Rutger Bregman is one of Europe’s most prominent young historians. Utopia for Realists, his book on universal basic income, was a Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller and has been translated from the Dutch into thirty-two languages. Rutger has twice been nominated for the prestigious European Press Prize for his work at The Correspondent, and his writing has also been featured in the Washington Post and the Guardian. His TED talk, ‘Poverty isn’t a lack of character; it’s a lack of cash’, has been watched more than three million times.
Rutger’s latest book is called Humankind: A Hopeful History, and he has kindly agreed to answer a few of our burning questions about it. Read on!
Rutger Bregman (Photo by Stephan Vanfleteren)
Tell us about your book, Humankind: A Hopeful History!
RB: It’s a book about a radical, subversive and dangerous idea: that most people are pretty decent.
What inspired you to write this book?
RB: For centuries Western culture has been permeated by the idea that we humans are just selfish creatures. That cynical image of man has been proclaimed in many places – in films and novels, in history books and in scientific research. But in the last twenty years, scientists from all over the world and from many disciplines have switched to a more hopeful view of mankind. This development is still so young that researchers often don’t even know about each other. Or as a prominent psychologist cried out when I told her about new trends in biology: ‘Oh God, so it’s happening there as well?’
Why is the idea that humans are kind and altruistic by nature so radical?
RB: If people can’t trust each other, then they need hierarchy. Then they need kings and generals, managers and CEOs to keep each other in check. If people have actually evolved to be friendly and cooperate, then we can revolutionise our society.
What do you think the wider implications of changing our beliefs about human nature would be?
RB: What you assume in other people is what you get out of them. If we assume that most people are pretty decent, we can organise our schools, workplaces, democracies and even prisons in a totally different way. In Norway they have a prison system where inmates are treated like people, and they have the freedom to work, play and make music together. The result? Norway has the lowest recidivism rate in the world – the lowest chance that someone will commit another crime after getting out of prison. So these friendly prisons are also the most realistic, most effective prisons out there.
Your book reframes famous events in world history to show readers how human nature can be trusting and benevolent. Could you talk us through one example?
RB: One event, which isn’t as famous but took me to Australia, was the example I discovered of the real-life Lord of the Flies. This took me on a journey to Byron Bay where I met Captain Peter Warner, a sailor who rescued 6 Tongan boys who were marooned on a deserted island for over a year in 1966. Instead of becoming brutal savages like in the fictional Lord of the Flies, Captain Warner wrote in his memoirs, ‘the boys had established a small commune, with a vegetable garden, hollowed out tree trunks to collect water, a gym with some unusual weights, a badminton court, chicken coops and a permanent fire.’
I also interviewed one of the boys who is now nearing 70 and still best friends with Peter, his rescuer! I asked him how they managed to survive on the island without any in-fighting and arguments. He told me that they agreed to work in teams of two, drawing up a strict roster for garden, kitchen, and guard duty. Sometimes they quarrelled, but whenever that happened, they solved it by imposing a time-out. The squabblers would go to opposite ends of the island to cool their tempers, and he said ‘after four hours or so, we’d bring them back together. Then we’d say “OK, now apologise to each other.” That’s how we stayed friends.’
William Golding’s classic work The Lord of the Flies is completely made up, yet this book is still upheld as a ‘realistic’ narrative. However, the real Lord of the Flies is a story about friendship and loyalty, a story that show how much we can achieve when we cooperate.
Has the global response to the coronavirus pandemic validated or challenged your way of thinking?
RB: I’m not sure yet. It’s too early to say. The first signs are hopeful though. The vast majority of the behaviour that we’re seeing right now is prosocial. Sure, there is some hoarding and egoism, but most people are willing to help each other.
Does Humankind build on any of the ideas from your previous book, Utopia for Realists? Can they be read in conversation with each other?
RB: Yes, very much so! In Utopia for Realists, I talk about the idea of a universal basic income – giving everyone a monthly grant that’s enough to pay for your basic needs. There’s a huge amount of scientific evidence that this actually works. And the idea presupposes a more optimistic view of human nature.
What are some of your recent favourite books?
RB: I loved Difficult Women by Helen Lewis, it’s a brilliant history of feminism in Great Britain. Why We’re Polarized by Ezra Klein about America’s broken democracy was also a real eye-opener. Oh, and I just started re-reading Harry Potter for the zillionth time.
What do you hope readers discover in Humankind?
RB: I hope it will give readers what writing the book gave me: hope for the future.
And finally, what’s up next for you?
RB: Book tour! Really looking forward to talk about the ideas in my book with readers from around the globe.
Thanks Rutger!
—Humankind by Rutger Bregman (Bloomsbury Books Australia) is out on the 19th of May.
Find out more about Rutger here.
Humankind
A Hopeful History
It's a belief that unites the left and right, psychologists and philosophers, writers and historians. It drives the headlines that surround us and the laws that touch our lives. From Machiavelli to Hobbes, Freud to Dawkins, the roots of this belief have sunk deep into Western thought. Human beings, we're taught, are by nature selfish and governed by self-interest.
Humankind makes a new argument - that it is realistic, as well as revolutionary, to assume that people are good...
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