In May we talked about the “pursuit of happiness”. Hence, we were once again inspired by the US Constitution. Moreover, happiness is often regarded as everybody’s daily objective and the “pursuit of happiness” has been part of international pop-culture for a long time. Therefore, we would like to discuss our perspectives on happiness in our personal life but also what happiness means for a society, especially if ones most prominent legal document constitutes happiness as a major goal and human right. 

As always we were guided through the discussion by some texts that we discover after a brief and relatively random research, these were our references:

Hannah Arendt on Action and the Pursuit of Happiness | Brain Pickings (Maria Popova)

Our ‘Pursuit of Happiness’ Is Killing the Planet | The New York Times (James Traub)

The Lost Meaning of The Pursuit of Happiness (Arthur M. Schlesinger)

The Pursuit of Happiness: What the Founders Meant –And Didn’t | The Atlantic (Kathleen Kennedy Townsend)

Were we happier in the stone age? | The Guardian (Yuval Noah Harari)

What the Declaration of Independence really means by ‘pursuit of happiness’ | Emory University