it anticipates the recent writings of Beck, Bauman and Giddens