ABSTRACT
Karl Popper and F. A. Hayek generally deprecate the experience of emotional solidarity. It smacks of "tribal society," the closed group united by the endeavour to achieve a shared and specific goal, and thus sharing the same hopes, fears, disappointments, and triumphs in that endeavour. Elements of emotional solidarity continue to exist in small groups within the Open or Great Society which rises above it and which is certainly not founded upon it. Michael Polanyi, in contrast to Popper and Hayek, does recognise the emotional basis of human life, thought, and of society. The difference between a free and an unfree society does not lie in the bonds of emotional unity of the latter and the lack of them in the former. Indeed, modern totalitarian states have lacked such unity which is why they had to invest so much effort in propaganda and parades to whip it up.
