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Books > Social sciences > Sociology, social studies > Social institutions
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Observing Society - Meaning, Communication, and Social Systems (Hardcover, New)
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Observing Society - Meaning, Communication, and Social Systems (Hardcover, New)
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This book introduces the resources of contemporary social system
theory, as pioneered by the German sociologist Niklas Luhmann and
associated theorists. Luhmann's theory is very different from the
general systems approach that dominated sociological thought for
several decades after the Second World War. Norms and functions are
not seen as fundamental premises of social systems and social
order. Rather meaning, communication, and observation are set into
the core of social life and its analysis. Meaning is seen as a
medium that couples psychic and social systems or consciousness and
communication. Observation is described as the introduction of
distinctions and selections, and communication is the basic
operation that connects observations and thereby allows for the
emergence of observers: persons, interaction systems,
organizations, and functional subsystems of society, such as the
economy, politics, law, and art. Society itself is conceived as the
encompassing unity of all communication, a universal set of
references that makes observation and communication possible.
Modern system theory does not join the quest for essential
variables such as norms, values, or institutions. It selects
observations and depicts their connectivity, their potential for
processing information, building expectations about meaning in the
world, and for structuring social systems. Contemporary social
systems theory tries to explain the probability of the improbable:
that communication occurs and reproduces a universe of meaning in
which observers may orient themselves. Social system theory
incorporates fresh insights from cognitive biology, the philosophy
of consciousness, phenomenology, distinction theory,
socio-cybernetics, and constructivism to explain the emergence of
society. The authors of Observing Society describe how the theory
moves beyond traditional sociological paradigms that attempt to
explain social order and understanding with presumptions of
intersubjectivity, collective conscience, communicative
rationality, or normative consensus. Observing Society: Meaning,
Communication, and Social Systems concisely outlines how social
system theory offers sociologists an integrated set of practical
and general analytical concepts, a promising agenda for scholarly
inquiry, and a cutting-edge description of modern society. Using
clear illustrations and effectively citing original material
previously unavailable in English, Lee and Brosziewski carefully
explain the logic of drawing distinctions to make observations, the
concepts of meaning and communication, the forms of communication
media such as speech and writing, the evolution of forms of
organizing society, the functional differentiation of modern
systems, and how social system theory informs sociological research
and methodology. This book will hold significant relevance for
collections in sociology, philosophy, German studies, European
studies, and culture and media studies.
General
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