Suchergebnisse

Discusses the present & potential dangers of democratic politics governed by technocracy: "the illegitimate extension of scientific ways of thinking to questions that do not admit of scientific answers, & the elevation of scientists & technicians to a position of responsibility for which their knowledge & skills alone do not qualify them." Although science & technology constitute an increasingly large portion of political & social life, their applications in the political & social realms have not achieved the utopian goals of justice & dissolution of bureaucracy. Despite the technocratic assertion that politics can be separated from ideology, it is suggested that politics requires ideology, & technocracy itself is a form of ideology. Understood as a medium for the socialized expression of conflicting beliefs, politics is thus both formed by & dependent on ideology. Further, it is argued that attempts to eliminate ideology from politics place technocratic rulers in a position of unearned & potentially dangerous authority. It is concluded that ideological disagreement & dissent are fundamental components of democracy, & cannot be eliminated through scientific analysis & methodology. T. Sevier

Der Beitrag enthält eine Analyse und Einschätzung von Zygmunt Baumans Schriften während der neunziger Jahre vor dem Hintergrund der Annahme einer thematischen Kontinuität des Werks seit seinen frühen Schriften. Da Bauman vor allem durch seine neueren Veröffentlichungen Aufmerksamkeit erregte, ist es nach Meinung der Autoren noch ungeklärt, welchen Stellenwert diese Arbeiten in der Entwicklung von Baumans Werk als Gesamtheit besitzen und inwieweit sie eine Kontinuität bei den Themen- und Problemstellungen, aber auch bei den moralischen Imperativen erkennen lassen. Der Beitrag widmet sich vor allem zwei Aufgaben: einer Rekonstruktion von Baumans gegenwärtigen Schriften, welche versucht, möglichst dicht an dessen Texten und Ausdrucksweisen zu bleiben, sowie einer kritischen Bewertung, um die Konsistenz und Einheit von Baumans Denken aufzuzeigen, was in der gegenwärtigen Diskussion noch nicht unternommen worden ist. In den Arbeiten Baumans werden ferner folgende Bereiche identifiziert, die Gegenstand für weiterführende Kontroversen sein können: der Status empirischer Evidenz in Baumans Diagnosen (1), die Balance zwischen beschränkenden und ermöglichenden Tendenzen des modernen Lebens (2) und Baumans Suche nach der Begründung eines moralischen Moments in der menschlichen Begegnung (3). (ICI2)

In the introduction to a collection of essays honoring Zygmunt Bauman (see abstracts of related chapters), Bauman's role in the evolution of sociology in Europe is discussed. It is argued that Bauman's sociology is a product of his diverse life experiences & his ability to remain ambivalent toward the political developments of his times & homes. Although he avoided systematic continuities & development of a universal theory of sociology, Bauman emphasized sociology's role as a form of active self-reflection on social life & focused his research on cultural themes & the fluid boundaries of sociology & social philosophy. Bauman was also a product of the sociological debates occurring in GB. As sociology entered the university as a legitimate discipline in the 1960s, he played an important role in shaping the discipline & exploring the relationship between sociology & Marxism. Throughout the ensuing decades of critical debate, Bauman remained an insightful critic of the dueling camps including phenomenology, Marxist theory, structuralism, hermeneutics, & ethnomethodology. T. Sevier

Zygmunt Bauman's sociological & socialist treatments of the concepts of power & culture are discussed in an addendum to Culture, Modernity and Revolution: Essays in Honour of Zygmunt Bauman. For Bauman, culture both creates & is created by social structure, & culture is simultaneously responsible for the historical durability & contextual fluidity of social structures. Further, culture & power are permanently linked in a mutually influential relationship: culture governs the human capacity to order, separate, & establish boundaries, while power dictates individuals' & groups' relative control over this process of boundary creation. Therefore, the extension of control is defined as the limiting of others' potential actions, behaviors, & ability to create or transform boundaries. Bauman argues that both capitalism & socialism represent diverse manifestations of the project of modernity. Therefore, revising & revitalizing socialism demands abandonment of its modernist foundations, eg, reliance on the industrial working class & belief in the metanarrative of Marxism. Bauman utilized postmodernism as a means of critiquing both socialism & sociology, thereby allowing for the creation of new concepts in each discipline. T. Sevier