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Intro -- Acknowledgements -- Contents -- About the Author -- List of Tables -- Chapter 1: Introduction -- References -- Chapter 2: What Is Risk? -- Newer Approaches to Risk Analysis -- Summary -- References -- Chapter 3: The Idea of the Risk Society -- The Contours of the Risk Society -- Risk, Knowledge and Politics -- Risk, Danger and 'Large-Scale Hazards' -- Risks as Both Real and Socially Constructed -- Manufactured Uncertainty -- Risk as Observation -- Risk, Insurance and Governmentality -- Critique of the Realist Understanding of Risk -- Three Basic Assumptions Underpinning Beck's Theory -- Summary -- References -- Chapter 4: Individualisation: Beyond Class and Social Communities? -- Individualisation in the Industrial Society ('Simple' Modernity) -- Individualisation in the Risk Society ('Reflexive' Modernity) -- Individualisation, Beck and Ziehe -- Individualisation, Beck and Giddens -- Individualisation, Beck and Bauman -- Summary -- References -- Chapter 5: Reflexive Modernity -- From Simple to Reflexive Modernity -- The 'Modern Counter-Modern' -- Reconceptualisation of Sociology in Reflexive Modernity -- Reflexive Modernity, Late Modernity and Liquid Modernity -- Multiple Modernities and Amodernity -- Summary -- References -- Chapter 6: Changes to Family, Paid Work and Politics in the (World) Risk Society -- Changes to the Family and Ways of Living Together -- The Change in Paid Work (Precarious Work) -- Changes to Politics (Sub-politics) -- Summary -- References -- Chapter 7: The World Risk Society as a Cosmopolitan Society? -- The 'Cosmopolitan Turn' in Beck's Theory -- World Risk Society and Cosmopolitanism -- Power and Counter-Power in the Age of Globalisation -- The Cosmopolitan Vision -- Cosmopolitan Europe -- A New Critical Sociology with a Cosmopolitan Outlook -- Cosmopolitanism, Universalism and Multiculturalism.

I efterhånden mere end et år har vi måttet leve med en radikalt forandret virkelighed forårsaget af en usynlig virus, der angiveligt sprang fra flagermus til menneske i storbyen Wuhan i Hubei-provinsen i Kina. Som en steppebrand spredte den sig ikke blot til Europa, men til den ganske verden. I løbet af et splitsekund blev også det ellers på mange måder relativt trygge danske velfærdssamfund forvandlet til et »pandemisk samfund« i noget nær undtagelsestilstand. Få havde set det komme, og endnu færre var, og er, i stand til at sige med sikkerhed, hvor længe det vil vare endnu. Økonomernes rolle som de fremmeste prognosemagere blev overtaget af epidemiologerne, der på daglig basis i medierne kommer med risikovurderinger, beregninger og estimater over epidemiens udvikling. Sociologer, politologer, psykologer og filosoffer har imidlertid også blandet sig i debatten og fremlagt analyser af, hvad coronakrisen har gjort ved os både på det individuelle og på det samfundsmæssige plan. Heriblandt også den italienske forfatter og fysiker Paolo Giordano, den bulgarske samfundsforsker Ivan Krastev og den slovenske sociolog og filosof Slavoj Zizek, som i tre små »coronabøger« hver især har givet et bud på dette.

Ikke kun i klassisk, men også i moderne sociologi spiller begrebet om "individualisering" en helt central rolle. I nyere sociologi har ikke mindst Ziehe, Beck, Giddens og Bauman gjort individualiseringsbegrebet til et nøglebegreb i deres teorier om sen-, refleksiv og flydende modernitet. Individualiseringssociologiens betoning af frisættelse, valg og social forandring udfordres imidlertid af differentierings- og magtsociologien (Bourdieu, Dean, Rose m.fl.), der i højere grad betoner klasser, magt og social reproduktion. I artiklen søges skismaet mellem forandring og social reproduktion "overvundet" i form af et forsøg på at tænke individualiseringens differentierede former i den refleksive modernitet. Antagelsen er således, at der – afhængigt af besiddelsen af økonomisk, social og kulturel kapital – er forskel på refleksiv moderne menneskers evne til at håndtere individualiseringens krav, hvilket – med fokus på unge – illustreres med en række empiriske eksempler. Afslutningsvis peges der på muligheden af en teoretisk integration af fundamentale indsigter i såvel individualiserings- som differentieringssociologien.


ENGELSK ABSTRACT:

Klaus Rasborg: Individualization and Social Differentiation in Reflexive Modernity

The concept of "individualization" plays a central role in both classic and modern sociology. In modern sociology writers such as Ziehe, Beck, Giddens and Bauman made the concept of individualization a key concept in their theories of "late", "reflexive" and "liquid modernity". However, the emphasis which the sociology of individualization puts on "liberation", choice and social change is challenged by the sociology of differentiation and power (Bourdieu, Dean, Rose and others) with its greater emphasis on class, power and social reproduction. This article seeks to "overcome" this schism between social change and social reproduction in the form of an attempt to think the differentiated forms of individualization in reflexive modernity. The assumption is that there is a differentiation in reflexive modern people's ability to deal with the requirements of individualization, depending on their possession of economic, social and cultural capital. This is argued by means of a theoretical "reconstruction" of the insights and deficiencies of the sociology of individualization, and demonstrated – with a focus on young people – by a number of empirical examples. In conclusion, the article discusses the possibility of a theoretical integration of the fundamental insights of both the sociology of individualization and the sociology of differentiation.

Key words: Individualization, social differentiation, young people, risk, reflexive habitus.

This paper calls attention to some basic problems and inner contradictions in the German sociologist Ulrich Beck's theory of the '(world) risk society' or reflexive (second) modernity. A main thread in the critique is that of addressing the theoretical ambiguities that seem to characterize Beck's at the same time 'social constructivist' and 'realist' notion of risk – ambiguities that seem to be repeated on the one hand in Beck's view on the relation between knowledge and unawareness in reflexive modernity and on the other hand in his view on the role of the mass media in the '(world) risk society'. Moreover, Beck's notions of second modernity, reflexivity, rationality and critique are critically examined. With the alternative positions discussed in the paper – represented by Jeffrey C. Alexander, Niklas Luhmann and Mitchell Dean – some indications are given as to how one might fruitfully elaborate on the problem of risk. Thus, rather than a mainly technology-driven new type of social reality, the '(world) risk society' could perhaps better be seen as indicating a changing cultural self-understanding of late modern society, a new 'semantics of crisis', or the emergence of new forms of governmentality in the contemporary welfare state. In conclusion, some indications are given as to how an analysis of more specific 'risk logics' or 'rationalities' could be elaborated on, and a terminology that reflects this more differentiated approach to risk in late modern society is suggested.