Claus Offe

Leistungsprinzip und industrielle Arbeit

Der Begriff der „Leistungsgesellschaft“ ist insofern ein Fremdkorper in der soziologischen Terminologie, als er uber seinen deskriptiven Gehalt hinaus mit normativen Vorstellungen belastet ist; wegen dieser Ambivalenz hat er sich der wissenschaftlichen Verwendung — jedenfalls in Deutschland — bisher entzogen. Wie kaum ein anderer typisierender soziologischer Begriff vereinigt er beschreibende Elemente mit einer wertenden Selbstinterpretation einer gesamtgesellschaftlichen Struktur. In sozialpolitischen Auseinandersetzungen und vor- oder halbwissenschaftlichen Stellungnahmen findet er haufig Verwendung und fungiert dort als universelles Legitimierungsprinzip, an dem jeweils bestimmte Ausschnitte der Sozialstruktur gemessen und kritisiert werden. Wenn man von diesem vorwissenschaftlichen Selbstverstandnis industrieller — und wohlgemerkt nicht nur industriellkapitalistischer — Gesellschaften ausgeht, so wird man durch dessen Prazisierung daher nicht zu einer Beschreibung der Sozialstruktur selbst, jedoch zu einer Beschreibung des wichtigsten status-legitimierenden Organisationsprinzips kommen, das diese Gesellschaften selbst als verbindlich akzeptieren oder sogar als erfullt ausgeben. Unter ‚Leistungsgesellschaft‘ ist zunachst also nur ein zur Norm erhobenes und vielfaltig institutionalisiertes Modell der sozialen Prozesse zu verstehen, die den Status von Individuen bestimmen und sanktionieren.

Governance — „Empty signifier“ oder sozialwissenschaftliches Forschungsprogramm?

Ich mochte bei meinen skeptischen uberlegungen zum Begriff und zum politikwissenschaftlichen Potenzial des Begriffs Governance zunachst einige Beobachtungen uber die syntaktische Struktur, die Semantik und Pragmatik des Konzepts anstellen (ohne dabei irgendwelche linguistischen oder diskurstheoretischen Ambitionen zu verfolgen) (I.). Ich diskutiere dann, wie Governance im Bezugsfeld von Markt und Staat verortet wird (II.). Mit einer wissenssoziologischen Spekulation versuche ich, mir die kometenhafte Karriere des Konzepts verstandlich zu machen (III.). Zum Abschluss werde ich drei Linien der Kritik am Konzept von Governance und dessen sozialwissenschaftlicher Anwendung resumieren (IV.)

Political Disaffection as an Outcome of Institutional Practices? Some Post-Tocquevillean Speculations

In this essay I proceed as follows. Its first part provides a conceptual map by which we can locate the various symptoms of political malaise and disenchantment, which beset, as it is widely perceived, political life and political developments even in established liberal democracies (and a fortiori in new ones). The second part proposes to invert the chain of causation that is widely used in empirical political science as a model of analysis. Rather than proceeding from opinions to behavior to institutional viability, I propose here, in an admittedly speculative mode, to proceed in a top-down perspective from institutional patterns to the observable “enactment” of institutions and the perceived opportunities, incentives, expectations they inculcate in citizens and finally the opinions, habits, and attitudes people exhibit and which are in turn registered and analyzed by the methods of survey research. In the third and final part of the paper, I propose a taxonomy of the various sorts of “failure of citizenship” (or deficient modes of its practice) that we encounter within established democracies of the OECD world. I conclude with a few remarks on the hypothetical impact of disaffection upon the liberal democratic regime form.

Die Zukunft des Arbeitsmarktes. Zur Ergänzungsbedürftigkeit eines versagenden Allokationsprinzips (1982)

In allen Gesellschaften stellt sich das Problem, wie eine doppelte Aufgabe institutionell gelost werden soll: einerseits muss das an menschliche Individuen gebundene Arbeitsvermogen auf konkrete Produktionsprozesse und Tatigkeiten verteilt werden, und andererseits mussen die Fruchte dieser Arbeit wiederum an die Arbeitenden und (auf dem Wege uber private und offentliche Haushalte) an die „legitimerweise“ Nicht-Arbeitenden verteilt werden. Marktwirtschaftlich-kapitalistische Systeme haben dieses Doppelproblem durch die Einrichtung eines „Marktes“ fur die „Ware“ Arbeitskraft „gelost“; diese Losung impliziert die Monetarisierung des Arbeitsvermogens („Lohnarbeit“) sowie die Herauslosung der Arbeitskrafte aus normativen, zwangsweisen oder aus Eigentum herruhrenden Zuordnungen zu einer bestimmten Verwendungsweise („freie“ Lohnarbeit).

Basic Income and the Labor Contract

Abstract The paper starts by exploring the negative contingencies that are associated with the core institution of capitalist societies, the labour contract: unemployment, poverty, and denial of autonomy. It argues that these are the three conditions that basic income schemes can help prevent. Next, the three major normative arguments are discussed that are raised by opponents of basic income proposals: the idle should not be rewarded, the prosperous don’t need it, and there are so many things waiting to be done in the world. After demonstrating that proponents of basic income stand in no way empty-handed when facing these objections, a third part considers basic income in functional terms: would its introduction help to resolve problems of social and economic order that are unlikely to be resolved in more conventional ways?

Whose good is the common good

Reference to the common good has increased in recent political discourse, not only on the right but also on the left. This development partly reflects genuine limitations in the liberal model of politics, and thus should not be dismissed as mere rhetoric. However, appeals to the common good face four difficulties: its social referent; its temporal horizon; its substantive content; and its authoritative identification. The article concludes with a modest suggestion for understanding the common good in complex societies.

Die Entwicklungsdynamik des Dienstleistungssektors (1976)

In sozialwissenschaftlichen Untersuchungen uber die Struktur und die Entwicklungstendenzen hochindustrialisierter westlicher Gesellschaften findet die Kennzeichnung dieser Gesellschaften als „Dienstleistungsgesellschaft“ in wachsendem Umfang Verwendung. Damit ist das relative und absolute Anwachsen des „Tertiaren Sektors“ bzw. „Dienstleistungssektors“ (DLS) gemeint. In der empirischen Forschung wie in der theoretischen Literatur finden sich aber bemerkenswerte Unklarheiten daruber, welches die – angeblich gesamtgesellschaftlich strukturbestimmenden – sozialen Merkmale dieses „Sektors“ sind. Bei den vorliegenden Ansatzen zur Begriffsbestimmung handelt es sich fast ausschlieslich um Residualdefinitionen (Dienstleistungssektor ist alles, was nicht zur gewinnenden oder verarbeitenden Produktion von „Sachen“ gehort), oder um Definitionen, die am technisch-stoff lichen Charakter von Dienstleistungen ansetzen (Nichtubertragbarkeit der Leistungen in Raum und Zeit, geringe Potentiale fur Produktivitatssteigerung).

Shared Social Responsibility - A Concept in Search of its Political Meaning and Promise

The aim of this paper is to draw attention to a long tradition of understanding the sources and limitations of subjectivity and to discuss the rich legacy of philosophical thought on the subject. (original abstract)This article contains a summary of the discussions conducted by the Cracow Circle during several semesters. The author comes to the conclusion that the concept of subjectivity can explain why, even if we are against a certain rule, we do not have to settle for a world without rules, but favour a set of rules which is gradually reinterpreted and modifi ed. It can be represented schematically by the following formula: subjectivity = to want (to know why) + to be able to (act and have appropriate tools) + not to have to (influence rules and the way they are modified). (original abstract)The purpose of this paper is to present the results of analyses of the methodological approaches which consider organization as an entity. Th e author discusses the limitations of such a procedure, but also presents arguments that confirm the thesis formulated in the title. In the conclusion of the paper, the author offers a critical discussion and a list of statements justifying the treatment of an organization as a subject. (original abstract)The main objective of the paper is to address the problem of responsibility of a collective being. This task has proven to be very complex due to the conviction which is currently dominant (in legal, political and economic consciousness): that of absolutely fundamental individual responsibility that closes any refl ection on the responsibility of a collective being which could destroy one of the undoubtedly most valuable achievements of human thought: the idea of moral responsibility of a human being. However, the increasingly rapid changes both in the nature and structure of societies, and in social relations, which are its new face, show that with the increasing impact and power of large organizations (public and private alike), one has to refl ect on a new dimension of responsibility, i.e. the responsibility of a collective being. The paper is therefore an attempt to show research directions of the new phenomenon, without questioning the inviolability of individual responsibility. (original abstract)In the Cracow Circle, we have dealt with the links between self, cognition, and action. It seems to me that the issue of subjectivity is key for the understanding of interactions between these categories. Knowledge and action should not be divorced from the subject. Th ere is no subject without knowledge. Th ere is no subject without action. However, the relationships between the subject, knowledge and action are neither linear nor simple. Th ere is no place for a causeeffect sequence or determinism. The author discusses subjectivity in the context of social relationships and interactions. From this point of view, subjectivity is a component of the social order and without subjectivity, or more accurately, without the existence of a number of social subjects, social order cannot emerge or last and evolve. (original abstract)

Political liberalism, identity politics and the role of fear

Resentment is not so much based upon the diversity of cultural and other identities but often rooted in grievances, complaints, and memories of historical conflicts that groups hold against other groups. Using examples from Central and Eastern Europe, this article argues that the viability of liberal democratic welfare states in Europe depends upon a minimum of toleration, trust, and solidarity among citizens. It is these cultural underpinnings of democracy which are threatened by historically rooted and (often strategically activated) feelings of resentment.

The Capitalist State

The title of the important and useful work, The Capitalist State,’ is slightly misleading. What the author is concerned with in the first four of its five chapters is not ‘the capitalist state’, but the various ways in which Marxist theoreticians have thought about the determinants and significance of the state and its potential for social change, as well as with the merits and failures of such thinking. The book thus adopts the traditional (if perhaps today somewhat debatable) procedure of approaching its object via a review and critique of the attempts of others that have approached the same object. This presupposes that the nature of the phenomenon in question-the capitalist state-can in fact be elucidated by a critical rearrangement of elements of prior theorizing and conceptualization. This presupposition (and hope), however, holds true, at least in this case, to only a very limited and modest extent. For the last chapter, in which the author offers his own conceptual schemes methodological guidelines and substantive propositions could, it appears, well have been written almost without the benefit of the preceding parts which the author has dedicated to a most careful and complex exploration of various Marxist debates and positions on the state in capitalist society. This raises the question to what extent and, under what circumstances, intellectual history is in fact able to enlighten us about present intellectual problems, or to what extent, conversely, it can, and must, better be considered a museum of past mistakes and failures from which, at best, we can learn which errors to avoid. Some years ago, the Italian constitutional theorist Norbert0 Bobbio provoked a heated debate by suggesting that there is no such thing as a Marxist theory of the state, and that there could not be. For, according to him before the revolution, the state is, within the Marxist framework, usually considered an epiphenomenon of class domination, and after the revolution, there is no need to theorize on something that is ‘withering away’ anyway. A book such as the one Jessop has written should be able to provide a consistent refutation of this ‘impossibility-theorem’. So, let us see whether it does so. Jessop provides a most comprehensive and detailed critical presentation of Marxist thinking on the state from European countries formulated in the period since World War 11. Earlier authors (Lenin, Gramsci) are excluded, though with exceptions, as are (unfortunately) contemporary North American authors (such as BaranISweezy, Bowles/Gintis, O’Connor, Panitch, Wallerstein) most of whom are part of, or have contributed to and influenced, the