This paper discusses ethnomethodology's program in relation to the phenomenological life-world analysis of Alfred Schutz. A recent publication of Garfinkel's early writings sheds new light on how he made use of phenomenological reflections in order to create a new sociological approach. Garfinkel used Schutz's life-world analysis as a source of inspiration, called for 'misreading' in the sense of an alternate reading and developed a new, empirical approach to the analysis of social order which he called 'ethnomethodology'. Ethnomethodologists usually acknowledge the (...) historical importance of Schutz but emphasize that Garfinkel succeeded to overcome the limitations of phenomenological analyses and moved beyond. This view has spread above all in the Anglosaxon countries. In German sociology, Schutz's life-world analysis still has a much stronger standing than ethnomethodology and is interpreted as a systematic whole. Following Luckmann, it is discussed as a protosociological foundation of the methodology of social sciences or, following Srubar, as a philosophical anthropology with two poles: a subjective and a social, pragmatic pole. Both versions claim to analyze the meaningful constitution of the social world, to serve as a foundation of sociological methodology and to provide guidelines for an `adequate' sociology. While Garfinkel used phenomenological concepts for sociological analysis, Luckmann clearly distinguishes the two: you either do phenomenology (protosociology) or you do sociology (a theoretically guided, empirical sociology of knowledge). This paper describes the present-day debate in German sociology and compares ethnomethodology's program with these interpretations of Schutz's life-world analysis. (shrink)

For Protosociology the "Diskurs "-theory has a special significance. Validity-dimensions of speech and their evaluation in the procedure of argumentation indicate generalized presuppositions of interactive processes. These validity-dimensions can be reconstructed in lingusitic characterisations of "normative language" (P.W. Taylor). Thus it is possible to make first steps to a theory of validity. Protosociology provides a special reconstruction of argumentative speech on the level "interpersonality, structure of communicative acting and collective identity". The aim of Protosociology within a context (...) of problems of "Diskurs"-theory would have to establish normative values for an evaluation of such validity-dimensions. A logic of "Diskurs" would have to be developed as a kind of logic of "relevance". (shrink)

Margaret Gilbert has recently argued in ProtoSociology against what she called my rejectionist’s view according to which (i) we have to make a distinction between the intentional states of believing and accepting and (ii) genuine group beliefs, i.e. group beliefs that cannot be reduced to the beliefs of the individual members of a group, should be understood in terms of the acceptance of a view rather than of beliefs proper. In this reply I discuss Gilbert’s objections.

Assuming the importance of Alfred Schutz’s “protosociology” in social theory as a given, the paper tries to explore its philosophical core, treating Schutz’s sociophenomenology as an answer to the most fundamental questions of phenomenology, such as evidence and phenomenological reduction. It analyses Schutz’s point of departure – the problematization of Max Weber’s concept of the meaning of social action and its deepening by means of Henri Bergson’s and Edmund Husserl’s notion of time – and tries to unravel the double (...) structure of consciousness, revealing increasingly its complex temporal character. Brentano’s and Husserl’s double intentionality, seeming to offer a kind of “decent realism” in modern philosophical context, in Schutz turns out to be marked by the profound pastness of reflexive consciousness, reaching the primary stream experience only by means of primary and secondary acts of remembrance, re-effectuated intersubjectively in acts of phantasying about future, thus constituting the very core of meaning, with its reference to external objects. It appears that only analysing this mode of phantasying in reference to its motives that we can solve the conundrum of realism in its modern shape. (shrink)

"This book represents a continuation of the research project in philosophy of language and semantics represented in the journal "Protosociology" at the J. W. ...

Friendship, as a unique form of social relationship, establishes a particular union among individual human beings which allows them to overcome diverse boundaries between individual subjects. Age, gender or cultural differences do not necessarily constitute an obstacle for establishing friendship and as a social phenomenon, it might even include the potential to exist independently of space and time. This analysis in the interface of social science and phenomenology focuses on the principles of construction and constitution of this specific form of (...) human encounter. In a “parallel action,” the perspective of social science focuses on concrete socio-historical constructions of friendship in different time periods. These findings are confronted with the description of principles of the subjective constitution of the phenomenon of “friendship” from a phenomenological perspective. The point of reference for the study is the real type of the symbolically established and excessively idealized form of friendship intended for eternity which was especially popular in eighteenth century Germany. Analogous to the method of phenomenological reduction, three different levels of protosociological reduction are developed for the exploration of the unique social phenomenon of friendship. (shrink)

In this essay I preface a discussion of “indifferent” globality, as seen in the agency of microbes and smart machines, and populism as an exemplar of tensions in local-global entanglements, with a brief excursus on the what exercises current scholarship on the global. The whole is written with Protosociology’s 30 year engagement with hard questions in social theory in mind.

Anti-naturalistic critics of Unity of Science have often tried to establish a fundamental difference between social and physical science on the grounds that research in the social field (unlike physical research) seems to interfere with the original situations so as to make accurate predictions impossible. A 'social' prediction may, e.g., itself influence the course of events so that the prediction proves false. H. A. Simon has dealt with such effects of predictions in a well-known article. Drawing on a mathematical theorem, (...) Brouwer's so-called fixed-point theorem, he claims to prove that reactions to published predictions can be accounted for so that appropriately adjusted predictions can avoid being self-destructive. The present article is an attempt to show that Simon's use of the Brouwer theorem is misplaced, and that his proof does not parry the anti-naturalistic argument. Indeed, the burden of his proof is not really of a mathematical, but, it is argued, of a 'protosociological' kind. In conclusion, the article points to the fundamental inadequacy of a frame of reference which makes the 'interference' or 'reaction' effects due to people's having access to social knowledge appear strange or eccentric: as some kind of marginal irregularity causing trouble in the philosophy of (social) science. (shrink)

"This book represents a continuation of the research project in philosophy of language and semantics represented in the journal "Protosociology" at the J. W. ...

Understanding human action is framed in a picture of the rational person. Protosociology identifies - in a hypothetical approach - generalized presuppositions (Vorverständnis) of the "objects" and "experience" of social science. Protosociology studies society (-ies) and human action from the basis of the following levels: Decentralisation and universalisation of world- picturing; Lifeworld-background and systemprocesses; Properties of structural evolution of societies; Interpersonality, structure of communicative acting and collective identity and Personality.Theorizing on these levels means mapping pictures of structural dimension (...) of action process and the limitation of agency through culturalsocial, personal, and natural resources. So it is recognition, that no absolute disposition is given about the limitation of action and elementary social regulation, norms, and institutions. However, break-downs in these spheres can be identified.The basic-principle of Protosociology is that all creatures who have propositional attitudes and the ability to act intentionally (voluntarily) are examples of application of the standard (norm) of rationality. Hypothesizing about other persons viz. understanding their utterance and ascription of all attitudes are mediated, and given on the level of language behaviour and their utilitarized competences and abilities. The focus of mapping are such examples to whom to ascribe the procedure of any social intercourse.This level is the basis for methodical construction and reconstruction of Protosociology and the Frankfurt version of action (speech act) theory. This version starts from cognition, that the concept of meaning cannot be understood completely, independent of propositional truth, normative correctness and person as primitive concept. Beliefs, illocutionary acts (doings) and propositional structure of language (saying that...) are fundamental features of the basic knowledge of this approach. But Protosociology does not claim that understanding social reality is committed to a sociologism or linguistic community semantic as overall viewpoint of agency, reasoning, and understanding. (shrink)

У статті автор аналізує твір "Казка бочки" Джонатана Свіфта, виділяючи соціально-філософські та протосоціологічні тези мислителя. При цьому проводиться думка про те, що сам Дж. Свіфт, безумовно, є не лише відомим літератором, а й оригінальним філософом доби Просвітництва, сатиричні твори якого містять висновки, цікаві для сучасних дослідників.

The notions of failure and denial are co-constitutive of both “global” theory and social order. Though these concepts have been used to evoke an array of metaphors and images to under­stand the condition of international relations as a knowledge production site and in rela­tion to other social sciences, they have not been deemed pivotal for much theorizing of world politics’ events, including the “success” of a sovereign state, or the subjects and knowledge production of decolonial realities. The article critically assesses (...) how the term failure is used by IR’s scholarly community as signifier and analogy and what it signifies and analogizes. It grapples with Bruno Latour’s “The Immense Cry Channeled” by Pope Francis and ‘“Love your Monsters.’” It concludes with a discussion of the ethics of critical theory and its empha­sis on critique. I problematize its critical moves to lodge racializations in the enslaved and colonized body and body politic of ‘failed’ states, and the normative projects it bolsters. I also point to its broader social and political implications, including its acknowledging of certain publics at the expense of others and its death limits in times of terror and the Anthropocene. I finally argue for a ‘global’ decolonizing social analysis that in an Fanonian sense, is a “real leap” as it introduces “invention into existence” by rupturing evolutionary trajectories and linear temporalities (i.e., pure immanence, or transcendentalism). (shrink)

The standard view of rationality distinguishes between instrumental rationality and the rationality of ends. We discuss this conception briefly before introducing an alternative theory. According to it, means and ends are interconnected so that the means will produce the ends. In other words, the means are used to shape our ends. We describe and discuss this view, asking whether it can be called rationality. It is clear that this alternative view has many irrational features. But at the same time it (...) is clear that much of our technological culture is based on this view so that also it is hampered by the emerging irrationality. We conclude by discussing the case of genetic engineering as a technology we cannot possibly accept. Its characteristic ends may be of a wrong type. (shrink)

Against the backdrop of China’s rapid social change in recent decades, this article explores the social categorizations of class and citizenship and how these have evolved in terms of structure and discourse. In order to do so, possibilities of employing Beck’s theory of second modernity to the case of China are explored. While China does not fit into Beck’s theory on all accounts, it is argued here that his individualization thesis can be fruitfully employed to make sense of China’s ongoing (...) process of modernization. It may provide a welcome new starting point for analyses of China’s current social developments beyond the “simple” modernization theories that still dominate in China studies. (shrink)

In Davidson’s opinion, the model of triangulation, which is a situation where two or more sufficiently similar interacting creatures respond to one another within a shared external environment, can give explanation to how concepts and mental contents are acquired and also clarify their very nature. In this paper, I will explore the model of triangulation, its various levels, and its specific role in concept acquisition. I will then assess the plausibility of Davidson’s account and suggest a few possible amendments to (...) the model of triangulation, in order to make it effective in explaining the process of concept acquisition. Finally, I will argue that the model of triangulation cannot be disconnected from holism and will briefly sketch some consequences of this claim. (shrink)

The paper tries first to show that P. Strawson’s and J. Searle’s proposal of explicating the illocutionary meaning of speech-acts in terms of the conditions of fulfilment or satisfaction is unsatisfactory. It provides no full understanding of the meaning of speech-acts, at least not of non-constative acts, as e.g. orders, requests, demands, confessions, promisses, etc.; for, through its quasi-verificationist horizon, it provides no unterstanding of the illocutionary force in terms of the conditions of accepting the validity-claims that are connected with (...) the performance of the act. Thus far the paper complies with Habermas’ approach. There remains however an ambiguity with regard to the good reasons for accepting a speech-act, since on the level of life-world communication and interaction not only validity-claims and pertinent arguments but also threats and offers are functioning as socially binding illocutionary forces. How is it possible to show by a cogent argument that openly strategical acts as offers and threats cannot fulfill the role of providing good reasons for accepting speech-acts in the sense of unrestricted Verständigung but are parasitic upon non-strategical ways of consensual communication by understanding and accepting validity-claims?The paper argues that this suggestive contention cannot be proved, i.e. grounded by a descriptive analysis of the normal function of communicative actions in the life-world but only - indeed - by transcendental pragmatic reflection on the normative conditions of argumentative discourse which cannot be denied without committing a performative self-contradiction. (shrink)

Almost a half century has passed since the appearance of The Politics of Modernization, (Apter, 1965) an analysis purporting to treat political development in terms of structural-functional theory. Since that time the world has virtually turned upside down. Modernization theory itself has all but disappeared. In part this has been for good reasons. Its three frames, social change in general, industrialization, in particular, and modernization as an aspect of the first resulting from the consequences of the second, contained too many (...) far from warranted assumptions, especially about the prospects of integrative order. Indeed, so much have the problematic questions changed that subsequent efforts to bring back at least of its principles have not had much success. In some ways this is a great pity. I believe it had greater depth and theoretical power than its critics have given it credit for. Accordingly I want to suggest some of the ideas that were most germane to modernization theory as it was practiced in the sixties of the last century and comment briefly on a few of theoretical characteristics. I will do so in three parts. Part I will outline of the ingredients and concerns of modernization theorists sketching its intellectual pedigree. Part II will examine particular schools and approaches to modernization. Part III will address some questions about modernization today suggesting new ways to examine them. (shrink)

Many mathematicians have sought ‘pure’ proofs of theorems. There are different takes on what a ‘pure’ proof is, though, and it’s important to be clear on their differences, because they can easily be conflated. In this paper I want to distinguish between two of them.

This paper analyzes the central relation between publicity, linguistic meaning, and the mental in the light of philosophical issues concerning intentionality. The concept of intentionality provides a way to articulate how the determinants of linguistic meaning are both public and private. A strength of this approach is that it accommodates desiderata of explaining compositionality and successful communication that initially seemed at odds with each other. A further benefit is that thinking about the case of linguistic meaning can help re-focus our (...) understanding of the metaphysical status of the intentional objects of our thoughts. (shrink)

In this article I will address the critical question of the constitution of global systems and the part played in such processes by what is often summarized as culture. I examine the important distinction between culture and globalization and culture as constitutive of global social relations. The need to cleave to a systemic treatment of globality is put, while noting the dangers that lie in one-dimensional accounts of global system constitution. To offset any such tendency I explore the constitution of (...) global systemness from a structurationist perspective. I outline the nature and significance of culture in the study of global systems, drawing attention to different literatures. Finally I underscore the importance of the cultural turn in the study of global systems and what has to be done to take full advantage of it.In what follows I will address the critical question of the constitution of global systems and the part played in such processes by what is conveniently – if sometimes unhelpfully – summarized as “culture”. By global systems I mean networks of interaction and meaning that transcend both societal and national frames of reference. I want to shift the emphasis away from an under-theorized focus on cultural globalization to a consideration of global systems as enacted in part through cultural processes. In other words, I do not want to conflate the conjunctional features of contemporary (cultural) globalization with culture as the realm of lived experience integral to the enactment of all social-systemic relations. In some respects this approach may be seen as part of a shift – perhaps a paradigm shift – in how we understand the space of the social, and in how, or whether, we construe the global as the constitutive of all social relations (Beck 2003; Shaw 2003). I will begin with a mild polemic against a well-known systemic account of world-making forces that highlights some of these issues. (shrink)

This article approaches the question of what musters, or should muster, as global theory for these times through the lens of mediatization. Emergent globalities – states of global (perhaps glocal) becoming – are seen as constituted by world-making practices that are obviously, per­haps paradigmatically, referenced in processes of digital communication within and across borders. This is no hymn to “mere connection”, but a sustained attempt to marry process and consciousness with a proper regard for the vagaries of human interaction with (...) the structures of indifferent technology and indifferent globalities. (shrink)

I explore the question of whether scientific changes can induce mutations in our ordinary notion of existence. I conclude that they can’t, partially on the grounds that some of the pro­posed alternative-notions of existence are only terminologically-distinct from our ordinary notion, and so don’t provide genuine metaphysical alternatives, and partially on the grounds that the ordinary notion of existence is criterion-transcendent.

The interaction between intuitions about inference, and the normative constraints that logical principles applied to mechanically-recognizable derivations impose on (informal) inference, is explored. These intuitions are evaluated in a clear testcase: informal mathe­matical proof. It is argued that formal derivations are not the source of our intuitions of validity, and indeed, neither is the semantic recognition of validity, either as construed model-theoretically, or as driven by the subject-matter such inferences are directed towards. Rather, psychologically-engrained inference-packages (often opportunistically used by mathematicians) (...) are the source of our sense of validity. Formal derivations, or the semantic construal of such, are after-the-fact norms imposed on our inference practices. (shrink)

Large Groups are not constituted simply by adding further members to small groups. There is a qualitative difference between the social actions which take place in small communities and those in large ones. Large communities are irreducibly characterized by anonymity, i.e., the members of large groups don’t know of most of the other members as individual. Therefore, social action in large groups is based on a sign process: each member of a large group is understood as a representative of the (...) other anonymous members of the group as well as a sign for the group as a whole. (shrink)

Is a social complex identical to many united people or is it a group entity in addition to the people? For specificity, I will assume that a social complex is a plural subject in Margaret Gilbert’s sense. By appeal to my theory of Aspects, according to which there can be qualitative difference without numerical difference, I give an answer that is a middle way between metaphysical individualism and metaphysical holism. This answer will enable answers to two additional metaphysical questions: (i) (...) how can two social complexes have all the same members and (ii) how can there be a social complex of social complexes? (shrink)

Modes of presentation are often posited to accommodate Frege’s puzzle. Philosophers differ, however, in whether they follow Frege in identifying modes of presentation with Fregean senses, or instead take them to be formally individuated symbols of “Mentalese”. Building on Fodor, Margolis and Laurence defend the latter view by arguing that the mind-independence of Fregean senses renders them ontologically suspect in a way that Mentalese symbols are not. This paper shows how Fregeans can withstand this objection. Along the way, a clearer (...) understanding emerges of what senses must be to serve as an ontologically benign alternative to symbols of Mentalese. (shrink)

The formation and evolution of multiculturalism and hybridization belong today to the leading research priorities of social sciences. These developments assumedly forward a kind of new or next society features of which seemingly emerge and may be captured in processes taking place in given partial structures. We think especially of subsystems that, at the origin, concretized utopic orientations that were abandoned over time to leave room to new ambitions. One such subsystem consists of the kibbutz that was for long viewed (...) as one of the most successful utopia that was both rigorous and performing, and which illustrates today an appropriate example of next-society emergence. The general validity of this assumption resides in this setting’s multigenerational survival through far reaching structural, cultural and ideological changes. A model of communitarian collectivity at its start that now is best defined by the oxymoron of “individualistic community”. (shrink)

We draw from Eisenstadt’s (2002) conceptualization of multiple modernities which he pro­posed to analyze processes marking modernity and their different versions in contemporary societies. These processes do not delete all pre-existing orientations, value affinities and social arrangements, and while modernity is recognizable everywhere, modern societies also differ at other respects. We formulate a similar contention for globalization. We point to three interacting and intermingling movers of social reality—globalization, multiculturalism and the national principle—which concretize everywhere, and according to contexts and a (...) priori features, specific models qualifying for the notion of multiple globalizations. Beyond the variety of multiple globalizations, this notion underlines the newness of our time and hints the “next society”. (shrink)

The numberless unprecedented situations attached today to the concept of transnational diaspora arise the debate of whether or not this phenomenon signals a new era. Our own contention is that it does represent a factor of new kinds of heterogenization of both the societal reality and of the diasporas themselves, as worldwide entities. It is in this dialectic perspective that we describe transnational diasporas as causes of discontinuity in our world and point out to the qualitative change in the social (...) fabrics that they represent. Among other aspects, dual or threefold homeness that is bound to the transnational condition signifies for diasporans a slipping away from the totalistic character of the commitment and view of the nation that the nation-state requires of its citizens. When viewed in its multiplicity, the cohabitation under the same societal roof of a priori alien socio-cultural entities yields a configuration that is not uniform in every setting, but which still responds in its essentials to the new reality experienced by many a contemporary society.To illustrate this approach, this paper compares four well-known contemporary transnational diasporas—namely, the Muslim, African, Hispanic and Chinese. (shrink)

This essay deals with the five origins of European populism. It touches upon a number of themes in the lexicon of re-globalization and the changing warp of populist globalization as a process. It carries a lively normative message, principally as to the required comportment of the European Union during a period of global change and dislocation, which prefigures, or may give rise to a post-populist era.

Global cycles of rising and declining hegemonies within the world-system have been associated with periods of war and peace, free trade and protectionism, and economic expansion and contraction. Periods of hegemonic decline are also associated with the cultural production of a certain strain of self deprecating, or even self-hating, literary output. And, because we are dealing with the world-system, the popularity of such icons of national self-deprecation should be gappreciated within other countries. We see this in the fact that Don (...) Quixote, poking fun at Spanish chivalry was an immensely popular book outside as well as inside Spain. Similarly, the James Bond books, and particularly the movies had a huge audience world wide, and, the same could be said for the Rambo movies which poked fun at the chivalric Green Beret American military figure. We see, then, three instances of hegemonic decline—Spain, Britain, United States—and three instances of self-deprecating literary figures—Don Quixote, James Bond, and Rambo. (shrink)

The debate between representationalists and anti-representationalists as I construe it in this chapter is a debate about whether truth-conditions are or should be assigned directly to natural language sentences (NLSs) – the anti-representationalist view – or whether they are or should be assigned instead to mental representations (MRs) that are related in some appropriate way to these NLSs. On the representationalist view, these MRs are related to NLSs in virtue of the fact that the MRs are the output of an (...) interpretive process that has as its input both representations of the lexico-syntactic structure of the NLSs and relevant non-linguistic assumptions that are accessible in the current conversational context. On this conception, language interpretation is a process of developing sentential forms into fully propositional forms, and it is these propositional forms that are the primary bearers of truth-conditional content, and are candidates for model-theoretic interpretation, not the NLSs themselves. (shrink)

Contrary to political rhetorics of market economy and democracy the so-called "transformation " of the former GDR - attempted to start a quick and nevertheless extensive social change - is in reality a change with little room for spontaneous order or self-organization, for social evolution or development. Analyzing this example this essay tries to work out the structural dynamics of social evolution and to demonstrate the diverse control media and alternative steering strategies available in postindustrial societies.

In part lit will be analysed the genesis of the term "lifeworld" in context of E. Husserl’s philosophy. In the Crisis of European Science Husserl shows that the Doxa has a special significance compared to Episteme. This corresponds with Hussser's thesis that the world of science requires always the lifeworld. The lifeworld is the result of the anonymous cons- titution of the transcentental ego. This constitution should be demonstrated in Husserl’s "ontology of lifeworld".In part II it will be demonstrated the (...) constitution of the lifeworld not in terms of the transcendental philosophy but in terms of the existencial philosophy. It appears that for the genesis of the lifeworld the experience of the confidence Has a constituent function, primary the confidence of the child in its mother. In this relationship the child improves the confidence. If this relationship will be broken so this has negative consequences for the following life.In Kafka’s story "Der Bau" will be demonstrated the situation in which the confidence is broken. The story shows that the lifeworld is the result of the individual experience. (shrink)

The recent interest in some of the phenomena traditionally associated with the context dependence of quantificational expressions (QPs) has centered around the idea that some constituents of a sentence might serve as the locus of domain restriction for QPs might be present but lack for overt manifestation. In this essay, one such argument – due to Stanley (2000) – is critically examined. Specifically, I will present a number of different kinds of constructions where the predictions of a theory based upon (...) syntactically represented context variables are not confirmed. (shrink)

Hume’s views concerning the existence of body or external objects are notoriously difficult and intractable. The paper sheds light on the concept of body in Hume’s Treatise by defending three theses. First, that Hume’s fundamental tenet that the only objects that are present to the mind are perceptions must be understood as methodological, rather than metaphysical or epistemological. Second, that Hume considers legitimate the fundamental assumption of natural philosophy that through experience and observation we know body. Third, that many of (...) the contradictions and difficulties that interpreters attribute to Hume’s concept of body should be attributed instead, as Hume does, to every system of philosophy. (shrink)

The debate about Habermas' use of the system and lifeworld distinction has not focused on the explanation of social pathologies that he offers, but rather only on conceptual problems with the theories that he uses. Twill argue that the explanation offered by his thesis that "systems colonize the lifeworld" fits the main criterion for adequacy for macro-micro explanation: because it establishes macro-micro linkage, it is at least potentially complete. Such an analysis fits the empirical approach to traditional debates between collectivists (...) and individualists among macrosociologists. I shall apply this approach here in three steps. First, I shall use the controversy about functionalist explanation in the social sciences to develop the criterion of completeness for macrosociological explanations (1). Second, I shall generalize the conditions of adequacy for functionalist explanations to macrosociology as a whole and show that Habermas'explanation of the colonization of the lifeworld is at least potentially complete, as an explanation sketch that lacks empirical detail (2). Third, I shall show that this approach also requires that Habermas modify his overly Weberian claims about the effects of bureaucracy, since his stronger notion of reification is based on the incompletness in his explanation of this aspect of the micromacrolinkage (3). Moreover; a more complete account has clearer practical consequences for agency in the form of collective action. (shrink)