Source: The post Affection economy returns communities to the center of power has been created, based on the article “The affection economy” published in “Indian Express” on 21st August 2025. Affection economy returns communities to the center of power.
UPSC Syllabus Topic: GS Paper 1- Society And Gs paper3-Developmental model across the world
Context: Power in each era rests on a core currency. Today, affection — via communities, kinship, and cohorts — shapes value, alliances, and growth. Digital change and pandemic isolation weakened old bonds and elevated communities, turning care and belonging into assets.
For detailed information on Why state must cede power to communities read this article here
The Affection Economy: Concept and Stakes
- From older currencies to care: Earlier ages prized land, minerals, demography, and innovation. Now success depends on affection. It guides purpose and determines power.
2. Building blocks of cooperation: Cohorts, kinships, and communities are the units that create value. Curating and nurturing them is a critical capability.
3. Attention and data are not enough: Past decades birthed the attention and data economies. A divided world now needs affection as the binding force.
International Relations and Soft Power
- Like-mindedness as strategy: Nations seek “like-minded” partners. Shared purpose sustains direction and trust, even amid turbulence from the current American president.
2. Networks define leadership: What separates countries today is the networks they lead. Affection capital builds and protects these networks.
3. China, the US, and ceilings: China is respected but not loved, limiting its rise. The US had no such ceiling until it built one for itself.
4. Running down stored capital: The United States long relied on private actors to cultivate affection. President Donald Trump is rapidly depleting that reserve.
Corporate and State Playbooks
- Competing for affection: Firms and states now expand through empathetic engagement and care. Both vie to be embraced by communities.
2. Dubai’s curated cohorts: Dubai designs visas and growth policies to assemble a “golden cohort.” The aim is to make people like, fly, buy, and live Dubai.
3. Other national models: The UAE is a leading example. Germany, Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore also build soft power around communities of interest.
4. Indian and American cases: Dhirubhai Ambani’s stakeholder capitalism rallied co-owners and now yields a data-equity community, taking broadband to the bottom of the pyramid. Apple scaled global networks that look to California for inspiration.
Roots in Social Capital
- Digital flattening and fragile bonds: Technology replaced neighborhood and workplace ties with diffuse online connections. Individualisation advanced for decades.
2. Putnam’s warning: In Bowling Alone, Robert Putnam argued that social capital was declining. Civic consciousness fell with it.
3. Trust as an economic engine: Francis Fukuyama’s Trust showed how social capital creates trust, and how trust drives stability and growth.
4. Dark substitutes for community: Putnam notes that extreme movements offer imitation communities. Steve Bannon cited Bowling Alone as inspiration for a political cure to isolation.
Covid and the New Primacy of Community
- Pandemic as accelerant: Covid deepened isolation and weakened workplaces. It elevated the solo actor.
2. Two sides of one coin: The digital nomad and the lone-wolf terrorist show two outcomes of the same shift.
3. What the future rewards: Those who understand that communities again matter most will lead. Prosperity flows from care and belonging.
4. A governing maxim: “Vasudhaiva kutumbakam” captures this turn: One Earth, One Family, One Future. It is time to return to affection.
Question for practice:
Examine how the affection economy reshapes power through communities and trust, with examples from Dubai, the United States, China, and India?
