The Movement for Happiness

When I refer to the “happiness movement” in my book it is a slightly jokey way of describing those who argue that happiness should be the over-riding goal for individuals or society. But even before the book is published I find a Movement for Happiness is being launched in Britain.

The driving forces behind it are more-or-less the same people I referred to as belonging to the happiness movement. They could also be fairly described as elite figures in British society: Richard Layard (a Labour life peer and also married to another life peer, old Etonian, adviser to the last government, professor at the London School of Economics), Anthony Seldon (the master of Wellington College [a posh private school]) and Geoff Mulgan (the head of the prime minister’s policy unit under Tony Blair).

Today’s Observer ran an article by Catherine Bennett about it while Richard Layard had a piece about it in the Times Literary Supplement in March.

It is a fitting movement for those who are happy to reconcile themselves to austerity.