Customization

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The concept of individualization comes from sociology and describes a process of transition of the individual from foreign to self-determination that goes hand in hand with the industrialization and modernization of Western societies . Individualism is the philosophical expression of individualization .

Theories

Two phases

Enlightenment and development of civil society

The process of individualization is divided into two phases by some authors: The first is seen in the individualization process, which begins with the development of a modern bourgeois society in the times of industrialization, but which has its philosophical and cultural-historical basis in the Enlightenment . This process, in which an expanded division of labor is accompanied by a weakening of social ties, is described by Georg Simmel and Émile Durkheim , among others . This was shown in the increase in economic and utilitarian relationships on the one hand and the associated withdrawal of the extended family and the collapse of the village communities. The disintegration of traditional ties contrasts with the increasing self-determination of the individual: more and more autobiographies are being written, the concept of romantic love develops, the relationship with God is personalized in Protestantism.

Pluralism of lifestyles

Many sociologists describe a second, the first overlaying and modifying individualization process since the late 1950s. According to Anthony Giddens and Ulrich Beck , a qualitatively new radicalization and universalization of this process is developing in today's postmodern society. Old social classifications such as class and class would become obsolete, increasing compulsion to lead a reflective lifestyle went hand in hand with an increase in education, the pluralization of lifestyles continued to increase, and finding identity and meaning became an individual achievement. This will be further promoted by a change in the state and economic framework. Ulrich Beck was also the one who coined this catchphrase in 1983 to describe today's social living conditions.

The cultural sociologist Andreas Reckwitz extends the concept of individualization developed by Giddens and Beck into a praxeological logic of singularization , which, according to Reckwitz , has shaped late modern societies since the 1970s .

Concept of the adventure society

In addition to the individualization thesis also describes the cultural sociological theory of the experience society of Gerhard Schulze changing lifestyles and goals of the people.

Norbert Elias

Norbert Elias also makes statements on the changing relationship between the individual and society within the framework of his theory of civilization ( on the process of civilization ). Basic terms are included

  • the social habitus (synonymous: the social personality structure; and: common feeling, thinking and behavior habits; or: group character), i.e. the psychological characteristics that a person has in common with other people in a social group. The social habitus forms the ground from which the characteristics emerge that distinguish a person from others. One example is the common script or spelling in a society, which a child learns in school and which he or she varies to an individual handwriting.
  • the we-I identity: we-identity describes the characteristics common to a group, the image of these common characteristics (“we-image”) and the feelings associated with this group (which can be of different strengths and can be ambivalent). I-identity describes the individual characteristics, the awareness or image of these characteristics and the feelings associated with oneself.
  • the we-I balance: the relationship between we and I identity fluctuates depending on the structure of society; the balance can have many nuances between a strong emphasis on the we identity (i.e. in particular group membership) and a strong emphasis on the I identity (i.e. the individual uniqueness and independence).
  • The survival unit: our species (like many others) lives socially, because the group formation brought a decisive survival advantage in view of the weak physical equipment: protection against dangers, support in obtaining food. So it is your job to guarantee the physical and social security of the members. Survival units (societies), however, also have opposing functions ("annihilation units") because they endanger the lives of their members in the constant competition between societies.
  • the long-term development : people are genetically not fixed on a species-specific form of society, but constantly change the form of living together. Because of this high flexibility (and other factors such as the competition between groups of people), our forms of society develop in an unplanned but directed manner. In the course of this development, smaller societies (levels of integration) are subjugated by larger ones, or smaller ones merge under external pressure to form larger units. Examples of possible survival units are groups / families , clans (further family association), tribes, place of residence (villages / cities), states , national associations and humanity. With increasing development, societies become larger and more complex in a surge of integration; Regularly there are also disintegration spurts in which societies disintegrate again, or imperfect integration in which smaller units within the larger association maintain considerable independence. In the long term, more and more complex societies will emerge with many sub-levels that share the tasks for the survival of the individual.

Elias sees the explanation for the individualization process in the fact that in the course of integration spurts, smaller units have to give up survival functions to the larger integration levels. While in the Middle Ages the emphasis was still on the we-identity, individualization processes have been observed since the Renaissance with the emergence of large territorial states and the resulting greater social mobility (initially for wandering scholars who took on official functions in cities and princely courts: the humanists) . This was reflected, for example, in the appreciation of the individual in Dürer's portrait painting or later in the individualistic philosophy since Descartes . Initially, this only reached smaller population groups, but since the 19th century the western European industrialized countries have taken on essential tasks in guaranteeing the physical and social security of their members with the expansion of the monopoly of force and the social systems ; they refer to them as individuals and not as members of e.g. B. Families or villages. As a result, the leading groups of the pre-state units lose power over their members. Individuals are gradually given greater scope for decision-making and can more and more easily break away from the pre-state units without having to fear any loss of physical and social security. This shifts the we-I balance in favor of the I identity. Individuals are not only given greater scope for decision-making, but are also forced to make decisions. One of the consequences is the increase in non-permanent relationships and the need to test relationships: private relationships, professional relationships and, within limits, nationalities are becoming more interchangeable. While people used to be tied to a certain social unit (e.g. family) for life, they can more and more often decide on their own relationships - and therefore have to. The social habitus changes from the focus on external regulation to the focus on self-regulation.

The societies around the world are at very different stages of development. Some are currently experiencing the conflict-ridden integration of hunter groups and tribes into the level of the (initially often weak) states, others are already in the process of integrating into continental associations of states. Typical misunderstandings and conflicts arise between societies at different levels, as they evaluate each other in an ethnocentric way. All are pushed by the unplanned development into the last level of integration, humanity, which is already the decisive level for the survival of the individual people (even if most people are only slowly becoming aware of this), but whose organizational structures are only in weak early forms indicate, the elaboration of which will take a long time and which can also be destroyed again in a disintegration surge. If the current trend continues, however, further individualization is to be expected, that is, a further increase in power of the individual people over their survival units. Elias' conclusion: bursts of integration are always also bursts of individualization.

Individualization as a power technique (Foucault)

As part of his conception of pastoral power , Michel Foucault outlines a critical and power-analytical conception of individualization: “After all, this form of power [pastoral power] can only be exercised if you know what is going on in people's minds (...). It presupposes that one knows the consciousness of the individual and is able to direct it. This form of power is oriented towards the salvation of the soul (...), it is individualized. (...) It is connected with the generation of truth, namely the truth of the individual. ”For Foucault, individualization is an important building block for the constitution and maintenance of social power. “A 'tactic' of individualization developed that was typical for various forms of power, for those of the family, medicine, psychiatry, education, employers, etc.” In his approach he reverses the usual perspective: “The problem That we face today is not the attempt to liberate the individual from the state and its institutions, but rather to liberate ourselves from the state and the associated form of individualization. We have to look for new forms of subjectivity and reject the kind of individuality that has been imposed on us for centuries. "

Individualization in the world of work

The individualization of working hours and forms of work can go hand in hand with precariousness and the erosion of the normal employment relationship , but also with more time sovereignty through flexibilisation of working hours . This creates individual possibilities for designing personal areas of life.

The trade unions see themselves compelled to exercise their collective influence in an environment characterized by globalization and competition and in view of tendencies towards individualization with (often opposing) demand for flexibility on the part of employers and employees.

Individualization of social rights

A system of social security in which the individual is entitled to social security regardless of marital status or civil partnership is known as a system of individualized social rights. With such a concept, every individual is equally entitled to individual coverage. Instead of family-oriented social benefits such as family insurance and the consideration of benefit communities and spouse subsidiarity, there is an individual right to social security, regardless of marital status. In this context, it is also proposed that social security should also be granted regardless of employment status, in order to ensure equal coverage for men and women. This would represent a replacement of social security from family policy.

Individual equipment of products

Individualization in the social area is also associated with a trend towards individuality in the economic area. The individual tries to express his or her individuality in and with an individual product and thereby stand out from other individuals. This can be traced back to the mass product automobile, where many automobile manufacturers offer customers the option of custom-making a series vehicle that is offered according to personal ideas and wishes. If the individual products are manufactured using mass production methods , this is called mass customization .

Individualization as a topic in the film

The Georgian-French feature film My Happy Family (2017) shows the departure of a woman from her family in the context of a society in which individuals usually remain in the family for life.

literature

  • Martin Baethge: Individualization as hope and fate. Aporias and paradoxes in late bourgeois societies or: the threat to subjectivity. In: Soziale Welt 36 (1985), pp. 299-312
  • Ulrich Beck: Beyond class and class? Social inequalities, social individualization processes and the emergence of new social formations and identities , in: Reinhard Kreckel (Ed.): Social Inequality. Soziale Welt , special volume 2, Göttingen 1983, pp. 35–74
  • Ulrich Beck: Risk Society . On the way to a different modern age , 1986.
  • Ulrich Beck: Risky Freedoms - Social Individualization Processes in the Modern Age , 1994. (together with Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim)
  • Ulrich Beck: Reflexive Modernisierung - Eine Debatte , 1996. (together with Anthony Giddens and Scott Lash )
  • Norbert Elias (2001): The Society of Individuals. Frankfurt / M .: Suhrkamp.
  • Karl Hackstette: Individualistic corporate management. An economic-philosophical study , Marburg 2003.
  • Dominic D. Kaltenbach: Globalization - does the individual fall by the wayside ?. A right-sociological consideration of the world of work . Publishing house Dr. Kovac, Hamburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-8300-4183-2 .
  • Thomas Kron (ed.): Individualization and sociological theory. , Opladen 2000, Leske + Budrich.
  • Thomas Kron, Martin Horacek: Individualization . transcript, Bielefeld 2009.
  • Andreas Reckwitz : The Society of Singularities . On the structural change of modernity . Suhrkamp 2017.
  • Markus Schroer : The Individual of Society , Frankfurt / M. 2001.
  • Gerhard Schulze: The adventure society, cultural sociology of the present , Campus-Verlag 1992.
  • Georg Simmel: The philosophy of money , 1900. ( DigBib.Org online text )
  • Georg Simmel: The Conflict of Modern Culture , 1918.
  • Jörg Ulrich : Individuality as a Political Religion , Ulmer Manuskripte Verlag, Albeck bei Ulm 2002
  • Herlyn, Wilmjakob: PPS in automotive engineering - production program planning and control of vehicles and assemblies. Hanser Verlag, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-446-41370-2 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Andreas Reckwitz: The society of singularities. On the structural change of modernity . 5th edition. Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2017, p. 480 .
  2. ↑ The double face of individualization . In: Attac theory blog . ( attac.de [accessed on August 7, 2018]).
  3. ↑ a b c Michel Foucault: Subject and Power (1982) in: Analytik der Macht , ed. by Daniel Defert and Francois Ewald, Verlag Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt a. M. 2005, ISBN 3-518-29359-1 , pp. 248-250
  4. ↑ Birgit Geissler : The (independence) in marriage and the civil right to care. Reflections on gender justice in the welfare state , p. 202 ff.
  5. ↑ Birgit Geissler: The (independence) in marriage and the civil right to care. Reflections on gender justice in the welfare state , p. 184 ff.
  6. ↑ Herlyn, PPS im Automobilbau , Hanser Verlag, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-446-41370-2 , p. 64 ff., P. 208
  7. ↑ Elisabeth von Thadden: And who are you? In: The time. July 13, 2017. Retrieved August 14, 2017 .