Lecture 9: Habermas: Colonisation of the Lifeworld
Social integration and system integration again: interpersonal interaction as integrating the social system (formal institutions) through values, rational thought processes, trust etc.-following Parsons’ approach in his The Social System
Departure from Parsons’ The Social System where the lifeworld or cultural subsystem is just system one amongst others for Habermas it is key to system as well as social integration.
If the lifeworld is undermined by the system world this will undermine also the formal organisations of state and capitalism (Habermas in Elliott, (ed.) 1999, p.183) …function of telling the truth to power
Historical background: In the Enlightenment period the lifeworld became uncoupled from the social system- a private or personal space emerged, a world of individual rights. This was crucial to the functioning of the modern world. Here the lifeworld becomes increasingly rational and the systems and their integration become increasingly complex (Elliott, 1999, p.172).
The abstractions of the social system- money/capitalism and power/state rely on mediation by non-linguistic means e.g. the market but also state regulation, and so depend for their acceptance/institutionalisation on connection to underlying values, customs, practices, traditions in the lifeworld
Language, symbolism- gives us shared meanings as basis for social integration and hence is central to the operation of the lifeworld
Transparency of 19th C ‘modern capitalism’ leads to attempts to manipulate or distort communication to legitimate the system which faces questions of social justice, inequality, disempowerment of agents etc.
Colonisation (‘refeudalisation’) of lifeworld- an attempt to control messages, understandings etc. arising in periods of social crisis. Manipulation of people’s desires via distorting representations of needs which via advertising, propaganda etc. attempt to substitute system demands re consumption and bureaucratic control for authentic desires
Implications of colonisation – hidden presence of system within lifeworld. Passes itself off as genuine communication, needs etc. by infiltrating our modes of understanding (p.174)
Parasitic relation of system to lifeworld
Communication reduced to unquestioned stereotypes-
formulaic, clichéd language (are you up to date, have you got value for money etc.). ‘Race’, gender may also fit this model of oppressive typing (see handout). Displacements of agents’ meanings. (ibid., p.174)
‘Structural violence’- Undermines forms of understanding by giving e.g. commercial values to interpersonal interactions (instrumental attitude to others). A kind of ventriloquism –the system speaks through you.
Habermas’s Communication Model of Rationality
Speech acts integrate, produce consensus- Austin’s speech act theory. Speech brings things about, makes things happen. Produces social integration where there are common symbols as with Parsons’ pattern maintenance.
Systems world is here to stay –unlike Marx for whom the state withers away under socialism returning the system to lifeworld and Gemeinschaft relationships
The system can be controlled via social movements occupying the terrain of the public sphere and pushing it back, so to speak.
Left to its own power and instrumental objectives the system ends up undermining the values that it depends on in order to function- trust and transparency. It does this by its colonisation or instrumentalisation of conduct in the lifeworld. (ibid, p.183)
Criticisms
Assumes a consensus can exist within modern capitalism
Ignores the situatedness of agents’ beliefs in favour of a universal rationality via ideal speech conditions. There may however be a conflictual basis to interaction (see Merleau-Ponty, Sense and Non-Sense or M-P in Feather, Intersubjectivity)
Assumes we give common meanings to common symbols (see also Durkheim and Parsons on this)
Do symbols give meaning and make us act in certain ways or do we give meaning to symbols- Bourdieu’s criticism (Language and Symbolic Power)
Lefebvre: the world of lived experience/lifeworld is the mask of modern capitalism but the life world also colonises, customises, personalises modern capitalism (see Everyday Life in the Modern World, 2006, p.25). Hence agents have more power re the system than Habermas gives credit for.
Social integration and system integration again: interpersonal interaction as integrating the social system (formal institutions) through values, rational thought processes, trust etc.-following Parsons’ approach in his The Social System
Departure from Parsons’ The Social System where the lifeworld or cultural subsystem is just system one amongst others for Habermas it is key to system as well as social integration.
If the lifeworld is undermined by the system world this will undermine also the formal organisations of state and capitalism (Habermas in Elliott, (ed.) 1999, p.183) …function of telling the truth to power
Historical background: In the Enlightenment period the lifeworld became uncoupled from the social system- a private or personal space emerged, a world of individual rights. This was crucial to the functioning of the modern world. Here the lifeworld becomes increasingly rational and the systems and their integration become increasingly complex (Elliott, 1999, p.172).
The abstractions of the social system- money/capitalism and power/state rely on mediation by non-linguistic means e.g. the market but also state regulation, and so depend for their acceptance/institutionalisation on connection to underlying values, customs, practices, traditions in the lifeworld
Language, symbolism- gives us shared meanings as basis for social integration and hence is central to the operation of the lifeworld
Transparency of 19th C ‘modern capitalism’ leads to attempts to manipulate or distort communication to legitimate the system which faces questions of social justice, inequality, disempowerment of agents etc.
Colonisation (‘refeudalisation’) of lifeworld- an attempt to control messages, understandings etc. arising in periods of social crisis. Manipulation of people’s desires via distorting representations of needs which via advertising, propaganda etc. attempt to substitute system demands re consumption and bureaucratic control for authentic desires
Implications of colonisation – hidden presence of system within lifeworld. Passes itself off as genuine communication, needs etc. by infiltrating our modes of understanding (p.174)
Parasitic relation of system to lifeworld
Communication reduced to unquestioned stereotypes-
formulaic, clichéd language (are you up to date, have you got value for money etc.). ‘Race’, gender may also fit this model of oppressive typing (see handout). Displacements of agents’ meanings. (ibid., p.174)
‘Structural violence’- Undermines forms of understanding by giving e.g. commercial values to interpersonal interactions (instrumental attitude to others). A kind of ventriloquism –the system speaks through you.
Habermas’s Communication Model of Rationality
Speech acts integrate, produce consensus- Austin’s speech act theory. Speech brings things about, makes things happen. Produces social integration where there are common symbols as with Parsons’ pattern maintenance.
Systems world is here to stay –unlike Marx for whom the state withers away under socialism returning the system to lifeworld and Gemeinschaft relationships
The system can be controlled via social movements occupying the terrain of the public sphere and pushing it back, so to speak.
Left to its own power and instrumental objectives the system ends up undermining the values that it depends on in order to function- trust and transparency. It does this by its colonisation or instrumentalisation of conduct in the lifeworld. (ibid, p.183)
Criticisms
Assumes a consensus can exist within modern capitalism
Ignores the situatedness of agents’ beliefs in favour of a universal rationality via ideal speech conditions. There may however be a conflictual basis to interaction (see Merleau-Ponty, Sense and Non-Sense or M-P in Feather, Intersubjectivity)
Assumes we give common meanings to common symbols (see also Durkheim and Parsons on this)
Do symbols give meaning and make us act in certain ways or do we give meaning to symbols- Bourdieu’s criticism (Language and Symbolic Power)
Lefebvre: the world of lived experience/lifeworld is the mask of modern capitalism but the life world also colonises, customises, personalises modern capitalism (see Everyday Life in the Modern World, 2006, p.25). Hence agents have more power re the system than Habermas gives credit for.
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