Of course, no such utopias have ever existed in real life and in most stories, the society turns out to be very imperfect indeed, usually a nightmare. The author believes (or at least wants to explore the possibility) that a society following a pure form of their philosophy would be without flaws. Many utopias are based on a particular political, social, or economic philosophy. When you come across a utopian story or image, try to work out what kind of moral, political, or scientific ideal is being explored.Īll these utopias use and explore questionable morals or ethics, such as the genetic perfection of human beings. They might be about political ethics, environmental ethics, religious ethics, or the ethics of science.

On the other hand, a libertarian utopia would be a society based on perfect freedom and individualism. These stories can be a great way to test out such philosophies by seeing how they would actually affect people in practice. For example, an eco-utopia would be a story exploring the concept of a society based on perfect harmony with nature. Utopian stories are generally written to explore ideas about how society should or could be. However, it may seem far from perfect to us– for example, Plato’s society outlawed music! In fact, scholars still debate whether Plato really meant it to be a true utopia or whether he meant is as a criticism of utopian ideals, like most such stories. In The Republic, Plato describes his perfect society. Of course, the planets at the fringes of Federation space are far less utopian. The central worlds of ‘The Federation’ in Star Trek are often depicted as utopias – they are lush with greenery and beautiful architecture, and there is no evidence of any hunger, poverty, or war. Utopian literature is generally about exploring real problems facing our world and making political, philosophical, or moral points through storytelling. Almost all of them are revealed to be the opposite of utopia-dystopia-during the course of the story. However, very few fictional utopias are true utopias.

Utopias are very common in fiction, especially in science fiction, where authors use them to explore what a perfect society would look like and what the problems might be in such a flawless society. A perfect society in which everything works and everyone is happy – or at least is supposed to be. A utopia (pronounced you-TOE-pee-yuh) is a paradise.

Utopia definition