Suicide : The Hidden Side of Modernity

In this major new study Christian Baudelot and Roger Establetprovide a timely and wide-ranging account of the changing nature ofsuicide in the world today. The suicide rate is soaring in theformer Communist bloc, in India and in China, which now has thehighest female suicide rate in the world. This rise coincides withthose countries accelerated entry into a period of brutalmodernization. In the developed countries of the West, suiciderates are rising fastest amongst young men and those social groupsthat are furthest down the social scale. How can we explain thesetrends and what do they tell us about modern societies? The social impact of suicide has preoccupied sociologists fromEmile Durkheim onwards. For Durkheim, the rising suicide rate wasan effect of the rise of modernity and the individualism, growingaffluence and increased anomie that accompanied it. Baudelot andEstablet draw upon Durkheim and his successor Maurice Halbwachs toargue that classic sociological theories of suicide require somemodification. The link between suicide, affluence and individualismis more complex: suicide rates do reflect broad social trends butthey are also influenced by the structural position and livedexperience of small social groups. The notion of social well-beingis demonstrated to be a key factor in changes in suicide rates.Whilst it is well-known that sociology cannot explain whyindividuals commit suicide, the suicide of individuals and themicro-groups to which they belong can tell us a lot about thesocieties in which they live.