The conviction of the inevitable: Collapsism and collective action in contemporary rural France

Abstract

The idea of a possible collapse of thermo-industrial societies became more prominent during the 2010s, particularly in France. The present article investigates this phenomenon by focusing more specifically on the belief on which it is based: the conviction of the inevitable. How does this conviction, which mixes cognitive and emotional registers, come to grasp certain individuals? And what do these people do with it? Contrary to various studies in the social sciences, the ethnographic observation of two collectives that have been affected by this conviction and have settled in the French countryside makes it possible to draw the contours of authentic collective actions. The article also shows how this conviction arises or is reinforced, emphasizing the potential importance of certain personal experiences and certain structural tendencies characteristic of contemporary democratic societies. More generally, studying the conviction of the inevitable in the context of collective actions also helps to identify snippets of imaginaries and practices that are developing in the shadow of the Anthropocene.