Niklas Luhmann

William Rasch

The essays in this volume formulate what is considered to be the preconditions for an adequate theory of modern society. The volume starts with an examination of the modern European philosophical and scientific tradition notably the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl.

Redescribing the Descriptions of Modernity

Theories of Distinction

This important new book places Carl Schmitt’s critique of liberal political theory in a broader historical context than is usually done. His belief in the centrality of the European state since the seventeenth century derives from various sources, including medieval (Scholastic) theology and nineteenth century (post-Hegelian) social and political theory. Schmitt’s famed ‘political theology’ aims at justifying the necessity of a strong secular state as the safeguard of a political community against the encroachment of legally protected interest groups that shield themselves behind pre-political rights. William Rasch neither condemns nor champions Schmitt’s various attacks on liberalism, but does insist that the tension between ‘society’ as the realm of individual rights to pursue private pleasures and the ‘state’ as the placeholder for something traditionally called the common good is a conundrum that is as important now as it was during the Weimar era in Germany. Reappraisal of some of the pillars of liberal dogma are as much in order as are fears of their demise.

State and Society

Carl Schmitt

Themenheft Soziale Systeme 1/08

»Tragic Choices«. Luhmann on Law and States of Exception

Wilfried Wilms

Prompted by recent challenges to and debates about the relative public silence concerning the effects of the Allied air war over Europe during World War II, this collection of essays examines literary, visual (film and photography), and institutional (museums) representations of the bombing of civilian targets, predominantly in Germany. The authors examine narrative strategies of both well-known and relatively little known works as well as the moral and ideological presuppositions of the varied representations of the depredations of total war. The introduction and afterword by the editors invite the readers to expand the contours and historical context of the debates about the German public discourse on the bombing war beyond the narrow confines of perpetrators and victims. The volume will be of interest to literary scholars, historians, and the general reading public interested in warfare and its effects on civilian populations.

Representing the Air War Over Europe and Japan

Bombs Away!

An introduction to the nature of modernity as envisioned by Germany's leading social theorist of the late-20th century, Niklas Luhmann. The book injects concepts derived from Luhmann's influential systems theory into debates about modernity and postmodernity, constructivist and foundationalist epistemologies, the relationship between politics and ethics, and the possibilities of interdisciplinary work that spans the great divide between science and the humanities. The book stages challenging engagements with suchthinkers as Jurgen Habermas, Jacques Derrida, Jean-Francois Lyotard, Drucilla Cornell, Judith Butler, Michel Serres, N. Katherine Hayles, and such political theorists as Chantal Mouffe and Carl Schmitt. The book closes with two interviews: one a discussion with Luhmann and Hayles on epistemology, the other with Luhmann on the functional differentiation of modern society.

William Rasch

Books

Your next favorite book is out there