'Emancipatory catastrophism' — why being scared works wonders

German sociologist Ulrich Beck was an incorrigible optimist. It is unfortunate that he died early, in 2015, at just 70 years old. Beck would undoubtedly have said and written fascinating things about our current times full of turbulence, struggles and uncertainties that we have not experienced in this intensity for a long time — and how we react to them.

In his last book, Die Metamorphose der W...