Counter-public

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Counter- public describes a form of social activity that consciously opposes the “ruling” public in order to make neglected or suppressed topics, problems or social groups accessible to the general public. Just like the public, there is also a counter-public in contrast to private - in principle it is about occupying public spaces in which people can gather and inform one another and others. The development of the means of communication decisively influenced the forms and possibilities of conveying information .

Anti-nuclear demonstration in Hanover 1979

The demonstration is the oldest and undiminished current public means of people to draw attention to themselves, their situation or their concerns. No (technical) medium is required for communication here - it can also be calls, chants or posters - and the messages are briefly brought up to the term. The advocacy journalism is also trying to draw attention to under-represented in the mass media issues.

Counter-public theory

Origin of the term

The term counter-public originated in the 1970s. The term appears as a way of conveying other views on politics and society that have arisen in practice, which are not or only falsely represented in the existing public and whose presence in the existing institutions - especially the media - itself cannot be enforced. In the 1968 movement , which had this experience and after initial, also violent actions such as the blockade of the delivery of the Axel Springer Verlag newspapers, saw the powerlessness in direct access, the idea of ​​using the technical media for in-house production arose. From the beginning of the 1970s, attempts were made to investigate this area of ​​confrontation and argument in a theoretical and historical context. The emergence of a new form of “ mass media ”, especially television, played a decisive role. The work by Oskar Negt and Alexander Kluge , published in 1972 : Public and Experience , which referred to the philosopher Jürgen Habermas , who published the volume Structural Change to the Public in 1962, was influential in this determination .

Historical bases

“The original need for the public in the representative sense seems to have been the need of the ruling feudal class. [...] The established bourgeois society adopts these forms of expression of domination and partially changes their function. "

Habermas chose the term “plebeian public” - derived from the mixed urban lower classes who attempted during the French Revolution to develop a public that was appropriate for them.

Oskar Negt and Alexander Kluge chose "the term proletarian public because it [...] is not a variant of the bourgeois public, but a historical, [...] completely different conception of the overall social context." The public and experience define the authors' interest in "examining the tendencies of contradiction that arise within advanced capitalist society with regard to the conditions in which the counter- public arises."

Counter-public as an intermediate stage

In the reception of the work, which took place particularly in the university sector, the term “counter-public” was particularly stuck. It has survived to this day, although Negt and Kluge referred to the counter-public as “a pre-form of the proletarian public” - an idea that did not survive the change in concept. A reduction to the opposite or a mere presentation of oppositional views was not in the interests of the authors, and the "proletarian public" should also be more than a way of implementing the interests of a social class: They were - also in the outlook - about a "transformation process" to achieve "the ability to form alliances between those social forces that are able to undertake the full scope of the reorganization of a coming society [...]."

Under this premise, counter-public opinion could only have arisen in rudimentary forms and to a comparatively small extent since the 1970s. It is significant, however, that in the context of the youth and protest movements and later the New Social Movements , the development of technical possibilities resulted in a decentralization of the public, leading to a multiplication of “autonomous spaces” - especially through the expansion of cultural activities led the "virtual spaces" of the Internet. However, this process, its effects and its connection with social developments have not been comprehensively analyzed and presented on a theoretical level since Negt and Kluge.

Practice of the counter-public

Public relations in the protest movement

The first activities in the Federal Republic of Germany and in West Berlin, which can be placed in the context of the counter-public, arose during the 1968 movement . The periodicals Agit 883 and “Langer Marsch” were known nationwide . The most important medium was the leaflet. Since there were no simple printing or copying processes, the production of a magazine was costly and usually only possible in connection with institutions or trade unions. This also applied to audiovisual media, at that time 16 mm film. Documentaries were mainly created at the German Film and Television Academy Berlin (DFFB) and the Institute for Film Design in Ulm. A broadcast on television was rarely possible. One forum was the International Short Film Festival in Oberhausen . Most of the demonstrations were organized by the makers themselves. In the later course of the 1968 movement, the often well-financed K-groups and GDR-related organizations emerged that had sufficient means of production for their party public relations work .

Alternative movement of the 1970s

Encouraged by the protest movement, the generation after the 68s also developed a lively media production activity, which, however, was hardly any more agitatory and initially often served the self-understanding of groups or scenes. Technical development had created new means of production - for example the Super 8 film , which replaced 16 mm - and music equipment was also affordable for young bands, studios and organizers (youth centers).

Song group Unistreik in the Audimax of the Technical University Berlin 1977

The university strikes of 1976/1977 in Berlin and Germany, during which the "unorganized" with their majority and their experience in event organization and public relations, were able to break the dominance of the K groups, led to a start-up boom in projects. It was the time when you left the universities and went to the districts, to the “Kiez” ( Tunix Congress 1978). Initially in the university centers, and soon in every major city, so-called " Stattzeitungen" appeared, such as the newspaper in Munich, Klenkes in Aachen or De Schnüss in Bonn. They achieved print runs of up to 20,000 copies and provided a forum for the various groups that did not get a word in the local press. An abundance of small and alternative newspapers appeared in German-speaking countries . In 1974, Peter Engel and W. Christian Schmitt identified around 250 alternative newspapers for the period since 1965. In 1986 the directory of the alternative press, which is published by the information service for the dissemination of missing news (ID), named approx. 600 more or less regularly appearing newspapers and magazines.

Poster motif for the film of the Medienwerkstatt Berlin 1980

The alternative movement achieved success with the six-week environmental festival at the radio tower in Berlin in the summer of 1978, which was attended by tens of thousands of interested citizens. The film about the event, made by an associated group, Medienwerkstatt Berlin, titled Who has no courage to dream, has no strength to fight , was shown in February 1980 at the International Forum for Young Film at the Berlinale .

Social movements

During this phase numerous theater groups and cabarets were founded (including the Frankfurter Fronttheater and Die Drei Tornados ). The concept of the counter-public now freed itself from its limited political definition and also encompassed cultural work as well as subject-oriented activities, as they were necessary in environmental engagement. The spectrum ranged from coming to terms with the past to environmental protection and the anti-nuclear power movement . The onset of specialization gave rise to the women's movement's own magazines , tenants' associations , and environmental and ecological groups.

The possibilities of using autonomous spaces were recognized not only in Berlin (Kreuzberg) and these were then expanded in connection with the squatting.

After the movement subsided, projects and counter-media set up, merged or dissolved for various reasons. In many cases, survival was only possible through a commercialization process. Examples are city ​​magazines such as Ketchup from Heidelberg, Tip and Zitty in Berlin. This also had an effect on the content. With the Internet, the counter-public also shifted to the Internet. However, the term fell out of use and is now a historical category.

Counter-public in the Eastern Bloc

The Russian term samizdat (literally: self-published ) denoted in the USSR and later in large parts of the Eastern Bloc the dissemination of alternative , non-system-compliant “gray” literature via non-official channels, for example by copying by hand or typewriter or by photocopy and passing on the copies produced in this way. Samizdat existed to a significant extent in the Soviet Union , Poland , the GDR , Czechoslovakia and Hungary .

Forms of communication of the counter-public

In addition to the demonstrations, the preferred media of the counter-public were printed works (books, brochures, newspapers, posters and leaflets) and audiovisual products (film, video, photo, music on record, tape and cassette). This also included public performances: street theater , artistic or politically motivated performances, musical performances and concerts. With these media, works or actions "counter-public" was created.

Radio, film and video

Hiding place for a radio station used by the squatters on the Gleisdreieck site in Berlin in 1981

With further technical developments in the 1980s, other media became accessible and affordable for the “counter-public from below”. Initially illegal, later legal, alternative radio stations such as Radio Dreyeckland or Radio Z began in Nuremberg. Thanks to the Super 8 and video technology, you could also create your own films with little money. The Super 8 film rental company Gegenlicht and video groups such as the Medienwerkstatt Freiburg, the Medienpädagogik Zentrum Hamburg e. V. in Hamburg and the Autofocus videowerkstatt in Berlin were founded.

Computer scene

The German-speaking mailbox scene largely stems from the new social movements. Computer activists took on issues such as free access to the Internet and data protection and created their own network culture .

With the spread of the Internet , the counter-public has found a new forum . A separate citizen journalism has arisen on the net, the net residents gave themselves names like netizen and rules like the netiquette .

New theoretical approaches

In an interview, Alexander Kluge describes the potential of the Internet as revolutionary: “The previous program is broadcast from top to bottom. If the online system is not owned by corporations, it will work from the bottom up. [...] It emerges as a potential, as a raw material. So far it has not been successful. The entire conservative compulsory program with its ideology is still in the mind. [...] You can't cheer yet, but there (on YouTube) Enzensberger's radio theory is presented. […] Online is a revolution. […] There are often brilliant things on YouTube , in a very scattered way, and they are completely reinvented without any program directorate. This indirect public is a new challenge [...] "

See also

literature

Web links

Wiktionary: counter-public  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Oskar Negt, Alexander Kluge: Public and Experience . Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1972. Quoted here in the edition: edition suhrkamp, ​​1976.
  2. ^ Jürgen Habermas: Structural change of the public . Neuwied and Berlin 1962.
  3. ^ Negt / Kluge: Public and Experience , p. 132.
  4. ↑ Jürgen Habermas: Structural Change of the Public , p. 8.
  5. ^ Negt / Kluge: Public and Experience , p. 8.
  6. ^ Negt / Kluge: Public and Experience , p. 8.
  7. ^ Negt / Kluge: Public and Experience , p. 163.
  8. ^ Negt / Kluge: Public and Experience , p. 167.
  9. ↑ Peter Engel, Winfried Christian Schmitt: Klitzekleine Bertelsmänner. Literary-journalistic alternatives 1965–1973 , Nann. Munich / Scheden (Gauke) 1974.
  10. ^ "[...] squatters who operated their illegal radio station from the water tower." In: Jörg Schmalfuß: Gleisdreieck - a railway site in Berlin. Quoted from: Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin , 4/2013, p. 28.
  11. ^ Süddeutsche Zeitung : Interview by Willi Winkler: Alexander Kluge on Revolution, 29./20. August 2009.