Hopousia; or The Sexual and Economic Foundations of a New Society

1940 Unwin, J[ohn] D[aniel] (1895-1936). Hopousia; or The Sexual and Economic Foundations of a New Society. London: George Allen and Unwin. U.S. ed. New York: O. Piest, 1940. Written in 1935 and 1936 intended as a sequel to his Sex and Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1934) and published posthumously as he left it. An extract was published as Our Economic Problems and Their Solution. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1944. 148 pp. DLC, L, PSt

Detailed nonfictional eutopia with the emphasis on its sexual and economic foundations, but the whole is presented as an experiment. The author argues that a good society needs very energetic people and that will require reformed sexual and economic systems. Sexually energy comes from restraint, and he proposes two types of marriage, one that is strictly monogamous and one that is not, although with the possibility of moving between the two. Economically, capitalism must be eliminated together with private ownership of land and replaced with a form of guild socialism. The word “Hopousia” is derived from the Greek for where. There is an “Introduction” (13-29) by Aldous Huxley, who argues that while the basic institutions are sound, the approach is overly simple.