Comparing Modernities

International Comparative
Social Studies
Editorial Board
Duane Alwin, Ann Arbor, USA
Wil Arts, Tilburg, The Netherlands
Mattei Dogan, Paris, France
S.N. Eisenstadt, Jerusalem, Israel
Johan Galtung, Versonnex, France
Linda Hantrais, Lougborough, UK
Jim Kluegel, Urbana-Champaign, USA
Chan Kwok Bun, Hongkong, China
Frank Lechner, Atlanta, USA
Ron Lesthaeghe, Brussels, Belgium
Ola Listhaug, Trondheim, Norway
Rubin Patterson, Toledo, USA
Eugene Roosens, Leuven, Belgium
Masamichi Sasaki, Tokyo, Japan
Saskia Sassen, New York, USA
John Rundell, Melbourne, Australia
Livy Visano, Toronto, Canada
Bernd Wegener, Berlin, Germany
Jock Young, London, UK

VOLUME 10

60

chapter two

Shmuel N. Eisenstadt

Comparing
Modernities
Pluralism versus Homogenity
Essays in Homage to Shmuel N. Eisenstadt

Edited by

Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Yitzhak Sternberg

BRILL
LEIDEN BOSTON

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data
Comparing modernities : pluralism versus homogenity / edited by Eliezer Ben-Rafael
and Yitzhak Sternberg
p. cm.(International comparative social studies, ISSN 1568-4474)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 9004144072 (alk. paper)
1. Pluralism (Social sciences)Congresses. 2. Comparative civilizationCongresses. I.
Ben Rafael, Eliezer. II. Sternberg. Yitzak. III. Series.
HM1271.C652 2005
306'.09dc22

2005041989

ISSN 15684474
ISBN 90 04 14407 2
Copyright 2005 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
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CONTENTS
Preface ........................................................................................

ix

In homage to Shmuel N. Eisenstadt ................................................

Menachem Magidor, Hayim Tadmor, Piotr Stzompka,
Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Shalini Randeria

xi

Introduction: Civilization, pluralism and uniformity ............................

Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Yitzhak Sternberg

I. THE HISTORICAL TRAJECTORY

OF MODERNITY
1. Modernity in socio-historical perspective ........................................
Shmuel N. Eisenstadt

31

2. The Axial Conundrum: Between historical sociology and the

philosophy of history ..................................................................
Johann P. Arnason

57

3. Cultural crystallization and civilization change: Axiality

and modernity ............................................................................
Bjrn Wittrock

83

4. The exception that proves the rule? Rome in the Axial Age .......... 125
W.G. Runciman
5. Civil Society: Some remarks on the career of a concept .................. 141
Jrgen Kocka
6. Challenges of modernity in an age of globalization ........................ 149
T.K. Oommen
7. The dark side of modernity: Tension relief, splitting, and Grace .... 171
Jerey C. Alexander

vi

contents
II. MODERNITY AND PLURALISM

8. Pluralities and pluralisms ........................................................

Zvi Werblowsky

183

9. Multiculturalism revisited ........................................................

Han Entzinger

191

10. Ethnic revival and religious revival in Providential democracies ......

Dominique Schnapper

205

11. Doubts about pluralism ..........................................................

Ralf Dahrendorf

223

12. The end of the social ..........................................................

Alain Touraine

229

13. Collective identity and the representation of liminality ................

Bernhard Giesen

245

III. RELIGION, NATIONALISM AND PLURALISM

14. Webers sociology of religion and Ancient Judaism ....................
Wolfgang Schluchter
15. Comparative analysis of the civilization of modernity:
1203 and 2003 ....................................................................
Edward A. Tiryakian
16. Political culture in the Islamicate civilization ............................
Sad Arjomand

261

287
309

17. Multiple religious modernities: A new approach to contemporary

religiosity ................................................................................
Danile Hervieu-Lger

327

18. Religion and power in the history of the Eastern

Orthodox Church ....................................................................
Michael Conno

339

19. From religion to nationalism: The transformation of the

Jewish identity ........................................................................
Eliezer Ben-Rafael

365

contents

vii

IV. MODERNITY AS WORLD REALITY

20. Who invented modernity in South India, and is it modern? ........
David Shulman

395

21. Is Israel Western? ..................................................................

Sammy Smooha

413

22. Cultural translations and European modernity ..........................

Gerard Delanty

443

23. Center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism ......................

Ulf Hannerz

461

24. Europes multiple modernity ....................................................

Erik Allardt

483

25. Civilizational resources for dialogic engagement? ........................

Donald N. Levine

501

V. CHALLENGES OF COLLECTIVE IDENTITIES

26. French and German Judaism facing modernity ..........................
Rolland Goetschell

515

27. From East Europeans to Europeans ........................................

Piotr Sztompka

527

28. Is Hindu-Muslim cleavage the paradigmatic case for conicts in

South Asia? ............................................................................
Stanley J. Tambiah

545

29. Democracy in Latin America: The only game in town? ..........

Luis Roniger

553

30. The European identity ............................................................

Alberto Martinelli

581

viii

contents
VI. EPILOGUE: MODERNITY AS PROGRAM

31. Basic mechanisms of moral evolution: in Durkheims and

Webers footsteps ....................................................................
Raymond Boudon

605

32. Collective identity and the constructive and destructive forces

of modernity ..........................................................................
Shmuel N. Eisenstadt

635

Appendix
The trail of a scholar ....................................................................
A scholarly portrait ........................................................................
Donald N. Levine

657
662

Bibliography ..............................................................................
Index of Persons ........................................................................
Index of Subjects ......................................................................

671
707
713

PREFACE

This book is in homage to Shmuel N. Eisenstadt as he reached the

age of eighty, at the peak of a rich and outstanding series of intellectual and scientic achievements in the Social Sciences, in general,
and in Sociology, in particular. The book is dedicated to an area of
study and research whose contemporary development can be credited largely to him: the comparative study of civilizations. Scholars
have debated the comparison of civilizations for more than a century, and since the last decades of the 20th century, these discussions
have related to the heart of the contemporary human experience
and culture. One major discussion focuses on the problem whether
contemporary developments lead to one model representing the end
of history, or, on the contrary, engender dierent types of modern
society (multiple modernities). Among the scholars who sustain the
view of dierent modernities, another discussion concerns whether
or not civilizations are doomed to clash. This book considers these
debates by emphasizing one central area, namely, pluralisticor
opennessversus totalisticor closuretendencies that develop within
civilizations. It is in this perspective, that dierent approaches to the
comparison of civilizations are elaborated and special attention focuses
both on the roots of present-day pluralism, and on predispositions
to totalitarianism and fundamentalism. The convergence and divergence of contemporary societies are highlighted within this framework. These questions are debated in the context of the often
acknowledged weakening of the nation-state, globalization processes
and the emergence of new transnational diasporas and social movements. The theoretical debates are rooted in the concrete analyses
of specic aspects of these issues. Renowned scholars from several
countries participate in this book which stems from a conference that
was organized with the support of the Israel Academy of Sciences
and Humanities and the International Institution of Sociology, and
was also made possible thanks to the cooperation of the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem, the Truman Institute for Peace, the TelAviv University and the Embassy of France in Israel. This book
received the support of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities

preface

and Brill Academic Publishers. As an introduction to the topics discussed in the all-following, it is our privilege to introduce rst the
contribution of Shmuel N. Eisenstadt.
The Editors

IN HOMAGE TO SHMUEL N. EISENSTADT

On behalf of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

This book pays tribute to a great intellectual leader, scholar and
teacher: Shmuel Noah Eisenstadt. Professor Eisenstadt is a rare combines dealing scholar whose working with detail and being rooted in
fact but, at the same time, generating sweeping conceptualizations
and bringing to the fore grand unifying themes. In addition, he
exemplies how local-oriented research can be incorporated into a
global scheme. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israeli
academic community are fortunate that a thinker such as Shmuel
Noah Eisenstadt has played such an important and formative role.
In the name of his large intellectual ospring, in the name of his
alma mater and his academic home, and in the name of the Israeli
scholarly community, it is an honor and pleasure to be able to pay
this tribute.
Menachem Magidor
President of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

On behalf of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities

On the occasion of the publication of this book at his homage, I
have the honour of conveying the Academys blessing to Professor
Eisenstadt, coupled with our wish for many more years of undiminished, fruitful creativity. Professor Eisenstadt was among the rst members to be elected to the Academy, and he is today the most senior
colleague in the Section of Humanities. Over the years, he has made
contributions of singular signicance to the Academy with the gift
of his wise counsel, in times of plenty as well as in harder days.
I am not a sociologist, and my interests as a historian are rather
remote from the scholarly discourse of the social sciences and the
numerous elds of research to which Professor Eisenstadt has turned
his critical attention. I have, however, approached one aspect of
Eisenstadts scholarly concerns, that of axiality. He strongly urged
me to come to the rst conference on the subject at Bad Homburg

xii

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

and to the second one in Florence. This professional encounter with

him was a momentous one for me; I was dazzled by his intellectual
ability, the breadth of the knowledge at his disposal, his organizational ability, and the astuteness of his comments, as well as by the
geniality and tact that he displayed in every interaction.
I wish to convey the Academys greetings to the honoured contributors to this book who have gathered from all over the world,
from the Far East to the furthermost west. The chapters presented
in this book bring some of the nest minds in the eld today to
bear upon Eisenstadts manifold interests, all of which are at the
forefront of sociological concern in the twenty-rst century.
Hayim Tadmor
Vice-President of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities

On behalf of the International Sociological Association

It is a great honor and pleasure for me to pay homage to Shmuel
Noah Eisenstadt, on the occasion of his 80th birthday and almost
60 years of academic work. As President of the International
Sociological Association (ISA), the biggest professional representation
of sociologists in the world, I guess I can speak on behalf of the
world sociological community.
This community is indebted to Eisenstadt in many senses. He certainly belong to those great scholars who left a strong imprint on
the sociology of our time. His innovative and deep theoretical work,
particularly in the macrosociological and historical scrutiny of great
civilizations and multiple modernities, has opened new vistas in the
interpretation of the heritage and prospects of humankind. With no
exaggeration Eisenstadt is one of the XXth century sociological
classics. At the same time he has been probably the most international of the great sociologists. His readiness for the active participation and always creative contribution to innumerable conferences,
seminars, symposia, and research projects all over the world has
become famous. Within the association that I represent, the ISA, he
has not only been one of the founding fathers but then took part
in almost all world congresses of sociology, where his presentations
were always true intellectual events.
Sociologists of the world are deeply grateful to him for the wisdom he has shared with all of us, for his commitment to the disci-

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

xiii

pline and his openness to the world and its challenges. We wish him
many more years of intellectual creativeness, health, prosperity and
deserved satisfaction with a work so important for others.
Piotr Sztompka
President of the International Sociological Association

On behalf of the International Institute of Sociology

I want to congratulate Shmuel Eisenstadt, rst as his former student
in Jerusalem, second as a member of the Israeli sociological community, and third as the president of the International Institute of
Sociology.
I was a student, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. I remember
Shmuel Eisenstadts seminars as a genuine intellectual experience.
My comrades and I have all been deeply marked by his intellectual
and scientic mind, as well as, of course, by his good nature and
openness to discussion. I dont remember that he ever raised his
voice, got anxious or intolerant. Year after year, we liked to gather
in his classroom and ponder, in good spirit, on a new subject, a
new model, a new approach, according to his changing interests.
We have learned from him about sociological theories, of course,
but also about age groups, revolutions, socialism, Latin America, the
Moslem world, Africa, the Welfare State, stratication and, last but
not least, the Israeli society. Later, from the distance or from the
close, we also followed his investigations of fundamentalism, Japan,
axial-age civilizations, and his comprehensive grasping of multiple
modernities. Shmuel Eisenstadt has always been for us a living
reference, and a source of knowledge, understanding and perspectives. It was an invaluable privilege to have such a great professor.
The most dicult problem for his students was that, as a rule, he
always nished writing a new book, before we nished reading the
former one.
I am also proud to congratulate Shmuel Eisenstadt on his eightieth anniversary, as a member of the Israeli sociological community.
Shmuel Eisenstadt was the worthy student of Martin Buber in
Jerusalem many years ago, and he also served as the editor for his
work. Ever since, Shmuel Eisenstadt has laid down the ground for
the development of an Israeli sociology; he set up a whole generation of students who, in turn, raised students of their own. For years,

xiv

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

Shmuel Eisenstadt served as the head of the Department of Sociology

at the Hebrew University from where came those who brought sociology to Israels new universities that were created in the 60s and
70s. Up to now, Shmuel Eisenstadt is the leading gure of Israeli
sociology and the greatest contributor to its presence on the world
scholarly scene. A desired guest in the prestigious universities of the
world and a member of major academies of social sciences, he has
been the founder of schools of thought and the tireless forerunner
of new perspectives.
It is also as the President of the International Institute of Sociology
that I want to pay homage to Shmuel Eisenstadt. This Institute, the
oldest world association of sociology that was created in Paris in
1893, holds world congresses every two years and numbers a following
of sociologists on all continents. For many years, Shmuel Eisenstadt
is a prominent key has been speaker to IIS congresses; he has contributed enormously to its development and renown. His strongest
contribution, if I may speak out my personal feeling, has been his
participation in the preparation and realization of the 34th world
congress that was held in Tel-Aviv in 1999. I had the privilege to
closely cooperate with him on the academic program. He endowed
the whole enterprise its genuine importance and impact. Again, two
years later, in 2001, Shmuel Eisenstadt was again a major contributor to the 35th world congress in Krakow. The Bureau of the
IIS, the members of the association as well as the many friends of
the IIS join me to wish Shmuel Eisenstadt to continue to amaze his
colleagues and admirers, with his fruitful endeavor, for the decades
to come.
Eliezer Ben-Rafael
President of the Intenational Institute of Sociology

On behalf of the Central European University at Budapest1

Prof. Shmuel Eisenstadt is today one of the most powerful intellectual gures of our time. He has done more than any other scholar
to combine sociological theory with historical and empirical research
1

On the occasion of the award of an honorary doctorate to S.N. Eisenstadt by

the Central European University, Budapest, 4th December 2003.

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

xv

besides promoting our knowledge of the uniqueness and anities, as

also the interrelationships, of ancient and modern societies in Asia,
Europe, Middle East, North and Latin America. No one has done
more to raise the appreciation of the possibilities of sociology amongst
related disciplines and especially in the elds of history and the
humanities. If today modern and medieval historians, classical scholars and students of religion, scholars of ancient India and modern
Japan, look at sociology as a source of deeper understanding of their
own subjects, it is in no small measure due to the reception of his
wide-ranging writings all over the world.
Prof. Eisenstadt has consistently framed all his enquiries in a comparative framework often spanning several continents and centuries.
He has provided bold innovative answers to the big questions in
sociological theory. But more importantly, his scholarship has changed
the nature of the very questions that we now ask. The hallmark of
his scholarship, at the intersection of sociology and history, is its synthesis of a vast and varied body of specialist literature into a unitary and universal analytical framework for the comparative study
of civilisations. His contribution to an analysis of social change in
axial civilisations as well as in the modern world is unique thanks
to his profound knowledge and understanding of times and of places
outside the modern western world.
I can hardly think of a central problem in sociological theory on
which Prof. Eisenstadt has not written during the course of his long
and distinguished academic career. The range of issues he has dealt
with is as impressive as the originality of his approach to them. He
has had an abiding interest in issues of structural dierentiation and
social change but also in questions of agency, cultural values and
meaning. His boundless intellectual curiosity has been brought to
bear on questions of power, legitimation, charisma, trust, solidarity
as well as on the role of elites, heterodoxies and protest movements
in shaping both institutional continuity and change. His work stands
out for its breadth of learning, its profound theoretical analysis and
its ability to marshal vast amounts of historical evidence from a range
of societies past and present. This empirical material is used by him
in order to discuss a set of clearly formulated hypotheses. His extraordinary skill in bringing together abstract generalisations with concrete data in support of these hypotheses is a hallmark of his writings
which has rendered them accessible to students and scholars across
several disciplines and continents.

xvi

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

Prof. Eisenstadt was always ahead of his times in taking up questions

which became fashionable many decades later. For example, he
emphasised the importance of trust and solidarity in the early 1950s
in his work on social change in Israel. He published an empirical
study on youth culture in the mid 50s, a subject which has been
the focus of a great deal of attention since the 1970s under the
inuence of cultural studies. As early as 1961 he explored the fruitfulness and the limitations of applying anthropological methods to
the study of complex societies, a matter of continuing debate among
anthropologists today as they question the traditional intellectual division of labour between sociology and social anthropology. With his
work on the political systems of empires he opened a new era of
macro-sociological comparative analysis in 1963 at a time when
decolonisation and the emergence of new nation-states exercised the
scholarly imagination and the Age of Empires was considered to
be over. I do not think that he deliberately chose to swim against
the tide with his choice of topics. Rather he remained unconcerned
about the fashions of the time as his themes were derived from his
own abiding scholarly interests. He chose to address some of the
central theoretical questions in classical sociology but his work also
shaped the terms in which these issues have been discussed since.
In Prof. Eisenstadt we honour an illustrious scholar who was, and
continues to be, deeply involved in society and politics in the state
of Israel and whose scholarship is also coloured by that experience;
someone who has lectured at almost all major universities in the
world but has not accepted a permanent teaching position outside
his country. We honour in him a rooted cosmopolitan, someone
whose moorings in Israel are as important as his reception of European
intellectual inuences, someone who has contributed as much to the
intellectual life of his country as he has changed research paradigms
in social sciences and humanities all over the world. He wrote his
doctoral dissertation in Jerusalem with Martin Buber with whom he
rst studied Max Webers writings which exercised a formative
inuence on his intellectual pursuits. During the post-doctoral year
he spent at the London School of Economics in 194748, he pursued this early interest in Webers comparative historical sociology
with Edward Shils. But that year also introduced him to the comparative institutional analysis which was the hallmark of British sociology and social anthropology broadening his comparative framework
beyond the Weberian one. Prof. Eisenstadt is commonly regarded

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

xvii

as working in the Weberian tradition, in fact he has often been

described as the Max Weber of our times. But such an understanding
of his work overlooks the role of his teachers Morris Ginsberg, David
Glass and T.H. Marshall in his intellectual life. More importantly,
it neglects the equally formative inuence on his work of social
anthropologists such as Raymond Firth, Audrey Richards and Fred
Nadel with whom he also studied at the London School of Economics
and those like Evans-Pritchard, Meyer Fortes, Max Gluckmann and
Edmund Leach whose work he admired and assimilated in many
subtle and sophisticated ways into his own analytical framework.
On his return to Jerusalem, in the then newly formed state of
Israel, he took up a position as an assistant lecturer in the department of sociology headed by Martin Buber. Prof. Eisenstadt continued to teach at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem till 1990 where
he was the Rose Isaacs Professor of Sociology from 1959 till his formal retirement in 1990. His published work has been as inuential
as his lectures and colloquia as a visiting professor in universities
abroad. In a long and distinguished academic career he has been a
visiting professor at universities or a Fellow of centres of advanced
studies in the USA, England, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway,
Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, Latin America, Austria and
Australia. He is a member of the Israeli Academy of Science and
Humanities, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American
Philosophical Society, the US National Academy of Sciences, and
the Institute of Comparative Civilisations in Brussels. He received
the prestigious Balzan prize for Sociology in 1988, followed by the
Amal Prize in Sociology and Social Sciences as well as the Max
Planck Forschungspreis. He has been awarded honorary doctorates
from the universities of Harvard, Helsinki and Tel Aviv.
So the Central European University, Budapest is a latecomer in
this respect. If the Central European University honours Prof. Eisenstadt
a little after his eightieth birthday, it is because the university is only
in its early teens and the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology in its infancy. Belated as this recognition may be, we at the
Central European University have several ties and anities with his
life and work. First there is a primordial bond. Prof. Eisenstadt was
born in Warsaw in a family that had settled there from central
Europe. Secondly, there is an institutional anity. Two years ago
the university decided to build an integrated department of sociology and social anthropology which would cover the comparative

xviii

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

study of societies in all parts of the world. This is an intellectual

project to which Prof. Eisenstadt has made an outstanding contribution.
Last year as I struggled to formulate an integrated curriculum for
the new department which would overcome the nineteenth century
disciplinary division of labour separating the study of the modern
West from the rest which has been institutionalised all over Europe
and the USA, I drew inspiration from Prof. Eisenstadts comparative programme on multiple modernities. It was then that I discovered
to my astonishment and delight an early article of his titled The
relations between sociological theory and anthropological research.
Written in 1949 for the British anthropology journal Man, it begins
with the sentence in my view there is no theoretical distinction
between sociology and social anthropology. The academic community at the Central European University not only shares this vision
but decided to institutionalise it. In my view it is thus tting that
we celebrate the opening of the new department at the Central
European University this year with the award of an honorary doctorate to Prof. Eisenstadt.
But in addition to primordial ties and a shared comparative interdisciplinary social science perspective, three themes in Prof. Eisenstadts
work are an important focus of teaching and research at the Central
European University. All three resonate strongly with the experience
of its students from many dierent post-socialist societies: (1) the
legacies of the making and unmaking of several empires; (2) a recognition of the paradoxes and precariousness of democracies; and (3)
nally the idea of multiple modernities with its sensitivity to the tensions between the political and the cultural projects of modernity
which are resolved in a variety of dierent ways in dierent contexts. It is to a brief treatment of some of these ideas that I now
wish to turn.
In the Political Systems of Empires Prof. Eisenstadt explored the systemic conditions of the development, continuity and change of imperial regimes focussing on the role of what he called free resources,
resources not embedded in various ascriptive groups or social sectors. Although a classical structural-functional analysis in many ways,
this innovative study went well beyond the limits of such a framework. What set the book apart from the dominant structural-functional paradigm of its day was its questioning of the natural givenness,
the taken-for-grantedness, of any social system. Instead of taking
existing institutional arrangements as its point of departure, the study

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

xix

broke new ground by treating institutions and their continuity to be

as much in need of explanation as the process of their transformation. It emphasised the central role of institutional entrepreneurs,
elites and their coalitions in the construction and reproduction of
dierent institutional settings. It not only recognised that cultural
values and visions inuence the actions of various groups but also
traced how these ideals aected the dynamics of institutional development. On the one hand, it examined the specic mechanisms and
politics by which bureaucracies maintained these regimes. On the
other, it identied the importance of internal contradictions and
conicts among groups which in their complex and contingent interaction with external factors inuence the course of development and
the disintegration of empires.
Going beyond the argument of the book, Prof. Eisenstadt later
extended his study to an analysis of the composition and the cosmological visions of major social groups examining the role of heterodoxies and movements of protest in the comparative dynamics
of empires and early state formation. In the light of these analyses
he then re-examined the relationship between action, culture and
structure suggesting the need to modify some of the basic concepts
of sociological theory, for example, those of centre-periphery, systemic
needs or functional prerequisites.
Written 40 years ago, his work on empires and their changing
fortunes has lost none of its signicance, though Prof. Eisenstadt himself would probably be the rst to acknowledge some of its limitations in retrospect. In fact, he has modied and extended his own
earlier argument in the light of subsequent research, much of which
was inspired by his own work. The Political Systems of Empire was sensitive both to the institutional constraints on social action and to the
contingency of historical changes. But it also dealt with the diversity of their outcomes even under very similar historical conditions
and structural features, a theme which would recur in Prof. Eisenstadts
later studies of patterns of modernity too. The focus on the interrelations between institutional patterns and cultural orientations of
various social actors would also remain a central theme in his later
writings. For example, when in the early eighties he took up a classic
anthropological theme, the patterns of exchange in friendship and
in patron-client relations, he shifted the traditional anthropological
focus to show how dierent patterns of trust in micro and in macro
settings were related systematically to dierent institutional formations.

xx

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

If today many of these arguments, or this way of conceptualising

the problem of agency, structure and culture seem self-evident to us,
it is in no small measure due to the seminal contributions of Prof.
Eisenstadt to these subjects.
Most recently it is his ideas on the plurality of the origins and
outcomes of dierent trajectories of modernity in dierent regions
of the world, its structural concomitants, historical pathways and cultural embeddedness which have attracted a great deal of attention
across the social sciences in many parts of the world. His idea of
multiple modernities has changed our understanding of modernity
and led to a reappraisal of many traditional premises of modernisation theory. He has made a strong argument for replacing the
classical linear teleological narrative of modernisation, which equates
it with westernisation, by a recognition of the symbolic and institutional variability of various dimensions and congurations of modernity in dierent societies. He has focussed on those movements which
have redened and appropriated modernity in their own terms, be
they ideological or cultural, both within Europe and outside it.
In numerous studies he has analysed the cultural and political programmes of modernity as it developed in western and central Europe
with its distinct ideological and institutional premises and as it
travelled to other regions of the world. As a result of the impact of
his writings the idea of a homogenous and hegemonic western modernity which has dominated social science research for far too long
has begun to be replaced by a recognition of the diverse origins,
outcomes and contestations of modernity. Any pluralisation of modernity, therefore, must also acknowledge its multiple paths and patterns
within Europe. Western European modernity, he has shown, is only
one among many variations on the theme of modernity.
Given its historical precedence and its global diusion and dominance, European modernity continues to remain a point of reference
for other modernities, though as Prof. Eisenstadt shows, it is often
a rather ambivalent one. In the light of his work we can rewrite the
history of modernity as a story of the continual constitution and
reconstitution of a plurality of cultural and political programmes
including some rather violent and repressive ones. He has analysed
not only the radical break from the civilisations of the axial age
which modernity represents but also the internal antinomies of this
western project, its unique conception of autonomous human agency,
its radical transformation of the nature of political order and legiti-

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

xxi

macy, its restructuring of the permeability of the boundaries between

centre and periphery within a society. Interestingly, he has contributed to the ongoing debates on globalisation by reminding us of
the similarities and dierences of contemporary patterns of globalisation in a historical perspective, thus pluralizing both modernity and
globalisation. And he has also examined the transnational dimensions of fascist, communist and fundamentalist movements which
have pursued dierent, and often contradictory, programmes of
modernity in the 19th and 20th centuries.
No other scholar since Max Weber has explored so systematically
the specicity of western modernity and the rupture with the past
which it marked in European societies. He has explored its emancipatory potential and its exclusionary dynamics, he has contrasted
its ideals of inclusion with its practices and drawn attention to its
violence and repression. But what makes Prof. Eisenstadts contribution to the study of modernity unique is his delineation of the
common core of modernity together with an analysis of its enormous
cultural and institutional diversity in dierent contexts including within
Europe itself. At a time when the nature of European identity is a
matter of public debate all over the continent and across the Atlantic,
such a reformulation has enormous political implications, even if
characteristically Prof. Eisenstadt does not spell these out himself. In
a highly ideological and normative debate on the end of history,
the clash of civilisations and on the old and new Europe, Prof.
Eisenstadts dispassionate and nuanced analysis is a very welcome
interjection indeed. Acutely aware of the pernicious potential of both
modernity and globalisation, he does not celebrate either. His work
strives instead to situate both sets of processes in a historical context and study their variations in dierent locations. And it retains
an acute sense of their antinomies and of the relative autonomy and
degrees of freedom of various actors in shaping these phenomena in
dierent ways and directions. It changes the terms of the debate and
oers an alternative intellectual perspective. A perspective which is
exemplary not the least due to its refusal to yield to the temptation
to turn sociological theory into a mere diagnosis of contemporary
aairs.
There are many other ideas of Prof. Eisenstadts that I could discuss which would be of interest to this audience. But I cannot hope
to do justice to his writings, the list of which spans a formidable 61
pages. It comprises 592 entries enumerating articles in all major

xxii

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

English language social science journals across the world. And it lists
94 monographs and edited books including translations into Hebrew,
German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese and Korean. Their
subjects range from classical sociological questions of structural
dierentiation and stratication to classical anthropological preoccupations like age sets among the plains Indians in north America.
They include the absorption of immigrants in Israel, the generalisation
of trust and patron-client relationships in Latin America, patterns of
social change in India, Japanese civilisation in comparative perspective, charisma and institution building, the dilemmas of development
in post-colonial societies, youth culture in Israel, the reconguration
of the political in modern protest movements, the reconstruction of
tradition in post-traditional societies, the modernity of religious
fundamentalist movements, the deconsolidation of contemporary
democracies and the dynamics of revolutionary change, to mention
only a few of the topics which bear witness to the extraordinary
range of his scholarly interests. He brings a wealth of historical
and empirical material to bear on these issues moving eortlessly
from the macro level to the micro level, linking social structure and
cultural traditions with collective action by diverse groups of actors.
Not everything he has written may be equally persuasive, but even
when one disagrees with him one learns more than from most
scholars.
Prof. Eisenstadt is no stylist. What his prose lacks in elegance, it
makes up for in clarity and the coherence of the argument. One
always reads him with prot, but listening to his lectures is a special pleasure. I do not know if it is years of teaching experience, or
just a natural gift, which enable him to deliver a public lecture without even a set of notes, let alone a manuscript. Never rambling,
timed to the minute, these well-structured oral presentations, in which
he never loses the thread of his complex argument, could go into
print without any alterations. His lectures have the informality of a
personal conversation with him and bear some testimony to his
delightful sense of humour of which there is no trace in his writings.
But they would not qualify as Eisenstadt lite. However brief his talks,
or informal the setting in which they are delivered, they are full of
stimulating ideas. Remarkable is the eortless ease with which he
links the large picture to little details drawn from a vast variety of
sources. So lightly does he wear his learning that even audiences
with a limited acquaintance of the enormous range of secondary

in homage to shmuel n. eisenstadt

xxiii

literature on which he draws nd his talks and writings accessible.

Yet even the specialist never fails to be impressed by the new insights
she gains in her own elds of expertise from his erudition.
Prof. Eisenstadt himself has identied the one common concern
in all his writings to be the problem of human creativity and its
limitations, or put dierently the exploration of the potential range
of human freedom in a variety of social contexts. I hardly need stress
the importance of this issue for the faculty and students of the Central
European University as an institution devoted to the ideal of the
promotion of open societies all over the world but especially in eastern and central Europe after long years of authoritarian rule. His
ideas on the paradoxes and precariousness of democracies are not
meant to sour the fruits of democracy but to caution us about the
challenges ahead. His writings on the subject may not persuade those
currently involved in the task of its global diusion to give up their
eorts. They are not intended to do so. By complicating the currently hegemonial simple narrative of the triumph of democracy
worldwide, they seek to warn us against the seduction of easy solutions. That is the privilege and the prerogative of the intellectual.
Let me end this laudation on a personal note. Of all the scholars
who contribute to this volume in his honour, I probably have the
shortest personal acquaintance with Prof. Eisenstadt. But I have read
with pleasure, and taught with prot, his writings for almost 20 years.
Over the last few months in preparation for this laudation I have
been able to renew my acquaintance with many of his writings, and
to discover many more which I had missed earlier. Reading through
the manuscript of his new book on Political theory in search of the
political, which he gave me in Jerusalem this summer, I realised
with some amazement that it would be his 95th published book. He
is not only the most prolic reader that I know, but also the most
prolic writer.
Prof. Dr. Shalini Randeria
The Central European University, Budapest

INTRODUCTION:
CIVILIZATION, PLURALISM AND UNIFORMITY
Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Yitzhak Sternberg
Anthropologist Clyde Kluckhohn expressed years ago the truism that
every man is in certain respects like all other men; like some other
men; like no other man (see Hannerz, 1996: 39). Two major sociological issues relate to this sentence, namely the appropriate unit of
socio-historical analysis and the question of pluralism versus uniformity in society; these issues are at the center of this volume. More
specically, it deals with the tensions and dilemmas that in nearly
every contemporary society oppose pluralism and homogeneity. Unlike the widest part of the literature that discusses this area of
questions, the present frame of discussion is civilizational analysis and
it looks at essential aspects of civilizations in order to approach it.
To avoid confusion, the concept of civilization is to be distinguished
from culture. This distinction developed in Germany where scholars
included in the notion of civilization technological, material and organizational aspects of the social reality which tend to spread in society
and beyond. In the same perspective, culture, on the other hand,
was viewed as designating deeper spiritual and aesthetic aspects of
social life and personality that are particular to specic societies and
groups (see Elias, 1994). According to this distinction, dierent social
groups can absorb given aspects pertaining to a same civilization
reaching them from external or internal foci, and at the same time
share dierent cultures. Hence, change in civilization does not necessarily imply corresponding change in culture, and civilization and
culture do not necessarily develop at the same pace. In addition, it
is also widely acknowledged that impacts of civilization may stand
in contradiction with desirata of culture. This theme was already
asserted by Wilhelm Mommsen in the middle of the 19th century,
when he said that it is humanitys duty today to see that civilization does not destroy culture, nor technology the human being (see
Braudel, 1994: 56). This theme, even if the explicit terminology
was not used, also appeared in Karl Marxs notion of alienation

eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

and Max Webers typology of rationality and its iron cage metaphor.
An attitude that has also been exemplied in writings of scholars
from the Frankfurt School (Horkheimer and Adorno, 1972). In
other words, the distinction between civilization and culture enables
a critique on civilization on behalf of culture.
At the heart of these outlooks resides the fact that civilization and
culture are both mainly concerned with choices of criteria of social
action and perspectives on social life. Civilization and culture, it is
true, are turned toward dierent items pertaining to dierent areas
of activity and reections. Yet, these areas are not completely
separate from each other and may overlap to a varying extent: the
use of technologies and the organization of consumption behavior,
for instance, as rstly determined by civilizational perspectives are
not alien to aesthetic or moral considerations that form the core of
cultural preoccupations. Moreover, civilization and culture may also
compete with each other with respect to the relative emphases individuals and groups set on the dierent relevant areas of action or
reection. Hence, the relations of civilization and culture are fraught
with tensions and dilemmas. Furthermore, such tensions and contradictions can still be aggravated when individuals, groups, parties
or organizations stand for opposed outlooks drawing in dierent
manners from civilizational or cultural codes.
It remains that contrary to the particularism of cultures, civilization is bound to world-historical processes (see Arnason, 2001;
Eisenstadt, 2001a), constitute long-term developments involving selfconstraints coming up to transformations in human behaviorwhat
Elias (1994) means by the notion of civilizing process. As such
they raise a spectrum of unavoidable analytical and moral questions.
According to Emile Durkheim, for example, a man is a man only
to the degree that he is civilized (see Arnason, 1988: 89). Sigmund
Freud expressed a similar view when remarking that the word
civilization describes the whole sum of the achievements and the
regulations which distinguish our lives from those of our animal
ancestors. (Freud, 1961: 36). This notion is connected, among
others, to the problmatique implied by the theme of the noble
savage, and opens a fundamental debate about the universal, nay
even universalistic, nature of social development.
At the same time, civilizations also refer to distinct sociocultural
spaces that include diverse units such as states and societies. Hence,
civilizational analysis usually deals with units of larger dimensions

introduction

and longer duration than the single societies that they encompass
(Arnason, 2001: 1910) and it is under this angle that Arnold Toynbee
(1965) considered civilization as the central unit for socio-historical
analysis. At this very point, however, this notion of civilization questions its relation to religion that, as it happens, also consists of a set
of codes that mostly run across the borders of individual societies.
According to Shmuel N. Eisenstadt although in the history of human
kind civilizations and religions were very closely interwovenat the
same time many religions have been only a part of the component
or not necessarily the most central component of civilizations
(Eisenstadt, 1992b: 1; see also Kroeber, 1963). Yet, as argued by
Fernand Braudel, religion can be seen as one of the most important traits of civilizations. According to him, Christianity is an essential reality in western life: it even marks atheists, whether they know
it or not. Ethical rules, attitudes to life and death, the concept of
work, the value of eort, the role of women and childrenthese
may seem to have nothing to do with Christian feeling: yet all derive
from it nevertheless (Braudel, 1994: 23). Braudel also suggests that
the long historical continuity of civilizations should be part of their
denition. Civilization is in fact the longest story of all says Braudel
(1994: 34). For Durkheim and Mauss ([1913] 1971: 811) a civilization constitutes a kind of moral milieu encompassing a certain
number of nations, each national culture being only a particular
form of the whole. Moreover, according to Carroll Quigley (1979)
only a culture that has some instruments of expansion can become
a civilization. This large-scale dimension of civilization makes it a
family of societies distinct from other such familiesto use the
words of Marcel Mauss. It is under this angle and at the level of
world history that one may also speak of civilization as carrying a
form of particularism (see also Arieli, 1992; Braudel, 1980; Febvre,
1973; Kroeber and Kluckhohn, 1952; Nelson, 1981b).
In this broad context, the concept of civilization implies a pluralistic calling that stems from both the plurality of civilizations and
plurality within civilizations. A plurality-condition that may add up to,
and combine with, additional factors of pluralism, like the character
of dominant and dominated groups (Toynbee, 1965) or diverse
distinctions between core and periphery (Quigley, 1979). In all
respects, what is at stake is the extent that dierencesthat is,
pluralismare tolerated at the cost of the common perspectives and
uniformity carried primarily by civilizational codes.

eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

In practical terms, the dilemma of pluralism-uniformity comes

down to the confrontation of socio-cultural groups in given social
realities that may be willing to confront the societal center in view
of bringing about changes in the social order. Such confrontations
focus on the power relations prevailing in society and the possibility
of bringing up new emphases and credos to the forefront of the public scene. This pluralism develops into multiculturalism where the
very fact of pluralism or aspects of it are recognized as permanent
and legitimate features of the social order, giving thereby expression,
as suggested by Taylor (1994), to the eventual aspirations of groups
to recognition.
At rst glance, it is true, a center is a priori interested in some
cohesion of the setting which it controls while groups may aspire,
in a no less natural manner, to assert their particular personality.
Yet, at least as far as individual settings are concerned which both
illustrate at any moment a particular culture and participation to a
civilizational perspective, one may contend that not every sociocultural group is interested in retaining its particularism in front of the
rest of society, and not every center together with the actors who
stand behind it, are interested in minimizing the heterogeneity of
the setting beyond a level warranting the endorsement of given common rules. Both in the case of socio-cultural groups and of the center and its supporters, the question which arises concerns then the
extent that they draw their major identity principles from universalistic-civilizational perspectives and emphasize the individuals participation to the general setting, or from particularistic-cultural allegiances
which singularizes the society and divides it into socially meaningful categories.
As far as groups are concerned, they often carry legacies of their
own, especially if they originate from the outside, let alone from
outer civilizational spaces. Beyond gradual adjustment to the environment, they may nd diculties to hyphenate their identity with
the prevailing societal identity whether because of basic incompatibilities of perspectives or of their sharing particularly strong anities
to their original tokenswhich is especially frequent with religious
allegiances. Moreover, and this is particularly the case with contemporary transnational diasporas, the retention of ties with the original motherland or fellow-members settled elsewhere is also a factor
encouraging the retention of particularism and politics of identity.
Feelings of discrimination and deprivationwhether or not justied

introduction

are another ingredient that one often nds behind the groups mobilization on behalf of its recognition as a distinct and respectable
entity. On the other hand, changes of values and perspectives among
members are also inevitable as they insert themselves in society,
are exposed to predominant patterns of behavior and convictions,
and undergo a degree of acculturation. Acculturation may even lead
to assimilation when individuals accede to higher-status positions and
are tempted by distancing themselves from their group of origin in
order to better integrate new milieus.
Such processes, however, are by no means unrelated to the viewpoint characterizing the societal center that may either encourage or
on the contrary hamper processes leading to homogeneity. In this
latter case, it is that which supports, from the above, the retention, nay even institutionalization, of pluralism regarding at least,
some of the groups in presence. This stance of the stronger party
of the scene is the primary factor in laying down the rules of the
game. On the ground of its representation of societys historical and
cultural personalityand of course, under the inuence of the interests of those who support its policies, this party may combine, in
dierent possible manners, universal valuessuch as freedom or
equalitywith particularistic outlooks, and specify in varying terms
rules of the pluralism-homogeneity dilemma, such as the exclusiveness or accessibility of membership; regulations ofeconomic, political,
or otherparticipatory rights; or entitlements to prominent positions
(see Almond and Verba, 1963; Znaniecki, 1973). These rules where
the imprint of civilization as well as culture can be revealed, manifest basic attitudes toward social divisions and, among other expressions, articulate fundamental orientations toward pluralism that may
vary over time and space (Grillo, 1989).
Unifying orientations perceive a setting where dierences are secondary and doomed to disappear. This type of orientation may accept
new members who are dierent, only on condition that they are
willing to conform. It encourages a complete integration of newcomers but with no tolerance for the public manifestation of their
particularisms. In contrast, pluralistic orientations recognize the social,
cultural, and linguistic dierences that exist in society. Permissive of
dierences, it is ready to institutionalize them as enduring features
of the social order. At its limit, these orientations can be segregationist
and refuse to leave to individual groups the choice between the retention of singularity or assimilation. Unifying and pluralistic orientations,

eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

however, are by no means mutually exclusive, and we may well conceive of a society where the center insists on unication and assimilation vis--vis some groups, but on pluralism vis--vis others.
This rough characterization is enough, we think, to evince how
far pluralism versus homogeneity can constitute a central axis of
debate in society. An assessment that, to be sure, cannot but remind
what we know about many contemporary societies, and more precisely, contemporary societies which participate to the modern civilization where universalistic claims and exigencies and particularistic
demands and struggles often constitute an endemic constituent of the
social order.
Have not, it must be emphasized time and again, to come up to
this point, societies had a long way to go through civilizational development. It is this parcours that is discussed in the rst section of this
volume.
The historical trajectory
Looking at historical civilizations or using the civilizational perspective, we have said, is fruitful for analyzing macro-historical continuities.
However, it can also be productive for understanding major historical or cultural ruptures and breakthroughs (see Arnason, 2001).
Thus, for example, Eisenstadt employs this civilizational perspective
in order to depict what seems to him as two major turning-points in
the history of mankind, namely the discontinuities relating to the
axial age and the modern age. It is argued that these major historical ruptures were materialized by civilizations. Eisenstadts chapter
which opens the rst section of this volume denes what modernity
as a civilization means, and further chapters delve into its historical
trajectory.
Eisenstadt, who forged the notion of multiple modernities to
account for the diversity of forms that modernity can assume in
dierent settings, discusses the analytical links of the notion of civilization to modernity, pointing out, more particularly, the tensions
with which their interaction is fraught. In modernity, says Eisenstadt,
the premises of the social order are not taken for granted, as people are freed from permanent authority or tradition. Society and the
human experience are interpreted on the basis of a belief in autono-

introduction

mous human agency. It is from this angle that conscious actions in

the mundane order may be understood as capable of realizing utopian
visions. By the same token, it is also understood that people may be
moved by a multiplicity of interests in, and interpretations of, the
common good. It follows that in this kind of society, centers are, in
principle, accessible to peripheral groups which are expected to show
political awareness, and an open political class emerges. Politicians
are permanently confronted with the exigency to enlistand compete forpublic support; numerous problems become political issues
and are often couched in ideological terms to constitute topics of
conict. Moreover, basic antinomies of the modernity program fuel
antagonisms throughout society. Rational construction of society stands
in opposition to emotional community solidarity; reexive critical
exploration contrasts with the commandingness of the mastery of the
world and the social reality; the contradiction pluralism-totalism implies alternate institutional patterns. If one further adds to the cultural multiplicity and institutional variance of modernity, the varying
constellations of power, the dierent civilizational traditions that
modernity encounters in dierent societies, and the tensions inherent
to the institutionalization of modernity itself, one can explain satisfactorily the confrontations that are generated between divergent
interpretations of its basic premises.
Exploring the roots of modernity in the footsteps of Karl Jaspers
(1953), Arnason focuses on the genesis epoch depicted by the German
scholar as axial age. That age constituted the epoch of birth of
major civilizations that, over time, were themselves to undergo transformation in the formative processes of the principal molds of modernity that we witness today. Arnason elaborates an analysis of what
he calls the axial conundrum. Around the middle of the last
millennium bce, he explains, there was an accumulation of innovative changes in major civilizational centers unexplainable in terms of
mutual inuences. These innovations were bound to complex ways
of articulating the world, and the age which they engendered was
to exhibit a new world-making capacity out of the traditions from
which it sprang. A variety of religious legacies was now initiated over
several centuries, sweeping from Persia to China, and from India to
Greeceincluding Judea/Israel. Most essentially, this period divides
religions which came into being before and after this erahence
the very notion of axial age. That ages salient strength was its

eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

emphasiswithin a large diversity of contextson state formation

processes which literally transformed societies. This exceptional period
remained related to the past in dierent ways, but its most importantand generalachievement consisted of its armation of ontological distinction between ultimate and mundane realities. In actual
fact, this was to constitute over time a most vital seed of the civilization of modernity.
As shown further by Wittrock, the axial age encompassed not only
deep-seated shifts articulated in world religions and the emergence
of imperial political orders, but also a restructuring of societal principles that came up to a re-conceptualization of the social endeavor.
Beyond its variance throughout Eurasia and its retention of a continuity vis--vis earlier civilizations, in its essence the axial breakthrough involved new attitudes regarding reexivity, historicity and
agentiality. These changes were expressed in new cosmologies, religious practices and institutional development. Among other patterns,
a common crucial denominator of all forms of axiality consisted of
the legitimacy of given patterns of dissent. On the other hand, as
distinguished by Wittrock, one may also speak of dierent models
of axial transformationsfrom the Mosaic variance which contrasted
true and false, and religion and politics, to the Greek philosophicalpolitical legacy that contributed deliberations about the human condition. All these were ingredients in the development of modernity,
but if one sees the axial age as the point of departure and modernity as the point of arrival, to the same extent that the point of
departure was not one, neither was the point of arrival.
Runciman emphasizes, at this point, that the most essential aspect
of the Axial Age lies in the fact that it consisted of cultural revolutions which engendered a new fundamental tension between the
transcendental and mundane orders. He contends, however, that,
among the civilizations associated with the Axial Age, Rome is a
major exception in this respect. Roman culture did draw a distinction between this world and the other one and it shared moral standards by which the powerful was judged. Moreover, that culture was
open to outsiders, valued private religious beliefs and showed respect
and fear for supra-human agencies, indicated undoubtedly a tension
between the mundane and the transcendental. Yet no notion of a
Mandate of Heaven was ever formulated, nor was any Roman
ruler ever dethroned on the grounds of abstract principles of justice,
or delity to divine commandments. Roman law, which referred to

introduction

Roman religion, evolved without any theological input and never

generated a dissenting movement. The junction of Roman law and
Roman religion signied that a secularization of law went hand-inhand with a politicization of religion. In brief, the Romans concern
was not with croyance but with savoir, and not with savoir-penser but
with savoir-faire. The legitimacy of imperial decision-making was taken
for granted and Roman society oered no institutional space for a
prophetic would-be leader of a reformation movement. It is only
when Christianity became the religion of the Roman empire that
the tension between the mundane and transcendental orders was
acknowledged, and Roman-Christian civilization joined, in this respect,
the path of axiality.
Western and Central Europe, research shows, have, in toto, illustrated not only divergences of development but also more than a
few traits of convergence. However, these traits may take on dierent
signicance from one setting to another and from one phase to
another. Kocka illustrates this point by focusing on a major notion
in European thought, namely, civil society. Originally this notion
conveyed the idea of an area of activities standing between the sphere
of the household and the state, and referring to how families and
individuals live or should live together. Civil society was increasingly
understood as dierentiating men from nature and in the eighteenth
century was associated with autonomous social activityindustry,
commerce or culture. Graduallyless so in England than in France
and Germanyit came to imply critical attitudes toward tradition
and, on behalf of utopian schemes, opposing the state as the defender
of the societal status quo. Later on, it designated voluntary associations opposed to absolutism which opened citizens access to the
political sphere. Receding into the background during the twentieth
century, until the 1980s, civil society reappeared in the anti-Soviet
critique in Eastern Europe, conveying a fervor for freedom and pluralism. From there it returned to the Westagain, not everywhere
with the same edgeas the promise of an alternative to worldwide
capitalism, designating associative action, raising claims and conicting
interests as the core of utopian projects.
The very spread of notionslike civil societyfrom one part of
the world to another is linked today with globalization as a trend
in which modernity has led the world. Assessing, under this angle,
essential features of our time, Oommen emphasizes that modernization
has implied structural dierentiation, rationalization, a history-making

10

eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

project and modern life. The empirical actuality of these transformations substantiates the reality of multiple modernities which, in
turn, account for the multiplicity of globality. Colonialism, the rst
phase of globalization, ascertained new conceptual dichotomiesthe
primitive versus the modern, the Orient versus the Occident and the
New World versus the Old. Globalization then also implied cultural
homogenization of urban populationsfrom the nuclearization of
the family to parliamentarism, although (and this is the pluralization
dimension), consumption styles and institutional structures pertaining
to national legacies often retain an inuence that is antagonistic to
modernization. Conict may ensue between revivalist traditionalist
reactions and the hegemonizing tendencies of modernization. It is
then the case that globalization intensies the clash between traditional communitarianism and modernization, even though their
unavoidable cross-breeding also nourishes a creative hybridism of
innovative patterns that are neither traditional nor modern.
The lack of systematic order that is the outcome of these transformations as well as the awareness of basic diculties that characterize our era bring Alexander to insist on an additional aspect that
can be followed up to axiality. This aspect is directly bound to the
question of mundane-transcendental tensions which is important for
the further development toward modernity. According to him, the
dark spot in Axial Age theory is that it rests on the assumption that
human beings tolerate the tension without backing away, ignoring
Webers warning of evasions from the demands of this-worldly asceticismwhat Fromm called escapes from freedom. Freedom might
be too hard to support and Weber could see escapes from it in militarism and the enlisting after dangerous demagogues. Such patterns,
according to Weber, illustrate the diculty for individuals to remain
adepts of moral universalism. Unable to bear the anxiety entailed
by autonomy, egos may tend to split the world and to project the
causes of anxiety onto otherswhich is discussed by sociologists under
the title of social closure. This is further expressed in the fact that
every collectivity creates an inside and outside, which Durkheim
conceptualized as pure and impure. This problem that is bound to
antagonisms and transgressions can be seen as intrinsically pertaining to modernity. Even fragmentation that is so evident in contemporary social life, Alexander contends, is fuelled by the energetic
obsessions of this-worldly asceticism and by the drive to escape from

introduction

11

it which results in the perversion of ethical demands. Modernism

and barbarism are thus intertwined for better and worse.
This analysis brings us to assess that the axial age legacy may still
be seen on the surface of our globe through the civilizations which
it has generated. Those civilizations substantially diverged from each
other from their very beginning, but had in common some shared
essential traits that we recognize in the development of modernity
and which allow us to understand the multiple forms, and also the
universal features, tensions and conicts that modernity takes on
everywhere. Understood in this light, the multiplication of modernities is bound to the expansion of globalization processes that, on the
one hand, forward a relative homogenization of all societies in the
world (Inkeles, 2001), but on the other, bring about the emergence
of new cultures by means of creolization/hybridization (Hannerz,
1996), globalization (Robertson, 1995) and heterogeneity (Appadurai,
1990).
These principles of pluralism refer not only to changing forces of
convergence and divergence acting among contemporary societies,
but also to the various components that participate in individual
societies. This is the topic of the next section.
Modernity and pluralism
A modernizing and globalizing world witnesses the growing importance of the pluralism-versus-homogeneity dilemma within individual contemporary societies. A dilemma that engenders new social
patterns, modes of action and identities, and which also implies tensions between divergent forces, strife and destruction. How to arrange
pluralism and construct it is thus by no means a simple issue, and
dierent strategies involve a diversity of costs and benets. Pluralism,
Werblowsky reminds us, primarily refers to an ideological attitude that
admits the fact of plurality. As a situation, it represents the openness of groups to the inuence of outsiders, up to the possibility of
being aected and transformed. What is questioned here is how far
groups are sure of their identities and unafraid of losing them through
their relations with others. A conict marked by religious labels, we
are reminded, is not necessarily a genuine religious conict, as demonstrated by the case of Ireland where adversaries belong to dierent
faiths but are indierent to doctrinal divergences. Whenever several

12

eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

identity components overlap, conict may reach an explosive stage,

as shown by the case of Cyprus, where Christian Greeks oppose
Muslim Turks.
Entzinger looks, in this respect, to the confrontation of modern
states with immigration on a scale which disrupts the existing social
order and forces societies to reconstitute their identities. He argues
that many dierent options are being adopted throughout the Western
world, according to degrees and patterns of institutionalization of
pluralismfrom the neutral state which considers culture to be a
private aair or accords limited public recognition to particular
groups, to the institutionalization of distinct collective interests in
given spheres and the legalization of dierences when dierent laws
apply to dierent groups allowing them to determine their own standards. However, any society, it is contended, must require from its
members a degree of identication with a common core of values
and symbols, and a given degree of civic assimilation. Beyond this
point, it is Entzingers standpoint that groups should be free to preserve their heritage in private and in the community. Inter-community tensions may well be the price implied by this essence of liberal
democracy, but between assimilation and extreme multiculturalism,
middle-of-the road approaches are commanding in a world of
globalization, continuing immigration and growing transnationalism.
This tolerant approach to pluralism is not completely endorsed by
Schnapper, who looks into the depth of this problmatique from a dierent
standpoint. Democracy, she argues, actually encourages the emergence
of ethnic and religious groups. Its very aspiration to integrate the
population into citizenship implies severe tensions between two dimensions: the universal character of the project, its attachment to a
denite social order and its respect of individual autonomy on the
one hand, and the existence of particularisms, the respect for free
expression of human emotions and collective life on the other hand.
As a utopian project, citizenship is grounded on the separation of
the political and the civic from the religious and the ethnic. The
latter breaches the democratic project by favoring the retreat of
citizens into communities. Moreover, the fragmentation of the society into communities also signies that those who feel repressed
in society may nd shelter in ethno-religious enclaves and strengthen
their ethnic identity. The welfare state itself contributes to this
development which results in an increasing ethnicization of public
policy as the limits of the states resources in front of the unlimited

introduction

13

claims feed dissatisfaction and ethnic-religious identications. Hence,

civic inclusionism does not always overcome ethno-religious exclusionism. The legal recognition of particularisms runs the risk of aggravating social fragmentation in democratic societies.
Pursuing in the same vein, Dahrendorf emphasizes that since 1945
totalizing tendencies have ended up in totalitarianism while pluralism
was regarded as a condition of the liberal order. The heterogeneous
nation-state expects to unite people of dierent creeds, cultures and
ethnic origins under one constitution. Pluralism does not mean a
blending of cultures but a toleration of dierences within common
rules. In actual fact, though, pluralism has failed to create unity and
a sense of belonging. It is an ideal that engages the head but not
the heart, while the rules of public life are barely sucient to hold
communities together. The result is conict that may lead to deep
cleavages, and the emergence of fundamentalism as a real threat.
Pluralism appears to contain the eventuality of separateness without
centre, and an image of the world in which anything goes. In this
new reality, however, while the nation-state has lost a part of its
charm and much of its power, it is still the most eective space for
the liberal order to ourish.
As for Touraine, he does not hesitate to claim the very destruction
of the social. Economic and technological issues are increasingly
important, while the state is loosing its grip on society. Religious
powers raise imperative demands and the societal sphere is declining.
The forces that command the world today can no longer be dened
in social terms because they fail to control even themselves. Political
parties and trade unions are loosing their inuence, while mass media,
associations of all sorts and NGOs are gaining dominance. The old
idea that the liberty of the individual is best ensured by social
participation is gradually replaced by the completely opposite idea,
that the liberty of individuals is ensured only by his liberation from
social roles. Multiculturalism leads society to fragmentation, sustained
as it is by post-modern de-historicized assessments of the disappearance of unitarian principles of thought.
Giesen throws additional light on this discussion of pluralism by
focusing on liminaloften very harsh and destructivecontemporary
situations where collective identities are transformed by references to
archetypal gures. The triumphant hero who rose against oppression
standing above rules has always been viewed as marking the origin
of a social order that is accepted as just. Modern democracy,

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

however, had turned triumphant heroism into a collective mode. On

the other hand, there is also the failing hero who was defeated but
kept his pristine purity, symbolizing the tension between the sacred
and the profane, and still justifying, by his/her sacrice, faithfulness
to the collective identity. This gure contrasts with the liminal victims
who were treated as de-humanized objects and have also been a
type of modern gure. Only from a distance, subsequent generations
will preserve the memory of those victims that will substantiate the
symbolic representation of their collective identity. Perpetrators who
have trespassed on basic norms are the counterparts of the victim.
They were admired by followers as long that they were victorious
but their defeat has pushed those followers into the dicult situation of former accomplices. Perpetrators may then become the focus
of negative reference for a redenition of the collective identity.
These chapters as a whole show that the pluralism-versus-homogeneity tension constitutesin this era of modernityan engine of
further social transformation. It generates new modes of action and
identities, and, at the same time, carries conict and destruction. Its
roots are endemic to modernity, accounting for the emergence of
ideologies that impact on the social dynamics. It is there when
modern societies experience drastic population changes that weigh
heavily on the social order and require a redenition of horizons.
A context that explains why societies nd it dicult to require identication from their members with a common core of values, and
why particularisms increase fragmentation.
At this point, we turn back to cultural forces that have long been
understood as antithetical to modernity but which are still among
the forcesand not the least onesthat mould our world even
though some researchers tend to ignore them. We mean religion and
its relation to other major aspects of todays society. A factor, indeed,
that expresses, through the development of modernity, how far contemporary reality is not disconnected from its past.
Religion, nationalism and pluralism
Religion has for long been understood by scholars as the culture
that was, that characterized mainly an era that has been rejected
with the triumph of modernityat least in the Western sphere.
Through new looks at the genesis of modernity, elaborations of the

introduction

15

concept of axiality and the delving into the complexities of nationalism, researchers have come to reappraise religions role in the
emergence of the age of modernity. In fact, some aspects of the particularism of given versions of modernity are now related to the open
or latent inuence of religious codes conveyed by, and from within,
major civilizational aspectsincluding the patterns taken on by the
pluralism-versus-homogeneity dilemma.
Schluchter starts this section by focusing on Webers analysis of
ancient Judaism, one of the most important progeny of the axial
age. Weber contrasts Jews with Indian pariahs by speaking of a
voluntary, not imposed, ghetto existence; while, moreover, the Indian
performs caste duties with the prospect of promotion in a better
future life, Jews see themselves now as elected and understand
ritual exclusion as a manifestation of inner morality. An ethics of
conviction leading to an ethics of law brings Judaism to dene its
God as a personal transcendent creator. It was a crucial turning
point in Middle-Eastern and Western development because it supported religious rationalization in combination with prophecy. While
theocracy achieved supremacy, hand in hand with fossilization, the
Jesus movement, at rst an internal Jewish movement for renewal,
achieved independence before the Pauline mission granted it a worldhistorical signicance. Christianity, says Weber, was an urge towards
universalization as the hour of conception of Occidental citizenship.
This kind of analysis sees religious developmentslike that from
Judaism to Christianitynot as obstacles to the evolution of modernity, but rather as preconditions for this development. Tiryakian continues this discussion by turning to thirteenth-century Occitan-speaking
Southern France. This area was then an urban, commercial and
quite wealthy region, characterized by a social hierarchy that was
less rigid than the feudal North, greater political participation of local
notables, and a relatively liberal spirit. Catholicism was predominant
but religious pluralism was strong as well. A center of Catharism
and its Albigensian sect which stood for dualist transcendental visions
and rejected monotheism, challenged the established Church. The
Albigensians were led by spiritual leaders while among the other new
movements advocating the return to the original ideals of the church,
one noted the importance of the Waldensians who preached
voluntary poverty. The Franciscans also preached similar values, but
remained attached to the Church. It is the Albigensian Crusade organized by the papacy that crushed the heretics by reviving the

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

Inquisition. This was the end of Occitan pluralism, but from a comparative civilizational perspective, the episode hints that only the
repression of heresy prevented modernity from emerging centuries
before it did.
This analysis suggests that the enemy of modernity was not religion as such but rather intolerant religious policies and institutional
set-ups. Focusing on the Islamicate political culture in the medieval
age, Arjomand emphasizes a convergent tendency in the development
of Islamicate political culture. He points out the mutual accommodation of the Sharia and Greek and Perso-Indian sources. This
encounter introduced a dualism of political and religious power in
the normative order. Works on ethics and statecraft dominated the
political thought of the Ottoman, Safavid and Mogul empires. Aristotles
Politics and equivalent works were missing however, as were many
key Aristotelian concepts. They penetrated the Islamic world only
in the wake of modern constitutionalism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and as the panacea of rulers and patrimonial-state
bureaucracies. This represented a missed opportunity to refashion
the political science of previous centuries in a democratic direction.
Failures of the Westernized state machinery, says the author, then
stirred up velleities to reassert the Islamic world view and reinstate
the Sharia in public life. The result was the reinvention of an Islamic
political tradition with no resemblance to the historical synthesis of
former centuries. Twentieth-century dispossessed traditional intellectuals formulated an Islamic counter-myth of their own against the
modernized state, obliterating the theory of the two powers on the
basis of an increasingly reied historical memory which decried
the menace of Islams suocation by Western cultural invasion. This
invented tradition blurs today the understanding of the prospects for
democracy in the contemporary Muslim world.
Focusing on today European society, Hervieu-Lgers analysis leads
to assessments that are not foreign to Tiryakians and Arjomands
concerns. She discusses religions relation to the shaping of social
reality from the viewpoint of contemporary Western Europe. Never,
she says, has denominational religion become eroded as much as at
the present time. The decline is steep, both in practice and traditional beliefs whereas one witnesses widespread individual do-it-yourself constructions of beliefs. Yet all European societies still carry the
marks of their particular and specic religious rootseven though
they are today extremely secularized. Up to now, major institu-

introduction

17

tions everywhere widely function by implicit reference to past religious models, while symbolic structures are still impregnated by them.
This is so, even though dissociation has taken place between politics and religion and the latter has been gradually pushed back into
the private sphere. What is new these days throughout a good part
of Europe, however, is that groups of newcomers who never shared
the original legacies of the veteran population weaken the reference
to Christian civilization. A cultural-religious pluralization has taken
place that is asserting a strong presence of Islam. This creates new
diculties on the road to integration that are widely accounted for
by both the political culture of Europes countries, and the varieties
of Islam brought by newcomers. The phenomena of internal cultural pluralization on the one hand and external cultural globalization on the other hand contribute simultaneously to the erosion, and
the partial and paradoxical recreation, of dierent religious civilizations in Europe. It is in this context that the pluralism-versus-homogeneity dilemma now requires new kinds of reference to religion.
The undeniable relation between religion, policies and societal
structures related to modernity and modernization is then presented
by Connos analysis of Eastern Orthodoxy. This Church has always
been a politicized ecclesiastical organization where, at least in the
Oriental-Empire version, the emperor was the head of the Church,
making it a part of the State structure. This state of aairs represented endemic tensions as by its very theogony, the Church aspired
to supremacy over the State. These tensions actually hindered the
Churchs drive toward hegemony over the State and facilitated its
submission. The Church never revolted against the State, despite its
autonomy and expansionism in the outside where it consisted of a
confederation of independent national churches united by common
dogma and regular ecumenical councils. This structural decentralization was bound to the use of local languages in liturgies, which
brought the Church closer to the people and separated the various
national churches from each other. This trend blurred the distinction
between church, state and nation.
To be sure, this particular form of relations between Church and
State is not alien to the versions of modernity witnessed in Russia
and Slavic Europe, on the one hand, and the Balkan countries,
on the other. We think here of both the institutional-structural
development of modernity in these areas and the relation of religion
to nationalism. Ben-Rafael focuses more particularly on this latter issue.

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

Since modern nationalism is always grounded not only on civic

values but also in the idea of an organic collective united by a code
stemming from traditions, religion may indeed constitute one of its
founding elements. Jewish nationalism illustrates a link that may exist
between religion and the principle of peoplehood which has always
been an essential assumption of Judaism. However, nationalism in
this case literally transformed religious contents to integrate them in
the new national identity. It remains that the centrality of the reference to religion in Jewish nationalism had major consequences in
the formation of Israeli society. Principles of action and symbols
embedded in traditional Judaism have been endowed with new meanings andin these new formshave remained inuential on many
societal aspects. This is expressed today in the relations of sociocultural groups and the links between Israel and diaspora Jews. Moreover,
the imprints of all these are also clearly visible in the relationships
of the Jewish majority and the Arab minority within Israeli society.
All in all, Zionists reliance on religious motives was certainly a factor in their success to enlist millions of followers, but it also widely
accounts for the cleavages that arose and dictated a good part of
this societys further development.
All in all, religious values and systems are a dimension of the
development of modernity. Religion, even when it declines and looses
its grip on individuals mentalities, denitely remains an axis of
the pluralism-versus-uniformity, and conjunctively, of the dilemma
inherent to the multiple-modernities reality. It is to this area of questions that the next section now turns.
Modernity as world reality
Hence, the civilization of modernity emerged from existing religions
and cultural traditions; as such, it combined with them in various
manners and could not be understood as a uniform straitjacket that
deleted out dierences between societies which belonged to dierent
civilizational spaces. This is the very root of the multiplication of
modernities, and it is in this respect that scholars refer to classications
such as Western and non-Western variants of modernities in view
of emphasizing their respective unique features at the same time as
their convergences.

introduction

19

It is in this perspective that Shulman discusses here the variant

of modernity illustrated by India. He contends that modern implies an awareness emerging from some institutional, socio-cultural
depth, transformative of society and institutions. Expressions of this
modernity found in Southern India indicate a sense of individual
autonomy freed from ascriptive ties, a political vision embodied in
state-systems, elements of a secular culture cutting through communal
boundaries, and cultural experimentation linked with skeptical and
radical epistemologies. Modernity in this sense began in Southern
India several centuries before what is usually thought of as the
modern age, and it evolved from within the local culture independently
from sustained contact with the West. Shulman discusses, in this
respect, the work of the poet Apparao in late nineteenth-century
Andhra as the culminating voice in a long series. His characters
speak a rich, colloquial, highly individualized language. His poem
Brides for Sale thematizes one major target of reformists, namely, the
practice of marrying o young girls for dowries to older men. These
expressions of modernity, however, do not gainsay that many tribal
elements were retained as evinced both in major rituals and the
political domain. Moreover, it is not to deny either that Buddhist
civilization, Brahminical institutions and other sources have left strong
prints on this society. Gurujada Apparaos Brides for Sale is only a
reectionparticularly hard-hittingof changes that unfolded over
the years ever since a far much earlier time in this part of the world
than in the West. Not less striking is the fact that politics as a whole
acquired here an experimental signicance and became a sphere for
critical existential debates.
Smooha brings in the contemporary example of Israel. Israel, he
argues, responds only partially to the Western syndrome. It is Western
in self-image, science and technology, higher education, market
economy, procedural democracy and ethics. But on the other hand
it is remote from this syndrome by features such as its criteria of
membership, the centrality of the family, the focal position of the
military, state intervention in the economy, the role of religion or
the salience of ethno-national cleavages. Factors accounting for this
singularity include the non-Western origin of the founding fathers of
this society, the entangling unity of ethnicity, religion and nationality
in Judaism, and permanent mobilization in face of a hostile environment. While Israel in the 2000s is more Western than it was in the

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

1950sIsraelis are more individualistic, materialistic and bourgeois

and Israelis self-image draws them closer to the West, the Israeli
case still demonstrates that the Western model is not readily exportable,
that globalization does not necessarily lead to convergence, and that,
above all, cleavages may develop in modern settings along lines that
are widely determined by singular cultural codes.
Focusing on our contemporary experience from a viewpoint that
emphasizes communicative aspects, Delanty sees modernity through
translation theory. Modernity, he contends, is universal and may be
spoken about in any language, but, at the same time, the notion of
multiple modernities means cultural exchange where translations from
one language to another transmit culture by transforming what they
take over and inserting it in a new context. Translation signies that
a foreign element is brought into a culture, creating new hybrid
forms that unavoidably re-codify identities, symbolic orders, cognitive structures and imaginings. The very emergence of modernity
implied cultural translation as an endemic aspect of it expressing the
condition of culture as communicability and that social actors all
over the world were increasingly dening themselves by reference to
global culture. However, by no means does this mean that they are
all saying the same things. What Delanty calls global culture cannot be seen as constant nor translations as static. People, he contends, continuously reinterpret their situation in light of their on-going
encounters with others. Globalizationas a process that intensies
connections, enhances possibilities and necessities for cultural translations and deepens the consciousness of globalityis the principal
motor of modernity and its diversity.
Hannerz pursues from here with a more structural analysis, asking
about the relevance and meanings in our contemporary life of the
notions of center and periphery. He reminds that in the past, the
center was identied with sacred symbols and beliefs, and institutions engaged in their propagation. While the metropolis was viewed
as a center of creative vitality, it was contrasted with the rude and
unimaginative province. Turning worldwide, metropolis is now
also contrasted with the periphery to underline the formers exploitation of the latter. The intensication of communication while dierences
among people tend to multiply bring about the formation of new
creolized or hybrid cultures at the conuence of local traditions
and imported forms. These processes involve today, it is the authors
basic contention, a periphery that is active and displays new imagined

introduction

21

worlds. From it run cultural counter-ows to the center, creating

liminal spaces where one nds cosmopolitanism and openness to
other cultures, together with conictual drives and motivations vis-vis the political class.
It is at this point that Allardt steps in by emphasizing the importance of core values and cultural programs as the essentials of an
all-modernity consensus. Modernity, he says, contains propositional
statements about the world, referring to institutional forms like the
democratic nation-state, a market economy or research-oriented universities. Beyond these agreed-upon basics, however, one cannot speak
of one modernity even with respect to Europe. The characteristic
European specicity is the distinction betweenand combination
ofthe striving for a social integration grounded in primordial
denitions, on the one hand, and the attempt to build an integrative whole based exclusively on rational considerations, on the other
hand. In other words, combining rationalistic and communal-romantic tendencies. However, it appears that Europe has moved since the
1970s toward postmodernity, meaning a weakening of class conicts,
a downplaying of modernization, a relativization of knowledge and
an increasing importance given to identity and moral issues. This
notion conveys a view of society made of ongoing processes constantly redened and reinterpreted.
Levine concludes this section by dealing with the general issue of
communication between modernities. Dialogue signies, in his eyes,
a type of discourse in which parties take turns listening to each other,
and responding to one anothers queries and requests. By no means
is Levine optimistic, though: all human groups manifest ethnocentrism and, as a rule, tend to exaggerate the dissimilarities between
in-groups and out-groups. Moreover, ethnocentric beliefs are fortied
when intertwined with imperatives that stem from strong cultural
mandates. And, indeed, the great civilizations have often extended
their domain through the glorication of ethnocentric interests and
exclusion. On the other hand, it is also the case that civilizations
have favored hospitability toward strangers, tolerance for diversity,
and understanding and compassion, that is, inclusionist orientations.
Some civilizations have been able to generate developments in which
traditional symbols are invoked in ways that combat elitist-ethnocentric molds in response to ethical demands. Such developments
represent resources for dialogical engagement that may reduce clashes
among civilizations.

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

These chapters, as a whole, turn the attention to the practice of

pluralism as a divided reality and it questions the potentiality of
conict and dialogue conveyed by collective identities characteristic
of modern plurality. It is to this space of issues that the following
section is addressed.
Challenges of collective identities
The foregoing converges to evince the importance in modern societies
of processes that account for, and are expressed in, the formation
and contestation of collective identities. Attributes like language,
history, racial features, and religious allegiances, are all the more
relevant factors here, as they encounter homogenizing forces that
antagonize them and tend to marginalize them. On the other hand,
though, tolerance that does not oppose groups which retain aspects
of their singularity, also encourage ipso facto the development of pluralism. In any case, the formation of collective identities, wherever
it takes place, is bound to the politicization of socio-cultural groups
and their acting as agents of social change. However, in each modern setting, the emergence and development of cleavages is also
widely determined by the specic conguration of modernity in the
context of national cultures.
This latter assessment is conrmed by Goetschells analysis which
opens this section by comparing the situation of Jews in France and
in Germany at their rst steps of insertion in society, during the
nineteenth century, as those two pillar-countries of West Europe were
launching their take-o toward modernity. Jews, who had until then
constituted enclaves in both countries, were now relocated in the
context of the transformations undergone by these societies. The
analysis shows how far the plight of Jews in each country diered
extremely. The emancipation of Frances Jews was the product of
the Revolution, and in Germany, of Napoleonic occupation; in France
it was a fast process, but in Germany a development that was prolonged over decades; in France political emancipation preceded and
facilitated economic and social incorporation, while the opposite
occurred in Germany. The variations in the dominant cultures account
for these dierences in the plights of Jews, who exhibited quite similar orientations in both societies. Modernity itself, however, did not
bring about the end of Jewish communities in either of these coun-

introduction

23

tries, independently from the prevailing orientationswhich was the

common denominator of the two situations at the time.
Sztompka considers the issue of conicting orientations between
minority and majority groups from the viewpoint of the integration
of Eastern Europe into the European Union. The very process, he
says, is possible because of the civilizational ground common to
Western and Eastern EuropeGreek philosophy, Roman legalism
and Judeo-Christian values. Which is not to deny that structural
models adopted in Western Europe and the strength of Slavic movements in the East have long hampered integrative drives. Moreover,
the Homo Sovieticus that was gloried in the USSRs satellite-states
after 1945 prevented rapprochement. The collapse of the Soviet
Empire was to ignite the return to Europe at the level of collective identity. Though dormant historical enmities may still reawaken
and the collapse of the communist bloc, the author acknowledges,
has eectively caused the rearmation of old, latent national, ethnic, religious and cultural primordialisms. Moreover, Western Europes
anti-Americanism, which is unknown in the East, may also create
diculties of its own.
In a dierent context, Tambiah focuses on the Hindu-Muslim divide
that is kept on the boil by the Kashmir dispute. Ever since 1947,
ideologists of Hindu nationalism view the Muslims in India as the
enemy within, and Pakistans Muslims as the enemy without. This
conict has its genesis in colonial late nineteenth century, and subsequently in post-independence nation-state making, in a plural democratic society dominated by majority politics marginalizing minorities.
Although India was greatly aected by Islamic incursions and conquests, and the conict endured over a long period, there is no tradition of contrasting antithetically Muslim and Hindu polities and
religious systems. Yet, in today India one may see a rising level of
rejection of Muslims accompanying a strand of anxiety regarding the
alleged conversion of Hindus to Islam and Christianity. Hinduism
under siege has become a rallying cry. Exemplied by members of
the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, and on the other side by militant
Muslims, the Hindu-Muslim cleavage is being assimilated to the grand
theme of the clash of civilizations.
Roniger explores again a very dierent environmentLatin America.
In the 1980s and early 1990s, most Ibero-American countries embraced
democracy and neoliberalism after years of authoritarian regimes.
Democracy seemed then to herald as a new age. Yet already by the

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

late 1990s, both democracy and the new economic policies were discredited. Though most citizens still support democracy, their trust
in the new system is decreasing, engendering institutional fragility,
as several countries on the continent went through economic disarray.
Democracy, it is true, still persists despite eventual outbreaks of
violence but security concerns are now expressed in tendencies to
seclusion along class and ethnic lines. Urban spaces become privatized, with groups refraining from entering each others neighborhoods. Accountability of the state and its institutions has eroded, and
while elections are being held, disenchantment with politicians is profound. Politicians have in fact revived clientelism and populism.
Seemingly, and according to the singularity of its own context and
basic orientations, Latin America is one more example of the importance of original codications of the social order in the unfolding of
social pluralism and group confrontations.
Martinelli brings us back to Europe by discussing the formation of
identity on this continent which, in recent decades, is undergoing
far-reaching transformation. His contention is that the basic elements
of the European culture make up a code that, although dierently
declined in geo-historical contingencies, identies a European-specic
character. Its central core is the opposing-complimentary relation of
rationalism and individualism. Another element is the nation-state
where the nation represents collective primordial goals, and the state
organized rationality. Democracy is still another component, and so
is the relation to Christianity which distinguishes the temporal from
the sacred. As a whole, these elementsloaded with inner contradictionsare not equally pervasive everywhere but are all relevant
to the making of European identity. This is not to deny that European
history has also been the source of aggressions and crimes, and in
this respect, contemporary European identity is necessarily an object
of reexive reassertion that must be built around a morally defensible project concerned with a multicultural future.
Epilogue: Modernity as program
The practice of pluralism in the context of civilizational diversity
explains how we can look at contemporary societies and at their
development, in a manner that leaves room for convergence across
civilizational spaces. Boudon proposes here an idea that sets in rela-

introduction

25

tion the divergences and converges of civilizational developments.

He returns to the classics of sociology reminding Durkheims sentence that individualism, free-thinking is a phenomenon which begins
nowhere, but which develops continuously through the course of
history. The social context, in other words, is taken into account
by individuals, but their behaviors and the way they view their
interests cannot be reduced to it. Actors, to some degree, are
autonomous in thought and action. This position converges with
Webers when he says that individuals are persons to be treated as
citizens. It is under this angle that the social evolution represents the
enfolding of programs. The invention twenty centuries ago of the
notion of person was a crucial step in the realization of the Western
program which is present throughout history, notwithstanding the
regressions. It requests endorsing always better means to promote it.
Accordingly, the individualistic idea is irreversible. The pluralistic
extension of rights today is to be viewed as a development of the
program that started with the notion of person and came up to the
exigency of respect for the many possible ways of human selfrealization. Rationalization does not mean that societies are deemed
to become standardized and the persistence of various cultures does
not imply that increasing rationalization is not at work. The programmatist theory, a version of Eisenstadts open-ended program,
shows that new ideas can be realized in indenite fashions.
Still widening the scope of this books overall discussion in view
of its conclusion, Eisenstadt elaborates further on the idea of modernity as a program, adding to Boudon, that this program may convey both constructive and destructive aspects. He argues that identities
are ingrained in the contradiction between humans exible biological program and uncompromising life nitude, a contradiction that
generates existential anxiety and a predisposition to construct a realm
dominated by the sacred. The elaboration, under the inuence of
ontological premises, of collective boundaries expresses the search for
order distinguishing the holy from the profane, dening within
specic situations and power congurationssimilarities among ins
and contrasts with outs. The constructive dimension of identities
lies in the fact that they generate trust; their destructive dimension
is bound to exclusiveness and ambivalence toward the social order,
which may develop tendencies to sacrilege and violence. What is
new within the frame of the modern project is that collective identities
are no longer taken as given implying reexive problematization,

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eliezer ben-rafael and yitzhak sternberg

contestation and divergences of visions, they may become factors of

conictual mobilization. In the frame of nation-states, identities may
even involve intrinsic tensions between the primordialism of the nation
and the universalism of citizenship, favoring the inuence of ideologies which justify violence. It is insofar as the primordial components of identities remain intimately interwoven with civil and
universalistic components and allow for pluralistic arrangements, that
their primeval barbarism may come under control.
All in all, this volume deals with the comparison of modernities,
from a general perspective of civilizational analysis, focusing on pluralism-versus-homogeneity tensions. Such tensions which can already
be read in the descriptions of the axial age, come out with the
greatest clarity in both the plurality and pluralism of modernities.
The plurality of modernities stems from the variety of civilizations
and cultural traditions that modernity encounters and combines with,
through its expansion from Europe to the rest of the world. At the
level of the individual setting, pluralism-versus-homogeneity tensions
are generated by modernitys spreading out among groups originating from dierent civilizational spaces or cultural legacies. Such
encounters generate the dierent modernities which we observe all
around, and the dierences lead to both misunderstandings and
conicts, and dialogical options and enriching experiences. These
dierences widely account for the variety of challenges facing modernity in dierent societies and among dierent groups and which, in
one way or another, often relate to the tensions endemic to modernity itself and which have their roots in its historical development
starting from the tension opposing universalistic aspects and primordial
commitments. Such tensions spark oin every combination of circumstances, under forms of its ownthe political organization of
social forces leading to conicts that have become routine reality.
No few examples, however, show that conicts may directly concern
the premises themselves of the social order and develop into relentlessly destructive forces causing bifurcations from modernity programs. It is this kind of tensions that Huntington discusses in Who
are we? (2004) where he investigates the acuteness of the challenges
facing todays America:
We Americans face a substantive problem of national identity . . . Are
we a we, one people or several? If we are a we, what distinguishes
us from the thems who are not us? Race, religion, ethnicity, values,
culture, wealth, politics, or what? Is the United States, as some have

introduction

27

argued, a universal nation, based on values common to all humanity

and in principle embracing all peoples? Or are we a Western nation
with our identity dened by our European heritage and institutions?
Or are we unique with a distinctive civilization of our own, as the
proponents of American exceptionalism have argued throughout our
history? Are we basically a political community whose identity exists
only in a social contract embodied in the Declaration of Independence
and other founding documents? Are we multicultural, bicultural, or
unicultural, a mosaic or a melting pot? Do we have any meaningful
identity as a nation that transcends our subnational ethnic, religious,
racial identities? (page 9)

These questions may take on dierent formulations in dierent

settings but it seems that their substance is not alien to any modernity across the planet. It is this volumes intention to delve into these
pluralism-versus-homogeneity tensions of modernities which attack
notions like social control, public authority, social division and cultural unication. Such notions codify what Norbert Elias means by
the civilizing process and these pages show their dialectical relation to the idea of decivilizing process. The juxtaposition of these
two question us about the moral evolution of mankind.

PART ONE

THE HISTORICAL TRAJECTORY

OF MODERNITY

CHAPTER ONE

MODERNITY IN SOCIO-HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Shmuel N. Eisenstadt
Introduction
I. The continual tensions and confrontations between pluralistic and
totalistic tendencies constitute not only a basic fact in the constitution of modern institutional ordersbut also a central component
of the ideological dimension of these orders, and those confrontations have been of central importance in shaping the development
of modern societies.
In order to understand this fact, it is necessary to emphasize that
modernity has to be viewedindeed, following very much Webers
indicationsas a distinct civilization, with distinct institutional and
cultural characteristics. According to this view, the core of modernity is rst the crystallization and development of a mode or modes
of interpretation of the world, or, to follow Cornelius Castoriadis
later terminology, of a distinct social imaginaire, a combination of
ontological vision, of a distinct cultural program, with the development of a set or sets of new institutional formationsthe central
core of both being an unprecedented openness and uncertainty.1 It
entailed some very distinct shifts in the conception of human agency,
of its autonomy, and of its place in the ow of time. Secondgoing
to some extent beyond Weber, but as I shall show, at least implicit
in his workis that this civilization, the distinct cultural program
with its institutional implications, which crystallized rst in Western
Europe and then spread into other parts of Europe, to the Americas
and later on throughout the world, gave rise to continually changing
cultural and institutional patterns that constituted dierent responses
to the challenges and possibilities inherent in the core characteristics of the distinct civilizational premises of modernity.

Eisenstadt, 2001b, pp. 320340; Castoriadis, 1991.

32

shmuel n. eisenstadt

II. In this analysis I shall follow James D. Faubions recent exposition of Webers conception of modernity:
Weber nds the existential threshold of modernity in a certain deconstruction: of what he speaks of as the ethical postulate that the world
is a God-ordained, and hence somehow a meaningfully and ethically
oriented cosmos.
What he assertswhat in any event might be extrapolated from his
assertionsis that the threshold of modernity has its epiphany precisely as the legitimacy of the postulate of a divinely preordained and
fated cosmos has its decline; that modernity emerges, that one or
another modernity can emerge, only as the legitimacy of the postulated cosmos ceases to be taken for granted and beyond reproach.
Countermoderns reject that reproach, believe in spite of it . . . One can
extract two theses: whatever else they may be, modernities in all their
variety are responses to the same existential problematic. The second:
whatever else they may be, modernities in all their variety are precisely those responses that leave the problematic in question intact,
that formulate visions of life and practice neither beyond, nor in denial
of it but rather within it, even in deference to it . . .2

Thus, the core of this program was rst that the premises and
legitimation of the social, ontological and political orders were no
longer taken for granted; second, that concomitantly there developed
within this program a very intensive reexivity around the basic ontological premises as well as around the bases of social and political
order of authority of societya reexivity which was shared even
by the most radical critics of this program, who in principle denied
the legitimacy of these premises. The second core of this program
was the quest for the emancipation of man from fetters of external authority or tradition, and the closely related naturalization
of the cosmos, man and society.
It is because of the fact that all the responses to the breakdown
of the traditional order leave the problematic intact, the reexivity
which developed in the program of modernity went beyond that
which crystallized in the Axial Civilizations. This reexivity focused
not only on the possibility of dierent interpretations of the transcendental visions and basic ontological conceptions prevalent in a
society or societies, but came to question the very givenness of such

James D. Faubion, 1993, pp. 113115.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

33

visions and of the institutional patterns related to them. It gave rise

to the awareness of the existence of the multiplicity of such visions
and patterns, and of the possibility that such visions and conceptions
can indeed be contested.3
Such awareness was closely connected with two central components of the modern project, emphasized in the early studies of
modernization by Dan Lerner and later by Alex Inkeles. The rst
such component is the recognition, among those becoming and being
modernizedas illustrated by the famous story in Lerners book
about the grocer and the shepherdof the possibility of undertaking a great variety of roles beyond any xed or ascriptive ones, and
the concomitant receptivity to dierent communication messages
which promulgate such open possibilities and visions. Second, there
is the recognition of the possibility of belonging to wider translocal,
possibly also changing, communities.4 This reexivity also entailed a
conception of the future in which various possibilities which can be
realized by autonomous human agencyor by the march of history
are open.
Concomitantly, closely related to such awareness and central to
this cultural program there developed an emphasis on the autonomy
of man; his or herbut in the initial formulation of this program
certainly hisemancipation from the fetters of traditional political
and cultural authority and the continuous expansion of the realm of
personal and institutional freedom and activity. Such autonomy
entailed several dimensions: rst, exploration of nature and its laws;
and second, active construction, mastery of nature, possibly including
human nature and society. In parallel, this program entailed a very
strong emphasis on the autonomous participation of members of
society in the constitution of social and political order and on
autonomous access by all members of the society to these orders and
their centers.
Out of the conjunctions of these conceptions there developed a
belief that society could be actively formed by conscious human
activity. Two basic complementary but also potentially contradictory

3
4

S.N. Eisenstadt, 1982; idem (ed.), 1986c.

D. Lerner, 1958; A. Inkeles and D.H. Smith, 1974.

34

shmuel n. eisenstadt

views of the best ways to do this developed within this program.

First, the program as it crystallized above all in the Great Revolutions
gave rise, perhaps for the rst time in human history, to the belief
that it was possible to bridge the gap between the transcendental
and mundane orders, to realize through conscious human actions in
the mundane orders, in social life, some of the utopian, eschatological visions; second, there was increasing acceptance of the legitimacy of multiple individual and group goals and interests and of
multiple interpretations of the common good.5
III. All these characteristics of the cultural program of modernity
entailed, to use Claude Leforts terminology, the loss of the markers of certainty and, to go beyond Lefortand very much in line
with Webers analysisthe search for their restoration was manifested in the major institutional arenas of modern societiesin the
political arena, in the constitution of collectivities and collective identities as well as in the visions of known personalities, of civilized
premises, they were constituted as an integral part of the modern
project.
Thus, in greater detail, the modern program also entailed a radical
transformation of the conceptions and premises of the political
order, of the constitution and denition of the political arena, and
of the basic characteristics of the political process. The core of the
new conceptions was the breakdown of traditional legitimation of
the political order, the concomitant opening up of dierent possibilities for the constitution of such order, and the consequent contestation about how political order was to be constituted to no small
extent by human actors.6 By virtue of all these characteristics, the
modern political program combined orientations of rebellion and
intellectual antinomianism with strong orientations to center-formation and institution-building, giving rise to social movements and
movements of protest as a continual and central component of the
political process. It was within the framework of these characteristics of the modern program that there developed within it the distinct problematic of the charismatic dimensions of human activity

5
6

S.N. Eisenstadt, 1999b; idem, 2001b.

Lefort, 1986; idem, 1988; Eisenstadt, 1999b.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

35

that constituted a central component of Webers analysis in general,

and especially of modern societies.
The breakdown of the traditional legitimation of the political order
was closely connected with the transformation in modern societies
of the basic characteristics of the political arena and processesespecially their openness. The most important of these characteristics
were, rst, the charismatization of the center, and the quest of the
periphery to participate in the constitution of their center. Second
was a strong emphasis on at least potentially active participation by
the periphery of society, by all its members, in the political arena.
Third were the strong tendencies of the centers to permeate the
periphery and of the periphery to impinge on the center, blurring
the distinctions between center and periphery. Fourth was the combination of the charismatization of the center or centers with the
incorporation of themes and symbols of protest mentioned already
aboveequality and freedom, justice and autonomy, solidarity and
identity. These themes became central components of the modern
project of human emancipation. It was indeed the incorporation of
such themes of protest into the center that heralded the radical transformation of various sectarian utopian visions from peripheral views
to central components of the political and cultural program.7
Symbols of protestequality and freedom, justice and autonomy,
solidarity and identitywhich can be found in the margins, peripheries, or in movements of protest in all human societies, became
central components of the modern project of human emancipation.
The incorporation in the modern political program, in the modern
imaginaire, of such themes of protest into the center heralded the radical transformation of popular and/or sectarian utopian visions from
peripheral or subterranean views into central components of the
political and cultural program, and became also the ideological bases
of the legitimation of modern regimesas can be seen in the trilogy
of the French Revolutionlibert, egalit, fraternit.
The quest of the periphery or peripheries for participation in the
social, political, and cultural orders, as it was closely interwoven with
the incorporation of themes of protest into the center, and with the
concomitant possible transformation of the center, was indeed often

Eisenstadt, 1999b.

36

shmuel n. eisenstadt

guided by the various attempts to reconstitute the markers of certainty in the political arena grounded in utopian visionsvisions promulgated by various social activists, above all by the major social
movements that developed as an inherent component of the modern
political process.
Out of the combination of the transformation of the incorporation of symbols and demands of protest into the central symbolic
repertoire of society, and of the recognition of the legitimacy of multiple interests and of visions of social order, the continuous restructuring of center-periphery relations and of the reconstitution of the
realm of the political has become a central component of political
process and dynamics in modern societies. The various processes of
structural change and dislocation which took place continually in
modern societies as a result of the development of capitalism, of economic changes, urbanization, changes in the process of communication, and of the new political formations have led in modern
societies not only to the promulgation by dierent groups of various
concrete grievances and demands, but also to a growing quest for
participation in the broader social and political order and in the
central arenas thereofindeed in the reconstitution thereof.
These demands for participation in the center were closely
connected with the crystallization of the basic characteristics of the
modern political processesthe common denominator of which has
been the openness thereof. While these characteristics are naturally
most visible in open, democratic or pluralistic regimes, they are also
inherent in autocratic and totalitarian regimes even if the latter
attempt to regulate and control them in such a way as seemingly to
close them. The rst of these aspects of the political process in
modern societies, attesting to such openness, has been the emergence
of a new type of political class or classesand of new types of
political activistsa non-ascriptive class, the recruitment to which
was in principle, if not in fact, open to everybody. The second is
the continual attempts of that class or those classes and activists
to mobilize political support through open public contestations. The
third is the fact that such attempts at the mobilization of such support and governance are closely related to the promulgation of
dierent policies and their implementation. Fourth are the very strong
tendenciesunparalleled in any other regimes, with the possible, but
very partial, exception of some of the city-states of antiquityof

modernity in socio-historical perspective

37

potential politicization of many problems and demands of various

sectors of the society and of conicts between them.
It was in close relation to these tendencies that there developed
in modern societies the continual struggle about the redenition of
the realm of the political which has been promulgated above all by
dierent social movements. Unlike in most other political regimes
in the history of mankind, the drawing of the boundaries of the
political has in itself constituted one of the major foci of open political
contestation and struggle in modern societies, and it was such
contestation that constituted one of the most important manifestations of the loss of markers of certainty and of the search for their
restoration.
IV. The same basic dynamics developed also with respect to the distinctive mode of constitution of the boundaries of collectivities and
collective identities that developed in modern societies. The most distinct characteristic thereof, very much in line with the general core
characteristics of modernity, was that such constitution was continually problematized. Collective identities were no longer taken as
given or as preordained by some transcendental vision and authority, or by perennial customs. They constituted foci of contestations
and struggles, often couched in highly ideological terms.8 These contestations and struggles were focused around the basic characteristics
of the constitution of modern collectivities, the most important among
which were rst the development of new concrete denitions of the
basic components of collective identitiesthe civil, primordial, and
universalistic and transcendental sacred onesand of the ways they
were institutionalized. Second, there developed a strong tendency to
absolutize these components in ideological terms. Third, the construction of political boundaries and those of the cultural or ethnic
and national collectivities became closely connected. Fourth, territorial boundaries of such collectivities were emphasized, giving rise to
continual tension between their territorial and/or particularistic components and broader, potential universalistic ones.
A central component in the constitution of modern collective identities was the self-perception of a society and its perception by other
8
Eisenstadt and Giesen, 1995, pp. 72102; Eisenstadt, 2002b, pp. 3387; Shils,
1975, pp. 111126.

38

shmuel n. eisenstadt

societies as modern, as the bearer of the distinct modern cultural

and political programand its relations from this point of view to
other societieswhether those societies that claim also to beor are
seen asbearers of this program, and various others.
The crystallization of such dierent modes of institutional arenas,
of political order and collective identity and personality, constituted
in modern societies continual foci of contestation and struggles, and
focused around the tensions and contradictions that were inherent
in the cultural program of modernity which were borne in modern
societies by many political activists and intellectuals, especially by the
major social movements.
The combination and continual interweaving between these struggles has become one of the hallmarks of the dynamics of modern
societies. It was indeed one of the most distinct characteristics of the
modern scene that the constitution of collective boundaries and consciousness could also become a focus of distinct social movements
the national or nationalistic ones, and which were explicitly explored
or implicitly indicated by Weber.
While in many modern societies, as for instance England, France,
and Sweden, the crystallization of new national collectivities and
identities, of dierent types of nation states took place, without the
national movements playing an important role, the potentiality of
such movements existed in all modern societies. In some societies
in Central and Eastern Europe, some Asian and African, and to
some extent in Latin-American societiesthey played a crucial role
in the development of the new nation-states.
Parallel tendencies developed within the modern program with
respect to the promulgation rst of very distinctive conceptions of
the formation of human personality, of the civilized person, emphasizing the autonomy of man and of the importance of the selfof
its autonomy and self-regulation. Second, parallel tendencies developed with respect to the symbolic denitions, usually couched in
highly ideological terms, of the relations between dierent arenas of
life such as a family and occupation, work, and culture; between
public and private realms; between dierent life-spaces; between
dierent age-spans; between the sexes; between dierent social classes
and of the dierent spaces of social and cultural life, together with
the development of very specic symbolic institutional and organizational linkages and combinations between them, as well as also
specic visions of history and civilizing vision or visions. These

modernity in socio-historical perspective

39

visions of the civilized person and of the structures of life-spaces were

promulgated through the construction of specic narratives of history,
of literature in which the visions of the best collectivity, of civilized
man were continually represented and institutionalized through the
major socializing and communicative agencies such as schools, armies
and collective activities, and public ceremonials and festivities.
Antinomies and tensions in the cultural and political program of modernity
V. These contestations around dierent political programs, constitution of collectivities, of the visions of civilized personsconstituted
part of the perennial search for the restoration of markers of certainty in modern societies. These contestations were to a very high
extent interwoven with the internal antinomies and contradictions
inherent in the modern program; closely related as they were to the
various meta-narratives of modernityto follow Tiryakians felicitous
expressionthe Christian, the gnostic and the chthonic9giving rise
to continual critical discourse and political contestations which focused
on the relations, tensions and contradictions between the various
premises of the modern cultural program and between these premises
and the institutional developments in modern societies. But this
search could never be fully realized, not only because of the internal characteristics of the cultural program of modernity, of the continual confrontation with the continually developing institutional
reality, but also because the concrete contours of the dierent cultural and institutional continuous patterns of modernity as they crystallized in dierent societies have indeed been continually changing,
as we shall analyze in greater detail later.
The importance of these tensions was fully recognized in the classical sociological literatureTocqueville, Marx, Durkheim, and above
all indeed Weberand was later taken up in the thirties, above all
in the Frankfurt school in the so-called critical sociologywhich,
however, mainly focused on the problems of fascism, but then became
neglected in post-Second World War studies of modernization. Lately
it has again come to the forefront to constitute a continual component of the analysis of modernity.10
9
10

Tiryakian, 1996, pp. 99118.

For instance: Joas, 2002.

40

shmuel n. eisenstadt

The basic antinomies of modernity constituted a radical transformation of those inherent in Axial civilizationsnamely, rst, those
focused on the awareness of a great range of possibilities of transcendental visions and of the range of ways of their possible implementation; second, on the tension between reason and revelation or
faith (or their equivalents in the non-monotheistic Axial civilizations);
and third, on the problmatique of the desirability of attempts at full
institutionalization of these visions in their pristine form.
The transformation of these antinomies and tensions in the cultural program of modernity focused rst on the evaluation of major
dimensions of human experience, and especially on the place of
reason in the construction of nature, of human society and human
history; and on the concomitant possible problem of the bases of
true morality and autonomy; second, or the tension between reexivity
and active construction of nature and society; third, between totalizing and pluralistic approaches to human life and the constitution
of society; and fourth, between control and autonomy, or discipline
and freedom.
The rst major tension that developed within the cultural program
of modernity was that with respect to the primacy or relative importance of dierent dimensions of human existence. This antinomy
focused on the evaluation of the relative importance, indeed predominance of reason as against the emotional and aesthetic dimension of human existence, often equated especially in the romantic
literature with various vital forces often seen as epitomizing the autonomy of human will, as well as with so-called primordial components
in the construction of collective identities. The emphasis on the emotional or expressivist dimension of human experience which could
nd its embodiment in the authenticity of community, while often
oriented against universalizing of perception of reason in the Enlightenment, yet shared with it the strong emphasis on the autonomy of
human will and activity inherent in the cultural program of modernity. Closely related were tensions between dierent conceptions of
the bases of human morality, especially whether such morality can
be based on or grounded in universal principles based above all in
reason, in instrumental rationality or in multiple rationalities; and/or
in multiple concrete experiences and traditions of dierent human
communities.
The second tension that developed within the cultural program of
modernity was that between dierent conceptions of human auto-

modernity in socio-historical perspective

41

nomy and of its relation to the constitution of man, society and of

nature. Of special importance in this context was the tension between
reexivity and the critical exploration of nature, man, society on the
one hand, and a very strong emphasis on the mastery, even construction of nature and society, on the other. The emphasis on mastery of nature and on active construction of society could become
closely connected with the tendency, inherent in cognitive instrumental conceptions of nature to emphasize the radical dichotomy
between subject and object, and between man and naturereinforcing that radical criticism which claimed the cultural program of
modernity necessarily entailed an alienation of man from nature and
from society.
Closely related has been the tension between, on the one hand,
the emphasis on human autonomy, the autonomy of man, of the
human person and, on the other hand, the strong restrictive control
dimensionsanalyzed among others, even if in an exaggerated way,
from dierent but complementary points of view by Norbert Elias
and Michel Foucaultwhich were rooted in the institutionalization
of this program according to the technocratic and/or moral visionary conceptions or in other words, to follow Peter Wagners formulation between freedom and control.11
The tension which was perhaps the most critical, in ideological
and political terms alike, has been that between totalizing and pluralistic visionsbetween the view which accepts the existence of
dierent values and rationalities as against the view which conates
such dierent values and above all dierent rationalities in a totalistic way. This tension developed above all with respect to the very
conception of reason and its place in the constitution of human
societya central focus of Webers analysis. It was manifest for
instance, as Stephen Toulmin has shown,12 even if in a rather exaggerated way, in the dierence between the more pluralistic conceptions of Montaigne or Erasmus which have entailed also the recognition
and legitimizing of other cultural characteristics of human experience as against the totalizing vision of reason promulgated by Descartes.
Among the most important such conations of dierent rationalities
has been that version of the sovereignty of reason which was often
11
Elias, 19781982; idem, 1983; Foucault, 1965; idem, 1973; idem, 1975; idem,
1988; Wagner, 1994.
12
Toulmin, 1990.

42

shmuel n. eisenstadt

identied as the major message of the Enlightenment and which subsumed value-rationality (Wertrationalitt) or substantive rationality under
instrumental rationality (Zweckrationalitt) in its technocratic mode or
under a totalizing moralistic utopian vision. In some cases, as for
instance in the Communist ideology, there may develop some combination of both the technocratic and the moralistic utopian visions
under one totalistic canopy. Concomitant tension between totalizing,
absolutizing as against more pluralistic tendencies developed also in
the denition of other dimensions of human experienceespecially
the emotional ones.
In all institutional arenas and arenas of cultural creativity there
developed tensions between emphasis on discipline with strong emphasis on guidance and regulation of the individual, as against autonomy and self-expression; between strong emphasis on clearly
structured, strict totalizing conceptions of man and relatively sharp
boundaries between dierent spheres of life and, on the other hand,
more multifaceted and open ones.
It was indeed this tensionbetween the view which accepts the
existence of dierent values, commitments and dierent rationalities;
of pluralistic multifaceted visions and practices as against the view
which conates such dierent values and rationalities in totalistic
ways, with strong tendencies to their absolutizationthat has been,
especially when combined with the other tensions, probably the most
critical from the point of view of the development of the dierent
cultural and institutional patterns of modernity, and of the possible
destructive potentialities thereof.
All these tensions, especially the one between the totalizing and
more pluralistic conceptions of constitution of human society, history
and nature and of the place of human agency in these constructions; between some type of an overarching logocentric, usually
some grand narrative and between a more pluralistic conception
of meaning of life and of the good society, and of constitution of
society, between emphases on dierent dimensions of human existence, between control and autonomy have existed from the very
beginning of the promulgation of the cultural program of modernity; and between the universalistic components of cultural program
of modernity and the traditions of the respective societies in which
it was institutionalized and they constituted continual components in
the continual far-reaching changes in the development of this program throughout modern history.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

43

It was within the framework of these characteristics of the modern

program that there developed within it the distinct problematic of
the charismatic dimensions of human activity that constituted a
central component of Webers analysis in general, and especially of
modern societies.
Those tensions inherent in the cultural program of modernity were
reinforced by those that developed with the institutionalization of
this program. It was in connection with these processes of institutionalization that there developed those themes promulgated by Weber
which were usually interpreted as the core of his view on modernitynamely the emphasis on the processes of disenchantment rooted
in the attening by virtue of the growing institutional rationalizational bureaucratization of the development of the modern world,
of the creative dimension inherent in visions of modernity promulgated
in the Renaissance, Reformation, Enlightenment and the Revolutions,
which led to the crystallization of modernity; in the contradiction
between an overreaching vision through which the modern world
becomes meaningful and the fragmentation of such meaning generated by the growing autonomous development of the dierent institutionalbe it the economic, the political or the culturalarenas,
giving rise to life in the iron cage and the concomitant processes of
disenchantment (Entzauberung).
VI. All the characterizations of the modern order emphasize very
strongly the inherent fragility of modern order, of modern societies,
as well as, even if perhaps less explicitly, their changeability and
variability.
These tensions, and the continual attempts to overcome them, to
insert, as it were, new markers of certainty into the modern order,
developed in all modern societiesbut beyond their common core
they developed in dierent ways in dierent modern societies.
The institutional orders of modernity that developed with the
institutionalization of the cultural and political orders of modernity
did notcontrary to the assumptions of classical theories of modernization of the fties, and even of the earlier classics of sociology
like Spencer and even to some extent Durkheim, and which were
very dominant in Webers timedevelop in a uniform way throughout the world. Rather they developed in multiple patterns, in patterns of continually changing multiple modernities. This can be seen
already with respect to the central dimension of the political program

shmuel n. eisenstadt

44

of modernity, referred to above, namely the promulgation of protest.

The discourses of justice and the political mechanisms of regime
change dier among dierent modern societies according to dierent
cultural contexts. Sombarts old question Why is there no socialism
in the United States?13 formulated in the rst decade of the twentieth
century is perhaps the rst recognition of such variability of the
characteristic movements of protest in dierent modern societiesa
variability which became even more visible when moving to other
countriesJapan, India or Muslim societies. In all of these societies
there developed modern institutional and ideological patterns and
movements of protest which while sharing these basic mode orientations yet diered greatly from the original European ones and
from each other. All these attested to the heterogeneity within the
modern project; or, in other words, to the continual development of
multiple and changing modernities.
VII. It is of special importance for the analysis of continually changing multiple modernities that such distinctive patterns of modernity,
dierent in many radical ways from the original European ones,
crystallized not only in non-Western societies, in societies that developed in the framework of the various great civilizationsMuslim,
Indian, Buddhist, or Confucianunder the impact of European
expansion and in their ensuing confrontation with the European program of modernity. They evolved alsoindeed initiallywithin the
framework of the Western expansion in societies in which seemingly
purely Western institutional frameworks developed in the Americas.
Whereas it was sometimes assumed that European patterns of
modernity were repeated in the Americas, it is now clear that North
America, Canada, and Latin America developed from the start in
distinctive ways. Indeed, throughout the Americas we can trace the
crystallization of new civilizations, and not just, as L. Hartz claimed,
of fragments of Europe.14 In these Western institutional and cultural frameworks, derived and brought over from Europe, there developed not just local variations of the European model or models, but
radically new institutional and ideological patterns. It is quite possible that this was the rst crystallization of new civilizations since that

13
14

Sombart, 1976.
Hartz, 1964.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

45

of the great Axial civilizations and also the last to date. The crystallization of dierent modernities in the Americasa fact to which
Weber was very sensitive in his analysis of the North American (U.S.)
experienceattests that even within the broad framework of Western
civilizationhowever denedthere developed not just one but multiple cultural programs and institutional patterns of modernity.15 This
was of course even more so with respect to the institutional orders
that developed beyond the West.
VIII. One of the most interesting illustrations of the crystallization
of such distinct programs of modernity beyond the West is Japan.16
Japan provides indeed one of the most interesting case-studies, not
only from the point of view of the comparative study of modern
societies, but also from the more general point of view of the analytical and empirical distinctions between the structural and organizational, and the cultural dimensions of human activity in terms of
the pattern variables.
While in purely structural-organizational terms, modern Japanese
society developed strong achievement and universalistic criteria, yet
these criteria went together with a very strong immanentist orientation/setting and were embedded in the particularistic social setting
a combination which crystallized already in the Meiji restoration and
state.
The Japanese program of modernity ushered in by the Meiji
Restoration was rooted in the non-Axial, immanentist ontologies, and
it guided the crystallization of the Meiji state and later on the development of modern Japanese society, and shaped to some extent at
least the specic characteristics of the major institutional formations
of modern Japan. These formations were not grounded in the conceptions of principled, metaphysical individualism or in a principled
confrontation between state and society as two distinct ontological
entities. One of the most important such characteristics was the strong
tendency to the conation of the national community, of the state
and of society. Such conation has had several repercussions on the
structuring of the ground rules of the political arena, the most important of which have been the development, rst of a weak concept

15
16

Eisenstadt, 2002c; Roniger and Sznajder, 1998.

Eisenstadt, 1996b.

shmuel n. eisenstadt

46

of the state as distinct from the broader overall, in modern terms

national community (national being dened in sacral, natural and
primordial terms); second, of a societal state characterized by a strong
tendency to emphasize guidance rather than direct regulation and
permeation of the periphery by the center; and third, a very weak
development of an autonomous civil society; although, needless to
say, elements of the latter, especially the structural, organizational
components thereof (such as dierent organizations) have not been
missing.
The specic type of civil society that developed in Japan is perhaps best illustrated by the continual construction of new social spaces
which provides semi-autonomous arenas in which new types of
activities, consciousness and discourse develop, which however do
not impinge directly on the center. Those participating in them do
not have autonomous access to the center, and are certainly not able
to challenge its premises. The relations between state and society
have been rather eected in the mode of patterned pluralism, of
multiple dispersed social contracts.17
Closely connected to these characteristics of civil society in
modern Japan there has also developed a rather distinct pattern of
political dynamics, especially of the impact of movements of protest
on the center. The most important characteristic of this impact was
the relatively weak principled ideological confrontation with the
centerabove all the lack of success of leaders of such confrontational movements to mobilize wide support; the concomitant quite
far-ranging success in inuencing, if often indirectly, the policies of
the authorities and the creation of new autonomous but segregated
social spaces in which activities promulgated by such movements
could be implemented. Accordingly, changes in the types of political regimes, or in the relative strength of dierent groups, have not
necessarily implied in Japan changes in principles of legitimation and
in the basic premises and ground rules of the social and political
order.
All these characteristics of the political arena and of the relations
between nation, country, state and society were very closely related
to the specic strongly immanentist and particularistic ontological
conceptions and their dynamics that have prevailed in Japan through17

Ibid.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

47

out its history. The strong universalistic orientations inherent in

Buddhism, and more latently in Confucianism, were subdued and
nativized in Japan. When Japan was dened as a divine nation,
this meant a nation protected by the gods, being a chosen people
in some sense, but not a nation carrying Gods universal mission.
Such transformation had far-reaching impacts on some of the basic
premises and conceptions of the social order such as the Mandate
of Heaven, with its implication for the conception of authority and
the accountability of rulers, as well as conceptions of community.
Unlike China, where in principle the emperor, even if a sacral gure,
was under the Mandate of Heaven, in Japan he was sacred and
seen as the embodiment of the sun and could not be held accountable to anybody, only the shoguns and other ocialsin ways not
clearly specied.
The historical roots of multiple modernities
X. This discussion of the development of multiple institutional modes
of modernity clearly indicates that these dierent cultural programs
and institutional patterns of modernity were not shaped, as assumed
in some of the earlier studies of modernization as natural evolutionary potentialities of these societiesindeed, potentially of all
human societies; or, as in the earlier criticisms thereof, by the
natural unfolding of their respective traditions; nor just by their placement in the new international settings. Rather they were shaped by
the continuous interaction between several factors, many of which
were indeed mentioned, the most general being the various constellations of power, i.e. dierent modes of elite contestation and
co-optation in dierent political systems and dierent ontological conceptions and political ideologies. It was the constellations of these
factors that inuenced the nature of the emerging discourse of modernity, as borne by various political activists, intellectuals, in conjunction
above all with the social movements constituting the major actors
like processes of reinterpretation and formation of new institutional
patterns.
Or, in greater detail, these programs were shapedvery much in
line with Webers many historical analysesrst by basic premises
of cosmic and social order, the basic cosmologies that were prevalent
in these societies in their orthodox and heterodox formulations

48

shmuel n. eisenstadt

alike as they have crystallized in these societies throughout their

histories. A second shaping factor was the pattern of institutional
formations that developed within these civilizations through their
historical experience, especially in their encounter with other societies
or civilizations.
The third set of factors shaping such programs was the internal
tensions, dynamics and contradictions that developed in these societies in conjunction with the structural-demographic, economic, and
political changes attendant on the institutionalization of modern
frameworks, and between these processes and the basic premises of
modernity.
Fourth, the dierentcontinually changingprograms of modernity were shaped by the encounter and continual interaction between
the processes mentioned above, and the ways in which the dierent
societies and civilizations were incorporated into the new international systems, and the ways in which they were placed or were able
to place themselves, in these systems, to insert or become inserted
into the global system. The dierent international constellations have
also to be taken into account as inuencing the mode of modernization in a particular context.
Fifth, such continually changing contours were shaped by the political struggles and confrontations between dierent states, and between
dierent centers of political and economic power. Such confrontations
developed within Europe with the crystallization of the modern
European state system and became further intensied with the
crystallization of world systems from the sixteenth or seventeenth
century on. Sixth, these contours changed in tandem with the shifting hegemonies in the dierent international systems that developed
concomitantly with economic, political, technological, and cultural
changes.18
Seventh, such contours were shaped by the fact that the expansion of modernity entailed confrontation between the basic premises
of this program and the institutional formations that developed in
Western and Northern Europe and other parts of Europe and later
in the Americas and Asia: in the Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Confucian
and Japanese civilizations.

18

Tiryakian, 1985, pp. 131147; idem, 1994, pp. 131148.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

49

Last, such changes were rooted in the continual confrontations

between on the one hand dierent interpretations of the basic premises
of modernity as promulgated by dierent centers and elites, and on
the other hand the concrete developments, conicts, and displacements that accompanied the institutionalization of these premises.
These confrontations activated the consciousness of the contradictions inherent in the cultural program of modernity and the potentialities conferred by its openness and reexivity; and gave rise to
the continual reinterpretation by dierent social actors of the major
themes of this program, and of the basic premises of their civilizational visions, and of the concomitant grand narratives and myths
of modernity.
It is the combination of such factors that can also explain some
of the puzzling aspects of multiple modernities. Thus to give just
one illustration, the combination of the prevalence of pluralistic organization of centers; the relative de-evaluation of the political system
as the major arena for the implementation of the basic ontological
visions of Hindu civilization and the history of relatively long centralized modern colonial and post-colonial regimes explain the rather
astonishing fact that India has developed as a modern, vibrant
democracy and continues to be so.19
XI. Most of these variations and changes of the institutional and
cultural contours of modernity were closely related to the continual
expansion of modernity. This expansion indeed spawned a tendency
rather new and practically unique in the history of mankindto the
development of universal, worldwide institutional and symbolic frameworks and systems. The expansion of modernity, not unlike that of
the Great Religions or of great Imperial regimes in past times, undermined the symbolic and institutional premises of the societies incorporated into it, causing very intensive dislocations while at the same
time opening up new options and possibilities. Because the expansion of this civilization almost always and continually combined economic, political, and ideological dimension forces to a much longer,
its impact on the societies to which it spread was much more intense
than in most historical cases. The development of international

19
Eisenstadt, Kahane and Shulman (eds.), 1984; Eisenstadt and Hartman, 1997,
pp. 2755; Hensen, 1999.

50

shmuel n. eisenstadt

systems or frameworks in the wake of military political and economic expansion were not of course by themselves new in the history
of mankind, especially in the history of the great civilizations. What
was new in the modern era was rst that the great technological
advances and the dynamics of modern economic and political forces
made this expansionthe changes and developments attendant on
them and their impact on the societies to which it expandedfar
more intensive. The expansion of modern civilization which took
place rst in Europe and then beyond it continually combined economic, political, and ideological aspects and forces, and its impact
on the societies to which it expanded was much more extensive and
intensive alike than in most historical cases. Accordingly the expansion of modernity evinced in comparison with other civilizations some
very distinct characteristics.
All of these frameworks were multi-centered and heterogeneous,
each generating its own dynamics, continual changes in constant
relation to the others. The interrelations among them have never
been static or unchanging, and the dynamics of these international
frameworks or settings gave rise to continuous changes in various
modern societies.
But it is only in conjunction with the specic cultural programs
of modernity as it crystallized rst in Europe and then expanded to
become continually interpreted throughout the world that the dynamics of these expansions and of the multiple worldwide systems can
be understood. The combination of military, political and economic
expansion with ideological vision rooted in distinct cultural programs
was not, of course, in itself new in the history of mankind. It has
indeed been characteristic of all Great Religions, of the Axial Civilizations,to some extent of the Jewish one, above all of the Christian,
Islamic or Confucian and to some extent also of the Buddhist ones.
It was also characteristic of the Hellenistic and Roman Empires. But
the cultural program of modernity, as it crystallized rst in Western
Europe from around the seventeenth century was characterized by
specic ideological features which entailed some very distinct institutional implications, which are of crucial importance for the understanding of the dynamics of modernity and its expansion. Of crucial
importance in this context is the fact that its basic modernity
crystallized out of the dynamics of Western and European Christian
civilization and societies and that the expansion of modernity entailed
its continual impingement on other great civilizations, among them

modernity in socio-historical perspective

51

the major Axial Civilizations, generating continual confrontations

between their premises and those of European modernity.
As a result of this, a great variety of modern or modernizing societies, sharing many common characteristics but also evincing great
dierences among themselves, developed in the dierent historical
contexts.
In the crystallization of dierent institutional and cultural contours
of modernities, of central importance was the characteristics of elites
and their relations with other social sectors of their respective societies.
Thus for instance the specic institutional and cultural dynamics that
developed in Japan and which were briey analyzed above were
major characteristics of the elites and their coalitions in Japanese
society. The common characteristic of these elites was that they were
relatively non-autonomous and their major coalitions was their embedment in groups and settings (contexts) that were mainly dened in
primordial, ascriptive, sacral and often hierarchical terms, and much
less in terms of specialized functions or of universalistic criteria of
social attributes. Linked to these characteristics of the major elites
was the relative weakness of autonomous cultural elites. True, many
cultural actorspriests, monks, scholars, and the likeparticipated
in such coalitions. But with very few exceptions, their participation
was based on primordial and social attributes and on criteria of
achievement and social obligations according to which these coalitions were structured, but not any distinct, autonomous criteria rooted
in or related to the arenas of cultural specialization in which they
were active. These arenascultural, religious, or literarywere themselves ultimately dened in primordial-sacral terms, notwithstanding
the fact that many specialized activities developed within them. It
was the combination of all these factors in combination with its
specic political ecological location that also explains the mode of
the incorporation of Japan into the modern international systems.
Other constellations of elites, their power relation with other
social sectors of their respective societies of ontological conceptions
carried by them and the impact of international forces and modes
of incorporation into the emerging and continually changing international system, gave rise in other societiesbe it indeed in the rst,
classical European modernity, in the Americas or in the multiple
modernities that developed in the realm of Islamic, Hindu, and
Buddhist civilizations, to other ideological and institutional programs
of modernity. In all these processes, it was the characteristics of

52

shmuel n. eisenstadt

elitesespecially their autonomy as against being embedded in various particularistic groups, the ontological visions promulgated by
them, and the relations between such elites and between them and
the broader onethat were of crucial importance.
A reassessment of the relations between structural and cultural dimensions
of modernity
XII. This basic fact that modernity did not develop in a uniform
way but in multiple, continually changing patternsmanifest in
dierent types of national and revolutionary states, and later on in
the contemporary era in multiple new patterns, calls for a close reexamination of some of the assumptions of the classical theories of
modernization, especially of the relations between the structural, institutional and cultural dimensions of modernity.
In the classical theories of modernization of 50s and 60s of the
twentieth century, it was the trend to continual structural dierentiation
and the concomitant development of distinct institutional arenas
the economic, the political, the cultural and the likethat were
often seen as the major institutional core of modernity.
There can be no doubt that processes of structural dierentiation
so strongly emphasized by many of the classics of sociologySpencer,
Durkheim, and later on in the classical theories of modernization of
the 50s and 60s of the twentieth century, constitute a basic component of the modern developments. It is, of course, true that the
concrete institutional context of the crystallization and development
of modernitythat of the initial phase of the development of capitalism, rst mercantile then industrial capitalism, and of their continual expansion involved continually increasing structural dierentiation
and the development of the attendant potentialities, to follow Karl
Deutschs nomenclature, for growing social mobilization.20
The crystallization of the cultural program of modernity, of the
distinct mode of interpretation of the world and of the attempts to
institutionalize it in new patterns, was indeed closely connected historically with the distinct structural-institutional dimensions of modern societiesabove all with the decomposition of olderpreviously
20

Deutsch, 1963a, pp. 497507; idem, 1963b.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

53

relatively closed social formations and of new spaces in which new

institutional formations could be formed. While there can be no
doubt that such processes constitute a basic component of the historical development of modernityyet they do not tell the whole
story thereof, and it is very important rst of all to distinguish between
several aspects of the structural components or dimensions of modernity.
Thus rst, great dierences in scope or extent of such dierentiation between dierent modern and modernizing societies could
be identied. Beyond this, second, the extent to which such institutional arenas were indeed dened and structured as autonomous;
as being regulated by their intrinsic rules or values, varied greatly
between dierent societies and within the same society, in the dierent
periods of its historical development; third, and in close relation to
the former and most important, the modes in which those dierent
structures or organization were organized and dened and the conicts
attendant on these processessuch as, for instance, industrial conicts
were regulated, varied greatly between dierent modern societies,
and it is these dierent modes that provide the core characteristics
of the specic multiple complexes of dierent modern societies. Indeed,
in societieseven those with seemingly similar degrees of structural dierentiation, as for instance in the most fully industrialized
societies like the U.S., the dierent societies of Western Europe, and
Japanthe dierent institutional spheres such as the economy, polity,
etc. can beand indeed weredened in dierent ways, entailing
dierent modes of their institutional autonomy.
Moreover there is no necessary correlation between any degree
or type of structural dierentiation, of development of autonomous
institutional arenas and specic types of modern institutional formations. Such dierent formations may develop in societies with
relatively similar level of dierentiation and conversely relatively
similar frameworkse.g. pluralistic as against authoritarian regimes
may develop in societies with dierent levels of dierentiation of the
development of autonomous institutional arenas even if there naturally develop between them important dierences in concrete institutional details. Contrary to some of the assumptions of many of the
theories of modernizationliberal and Marxist alikethere is no
necessary correlation between any specic modern institutional form
be it dierent types of capitalist or guided (socialist) economies;
between specic types of political regimepluralistic, authoritarian

54

shmuel n. eisenstadt

or totalitarian ones and the dierent components of the modern cultural program.
The same is even more true with respect to the relation between
the cultural and structural dimensions of modernity. A very strong
even if implicitassumption of the studies of modernization was that
the cultural dimensions or aspects of modernizationthe basic cultural premises of Western modernityare inherently and necessarily
interwoven with the structural ones, became highly questionable. The
actual developments in these societies have gone far beyond the
homogenizing and hegemonic dimensions of the original cultural program of modernity. While the dierent dimensions of the original
Western project have indeed constituted the crucial startingand
continual referencefor the processes that developed among dierent
societies throughout the world, yet those processes did not simply
copy, as it were, the Western patterns.
XIII. Each of these dimensions or aspects of modernity, of modern
societiesthe structural, the institutional and the cultural onesare
analytically distinct, and they come together in dierent ways in
dierent historical constellations coalescing in dierent ways in dierent
historical contexts. Moreover, in one historical casethat of Tokugawa
Japanthere developed many institutional, especially economic formations which could have perhaps led to modern market capitalist
economy, without a concomitant development of a distinct cultural
program of modernity (Randall Collins);21 and it was only under the
impact of the West that such a programindeed of a very distinct
typedeveloped.
These dierent modes of modern institutional order were greatly
inuenced among other factors by the dierent ways in which the
basic civilizational premises of modernity were interpreted within
those societiesor in other words, these modes were greatly inuenced
by the dierent interpretations of the central core of modernityof
the cultural program of modernity, very often constituting in each
society foci of contestation.
It is through the interweaving of such distinct institutional constellations with the dierent dimensions or components of the new
mode of interpretation of the world, of the cultural program of

21

Collins, 1999, ch. 7: An Asian Route to Capitalism.

modernity in socio-historical perspective

55

modernity and the antinomies inherent in them that the various

modern societies and their dynamics develop.
The destructive components of modernity
XIV. The development and expansion of modernity was not, indeed
contrary to the optimistic views of modernity as progresspeaceful.
The crystallization of European modernity and its later expansion
was by no means peaceful. Contrary to the optimistic visions of
modernity as inevitable progress, the crystallizations of modernities
were continually interwoven with internal conict and confrontation,
rooted in the contradictions and tensions attendant on the development of the capitalist systems, and, in the political arena, on growing
demands for democratization. The development of modernity bore
within it destructive possibilities that were voiced, somewhat ironically, often by some of its most radical critics, who thought modernity to be a morally destructive force, emphasizing the negative
eects of certain of its core characteristics. All these factors were
compounded by international conicts, exacerbated by the modern
state and imperialist systems. War and genocide were scarcely new
phenomena in history. But they became radically transformed,
intensied, generating specically modern modes of barbarism. The
ideologization of violence, terror and warrst and most vividly witnessed in the French Revolutionbecame the most important components of the construction of modern states. The tendency to such
ideologies of violence became closely related to the fact that the
nation-state became the focus of symbols of collective identity.22 The
Holocaust, which took place in the very center of modernity, became
a symbol of its negative, destructive potential, of the barbarism lurking within its very core.
These destructive forces, the traumas of modernity which undermined the great promises thereof, emerged clearly during and after
the First World War in the Armenian genocide, became even more
visible in the Second World War, above all in the Holocaust, all of
them shaking the naive belief in the inevitability of progress and of

22
Giddens and Held, 1982; Schumpeter, 1991; Furet, 1982; Furet and Ozouf,
1989; Joas, 1996, pp. 1327.

56

shmuel n. eisenstadt

the conation of modernity with progress. These destructive forces

of modernity were paradoxically ignored or bracketed out from the
discourse of modernity in the rst two or three decades after the
Second World War. Lately they have reemerged again in a most
frightening way on the contemporary scene, in the new ethnic
conicts in many of the former republics of Soviet Russia, in Sri
Lanka, in Kosovo, and in a most terrible way in Cambodia and in
African countries, such as Rwanda.

CHAPTER TWO

THE AXIAL CONUNDRUM: BETWEEN HISTORICAL

SOCIOLOGY AND THE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY
Johann P. Arnason
Changing interpretations of the Axial Age can be linked to the ongoing self-reection of Western modernity.1 Both the underlying
visions of history and the explicit questions asked by those who tried
to make sense of a distant but decisive turning-point relate to modern experiences. This does not mean that we are dealing with a pure
projection or (to use an undeservedly popular term) an invented
tradition. Rather, the ideas in question have matured through a
hermeneutical fusion of horizons that involves three sets of themes
and problems. The debate on the Axial Age, its metahistorical meaning and its world-historical consequences has so far been highly discontinuous, and the main landmarks correspond to markedly dierent
moments in the history of twentieth-century social and historical
thought.2 But the shifts reect a growing inclination to question selfuniversalizing projections of the West from a more comparative worldhistorical perspective, and thus to seek a more balanced starting-point
for a discussion of Western exceptionalism (not to be mistaken for
an a priori denial of it). At the same time, the attempts to understand a specic historical period, its dening characteristics and the
dividing lines that set it apart from earlier and later phases, have
followed a logic of their own and led to signicant results. Finally,
the exemplary cases of intellectual or religious transformation, seen
as evidence of some kind of unity across cultural boundaries, also
served to outline frameworks for the comparative analysis and mutual
understanding of traditions and civilizations that had drawn on separate legacies of the Axial Age. The following comments will focus

1
2

For further discussion of this aspect, see Wagner, 2004.

See Arnason, 2004.

58

johann p. arnason

on the two latter themes; but the discussion will then shift to a recent
interpretation which exemplies the broader context of historical and
sociological reection, as well as the specic issues of axiality and
its long-term-transformative logic.
The problem of the Axial Agemore precisely: the question
whether we should speak of it as a distinctive and formative historical periodcan now, as a result of scholarly work in several interrelated elds, be posed with greater precision than in the rst stages
of the debate. The chronological setting can only be dened in broad
and exible terms: some earlier writers placed particular emphasis
on the sixth century bce, but it now seems clear that comparative
analyses of the Axial Age must deal with several centuries around
the middle of the last millennium bce.3 During this period, there
was undeniablyto quote an author who takes a skeptical view of
traditional approachesa certain cumulation4 of innovative changes
to the cultural traditions of major civilizational centres, from Ancient
Greece to Ancient China. Even this minimalist version of the axial
thesis calls for some qualications. Growing knowledge of early civilizations has brought to light trends and episodes that pregured the
more decisive (or at least conventionally acknowledged) achievements
of the Axial Age. So far, however, this line of research is very unequally developed, and it seems unlikely that a balanced picture
will ever be possible. Among the crucial cases, the Egyptian tradition is better known than its Mesopotamian counterpart; but the
available evidence would still seem to allow for further progress on
the latter side. As for the archaic backgrounds to Indian and Chinese
transformations, the record is more elusive, the attempts at reconstruction more speculative and the prospects for further work more
limited. But given the nature of the sources, the Chinese experience
seems somewhat more accessible than the Indian one.5 Finally, there
are historical borderline cases that may never be settled: in particular, it is still an open question whether the beginning of the
Zoroastrian tradition should be ranked among the most momentous

3
For otherwise very dierent examples of emphasis on the sixth century BCE,
see Burckhardt, 1978 (rst published posthumously in 1905), who refers (p. 8) to a
religious movement of the sixth century BC, from China to Ionia; and Nehru,
1936.
4
Assmann, 2000, p. 291.
5
For a recent interpretation of the Chinese evidence, see Pines, 2002.

the axial conundrum

59

archaic innovations or included in the Axial Age. There is no consensus on the chronology, but growing support for a date in the
early last millennium bce (at least among some scholars) may have
strengthened the latter view.
To sum up, the chronological demarcation of the Axial Age is
bound to be uid and contested, even more so in some cases than
others, and more work on its prehistory is likely to raise new questions about its claims to exceptional signicance. But if we accept
that there are stillon balancegood reasons to regard the period
in question as a prima facie challenging problem for comparative history, the next step is to consider the specic meaning and long-term
logic of the changes that seem to have taken place in dierent but
similarly formative settings. All interpretations of the Axial Age have
centred on cultural (more specically religious or intellectual) breakthroughs of such epoch-making dimensions that they could not nd
adequate expression in any simultaneous structural changes. Without
entering into the debate between rival theories, a provisional phenomenological view would suggest that axial transformations aect
the position and the possible role of cultural patterns within the
social-historical world. New cultural orientations lend themselves to
more varied social uses: they provide social frameworks for justication
on one side and protest on the other, as well as for more detached
forms of intellectual life. These innovations presuppose new and
more complex ways of articulating the world, whether the primary
cultural impetus to that shift comes from religion or philosophy, or
from a mode of thought that cuts across conventional distinctions
between them. Changes to the relationship between culture and
society are reected on the level of social structures: most obviously,
intellectuals as a social group can play a more important role, both
directly and through interaction with a broader eld of social forces.
Finally, the earliest modern attempts to re-envision the Axial Age
made much of exemplary individualsprophets and thinkerswho
for the rst time appeared as creators of meaning in history. But
although the images of charismatic founders cannot be dismissed out
of hand, we must nowon the basis of better insight into the mechanisms of tradition-buildingallow for retrospective individualization.
The question of substantive parallels or anities between the various transformations isas will be seena very dicult and still
hotly debated one. But even the most cautious view of the evidence
will, at this stage, admit the striking fact of roughly simultaneous

johann p. arnason

60

transformations, comparable at least in the limited sense dened

above, and clearly unexplainable in terms of mutual inuences. It is
probably true that interaction between dierent civilizational complexes counted for something in the general intensication of social
life that preceded or accompanied the axial turn. Moreover, recent
work has thrown new light on specic cases of intercivilizational contacts. The whole early history of Chinese civilization now seems to
have been less isolated from the rest of Eurasia than scholars had
previously assumed. Relations between India and the Ancient Near
Eastcommercial, cultural and politicalwere clearly not unimportant, but it seems unlikely that connections can be traced in
greater detail. By contrast, the Near Eastern context of Ancient Greek
and Israeli innovations is now much better understood. However, all
things considered, the broadly dened Axial Age still stands out as
an example of separate and internal but prima facie similar developments, more signicant than any encounters between cultural worlds.
We are, in other words, dealing with contingent parallels of the kind
observable in some other historical contexts; such cases invite comparative analysis, but it should always include a sustained eort to
clarify and criticize the self-projections that may be built into perceptions of other civilizations and their histories. Ongoing debates
in the comparative history of religion and philosophy suggest that
analysts of the Axial Age still need to pay attention to that part of
the problem.
The Axial Age is commonly seen as a prime case of creative
eervescence. But the lasting interest in it is also due to the continuity and world-making capacity of the traditions that grew out of
this creative turn. Some analysts, mindful of the problems encountered in trying to nd a common denominator for separate beginnings, rested their case on these long-term consequences. Marshall
Hodgson argued that the Axial Age deserved this label because it
resulted in an enduring geographical and cultural articulation of the
citied zone of the Oikumene into regions.6 Hodgsons particular
emphasis on this aspect was linked to his advocacy of a multi-regional
framework for world history in general and Afro-Eurasian history in
particular; the evident importance of the Axial Age for that approach
made it less urgent to answer the question of contrasts and paral-

Hodgson, 1974, p. 112.

the axial conundrum

61

lels between the foundational ideas, gures and initiatives. Hodgsons

reections on the latter issue were rather inconclusive, and his main
theme was the specic history of rival but interrelated monotheistic
religions, rather than any broader basis that they might have shared
with other traditions. He traced the idea of a supreme and unique
God, not reducible within any image, visible or mental, but expressing a moral dimension in the cosmos,7 to Irano-Semitic traditions
in the Ancient Near east (or the Nile-to-Oxus region, as he preferred to call it). But the monotheistic innovations of the Axial Age
did not give rise to a new regional identity. In that sense, this part
of the world lagged behind the regional cultural complexes that
crystallized around their respective traditions; the weight of its legacy
the oldest civilizations, the rst intercivilizational empires and the
earliest beginnings of cosmopolitan cultural exchangeseems to have
become an obstacle to further changes. The denitive civilizational
integration of the region was not achieved until much later: through
the Islamic version of monotheism and the Islamicate traditions that
took shape within its orbit (Hodgson used the latter term to stress
the dierence between a religious vision and a more composite civilizational pattern). At the same time, the other monotheistic world
religion, which had had a powerful impact on the Nile-to-Oxus region
but failed to impose a new identity on its older cultures, maintained
its hold and laid foundations for new developments in a less central
region. Divergent branches of Christianity became civilizational frameworks for two distinct parts of the European complex that had rst
emerged as a Greco-Roman cultural world around the Mediterranean.
Hodgsons approach exemplies a way to dene the Axial Age on
the basis of enduring and visible eects, rather than contestable and
in any case premature interpretations of cultural backgrounds. But
further reection will, whether it begins with the sources or the
sequels, necessarily entail an eort to clarify the relationship between
the two levels of inquiry. If it is true that the world-historical meaning
of the Axial Age can only be understood in light of its multiple legacies, it is equally true that macro-cultural congurations of the kind
emphasized by Hodgson derive their distinctive modes of unity and
continuity from core meanings, and these meanings exist only in and
through ongoing interpretation and reactivation of formative sources.

Ibid., p. 115.

62

johann p. arnason

To indicate the questions that would result from the combination of

these two perspectives, but cannot be discussed here, a few words
may be said about basic dierences between the main cases to be
considered. All major civilizational complexes incorporate the axial
connection into their representative self-denitions (and a more critical
discussion must take o from there), but not always in the same
way. The most durable and dominant self-dening references to the
Axial Age prevailed in the otherwise very dierent Chinese and
Judaic traditions: the imperial and the diasporic civilization par
excellence. The multi-faceted Greek legacy did not crystallize into
an autonomous and continuous tradition, and its most signicant
long-term eects unfoldedin markedly discontinuous waysin civilizations more directly identied with transformations of Jewish
monotheism. In the Indian case, the religious and intellectual current
most clearly central to the Axial AgeBuddhismwas marginalized
and submerged by other traditions, and the Axial Age innovations
on which they drewthe foundations of classical Hindu thought
were projected back into a much more remote past. Finally, it seems
clear that the uncertain chronology and diuse historical contours
of Zoroastrian religion are not unrelated to the destinies of the Iranian
(or Persianate) civilizational formation. After an early and epochmaking imperial venture, tailored to Near Eastern precedents and
conditions therefore not closely aligned with indigenous religious
traditions of the rulers, the Iranian sphere was overshadowed by
ascendant Hellenism; the Sasanian revival of Zoroastrianism, after a
historical hiatus that disrupted cultural memory, was then followed
by a violent break and eective absorption into another religious
culture. The re-emergence of a Persianate civilizational sphere
within Islam did not go beyond a very selective restoration of continuity. Among the cultural complexes that can (even if with some
reservations) be traced back to the Axial Age, this was clearly the
case where the connection was least visible at the level of explicit
self-understanding.
A proper comparative analysis of traditions and civilizations rooted
in the Axial Age would have to link these preliminary bearings to
broader perspectives. The overall articulations and qualications of
continuity are embedded in a more complex interplay of ideas and
institutions (constellations of the latter kind are the basic components
of civilizational frameworks). But at this point, the debate on the

the axial conundrum

63

Axial Age and its legacies faces another set of problems. The historiographical division of labour has, on the whole, not favoured systematic study of the interconnections between ideas and institutions.
As for the dierent civilizational complexes in question, scholarly
work on their respective dynamics and trajectories is very unequally
developed. Last but not least, the original formulations of the whole
problematic were one-sidedly and inevitably Eurocentric, and although
signicant steps have been taken to correct this bias, there is no
denying the need for more sustained work from non-European perspectives. This is an uphill task, and the persistence of Eurocentrism
is not the only obstacle to progress. For all these reasons, interpretations of the Axial Ageseen as a formative phase of world historymust translate into long-term research programmes, open to
adjustment and revision of basic assumptions. But in that context,
strong hypotheses with a speculative thrustprospecting a eld to
be further explored by comparative historycan be useful: they may
sensitize us to dimensions and implications that would otherwise go
unnoticed. Rearmations of speculative views might even help to
avert the danger of fragmentation into case studies without a connecting project.
Gauchets interpretation of the Axial Age
With the problematic of ideas and institutions, the focus of the discussion shifts towards historical sociology. Eisenstadts work on the
Axial Age and its civilizational paradigms is the rst systematic formulation of that perspective. More precisely, it translates ideas originally developed within the philosophy of history into the language
of historical sociology and integrates them into a theoretical framework for the comparative analysis of civilizations. Eisenstadts model
links the cultural logic of world-views to the dynamics of institutional
formations, the strategic action of political and cultural elites, and
the transformative eects of social conict. This reorientation of the
debate represents a decisive and denitive achievement, even if the
more specic claims attached to it can be questioned; it seems clear
that both the transformations of world-views and the new direction
of social change were more diverse than Eisenstadt was at rst inclined
to think, but these issuesand others related to themcan be discussed within the general historical-sociological framework. They are,

64

johann p. arnason

however, beyond the scope of the present paper.8 Here I propose

to discuss a dierent question. The historical-sociological turn may
be seen as an incontestable breakthrough, but this does not necessarily mean that no place is left for the philosophy of history. We
can easily envisage a productive dialogue between the two approaches;
as will be seen, Marcel Gauchets political history of religion and
its new perspective on the Axial Age answer that expectation. It
should be stressed that references to the philosophy of history have
no pejorative connotations: all macro-historical interpretations depend
on philosophical presuppositions and raise philosophical questions.
We are, in other words, dealing with a necessary component of all
theorizing with large-scale and long-term ambitions, more clearly
articulated in some cases than others, but never irrelevant. Nor is it
being suggested that a strict and invariant dividing line can be drawn
between historical sociology and the philosophy of history. The two
levels of analysis interpenetrate in varying ways. Sociological themes
are integral to Gauchets project; but whenas in the main text to
be discussed herekey parts of the argument have to do with the
dynamics of transcendence, the gures of subjectivity and the relationship between these two dimensions, it seems safe to conclude
that philosophical concerns are coming to the fore.
A short description of Gauchets projectone of the most ambitious undertakings in contemporary social and political thoughtwill
help to clarify the background to the following discussion. There is,
most obviously, an essential connection to ideas developed by Cornelius
Castoriadis and Claude Lefort. These two thinkers came from within
the Marxian tradition and broke with it in particularly creative and
seminal ways, arguably more so than anybody else with a comparable intellectual biography; their roads beyond Marx intersected and
overlapped in signicant ways, not least with regard to the rediscovery of democracy, its problems and its promises; but they also
diverged at crucial points. Gauchets work represents an original synthesis of insights from both sides. He shares with Castoriadis a strong
emphasis on autonomy, understood as a conscious articulation and
appropriation of the self-constitutive and self-transformative capacity

8
For a more detailed discussion, see Eisenstadts Concluding statement in
Arnason et al., Axial Civilizations and World History, and the last section of my article in the same book.

the axial conundrum

65

of human societies. But in contrast to Castoriadis, he does not invoke

the idea of autonomy to defend a new version of the revolutionary
project. His analysis of the complex and often counterintuitive forms
taken by autonomy as an institutional principleincluding modern
bureaucracy and representative governmentis closer to Leforts
interpretation of democracy. At the same time, his analysis of political modernity is grounded in a universal-historical perspective that
centresmore explicitly than Castoriadis or Lefort ever suggested
on political determinants and transformations. This is evident in the
attempt to reconstruct a political history of religion, and more
specically in the portrayal of the state as the greatest historical transformer, albeit with thoroughly unintended consequences; as we shall
see, this is the key to Gauchets conception of the Axial Age.
The above summary covers only one part of the project. Gauchet
also aims at a comprehensive reactivation and reformulation of
questions posed by classical sociology, particularly those concerning
religion, its role in the constitution of society, and its importance for
the transition to modernity. He follows Durkheims lead in analyzing
religion as a meta-institution,9 i.e. as a structurally and historically
primary mode of societal self-constitution, and in singling out primitive religion as the paradigmatic case in point. But his account of
the relationship between religious meaning and social life stresses the
negative aspects much more than Durkheim ever did: for him, the
religious mode of self-institutionalization ismore emphatically and
importantly than for Durkheimalso a self-denial and a self-disguising
of society as a creative force. If it is nevertheless to be understood
as a detour towards autonomy, a detailed reconstruction of its developmental logic is needed. The achievement of autonomy through an
exit from the religious universe is described in terms reminiscent of
Durkheims (1969, 123) comment on democracy: the most adequate
way in which society becomes conscious of itself. Durkheim had,
however, left the interpretations of religion and democracy unconnected and unequally developed. Gauchets line of argument integrates the two thematic foci into a common framework.
The reworking of Durkheims problematic throws new light on
some well-known Weberian themes. Gauchet shares Webers interest in Christian sources of Western transformations, but argues that
9
Durkheim did not use this term, but it seems appropriate; to the best of my
knowledge, it was rst used by Poggi, 1972.

66

johann p. arnason

the unilateral emphasis on Protestantism was misguided. In his view,

general and enduring characteristicsand inherent problemsof
Christianity were more important. But this also means that historical inquiry has to allow for a wider range of circumstances intersecting with the religious tradition in question. At the same time,
the focus on political modernity sets Gauchets project apart from
the Weberian vision of capitalism as the main transformative force.
The political history of religion culminates in a critical but decidedly anti-utopian analysis of modern democracy. As for the dynamics
central to this long-term trajectory, the concept of rationalization
must be applied with greater reservations than in the Weberian frame
of reference. Gauchets reasons for dissenting on this point can only
be understood in the context of his more specic claims.10
Gauchets interpretation of the Axial Age is essential to his macrohistorical model, but dependent on more basic premises that should
be outlined before going on to consider substantive problems. An
analysis of primitive religion sets the scene for interpretations of successive historical formations.11 Gauchets reconstruction of this background draws on a variety of sources, including Mircea Eliade and
Pierre Clastres, as well as a critical reading of Claude Lvi-Strauss.
But the distinctive turn taken by this synthesis is perhaps best described
with reference to Durkheims argument in The Elementary Forms of
Religious Life. Durkheims view of primitive religion as the most undisturbed expression of religious essentials, and therefore the proper
starting-point for scientic inquiry, seems to be echoed in the following statement: By looking at areas where religion has survived,
from America to New Guinea, we can form a concrete image of
religion as it was in the beginning, in its purest and most systematic form, in the world prior to the State.12 In a sense, Gauchet
goes even further than Durkheim: for him, the original radical

10
Gauchets main works are as follows: Le dsenchantement du monde, 1987 (English
translation: The Disenchantment of the World ); La rvolution des droits humains, 1989; La
rvolution des pouvoirs, 1996; La dmocratie contre elle-mme, 2001; La condition historique,
2003.
11
I follow English usage in referring to primitive religions. But it should be
noted that Gauchet has strong reservations about the term primitive. It suggests
that we are dealing with religions or societies closer to the natural origins of humanity. In his view, this is an illusion.
12
Gauchet, 1997, p. 9.

the axial conundrum

67

core13 of religion is more fully present and more adequately embodied in primitive forms than in the historical ones. This stronger
emphasis reects a more fundamental underlying dierence. Gauchet
equates primitive religion with radical dispossession, where the
foundation was considered to be wholly other.14 Such an understanding is not totally alien to the Elementary Forms, but certainly not
fully translatable into Durkheims language. It presupposes a vision
of history and a phenomenology of the human condition, neither of
which is easily adapted to classical sociology.
For Gauchet, it is an anthropological fact of the most fundamental
kind that humanity entered history (at least the history that we can
know) by denying its capacity to create history.15 This initial self
suppression of human creativity is, as he argues, an intelligible but
not predetermined response to the ambiguous human experience of
time: our perception is divided between an always already there,
which reduces us to nothing, and a yet to be realized, which throws
us into the wide open space of action. On the one hand, we always
arrive on the scene after things have been determined, so we have
no grasp of them and have no choice but to comply with their rules
in order to become part of and lose ourselves in them. On the other
hand, we nd ourselves thrown into the world as originating beings
for whom there is no before, which is why we are beings of action
who cannot avoid changing ourselves and our surroundings, even
when we try desperately not to, as we have done for the greatest
part of our history.16
The socio-cultural regime conforms to the rst aspect of this experience and strives to minimize. The second is a choice, in roughly
the same sense that Marcel Mauss used to describe civilizational
alternatives: it is contingent in the sense that no causal chain can
explain its logic, but it is based on pre-given possibilities and develops them into a coherent pattern. Its dening feature is the acceptance of absolute dependence on a mythical past. The socio-cultural
order, embedded in a cosmic one, appears as a creation of ancestors who accomplished their work in another time, and whose legacy

13
14
15
16

Ibid.,
Ibid.,
Ibid.,
Ibid.,

p.
p.
p.
p.

9.
23.
15.
11.

johann p. arnason

68

remains binding. The negating capacity of human beings is thus

turned against itself and into submission to wholly external rule. In
comparison to later images of divinity, the mythical ancestors may
seem less exalted, but with regard to the total power vested in an
imposed order, their sacred authority is unrivalled by any later products of the religious imagination. This is Gauchets reason for describing the earliest known form of religion as the most complete and
consistent, but by the same token most clearly centred on a constitutive paradox: self-denition through self-dispossession. This paradox is, however, compounded by another one. The dispossessive
nature of religion does not prevent its human creators from identifying with their world in a way that later and less stable societies
may perceive as a lost treasure. Autonomy generates its own problems, both through unintended consequences of increasingly free
action and through interpretive conicts that accompany historical
change. Since there are no a priori limits to this unfolding problematic, the debate on merits and demerits of the two alternative
forms of historical existence will remain open.
The negation of human autonomy aects all domains of social
life. In particular, it reduces the scope and meaning of the politicalnever absent from human societiesto a bare minimum, and
excludes the formation of a separate power centre It is the overall
logic of archaic religion, not a premonition of dangers inherent in
uncontrolled power, that explains the constitution of society against
the state, to use the terms coined by Pierre Clastres. Conversely, the
rise of the state is more than an institutional mutation: it changes
the whole interpretive and symbolic framework of the human condition. For Gauchet, it is the rst religious revolution in history.17
But if it is a uniquely momentous event, it is also a uniquely ambiguous one. The two sides are summed up in Gauchets description of
the state as a sacral transforming agent (transformateur sacral ).18 The
early state brings the authority previously vested in a religious Other
back into the human world, but does so in a way that opens up
possibilities and perspectives of further change.

17
18

Ibid., p. 13.
Ibid., p. 33.

the axial conundrum

69

Since the implications of this turning-point are crucial to Gauchets

interpretation of the Axial Age, they should be examined in greater
detail. On the one hand, the sacred rulers who embody the state
(their varying attributes and images can be disregarded in this context) invoke the authority of a higher order, reigning from time
immemorial and immutably superior to all human activity. In so
doing, they perpetuate the foundational pattern of primeval religion,
back it up by more concentrated power, and articulate it in the more
systematic form made possible by new cultural skills and resources.
If the beginning of human history was, as Gauchet puts it, a backwards entrance in the sense that human autonomy was exercised
through self-denial, there is a similarly backward-oriented side to the
rst major break with the archaic pattern. On the other hand, the
early state entangles the gods in history19 and thus activates trends
and forces conducive to more radical transformations. Gauchet notes
three dimensions of early statehood that in the long run open up
new mental horizons and give rise to new symbolic signications.
First, the construction of a hierarchical orderan essential complement to the stateredistributes authority within society and changes
the forms of subordination and the tie between the individual and
the collective.20 When the instituting principlepreviously kept at
an imaginary distance from social practicesis translated into radically unequal relationships between groups and individuals, it is at
the same time enmeshed in power struggles and exposed to questioning and protest. The hierarchical restructuring of society entails
the humanization and latent problematization of hierarchy. Second,
the new phenomenon of political domination brings in its wake a
more far-reaching anthropological innovation: both the intra-social
relation and the relation to the extra-social tend to be subjectivized.21
The intentional exercise of power, for the purpose of imposing and
maintaining order, and with a claim to authority that raises the question of accountability, marks a new phase in the history of the human
subject. Finally, a more or less explicit vision of conquest seems to
be inherent in statehood from the beginning: universal domination,

19
20
21

Ibid., p. 37.
Ibid., p. 39.
Ibid., p. 40.

johann p. arnason

70

the ultimate unication of the world under the authority of the most
powerful, is latent in the narrower form of domination.22 This is
the rst encounter with the promises and challenges of universality,
and it has the potential to transform the whole range of human relationships, identities and beliefs.
Hierarchy and subversion, power and subjectivity, conquest and
universality: in all three respects, the early state thus appears as a
motor of momentous and potentially divergent changes. It simultaneously rearms and undermines a cultural model of social order.
Gauchet develops this argument in very general terms, without
reference to particular cases. Moreover, his strong emphasis on the
problematic of statehood as such and on it relevance to pre-literate
polities (such as the African states) tends to obscure the specic importance of early civilizations. It is worth pausing to consider the implications of the model for the historical examples most closely related
to our topic: the civilizations of the Ancient Near East. In light of
Gauchets analysis, they would seem to represent creative and elaborate compromises, resilient but certainly not crisis-proof, between
archaic visions of order and innovations generated through their
implementation in an altered context. Episodes of signicant but contained or abortive change might be understood as expressions of the
underlying tensions. The very brief breakthrough of monotheism in
Ancient Egypt is a case in point. It is less clear whether there was
any comparable upset to the Mesopotamian tradition, but the Epic
of Gilgamesh reects an early concern with the human predicament
in a theocentric world; this exploration of ultimate limits and faultiness was preserved as a literary monument, not as a source of interpretive variations. At another level, the tension between early state
particularism and the aspirations to universal rule is most evident in
the history of Assyria, the rst city-state that became a regional
empire.
Gauchets line of argument is thus easily extended to more concrete cases. But the main topic to be discussed here is its bearing
on the Axial Age. The latter is dened very broadly: Gauchet refers
to the enormous groundswell, which over several centuries (from
approximately 800 to 200 bc) swept from Persia to China, from

22

Ibid., p. 41.

the axial conundrum

71

India to Greece, including Palestine. This period divides religions

into pre-and post, those coming before and those coming after it,
which is why Karl Jaspers has called it the axial age of universal
history, and the two groups cannot be conceptually reunited without referring to the enormous spiritual activity inscribed deep within
the political division and its expansion.23 As the quoted formulation
shows, Jasperss work is taken as a starting-point; Eisenstadts 1982
essay on the Axial Age is mentioned in a footnote, but there is no
reference to later writings or debates. Gauchets own view, markedly
dierent from any other interpretation, is that the various breakthroughs of the Axial Age brought out into the open the hidden
logic of the State as an intrinsically religion-producing enterprise.24
After a very long period marked by institutional containment of latent
cultural meaning, a radical and irreversible reorientation of the religious imagination completes the change that had been initiated in
the political sphere; at the same time, it opens a new round in the
political history of religion. There is no attempt to explain why the
overt religious revolutionin contrast to the tacit one spearheaded
by early statesoccurred when and where it did. Gauchet appears
to think that the evidence will not allow us to go further. We would
thus be dealing with a developmental logic that can be reconstructed
in philosophical terms, but without any substantiated link to historical dynamics.
When it comes to the interpretation and comparison of traditions,
Gauchet takes a very cautious line. The doctrines and discourses of
the Axial Age are, in every known case, intricate mixtures of old
and new, and the modalities of compromise vary from one civilization to another. Revolutionary innovations do not expand into allround breaks with the past. And even if we try to isolate the new
components, their common denominator is not so much a specic
mode of thought as a set of general underlying trends: The gap
between the here-below and the beyond, subjectivation of the divine principle, and universalization of life values: these are the three
main outcomes of the religious subversion embedded in the depths
of the collective articulation and they break into social discourse

23
24

Ibid., p. 44.
Ibid., p. 44.

johann p. arnason

72

during the spiritual upsurge of the axial age.25 The anity with
Jasperss interpretation is obvious, and it is further underlined by
remarks on the principle of individuality as another invention of the
Axial Age: in the double sense of creative individuals opening up
new horizons and the mobilizing appeal to individuality as inwardness. A more distinctive view emerges when Gauchet sums up the
meaning of the Axial Age as a metamorphosis of otherness.26
This metamorphosis responds to prior changes in the relationship
between religion and society, but at the same time, it opens up alternative possibilities of further innovations. The decisive step is a shift
from temporal to ontological otherness: the alignment of sacred
authority with political power had broken through the original
barrier between a foundational past and a derivative present. When
the axial breakthrough brings the implications of divine intervention
and involvement in history to the surface, the otherness that has lost
its mythical meaning is rearmed at the level of being. Gauchet
reserves the term transcendence for this new articulation of the
religious division between the visible and the invisible, which can
also be seen as a reunication of two dimensions that were initially
separate, the original and the actual, the inaugural institution and the
actually present forces of the invisible.27 Although the early state
had striven to preserve essential parts of an older religious imaginary,
the new role of a sacral transforming agent was in the long run
unsustainable without a redenition of ultimate authorizing forces.
But Gauchet rejects the idea that the turn to transcendence could
be explained in terms of a search for legitimization. Rather, the
radical transformation of the social world triggers a corresponding
but neither instant nor unambiguousrestructuring of the religious
universe. The separation of the here-below from the beyond makes
it possible to glorify and justify power in new ways, but it also opens
up a whole new dimension of reection, questioning and imagination that can never be brought under complete control. There is, in
other words, a general shift towards a new logic of religious life and
thought, going far beyond the institutional interconnections of religion and politics. At its most radical, the reorientation can lead to
the constitution of a realm of faith, as distinct from the realm of
25
26
27

Ibid., p. 44.
Ibid., p. 46.
Ibid., p. 52.

the axial conundrum

73

law. It is this broader human relation to transcendence that Gauchet

has in mind when he writes that religious division was transposed
into individuals and installed at the heart of universal being.28 In
that sense, the metamorphosis of otherness is accompanied by the
discovery of inwardness.
But the new beginning of the Axial Age is also a bifurcation of
religious and intellectual history. Gauchets conception of history
allows for radical and conservative options at every critical juncture;
but since attempts to adapt or reproduce inherited patterns are undertaken in a new interpretive context, they cannot but participate in
the ongoing mutations. This applies to the many currents and divergent traditions of the Axial Age, perhaps more so than in any other
case. The dierent paths taken at this point aected the whole later
course of history in lasting and signicant ways. On the one hand,
the metamorphosis of otherness and the experience of separation
could inspire eorts to restore the unity of the world and return to
a primeval condition of unbroken continuity. But such projects now
called for explicit thinking of the totality that had previously been
implicit in the mythical order, and the most eective response to
that demand was a speculative denial of mundane reality as an illusion, to be overcome by absorption into an impersonal and ultimately indeterminate foundation. On the other hand, ontological
duality could be radicalized into a polar contrast between two worlds,
and this mode of thought was inherently conducive to more personied
conceptions of the divine other.
Although Gauchet seems inclined to think that elements and indications of both alternatives can be found in the main innovative cultures of the Axial Age, he stresses the long-term contrasts between
separate traditions and geo-cultural worlds. The logic of the fundamental fracture between immanent impersonality and transcendental subjectivism, between underlying identity and separated
otherness,29 manifested itself in the cultural patterns and historical
destinies of major civilizational complexes. The more revolutionary
trend, centred on the duality of a creator god and a created world,
prevailed in monotheistic traditions and was taken to its ultimate
consequences in Western Christianity. The restorative mode of thought

28
29

Ibid., p. 47.
Ibid., p. 48.

johann p. arnason

74

persistedin dierent formsin Indian and Chinese traditions.

Another bifurcation appears within the monotheistic framework: the
Gnostic devaluation of the world contrasts with the theocratic demand
for a thoroughgoing integration of worldly life into the religious one.
The historical trajectory of Western Christendom may be seen as a
winding path between these extremes, with orthodox and heretical
projects coming into play at every juncture.
However, a straightforward identication of the two paths with
East and West would be misleading. This emerges from Gauchets
discussion of philosophy and religion as twin expressions of the axial
turn. It is often dicult to draw a dividing line, but in the most
general terms, the interest in exploring cognitive issues and elaborating rational procedures can be distinguished from eorts to codify
or redene relations between the human and the divine. The prime
example of this dierence is the contrast symbolizedin retrospect
by Athens and Jerusalem. Gauchets comments on the Greek religion of reason show that he aligns philosophy with the restorative
trend, whereas the religious dynamics of transcendence and interiority lead in the very long run to a more radical armation of
human autonomy and rationality. On this view, Greek thought was
fundamentally committed to the ontology of the One. The rational
ordering of the cosmos was the most accomplished result of the quest
for a more articulatedpost-axialversion of primeval unity; even
those Greek thinkers who went furthest in separating the intelligible
sphere from the sensory one remained within the totalizing frame
of reference. Gauchet links this persistent intellectual conservatism to
the traditionalism that circumscribed political innovations. As he sees
it, the polis combined otherwise contradictory trends: the preeminence of the collective whole and the equal right of the parts.30
He admits that the unprecedented redistribution of power within the
polis opened up a new space for interpretive conicts, and that they
polarized in two directions: towards a relativizing emphasis on social
conventions and towards an ideal of autonomous sagehood in retreat
from the City. But neither the sophistic nor the Socratic path broke
through the ontological barriers.

30

Ibid., p. 147.

the axial conundrum

75

Critical reections
Gauchets detailed analysis of Christianitythe religion of incarnation and interpretationand its key role in laying the foundations
for the modern world is beyond the scope of this paper. The focus is
on his interpretation of the Axial Age; to conclude, I will reconsider
its main points and single out some major strengths and weaknesses.
The discussion should begin with the emergence of the state. There
are good reasons (and Gauchet has summed them up very convincingly) to regard the state as the most momentous innovation and
the most radical transforming agent among the forces and phenomena
commonly taken to mark the origins of civilization. Gauchet is also
right to insist on the ambiguous implications of this transition to a
new form of social life. The subordination of society to a separate
power centre is accompanied by an upgrading of human agency on
the part of the rulers. At the same time, the transformative ramications
of the new order are minimized by attaching it to pre-existing sacred
foundations. It is at least a plausible hypothesis that the tensions thus
built into the stateas a power structure and a symbolic constellationtranslate into long-term dynamics. Our perceptions of the Axial
Age are bound to change when these aspects of its prehistory are
given their due. In particular, we cannot see the intellectual and religious transformations in question as breaks with a previously undisturbed continuity. Early states and their cultural elites already faced
the task of balancing or reconciling continuity and discontinuity. The
cultures of the Axial Age had to re-open that question, and even if
we have some reservations about Gauchets account of the relationship between philosophy and religion, we can accept that the
creative eorts and achievements were not all on the side of discontinuity: they also included rearticulations of inherited traditions
in new contexts. Varying mixtures of these two trends left their mark
on the cultural legacies of the Axial Age. To stress this pervasive
but unequally developed ambiguity is, of course, to cast doubt on
constructions that subsume the new beginnings of the Axial Age
under a uniform and unequivocal logic; and by the same token, it
becomes more dicult to shift from the idea of the Axial Age as
a historical period to an analytical model or a typology of axial
civilizations.
In short, Gauchets analysis of the background to the Axial Age
has some obvious merits. But there is a rub: his reconstruction of

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the cultural logic inherent in early statehood takes an uncompromisingly universalist turn and seems to disregard the evidence of
diversity. More specically, Gauchet stresses the sacral aspect of the
state and treats it as an invariant factor; there is no discussion of
divergent trends or alternative forms. The main point at issue is the
relationship between kingship and priesthood. It would be thoroughly
misleading to interpret it as a matter of secular and sacred power,
interdependent but also prone to rivalry: both sides are actively
involved in and structurally dependent on the relocation of the sacred
into history. But the dierence reects the underlying problematic
of the shift. The tensions are not wholly deected to the level of
long-term processes; they nd a more direct expression in two faces
of power, both embedded in sacral contexts, but not in the same
fashion.
The dierence between kingship and priesthood, as well as the
dierent ways in which it is dened and institutionalized, could therefore be taken as starting-points for more comparative approaches to
early states. This diversifying factor also highlights the contingent
character of key developments (not that Gauchet denies contingency,
but his strong emphasis on dominant dynamics tends to limits its
importance). Max Weber alluded to this in a brief aside, but did
not take it further: he suggested that Indian and Chinese traditions
might exemplify the lasting consequences of early and accidental
shifts in the balance between royal and priestly power. A brief look
at a broader range of cases may bring the problem into clearer focus.
Among early civilizations, Ancient Egypt stands out as the extreme
example of not merely sacred, but divine kingship. But even this
exceptionally long-lived and self-contained power structure had to
cope with tensions between kings and priests, and the brief but spectacular turn to monotheism would seem to have been an ambitious
rulers response to that problem, The origins of the Mesopotamian
political tradition are still a matter of debate, but even if the idea
of an early temple-state has to be toned down, it seems clear that
the power of the temples always set limits to the scope and status
of kingship, and that this institutional pattern was linked to a selflimiting symbolism of kingship: contrary to Egypt, the king could
not claim divine status (an abortive move in that direction under
the rst Mesopotamian empire had no noteworthy eects).
The Egyptian and Mesopotamian models of kingship were associated with dierent types of statehood: Egypt emerged into history

the axial conundrum

77

as the rst territorial state, whereas the Mesopotamian region was

divided between multiple city-states (in view of Gauchets comments
on the imperial telos of the state as such, it is worth noting that the
rst overtly imperial turn was nevertheless taken in Mesopotamia).
These alternative institutional forms were embedded in markedly
divergent constellations of meaning. Varying ways of arming the
sacred foundations of rulership call for corresponding articulations
of a broader symbolic order. Neither general considerations nor the
fragmentary historical evidence would justify claiming causal primacy
for the state; we can only speak of mutually constitutive connections,
but it can be plausibly argued that the statein other words: the
political ordering of social liferepresents the most central and
dynamic component of the overall conguration. In the Egyptian
case, an emphatic and totalizing version of sacred kingship brought
the social and cosmic dimensions into very close contact: if we follow
Assmanns analyses, it embodied a conception of overarching justice
and a vision of human participation in the maintenance of cosmic
order. Even more importantly, the prerogatives and privileges of the
sacred centre became starting-points for transformative processes
that changed the meaning and expanded the scope of the original
nexus between human and divine worlds. Both the broader access
to immortality and the growing emphasis on inner life in later
Egyptian religion can be understood as results of such developments.
By contrast, the Mesopotamian pattern kept the rulers at greater distance from the gods and seems to have been less conducive to farreaching reinterpretations (this would t Gauchets general view that
strong conceptions of divine power can in the long run favour reexive
turns towards human autonomy). Mesopotamian traditions tended to
perpetuate a more uncompromisingly theocentric world-view; it is
still a matter of debate how signicant this background was for
monotheistic innovations in more peripheral parts of the Near East.
The Egyptian and Mesopotamian case are the best known and
most clearly contrasting ones, but some other examples could be
added to the picture. More wide-ranging variations on the theme of
sacred kingship seem to have developed on the peripheries of
Mesopotamian centres than within the zone of Egyptian cultural
inuence. One of the more interesting cases is the Hittite Empire,
where the institutionalized conception of kingship seems to have
shifted towards greater emphasis on a legal framework according to
some interpretations, this included the rst explicit notion of the

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kings two bodies: the mortal exterior and the sacred essence). An
earlier variant of sacred rulership, more distant from the two main
centres and much less denable on the basis of available evidence,
had emerged in Minoan Crete; it is interesting both in its own right
and as a predecessor to Mycenaean and post-Mycenaean Greece. In
short, even a brief glance at the spectrum of archaic civilizations
in the most innovative and multi-central regionshows the range of
diversity compatible with the shared pattern of sacral statehood. The
problems posed by the entanglement of the gods in history, to
paraphrase Gauchets formulation, are reected in historical dynamics and managed (rather than solved) in ways that translate into
divergent developmental paths. If the transformations of the Axial
Age are see in light of this eventful prehistory, rather than against
the background of a supposedly uniform archaic world, some traditional views will have to be reconsidered. Gauchets notion of a
permanent containment, neutralizing the religious problematic of the
state from its beginnings to the onset of the Archaic Age, ismutatis
mutandisopen to the same objection as the interpretations that
posit an untroubled discontinuity of pre-axial world-views: it does
not do justice to the historicity of early civilizations.
But if we set out to contextualize the Axial Age, the long-term
perspective discussed above must be linked to a more specic historical conjuncture. A few centuries before the Axial Age (around
the twelfth century bce), the Near East and its Mediterranean margins experienced a massive upheaval which historians now know as
the crisis of the late Bronze Age. While the relationship between
external and internal factors (attacks from the periphery and decomposing power structures) is very unclear and disputed, the outcome
is easier to describe: some major cultural and political centres were
destroyed, those that survived were seriously weakened, and in the
long run, the crisis seems to have prompted a shift towards more
community-related forms of statehood. In this de-centred and destructured world, there was more scope for innovative developments
in peripheral contexts, and the most momentous changes of that
kind occurred in the two places that became primary sources of
Western axiality, Ancient Greece and Ancient Israel. If we compare
the elusive but unmistakably signicant Near Eastern episode to
events in other regions that were to undergo major transformations
in the Axial Age, we rst encounter a case of the contingent parallelism that often provides an anchor for comparative inquiry. At

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79

roughly the same time (the turn of the twelfth and eleventh centuries bce), the Shang kingdomlater included in the list of Chinas
ruling dynastieswas conquered by a peripheral and previously subordinate state; the victors went on to found the Zhou dynasty. Up
to that point, there is a Chinese parallel to the crisis of the late
Bronze Age. It is less clear whether the underlying structural factors
are comparablehistorians do not seem to have discussed this at
great length. But in contrast to the Near East, the result seems to
have been a very constructive takeover of the centre by the periphery. The new Zhou rulers built on Shang foundations and added
new elements; the combination had a very lasting and formative
impact on the later trajectory of Chinese history. As for the other
major axial site east of Iran, the Indian case is very dierent from
both China and the Near East, and it is much harder to construct
a coherent picture. An early, distinctive andat its most mature
very far-ung civilization collapsed long before the crises of the late
Bronze Age, and it was not until much later that invaders from
Inner Eurasia set Indian history on a new course (the idea that an
Aryan invasion destroyed the Indus civilization has been completely
abandoned). The discontinuity between the whole archaic phase and
the prelude to the Axial Age is much more marked than elsewhere.
The two sides of the historical contexttraditions and conjuncturesare intertwined, and the connection is best understood in
relation to the problematic of sacred rulership and its metamorphoses. The Near Eastern crisis resulted in what Jean-Pierre Vernant
called a crisis of sovereignty, most acutely felt on the periphery.
Vernants analyses show how important this aspect of post-Mycenaean
Greece was for the formation of the polis and the new direction taken
by Greek thought. Jan Assmanns interpretation of Ancient Israel
also suggests a crisis of sovereignty, but with a very dierent outcome: sovereignty is transferred from the king to a lawgiving god.
In more general terms, the shared background to Greek and Jewish
axiality was a regional setback to sacred kingship and a corresponding
opening of perspectives that could be articulated in dierent ways
in dierent settings. In China, the transition from Shang to Zhou
does not seem to have involved a crisis of sovereignty; rather, the
conquering elite redened sovereignty in a way that preserved the
essentials of sacred kingship but translated its core idea into a new
language that lent itself to further rationalization. The notion of a
mandate from heaven goes back to the beginning of Zhou rule, and

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it was to become a dening feature of the whole Chinese imperial

tradition. As noted above, the genealogy of Indian traditions is much
more obscure. But the social world of the Axial Age in India was
in any case characterized by rivalry between priestly and warrior
elites (the social power of the latter was gradually restructured into
kingdoms). Jan Heestermans fascinating but admittedly speculative
reconstruction of this background suggests that the rivalry was reected
in strategies of access to the divine world (through sacrice), and
that it ultimately gave rise to alternative forms of the religious rejection
of the world that Weber had already identied as a dening feature
of the Indian tradition.
In short, the patterns of change during the Axial Age are not
unrelated to earlier vicissitudes and divisions of sacred power. Here
we cannot pursue this problem further. But to conclude the discussion, let us briey return to Gauchets line of argument. Its most
salient strength is the emphasis on early state formation as a radical
transformation of socio-cultural life: a convincing case is made for
bringing not only the long-term dynamic of state formation, but also
the logic of its inherent meaning to bear on our understanding of
the Axial Age. The above critical reections do not contest this point:
rather, they aim at a re-historicization of questions which Gauchet
tends to pose in somewhat short-circuiting terms. The archaic modes
of interaction between religion and the political sphere were open
to redenitions and dierentiations, signicant enough to set whole
traditions apart from each other. This variegated background cannot
be dismissed as external to the Axial Age. Past historical experience
enters into the horizons of meaning. There is no denying the radical
intellectual and religious innovations of the Axial Age; but this exceptionally creative period did not simply turn its back on the past.
Dierent currents could relate to it in dierent ways. The Axial Age
has sometimes been described as an age of transcendence; in
response to that claim, Benjamin Schwartz argued that a generalized concept of transcendence could only apply to a new attitude,
a standing back and looking beyond.32 He was referring to a shift
in cultural orientations that can also be understoodin terms borrowed from Hans-Georg Gadameras an ascent from the life world
to the world. It involves a broadening of experiential and interpre-

32

See the discussion in Daedalus, 1975, 2.

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81

tive horizons. Whether it leads to an armation of ontological transcendence, in the more specic sense of a distinction between ultimate
and mundane realities, is another question. It did so, most clearly
and momentously, in the case of the Jewish turn towards monotheism. But it could also nd expression in an attempt to reintegrate a
fragmented world, and to draw on correspondingly reworked older
traditions for this purpose. This was the dominant trend in China.
As suggested above, the historical-sociological analysis of the Axial
Age must allow for dierentiations of that kind. But here we must
abstain from further discussion of details.

CHAPTER THREE

CULTURAL CRYSTALLIZATION AND CIVILIZATION

CHANGE: AXIALITY AND MODERNITY
Bjrn Wittrock
In the following, I shall discuss three themes in S.N. Eisenstadts
historical sociology that have inspired my own work within a wide
network of historians, philologists and historically orientated social
scientists, in which I have had the privilege of being involved for
over a decade and where S.N. Eisenstadt has been a central gure.
The ambition is to explicate and defend an understanding of the
nature of historically informed studies of major societal transformations but also to acknowledge an intellectual debt of gratitude.
Firstly, I shall outline one way to conceptualise the formation of
modernity, with a focus on the transformations of the late 18th and
early 19th centuries, that makes it possible not only to link conceptual change to processes of socio-political transformations and upheavals
but also to explore dierent varieties of modernity.
Secondly, if the formation of modernity cannot, as in most standard
social science accounts, be cast just in terms of socio-economicpolitical transformations, with conceptual changes relegated to the
role of ideological epiphenomena, then the question arises whether
modernity as a deep-seated cultural crystallization may or may not
be thought of in relation to other processes of cultural crystallization
in global history, in particular to what the one that S.N. Eisenstadt
has written extensively about namely the so-called Axial Age. I shall
argue that this is, indeed, the case. I shall elaborate an understanding
of the historical study of macro-societal change as a research programme for a form of historical phenomenology not only of the
constitution of modernity but of analogous processes of cultural crystallization in global history.
Thirdly, such a study of the formation of multiple modernities raises
fundamental questions about legitimate procedures in assigning meaning to events and processes in their historical contexts. In my view
it either transcends or rejects three prominent ways of dealing with

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questions of meaning in history, namely those that we may associate with classical historicism, with modern speech-act theory, and
with postmodernist radical constructivism. I shall briey indicate
where I believe some implications of an historical sociology in the
tradition of S.N. Eisenstadt hold particular promise in this respect.
The cultural constitution of modernity
Both social scientists and social historians have tended to cast the
constitution of modernity in terms of dual, interlinked, transformations
in socio-economic and political practices. Terms such the industrial revolution and the democratic revolution and are just two
examples of this type of conceptualisation which ranges from functionalist ways of theorising to Weberian and Marxian ones. What
they have in common is a disregard for the fact that the formation
of modernity also involved a profound change in the nature of discursive practices. These discursive transformations were not mere
ideological epiphenomena. Rather, deep-seated epistemic and ontological ruptures; redenitions opened up new horizons of expectations and hopes. These shifts made possible or, more literally,
conceivable, if only as projects and imaginations, new institutional
practices.
The works of Reinhart Koselleck have played a pioneering role
in enabling accounts that emphasis that the formation of modernity
can not be reduced to the processes of transformation in political
and economic practices that are referred to by terms such as the
to use, once again, Parsons terminologythe democratic revolution and the industrial revolution. Instead it has to be located
within the context of a deep epistemic and cultural shift as well. For
Koselleck, contrary to Parsons and a number of earlier scholars, the
French revolution per se is a symptom rather than a cause of the
arrival of new expectations and new imaginations of temporality, of
the sense of co-temporality of the non-co-temporal, die Gleichzeitigkeit
des Ungleichzeitigen. In the new era the simultaneous existence of
phenomena, that in an earlier era would have appeared so dierent
as to be conceivable only at historical points separated by vast
expanses in time, is a prominent feature (Koselleck 1985: 88 ). In
this sense the French revolution did not oer anything substantially
new but entailed an acceleration, a Beschleunigung, of the passage of

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historical time so as to engender precisely this new sense of co-temporality of historical dierence. One may add that Kosellecks analysis of the European revolutions of 1848/49 emphasizes that the
distinguishing innovative feature of them was not their substantive
nature but rather their almost instantaneous spatial diusion across
most of Europe (Koselleck 1989).
In recent years one may, apart from the many contributions by
conceptual historians proper, also speak of something of a school of
new historical sociologists, such Johann Arnason, Johan Heilbron,
Hans Joas, and Peter Wagner, who trace historical interactions of
ideational and macro-institutional transformations far beyond what
has been customary among proponents of historical institutionalism
in the social sciences. They and others have also explored the extent
to which the rise of the social sciences themselves must be cast in
terms of the fundamental transformation of European societies that
the formation of modernity entailed. In the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries natural philosophy gradually gave way to a range
of natural science disciplines. Analogously, moral philosophy was
slowly transformed into a range of separate discourses. In the course
of the nineteenth century these discourses came to distinguish themselves both from natural science and from literary discourse and
came to label themselves social sciences. In this process of an epistemic sea change, historical reasoning, which had formed a central
component of moral philosophy, came to form a discursive realm
of its own, separate from philosophy and separate from the social
sciences.1
One shift in intellectual and cultural transformation in this period
pertains precisely to the concepts of society and history and to the
new awareness of the structural and constraining nature of societal
life. Pierre Manent has put forward the notion that society is a
postrevolutionary discovery. True enough, and as is convincingly
demonstrated by Keith Baker, the term society undergoes a long
conceptual development in the French context in the course of the
seventeenth and eighteenth centurieswith a dramatic increase in
the utilisation of the term in the mid-eighteenth century. It is also
true that, in his critique of Louis Dumonts analysis of Western
1
See, e.g., Heilbron (1995), Heilbron, Magnusson and Wittrock (1998), but also
Brian (1994), Fox, Porter and Wokler (1995), Lepenies (1988), and Wokler (1987).

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individualism and holism, Marcel Gauchet argued that (this is Bakers

elegant summary):
Individualism was not simply a symptom of the dissolution of the primacy of the social whole, as that had been understood in traditional
religious terms. It was also a necessary condition for what he once
again called (following Karl Polanyi) the discovery of societyits discovery in strictly sociological terms, disengaged from the religious representations in which it had hitherto expressed its existence. Not until
the ideological primacy of individual interests was postulated, he argued,
could constraints upon these interests be discovered in the operation
of an autonomous social order subject to its own laws (Baker 1990, 112).

Johan Heilbron has pursued an inquiry into the constitution of individual interests (Heilbron 1995). In the course of the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries, such interests were conceived as amenable
to the constraints of various notions of sociability. In particular, given
a human condition short of true religious virtue, was there a prospect
for a human existence beyond the borders of a Leviathan-like imposition of absolute order that would involve socially acceptable outcomes of the pursuit of the self-interests of human beings? Such
inquiries were pursued in various ways in the dierent parts of Europe
throughout the late seventeenth and the eighteenth centuries. However,
Heilbron and many others today agree that, even if there is a long
process of gestation of the modern concept of society, the unique
event of revolutionary upheaval requires that discursive controversy
and political practice become joined in the formation of a distinctly
modern era. Pierre Manent has elaborated a similar argument: The
Revolution oered the original spectacle of a political change of
unheard-of scope, yet having no stable political eects, of a political
upheaval impossible to settle, of an interminable and indeterminate
event (Manent 1994, 82).
This description of the Revolution as an irreversible and interminable process of fundamental change was formulated, as pointed
out by Hans-Ulrich Wehler, perhaps most clearly by one of the most
well known thinkers of the nineteenth century, Alexis de Tocqueville.
In his memoirs, Souvenirs, written in the summer of 1850, he describes
the revolution as one long upheaval that our fathers have seen the
beginning of and which, in all likelihood, we shall not see the end
of. Everything that remained of the old regime was destroyed forever (Tocqueville 1964, 30).

axiality and modernity

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Reinhart Kosellecks conception in his early work Critique and Crisis

is quite similar. He also links the temporal duration of the process
of upheaval to its spatial, and indeed world-wide, extension, as well
as to its increasing intensity in terms of modernity as a process that
aects all human beings:
The eighteenth century witnessed the unfolding of bourgeois society,
which saw itself as the new world, laying intellectual claim to the whole
world and simultaneously denying the old. It grew out of the territories of the European states and, in dissolving this link, developed a
progressive philosophy in line with the process. The subject of that
philosophy was all mankind, to be unied from its European centre
and led peacefully towards a better future (Koselleck 1987a, 5f.).

In this process, horizons of expectations, to use one of Kosellecks

key notions, opened up that were previously unknown. It is also this
sense of openness and contingency that serves as a forceful impetus
to an examination of the structural conditions of the political body
and entails a passage from political and moral philosophy to a social
science. It should be pointed out, however, that the transition meant
that ve key problematiqueswhich today are more acutely open
to reinterpretation than they have been for decades if not for a centuryare being formulated or at least fundamentally reformulated
and are entering into the new social science discourse.
Firstly, the whole role of historical inquiry becomes a crucial one.
On the one hand, historical reasoning becomes an integral part of
the intellectual transition, and even abstract reason itself becomes
historicised in early nineteenth-century philosophy. However, on the
other hand, the moral and political sciences break up into a variety
of new discourses that in the course of the nineteenth century coalesce and are reduced to a number of disciplines. This means that
the stage is set for the divergence between a professionalised historical discipline and the other social and human sciences, a divergence
that we still today experience as a major intellectual divide.
Secondly, interest in language and linguistic analysis enters into all
domains of the human and social sciences as a key problematique.
One outow of this is the constitution of textual and hermeneutic
modes of analysis. A second onefamiliar from contemporary debates
on linguistic analysis and poststructuralismis that of the relationship
between text, interpretation, and consciousness. A third one is the
eort to historicise language and linguistic development itself. Thereby

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a crucial link was provided to various collective entities such as the

historic construction of notions of dierent peoples.
This leads to a third problematique, namely that of constituting
new collective identities. Membership in a collectivity could no longer
be taken for granted in terms of the life experiences of the inhabitants of a certain village or region. Nor could a relationship of obligation and loyalty between the princely ruler and his subjects continue
to constitute an unquestionable core of the body politic. That, however, meant that even the most basic categories of societal existence
were open to doubt.
Fourthly, the whole problematique of the relationship between notions
of polity, society, and civil society was succinctly and acutely reformulated in this period of transition. The fact that once again these
notions are probed and fundamentally re-examined should not conceal the fact that they were indeed in many ways not just reformulated in this period but rather discovered or even invented.
Fifthly, assumptions about what prompts human beings to act and
how to interpret their actions within a broader framework are at the
very core of any scholarly program in the social and human sciences. At the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the
fundamental categories that we still by and large draw upon were
elaborated and proposed.
Three or four such fundamental categorical conceptualisations were
propounded. Each of them corresponded to a conceptualisation of
what society was constituted by. These categories might be described
as follows:
Economic-rationalistic; with a corresponding view of society as a form of
compositional collective.
Statistical-inductive; with a view of society as a systemic aggregate.
Structural-constraining; with a view of society in terms of an organic
totality.
Linguistic-interpretative; with a conceptualisation of society as an emergent totality.
The transition from a discourse on moral and political philosophy
to a social scienceanalysed by, for example, by Robert Wokler
(1987)in rudimentary form has already taken place in the mid and
late 1790s in France after the Revolution. It entails a decisive shift
from an agentialsome would say voluntaristicview of society to
one that emphasises structural conditions. To some extent, a simi-

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89

lar shift occurs in economic reasoning away from a broad concern

about moral and political agency. In the course of the nineteenth
century, average economic man instead becomes cast in a web of
structural properties and dynamic regularities rather than in a moral
universe of individual action.
Thus fundamental categories of agency and society that came to
be elaborated and redened during much of the rest of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries can be discerned in rudimentary form
already during the great transition. So too, however, can some of the
features that came to aect these endeavors. One such tacit but crucial feature concerns the abandonment of the truly universal heritage
of the Enlightenment project in favor of forms of representation and
endowment of rights based on territoriality or membership in a linguistically and historically constituted and constructed community.
Another feature was an emerging and growing chasm between
moral discourse and other forms of reasoning about society. Thus,
an earlier encompassing conception of the moral and political sciences
was gradually replaced by social sciences that marginalized moral
reasoning or consigned it to the specialized discipline of philosophy.
Third, historical reasoning, which had been at the core of the
intellectual transformation at the end of the eighteenth century,
became a separate discipline and, toward the end of the nineteenth
century, a permanent divide emerged between history and the social
sciences. The end of the eighteenth century was a formative period
in the rise of the social sciences in conceptual terms. The shift in
epistemic and institutional regimes that occurred at the turn of the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries did not immediately usher in
the set of disciplinary congurations in the social and human sciences that we now all too often take for granted.
This occurred only in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuriesand then only in an uneven and partial process that did not
become a universal pattern of ordering until well after World War II.
However, it did entail, in a more or less rudimentary way, both the
institutional form for intellectual activities and the epistemic forms
that became constitutive of the discourses on society in the age of
modernity.
It is also possible to discern, across all confrontations and divergences, a fundamental acknowledgement of the idea that agency,
reexivity, and historical consciousness might help construct a new
set of institutions but that this takes place within a complex web of

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interactions that jointly constitute a society. Thus, there existed a

limited number of thematic foci underlying the cultural constitution
of a new set of societal macro-institutions.
Institutions of modernity: Promissory notes and cultural trauma
In the previous sections I have outlined some of the ways in which
the social sciences may be seen as emblematic discourses of modernity. The early history of these discourses was intimately linked to
a deep process of cultural crystallisation that also entailed the emergence of the prospect of new types of macro-societal institutions. In
the wake of the deep cultural shift at the turn of the 18th century,
a distinctively new type of societal order manifested itself in the
European context through the emergence of a set of institutional
projects that became emblematic of the modern world at large. Preeminent among these institutional projects were those of economic
organisation in the form of a liberal market economy rather than
in a regulated mercantilist economy. Similarly political order came
to be conceptualised as a modern nation state of compatriots or of
a constitutional republic of fellow citizens rather than in the form
of an absolutist monarchy with its distinction between ruler and subjects. In the realm of private interactions, new demands arose for a
legally protected sphere where the State was only allowed to make
interventions and undertake sanctions that were clearly specied and
foreseeable.
The new conception of the nature of the public sphere and political order was thus based on ontological assumptions about human
beings of a radically new nature, namely the idea of the principled
equal rights of all human beings to participation in the macro-institutions of the public sphere and of the state. In this sense, the formation of modernity in Europe was not just another period reminiscent
of the axial age or of the early emergence of a bifurcation between
secular and sacred power in 12th and 13th century Europe.
In the political sphere, the new institutions involved a conception
of political order as constituted and legitimated in terms not only of
silent tolerance but some form of active acquiescence and participation. Thus centuries-old ideas of representation in the form of
estates and parliaments were complemented with demands for participation and even popular sovereignty. In the Western half of

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Europe, the wave of demand associated with these ideas, what Parsons
referred to as the Democratic Revolution, was a constant feature of
political life from the late 18th to the mid 20th century when they
were nally victorious across the board. In political terms it had
entailed the gradual limitation of constitutional monarchical regimes
and their eventual replacement by some form of parliamentary
democracy.
In the private sphere, there were parallel developments which basically entailed that age-old demands that princely rulers abstain from
acts of arbitrary intervention and violence be superseded by demands
that there be a legal-rational basis for all actions of government.
Thus ocial acts are legitimate only if they are based on legal rules
that are transparent and allow for consequences of actions to be predictable. Such transparency and predictability can become a reality
only if the nature of political order accepts the rule of law as a basic
principle rather than the volition of the princely ruler as its basic
principle of operation. Such demands not only for legal protection
but also for the universal application of legal order had long traditions in somebut by no means allEuropean countries. At the
turn of the 18th century, however, they were voiced with increasing
intensity. Furthermore their urgency was reinforced by the demands
of new commercial and industrial activities.
New public spheres also emerged outside of courts, academies and
salons, outside of the control and purview of royally sanction and
control. Whether in scholarly, political or artistic life, fora are created that are based on the idea that public discourse should not be
subject to persecution or censorship but rather be able to express
an opinion on all aspects of political and public life. One may say
that they were premised on the legitimate articulation of a discourse
not only about but addressed to and critical of the ocial power of
the state.
In what sense do these dierent institutional projects constitute a
societal form that we may associate with the notion of modernity?
Clearly it would be misleading to suggest that these projects became
universally realised in the European context at the time of their intellectual conception. Nothing could be further from the truth. Instead
the new institutional projects remained embattled and highly controversial in practical aairs in Europe throughout the following
century and a half. Even in Western Europe, a modern political order
in terms of truly universal surage did not become a full institutional

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reality until the end of the Second World War. Despite these facts,
however, it is still possible to speak in a meaningful way of modernity and its institutional projects as a societal reality in a specic
sense of the word, namely as a new set of promissory notes. These
promissory notes, formulated and promulgated and even partially
implemented, if for brief periods of time, at the turn of the 18th
century, came to have global relevance. At their core were notions
of self-reexivity, agency and historical consciousness. These institutional projects became the object of continuous discursive and institutional battles. However, they could never again be exorcised from
the attention of such battles in the European context.
The Vienna Congress and the Holy Alliance was a comprehensive eort to unthink the consequences of the French Revolution
and to restore the Old Regime and make Europe safe for tradition.
It became almost immediately clear that this program was an unrealisable one. Even the political thought of the pro-resurrection forces
in France found it impossible to return to the intellectual landscape
of pre-Revolutionary France.
The new institutional projects, whether they were adopted or, as
was initially often enough the case, rejected, became inevitable reference points on a truly global scale. The history of European dominance and colonialism in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries
is largely the history of gross violations of promissory notes of the
institutional projects of modernity. The twentieth century includes
histories of horrors of war and of not only traditionally authoritarian
regimes but also state terrorism on a vast scale. These experiences
indicate that a purely structural analysis of modernity is insucient.
The institutional structures of modernity were and are by their own
inhabitants interpretedand this is true not only of the victims but
also of some of the perpetrators of some of the worst massacres
in terms of normative commitments and entailments and would
remain inexplicable if the outside observer refused to pay attention
to this fact.
It is also this feature that makes it possible to talk about modernity without unduly imposing a rigid and misleading institutional
gridlock on an unwieldy and complex historical reality. Thus modernity is not equivalent with universal acclaim of a small set of philosophical principles or the endorsement and implementation of a few
crucial institutional projects. This also means that modernity can
possibly best be delineated in terms of a conjunction, with global

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implications, of a set of cultural, institutional and cosmological shifts.

In all other periods of cultural crystallisation before the formation
of modernity, critical reection has had as its focus not solely the
physical limits of personal nite existence but in generalisable form
it also brought out a discourse on ways that might bridge the chasm
between the mundane and the transcendental order. Consciousness
of the existence of such a chasm was in all cases also linked to consciousness about institutional practices that might serve to transcend
that chasm. The discourse about such transcendence might be religious and philosophical as in the axial age or ecclesiastically ecumenical, as in the 12th and 13th centuries in Europe.
In the formation of modernity in Europe in the late 18th and
early 19th centuries, philosophical reection was, however, also
explicitly political. The political element consists precisely in the contestations about the constitution of a normative order that is enforceable, in the last instance by violent means.
In this process there were, as already emphasised, wide dierences
not only between proponents and adversaries of dierent political
reform projects but also of fundamentally dierent political regimes.
However all such contestations now occur within the bounds of the
ontological, and cosmological presuppositions of modernity. To my
knowledge one of the few philosophically serious eorts in our own
time to transcend those boundaries were the eorts by Heidegger in
the interwar period. The state structures of Italian Fascism as well
as of Soviet Stalinist Marxism-Leninism may best be described as
alternative modernities. What Heidegger seemed to have envisaged
were practices so fundamentally dierent in their ontological and
cosmological presuppositions that it would have been meaningless to
label them an alternative modernity or even an anti-modernity. It
seems clear that his philosophical thinking for some years was directed
at enabling the emergence of such a transformation that he led
himself to believe was underway in his home country at the time.
In this sense, his involvement with National Socialism may have
rested on a misperception of the true nature of that regime but it
was intimately related to his basic philosophical project of the times
and not a mere contingency or an expression of opportunism.
Until now, there is little in todays various forms of fundamentalism that seems to justify a description of these phenomena as anything but part of modernity (see also Eisenstadt 1999a). Maybe,
however, part of the attention, not to say, fascination, attached to

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these phenomena may have to do not just with the violence exercised by themthis seems to be little but another instance of the
kind of ruthless violence, performed without any qualms, with which
the twentieth century is repletebut rather the inkling of a fundamental challenge to precisely the cultural and cosmological presuppositions of modernity.
The conjunction of new epistemic and ontological presuppositions
and the range of institutional proposals put forth on the basis of
these presuppositions constitutewhat, in another context (Wittrock
2000), I have calledpromissory notes. Such promissory notes
form focal points for long-term processes of contestation and interpretation. In the course of such processes, they may travel in time
and space far beyond the imaginations and expectations of any of
the progenitors of the original shift. They entail a range of possible
societal states of aairs that were previouslyand literallynot conceivable but that can thereafter not be made, as it were, unthought.2
Discursive and cosmological shifts are not ideological reections;
they are necessary, but not sucient, for the constitution of new
institutional practices.
The notion of promissory notes alsoand as I have indicated
above argued at some extent in another context (Wittrock 2001)
provides a way to make sense of what is sometimes called cultural
trauma.3 This latter notion has been used to interpret experiences
of deep violations of human dignity. I believe the simplest, and perhaps the only, way to make the concept analytically meaningful outside of the realm of psychology is to limit its use to instances where
a fundamental and irreversible breach occurs of promissory notes
that have become constitutive of key practices. Such a breach means
that conceptually necessary assumptions inherent in the practice itself
are violated. In this sense such violations do not merely encroach
upon the integrity, or indeed the lives, of human beings, but bereave
them of the means to interpret and articulate their experiences of
those violations.
If a large group of citizens of a country, as occurred in countless
instances in the course of the twentieth century, are suddenly treated

Wittrock (2000). See also Eisenstadt, Schluchter and Wittrock (2001).

For a discussion of these themes from a slightly dierent perspective see Joas
(2002).
3

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by the authorities and by their neighbours not as citizens or compatriots but as enemies whose only redemption is death, then conceptually necessary components of citizenship have simply disappeared.
Similar violations may, incidentally, also occur in person-to-person
relationships. A child, who is molested by her or his own parent,
has not just been grossly violated but is bereft of a crucial experiential horizon by the parent taking away irreversibly from the child
a conceptually necessary component of the relationship between
parent and child.
If I am right, however, an analysis of cultural traumas presupposes an understanding of institutional practices. It presupposes an
understanding of the way in which promissory notes have become
constitutive of these practices. In particular for a theoretically and
historically orientated social science it is necessary to rethink the
formation of the key institutions of modernity and to understand the
outlines of the cultural constitution of modernity and not to shortcircuit such an analysis by way of going straight to a structuralinstitutional account.
A purely structural account will not be able to reect critically
upon its own foundations and will not be able to lend itself to a
comparative and historical analysis that is not just a conceptual imposition of the experiences of a particular region of the world. This, I
believe, is equally true whether the particular version of such a structural-institutional account is Parsonian, Weberian or, indeed, Marxian.
An analysis of the varieties of modernity in the contemporary world
must be culturally sensitive and open up for a dialogue across dierent
historical and civilisational legacies. The constitution of modernity
involved a process emanating at the North-Western edge of the
Eurasian hemisphere but with repercussions that came to have global
extension. In its core this process involved not just institutional changes
but new conceptualisations of the fundamental dimensions of human
existence. In this respect, the new understanding of the formation
of modernity that we may associate with contributions by conceptual historians also raises the question of the specic nature of modernity relative to other processes of deep-seated cultural crystallization
in global history.

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Modernity in global context

During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the type
of critical historical reection on the European political experience
relative to that of other parts of the world, and in particular that of
East Asia and China and which was most closely associated with
Voltaire, but echoed also in Kants critique of European imposition
and in his appreciating comments on Chinese society, gradually disappeared. In its place came rst a distinctly Europe-centred conception of world history with Hegels lectures on the philosophy of
history as an emblematic expression. Later history emerged as an
academic discipline with its focus on the European experience of
the formation of a range of nation states.4 In its formative stage in
the early nineteenth century, in the foundational works of Ranke, the
main theme was the shaping of Europe through the conuence of
the cultural traditions of Latin and Germanic peoples. Later most
European historians would narrow their focus further and write
narratives about the trajectories of individual nations. Sometimes
these studies, as in majestic works at turn of the nineteenth century
by Meinecke and Hintze, had a strong comparative perspective;
sometimes their orientation was limited to the achievements of one
particular nation.
In the late nineteenth century, at a period in time when European
global pre-eminence was at its peak, history largely came to be a
scholarly exercise that served as a discursive parallel to the formation or reform of European nation states. The new investigations of
social conditions and the back side of processes of industrialisation,
urbanisation and modernisation were to become institutionally embedded, if in a slow and uneven process, in the research-orientated universities and other new higher education institutions.5 They formed
an analogous parallel to the eorts of those nation states to cope
with the social question. Thus the relationship of the new social
sciences to an historical conception, other than that, which took the
life of a given nation state as its starting point, could not be but a

4
The argument about that the formation of modernity entailed that a universalistic commimtent inherent in the Enlightenment was abandoned has in recent
years been pursued perhaps most vigoursly by Robert Wokler, e.g. in Wokler (1998).
5
Wittrock and Wagner (1992) and (1996). See also Rothblatt and Wittrock (1993).

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tenuous one.6 The notion that the European experience should

not be taken as the self-evident yardstick for the achievements of a
civilisation was even more remote. To some extent this is true also
of the intellectual giants of early social science, including Max Weber.
Thus even if Webers most seminal works, such as his collected essays
on the world religions, are masterpieces of global history, they stand
in a complex and never quite resolved tension with other parts of
his works. In the interpretation of his legacy for future generations
of social scientists, as handed down most prominently perhaps by
Talcott Parsons, it were these latter parts, emphasising the unique
nature of Western modernity and its historical trajectory, that became
the most visible and most frequently cited ones.7
It was only the disaster of the First World War, which came to
shake the conviction of a historically assured pre-eminence of Europe
in particular and a more vaguely dened Western world in general.
In the wake of the war, a rst wave of eorts appeared to write
the history not of civilisation but of the rise and decline of dierent
civilisations, accounts in which the achievements and predominance
of Europe were cast in serious doubt. Often enough, such accounts
were written from the perspective of the defeated nations and echoed
a generalised conservative cultural pessimism. In a more conventional form this is true of Spengler, in an abstracted and radicalised
form this is characteristic of Heideggers programmatic writings from
the late 1920s and early 1930s. In other cases, authors transcended
those conventions and tried to reect upon the cultural foundations
of dierent political and societal orders from the vantagepoint of an
historical scholarship characterised by the highest degrees of critical
reexivity. This is to some extent the case in the philosophical
writings of Jaspers. It is even more tangible in the historical writings of such diverse authors as Marc Bloch, Franz Borkenau, and
Arnold Toynbee. In their writings one may discern the outlines and

The argument in this section is largley based on a long-term research programme with results published in Wagner et al. (1991); Wagner (1999); Wittrock
(1999); Wittrock and Wagner (1992) and (1996). An analogous line of argumentation is pursued in Wallerstein et al. (1996). For a discussion of the role of universities in this process see Rothblatt and Wittrock (1993).
7
This also entailed that an alernative, more historical, interpretation as propounded e.g. by Reinhard Bendix came to play a less prominent role as did Bendix
own magnum opus, Kings or People (1978).

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the scholarly promise of a social science that brings in a comparative and critical account of world history.
However, these potentials were certainly not the ones that became
predominant or were realised when social science nally became
institutionalised across the board in the 1950s and 1960s. Rather
this occurred in the particularly ahistorical form of social science
that had long been predominant in the United States and that became
transposed abroad after the Second World War, linked to the notion
of the so-called behavioural revolution. These eorts were often promoted within the framework of the new international social sciences
associations that had been established with links to unesco and other
forms of international scientic collaboration, shaped by the United
States.8 Thus social science not only became less historical than it
had tended to be in most parts of Europe at the turn of the century. It also became shaped by the fact that social science disciplines,
and most notably so perhaps political science and sociology, in their
theoretical core came to reect the pre-eminent position of the United
States in the post-Second World War world.
Nowhere is this more obvious than in the curtailed form of theorising about world history that came to be known as modernisation theory. This type of theorising was explicitly premised on a view
of world history cast in terms of a set of dichotomies between the
traditional and the modern, the Western and the non-western, the
rural and the urban, the stagnant and the dynamic. Implicitly it
tended to be premised on a view of the world in which the particular experiences of one country, notably the United States, was taken
as the yardstick against which the achievements and failures of other
countries were measured.
Thus even if social science, in its own long-standing self-conception, remained a discourse of modernity, these presuppositions tended
to entail a social science that was reticent to theorise either world
history at large and even those upheavals that came to constitute
the particular Western trajectory. Thus the particular Western trajectory to modernity tended to be assumed rather than examined.
Furthermore, the relationship of a European trajectory to global historical developments tended to be ignored or simply dismissed. These

8
For an overview of these developments see Wagner et al. (1990) and Wagner
(1999).

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types of questions, so prominent in earlier and overtaken forms of

philosophy of history, were simply irrelevant to the behavioural sciences of modern industrial societies and their increasingly urbanised
and dierentiated forms of organised social life.
Within the discipline of history, a gradual process of disciplinary
demarcation led to analogous results. Thus scholars, to whom questions
of world history had been a central concern tended to lose their
standing as exemplars and be regarded as falling outside of the
bounds of the discipline and occupying a role as civilisational
critics. As such they might be interesting perhaps but ultimately they
were seen as failing to conform to proper standards of modern historical science. Arnold Toynbee is an obvious case in point, and
despite his strenuous eorts to argue for the empirical and scholarly
basis of his writing of history he was often depicted as a speculative
writer. In other cases, such as that of Franz Borkenau, their works
have simply fallen into relative oblivion. These scholars appeared as
hopelessly overtaken in methodological terms long before the era of
the behavioural revolution of the 1950s and 1960s, an event which
further contributed to their neglect, as did in some cases their dierent
political allegiances.
Global interactions have become so prominent and immediately
visible as to make obvious the existence of distinctly modern, yet
clearly dierent, societies across the globe.9 No longer is it possible
to credibly argue that dierent cultural, religious and historical traditions will become increasing irrelevant and eventually fade away
in favour of one all-encompassing form of modernity and modernisation. It is in this context that there are renewed eorts to understand the dierent civilisational legacies and to explore various modes
of interactions over long periods of time. Within social science this
renewed interest often has come under the label of studies of
globalisation. Paradoxically, globalisation studies often seem premised
on assumptions close to those of earlier forms of theorising about
convergence and modernisation. They describe the global and all
but inevitable diusion and impact of market interactions and capitalist forms of production.
In so doing, they highlight a major antinomy in modernisation
theory. Thus this type of theory started from a description of West
9
An exemplary introduction to debates on globalisation is Held and McGrew
(2000).

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European or North American societies and then traced processes

that would lead to the global diusion of key characteristics of these
societies. To the extent, that such studies had demarcated what were
the dening characteristics of modernity, there was however nothing per se that would guarantee the continued geographical preeminence of Western Europe and North America. Clearly, if modernisation
theory was taken to its logical conclusion there were no obvious reasons why European or North American societies might not be challenged and overtaken by late-comers in other parts of the world.
The failure to draw this conclusion on the part of proponents of
modernisation theory is indicative of their inability to tell clearly
what features of Western societies were the dening ones of a modern society and which were just historically accidental.
Present day globalization studies and theories about global networks are in conceptual terms strangely reminiscent of modernizations theory. Notions of structures may be replaced by those of
networks, and Eurocentrism by globalism. However the core assumptions of earlier modernization theory in the form of a functional evolutionary account of history and a functional and non-agential account
of society are remarkably familiar.
In historical research the renewed interest has taken the form of
an interest in what is often termed global history. What holds this
wide area together is essentially an insistence, from a variety of
dierent perspectives, on the legitimacy and scholarly viability of asking questions about long-term developments that transcend the borders of any given polity, or indeed geographical region. The empirical
basis of such studies are of course ultimately the same as those of
historical studies at large and will in one form or the other draw
upon archival research of primary sources.
However if the requirement is made that it is only those studies
that are exclusively based on primary archival research by a given
author her- or himself that should enjoy scholarly legitimacy, then
global history will be ruled out by denition. However, highly respected
historians have in all times conducted studies that go beyond the
prohibitions of such a rule. Thus the relevant question is not so
much whether global history is a legitimate scholarly pursuit or not
but rather how criteria of adequacy can be articulated and what
might satisfy a requirement for justication of some particular account.10
10

For a set of contributions to this debate see e.g. Engelstad and Kalleberg (1999).

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This, indeed, is a process that is now going on among historians

on a worldwide scale. In this process, it is clearly the case that historians seek for ways of engaging with questions of global history
that will not commit them to a representation of the world in terms
of the interaction of a number of states and polities, nor of cohesive civilisational blocs. Rather there is a search for more sensitive
modes of representation that highlights cultural and institutional legacies that are shared across such boundaries. Terms such as connections and encounters recur frequently. This is true of the
master of global history, William McNeill, and an analogous form
of analysis pervades the works of the intellectual pioneer in this eld,
Marsahll Hodgson.11
It is also true, to take but two recent example, of Sanjay Subramanyam and his notion of connected histories across the Eurasian
landmass in the 14th to the 17th centuries and of Jerry Bentley and
his focus on cultural encounters on a hemispheric scale.12 Similarly
a group of young scholars at the Institute for Advanced Study in
Berlin have tried to spell out the entangled histories of dierent
parts of the world in the age of modernity.
It is dicult, for scholarly and maybe also for normative reasons,
not to feel sympathy for these eorts. They seem to hold every
promise to yield important insights. However, they do not relieve us
of the need to go beyond a mere amassing of interesting insights in
the hope that we might eventually be able to discern the contours
of global historical developments. This is the point where social theory must confront global history.
The idea of the axial age
One step in the elaboration of the research programme, indicated
above, might indeed be to examine some lineages in scholarship,
that constitute what may never have been a mainstream promising,

11
This is the case already in his early standard work, originally published in
1967 with later editions (McNeill, 1999) but also in his shorter essays, e.g. McNeill
(2000). Hodgsons posthumous collection of essays (Hodgson, 1993) is a monument
to this kind of thinking about global history.
12
Subramanyam (1997) and (1998); Bentley e.g. (1993) and (1998). For an overview
of the treatment of global history, which served as the rst major theme at the
recent 19th international congress of historical sciences, see OBrien (2000).

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and in some case all but forgotten, traditions in social thought and
historical scholarship, but that seem exceptionally promising in such
a wider perspective. One such important existing tradition of great
relevance to a reconstructive research programme in social theory
and global history is the one that is often associated with a work of
Karl Jaspers. In the book, Vom Urspung und Ziel der Geschichte
(published in 1949; English translation, The Origin and Goal of
History, in 1953), he expressed the idea that our understanding of
history, indeed the very origin of history, is related to the emergence
and institutionalisation of forms of critical reexivity. Needless to say,
it is, to some extent, an arbitrary decision whether that moment is
associated by the most basic human activities in the form of the
emergence of language itself or with some other form of human
articulation. Jaspers argued that the emergence and institutionalisation of critical reexivity is associated with the emergence of forms
of thought that clearly transcend activities associated with the daily
lives and needs of human beings. Thus it has to be possible to identify the expression of forms of thinking that involve an explicit formulation of ideas about human life beyond the constraints of existence
as it looks at a specic time and place.
In other words, Jaspers believed that the distinctive feature in the
emergence of human history, as opposed to the evolution of the
human species, is the manifestation of a specic capacity. This was
the capacity of human beings to reect upon and to give expression
to an image of the world as having the potential of being dierent
from what it was perceived to be here and now. The emergence of
such images of the world, based on critical reection, marked, in
Jaspers classical formulation (1949), the transition from Mythos to
Logos, a breakthrough in critical reexivity and, indeed, the emergence of history in the sense of the epoch in human existence characterised by a reexive, historical consciousness.13 He termed this
period the axial age. In temporal terms he located it to the centuries around the middle of the rst millennium bce.

13
In fact, Jaspers notion was not altoghether dierent from the one Hegel proposed in his lectures on the philosphy of history, although in Hegels case the ascription, as in the case of Iran, and denialas in his statement that India does not
have a historyof such a capacity was heavily imbued with an empirical bias that
cannot but be called Eurocentric.

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The idea of the axial age, as outlined by Karl Jaspers, had the
character of a bold idea briey sketched. The same is true of analogous formulations by Alfred Weber and Eric Voegelin. In the 1970s
this idea was taken up the Harvard sinologist Benjamin Schwartz
and a group of prominent scholars, including Peter Brown, Louis
Dumont, Eric Weil and Robert Darnton, in a special issue of the
journal Daedalus, devoted to the theme Wisdom, Revelation, and
Doubt: Perspectives on The rst Millennium bc. The idea was
explored later and elaborated by S.N. Eisenstadt who, with Wolfgang
Schluchter as the other principal investigator, made it the focus of
a sustained research programme. In collaboration with a large number of historians and linguists Eisenstadt extended the analysis considerably and systematically related it to recent advances in historical
scholarship.
For all its remaining openness, this theoryor rather this hypothesisof the axial age is to date the most ambitious and encompassing one that outlines the key features of a rst global cultural
crystallisation. It has, without achieving universal acclaim but also
without being convincingly refuted, been the subject of two decades
of intense scholarly debate, involving ancient historians, historians of
religion and philosophy, and linguists.14 My own ambition in this
essay is to advance an understanding of the notion of axiality that
makes it possible to relate it to some of the key problems in present-day historically orientated scholarship on major transformations
of societies and, indeed, civilisational legacies. As already indicated,
I am convinced that a purely structural and institutional analysis is
grossly inadequate for this purpose.
The concept of the axial age encompasses deep-seated intellectual
and cosmological shifts that occurred in dierent forms but with
striking, if relative, simultaneity, across the Eurasian hemisphere.
These shifts were manifested in such dierent forms as the thought
of Confucius and, two centuries later, Mencius in China, Buddha in
India, the Hebrew prophetical movement and the classical age in
Greek philosophy. Neither in the early formulations of Japers, nor
in the more recent ones by scholars, collaborating with S.N. Eisenstadt,

14
Among these publications the following ones may be specially mentioned, viz
Eisenstadt (1982), (1986c), (1987a), and (1992c, d and e), (1996b), and (1999a), as
well as Eisenstadt et al. (2001) and Schluchter (1996).

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has there been an entirely successful eort to relate these cosmological shifts to other types of human activities. Maybe the most
important direction in future research directions is to spell out the
links between the set of intellectual and cosmological breakthroughs,
that the concept of the axial age in a limited sense of the word
denotes, and sea-changing institutional transformations.
These are rstly the formation of the great world religions. This
transformation is a consequence of the Axial Age but not an immediate and direct one. It only manifests itself in the form of a series
of cultural encounters with ensuing articulations that synthesise cosmological elements from dierent and previously distinct civilisational
traditions. Furthermore, the hemispheric-wide diusion of these articulations in the form of world religions is in practical terms premised
on a second transformation of the widest consequence, namely the
emergence of a number of imperial political orders across the Eurasian
hemisphere. This development, thirdly, also makes possible the consolidation of hemispheric-wide trade routes over land linking the Far
West and the Far East. Thus the establishment of, what 19th century historians came to call, the Silk Route was stimulated by the
meeting of Sinic and Hellenistic cultures in Central Asia, and the
concomitant Western extension of control by the Han empire. Fourthly,
there also occurs, in direct conjunction with the last two transformations, a path-breaking change in the institutionalisation of warfare and military organisation. In this process, the role of the Iranian
imperial polities of the Parthians and Sassanians plays the foremost
role.
The concept of the axial age in a wider sense encompasses also
these macro-institutional transformations. In other words, a profound
cultural crystallisationthe dimensions of which refer to the imagination and representation of human existenceinvolved not just a
process of cultural reconguration. It also meant the formation of
culturally entrenched structuring principles for macro institutions.
Such a conceptualisation of the axial age stands in a striking relationship of analogy in analytical terms to accounts of the formation
of modernity. More precisely this is valid for such accounts that
emphasise that the formation of modernity can not be reduced to
the processes of transformation in political and economic practices
that are referred to by terms such as theto use Parsons terminologythe democratic revolution and the industrial revolution.
Instead it has to be located within the context of a deep epistemic

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and cultural shift as well. It also has to trace historical interactions

of ideational and macro-institutional transformations far beyond what
has been customary among proponents of historical institutionalism
in recent decades.
A rethinking of the formation of modernity has taken place that
focuses not only on an industrial and political revolution but also
on the parallel revolution in intellectual and cosmological terms.15 In
this revolution, there occurred momentous shifts along dimensions
of reexivity, temporality, agency, and a redenition of the relationship between immanence and transcendence, as well as modes
of articulation and linguistic interpretation. This means that it is,
indeed, possible to elaborate a conceptual framework that should
eventually allow for a recasting and a comparison of the formation
of modernity relative to the cultural crystallisation of the axial age.
In the sequel I shall rst of all explicate the meaning of the Axial
Age and delineate its key dimensions. I shall then examine three
claims that Japsers saw as consequences of the hypothesis of the
Axial Age. They are the claim that the axial age constitutes the origin of history in a specic sense, the claim that that the axial age
ushered in the great world religions, and nally the claim that the
Axial Age entailed the emergence of imperial political orders that
replaced political entities of a small and fragile nature. I shall argue
that none of these statements can be justied in the light of available
empirical evidence. It is, however, also clear that none of them follow from the formulation of the idea of an Axial Age that I propose.
Explication and denition of the axial age
The rst and most obvious question concerns the meaning of the
concept of the axial age. We are indebted to Johann Arnason for
having provided a brief conceptual history and a critical discussion
of the uses of the term. My own view is that it is only with Karl
Jaspers The Origin and Goal of History that a reasonably clear delimitation of the meaning of the concept is proposed. It is this conceptualisation that serves as a basis and starting point for the subsequent

15
E.g. Foucault (1966); Koselleck (1979), (1985), (1986), (1987a), (1987b) and
(2002); Heilbron 1995, Heilbron et al. (1998).

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elaboration of the hypothesis, something that for instance Benjamin

Schwartz is explicit about in his classical introductory article to the
1975 issue of Daedalus. Jasperss empirical statements about the
momentous change that he associated with the Axial Age may, as
Arnason points out, involve statements that we today, against the
background of now available knowledge, see as no longer tenable.
However, Jaspers conceptual delimitation of the idea of the Axial
Age essentially rests on an assertion about a limited number of dimensions that are crucial in human existence.
In my view, Jaspers position rests on the assumption that in the
centuries around the middle of the rst millennium bc a major shift
occurred in the way reectively articulate human beings in some of
the high cultures in the Eurasian hemisphere reconceptualised their
existential position. The breakthrough was manifest in dierent ways
in the dierent civilisations of the Eurasian landmass. However in
all its manifestations it involved dramatic shifts in ve major dimensions, namely the following ones:
Firstly, an increasing human reexivity and reexive consciousness;
this is what Japsers saw as the most basic feature. It involved the
ability to use reason to transcend the immediately given.
Secondly, an increasing historical consciousness and an awareness of the
temporal location and the limitations of human existence and thereby
also a sense of relative contingency.
Thirdly, an increasing awareness of the malleability of human existence, of the potentials of human action and human agentiality within
the bounds of human mundane temporality or, as in the case of
Iranian culture, with respect to the relationship between actions in a
mundane and a transcendental sphere. Conceptualisations of agentiality tended during the Axial transformations to become increasingly
premised on what might be termed more individualistic assumptions
than had previously been the case.
Fourthly, an elaboration of more reective cosmologies in terms of
either the immanence of human existence or a shift in the direction
of the positing of a fundamental and discursively argued separation
between a mundane and a transcendental sphere.
Fifthly, an articulation and interpretation of such cosmologies in terms
not only of their oral mediation but also of their textual inscription
and the emergence of a set of rules for the authoritative interpretation of such texts. Such processes of codication and standardisation
inevitably entailed breaches with some previously co-existing set of

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beliefs and practices. They also entailed the potentials for new interpretative contestations. Thereby, of course, the stage was set not only
for the articulation and diusion of orthodoxy but also for heterodox challenges.
This, I maintain, is the core of the meaning of the Axial Age in
its original formulation, and it is this core that has subsequently been
elaborated in various ways. My understanding is that it is important
to see that any particular articulation of a position on any of these
existential dimensions will inevitably involve some assumptions that
are contextually bound and culturally specic. It would for instance
to my mind be illegitimate to tie the meaning of the Axial Age to
an insistence on the occurrence of some specic cosmology, say one
premised on notions of transcendence as opposed to immanence, or
on some specic account of the dramatic increase in historical consciousness that we associate with the Axial Age.
What is not culturally specic is the idea that the Axial Age is a
period of deep change in the fundamental dimensions of human
existencereexivity, historicity and agentiality. This change, furthermore,
exhibits great variations in dierent parts of Eurasia, but it universally entails increasing reexivity, historicality and agentiality.
The change is broadly cotemporaneous across vast regions of the
Old World. The Axial Age is then an epoch, but not the only one,
of a profound cultural crystallisation that aects these inevitable existential dimensions in some of the high cultures across Eurasia. These
shifts entail the consolidation or the emergence of a set of dierent
cosmologies and make possible a set of dierent institutional paths
of development of lasting importance.
For all contestations about historical accounts, a delimitation of
the notion of the Axial Age in this way provides not only a fruitful
starting point for the study of global history and for an understanding
of its relevance to the social and human sciences at large. It is, I
claim, the only possibility of giving the notion of the Axial Age a
meaning that does not entail an unjustiable teleology and some
form of cultural imposition.
The axial age and the origin of history
One problematic question, and one, which Arnason deals with at some
length, is that of the relationship of political and societal formations

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before and after what is often termed the Axial breakthrough. It

seems undeniable that Japsers argues that the Axial Age constitutes
the origin of history, in the sense of the history of human beings
who have consciously reected about their own location in temporal and cosmological terms and tried to form their own existence
from the vantage point of such reections. This is an argument that
tends to deny the historicity of previous civilisations in a way that
cannot be made compatible with available historical research. Here
Jaspers is all but echoing Hegels lectures on world history and
Hegels characterisation of Indiaas opposed to Iranas a nonhistoric civilisation precisely because India was, as seen by Hegel,
lacking a form of reection that would involve a critical stance
towards its own traditions and the possibility of their transcendence.
Contrary to what Jaspers asserts, several of the contributors of this
volume highlight the fact that in both China, Greece and the Near
East a key factor behind the dramatic increase in reexivity and
critical discussion may have been precisely the breakdown of the
established practices and assumptions prevailing in earlier civilisations. Whether we look at Egypt, Greece, Mesopotamia or China of
the Shang and Zhou empires, it is simply not possible to defend
what Jaspers seem to assert, namely that these civilisations somehow
fall outside of history, even in the specic sense of the word employed
by Jaspers himself.
The important question is rather to what extent the axial transformations did or did not involve continuities relative to these earlier civilisations. Maybe the most fruitful way to approach this
problematique is to focus on the relationship between two types of
components, namely rstly the interpretation and redenition by key
Axial Age writers of an imagined legacy of their own societies and
civilisations, secondly their own linguistic strategies and conceptual
innovations that often involve the generalisation, or rather universalisation, of key characteristics in their interpretations of these traditions. Thus Confucian ethic involves not so much completely new
conceptualisations but rather an articulation of tradition, synthetic in
its own ways, and the universalisation of some of the most important virtues that had traditionally been seen as properties limited to
aristocratic strata. In this case, as in several of the others, axiality is
a form of reaction to a new type of human condition where neither
the structures of kinship and physical proximity, nor those of a selflegitimising empire, suce any longer to embed the individual in a

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context of meaning and familiarity. The emergence of the world religions is also part of this problematique.
The more the Axial Age breakthrough is described in terms of
an epochal rupture, the more the relevance of earlier intellectual and
institutional traditions is de-emphasised. As a consequence historical
and civilisational analysis will be less concerned with the specicity
of individual traditions and more with the extent to which a given
civilisation has or has not achieved an axial breakthrough. This
question is directly related to the question of the relationship between
the axial age as a cultural and cosmological shift on the one hand
and institutional transformations of religious and political practices
on the other.
The axial age and the world religions
A key question is the relationship between the Axial Age and the
emergence and diusion of the great world religions. The idea of
such a relationship has been at the core of much reasoning concerning the Axial Age hypothesis. Again, it seems undeniable that
the intellectual and ontological shift, described in terms of a breakthrough, has important links to deep-seated shifts in religious practices. It is however also clear that the exact of such links in many
cases is open to quite dierent interpretations.
Maybe one can say that the articulation and diusion of Mahayana
Buddhism occurred in a complex process of demarcation and synthesis of Indic and later, in artistic and perhaps also in ideational
terms, of Hellenistic traditions, as they existed in Bactria, parts of
Central Asia but also south of the Hindu Kush. Perhaps Christianity
may be described as a kind of secondary breakthrough in the form
of a synthesis of shifts in Hebrew and Greek Axial transformations.
Maybe even Islam can be seen as a distant echo of the early Axial
transformations, if occurring a millennium later. However, neither
Mahayana Buddhism, nor Christianity emerges as widely diused
world religions until maybe the 4th to 6th centuries. It is only
then that they become closely linked to imperial political orders in
the Mediterranean region and in China respectively.
Their subsequent wider diusion across the North-Western and
North-Eastern peripheries of the hemisphere is even more removed
from the original Axial Age breakthrough. In both cases it means

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that their religious practices become transmuted and intimately interwoven with distinctly non-Axial traditions, whether in the form of
the nature-orientated pre-Christian religions of the Celtic and Nordic
peoples of Europe or the nature-orientated pre-Buddhist religious
practices in Korea and Japan.
In all these cases, however, world religions have some sources that
are related to Axial transformations. However, the further developments of the religions, in terms of processes of standardisation,
codication and routinisation, involve at least as much of processes
that tended to stie the reexivity, the sense of historical contingency
and agential openness that were inherent in the axial transformations.
The Axial Age and the political order of empires
In most interpretations of the Axial Age, a relationship is discerned
between the Axial Age as a shift in cosmology and ontology and the
emergence of imperial-like political orders on the other. This raises
three questions that concern rstly the imagined nature of axial- and
pre-axial age political orders, secondly the continuities of such orders
and, thirdly, the consequences of the axial breakthrough for political
orders.
As to the rst question, clearly, as argued by Arnason, Jaspers
characterisation of pre-Axial political orders in terms of small states
and cities is not tenable. It is for instance simply not reasonable to
characterise the pre-axial Chinese empires of Western and Eastern
Zhou in these terms. There is no reason to deny the obvious fact
that many pre-axial political entities exhibit features of an imperial
order. This relates directly to the second question about continuities.
Again, it seems clear that we discern continuities between pre-axial
and axial political orders in dierent civilisations. Indeed, the political transformations that were possibly stimulated by the axial breakthrough may well be thought of as eort to preserve or resurrect
features of an idealised political order of the past. Again, as already
indicated, China, but also Iran, provides examples of precisely this.
Thirdly, maybe the most important question from the point of view
of the Axial Age hypothesis concerns the consequences of this axial
breakthrough for the emergence of imperial political orders. Basically
the problem here is that while such links may be hypothesised in
individual cases, the nature of any kind of causation is tenuous at

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best. At the Western edge of the Eurasian landmass, the rise of the
Roman Empire may be coterminous with events that may be associated
with axial transformations. However, it would be unreasonable to
describe this empire as in any way itself expressing a commitment
to an axial age cosmology. On the contrary, emerging empires may
rather be seen to entail processes of the stiing of the vivid contestation and critique involved in the original axial transformations.
Conversely, the Han Empire is maybe the clearest example of a
relationship between imperial order and philosophical reection associated with the Axial Age breakthrough. This philosophical reection,
whether in the form expressed by Confucius or Mo or the one later
associated with Mencius, occurs against the background of coterminous political upheavals and may more accurately be seen in the
light of eorts to preserve features associated with an earlier imperial tradition than with any kind of cosmological reection on a
chasm between a mundane and transcendental sphere, more accurately as a kind of moral and political philosophy, with a stronger
emphasis on the human mind than on transcendental-religious discourse. To some extent, and in a completely, dierent political and
societal context, much the same may holds true for Greek philosophy in the same period where a pragmatic attitude and a focus on
the life of a polis was often the self-evident starting point for philosophical reection and debate, not a purported chasm between
transcendental and mundane spheres.
Analogously, the Maurya Empire during the reign of Ashoka, and
the Achaemenid Empire, may perhaps be depicted as political
manifestations of axial transformation of Buddhism in India and of
an axially transformed Ahura Mazda worship in Iran. In the Indian
case, though, this rather immediate link is of relatively short duration. The Iranian case, as the Chinese, is of a more long-standing
nature but one where the cosmology involved is of a radically dierent
nature than the one posited in some earlier pronouncement of the
thesis of the Axial Age in terms mainly of a dichotomy between a
transcendental and a mundane sphere.
These observations lead to two conclusions. Firstly they underline
the relevance of the delimitation of the concept of the Axial Age
made previously and formulated in a way that focuses on deep-seated
redenitions in key existential dimension without elevating the outcome in any given civilisational context to the status of being the
sole standard of the achievement of axiality.

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Secondly, they bring out the need to spell out links between shifts
in these dimensionsmanifested in new forms of basic conceptualisations and cosmologiesand institutional transformations in terms
not of one single form of axial transformation but in terms of a set
of dierent paths of axiality. This is the task to which we now turn.
Overcoming teleology
Jaspers rejected teleological reasoning. His formulation of the thesis
of the Axial Age also marked an eort to overcome the idea of
European cultural pre-eminence. It is clear however that much of
the discussion around the Axial Age has been haunted by an implicit
teleology, not completely unlike the one that has characterised much
of the discussion of modernity and modernisation. Even if the
Eurocentrism of earlier historiographyand historiosophy16has been
absent from virtually all formulations of the idea of the Axial Age,
many of them have been unable to avoid an implicit teleology. This
has been so in two respects:
Firstly, some formulations have focuses on just one specic form
of ontological transformation in the basic dimensions of human existence that I have chosen to delineate in terms of increasing reexivity
and sense of the temporal location of human beings and their agential possibility. This particular form of transformation then tends to
be depicted as more genuinely axial than another one and indicative of the achievement of a true axial breakthrough. One typical
example of such a conceptualisation is one that claims that a dening
characteristic of axiality is the positing of a cosmological chasm
between a transcendental and a mundane sphere.
This is a view that I do not share. My own view is that the
dening characteristic is an increasing reexivity of human beings
and their ability to overcome the bounds of a perceived inevitability of given conditions in temporal and social orderings. What particular cosmology this gives rise, e.g. one cast in terms of transcendence
or immanence, is a mater of context and contingency. Therefore I
propose an analysis that brings out dierent varieties of axial trans-

16
For an interesting discussion on these aspects see Assmann, 1992, 330340.
See also Koselleck (1986). I have spelt out my own view in Wittrock (2003).

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formations. I distinguish ve dierent paths of axiality. This is the

theme of the next section.
Secondly, there is another, and perhaps more surreptitious, form of
teleology involved in discussions about the Axial Age. Even if the
existence of separate paths of axiality is recognized, the question
remains how to view societies and cultures that seem to fall outside
of the domain of axial transformations. In this perspective, societies
and cultures that have passed through the gate of axiality have, as
it were, entered the realm of responsible and autonomous action, of
a new and higher stage of human existence. But what about the
rest? This question will be addressed in the nal section of the
contribution.
Five paths of Axiality
It is, as already argued, possible to delineate a meaningful conceptualisation of the Axial Age as an epoch in global history that involved
profound shifts in at least three fundamental and inescapable dimensions of human existence, namely reexivity, historicity and agentiality. The Axial Age is not the only period where deep-seated shifts
of this type occur. It is, in other words, not the only period of cultural crystallisation in global history. In terms of a redenition along
basic dimensions of human existence, the formation of our own
modernity is, or so I have argued in several texts, another period
of equally profound change, and this is, incidentally, one of the reasons for us to engage with the idea of the Axial Age today. The
Axial Age is, however, probably the most consequential cultural
crystallisation before the Common Era.
The redenitions, characterising a period of cultural crystallisation, will always occur in a given historical context and the practical and institutional implications of the shifts mean that a range, but
certainly not an unlimited range, of new horizons of human practice
open up. Thus while there is no one-to-one relation between a given
shift in culture and cosmology and a particular institutional path of
development, it is still possible to argue that in a given context some
institutional paths are made conceivable, in a literal sense of the
word, others not.
There are ve distinctly dierent paths of axial transformations
linking cultural and cosmological shifts to institutional transformations,

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none of which should be given either empirical or normative preferred status. The contributions to this volume provide rich empirical evidence about these dierent paths. In the present context, I
shall only outline their dierences by the briefest indication. The
paths are:
Firstly, there is the development in the Near East whereby, in
a complex process of inuence and juxtaposition, the Mosaic
distinction (to use Jan Assmans terminology) between true and false
in religion and, as a consequence, a distinction between religion and
politics, is being drawn not, despite several preparatory steps, in
Ancient Egypt but in Ancient Israel. Eventually this distinction, in
the prophetic age and in second temple Judaism gives rise to a
path of development that may perhaps be termed transcendentalinterpretative.
One signicant element is a process of textual inscription and standardisation but also of interpretative contestation and the interplay
between carriers of orthodoxy and heterodoxy. The participants in
these contestations exhibit a remarkably independence relative to
political power. Sometimes this reects a withdrawal from it. However,
more often their activities impinge upon the world of rulership, sometimes explicitly, sometimes inadvertently, sometimes as heterodox
dissent or even rebellion, sometimes as support for established power.
Secondly, there is a related path, fundamentally inuenced by
Near Eastern developments, but in key respects distinctly dierent.
It is a tradition that gradually emerges in the Greek world and that
may be termed a philosophical-political path of development. It
involves contestation and deliberation that exhibit intense concern
about human potentials and action, about the location of human
beings in history and constant reection on the human condition.
However, in this case, a clear distinction between a transcendental and a mundane sphere, something absolutely central to the transcendental-interpretative tradition, is relatively insignicant. Nor can
one speak of a standardised religious cosmology inscribed in codied
texts. Instead contestation is dialogical, if often textually transmitted,
and has a philosophical and largely pragmatic character with the
political and moral life of a given community, a polis, as an inevitable
reference point. The key protagonists in these contestations act in a
context that is characterized by a previously unknown combination
of intellectual independence, institutional autonomy and political
engagement.

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Thirdly, there is the particular Chinese path that involves, at least

from a period a millennium earlier than the Axial age proper, the
gradual merging and synthesis of dierent regional ritualistic practices and political orders in a broad synthetic cultural tradition that
may be termed universal-inclusive. Key features of not only cultural
but also political order are clearly articulated hundreds of years before
the Axial age and in some respects, Confucius, Mo and later Mencius
and the legalists write against the background of a perceived loss of
cohesion, and indeed the demise, of this earlier order and seek for
a renewed articulation of it. Cultural and scientic developments can
and have been described by a wide set of stepwise shifts but do
nonetheless exhibit important ruptures and advances in the period
of the Axial age as does certainly political and social thought with
a renewed emphasis on both tradition, history and human agency.
A fundamental feature of this path of axiality is that it is universalinclusive but at the same time characterised by a high degree of
contingency even in the political sphere. Thus already in pre-axial
Zhou political thought the Mandate of Heaven transfers the ultimate
legitimacy to political order. However, it is a revocable mandate and
improper conduct is incompatible with the maintenance of this mandate. Therefore Heavenly sanctioned imperial rule is nonetheless contingent and open to doubt, critique and potentially revolt. Similarly,
there is a synthetic cultural order composed of highly dierent original tradition some of which may perhaps best be understood as
forms of moral philosophy and in the case of two of major traditions, Confucianism and Daoism, with little if any concern for any
distinction between a transcendental and mundane sphere. Precisely
for this reason the universal-inclusive path of the Sinic world allows
for and involves constant philosophical contestation between dierent
traditions. In a sense a Mosaic distinction needs not be drawn in a
context, where the relationship between political and religious order
has always been of a much more open-ended nature than in the
early Near East polities of Egypt and Mesopotamia.
Fourthly, in India early Buddhism constitutes an axial challenge to
Vedic religion. This challenge involvesthrough a process of semantic appropriation, transvaluation and contestationa focus on those
aspects of that have here been delimited as central to the Axial Age,
namely a focus on history and agentiality, and thereby, brings out
the potentials of a critical stance towards what are no longer seminaturalistic practices but rather conventions that may be transgressed.

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It is precisely in reaction against this challenge that there occurs

an articulation of Vedic religion. Thus the Indic world of Vedic religion may have been distinctly non-axial. However, even Vedic religion could not avoid an engagement with the cultural systems that
grew out of the early axial transformations. Whereas, both the philosophical-political axialty of Greece and the universal-inclusive one of
the Sinic world had political order as its explicit or implicit centre
of attention, the political implications of the Indic pathlet us call
it pluralistic-semanticlargely, and with the possible exception of
the Maurya Empire under Ashoka, remained potentials or where
entirely contingent.
Fifthly, the geographical and political space where all of the major
traditions of Eurasia actually interacted is that of the area of the
Achaemenid Empire and its Hellenistic and Iranian successors. In
many ways, cultural traditions in the Iranian lands came to serve as
direct or indirect sources of inspiration for several of the world religions and imperial orders. On the other hand, knowledge of key
aspects religious, and even political, practices not only in the Achaemenid Empire but even of the Sassanian Empire is lacking. Nevertheless the path of development of the Iranian lands may perhaps
be termed one of a dualistic-agential tradition, where the relationship between political and religious order is seen as one of mutual
dependence and close interaction, where there is a distinction between
a transcendental and a mundane sphere but where the battles within
these spheres have direct implications for all actions also in the mundane sphere.
It is therefore at the same time a tradition with an articulated
cosmology but in its dualistic conceptualisation of this cosmology it
diers fundamentally from the cosmology of the mainstream of
Judaism, Christendom and Islam. This however, also means that the
cosmological distinction between a transcendental and a mundane
sphere is consistent with a strong this-worldly orientation of practical engagement and action also in the realm of political order.
The relationship of the main intellectual-religious carriers of this
cosmology to political power is characterized by proximity and
reciprocal dependence. As in other forms of axiality, there are also
here forms of heterodoxy and dissent. However, on the whole, there
is a more explicit and direct link to imperial power than found
along the other paths of axiality.

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The Achaemenid Empire came to exert a far-reaching inuence

on later types of imperial orders in the region of the Mediterranean
and the Near East. In the rst millennium ad the Sassanian Empire
was in its own self-conception the legitimate heir of the Achaemenid
Empire. The Byzantine Eastern Roman Empirefor half a millennium the main competitor of the Sassanian Empire in the Eastern
Mediterranean and Near Eastern regionwith its Hellenistic and
urban legacy was structurally dierent from the Sassanian Empire.
However from the 7th century onwards it increasingly, not least as
a result of the loss of rich urban centres in Syria and Egypt in the
wake of the original Islamic onslaught, came to exhibit many features reminiscent of the Iranian Imperial model. This was so in terms
of changes in military-territorial organisation in a direction that in
medieval Western Europe came to be called feudal. It was also the
case in terms of a gradual change in relationships between political
and religious order. The Achaemenid Empire was the rst imperial
political order to be premised on a cosmology that was axial and at
the same time involved a close reciprocal, but not symmetric, relationship between the leading representatives of political and of cosmological-religious order. The same is true for the Sassanian Empire
but also for the successor of that Empire, namely the new Islamic
political order, at least as it emerged with the establishment of the
Abbasid Caliphate.
As was the case with the Roman Empire, the Achaemenid Empire
was characterized by a tolerance of minority cultures and languages.
Unlike the Roman Empire, it did not engage in eorts to promote
the language of the rulers, i.e. Old Persian, relative to the language
of other peoples of the Empire. However, the Iranian Empires, as
well as the classical Roman Empire, involved elements of ethno-transcendence, i.e. the assignment of a crucial place in the imperial project to an ethnically dened people that is linked both to the temporal
extension of empire and to its divine protection.
Both the Roman and Iranian imperial patterns are distinctly
dierent from that of India but also from the cultural-political
order of Ancient Israel and Ancient Greece during the early Axial
transformationsand of course also from that on non-Roman and
non-axial Europe. In both Ancient Greece and Ancient Israel the
position of the intellectual carriers of interpretative elaborations was
characterized by greater independence relative to the holders of

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political power. This is again one reason why it would be erroneous

to assume a necessary relationship between axiality and imperial
order. One may indeed argue, that the post-axial imperial orders,
while often embracing a cosmology of axial origins, often involved
severe institutional constraints and a reduction in intellectual autonomy for the carriers of axial thought.
Perhaps we may summarize, with all inevitable simplications,
some of the points above in a gure.
Figure 1. Five paths of axiality
Region of
Emergence

CulturalCosmological Focus

Ancient Israel

transcendentalinterpretative
philosophicalpolitical
universalinclusive
pluralisticsemantic
dualisticagential

Greece
China
India
Iran

Relation to
Political Power
strong
independence
strong
independence
weak
independence
strong
dependence
strong
dependence

Ethno-linguistic Force
autonomous
weakly
ecumenical
strongly
ecumenical
weakly
ecumenical
Ethno-transcendence
cum linguistic
pluralism

If anything, this gure highlights three conclusions indicated above.

Firstly, a qualitative increase in reexivity, historicality and agentiality
is characteristic of the Axial Age and is the very premise for any
reasoned distinction between political order and religious-cultural
order and hence for the opening up of the possibility of a challenge
to cultural claims of legitimacy of political order. Once this possibility has been conceptually permitted, it is a potential that can never
henceforth be unthought, i.e. the potential of a fundamental
challenge of established order can never again be permanently
removed. However, the cultural-cosmological construct that allows
for such a distinction may, but does not need to, rest on a crucial
distinction between a transcendental and a mundane sphere. In fact
in four of the ve paths of axiality, this is not the case.
Secondly, the institutional position of the interpreters of a given
cultural-religious cosmology determines whether the potentials of the
increases in reexivity are being realized or not. Within all the ve

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paths of axiality there were always interplay between orthodoxy and

heterodoxy, and there were always contending articulations of a given
cultural-cosmological order. Often, as in the cases of both India and
China, there was also always contention between deeply dierent
cosmologies. Even in the case of Sassanian Iran, Zoroastrian orthodoxy had always to contend with heterodox interpretations (Zurvianism,
Mazdakism).
Thirdly, there are fundamental dierences in terms of the ethnolinguistic force of the dierent paths of axiality. From the perspective of our own age, it is dicult not to reect upon the fact that
virtually all modern imperial orders reect a form of Roman-Eastern
Mediterranean path rather than the less impositional ones of some
of the others axial paths or the more ecumenical path of one of
them, i.e. China. From the point of view of modern social thought
and with the newly awakened interest in imperial orders, it seems
that the study of the Axial Age, if nothing else, might serve an urgent
need to broaden the range of imagination of modern social and
political thought.
The Axial Age in global history: Axial and non-Axial transformations
The Axial Age involved a series of momentous transformations that
aected a number of cultures across Eurasia within a global historical perspective, relatively limited range of time. These transformations came to have far-reaching implications. However the rest of
global history cannot possibly be regarded just as the unfolding of
the consequences of an original breakthrough. Rather the axial transformations involved deep-seated shifts along the key existential dimensions of reectivity, historicity and agentiality and constitute one, but
not the only, period of cultural crystallisation in global history.
All such crystallisations are manifested in a variety of institutional
transformations that will determine important parameters for cultural
and political developments for periods to come. However, this does
not commit us to either a belief in the end of history, nor to a
hypothesis that the particular reconguration of positions on these
dimensions would have to be the same or even similar in dierent
cultures or civilisations. Such momentous recongurations, in particular the Axial Age, the transformations of the eleventh to thirteenth

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centurieswhat in another context I have term the period of Ecumenical Renaissanceand the formation of modernity, should also be
examined in comparative terms.
Here neither a purely structural account, nor one that just highlights the contingency of language, is of much help. It is also here
that both the historical phenomenology of Karl Jaspers and the
civilizational analysis of S.N. Eisenstadt raise important questions
beyond those that most historical sociologists and speech-act theorists
nd interesting or indeed legitimate. Thus beyond speech acts proper
and beyond both linguistic conventions and social structural conditions, there are unavoidable dilemmas posed by our very existence
as reecting human beings. One inevitable fact is the nite nature
of our physical existence but equally inevitable is the need to adopt
some kind of position relative to a few basic phenomenological dimensions. These dimensions, inherent in our existence as human beings,
pertain to the nitude of our own existence, to universal anthropological necessities of drawing boundaries between the inside and outside of a community and of recognising the temporal and social
location of our own existence relative to that of others.17
An articulation of the phenomenology of reexive human existence is inherent in the human condition. Our very capacity to reect
upon our own situation entails the inevitability of a boundary between
the world and ourselves; the world is no longer a seamless web from
which we cannot even reectively distance ourselves. This, of course,
is what Jaspers saw as the origin of history in the sense not of biological reproduction but of the self-reexivity of humankind. Reexivity
entails the unavoidability of some boundary between inside and outside, no matter where this boundary is drawn and how it is constructed. Our realisation of the nitude of our own existence entails
a reection on our temporal and historical location. These types of
reexivity and our realisation of the existence of orderings in relations between oneself and other human beings entail the potential
of concepts of changing states of the world, of what social scientists
today would call agentiality.
Here two statements of caution are necessary. Firstly, the recognition of these phenomenological dimensions does not entail any single specic theory of historical meaning. It is compatible both with

17

See Koselleck 1987b and 1989.

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121

an analysisas that undertaken in the history of political thought

by the Cambridge contextualiststhat emphasizes the role of conventions and rejects that of hermeneutic interpretation as well as
with a hermeneutic or historical intentionalist analysis. Secondly, the
particular positions adopted along these phenomenological dimensions may of course, as highlighted by the contributions to this
volume, vary dramatically across historical epochs and civilizations.18
Maybe a critic might say that these dimensions are so general as to
be of little real interest or importance. Such a comment would, however, be mistaken. On the contrary, a historical phenomenology of
this type has two invaluable characteristics. Firstly, it provides an
analytical focus to the study of individual speech acts and contestations. I have suggested the term cultural crystallization to denote
periods of fundamental reconceptualisations of positions on these phenomenological dimensions, leading to basic recongurations or reassertions of macro-institutional practices. Secondly then such an analysis,
in what might be called, the Jaspers-Koselleck-Eisenstadt tradition of
historical phenomenology, opens up for the possibility of reintroducing civilizational analysis into empirical historical research.
The existence of varieties of axial transformations must, as already
argued, be recognized. However, is there not a lingering, if implicit,
teleology in such an analysis when it comes to societies and cultures
that were not part of the transformations of the Axial Age? To some
extent this is, and inescapably so, the case, if the notion of an Axial
Age is to carry any meaning. However, one of the reasons we may
call the Axial Age an epoch in global history is that its eventual
implications were indeed global. The axial transformations faced nonaxial cultures and societies with a choice between accommodation
and rejection. Accommodation sometimes took the form of wholesale conversion to the cosmology of a religion or a political order
steeped in an axial cosmology. In other cases, it involved the addition of an axial cosmology to a set of distinctly non-axial cosmologies and practices. This was essentially the way that the Chinese
cultural ecumene came to deal with Mahayana Buddhism in the
centuries around the middle of the rst millennium ad, namely as
a set of beliefs and precepts parallel to those of Confucianism, itself

18

See also Eisenstadt 1987a and 1992c, d and e.

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bjrn wittrock

certainly part of the Axial Age, and Daoism, which was not, and,
in the Western provinces bordering Central Asia, to some extent
also, Nestorian Christianity and Zoroastrianism.
Christianity as a distinctly axial synthesis of Jewish and Hellenistic
beliefs and practices came, eventually came to exemplify the rst
pattern of development within the ecumene of Latin Christendom;
it was only in the Northern- and Easternmost peripheries of Europe,
where the conversion to Christianity came even later than the arrival
of Buddhism to Japan, that strong non-axial elements survived long
after formal Christianisation.
In South Asia, the emergence of Buddhism marks a moment of
axiality and a demarcation against Vedic religion. However, it is precisely in reaction against this challenge that there occurs an articulation of Vedic religion. Much later, in the 8th to 10th centuries ad,
what may then be termed Hinduism goes through another stage of
a articulation, this time in conscious demarcation against Islam as a
religion and cultural system that could not easily as Buddhism and
largely also early Christianity be assimilated into the Indic world.
Thus the Indic world of Vedic religion may have been distinctly
non-axial. However, even Vedic religion could not avoid an engagement with the cultural systems that grew out of the early axial transformations. Thus axial transformations came to impinge upon and
inuence cultures and societies across Eurasia, whether or not there
was a rejection or an embrace of some of the specic paths of axiality discussed in the previous section.
Fundamental redenitions along the dimensions of reexive consciousness, of historicity and agentialityto use once again the language of social theoryare what characterize periods of deep-seated
cultural crystallization, be they the Axial Age in the analysis of Alfred
and Max Weber, Karl Jaspers and S.N. Eisenstadt or be they the
formative moment of a new era in late eighteenth century Europe
in the analysis of Reinhart Koselleck, the conceptual historians and
the new historical sociologists. These dimensions are no mere cumbersome ontological addition to conceptual history. It is existentially
unavoidable for us as reecting human beings to relate to them.
However, precisely for that reason, they are also analytically necessary presuppositions for a historical phenomenology that is able to
engage with conceptual change in global history.
Ultimately, the cultural crystallizations that constitute formative
moments in global history involve an institutional articulation and

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interpretation of the human condition, of what it means to conceptualise the nitude of our own existence in a world premised on
assumptions of the potentially innite malleability of the world upon
which and into which our actions impinge and what human existence
may mean in such a world.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE EXCEPTION THAT PROVES THE RULE?

ROME IN THE AXIAL AGE1
W.G. Runciman

I. According to Eisenstadt, the Axial Age revolutions, if such they

were, have to do with the emergence, conceptualization, and institutionalization of a basic tension between the transcendental and
mundane orders.2 In Israel, Greece, China, and Iran, as in the
worlds of Hinduism, Buddhism, and subsequently Islam, there appeared
carriers of novel and inuential ideas about the relation between
worldly power and some other-worldly standard by which its
possession and use should be judged. There might or might not be
a single charismatic founder whose teachings spread from an initial
circle of family and friends to a wider following of disciples and
adherents, and the novel ideas might or might not combine with
others which had originated elsewhere. But from the theoretical perspective from which this chapter is written, their appearance can be
regarded as a textbook case of convergent cultural evolution. No
individual case could have been predicted in advance, any more than
could the longer-term consequences which would follow from the
initial break with the past. But in each case, there was waiting, so
to speak, an environment which would favour the probability of
replication and diusion of the new ideas once they had been coherently articulated, and the break with the past was from then on
irreversible.
There is, however, one major civilization in which no comparable
break took place: Rome. Only when Christianity had become, for
wholly other and equally unforeseeable reasons, the religion of the
Roman emperors did the tension between the mundane and transcendental orders emerge within the Roman state and nd expression

1
2

I am grateful to Mary Beard for helpful comments on an initial draft.

Eisenstadt (1982): 294.

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in the attitudes and behaviour of both its rulers and their critics
including not least the intransigent members of monastic communities of the kind so important in the history of Christianity.3 Why did
it not happen before? Two stereotypical answers immediately suggest
themselves, the Durkheimian and the Marxist. But neither will do.
From a Durkheimian view, Roman religion was so paradigmatic an
example of a societys worship of itself that the collective consciousness
of the Roman people excluded any possibility of tension between
the mundane and transcendental. From a Marxist view, the Roman
ruling class was so rmly in control of the means of production that
it was able to suppress any alternative ideology to which its exploitation of the rest of Roman society might give rise. But although the
connection between Roman religion and Roman politics was always
exceptionally close, they were never identical; and although the
Roman ruling class was always ready to manipulate Roman religion
to its advantage, there is at the same time ample evidence which
shows its members acting from authentically religious motives (of
piety or superstition, as you please). In comparative sociology, the
question why not? is often as dicult to answer as the question
why?; and it is particularly so in this case because so many of the
conditions which might be expected to give rise, in Roman as in
the other civilizations, to a similar Axial Age revolution were visibly
present in some form and to some degree.
First of all, it would be mistaken to suppose that Roman culture
drew no distinction between this world and some other one. Cynical,
philistine, and avaricious as many members of its elite may have
been, they seldom questioned the existence of non-human agencies
of some kind or other to whose inuence human beings were, or
could be, subject. When Marcus Aurelius (Meditations XII.38) said
that we know the gods exist because we experience their power, he
was enunciating what was a virtual truism even to the many Romans
who did not share his own philosophical interests or outlook. Prayers,
sacrices, haruspication, incantation, spells, and curse-tablets (dexiones)
invoking unseen powers were facts of everyday Roman life. As Cicero
remarks at the opening of his dialogue On the Nature of the Gods, there
is no subject on which there is more disagreement among the docti
and indocti alike. But disagreement of the kind in which that dia-

Eisenstadt (1990): 1301.

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127

logue is an exercise is quite dierent from the dominance of a wholly

secular ideology in which what happens in the world is unanimously
assumed to be brought about by nothing other than the workings
of an impersonal Nature coupled with the deliberate actions of
human beings themselves. A small but illuminating example comes
from the Attic Nights of Aulus Gellius (II.28) where the topic under
discussion is earthquakes: are they due, as is controversial even among
natural philosophers, to winds, to subterranean water, to some other
physical cause, or to the numinous power of a god? To which
question the Romans response was to decree certain days as holy,
but without specifying a particular god in case the populus might
thereby be involved in falsa religio.
Second, it would be equally mistaken to suppose that Roman culture had no moral standards by which the treatment by the more
of the less powerful was judged beyond the formal presumption that
contracts, once entered into, should be kept by both parties. Hypocritical as Cicero is often held to be, there can be no doubt about
his disapproval of abuse of power by a provincial governor like
Verres, or his admiration for Brutus and Cassius as tyrannicides, and
even his willingness to see the laws governing inheritance as framed
for the benet of men and therefore unjust to women (de Republica
III.x). However unoriginal in its substantive content, his de Ociis
is the expression of beliefs and values genuinely held. When Fronto
advises Marcus Aurelius on the duties of an emperor, these specically include a duty to correct the injustices of the law. The Younger
Cato was, according to Plutarch, explicitly admired for his refusal
to hand down bad judgements (Cato Minor XVIII.2). However resistant
the Roman elite to any change which might threaten the stability
of the state and their own privileged position within it, this never
extended to a categorical presumption that might is always right.
Third, for all the Romans periodic insistence on the autonomy
of an indigenous Roman tradition, Roman culture had been open
from its beginnings to Etruscan, Greek, and other exogenous concepts, cults, and creeds. Nor did these lack adherents. It is true that
any seeming threat to the authority of the Roman state would be
forcibly suppressed, of which the notable example is the so-called
Bacchanalian Conspiracy of 186 bce which according to Livy
(XXXIX.14.4) threw the Senate into a panic ( pavor ingens). Astrologers
were periodically expelled, magic of the kind thought dangerous
was outlawed, and refusal to conform to traditional ritual could, as

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with the Christians, invite active persecution. But such groups and
movements were generally left to themselves unless or until reasons
of state dictated otherwise. Philosophers, preachers, oneiromancers,
mystagogues, and magi (of whom Jesus could be seen as just another
one) moved freely about the Roman Empire and addressed whatever audiences were prepared to listen to them. However strongly
and from whatever self-interested motives the Roman elite upheld
traditional Roman religion, potential competitors were always present.
Fourth, despite the weight of both literary and archaeological evidence for the public and political character of Roman religion, there
is evidence also for the signicance of personal and private religious
beliefs and values in the lives not only of a wealthy neurotic like
Aelius Aristides4 whose obsessive self-description survives in literary
form but of the many humble Romans whose votive oerings and
funerary inscriptions were in no sense part of the self-worship of the
Roman state. The notion of personal salvation is amply documented
in the evidence for the appeal of the mystery cults, notably Mithraism,5
into which initiation was on oer in the two centuries before the
conversion of Constantine. It was not, to be sure, salvation in the
Christian sense, but it did involve the explicit idea of the possibility
of detachment from the mundane experience of the worshipper and
a transcendental communication with some higher being.
Fifth, the seriousness with which the Romans took omens, portents,
prodigies, apparitions, and the prophetic implications of dreams
testies not only to the universal human hope of nding ways of
predicting the future but also to an uneasy wish to ascertain the attitudes and requirements of the supra-human agencies capable of
inuencing their destiny and that of the Roman state itself. A fear
that supra-human agencies to whom prayer and sacrices are oered
may be oended or displeased is explicit in the Roman cultural tradition, however shamelessly it might on occasion be manipulated for
political ends. There were always sceptics and scoers ready to deride
the idea that the wicked are punished for their wickedness either in
this world or the next, but there was also a plentiful supply of anecdotes whose moral is that they are. Whatever the intellectual merit

4
5

Burkert (1998): 356.

Claess (2000): 15.

rome in the axial age

129

of their arguments, the scoers never succeeded in expelling the idea

of divine displeasure from Roman culture.
There was, therefore, ample scope for a challenge to established
political authority based on an articulated tension between the mundane and the transcendental. Yet there is no trace of any inuential
group or movement propagating any doctrine amounting to a notion
of a Mandate of Heaven that might be withdrawn from an unjust
ruler, or to a conviction that agrant abuses of power might in themselves bring down retribution from on high, or to a view of entitlement to rule as depending on conformity to some higher standard
of virtue. It was merely felt, as one authority has put it, that the
gods could not be asked positively to maintain the state, while the
Romans were behaving in a way that must undermine it.6 Finley,
having drawn attention to the absence of any need to grapple with
the problem of legitimacy in the Ancient World, goes on to say that
It is not at all obvious why a problem that came to the fore in the
Middle Ages and has been important ever since should not have
arisen in antiquity and I have no explanation to oer.7 He does
qualify his remark by reference to the Greek Sophists reections on
politics on the one hand and Christian theodicy on the other. But
he sees acceptance of political authority in the Roman world as
resting on nothing more than a utilitarian consensus based on a
recognition that political stability could only be achieved by conquest; and Rome was, as he says, the quintessential case.
II. But why should there not be an Axial Age revolution in a conquest state? Ought we not expect that Romes uninhibitedly expansionist and predatory policy provoke the emergence of a group or
movement determined to question the mundane behaviour of its generals and their armies in the name of some transcendental standard?
There are occasional hints of a perceived need to justify wars of
conquest as, if not strictly defensive, necessary to preempt iniuria
which might be inicted or attempted against Rome. But the doubts
on the part of individual members of the Senate which can be traced
in the sources, whether on the grounds that a war is not really necessary or that it is not really justied by the pretext given, fall far
6
7

Liebeschutz (1979): 100.

Finley (1983): 131.

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w.g. runciman

short of a concerted challenge to an ideology which proclaimed the

successful extension of Roman power by force of arms to be a visible demonstration of the favour of the gods. Polybius is as explicit
(I.63.9) about what he saw at rst hand as the Romans deliberate
pursuit of hegemonia and dynasteia as he is about their deliberate search
for a plausible excuse ( prophasis) to inuence foreign opinion (XXXVI.2).
Although some commentators have sought to argue that this is a
misreading of the evidence in the light of presuppositions of Polybiuss
own, it has been convincingly argued by W.V. Harris that the
grounds for rejecting the historians description of the dominant
Roman attitude are lacking.8 After the early days of the Republic,
it became less and less plausible to characterize Romes wars as
defensive and correspondingly more noticeable that there is no serious debate about the rights and wrongs either of the continuing pursuit of military glory by successive consuls or of imperial rule over
alien nations which might wish to emancipate themselves from Roman
inuence but posed no conceivable threat to Rome itself of the kind
that Carthage had done.
Domestically, there was no lack of contenders ready to depose
existing rulers and take power themselves, whether conspirators like
Catiline and generals like Sulla under the Republic or rebels like
Avidius Cassius and usurpers like Galba, Otho, and Vitellius under
the Principate. But they never appealed to abstract principles of justice, or delity to divine commandment, or a vision of a purer and
better world. Augustuss careful euthanasia of Republican institutions,
however deplored by Tacitus and others in the name of senatorial
libertas, never provoked ideological denunciation in the name of a
transcendental standard which might undermine rulers right to rule.
Nor, although Symes classic account of Augustuss rise to power is
titled The Roman Revolution, was it either animated or justied by any
political ideals remotely analogous to those which were to animate
and justify the American, French, and Russian Revolutions. It was
indeed, in Symes words, a violent transference of power and
property,9 but not from a dominant stratum to a hitherto underprivileged one; as I have put it elsewhere, it was merely the forcible
replacement of one section of the nobility and its clients by another,

8
9

Harris (1979): 116.

Syme (1939): vii.

rome in the axial age

131

or at most a transference from one set of members of the dominant stratum to another supplemented by some upward individual
mobility by provincials into the ranks of the senatorial nobility.10
Nor, in any case, is it as if a close overlap between politics and
religion automatically inhibits the emergence of tension between the
mundane and transcendental orders. On the contrary, as the example
of Islam was later to show, it can directly give rise to it. In the
empire created by the Prophet and his early successors as rulers,
political and religious authority were even less distinguishable than
in Rome. But unlike the Roman jurists, the jurists of the Islamic
ulemate, through their diering interpretations of the Quran, the
sayings of the Prophet, and the Sharia, provided would-be rebels
and usurpers with ideological justications which they eloquently and
vigorously deployed. It was an empire which was as quintessential
a case of expansion by conquest as the Roman Empire had been.
But where the would-be usurpers who challenged the rulers of the
Roman Empire were simply seeking to replace the incumbents of
existing roles by themselves, the would-be usurpers of power in the
world of Islam, however they might behave if and when they succeeded, laid claim to legitimacy as the true heirs of the Prophets
mission which the existing rulers had betrayed.
Nor is it enough simply to point to the conservatism amounting
on occasion to self-conscious archaism of the Roman elite. The legitimacy of rulers can be as readily challenged when they depart from
a standard of conduct set in a mythical past as when they fail to
live up to the utopian ideals of a projected future. Indeed, the literary sources are full of complaints about the decline and disappearance of the virtues characteristic of the earlier days of the Republic
when its exemplary leaders were supposedly frugal, ascetic, selfdisciplined, austere, and impervious to the temptations and trappings
of riches. But the criticisms voiced of the decadence and corruption
of their successors never carried personal disapproval into serious
questioning of the system which had placed them in power. Again,
the unrestrained degree of Romes enrichment by conquest might
have been expected to generate an ideological movement aiming to
return the institutions of the state to their earlier and purer forms
and functions. But there is none. So what is it that is unique to the

10

Runciman (1989): 106.

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w.g. runciman

Roman case which might explain the absence of anything approaching an Axial Age revolution as Eisenstadt denes one?
III. Once the question is put in that form, one answer immediately
suggest itself. If there is a single feature of Roman civilization which
distinguishes it from any and all others it is Roman lawa unique
combination of culturally selected beliefs and values and socially
selected roles and institutions whose pervasive inuence extends from
the XII Tables of the mid-5th century bce and the early days of
the Republic to the late Empire and the codications of Justinian.
But if that indeed furnishes the right answer to the why not?
question, why should it be so? Systems of law can be of very dierent
kinds and can evolve in very dierent ways. From a Weberian perspective, rational-legal legitimacy stands in contrast not only to charismatic but to traditional legitimacy. But the legitimacy which Roman
law gave to magistrates and emperors was, in practice, a unique
combination of the resolutely traditional with the pedantically rational-legal. Could it, therefore, be that combination which in itself created an ideological and political environment within which an Axial
Age revolution would never occur?
Anyone not a specialist in Roman studies who oers to comment
on Roman law is aware of venturing into a eld to which successive
generations of specialists have devoted lifetimes of scholarship. But
nobody who does venture into it can fail to be struck not only by
extent to which legal and political roles were occupied by the same
people but by the unquestioned appeal to ancestral customthe mos
maiorumas the criterion of legitimacy for successive legal decisions.
It is not enough just to repeat the platitude that law is inherently
conservative, since the XII Tables had, as emphasized by Weber,
much of the character of what he called aisymnetic lawlaw, that
is, which is the active creation of a lawgiver in whom authority has
been vested because of a recognized need to bring about change by
which political stability can be secured. But right through the Republic
and the Principate, the system as it existed is consistently and even
fervently justied by the wisdom of the maiores from whom the senatorial patres have inherited it and by the length of time for which
it has been upheld.
It is perhaps unwise to draw too heavily on Cicero simply because
so many of his writings survive. But it is remarkable that when, in
his enforced retirement from active politics, he set himself to write

rome in the axial age

133

two dialogues of his own based on Platos Republic and Laws, his
ideal republic turns out to be nothing other than the Roman state
and his ideal laws those of the kind of state already agreed to be
best, i.e. Rome. Similarly, when Tacitus (Annals XIV.423), in his
account of the Senates ferocious but traditional (vetere ex more) reaction to the murder of the prefect Pedanius Secundus, reports the
eminent Gaius Cassius Longinus as saying that he has never doubted
that on any issue what had been olim provisum was melius and rectius
and change always for the worse (in deterius), there is no reason to
suppose that Longinus was not reecting an attitude common among
his peers. The jurists are explicit that it is improper to challenge the
rationes for things that are a maioribus constituta, and that where there
is no law to which reference can be made directly custom (consuetudo)
is the appropriate guide. There is nowhere in the texts (so far as I
am aware) any elaboration of what could be called a philosophy of
law or of the notion of a legal right: for Buckland, The conception
of a right is so familiar to us as to seem obvious. But it represents
a feat of abstraction which the Romans never thoroughly achieved.11
Anachronistic laws were allowed simply to lapse rather than be formally abolished. Cases were argued not by reference to entitlements
in principle that individual persons might have but to the procedures available to redress the wrongs they might be held to have
suered. It would be an exaggeration to say that no distinction is
drawn between the letter and the spirit of the law, since ius may
not guarantee aequitas. But aequitas is not justice as fairness to all so
much as the procedural proprieties without which the application of
the law may wrongly discriminate against an aggrieved litigants
deserving case.
IV. Roman law cannot, however, be seriously discussed in the present context without reference to Roman religion. At the time when
the XII Tables were enacted, there was no very clear distinction
between religious and legal rules. The shadowy leges regiae which preceded them seem to have been at least as much ius divinum as ius
civile. The practices dening the roles of the members of the College
of pontices are an inextricable mixture of the sacred and the secular, and (if Livy is to be trusted) the pontices were for a long period

11

Buckland (1963): 58, 293.

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w.g. runciman

the repositories of secret formulae and the authorities for the religious-cum-legal procedures which ordinary citizens were to follow
in such matters as the burial of the dead or the maintenance of
familial sacra in households with no male heir. They had, moreover,
a power to interpret the XII Tables which, in the words of Buckland,
was in eect a power to alter the law,12 and they were responsible both for controlling the calendar and for keeping an annual
record of public events. They were credited (according to Valerius
Maximus) by the maiores with the scientia by which ceremonial should
be regulated. They held oce for life, and were drawn from the
leading families of the day. They might therefore be expected to
have constituted the beginnings of a distinctive group or stratum
with theocratic aspirations and the authority to pursue them. But no
such development took place. Although the norms and practices of
Roman religion were regularly adapted to changes in both their
domestic and their foreign environment, they never changed in such
a way as to bring them into conict with the presuppositions underlying the ius civile and the entitlement of political oce-holders to
apply it as they did. The divisive conicts were not about doctrine
but about control of the priestly colleges. Roman law, as Weber
categorically put it, evolved without any theological input whatever
(Der theologische Einschlag fehlt der romischen Rechtsentwicklung vllig).13 If
there had been an appeal to the supernatural in the XII Tables,
there was no trace of it left in the simplied legis actio.14 Priests never
became, or even looked like becoming, the carriers of transcendental standards by which the conduct of the business of the state might
have been publicly criticized or the authority of magistrates (and in
due course emperors) seriously questioned.
The same was true of the Roman jurists. They were neither an
organized group of teachers, pupils, and successors promoting a distinctive doctrine of rights and duties, nor a set of detached intellectuals testing the rationale for the legal system as such. They were
unpaid but prestigious advisers who gave legal opinions (responsa),
instructed advocates on the conduct of particular cases, and helped
in the preparation of documents. They disputed with one another,

12
13
14

Op. cit.: 2.
Weber (1956): 466.
Jolowicz and Nicholas (1972): 179.

rome in the axial age

135

but the rival schools or sects referred to in our sources were not
divided by religious or any other principles but at most by a greater
or lesser readiness to depart from strict adherence to traditional
authority. They gave no formal teaching. Their writings were perhaps more systematic, particularly in the later period, than Weber
gives them credit for (he calls them meist mssig rational geordnete
Sammlungen von einzelnen Rechtssprchen).15 But nothing that they wrote
could possibly be construed as subversive or even seriously critical
of the system about whose interpretation and application they recorded
their views. So far from being potential carriers of ideas of some
transcendental order, they were, whatever their intellectual talents,
untted by training, inclination, and interest alike for anything other
than the application of traditional legal concepts and procedures to
the circumstances and needs of those to whom they gave their advice.
None of this necessarily prevented a group of like-minded members of the Roman elite from formulating a critical attitude of their
own which might at least have raised the possibility of a challenge
to the dominant orthodoxy in the name of a transcendental standard of some kind. But once again, that is precisely the direction in
which their intellectual interests never did take them. Although
not restricted purely to rhetoric, history, and natural science, their
speculations were philosophical only in a form which not only avoided
the issue of political legitimacy altogether but left both traditional
law and traditional religion institutionally in place. Whatever Ciceros
own views about the Epicurean, Stoic, and Academic arguments
deployed by his three protagonists in the De Natura Deorum, no more
radical conclusion can be drawn from it than that there are serious
grounds for scepticism about the inuence allegedly exercised by the
gods in human aairs; if, as some scholars including Momigliano16
have argued, this implies that Cicero was now paying no more than
lip service to the traditional values of the Roman religious tradition,
that is still a very long way from championing an alternative system
of values with which they should be replaced. The Stoicism brought
to Rome by Crates and Panaetius and later expounded by Seneca
clearly had some impact on the higher echelons of Roman society,
but exercise of the virtues which Stoicism sought to inculcate was

15
16

Op. cit.: 465.

Momigliano (1984): 199211.

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w.g. runciman

entirely compatible with acceptance of legal and religious institutions

as they stood. To be told that the holders of power ought ideally
to act with moderation, clemency, detachment, and self-discipline in
a world ordered by reason where the vulgus should (as Varro explicitly stressed) adhere to the traditional forms of worship was
inoensive to magistrates and emperors alike. Nor (so far as they
can be reconstructed from Athenaeus and others) did the writings
of Posidonius, who was perhaps the philosopher most admired by
the Roman elite, say anything to suggest that Roman imperialism
was not comfortably in accordance with divine providence.
Nor, nally, did Roman religion, for all its celebrated syncretism,
ever generate a dissenting minority, or heretical movement, or schismatic sect whose members might have been the carriers of ideas of
the kind which gave rise to the fundamental ideological changes
which took place in the other major civilizations of the Axial Age.
However many Romans outside the governing elite (or, in some
cases, within it) may have irted, or more than irted, with the mystery cults, or engaged in more or less occult attempts to communicate with supernatural beings in either an upper or a nether world,
or combined together in the name of a chosen divinity for cultic
and ceremonial purposes of their own, these never amounted to selfidentication with a creed and associated set of injunctions about
the right governance of the good society analogous to the split within
Islam between Sunnis and Shiites (and in due course Wahhabites)
or the split within Christianity between Catholics and Protestants.
As remarked by Beard, North & Price,17 no Roman ever had a religious identity like Catholic or Moslem (or for that matter atheist) distinguishable from identity as a citizen or family member.
V. The answer to the why not? question lies, therefore, not so
much in the uniquely distinguishing feature of Roman law itself as
in the unique joint history of, and relationship between, Roman law
and Roman religion. From the early years of the Republic, a secularization of law went hand-in-hand with a politicization of religion
and consequential conicts over its control. The arrogation to himself of the oce of pontifex maximus by Augustus was no more (as
well as no less) than the culmination of a trend going back to the

17

Beard, North & Price (1998): I, 43.

rome in the axial age

137

early 3rd century bce when a pontifex maximus (and a plebeian one
at that) was also consul; and that occurred shortly after the civile ius,
which in Livys words (IX.46.5) had hitherto been repositum in
penetralibus ponticum, was rst made public. It was not that the successive holders of political powerrst, the senatorial oligarchs of
the Republic and then the emperors and their favoured appointees
kept both law and religion under their direct control as part of an
undierentiated, all-embracing authority. As the codication of the
XII Tables and the establishment of the priestly colleges already
demonstrate, Roman society was not a traditional one of the kind
in which law and religion remain embedded in such a way that
the distinction cannot be meaningfully drawn. But whereas the law
became increasingly disembedded from religion, religion never became
disembedded from politics to anything approaching the same degree.
This did not make either law or religion any less serious an activity to those who practised them. The members of the Roman elite
devoted large amounts of time, energy, and money to both. In both,
however, they were preoccupied much less with doctrine than with
practice. Numerous commentators have been struck by the Romans
obsessional concern with accuracy of performance of the details of
their traditional rituals and the superuity of priestly zeal which
Warde Fowler thought best illustrated by that strange list of forms
of invocation called Indigitamenta.18 But, as it has aptly been put by
Linder and Scheid, the Romans concern was not with croyance but
with savoir, and not with savoir-penser but with savoir-faire.19 In the
commerce rituel between men and gods, it was critically important to
avoid maladresse: gods were not thought to care about the purity of
heart of their devotees so much as about aronts for which the whole
community, not merely the oending individual, might be punished.
To be sure, insistence on accurate performance of ritual is abundantly documented across the ethnographic and historical record
both in religion and in law. The proceedings must follow the prescribed sequence, due dates must be adhered to, the parties must
be correctly addressed, and the traditional formulae are not to be
varied without good cause. But what is missing in the Roman case
is the articulation of any principled case for serious reform, even to

18
19

Fowler (1922): 286.

Linder & Scheid (1993): 54, 50.

w.g. runciman

138

the limited extent of asking whether the concern with mere accuracy of performance might not have become excessive. Change was
always permissible, particularly in the modications to both legal and
religious ritual which inevitably followed the transition from republic to autocracy: the extensive fragments of inscriptions which survive from the cult centre of the Arval Brethren illustrate this without
the need to rely on literary testimony alone. But the legitimacy of
imperial, as previously of senatorial, decision-making was taken for
granted.
Once lawmakers were no longer priests, but priests were always
politicians, no systact could easily form, if at all, within the structure of Roman society whose constituent roles might have carried
the novel ideas by which the preoccupation with procedure at the
expense of principle might have been challenged. In comparative
sociology, it is often the overlap between roles which is more important than the relative economic, ideological, or political power which
attaches to them, and Rome oers a particularly striking example.
The only potential carriers of ideas which might have initiated an
Axial Age revolution were outsiders such as Jews or Greeks. But
whatever the interest shown by members of the Roman elite in
Judaism as well as in Greek philosophy, literature, and rhetoric, no
Jew or Greek occupied an institutional role from within which
political dissent might have been inuentially articulated. In the
Roman economy, outsiders (including freedmen as well as provincials) played an essential part. But neither in law nor in religion
were outsiders ever in a position to change the presuppositions which
underlay the decisions taken by the holders of power. Even if Roman
culture oered some limited ideological space within which the invocation of a transcendental standard might have been both horizontally and vertically transmitted from preachers to acolytes, Roman
society oered no institutional space for a prophetic would-be leader
of a reformation movement of the kind which in later empires set
out to purge the power-holders and submit them to ancient and
universal virtues.20
VI. It remains to relate the argument of this chapter to the theoretical perspective from within which it has been advanced. If Rome

20

Bayly (2004): 103.

rome in the axial age

139

was as dierent from the other Axial Age civilizations as I have

suggested, ought it not to be said to disprove the rule rather than
prove it? But in selectionist evolutionary theory, there are no such
rulesno would-be law-like generalizations, that is, at the sociological
level. There is, rather, a universal underlying process of heritable
variation and competitive selection operating at the three separate
but interacting levels of biological, cultural, and social evolution.
Distinctive species, cultures, and societies are all the outcome of distinctive parth-dependent sequences in which selective pressure comes to
bear on the extended phenotypic eects of information transmitted
either genetically (by strings of DNA passed from parents to ospring),
culturally (by imitation or learning), or socially (by imposition of institutional inducements and sanctions). On the topic of Roman law
and its relation to Roman religion, natural selection has little or
nothing to contributeunlike the topics of Roman monogamy and
polygyny, where maximization of inclusive reproductive tness is of
obvious, if controversial, relevance.21 But Roman law and Roman
religion and the relation between them oer a textbook example of
co-evolution at the cultural and social levels.
From this perspective, the Roman story is one in which the early
mutations in memes and practices identied here had long-term consequences which, as so often, were neither intended nor foreseen.
They turned out to be adaptivethat is, to enjoy a higher relative
probability of continuing replication and diusion down successive
generations than their competitorsbecause of an environment of
continuing success in warfare coupled with a close overlap between
military, legal, and religious roles. Adaptation, it should be emphasized, is not to be equated with optimization. In no sense was either
Roman culture or Roman society a best of possible worlds. But
Roman law and Roman religion were both examples of what are
called in neo-evolutionary theory local tness peaks where rival
mutations have peculiar diculty in successfully invading the established distribution of the memes and practices constitutive of a distinctive culture and society even though they fall demonstrably short
of optimal design.
All this was changed when Christianity became the ocial religion
of the Empire and Rome experienced its own Axial Age revolution

21

Betzig (1992): 30949, 35783.

w.g. runciman

140

after all. But Constantines conversion (if such it authentically was)

to Christianity, like Julians subsequent attempt to reverse it, is one
of those unpredictable events which, although not random in the
sense of uncaused (whatever that might mean), is random in the
sense that its origins are no guide to its consequences. The spread
of Christianity in the Eastern Empire during the third century ad
was a necessary, although by no means sucient, condition of
Constantines conversion which calls for separate explanation within
the theory of cultural selection.22 But the story of how Christianity
became the religion of the Roman state and traditional paganism
an embattled heresy whose adherents were turned into outlaws at
last23 is a story of a quite dierent kind which has no bearing at
all on the argument put forward here.

22
23

Runciman (forthcoming).
MacMullen (1981): 101.

CHAPTER FIVE

CIVIL SOCIETY: SOME REMARKS ON THE CAREER OF

A CONCEPT
Jrgen Kocka
Civil society is one of the many topics on which Shmuel Eisenstadt
has written.1 The concept continues to be much in use, both in the
social sciences and in public debates. This was not so two decades
ago, when the concept was marginal. What has caused the remarkable career of this concept? A festschrift for Shmuel Eisenstadt
may be an appropriate place to oer some thoughts on the history
and the meaning of this oscillating concept as well as on its present
attractiveness.
The concept has a long history. For centuries it was among the
central concepts in European political thought. In the medieval and early
modern period, up to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries at least,
the Aristotelian concept of politiki koinonia or polistranslated as societas civilis, civil society, socit civile and brgerliche Gesellschaft (for example by Leibniz)survived. Notwithstanding its polymorphous use,
three aspects of its meaning stayed relatively constant.
First, societas civilis was seen as distinguished from and transcendent to the sphere of the household, i.e. the sphere of work and
reproduction. Second, there was no clear delineation between civil
society and state, quite the contrary, one spoke of societas civilis sive
res publica, i.e. of a community not yet internally dierentiated by
the distinction between society and state. Third, civil society usually
had something to do with the ways in which houses, families, estates
and individuals lived or should live together. Its meaning transcended
the strictly particularit had to do with common things, with the
common well-being, the commonwealth, with general aims, virtues
and vices, with res publica, with Politik in an emphatic sense.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a redenition was made. The
modern meanings emerged, as was the case with so many central
1

Eisenstadt, 1993a; 1995d, pp. 24042.

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jrgen kocka

concepts of our social and political language. Increasingly, civil society

was understood as a process of civilizing or civilization, dened by
a new type of dierence: dierence from nature or dierence from
barbarism. This was linked with the emergence of new kinds of
European self-understanding, set in opposition to non-European
parts of the world, especially the Orient. In these eighteenth-century
discourses, civilizing was understood and civil society dened in
various ways, or ratherrelated to dierent semantic elds. For
example, in the writings of David Hume, Adam Smith and the
French Encyclopdistes, civilizing and civil society had a lot to do with
industry, commerce and property. Work, travail, became a centerpiece in the social order which these authors hoped to promote and
which they called civil society. In the writings of Moses Mendelssohn,
to take another example, one nds beautiful remarks on civilizing
by education and culture, on Bildung of the intellect and of the senses;
taste, sociability and savoir-vivre played a role. In the writings of a
third group of authors, Zivilisierung was related to overcoming particularistic restrictions, to emancipation from the limits of birth, estate,
business or even gender. Take Immanuel Kant as a case in point;
for him the concept brgerliche Gesellschaft opened itself up towards
the idea of mankind, towards une socit qui embrasse tous les hommes.
In all cases, civil society was seen as a contrast to violence, barbarism
and chaos.
Step by step, the normative dimension of the concept became
dominant. Civil society became a critical concept, critical of tradition and critical of the status quo, oriented towards somewhat
utopian aims, a Bewegungsbegri (Reinhart Koselleck) with an antitraditional, anti-corporatist, modern avor: critical of the past and
oriented towards the future. It stood for a project, not yet fullled,
to be approached in the future.
At the same time, chiey in the eighteenth century, the concept
was accentuated by separating civil society from the state or even
posing it against the state. This happened primarily in the languages
of countries with absolutist governments, i.e. on the European continent, less so in England. Brgerliche Gesellschaft, Kant wrote, needs
Mitgenossenschaft. One can freely translate: civil society needs the selforganized and voluntary cooperation of its members. According to
this view, the Vereine, the voluntary associations make a civil society,
which cannot be founded on dominance and obedience (Oberherrschaft
and Unterwrgkeit), but on self-organization. In this way, civil society

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143

became a polemical concept with an anti-absolutist thrust and

with an orientation towards the autonomous citizen of the future
into which the dependent subject of the present would hopefully
develop.
As mentioned before, this anti-statist element of the concept was
less visible in English, more present in German and French, and
even there, civil societys relation to the state remained important.
On the one hand, changing government by due process of law, public opinion and parliamentary representation was a central aim of
the program, of the liberal vision of which civil society had become
a symbolic core. Civil society was dened by its relation to the public and ultimately to government and the state. It implied access by
citizens to the political, at least as an aim. On the other hand it
was clear that the kind of civil society one hoped to achieve would
need the support of law, of representative institutions, of the state,
of a more liberal state of course, but of a state.
It was in the nineteenth century, under the inuence of spreading
capitalism and early industrialization, under the impact of new
forms of inequality and emerging class structures that this eighteenthcentury concept was redened again, particularly in German, e.g. in
the works of Hegel and Marx. Now, the denition of brgerliche
Gesellschaft became even more clearly distinguished from Staat. Now
it became understood as a system of needs, labor and markets, of
negotiation and contract, of particular interests, conicts and contradictions: more in the sense of a middle class (brgerliche) society
of the bourgeoisie than as a civil society made up of citizens (Brger).
In German the terms Zivilgesellschaft or brgerliche Gesellschaft which traditionally had a positive connotation were superseded by the term
brgerliche Gesellschaft, which was increasingly used as a critical and
polemical conceptboth within and outside Marxist traditions, until
very recently. The traditional, positive meaning was retained longer
in English and in French, e.g. in the work of Tocqueville. On the
whole, however, the term civil society receded to the background
in other languages as well, playing only a marginal role until roughly
1980with some exceptions, Gramsci among them.
But in the late twentieth century the term civil society has experienced a brilliant comeback. In the 1970s and 80s it became an
important term in anti-dictatorial critique, as expressed in East Central
Europe, in Prague, Warsaw and Budapest, where dissidents such as
Vaclav Havel and Bronislav Geremek, intellectuals like Ivn Szelnyi

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jrgen kocka

and Gyrgy Konrd, used the term in their respective languages to

speak out against one-party dictatorship, Soviet hegemony, communism
and totalitarianism, in favor of freedom, pluralism and social autonomy. It would be benecial to gain a clearer understanding of how
this semantic revival of civil society took place in some quarters of
the left. Perhaps Gramscis use of the term as a revisionist also played
a role. Furthermore, there seems to have been some exchange between
academic visitors from the West and intellectuals in the East Central
European cities, an exchange that merits study.
There may have been other roots as well in Latin American and
South African movements on the left. From the early 1990s onwards,
the term quickly spread. It is now used worldwide, in various political climates, among political centrists and on the left, by liberals,
communitarians and anti-globalization activists, by authors such as
John Keane, Charles Taylor and Jrgen Habermasalways with a
positive connotation. When the term was translated back into German,
Zivilgesellschaft was used in order to avoid the still-critical, polemical
thrust of bourgeois which was associated with brgerliche Gesellschaft.2
Civil society became attractive again in the victorious struggles
against dictatorships which represented the clearest negation of civil
society in the twentieth century. But in the non-dictatorial Western
world as well, the term t then and still ts now, into the general
political, intellectual climate, in at least three respects. First, it emphasizes social self-organization as well as individual responsibility, reecting
the wide-spread scepticism towards being spoon-fed by the state.
Many believe that the interventionist state has reached its limits by
regulating too much and becoming overburdened. Second, civil
society, as demonstrated by the phrases use by present-day antiglobalization movements, promises an alternative to the unbridled

2
For details and references see Kocka, 2000, pp. 1420. For the conference
The languages of civil societyEurope and beyond at the European University
Institute in Florence, 68 Nov. 2003, three reports on the history of the concept
were prepared (as part of the EU-sponsored network Towards a European Civil
Society with the Social Science Research Centre Berlin as its speaker institution)
by Peter Hallberg and Bjrn Wittrock (Uppsala); by Shin Jong-Hwa, Jean Terrier
and Peter Wagner (Florence); and by Jody Jensen and Ferenc Miszlivetz (Szombathely).
They will be published. A basic survey: Riedel, 1975, pp. 719800, esp. 73267
(749 Hume, 751 Mendelssohn, 75759 Kant). Gramsci, 1975, pp. 751f., 800f., 1028.
On this: Bobbio, 1988, pp. 7399; Arato, 1981, pp. 2347; Geremek, 1991, pp. 264
273; Keane, 1998, pp. 1231; Trentmann, 2003, pp. 38.

civil society

145

capitalism that has been developing so strongly across the world.

The term thus reects a new kind of capitalism critique, since the
logic of civil society, as determined by public discourse, conict and
agreement, promises solutions dierent from those of the logic of the
market, based on competition, exchange and the maximization of
individual benets. Thirdly, civic involvement and eorts to achieve
common goals are civil society, no matter how dierently the goals
may be dened. In the highly individualized and partly fragmented
societies of the late- and post-industrial periods, civil society promises
an answer to the pressing question of what holds our societies together
at all.
There are concerns that the state and governments are overreaching themselves. There are fears that markets are becoming overdominant and all-pervasive. There are worries about a possible
over-individualization of our social and cultural fabric with unpleasant political consequences. These three concerns dene the
present mental situation which explains why the concept civil
society is so attractive today, at least in large parts of Europe.
It should have become clear that the concepts opponents have
changed over time from uncivilized nature and barbarism through
violence and war, to the over-dominant state, capitalist dominance
and fragmentation. And with changing opponents, the meanings
change too, at least slightly. The concept is hard to stabilize.
Still, if one understands the reasons for its current attractiveness,
the contexts out of which it emerged, and the semantic baggage that
it carries with it, one can attempt to oer a working denition. I
would like to distinguish three dimensions in the meaning of civil
society: rst, civil society as a type of social action; second, civil
society as a sphere or space between economy, state, and the private sphere; third, civil society as the core of a project not yet fullled.
Understood as a specic type of social action, civil society is
characterized by orientation towards conict, discourse and agreement in public; by emphasis on individual independence and
collective self-organization; by non-violence; by the recognition of
plurality and dierence as legitimate; and by an orientation towards
general concerns reaching beyond strictly particularistic interests and
experiences, although dierent actors always have dierent opinions
of what constitutes the public good.
Understood as a social sphere or social space, civil society encompasses a multitude of initiatives, networks, associations and movements;

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jrgen kocka

related tobut distinguished fromgovernment (or the state), business (or the market) and the private sphere; a social space in which
civil society understood as a specic type of social action dominates.
Understood as a core element of a project not yet fullled, civil
society preserves part of its utopian thrust, by which it is dened
due to its Enlightenment heritage. This is where the descriptiveanalytical concept becomes most clearly normative.
Denition is always partly a matter of decision, too, and there are
many dierent shades of opinion. Some authors abstain from a clear
denition, preferring to stress the historical uidity, the openness and
the paradoxes of civil society.3 But intellectually, this is not satisfactory and opens the door both to misunderstandings and a certain
degree of essayistic arbitrariness.
Some authors like John Keane tend to see large corporations and
other economic institutions as major parts or actors of civil society.4
In contrast I have stressed the dierence between the logic of the
market and the logic of civil society. It is interesting to note that
Ferguson already dierentiated between commercial relation (on the
market) and communicative relation (in civil society).5 But it may be
appropriate to concede that while businesses primarily act according
to the logic of the market, they can, under specic circumstances,
be actors in civil societies as wellwith both roles interconnected.
Some scholars think that we should see family as part of civil
society.6 The relation between family and civil society is underresearched. While families as spaces of privacy should not be seen
as belonging to civil society, certain types of familiese.g. European
bourgeois families of the nineteenth centuryperformed functions
and provided opportunities which enabled and strengthened civil
society. In this sense the family could become part of civil society.7
And there are those who dene civil society in a more formalistic
way, by seeing non-state and non-prot voluntary associations with
or without political ambitions and functions as the dening element

As an example: Trentmann, 2003.

Keane, 1998, p. 6.
5
Ferguson, 1995, pp. 208.
6
Budde, 2003, pp. 5775.
7
On the conference in November 2003 (see above note 2) Paul Ginsborg,
University of Florence, gave a paper: Only connectFamily and civil society. It
will be published.
4

civil society

147

of civil society, and not more. The consequence of this position is

that also the Maa and the Ku Klux Klan, the Italian Fascist movements of 1920 and the Nazi Storm Troopers of 1930 have to be
seen as parts of civil society. Along this line one can argue for
instance that the strength of civil society in Weimar Germany contributed to its democratic instability.8 Along these lines, the dark
sides of civil society like egotism, fragmentation and possible violence are stressed.
In contrast, I think we should take seriously the long semantic
and intellectual tradition which has associated civil society with
civility, non-violence and the recognition of dierence as legitimate.
Seen and dened this way, violent, violence-prone, xenophobic, hategroups, and groups with a totalitarian spirit should not be regarded
as elements of civil society. Rather, they violate central features of
civil society while they full others. It should be admitted however
that in many cases the line of distinction is hard to draw.
Carefully dened, the concept can be used in empirical research,
not only in the social sciences but also in history as an instrument
for comparison in European history and beyond. Some work of this
kind is the way.9

Berman, 1997, pp. 401429.

Cf. Kocka and Mitchell, 1993; Hildermeier et al., 2000; Bauerkmper and
Borutta, 2003; Kocka, 2004, pp. 6579.
9

CHAPTER SIX

CHALLENGES OF MODERNITY IN AN AGE OF

GLOBALIZATION
T.K. Oommen
Conceptualizing any phenomenon in the singularbe it civilization,
modernity or globalizationis intended to bring about homogeneity and tends to become a tool of hegemonization. For example, the
term civilization was introduced into the French vocabulary in 1756
by Mirabeau and certainly till the 1790s, when diggings started in
Egypt, it was used in the singular and widely believed that only
Europe was civilized. Gradually several ancient civilizations
Mesopotamian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Chinese, Indian, Mayan, Aztec
have been discovered and the term has come to be used in the
plural (see, Mazlish 2001: 293299). This is a sea change in that
Europe could not have any more claimed to be the sole civilizing
agent although, of course, the civilizing mission could be viewed as
the principal motive of colonialism (discussed below).
The term civilization has several referents today; the three most
common are anchored to religion, mode of production and region.
The reference to Buddhist, Christian, Confucian, Hindu or Jewish
civilization imply that civilization is a non-spatial phenomenon as
religions have been substantially deterritorialised. Further, while religion does contribute to the making of a civilization, numerous other
factors too make for its formation. However, religion in its initial
and/or predominant abode and in its transplanted sites does vary
substantially. If so, one can legitimately speak of several civilizations
within a religious formation. At any rate, to endorse the religionbased view of civilization would necessarily create the superiorinferior syndrome of civilizations.
This diculty is also common to designations such as agrarian,
industrial or techno-scientic civilizations. But the fact is that all
these elements co-exist in the same civilization in diering proportions. It is a truism that the basis of all industrial and techno-scientic
civilizations is agriculture. However, the inherent problem in this

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t.k. oommen

mode of conceptualizing civilization is that some (e.g., agrarian) are

invariably perceived as inferior and others (e.g., techno-scientist) are
necessarily viewed as superior. Thus even as Huntington endorses
the idea of plurality of civilizations, the clash between them is inevitable
because the superior ones insist on retaining their superiority, at any
rate in preventing their impending decline. He wrote: To preserve
Western (read Christian) civilization in the face of declining Western
power, it is in the interest of the United States and European countries to maintain Western technological and military superiority over
other civilizations (Huntington, 1996: 311). That is, although it is
widely held that Huntingtons categorization of civilizations is based
on religion he does not directly talk about superiority or inferiority
of religions but the superiority of the West in technological and
military terms.
The third referent of civilization is regional as in Chinese, Egyptian,
European or Indian. None of these civilizational regions has monopoly in producing religions or technologies if one takes a longue
duree view. Even if one endorses the untenable idea that civilisations
belong to a superior-inferior continuum, none of them can legitimately
claim that theirs have been perennially superior and others are permanently inferior. The point I am making is this: a shift from a singular to a multiple view of civilization (or for that matter modernity
or globality, see below) will not necessarily ward o the tendency to
think in terms of inferiority or superiority of civilizations. However,
if one takes the view that the phenomena exists in multiplicity there
is a possibility of viewing them as dierent and not necessarily inferior or superior.
On the other hand, even the singular use of the term as in human
civilization, enveloping the whole of humankind, also does not solve
the problem. For one thing, the notion is meaningless in that only
humans are capable of civilization, we know no nature civilization.
Secondly, those who refer to human civilization in this view invariably denote the human capacity to control nature, to bring about
technological advancement, alleviation of human distress, that which
increase human eciency and the like. They talk in terms of one
global civilization (Schafer, 2001: 301319) and/or modernity as a
distinct civilization (Eisenstadt, 2001b: 320340). While the crucial
importance of the human agency ought to be squarely recognized
in the formation of civilization, humans create civilization in conjunction with nature. It is the collaboration between human reexivity

modernity in an age of globalization

151

and natures endowments which produce civilizations. Conceiving

civilization as the human capacity to control nature is embedded in
a homocentric view of the universe. In contrast, a cosmocentric view
implies harmonious co-existence of humanity and nature.
If dierent value-orientations are to be accommodated, including
the homocentric and cosmocentric world views, we need to think of
civilizations in the plural. If ecology and environment, ora and
fauna, climate and geography along with culture, that is the human
made part of environment, gives birth to civilization there would be
diering civilizations. They are not inferior or superior but simply
dierent. We need to recognise and respect these dierences. The
same holds true for modernities, the basic theme of this paper, to
the discussions of which I turn now.
I. The tradition-modernity dichotomy was almost universally endorsed
in the 1960s and modernization is still viewed as a homogenizing
process. The underlying assumption behind this proposition is that
there are a wide variety of traditional societies and the series of izationsindustrialization, urbanization, bureaucratization and the like
will eventually bring about one modern society. But latterly the talk
about multiple modernities rent the air of social science. (I draw
substantially from a previous paper of mine in developing this section (see Oommen, 2001: 116).
The immediate inspiration for this new conceptualization seems
to be threefold. First, the empirical experiences of the now dismantled Second World which too was technologically modern like the
First World, but was radically dierent from the latter, socially and
politically. Second, the emergence of East Asia, as an economic
power, particularly Japan and the Asian Tigers, which too are modern, but not quite similar in their modernity as compared to that
of the First World. Finally, the dependent modernity of Latin
American society which shared the culture particularly religion and
language of the First World but is quite dierent in its economic
basenot a coloniser but an ex-colony. These dierent permutations and combinations in specic societies and several more could
be added to the list as African modernity or South-Asian modernity, should have understandably gave birth to the current notion
of multiple modernities. But an examination of the classical conceptual baggage of sociology unfolds at least four axes around which
the notion of modernity was articulated. These are structural

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t.k. oommen

dierentiation (Emile Durkheim), rationalization (Max Weber), the

history-making project (Karl Marx) and modern life (Georg Simmel).
The notion of structural dierentiation gave birth to the dynamics
of societal transformation variously conceptualized as a movement
from simple to complex, tradition to modernity, community to society,
sacred to secular, status to contract, folk/rural to urban, to list a few.
The mechanisms involved in this transformation are believed to be
(a) occupational dierentiation and the consequent elaboration of
division of labour, (b) diversication and the attendant heterogeneity and (c) plurality and the gradual evolving of a complex social
network and interdependence in the place of the traditional cradleto-grave arrangement. In this process each society becomes dierent
from the other, less and less self-sucient, more and more specialized and hence results in increased complementarity (Durkheim
1964).
On the other hand, a specic type of social dierentiation has laid
the foundation for increasing individuation of subjects, the route
being organic solidarity brought about through industrialization. The
most compelling element behind this process, it has been argued, is
modern technology, so much so that modernisation is conceived as
a process in which the progressive displacement of animate energy
with inanimate energy occurs (Levy, Jr. 1966). But for dierentiation
to occur, the intervention through technology is not always a prerequisite. Thus dierentiation in the West occurred both before the
advent of modern technology (e.g., the bifurcation between state and
church) and after it (e.g., the dierentiation between civil society and
market). In contrast, in one-party systems, in spite of technological
sophistication, structural dierentiation did not occur. Further, in
spite of considerable progress in industrialization and elaboration of
occupational division of labour both market and civil society remained
under the control of the state.
That is, while modern technology, elaborate division of labour and
occupational dierentiation are common to capitalist and socialist
societies, there are basic dierences between them. Both are modern but their modernities dier. But it can be argued that socialist
societies are not modern as the dierentiation between their political
(state) economic (market) and civil society structures are thwarted
through excessive state domination. It can also be suggested that
technological modernity shared by both capitalist and socialist soci-

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eties created a convergence between them. This means one can and
perhaps one should distinguish between the compartmental modernity of socialist systems and the fully edged modernity of capitalist systems. Which is to say, structural dierentiation is not the
only not even the most critical marker of modernity. This renders
structural dierentiation as a source of modernity incomplete and
inecient as it can account for only certain dimensions of modernity (cf. Luhmann 1982). This brings me to rationalization as a
source of modernity.
Rationalization is a process bound up with disenchantment of the
world, its demystication. Accordingly, unforeseeable forces no longer
interfere in social aairs, it is argued. The good is dened less and
less in relation to God, but more and more in relation to functioning society. In this rendition of modernity, reason and reality are
isomorphic. Understandably, the rationalization process results in
increasing t between means and ends, it is believed. Science and
technology, rather than religion or magic, becomes crucial. In this
vein of thinking, capitalism is the embodiment of rationality and
modern capitalism has its essence in rationality (Weber 1947).
The essential features of rationality of modern capitalism are the
calculability furthered by market place, the purely instrumental orientation of action, a highly technical system of book-keeping and
the bureaucratic organisation of rms. Traditional aective constraints
wane or vanish as a social world wherein social actors are increasingly,
if not exclusively, guided by their instrumental interests emerging.
The project of rationality assumes that the individual can gradually
evolve and ultimately become autonomous guided by his interests,
in an intelligible world. Perfection through reason is the guiding principle; and hence god is a dispensable entity; but rationalization of
the world pre-supposes the depersonalization of social relations.
However, the fact that functioning modern societies are visited
by irrationality, superstition and sentiments is widely acknowledged
and recorded which points to the impossibility of a completely rational and hence modern society of this version. The hatred which thrives
across religious, linguistic and racial groups and the animosity which
prevails across even secular ideological communities in the modern
world are not founded in rationality. In fact, human beings are more
rationalizers rather than rational. This points to the limits of the
modernity which can be unleashed through the axis of rationality.

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It is important to note in passing here the two features shared by

the two sources of modernitystructural dierentiation and rationalization. First, both seem to be accounting more for the modernity of capitalist societies and neglect the modernity of socialist
societies. Second, both have the displacement syndrome and western
epistemological dualism at their core. That is, reality is conceptualized as a dualitytraditional/modern, rational/irrationaland it is
presumed that in the onward march of social transformation one
will displace the other. But available empirical evidence suggests that
this is not happening. Three processes occur simultaneously: displacements, retentions, accretions. And what is more, what are
displaced are not always irrational and those which are retained and
added are not always rational. What we have is a collage of the old
and the new, rational and irrational.
Both structural dierentiation and rationalization assume the displacement of traditional collectivism with modern individualism. True,
modernity cannot be separated from the will of individuals who
become unfettered actors in society. In fact, the birth of autonomous
individual itself is an indication of modernity. In pre-modern societies, traditional collectivism prevailed. The conscious individual is a
creator of history, who interrogates all established social relationships. To do this, the individual should be incessantly in the quest
for knowledge, not only to meet intellectual curiosity but also to
solve practical problems. This voluntarism cannot remain at the individual level, it should generate a new, modern collectivism manifesting in the working class mobilization eventuating in revolution
giving birth to a new society. This is the Marxian project of making
history (Marx and Engels 1988).
The two versions of modernity fathered by structural dierentiation
and rationalization recognized traditional collectivism but did not
yield much space for modern collectivism. In contrast, the version
of modernity championed by the history-making project juxtaposed
the two antagonistic classes and assumed that social transformation
is a function of conict between these classes. But this characterization was not entirely correct even in the case of European societies.
There were (and are) several non-class antagonistic social categories
national, racial, gender, generational and regional. The existence
of these social categories was not adequately recognized in the version of modernity which addressed the Marxian project of making
history.

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155

However, the salience of working class movements articulating a

myriad formprofessional and occupational associations, trade unions
and a variety of interest groupscannot be denied. But their career
climaxed in the West in the 1960s and a set of post-class movementsfeminist, peace, youth, environmental/ecological, national/ethnicall of which transcend the class dichotomy and boundaries
emerged. These are the New Social Movements. This development
was not anticipated by Marx or Marxians but this too has to be
reckoned as a project of making history. The New History does not
advocate class antagonism but class harmony and the project has
the harmony of races, sexes, and generations as well as the harmony
between humans and nature as its ultimate goal.
The old version of history-making project has been abandoned
because of its political authoritarianism. Dictatorship of the proletariat manifested as one-party regimes crystallized as party-states
which are totalitarian and all-encompassing. The socialist state became
not only the nal arbiter but the only adjudicator between contending interests. In this process, it not only prevented the birth of
market but relegated the civil society too to the background. That
is, the project of making history, although started as a modernist
venture has ended up as an antidemocratic and hence anti-modern
project.
I have noted above that neither structural dierentiation nor rationalization adequately recognized modern collectivism. The Marxian
project of making history did provide the space for modern collectivism but it recognised only class consciousness and dismissed the
consciousness of other collectivities as false. In the project of making
history in Socialist states the history of non-class categories was cognized as irrelevant and inappropriate. Indeed an eort was made to
banish these inconvenient histories from collective memory and an
eort was made to re-invent history in favour of dominant nationalities so as to facilitate their hegemonization. Russication in Soviet
Union, Hanisation in China, Serbianization in Yugoslavia aord
examples of this (see Connor 1984). This process has also occurred
in capitalist societies, although through a dierent route, as exemplied
by Frenchication in France, Englishisation in United Kingdom and
Spanishisation in Spain etc. (see Oommen 1997). But relegation of
collective memory and identity to the background of a wide variety
of categoriesage-groups and genderin homogeneous societies and
also of racial, national and religious identities in multi-racial and

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multi-cultural societies has prompted these categories to invent their

specic histories and insist on their specic identities.
In the absence of a common history, there cannot be a collective
conscience or a common vanguard. This is the context of identity
politics as against class politics; if in the latter the society is polarised
into two classes, in the former a wide variety of identities crystallize.
If in class politics and its history-making project protest was based
on the political economy of exploitation, in the case of identity
politics protest focus on the repression of identity too in addition to
economic exploitation (Melucci 1989). If both structural dierentiation
and rationalization associated with capitalist modernity produced individual alienation, loss of non-class collective freedom and absence of
identity-recognition resulted in alienation of collectivities in socialist
societies. The break-up of Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia
points to the search for a non-class, national identity on the part of
marginalized nationalities.
The fourth modernity that I am referring to relates to modern
life-style. Modernity implies changes in perceptions of space and time
and in the speed of exchange. Modernity involves rapid transactions,
life in cities and accelerated pace of events. Modern life in cities is
unsettled and it is constantly in ux. Due to these reasons barter is
not possible and money assumes social importance in three contexts.
First, as the symbol of movement and circulation. Second, as the
universal equivalent of goods and services transacted. Third, as a
universal leveling force. Money empties everything of its particularity,
its specic value. Importance is decided in terms of how much money
value one commandsthe neighbourhood one stays, the car one
owns, the amount of money ones acting or painting can get, the
number of copies ones book sells and hence the royalty one pockets.
Nothing has intrinsic value, everything has only money value (Simmel
1990).
The modern life-style is made possible through the shrinkage of
space and time facilitated through the revolution in transport and
communication. From this, the distance to globality itself is short
because globalization ultimately is brought about through a shrinkage
in space and time and the easiness of exchange. This is further
facilitated through money taking new formfor example, the credit
card, wherein even the disadvantages of a multiplicity of currencies
are done away with. That is, Simmels conceptualization of modernity is precariously proximate to the current notion of globality.

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All the four classical thinkers recognized the discontents of modernity. Durkheim recognized increasing individuation, Weber warned
about depersonalization, Marx alerted about alienation and Simmel
noted the loss of intrinsic worth. Through these processes the community is sentenced to death by modernity, individualism is celebrated and a homogeneity based on similarity in behaviour, attitudes
and values emerge which has no organic base, but is merely aggregative. That is social actors are apparently similar viewed in terms of
their life style but actually they are dierent in terms of their deeper
values. This explains why individuals and groups who share the same
life styles enter into persisting conicts based on race, religion or
language. Recall the conicts in Bosnia, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Ireland
or Kashmir.
Part of the problem here arises from the monistic conceptualization of modernity as a movement from multiple traditions to singular modernity. Western epistemological dualism and displacement
syndrome is at the core of this mode of conceptualization. It is an
either-or paradigm which juxtaposes mind and matter, emperor and
pope, church and state, sacred and secular. The fact is that this
mode of conceptualization cannot grapple with the evolving empirical reality even of the West. Co-existence of religious, racial and
linguistic diversities along with dierent secular ideologies has become
an empirical fact which sits uneasily with the tradition versus modernity paradigm. Further, the ongoing process of transformation also
indicates the existence of multiple modernities. It seems to be correct
to think of dierent versions of democracy, capitalism, socialism, secularism and technologies. If so, plurality of modernity is a fact.
In Europe, modernitys source was endogenousthe internal
dynamic of societysurfacing through a series of revolutionsthe
conicts between aristocracy and clergy, the revolt of economic categories against clergy and aristocracy, and the proletarian revolution
which targeted the bourgeoisie. The trajectory of modernity diers
in other part of the world. For example, in South Asia, to begin
with the source of modernity was colonialism. But the modernizing
impact of colonialism was segmental: the lites exposed to higher
education and secular ideology were the agency through which modernization impacted. Gradually the consequences started seeping
down. The vertical transmission of the consequences of modernity
started gradually enveloping the lower sections of society in South
Asia. The promise of equality and justice in a modern polity which

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still hosted a traditional society gave birth to a new trajectory of

modernisation.
It was industrial urbanization, propped up by modern technology,
which heralded the beginning of modernity in the West. Four mobilitiesspatial, social, occupational and ideationalfollowed, which
shued around individuals and groups. While the pace of change
in the material and technological realms were substantial, the change
in non-material and ideational realms were less. This led to the
formulation of cultural-lag hypothesis (see Ogburn 1964). What is
pertinent for the present discussion is that this trajectory aected the
content of modernity in Europe, which in turn gave meaning to the
convergence thesis: convergence between capitalist and socialist systems.
In South Asia, the ideological dimension was sought to be changed
rst. The introduction of the values of equality, justice and freedom was far more unsettling in a hierarchical and traditional society
than spatial mobility or technological change. In turn this produced
a modernity of a dierent hue which assigned primacy to change of
values rather than the role of technology. That is, the sources, patterns and consequences of modernity diered between say West
Europe and South Asia. Therefore, not only that the simplistic
unilinear movement from tradition to modernity is untenable but
the movement seems to be from multiple traditions to multiple
modernities.
If this argument is correct the notion of singular globality too is
untenable. Multiple modernity implies multiple globality because the
point of departure inevitably inuences the point of destination even
when the process of displacement is the same. But the following
points may be underlined: (a) displacement is never total and invariably partial, (b) the process of displacement diers across societies
and (c) accretion of alien elements into societies is necessarily selective.
For these reasons, the notion of a monolithic globality should be
re-examined with greater rigour and care.
II. The following points emerge from the preceding analysis. One,
civilization is a spatial concept. Two, modernity is a temporal notion.
Three, globality is de-spatialized temporal idea. This postulation
can meet some of the challenger of modernity in the emerging age
of globalization. There is a general tendency among social theorists
to view izationscolonization, industrialisation, urbanization, modernization, globalizationeither as negative or positive processes and

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having a denite direction. As against this, I want to argue that these

processes have both negative and positive consequences and do not
have any inherent direction. Through this stance, we avoid (a) any
implied teleology and ( b) disengage globalization from a pre-conceived notion of progress. This position is necessitated not simply
for conceptual rigour but also by historical experience. We can understand this by reviewing briey the conceptual history of globalization.
Broadly speaking globalization began with geographical explorations of sixteenth century and colonialism which followed it; colonialism and modernisation were the rst two phases of globalization.
Although dierent parts of the world were linked in a limited way
even before colonialism, the globe of globalization entered the cognitive map of humanity with the process of colonisation: Captain
Cook, Vasco de Gamma and Columbus were its initial agents.
Colonialism however did not produce the One World familiar
to us to day; it has given birth to three dichotomies which conjointly
encapsulated the world. These dichotomies were the primitive and
the modern, the Orient and the Occident and the New World and
the Old World. Europe, the Occident, was at once old and modern.
The primitives, Orientals and the new worlders were in the periphery
of the world society while Europe constituted the centre (see Oommen
2000: 153190).
The modern society of Europe was inhabited by whites and
characterized by the territorial state, monogamous family and private property. Its polar opposite was the Dark Continent, Primitive
Africa, inhabited by blacks and characterized by nomadic life, polygamy
and communal property. The primitive man was illogical, given to
magic and hence devoid of civilization. It was necessary to civilize
them and colonialism was an instrument of the civilizing mission
(Kuper 1988). Further, African tribes were viewed as peoples without history as well as pre-literates and hence not nations. Therefore,
the principles of national self-determination, the basic tenet for
modern (read, western) democratic nations, was not applicable to
these primitives; colonialism was a stepping stone to create modern
nation-states of the European variety in Africa.
In the context of the Orient-Occident dichotomy the situation was
dierent in that the Orientals were heir to ancient civilizations. But
they lacked the concept of individual autonomy and hence not ready
for modernization. Their long history steeped in traditional collectivism
was a liability. Colonialism was a pre-requisite to transform the

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unwieldy ancient civilizations into neat modern nation-states (cf. Said

1978). The historical justication of colonialism was that it heralded
the birth of modern world itselfit was contended.
It is important to note here in passing that there were three Orients
each of which was viewed with diering attitudes and orientations
by the West. The Near Orient, broadly the Egyptian civilizational
region, was geographically the most proximate and populated by one
of the peoples of the Bookthe Muslimsand yet the object of
great hostility for a variety of reasons, particularly the prevalence of
slavery and oppression of women. The Far Orient, the area of
Chinese civilizational region was geographically and mentally distant
and yet an object of some admiration for its technology, bureaucracy, literacy and religion. The attitude towards the Middle Orient
the Indian civilizational regionwas mixed; it was admired for its
ancient civilization, long history, Sanskrit language and above all the
Aryan race. But it was despised for its institutionalized inequality
manifesting through the caste system and the oppression of women.
The point of interest for the present is that the grand Orient-Occident
narrative actually contained at least three subsets which had diering
implications for modernization and consequently for globalization.
The third dichotomy produced by colonialism was applied to the
Americas, Australia and New Zealandthe New World, which was
treated as if it was an empty space. Colonialism in the New World
was justied based on the Hobbesian doctrine of the right of the
people living in densely populated regions of the world to migrate
in search of their livelihood to sparsely populated regions. The original inhabitants of the New World were pre-literates who needed to
be civilized. But even the immigrants, as they were drawn from a
multiplicity of races and nations, did not constitute a people and
hence the notion of national self-determination hailed as a great
democratic principle in Europe was irrelevant in the New World.
Democracy was given a new twist, individualism was foregrounded
and nationalism of the European variety was put in the backyard in
the New World. This explains the saliency of Human Rights in the
New World. This also explains the importance accorded to Human
Right, in the context of globalization, the United States of America
being its chief protagonist.
It is important for the present purpose to note that in all the three
locales of colonialismDark Africa, Ancient Orient and the New
Worldcolonialism introduced new values and institutions. The most

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important of these were the value of individualism and the institution of private property. In turn they gave birth to democracy,
monogamous marriage and nuclear family. The introduction of
modern communication, transportation and technology gradually led
to the shrinkage of time and space, the basic pre-requisites of
globalization.
The second phase of globalization was couched in terms of the
modernization project. Broadly speaking three revolutions produced
three worlds. The rst revolution to occur was the bourgeoisie revolution, which produced the First World with its anchorage in Western
Europe. The values and institutions which colonialism sought to
spread were the products of this revolution. The proletarian revolution followed and produced the Second World. This revolution questioned some of the values (e.g. individualism) and institutions (e.g.
private property, multiparty democracy) of the First World. The leading value produced by the proletarian revolution was modern collectivism; it advocated one-party democracy and collectivization of
property. Inspired by the values and institutions of the rst and the
second worlds, the colonial revolution triggered o producing the
Third World. The rst and the second worlds started the contestation for the Third World and the Cold War phase, the period of
capitalist and socialist modernities, emerged.
If colonialism produced three dichotomies, Cold War produced a
trichotomy of the three worlds (Worsley 1984). In this rendition the
Third World was characterised as the world of tradition, illiteracy,
irrationality, under-development and over-population. It needs to be
modernized. For this, modern (that is, European) knowledge is to be
imbibed, western technology should be introduced, secular-values
ought to be internalized and population should be controlled. Most
of all, the persisting traditional collectivism of the Third World
should be replaced by western individualism to sustain multi-party
democracy.
Unlike the Third World, the Second World was modern but its
modernity was dierent from the modernity of the First World. The
Second World was technologically sophisticated and secular. But it
was politically authoritarian; it did not provide any space for civil
society and the market was subservient to state. Indeed it produced
a state-centric system which rolled the state, market and civil society
into one entity. If the central thrust of the First World modernity
was dierentiation, the ethos of the Second World modernity was

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de-dierentiation. To cap it all, the one party democracy which

prevailed in the Second World was no democracy at all, it was
contented (see Pletsch 1981: 56590).
In contrast to this, the First World was modern in all respects.
Not only was it a haven of science and technology, it was rational,
ecient and secular. Above all the First World was democratic and
free. The Cold War was a struggle to annex the Third World into
one of the modernities: the natural modernity of the First World
and the enlightened modernity of the Second World. Apparently,
the modernity of the First World triumphed and the modernity
of the Second World succumbed. The Third World disappeared and
Cold War got terminated. The world has become one; a worldsociety has emerged. This is the perception about the world in the
Global Age.
The basic value of the Modern Age was rationality, its central
institution was nation-state and the central identity it fostered was
citizenship (see Albrow 1996). Although rationality was touted as the
central value orientation of the Modern Age, racism, religious intolerance, wars of great destruction, annihilation of species and habitats, even slavery, were all witnessed during this era. The nation-state
encouraged rationality through technology-driven development, but
it also fostered irrationality through patriotism. The hero of the
nation-state, the citizen, was expected to subordinate all primordial
identitiestribe, race, religion, language, regionsingly or in combination to the citizenship identity. And yet, citizenship was invariably based on nationality, a primordial identity.
That is, rationality and irrationality not only co-existed but the
latter was even encouraged, sometime unwittingly but often surreptitiously. The de-linking of the structures of state and nation and
pursuantly the identities of citizenship and nationality is the central
challenge in the transition from the Modern Age to the Global Age
(see Oommen 1997; 2002)
Those who advocate the idea of one world see it in terms of one
or another dimension: communication and transportation, life-style
and consumption pattern, global production and nance, shrinkage
of time and space, that is intensication of world-wide social relations, proximate to Simmels view of modernity as noted earlier. But
there are those who dene globalization as all those processes by
which the peoples of the world are incorporated into a single world
society; the global society. That is, globalization as a concept refers

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both to the compression of the world and intensication of consciousness of the world as a whole (Giddens 1990; Robertson 1992).
To accomplish globalization, this should apply equally to all the
inhabitants of the erstwhile three worlds. In turn this implies reciprocity between them and ow of ideas across them. But in reality
the process of globalization as it occurs is quite at variance from this.
The chief instrument of globalization is the Structural Adjustment
Programme (SAP) and it is enunciated and operated by the Brettonwoods institutionsthe World Bank, International Monetary Fund,
World Trade Organisation etc. on behalf of the erstwhile First World,
particularly some of its constituents. As is well known SAP has several
aspects: Minimalization of state, dismantling of developmental bureaucracy, de-legitimation of the concept of welfare state, promotion of
free trade, privatization of the economy, institutionalization of multiparty democracy, observance of Human Rights. Admittedly, this is
a mixed baggage. While the last two dimensions have acquired nearuniversal acclaim and recognition this cannot be said of other aspects.
The most widely contested dimensions of SAP are the disproportionate
importance it accords to market and the near marginalisation of
state.
It is very important to recall here that those who are subjected
to the pressures of SAP are mainly the democratic incapables of
the colonial erathe primitives and orientalsand the democratic
mists of the Cold War erathose from the former socialist states.
Thus viewed, globalization is the third incarnation of the civilizing
mission, the rst two being colonialism and modernization. With this
understanding of the conceptual history of globalization which situates the changing cognitions about the world let us look at the more
direct manifestation of its social impact, the intention being to avoid
the decits of modernity in the ongoing process of globalization.
III. Globalization, as other izations, has both negative and positive consequences as I have noted above. In what follows I shall
identify four inter-related and interacting processeshomogenization,
pluralization, traditionalization and hybridizationin terms of their
positive and negative social impact and through that the challenges
posed by modernity to globalization.
The revolution in transport and communication did bring about
a certain degree of homogenization in cultural patterns and institutional
arrangements right from the time of colonialism. While modernization

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accelerated this process, homogenization seems to be climaxing with

the on-set of globalization. The more visible aspects of homogenization manifest in the cultural context through common life style
and consumption patterndress (e.g. jeans), food (e.g. McDonalds),
music (e.g. popularity of Michael Jackson). Yet it is not true that
this consumption pattern and life style have become or fast becoming
universal. Generally speaking these are conned to the urban population and within that those who live in metropolitan centres, which
is a minority. But this minority is the most visible segment of the
contemporary world population and the similarity in their life-style
leaves a deep social impact. Notwithstanding this, to argue that globalization brings about homogenization of life-style and consumption
pattern is to mistake the part for the whole. The majority of worlds
population is still untouched by the process of homogenization, cultural heterogeneity obstinately persists.
However, homogenisation is more visible in certain other contexts
nuclear family, monogamous marriages, parliamentary democracy,
private property and western technology. Here again some of these
institutional arrangements (e.g. parliamentary democracy, private
property) have a near-universal endorsement as compared with other
institutional patterns. For example, joint family ethic has not disappeared from Asia and monogamy has not yet become the normative pattern in most Muslim societies. The homogenisation process
in these institutional arrangements was initiated during the colonial
era and gained momentum during the Modern Age.
The process of homogenization assumes the eective functioning
of displacement syndrome, that is, the belief that the old is necessarily displaced by the new. But this is not a correct perception
regarding the dynamics of social transformation. It is true that some
of the old elements/aspects are displaced but some others are retained
and new elements are added to the existing stock of the old. Further,
retention of the unique elements in the national heritages while incorporating exogenous elements facilitate glocalisation (Robertson 1992).
These processesdisplacement, retention, accretion, glocalisation
conjointly produce pluralization.
Pluralization concedes and commends the co-existence of a variety
of consumption and institutional patterns. To go back to the examples I have used, along with McDonalds other varieties of junk food
(e.g., pizza) and along with Michael Jacksons other recent styles of
popular music (such as rap by Eminem) come to be accommodated.

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Not only that. Several of the old patterns in food, dress and music
persists with vehemence; cultural revivals are indeed common in contemporary world. This partial change and partial persistence gives
birth to what I have designated as pluralisation.
I have already hinted above the possibility of pluralisation in the
institutional realm. Witness the arrangements of marriage that exists
today from simple temporary co-habitation without any legal or moral
binding to highly committed and life-long marriages. Similarly,
families range from ephemeral dwelling units of couples to long
term cohabitation of a wide circle of kin. Even as private property
and parliamentary democracy are endorsed in form, their content
varies across societies. The democratic pattern varies from two-party
systems to multiparty coalitions. Property forms vary from exclusive
private ownership, to joint-stock companies to co-operatives and collective enterprises. Even in the case of technology, the distinction
between simple (traditional), intermediate and advanced (complex)
technologies is not merely conceptual but is of robust empirical possibility (Oommen 1992: 1319). That is, pluralization is a fact of
contemporary social reality.
I must add a caveat here. It is not my point that globalization
causes pluralization. But I want to suggest that because of the processes
of accretion and retention pluralization comes about as globalization
proceeds. That is, globalization cannot be and indeed should not be
homogenizing in its tenor, the central tendency of modernization.
Pluralism does not reject a cultural item or an institutional device
based on the locale of its origin, because it recognizes and respects
other cultures. But generally speaking the non-west accepts many
more of the western cultural items and west reluctantly takes to
things non-western. Globalization which should imply ow of goods
and ideas in multiple directions actually results in their ow in one
direction, from the west to the non-west, from the centre to the
periphery and hence hegemonizing in its tenor and orientation. One
of the challenges of globalization is to reject this unilinearity and
consciously move towards reciprocity.
The hegemonizing tendency of modernization gives birth to a loss
of meaning and an erosion of identity to the non-West. This leads
to the revivalist syndrome, the resurrection of roots, a search for
identity, a process of traditionalisation. However this tendency is not
conned to the non-west. Americanization is resisted even by
Europeans, particularly the French. Dierent nations even as they

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modernize and globalize want to retain their national heritages.

Sometimes response to modernity takes the form of cultural revival
and results in the re-invention of tradition both as religious fundamentalism and also as religious reforms. If fundamentalism is invariably a literal interpretation of texts ignoring the changing contexts,
reform is a creative reinterpretation of the text taking into account
the change in the context. When traditionalization relapses into the
search for cultural purity it engenders cultural relativism, the belief
that ones culture is the purest and it needs to be maintained in its
pristine purity (Redeld 1957: 148). Globalization has to meet the
challenge of containing fundamentalism and accelerating reform.
Tradition, however, is not a monolith; plurality of tradition is
widely recognised. Given the plurality of tradition the tendency of
one or another strand of tradition to establish hegemony over other
traditions cannot be ruled out. Generally speaking, the conict between
tradition and modernity is a conict between the traditional hegemon and the homogenizing tendency of modernity. Dominated traditions do not have the power to challenge modernity and hence
they tend to succumb or acquiesce. If modernity succeeds in successfully challenging the hegemonic tradition homogenization will
occur. But this is unlikely to happen in all parts of the world with
equal intensity as hegemonic traditions and their strength vary across
the globe. This is evident from the persistence of fundamentalism/
revivalismreligious, political, economic and/or culturalin dierent
parts of the world.
The plurality of tradition that I am referring to has another dimensionits verticality. Thus one may distinguish between Little and
Great Traditions. The latter, generally speaking, obtains at the civilizational level often transcending nations and states. Little traditions
exist essentially at the level of communitiessome big, others small;
some territorially anchored, others spatially dispersed. The confrontation between great traditions re-surface in the context of
globalization, designated as clash of civilizations by some scholars
(see for an example, Huntington 1996). The intensity of clash across
these great traditions depends upon their proximity or distance to
the process of globalization. Thus one may postulate a continuum
with globalizing great traditions on the one end and those great traditions which resist the process of globalization on the other. All the
same globalization produces self-awareness and dignity about ones
heritage and culture.

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167

The clashes between great traditions transmit their tension vertically leading to conicts at the level of local communities. These
manifest in a million mutinies between religious, linguistic and tribal
communities as well as racial and caste groups. The clashes between
these little traditions are based on the specicities of their situations
whether they occur in Ireland, Bosnia, Basque Land, Kashmir,
Burundi or Los Angeles. These are not clash of civilizations as such
but are their local expressions which have a bearing at the macro
level. Further, these local clashes feed on each other because of
globalization, through the agency of communication, particularly
electronic media.
It is not my intention to suggest that globalization only intensies
the clashes between little traditions, it can also and often it does
prompt communitarianism. The mass media often instills in their
audience sympathy and concern for the victims of dierent types of
disasters. Humanitarian work and charity result from this. Thus
globalization does produce fellow feeling, fraternity and altruism.
There is another aspect of communitarianism that merits reference.
Modernitys emphasis on homogenization tends to destroy the
specicities of local communities. Therefore, people soon discover
the decits of modernityanonymity, impersonality and bureaucratization. These render them rudderless creatures and they often
yearn for the return of the community. New associations of friendshipclubs, eating jaunts, entertainments, picnics, excursions, tours
and the likecome into vogue. Neighbourhood associations and
other voluntary associations get established to meet instrumental and
expressive needs. There occurs a resurrection of localism as a reaction
to globalism resulting in the return of community (see Etzioni 1993).
The cross-breeding of the traditional and the modern, the local
and the global, gives birth to hybridity. Hybridisation creates new cultural elements and social patterns which are neither traditional nor
modern, neither local nor global. Hybridization is dierent from pluralization in that it is neither co-existence nor elaboration. It is an
eort to innovate, to break out of cultural and social dead ends. It
is a product of the mutation syndrome. It is simultaneous engagement
with both tradition and modernity and local and global (cf. Pieterse
1994: 16184). This is evident in contemporary institutional arrangements and consumption patterns.
If in the traditional societies living in joint family was the norm,
in the modern society nuclear family came to be accepted as the

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t.k. oommen

standard. But it was realized that nuclear family with its aggressive
individualism neglects not only the aged, the imbecile and the physically
handicapped but even the normal child. An appreciation of eastern
family ethic gradually developed in the West. Inter-family arrangements
to look after children intermittently are gradually emerging (e.g., in
Scandinavian countries) instead of vigorously pursuing the professionalization of mother role, the refrain of modernity. Acute sexual
division of labour which prevailed in the wake of modernization is
gradually being replaced by sharing of domestic chores by husband
and wife (Hochschild 1989). The possibility of lodging the aged parents in houses and ats proximate to those of adult children is being
explored instead of their being dumped into Old Age Homes, which
are invariably run with a commercial motive. In all these institutional arrangements of the Global Age one sees mutation of the traditional and the modern.
The mutation between the local and the global too lead to hybridization as is evident in music, art forms or food items. Vegetarian hamburger, Indian rap music, European Curry, Japanese Pasta, and
numerous other examples suggest the relentless march of hybridization. And yet, it ought to be noted that there is a hierarchy here.
Generally speaking the cultural elements from the auent and dominant nations dominate over the cultural elements from weak, small
and/or dominated nations. There is an unfortunate tendency to
value positively everything from the dominant or groupsbe they
political institutions, economic organisations, family patterns, or eating
habits and stigmatization of those from dominated ones. Nullication
of this tendency is an important challenge before globalization.
IV. The four processeshomogenization, pluralization, traditionalization and hybridizationthat I have referred to above are resultants of the revolutions in transport and communication leading to
ideational, spatial, social and cultural mobilities. Precisely because
globalization contribute to the acceleration of these processes it is
extremely unlikely that the world will become one socially and culturally. True, a commonly shared social and cultural layer is emerging and getting universal endorsement. But even as this layer is likely
to be similar in its form, it is likely to be dierent in its contents in
dierent locales. To wit Indian democracy, the biggest in the world
functions dierently from the American, the most successful. Italian
Catholicism is conservative as compared with the Brazilian one

modernity in an age of globalization

169

which is radical. Indonesian Islam is syncretic, if Iranian Islam is

puritanic. Thus beneath the common homogenous layer there lies
many uncommon and diering layers. This is so because of the
dierent histories and traditions of these societies which impact on
the processes of modernization and hence globalization dierently
through cultural mutations and social hybridizations.
The four processes operating independently and in interaction give
birth to a world society which is much more complex than the protagonists of globalization would have it. It is not a movement from
tradition to modernity, simplicity to complexity, heterogeneity to
homogeneity. But it produces new permutations and combinations
giving birth to diversity. The challenge of globalization lies in welcoming and celebrating this emerging diversity instead of opting for
the engineered homogeneity of the Modern Age. Diversity as a social
fact existed since the hoary past and modernity tried to destroy it
through Project Homogenization. The challenge of the Global Age
is to endorse diversity as a value, that is, transform diversity into
pluralism. That is . . . globalizations are not globally uniform but
regionally and nationally variable (Therborn 2000: 172).

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE DARK SIDE OF MODERNITY: TENSION RELIEF,

SPLITTING, AND GRACE
Jerey C. Alexander
Modern societies in the 20th century rst ssured, then shattered,
into the warring camps of liberal democracy, the communist revolution and fascist reaction. So did modern intellectuals. The coinciding of these intellectual and social divisions was hardly unrelated.
In fact, the social divisions can be framed, and in some cases were
inspired by, the theoretical reections of Marx, Nietzsche, and Weber.
The terms of these divisions can be conceived as dierent answers
to the question that has been revisited many times and in many
ways: Is the universalism and abstraction that characterizes modern
life good or bad?
Modernity has encased human action and institutions with abstract
ethical demands and impersonal requirementsfrom the moral and
secular law to the rule of expert advice, from income tax to bureaucratic controls, from market exigencies and currency adjustments to
psychotherapy, from surveillance to democratic control, from peaceful coexistence under international statutes and laws to stand-os
produced via armed confrontation, tense vigilance, and techno-war.
The subsequent questions that arise in determining universalism
and abstractions to be good or bad, given the abstract ethical demands
and impersonal requirements, are: First, can they be lived with? If
so, are they user friendly? Do they contribute to reform, humanism,
justice, and inclusion? Do they make people fullled, authentic, or
just plain happy? Do they make them civilized?
The answers to these fundamental questions are: 1) yes, modernity is a good thing 2) not quite yet but someday soon if we do
something radical, and 3) no, modernity can never be a good thing.
The yes answer is found in Parsons work, taken from Weber.1
1
Parsons, 1971. Parsons also took this yes from Durkheim, especially the rst
two books of The Division of Labor in Society (1984 [1893]). To mention Durkheim

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jeffrey c. alexander

The transcendentalism of the radical Protestant tradition has issued

in liberal democracy, which is rule bound in a good way. The
scientic revolution was a great step forward, and it promoted a
form of objective truth seeking that allowed social problems to be
evaluated and alleviated. The modern personality is protean and
capable, and handles this new discipline in an autonomous way.
Barbarism can only be a product of premodern societies; in modernity, therefore, barbarism can only be the result primordial residues
from earlier life. It is the result of primo Modern abstraction, autonomy, and discipline that supply the resources, and also the will, for
a civilizing process that institutionalizes idealistic utopias in thisworldly form.
The second response, not quite yet, but someday soon if we do
something radical, is the position of left-wing revolutionaries. Although
the liberal standpoint is true, their position is only valid and accurate to a certain extent. That is, What they have not realized is that
the great energy and bounty of civilization leads not only to
objectication in the good sense (viz., Hegel in the phenomenology,
where it produces growth), but in the bad sense as well. Objectication in modern societies produces alienation in Marxs sense,
reication in Lukacs.2 There is a dialectic of the enlightenment, such
that inequality and oppression come out of modernity, and not just
freedom and solidarity.3 The latter are for the dominant and privileged classes; the former are for the lot of most of mankind. So the

and his relationship to modernity is to suggest the self-imposed limitations of the

present essay. My ambition is to set the debate about modernity in the framework
of the ambiguities of rationalization not only fact but as theory. This specic
manner of framing the question of modernity has been enormously productive philosophically and sociologically, marking the German and German-inuenced traditions most strongly, though it has emerged in other national traditions as well. Still,
when American pragmatists like John Dewey spoke of rationalization, it was in a
much dierent vein than the subjects of this paper. American pragmatists typically
were more positive and optimistic, even if equally critical of capitalism. While there
is little doubt that Parsons draws on this American tradition in his liberal incorporation of Weber, I wish to present his views on modernity, like the others, as
systematic responses to the rationalization theme. For my most recent critique of
Parsons one-sided optimism about modernity, see Alexander, Contradictions in
the Societal Community: The Promise and Disappointment of Parsons Concept.
2
Lukacs, 1971 [1924].
3
Adorno and Horkheimer, 1973 [1944].

the dark side of modernity

173

modern age has produced turmoil and strife, not amelioration and
equilibrium.
But history has provided an opportunity to overcome this ambiguous legacy of the Axial age, in order to make it good. The
Puritans of old, under the yoke of modern abstraction, created capitalism and bourgeois democracy. Bearing the same cultural and
organizational burden, the new PuritansMarxists, Leninists, or
Maoistswould create communism and workers democracy. Revolution
is this-worldly asceticism in our own time.4 Yet, the result is a just
order; the deracinating promise of bourgeois modernity will nally
be fullled in the next historical time.
The third response to the question posed is No, modernity, tout
court, simply is not a good thing. The abstraction that men are bound
to live with is fundamentally other, and unbearable for that reason.
It sets up tensions that tear man away from himself. The passions
of human nature cannot be corrected or civilized through abstract
morality, the hypocrisies of which man must be fundamentally in
rebellion against.5 Modernity unleashes, not enlightenment, but an
even darker dark age. It cannot be saved through disciplined revolution, which would only make it worse. It must be discarded.
Some of these critics have argued that an alternative to modernity
can be found by just saying No, by taking the route of other-worldly
or this-worldly mysticism.6 Others have insisted that modernity must
be destroyed by violence of a right-wing, not left-wing, form.7 Both
kinds of critics agree that the new world must set aside the tensions
of the axial age. Unity must be restored. Depending on which path
to restoration is chosen, there will be concreteness, not abstraction
release, not disciplinefusion, not divisionplay, not work. Only if
abstract morality and inner-worldly discipline are set aside can humans
lead a truly human life.8
4

Eistenstadt, 1978.
Nietzsche, 1956 [1872, 1887].
6
Roszack, 1969.
7
On the role that desire for transcendence played in radical right wing ideology, see Nolte, 1966.
8
In simplifying so as to make its polemical point, this paragraph points once
again to the self-circumscribed framework of this paper, which considers the history of modern society and thought entirely from within the framework of rationalization theory in its classical and modern from. A fuller treatment of the no
reaction against modernity, for example, would have to explore romanticism. The
5

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jeffrey c. alexander

The historically specic conicts in which these three answers were

encoded during the 20th century apparently have come to an end.
It seems unlikely that communist and fascist revolutions will rise
again as alternative answers to the question of modernity, at least
in the forms that are horrically familiar to us today.9 But, despite
the escatological expectations of 1989, it has become clear that
the more fundamental arguments over modernity remain. From postmodern nihilism to antimodern fundamentalism, there is still basic
disagreement over the question of modernity, and the radical alternatives to liberal democracy remain robust if less ideologically
coherent.
Eisenstadts sociology allows us to frame this ontological anxiety
of modernity in an historical manner. In his theory of the Axial Age,
he explains that fundamental contradictions are immanent to modernity, tensions that can never be resolved and which take dierent
social forms, depending on the balance of forces at hand.10 These
tensions reach their greatest intensity in the Western modernity,
where this-worldly asceticism rst had its day and profoundly aected
the other civilizations spawned in the axial age. I wish to explore
the results of these tensions in what may be a new take on the issue.
The Axial Age marked a sharp break from the unied cosmos,
or at least from the more incrementally stratied cosmos and social
structure of archaic religious and social life. It established a sharp
and unbridgeable break between the heavenly, ideal world and the
mundane world inhabited by mere human beings. Especially in what
became known as the Western tradition, not only the Judaic-Christian
but also the Greek, this development took especially severe and
radical forms. Rituals were attacked for making things to easy. Salvation
became a serious problem, and grace often an unattainable or at

aesthetic, cognitive, and moral development of romanticism forms the key counterpoint to rationalized modernity. Emerging in late eighteenth and early nineteenth
century literature, music, art, and philosophyfor one of the best general accounts
of this movement, see, e.g., Abrams, (1953)romanticism did not necessarily take
an antidemocratic or anti-Enlightenment form. As Seidman (1983) pointed out,
while Romanticism often opposed hyper or distorted rationalization, it did not
oppose rationality in a broader sense, which would include such themes as expressive individualism, authenticity, creativity, and reciprocity. For this broader argument, see Taylor, (1989).
9
Furet, 1999.
10
Eisenstadt, (1982): 294314. Alexander, (1992): 8594.

the dark side of modernity

175

least unfathomable goal. Human beings were submitted to harsh

judgments from a righteous and wrathful god. Judged by a powerful
and distant god, man learns to judge himself in an equally unforgiving way.11 He must wear Rawls veil of ignorance and submit
to Kants categorical imperative.
The social results of this-worldly asceticism, whether religious or
secular, are there for all to see. The Calvinists created not only capitalism but radical democraciesWalzers revolutionary saints,
Eisenstadts puritan-like Jacobins.12 This duality, with its guilty sense
of obligation to nd grace in this-worldly action, made Westerners
into world transformers, historys greatest empire builders, whose
dominion spread far beyond the West to transform and modernize the entire world.13
For liberal moderns, the tensions and opportunities of Axial civilization continue to mark the vital characteristics of the modern age.
It helps us understand the restlessness that surrounds us, the existential demand for self-examination so that we can act in good faith,
not blaming others by shifting responsibilities away from ourselves.14
It explains the need for continuous discipline and achievement, and
for the feeling that charisma can never be fully institutionalized.15
Grace is available but cant be bottled, even if it can be sold. But
we are not only liberal moderns. There is a persistent unease with
civilization,16 and there are dierent answers, as we have seen, to
the question of modernity rst posed by the Axial Age. There is a
dark spot in Axial Age theory that needs to be pressed much further,
a weakness in the structure and culture of modern societies that has
not been suciently, or systematically, explored.

11

Weber, (1927).
Walzer, 1965; Eisenstadt, 1999a.
13
Eisenstadt, 1987.
14
These quintessentially modern feelings are captured by such terms as ontological anxietyrst employed, in a psychoanalytic version of existentialism, by
Lang (1966) and later by Giddens (1984)and psychological man, which Philip
Rie (1968) developed. The structural status of such anxieties explains why psychotherapy can make a claim to have been the most important and inuential cultural invention of the twentieth century, and why so much contemporary popular
literature is devoted to self-help guides for the perplexed and restless.
15
Eisenstadt, 1995a.
16
Freud, 1961 [1930].
12

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jeffrey c. alexander

I would phrase the question this way. Does the separated ideal
that is posited by the Weberian tradition remain whole and transcendent in the manner that liberal social theory suggests?
Transcendent. The ability to tie the Axial age breakthrough to human
progress, to the institutionalization of principled ethics and democratic reform, rests on the assumption that human beings can tolerate
the tension without inching or backing away. Perhaps this assumption, and this ability, seems obvious enough, but Max Weber himself
expressed doubts.
In Religious Rejections of the World and their Directions, Weber
outlined dierent kinds of ights from the demands of this-worldly
asceticism.17 Each of these eorts undermined the capacity of ethical judgment to exercise compelling moral demands. They undermined dualism, and they provided expressive outlets for symbolic
process that took a mystical form. Weber speaks of aestheticism, of
art for arts sake, which is closely connected to the Nietzschean
rejection of the good for the beautiful and to his attack on the sustainability of modern moral claims. Weber also speaks of eroticism,
demands for impulse release, and romantic love, whether the love
of another or of divine representatives of god.
Weber presents here a range of forces that undermine discipline
and autonomy and tempt moderns into bad faith. They are, in
Fromms words, escapes from freedom.18 There is in the mind of
every modern person the conviction that freedom might be too hard,
too unkind, and too intrinsically fullling. There is some evidence
in Webers writings that he sees this need to escape not merely as
a micro problem, or an incidental one, but as a systemic and dangerous macro-social strain. He speaks, for example, of militarism and
various forms of popular enthusiasm as providing ights from asceticism that are positively sanctioned by society.19 It is this strain in his
theorizing that explains Webers attention to plebiscitarian democracy,

17
Weber, (1946). For a broader discussion of Weber from this point of view,
and a systematic comparison to Sartres dialectic of freedom in Being and Nothingness,
see Alexander, 1988: 185206. In the background to this discussion is Mitzmans
(1970) compelling and original, if also awed interpretive.
18
Erich Fromm, (1941)Fromms work should be seen as part of the dialogue
about the dialectics of rationalization; he was a connected to the Frankfurt school
and a Freudian analyst, as well.
19
For a recent and penetrating study that applies this perspective to contemporary American life, see Gibson, 1994.

the dark side of modernity

177

which oers masses of people the chance to experience the charisma

of the demagogue. Weber saw these modern prophets as distorting
the Hebraic heritage and feared their great potential for wreaking
havoc on the institutions of modern life.
While expressed in this admittedly fragmentary manner, Webers
insights into ights from modernity illuminate how dicult it is to
maintain transcendental abstraction, or moral universalism, in the
modern world. Illustrations of such ight mark modernity from its
beginnings. Consider, for example, the experiments of the Puritan
settlers in early America.20 Despite the fact that their covenant with
God made it formally impossible to know whether or not they were
saved, the Puritans soon found ways. They established the half way
covenant to allow their children to be born into the church, to
achieve election without having to earn it. They allowed good works
to become evidence of good faith, rather than its result. When these
Puritan Americans rst conceived of themselves as Gods chosen people, they conceived this status in the covenantal terms of the ancient
prophets. Yet, it soon became a signal of their having already been
saved. It awarded them a special righteous status that ensured their
own goodness as compared with the faithlessness of others. It is hard
to continually sit in judgment of ones self. It is much easier to
release the tension and embrace the innocence of the already saved.21
Wholeness. The ight from transcendence in modern society is also
connected to the way its regulating ethical structure has been continuously polarized. Righteousness has always been dened in
connection with wickedness. Goodness has been inseparable from evil.22

20

For this framing of the early American experience, see Morgan, (1958) and,
most generally and powerfully, the various works by Perry Miller (1956, 1965, 1967).
One of the great intellectual historians of American history, Millers reections about
grace, salvation, social rationalization, and psychological release form an extraordinary counterpart to Webers sociology. There has even emerged a left-Millerism
that constructs violence less as a deviant than as a deeply institutionalized search
for grace, e.g., Slotkin, (1973) and Gibson, loc. cit. Edward Tiryakian took o from
this Miller tradition in American Studies in his thoughtful and imaginative discussion of the dilemmas of modernity (cite).
21
Both because of the American nations Puritan-Protestant religious core, and
because of the vast inuence of Perry Millers historical framing, the escape from
this-worldly tension and the paths this escape have taken can be seen as a constant
theme in the non-Marxist criticisms that American thinkers have leveled against
themselves and their nation. See, e.g., Riesman (1950), Cherry, (1970), Slater, (1970),
Bellah, (1975) and Bellah et al., (1985).
22
Alexander, 2003.

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jeffrey c. alexander

The fundamental fact of this splitting, of this binary thinking, allows

us to understand the tension relief, the ight from transcendence
that Weber described, in more systematic and theoretically sophisticated ways.
In psychoanalytic terms, this splitting can be understood in terms
of Anna Freuds classical theory of the mechanisms of defense.23
Unable to stand the anxiety entailed by autonomy and self-control,
the ego splits the world and projects the causes of anxiety outside
the self, onto others. The stress and strain are out there, not in here;
we can now defend ourselves against tension by ghting against these
outside threats.
This conceptual language allows us to connect ethical polarization
to the ight from transcendence. But there are other theoretical languages that allow us to explain this process in more sociological
ways. One is through the theory of social closure, which such thinkers
as Dahrendorf, Erikson, Parkin, Brubaker, Lamont, and Giesen have
conceptualized in a more instrumental or more cultural manner.24
Closure theory operationalizes Webers pessimism, via a model of
social organization. Every collectivity demands a boundary, creating
an inside and outside. Closure applies to small groups, such as sects,
but also to larger societies, such as political parties and religions,
and to nation-states and civilizations as well.
Closure theory needs to be culturally expanded. Semiotics shows
that all thinking is binary, that all concepts are dened by their
opposites. The late Durkheim, who inspired Saussure and thereby
fathered semiotics, put a moral and emotional spin on this understanding.25 He conceptualized inside and outside as sacred and profane, as right and left sacred, as pure and the impure. These ideas
were developed by early anthropological theories of pollution and
taboo, then by Caillois and Batailles, and later still by Mary Douglas.
These thinkers demonstrated that pollution and stigma are fundamental processes in social life, even or perhaps especially in its
modern form. This move makes both antagonism and transgression
into fundamental processes of modernity.26

23

Freud, (1936).
Dahrendorf, (1959); Erikson, (1966); Parkin, (1979); Brubaker, (2002); Lamont,
(1982); Giesen, (1998).
25
Alexander, (1988); Alexander and Smith, 2004.
26
Batailles, (1985); Caillois, (1959); Douglas, (1966); Drag Kings at the Totem
24

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179

These lines of organizational and cultural thinking clarify, in a

theoretical rather than empirical manner, why the benecent power
of ideal regulation that the Axial Age introduced, and modernity
promised to perfect, has so continuously been fragmented and brought
down to earth. This declension has been fuelled by the energetic
obsessions of this-worldly asceticism and by the insistent drive to
escape from it. What results is the perversion of the ethical demands
imposed by the Axial Age.
In conclusion, it is because transcendence can be so easily undermined and wholeness so consistently broken that modernism and
barbarism have so often been closely intertwined. We are the righteous ones that God has chosen. They are the evil ones who aict
us, and they are responsible for the troubles we are in today. We
are pure, and they are polluted. We are innocent, and they are
guilty. Our salvation depends, not on regulating our own desires and
actions, but on purifying the outside world of those polluted others.
By destroying them, we can ourselves be saved.
It is no wonder that Gods grace has been so hard to nd in societies that have been formed by this-worldly asceticism. The search
for alternative pathways to (secular) grace has propelled self-defeating
revolutionary experiments, of the left and the right. But it has also
inspired humanizing kinds of mystical ights. Hinduism and Buddhism
have made increasing incursions into the religious life of the Western
educated strata. New Age movements have reversed Webers historical preference for instrumental rationality in a more secular way.
The deep underground spring that feeds this recent outcroppings is
romanticism, which at the very beginnings of industrial society made
its case that moderns should be vessels rather than merely tools of
the divine. From that time on, romanticism, for better and for worse,
has been interlarded with ascetic modernity. The ambition of this
paper has been to explain why.

Ball: The Erotics of Collective Representation in Emile Durkheim and Sigmund

Freud, in Alexander and Smith, loc. cit.

PART TWO

MODERNITY AND PLURALISM

CHAPTER EIGHT

PLURALITIES AND PLURALISMS

Zvi Werblowsky
Plurality designates a factual situation to wit a situation of variety
and diversity as perceived by individuals who collectively perceive
themselves as a distinct group or sub-group vis vis others. Pluralism (in my current usage of the term) refers to an ideological attitude that admits and tolerates, or even arms, plurality as a cultural
and social reality, inevitability or even value. Pluralism in this sense
is, of course, rejected by those who see it as a danger to a desirable, indeed essential, homogeneity, undermining and disintegrating
a real or imagined identity deemed to be not only a social and
psychological necessity but a summum bonum.
Expressing the latter view, T.S. Eliot once noted that a
population should be homogenous . . . where two or more cultures exist
in the same place, they are likely either to be ercely self-conscious
or both to become adulterate. What is still more important is unity of
religious background . . .

This quote could very well have been attributed to a Zionist discoursing on Israel as a Jewish state. However, the idea that a Zionist
could have spoken these words is dispelled once we turn to the continuation of the quote expressed by Eliot which reads:
reasons of race and religion combine to make any large number of
free-thinking Jews undesirable.

The free-thinking Jews mentioned above are apt to act as leaven

or yeast, penetrating, transforming and secularizingwhich are all
tantamount to disintegrating a previously homogenous Christian
society, whereas the orthodox, or at least a denominationally committed Jew, may carry with him the idea of being in a ghetto, residing in the surrounding society, but not of it; unless, the society denes
itself by other means.
The qualifying phrase in the same place which appears in the
rst sentence of the Eliots quote brings to light the issue of extensive

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zvi werblowsky

pluralism, which is (perhaps) unobjectionable, and intensive pluralism, which is only possible within strict limitations. From the latter
perspective, pluralism is, at best, a euphemism for a millet system.
Having said that, I reassure that there is no immediate danger of a
coalition of free-thinking Jews and Palestinian Arabs undermining
the character of the State of Israel, nor, for that matter, is there a
coalition of free-thinking Copts and Muslims threatening the character of Egypt.
There are many kinds of pluralism e.g., external tolerance or even
armation of plural identities vs. the internal intolerance required
to safeguard collective identityor at least a certain conception of
it (as Socrates realized in Athens). These in turn relate to, and are
dened by, a variety of pluralities (ethnicity, historical consciousness, language, religion). Should and can plural entities, rather than
clash and compete for hegemony, co-exist and possibly even enrich
one another (whatever that may mean) without the dissolution of
their individuality which continues to be considered a major value?
Should minority cultures and population-groups (aboriginal tribes,
local dialects, religious sects ancient and modern) be treated as endangered species to be preserved at all cost? In due course we shall
single out religion for closer examination, as its sacrality renders
it a particularly potent identity-marker as well as a test-case for
the theoretical and practical applications of pluralism.
Understandably enough, and almost logically rather than paradoxically, it is precisely the age of globalization that is also the age
of urgent concern with pluralism. The galloping processes unleashed
by the accelerating speed of technical innovation, of which transportation and the near-instantaneous transfer of information are
merely some of the more conspicuous examples, has led to a globalization of economic, political and cultural systems; the origin of
which is in the West and in western hegemony. But there is a
dierence between the endogenous development of western modernity and its reception and absorption, both imitative and ambivalent elsewhere. This also accounts for the initial misconception,
abandoned long ago, that modernization equals non-plural, uniform
westernization. Some forty years or so ago Eisenstadt already told
us to look in the various societies and cultures for the possibility of
the development of parameters of modernity diering from the ones
developed in Europe and not dened by a uniform set of charac-

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teristics or indices and irreversibly moving in the same xed direction. Since then the expression multiple modernities (a truly pluralistic concept!) has become the commonly used word referring to
a series of processes with a common core, generating similar problems to which, however, dierent responses have been and are being
given.
Of the innumerable examples with which I could illustrate my
present argument I shall choose the one to which Eisenstadt has
devoted a monumental study: Japanthe one civilization which
Huntington did not quite know how to classify since it does not
prima facie belong to his China-Islam axis. Japan, as Eisenstadt has
shown in great detail, is a prime example of an old home-truth
which in the Latin middle-ages was rendered quidquid recipitur ad
modum recipientis recipitur. Whatever is received, it is received (we
might also say absorbed) according to the mode of the recipient.
The Jewish philosophers and kabbalists translated hakol ke hamekabbelim. My present tzen (advance eastwarda term used
already in ancient texts for the spread of Buddhism from China and
Korea to Japan) is concerned not so much with modernization as
with another exemplary aspect of the experience of, and reaction to,
massive hegemony on the part of a civilization conscious of its identity, not to say uniqueness. This experience is, of course, not limited to the East. Every group absorbs inuences from outside which
aect and transform it and which, in the process of such adoption,
are themselves adapted and transformed in accordance with what is
supposed to be the receivers basic character. Some would use the
terms culture and civilization to distinguish between the two levels.
(Huntington uses the two terms interchangeably). The Meiji separation of Shinto and Buddhism (shinbutsu bunri) was, as we all know,
an expression not of religious intolerance but of ideologized Nihonism.
Ruthless as it was, the crusade was rather humane. There simply
were too many Buddhists in Japan who could not all be massacred
like the Albigenses in Catholic France, or expelled like the Jews in
Catholic Spain, or persecuted and crucied like Christians in Tokugawa
Japan. If globalisation is associated in the contemporary mind with
the U.S. and symbolized by McDonalds then it may be useful to
remind ourselves that in the pre-global universe of the Japanese the
dominating hegemon, culturally more than economically, was China.
Hence not only the Chinese importation called Buddhism but also

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the Japanese-Confucian (viz. neo-Confucian) symbiosis was repudiated by the School of National Learning and their predecessors as
a foreign corruption of the true Japanese spirit, the yamato damashii.
National Learning (kokugaku) meant authentic Japanese learning
(wagaku). Kangaku (Chinese Learning) could easily be cast in the
role of the main whipping boy and source of all evil as long as
China was politically and culturally dominant. Chinas dramatic
decline and the equally dramatic rise of western inuence, yogaku
(western learning and culture) took the place of kangaku as the
villain of the piece. These ambivalences, of course, are not specically
Japanese. Especially since the 19th century non-western civilizations
(including orthodox Judaism) keep repeating their answer to the Clash
of Civilizations with more or less the same favourite formula: western technology (including nuclear weaponry for Gandhis India)
yes, by all means; western civilizationno! The earlier Japanese
slogan wakonkansai (Japanese spirit and Chinese knowledge) has
now been replaced by wakonyosai (Japanese spirit and western
technology). Theoretically one might interpret this attitude as a
charter for pluralism which, in a global age, should lead to civilizational two-way trac instead of confrontation, were it not for the
shadow of hegemonic dominance blackening the horizon.
Pluralism, as I have said before, implies an existing plurality.
Rapprochement of pluralities requires that each side be sure of its
identity and be unafraid of losing it. Cultural plurality means that
every group has its own denitions of narrower or wider identities
and homogeneities, and of their relation (congruence or dierence)
to other identities. This is a very complex aair and not simply a
matter of inventing (I have deliberately chosen this ambiguous
word because of its original meaning which is nding, discovering) some allegedly trans-cultural and supra-particular common
denominator of valuesfor example the U.N. Bill of Rightsor, in
the case of religions, implying a vague reference to some ultimate
spiritual realityfor example, the by now almost traditional jamborees of world-religions, especially of world religions for peace
or for interfaith dialogue or whatever. Whether held in Assisi (which
is certainly more appealing than the Vatican) or on Mount Hiei.
Every culture has to inventthat is both discover and construct
the nature, character, dynamics and limitations of the pluralisms that
it can advocate or endure.

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Of the factors and elements constituting the identities of the candidates for rapprochement I want to mention, by way of example,
only a few of the better known in order to illustrate how their specic
weight varies from one case to another: historical memory, language,
religion. Religion can function as a major identity-marker also when
initially absorbed from outside but then so thoroughly internalized
as to become an essential part of a groups self-denition. Catholic
Poland, Buddhist Thailand, Sinhalese Sri Lanka and Muslim Malaysia
are cases in point. A conict that is known by religious labels is not
necessarily a religious conict. In Ireland both sides speak the same
language (not Irish!) and the murderous conict in which Catholics
and Protestants are locked is not about the doctrine of the Eucharist
or the status of the Holy Virgin. In Belgium both sides are Catholic
and the conict therefore ostensibly polarizes around language. The
India/Pakistan case cannot, of course, be compared to either Ireland
or Belgium. Often sets of binary opposites coalesce; Canada could
serve as an example. The main sanctuary of France is not the cathedral of Reims or Chartres, not even the Panthon or the Arc de
Triomphe, but the Acadmie Franaise. Switzerland has added a
fourth idiom to its list of national languages and apparently nobody
feels this to be a threat to his Swiss identity. India had good reason
to fear that the imposition of one national language might be
perceived as a particularist hegemonic act jeopardizing a wider
national identity. I am not speaking here of the unique sacrality
inherent in the Hebrew language or, for that matter, in the kotodama of Japanese which makes them dierent from all other languages. When several elements coincide in an identity-marker the
conict can become explosive: Cyprus (Greek/Christian v. Turkish/
Muslim), Sri Lanka (Sinhalese/Buddhist v. Tamili/Hindu) and Israel
Palestinians are alarming examples. The ethnic component is increasingly and indeed frighteningly in the ascendant. Is the state the only
guarantor or even source of unity? I am asking the question not so
much philosophically with a view to William James A Pluralistic
Universe as to Carl Schmitts Staatsethik und pluralistischer Staat.
Basques probably do not object to membership in the European
Union, but they want to do so as Basques and not as Spaniards. A
President of the French Republic exclaimed, nota bene as guest of
the Canadian Government, vive le Qubec libre. There is no
record of his ever having exclaimed, when in France, vive la Corsique

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libre. Globalization is one of the biggest of the currently fashionable big words. One of its oddest manifestations is the multiplication of nation-states in which ethnicity determines geography. Here
is pluralism with a vengeance! The U.N. currently has close to 200
member-statesmost of which share a not unfounded fear of the
hegemony called globalization, though all of them indulge in their
own particular agendas of hegemonic practice.
Let me return, in conclusion, to my earlier, perhaps unduly sarcastic, remarks about the popular jamborees of world-religions and
say a word in praise of religion, especially the so-called universalistic religions and even more especially the bible-derived monotheistic religions. A few weeks ago (2324 September 2003) such a jamboree
took place in Kazakhstan, signicantly titled The Congress of World
and Traditional National Religions. Traditional National (to avoid
the apparently more pejorative tribal) Religions are therefore as
respectable as the universalistic so-called World Religions which,
of course, are traditional too. That is probably why pluralism in
Kazakhstan stopped short of the less traditional so-called new religions. In any case religions and their gods are pluralizable, regionizable, tribalizable, nationalizable. Monotheism is not. The view that
the plurality of manifestations of the cultural phenomenon usually
subsumed under the term religion is ultimately a matter of variations on a common theme may be a perfectly legitimate ideological
position or even theological corollary of the structure of certain religious systems but it is surely incompatible with others. What now?
Should we be satised with distinctions such as aggressive vs. peaceful universalism (e.g., regarding missionary activity), or theoretical vs.
practical intolerance, or perhaps retreat behind a relativism that looks
at all claims to validity revise to: looks at the validity of all claims
whether absolute validity or relative validities or combinations of
bothas a plurality of cultural and religious language-games. This,
of course, would merely be a post-modern version of the jolly old
common denominator game. The study of contemporary religion
is fascinating not least because it seeks to comprehend how religious
cultures, each with its particular and specic claim to validity,
struggle, each in its own way, to invent i.e., to discover, construct
and dene on their own terms, the nature, character, dynamics, theological legitimations as well as immanent limitations of the inescapable
demands of pluralism in a global world. The common denomina-

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tor, at least for some of them, would thus be their openness to what
might be called the pluralist imperative. To the ancient teaser can
tolerance tolerate intolerance? we can now add the question how
much plurality can pluralism bear?

CHAPTER NINE

MULTICULTURALISM REVISITED
Han Entzinger
Cultural diversity and the state
Sociologists and political scientists have long been fascinated by the
way in which public authorities, the state, come to terms with pluriformity. The concept of the modern nation-state nds its roots in
the social contract: the idea that the confrontation of diverging individual and group interests in a society should be regulated by means
of political institutions that acquire their legitimization through democratic decision-making. The genesis of this phenomenon has been
wonderfully described and analyzed in what I think is one of the
jewels of Shmuel Eisenstadts monumental work over the past half
centurythe book Paradoxes of Democracy (Eisenstadt 1999b). It is a
short textalmost an essaybut one that very well reects his profound knowledge and his rich experience in these matters.
One of the main reasons why in the Western world the modern
nation-state was able to develop the way it did, was the sucient
degree of cultural and political homogeneity among individuals and
groups who were part of it. The idea that everyoneor virtually
everyonebelonged to the same nation provided a sense of togetherness and a collective identity, which became stronger than the
divisive forces that equally existed. As the institutions of the nationstates expanded, largely through improved communications and the
development and spreading of educational and social policies, the
sense of togetherness was further reinforced. Those states that included
more than one pre-existing natione.g. Belgium, Switzerland, Canada,
Spainhave more or less successfully learnt how to cope with their
dierences. They usually do so through forms of institutional devolution. Besides, over the years, most modern nation-states have also
come to terms with religion and its potentially divisive power in societies that are not homogeneous in that respect. As Shmuel Eisenstadt
stated, bringing the City of God into the city of man almost by

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denition excludes pluralism. It is that tension that the modern nationstate has been able to overcome, at least seemingly.
Much more recently, the modern nation-state has again been confronted with a potentially divisive phenomenon, which is immigration. It should be stated right away that immigration is not new to
all democratic societies in the world. In certain cases it is even part
of the national ideology. National identity has been constructed
and shaped around immigration in countries such as the USA,
Canada and Australia. However, that does not imply that immigration is unproblematic in those countries. Immigration not only disrupts the existing social, economic and political order, but it also
forces societies to reconstitute their collective identitiesan issue
recently back in the forefront of the social sciences. Nation-states
always look somewhat like gated communities: they are weary of
newcomers, even though they know very well that their future may
depend on them. This weariness is particularly acute when newcomers look dierent and behave dierently, as newcomers often do.
Their initial response is one of exclusion, rather than of inclusion.
Countries that have much more recently been confronted with immigration, particularly those in Western Europeand increasingly also
those in Central Europetend to be even more weary of its consequences. The basic question here is how liberal democratic societies that formally acknowledge cultural pluriformity, actually handle
the increase in pluriformity thatalmost by denitioncomes along
with immigration.
Of course, in our Western societies people are free to organize
themselves on the basis of common interests, and in the majority of
cases this also applies to immigrants. A more pluriform society is
also likely to produce a more pluriform civil society and a more pluriform market. That is not our primary interest here. The idea is
how the state itself comes to terms with plurality, or with multiculturalism, as it is often referred to in the context of immigration. On
the basis of the comparative work carried out by many of our
colleagues and myself on a considerable number of immigration countries in the Western world, it is possible to develop a continuum that
reects the degree of institutionalization of dierence that results
from immigration. On this continuum I distinguish ve positions,
which I shall briey describe.
1. The neutral state, which treats all its citizens in the same way
and considers culture to be a private aair. The Jacobin French tra-

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dition is probably the purest example here: immigrants are welcome,

but in the public sphere they should behave like us (Schnapper,
1994). The strong emphasis on the need for civic integration in the
USA is another example. The democratic institutions and their functioning cannot be disputed, let alone be duplicated in parallel institutions. Immigrants simply have to accept the existing arrangements
as these are, but they are encouraged to participate in those arrangements. Immigrant cultures are banned from public life (this is less
so in the USA than in the classical French tradition), but perfectly
acceptable in private life. Immigrant organizations, however, cannot
be sponsored by the state, since the state is neutral. This approach
is considered to be equally fair to everyone. However, what is often
overlooked is the cultural bias that is almost unavoidably built into
the major mechanisms for selection and attribution in any society.
Such bias tends to favor the mainstream population and to exclude
newcomers.
2. Partly in response to this shortcoming, certain forms of public
recognition of immigrant and minority cultures have developed, thus
enabling these to become institutionalized with some state support.
We distinguish two positions here on our continuum, one of weak
institutionalization or institutionalization with only internal eects,
and one of strong institutionalization, which also has external
eects. Internal institutionalization limits itself in essence to culture in
its strictest sense and to matters immediately related to the cultural
heritage and to cultural peculiarities of an immigrant community.
Public endorsement mainly aims at enabling the community to preserve its specic identity by creating opportunities for sharing and
transmitting (e.g. through the support of ethnic organizations, ethnic newspapers, broadcasting facilities etc.). One step further is to
create opportunities for the transfer of culture to the next generation. A major instrument here is teaching ones mother tongue to
the second generation. This is usually not a problem as long as the
community creates its own facilities, but public support to mothertongue teaching has become a divisive issue in several immigration
countries.
3. The third position is that of external institutionalization. The development of parallel institutions, each based on dierent cultural traditions, may be facilitated or even encouraged here in some of the
major elds of society. This is the classical concept of a plural society, studied by anthropologists in colonial society (e.g. Furnivall 1948).

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In Western societies, such as the Netherlands and Belgium, it has

also become known as pillarisation (or verzuiling) (Lijphart 1975).
During most of the twentieth century, these two countries oered
the most far-reaching examples of institutionalization of parallel, yet
separate interests along the lines of religious or ideological identities.
The dierent communities (Catholics, Protestants, socialists, humanists,
liberals, Jews, etc.) each had their own institutional arrangements in
a variety of social spheres: schools, hospitals, newspapers, trade unions,
broadcasting organizations, sports clubs, etc. Where public support
was at stake, it was meticulously observed that every community
obtained a fair, i.e. a proportional, share of the public funds available. The communities were largely free to decide for themselves
how to spend this public money.1
When pillarised countries were confronted with large-scale immigration, the immediate reex was to add a few new pillars to the
existing pattern. The new communities should be given their own
institutional arrangements as well. This reex was somewhat stronger
in the Netherlands than in Belgium, where the omnipresent rivalry
between the two pre-existing linguistic communities complicated the
institutional accommodation of newcomers. One of the most interesting consequences of institutionalized multiculturalism is that the
Dutch government now nances several scores of Muslim and Hindu
schools in the Netherlands under exactly the same conditions that
apply to Catholic and Protestant schools.
4. A common characteristic of the three positions discussed so far
is that the law is the same for everyone, even though there may be
separate institutional arrangements for certain communities. This is
no longer the case with the fourth position that implies legal pluralism. We do not nd many examples of this in the modern liberal
nation-state, precisely because equality before the law is one of its
most fundamental principles. In imperial and colonial days, by contrast, examples abounded: the Ottoman Empire, for example, had

1
Interestingly, the much-condemned system of apartheid in pre-1994 South Africa
had the same roots as pillarisation: the basically Calvinist idea that communities
who share the same cultural background should be self-governing in as many elds
as possible (sovereignty in ones own circle). The big dierence, however, was
that under apartheid a hierarchy of communities existed: some had more rights and
entitlements than others.

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a variety of legal systems, some of which were territorially based,

but some of which also applied to specic minority communities,
such as Roma, Jews or Muslims. Today we have to look at nonWestern countries to nd examples of ethnically based legal pluralism
(e.g. India, Nigeria or Malaysia). However, certain traces of it may
also be found in the West, particularly in family law and in penal
law. Moroccans, for example, who reside in Western Europe, but
who marry in Moroccoas many of them dowill be married under
Islamic law. Women have fewer rights under that system than under
its Western counterpart, even though the King of Morocco recently
announced some modernization in this respect. A judge in a Western
country is not supposed to apply dierent legal standards to members of dierent communities. However, that same judge has a right
to take account of the suspects cultural origins when establishing
the verdict, as much as that judge has a right to take account of
any other claim in mitigation. This has led to debates in a number
of Western countries on how to deal with honor killings, genital
mutilation and other practices of certain Muslims, which they justify with an appeal on their religious beliefs and traditions (Carens
2000).
5. The fth and most extreme position is self-determination for one
or more cultural communities that live in a given country. Several
examples of more or less successful forms of devolution in multinational Western states were mentioned earlier (e.g. Belgium, Canada).
In the case of recent immigrants, this is not really an option. It
would be too strong a challenge to the unity of the nation-state, as
immigrants also feel loyalty towards another state. This is usually
not the case with regional minorities. Besides, most immigrant communities are too dispersed for this. It is, however, not totally inconceivable. A prerequisite seems to be that immigrant communities rst
turn into national communities. This was the case, for example, with
Jewish or German minorities in several Central European countries.
It is obvious that this will take generations, and it is not very likely
to happen to any of the newly established immigrant communities
in the modern nation-state. It may be a solution for the future of
the Middle East, but as I am not at all an expert on Israeli-Palestinian
relations I will not go any deeper into this. There are also many
risks to this option. The recent history of the former Yugoslavia is
a sad illustration of this. There, self-determination rapidly turned
into ethnic cleansing.

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The ve positions I have just described are far from static. That
is, the positions may remain unchanged, but countries and their policies tend to move along the continuum. Approaches may change as
immigration changes, as governments change, as the economy and
the employment situation change, et cetera. The initial choice of a
country upon its rst confrontation with immigration often tells us
more about that country than about its immigrants. Thus, it is understandable that France opted for the culture is a private aair
approach, while the Netherlands preferred institutionalized multiculturalism. In order to be eective in defending their interests, immigrants should familiarize themselves as much as possible with the
habits of the country where they live and get organized in accordance with the pattern commonly used in that country. In his comparative study on lobbying practices of the Moroccan community in
four dierent European cities, Hassan Bousetta found that in each
case Moroccans were more eective as they adapted themselves
better to local circumstances (Bousetta 2001).
On the whole, it is interesting to observe that the further one goes
North in Europe, the more traces one nds of institutionalized multiculturalism. This is not always because it is the traditional way of
dealing with diversity, as is the case in the Netherlands. The fact
that the North European countries have a particularly strong public sector may equally be of importance. A strong public sector almost
seems an imperative for state supported multiculturalism. Surprisingly,
therefore, institutionalized multiculturalism seems to ourish better
in a welfare state, where opportunities for public intervention tend
to be stronger than in societies where more is being left to private
initiative or the market.
Exploring the limits of multiculturalism
In recent years we have witnessed considerable changes in the way
many countries in Europe are dealing with immigration and its longterm eects. Frances recent struggles with the headscarves indicate
that that country cannot totally ignore the relevance of cultural
dierence, although its traditional ideology points in a dierent direction. The presence of almost ve million Muslims in that country,
the signicant transformations in the banlieues of Paris and other large
cities, simply require certain forms of recognition and acceptance of

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dierence and practically forces the authorities to establish contacts

with community leaders. Germany has woken up from its long
lasting dream of immigration as a temporary phenomenon, and is
now actively promoting integration. Most countries that rst tended
to recognize or even emphasize the merits of cultural diversity have
now begun to stress the need for more unity. Virtually all countries
in Northwestern Europe have now introduced compulsory integration and language courses for some of their newly arriving immigrants (Michalowski 2004). Awareness seems to be growing that
diversity has its limits. Ongoing immigration forces the liberal nationstate to reconsider its mechanisms of incorporation, particularly of
those newcomers whose origins lie in countries that are not liberal
democracies themselves. This phenomenon is not limited to Europe;
we also observe it in Australia and in the USAwhere it has become
even more acute in the aftermath of 9/11. So far, only Canada
seems to be able to escape from it, probably because it has a highly
selective immigration policy, which makes Canada the only OECD
Member State where the level of education goes up as a result of
immigration.
The shift in appreciation of immigration and its ensuing diversity
has become particularly visible in two countries: Denmark and the
Netherlands. Both countries have a strong welfare state tradition.
They used to be very much preoccupied with the material wellbeing of their newcomers. That has changed now: these countries asylum and immigration policies are among the strictest in Europe, and
the pressure for acculturation, if not assimilation, has become much
strongereven though it is not at all clear to what these new immigrants actually have to assimilate. Institutionalized multiculturalism
in Denmark never was very strong, but in the Netherlands it has
come under re, particularly since the brief Pim Fortuyn episode
in Dutch politics, in the politically turbulent year 2002. Yet even
though the current pressure for assimilation may be too strong a
reaction to the leniency of the past, the concept of institutionalized
multiculturalism was equally ill-reected for various reasons. Let me
elaborate ve of these reasons.
1. Institutionalized multiculturalism takes ethnic originor actually nationality in the sense of citizenshipas a master status. This
term was introduced by Hughes (1994) to denote a sociological
marker, so overriding that it rules out all others, including religion,
language et cetera. If ethnic origin is a master status, every immigrant

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is seen primarily as a member of his or her ethnic community

the common term in the Netherlands is ethnic minorityand is
treated accordingly. Already in the 1980s, Robert Miles warned
against the divisive eects that this approach could have on society
as a whole (Miles 1989). Adopting a neo-Marxist perspective, he
claimed that the UK had deliberately racialised or ethnicised immigration, so as to drive a wedge between the established population and
the newcomers. Non-Marxists may also see disadvantages to this
approach. What happens, for example, to those migrants who wish
to leave their community? Moreover, by using the immigrants country of origin as the major criterion for status ascription, enormous
dierences tend to be overlooked, for example in ethnic belonging
(Turks vs. Kurds, Arabs vs. Berber) or in political orientation. In the
early 1990s, for instance, when the world was witnessing how
Yugoslavia fell apart in ethnically based rival states, the Dutch authorities continued to insist that the dierent factions of the Yugoslav
minority in that country co-operate in order to qualify for public
funding. Using ethnic origin as a master status becomes even more
dicult for the second generation. Generally, their identication with
their parents country of origin tends to weaken. In the case of
Muslims, however, we observe a certain shift from a national identication towards an identication with Islam.
2. Institutionalized multiculturalism requires forms of codication
that are often not so easy to achieve. A good example is mothertongue teaching. What, actually, is the mother-tongue of a secondgeneration immigrant child? Is it their parents language, or is it the
local language of the country where that child lives? Many immigrant children master the latter better than the former, though by
no means always perfectly. How to act if the parents native tongue
is not the ocial language of the country of origin, as in the case
of Berbers from Morocco or Algeria, or Kurds from Turkey? Once
this dilemma has been solved, the question arises which books should
be used in mother-tongue lessons. Those of the country of origin,
which may often be hyper-nationalistic and based on completely
dierent teaching methods? Or should special books be developed
for children living in diaspora? If so, given the fact that mothertongue teaching is part of the ocial curriculum, are enough teachers
available who possess the formally required qualications?
Comparable problems may arise in matters related to religion.
Over the years, most liberal democracies in the West have devel-

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oped arrangements regarding the complex relationship between state

and religion. The position of clergymen in public institutions such
as prisons or the army is clear, but can it simply be copied for
imams? Many Muslim communities in Europe are served by imams
from elsewhere, often from the country of origin. Should they be
given the same rights and privileges as Protestant, Catholic or Jewish
clergymen? How to assess the potential risk that their activities may
lead to unwanted forms of foreign involvement?
3. The previous example illustrates that institutionalized multiculturalism generally presupposes a common core. Such a common core
is not always present in the case of immigrants who have recently
settled in another country, particularly not if their presence is seen
as temporary. This has been the case for a large number of newcomers who have migrated to Europe in the past decades. Europes
long-lasting reluctance to recognize their presence as permanent has
contributed to the phenomenon that many migrants who currently
live in Europe hesitate to identify with their country of residence. A
survey, which I carried out with two colleagues among youngsters
of Turkish and Moroccan origin living in Rotterdam, indicated that
four out of ve of these youngsters identied themselves primarily
or exclusively as Turks or Moroccans (Phalet et al. 2000; Entzinger
2003a). Only 22 per cent of the Moroccans and 16 per cent of the
Turks in our sample considered themselves both Moroccan/Turkish
and Dutch, and a mere 2 per cent of both groups identied themselves primarily as Dutch. Thus, identication with the Netherlands
as a nation proved to be very limited. Both groups, however, identied
signicantly more strongly with Rotterdam as a city.
This, however, does not seem to be a good starting-point for institutionalized multiculturalism, which requires a common basis for
understanding. Traditionally, multiculturalist societies almost tacitly
assumed the exclusive loyalty of their members to the society of
which they were a part. In Dutch pillarisation this loyalty has been
epitomized by a common language, a shared national tradition and
shared symbols. Institutionalized multiculturalism becomes much more
problematic if the minorities concerned lack a sucient degree of
identication with the nation-state that actually grants these facilities
to them. Under such circumstances it can easily lead to exclusion,
possibly even with silent approval by either side. The receiving society then sees multiculturalism an instrument for keeping the newcomers in its margins. By doing so, it can avoid conict or postpone

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the need for acceptance and change. This situation may legitimize
the country of origin in its eorts to exercise political and other
inuences on its diaspora citizens. Of course, in todays globalizing
world we are getting increasingly familiar with transnationalism, a
phenomenon that has become quite popular in certain academic
circles (Portes et al. 1999; Vertovec & Cohen 1999; Faist 2000).
Migrants can indeed identify and have contacts with more than one
country at a time. However, an almost complete avoidance of contacts with the receiving society, as is the case for certain immigrants
in Europe, forces that society to reconsider its diversity policies.
4. A fourth reason why institutionalized multiculturalism has been
losing ground is its growing complexity as immigration continues and
becomes more diverse, and as the number of immigrant communities grows. It may be feasible to set up arrangements of the types
discussed earlier for four or ve communities, but it becomes much
more complex if their numbers increase further. Besides, many groups
are too small and too much dispersed to create a sound basis for
own institutional provisions. This is a strong conceptual dierence
with classical Dutch pillarisationas described by Lijphart (1975)
where the various groups needed one another in order to reach compromises and to create majorities. At the national level, todays
immigrant communities simply are too small for that, and therefore
not suciently relevant. Only in larger metropolitan areas with substantial immigrant or ethnic minority populations, in Europe and
elsewhere, can we observe that ethnicity or immigrant status continues to play a role in the forging of alliances and in local policymaking. This phenomenon was rst analyzed and described for New
York City by Nathan Glazer and Daniel Moynihan in their classical Beyond the Melting Pot (Glazer & Moynihan 1963).
5. Perhaps the most important objection against institutionalized
multiculturalism is that it insuciently accounts for shifts that take
place in immigrants cultural orientation. Every social anthropologist knows
that identities are dynamic, dened as they are by the surrounding
conditions. This is even more so for migrant identities. There is overwhelming research evidence that migrants identities and their orientations change as time goes by. For those who are familiar with
one of Shmuel Eisenstadts earliest works The Absorption of Immigrants,
this is not new (Eisenstadt 1954). In that work, still a classic in
migration studies, he analyzed the sequence of the adaptation process
of newcomers to Israel, in which he found a number of regularities.

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Times may have changed since 1954. However, even in times of

increased globalization, the average immigrant still does acculturate
to and integrate into his or her new society, even though that does
not necessarily imply a complete loss of the initial cultural identity.
Pretending that immigrant cultures, or any culture, can remain
unchanged is simply false. Such ideas needlessly fossilize cultures,
and therefore tend to exclude their bearers from their environment,
rather than to include them.
Alternatives to multiculturalism
Our preceding exploration of the limits and the limitations of institutionalized multiculturalism leaves us with the question about possible alternatives. Nathan Glazer, co-author of Beyond the Melting Pot
(1963), in which he and Daniel Moynihan analyzed the relevance
of cultural diversity, published another book with an equally catchy
title in 1997, called We are all multiculturalists now. The message of
that book is that, as we have all become multiculturalists, multiculturalism has become meaningless. And indeed, in recent years the
academic as well as the public debate in several immigration countries at either side of the Atlantic has been shifting back towards
assimilation. Herbert Gans (1997) tried to achieve a Reconciliation
between Assimilation and Pluralism. Rogers Brubaker (2003) even
speaks about The Return of Assimilation?, although still with a question
mark.
In politics as well, the current trend seems to favor unity over
diversity. That trend began well before the events of 9/11 and the
increased eorts by many countries to fence themselves o from
unwanted foreign inuences. The debate may be on Leitkultur, as in
Germany, on headscarves, as in France, on bilingualism, as in the
United States, on the national curriculum, as in Britain, or on mandatory integration courses, as in the Netherlands. The heart of the
matter is that more pressure is being put on immigrants to identify
with their country of residence, its culture, heritage and basic values
(Entzinger 2003b). Many politicians and their followers see this as
a necessary condition for maintaining a sucient degree of cohesion
and solidarity in a society. Some of them even use old-fashioned
nationalist rhetoric to underline their views. The question is, of course,
how far a liberal democracy can go in requiring its newcomers to

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adapt to its basic values, particularly those that are not codied in
legislation. To what extent can this approach be reconciled with freedom of religion, and also with other freedoms and rights to which
anyone, including migrants, is entitled in a liberal society?
My personal viewpoint of this is that any society, including immigrant societies, must require from its members a certain degree of
identication with a common core. But, in the footsteps of Habermas
and Parekh, I shall not go any further than advocating a sucient
degree of what the former calls Verfassungpatriottismus (constitutional
patriotism), and the latter calls civic assimilation. (Habermas 1995;
Parekh 2000). Newcomers may be required to identify unconditionally with the public sector and its institutions, even though these are
not totally unchangeable. Newcomers may be forced to comply with
the demands of these institutions, among which the law has a very
prominent place. Otherwise, they must be free to preserve their own
heritage and their own ties and connections, if they wish to do so.
At most, the public authorities may have a facilitating role in these
matters.
This approach leaves more room for individual and group dierences
in the private sphere than in the public sphere. Of course, this will
produce social and cultural tensions and clashes of the types described,
inter alia, by Carens (2000). However, the essence of a liberal-democratic system is that it must give room to divergent ideas and divergent behavior up to the point where these actively seek to overthrow
the system. This is by no means always the case in situations of cultural pluriformity. Flexibility and a great capacity for absorption have
always been dominant characteristics of our Western, strongly individualist cultures.
To illustrate this last point I once more quote some of the results
of our survey of Rotterdam youngsters (Phalet et al. 2000; Entzinger
2003a). It is remarkable how strongly both native and immigrant
youngsters are aware of dierences between the public and the private spheres, and of the fact that dierent attitudes may prevail in
each of these. In the public sphere 80 per cent of the Moroccans
and 75 per cent of the Turks were convinced that integration should
be the rule. They showed themselves willing to adapt to the rules
of Dutch society, basically on the condition that the Dutch would
accept them as fellow-citizens. By contrast, in the private sphere this
readiness to adapt was only expressed by 35 per cent of the Moroccans
and 32 per cent of the Turks. The Dutch control group, asked about

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their views on these matters, showed a similar pattern, although those

in favor of immigrant adaptation were far more numerous: 94 per
cent in the public sphere, and 57 per cent in the private sphere.
However, the remaining 43 per cent of the Dutch youngsters we
interviewed still felt that immigrants should be free to preserve their
own cultural identity in the private sphere.
To what extent do these opinions reect reality? If we look at the
degree of endorsement for values that dominate the public sphere,
such as respect for democracy, for freedom, for plurality, for dierence,
for individualism or for equality, dierences between the three groups
in our research are indeed quite small. Those dierences that do
emerge tend to disappear as the educational level goes up, and as
the length of residence increases. Apparently, these two factors encourage the youngsters to familiarize themselves with attitudes that dominate in Dutch society. In the private sphere, however, attitudes dier
considerably between the Dutch and the immigrants. First, we found
striking dierences in the role of religion in private life. The vast
majority of our Turkish and Moroccan respondents called themselves
Muslims, even though only half of them actually claim to observe
the basic rules of Islam. The role of religion proved to be far less
signicant for our Dutch respondents. Secondly, the idea that others,
in particular the parents, should have a say in the choice of a marriage partner is much more widespread among Turks and Moroccan
youngsters than among their Dutch counterparts. Likewise, attitudes
regarding ethical matters such as abortion, euthanasia and the acceptance of homosexuality strongly dier between immigrants and Dutch.
It is interesting to observe how skillfully many immigrant youngsters
are able in everyday life to reconcile their more liberal interpretation of public values with a more conservative interpretation of those
in the private sphere. This is particularly true for young women
who, in doing so, often serve as cultural brokers between their
parents and the outside world of life in Rotterdam.
Our research illustrates once more that the public and the private spheres may be distinguished from one another, but not always
separated. Future dilemmas and confrontations in our increasingly
multicultural societies will primarily become manifest in areas where
these two spheres meet (Walzer 1997). Answers to such challenges
will have to be formulated at the individual and at the institutional
levels. This will continue to lead to conict; a multicultural society
without conicts is unthinkable. One easy answer to such conicts

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seems to institutionalize cultural dierence. As we have seen in this

chapter, this clearly has its limits. Another easy answer is to force
newcomers to assimilate to mainstream values. Such an approach
tends to undermine the basic principles of a liberal democracy.
Between these two lies a dicult road that combines the need for
clearly dening the conditions for immigrant adaptation with the
need for a lasting acceptance of cultural dierence. Globalization,
continuing immigration and growing transnationalism will force us
to explore that road much more actively.

CHAPTER TEN

ETHNIC REVIVAL AND RELIGIOUS REVIVAL IN

PROVIDENTIAL DEMOCRACIES
Dominique Schnapper
The conception of modern society as one which tends to be bureaucratic, peaceful and rational has been radically called into question
by the witnessing of the revolutions and wars of the twentieth century, yet the debate about the element of rationality and the element of political passions or ethnic-religious emotions in modern
democratic societies continues. No one has contributed to the development of this discussion as much as Shmuel Eisenstadt. In this
chapter I pay homage to him through a discussion of political modernity and the principle of citizenship.
In a previous article, I discussed the theories of sociologists who
aimed to understand ethnic and religious revival in modern democratic societies by grouping their ideas in terms of theories of survival and theories of compensation (Schnapper, 1993). For authors
concerned with the rst group of theories, whose thought has
dominated sociology for a long time, modern societies have undergone a progressive phase of rationalization which paralleled a receding of religious life and the weakening inuence of the religious on
collective life. Similarly, ethnic aliations progressively weakened as
the process of nation building developed. So, in a more or less clear
manner, it was argued that religion and ethnic aliations were incompatible with modern society, which had embarked on a process of
rationalization. Thinkers inuenced by Marxism, American theorists
of assimilation, sociologists of development or sociologists of nationbuildingfrom dierent premisesconverged in seeing religious and
ethnic phenomena as surviving elements essentially. To summarize
their conclusions, we can cite the following statement: Ethnicity is
one of the forms of Gemeinschaft that has survived (underlined by me)
in a rationalized, bureaucratised society (Greeley, 1972: 27). I contrasted these survival theories with those more recent theories which
focused on the notion of compensation in the face of the modern

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project of rationalization. Observing the ethnic and religious revival,

sociologists drew on the ideas of Max Weber, who demonstrated the
structural irrationality of the world which had become disenchanted
with rationality. Far from being simple surviving phenomena, religious and ethnic renewal could be analyzed as the products of modernity, linked to the eternal desire of human beings to give sense to
their experience in the face of evil and misfortune.
I would like to develop these analyses in the light of the knowledge and reections which have accumulated over the last ten years.
It seems clearer to me today that the survival theories, which imply
a programmed withering away of ethnic-religious identications are
obviously unsatisfactory. On the one hand, we can only note that
these identications and the passions that they create, far from burning themselves out over time with the spread of the democratic
principle, seem on the contrary to be multiplying and arming themselves in a more striking manner. On the other hand, the revival
movements are not only the domain of those social groups and movements which are pre-modern or marginal, but rather of those social
groups which participate the most actively in the economic and political aspects of modernity. Compensation theories therefore appear
more fruitful, in that they show successfully that the ethnic and religious revival movements are products of modernity itself.
Yet the term compensation seems to me today to be too marked
by psychology and, above all, the analysis in terms of product of modernity requires further elaboration. I would therefore like to understand
this double revival process and develop the idea of a link between
modernity and religious and ethnic renewal through a sociological
analysis of contemporary democratization. I would like to argue that,
in transforming itself as a result of the democratic dynamic
(Schnapper, 2002), the so-called classical citizenship (Schnapper,
1994) tends to encourage the emergence of ethnic and religious
revivala phenomenon which invites us to reect on the future of
democracies.
Citizenship as a rational project or the pre-eminence of the civic principle
Citizenship has become such a fashionable term, politically and
scientically, that it has lost some of its real sense and by extension
has been diluted in meaning. I would therefore like to return to

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what seems to me to be essential in what we now call classic

citizenship.
Citizenship has a legal sensea range of rights and responsibilitiesbut it is rst and foremost a principle of political legitimacy.
Citizens are not only subjects of law and rights; each one of them
is a holder of an element of political legitimacy. It is the whole body
of citizens, constituted in a political collectivity, or in a community
of citizens, which, through elections, choose their governors, and
then check and sanction their actions. It is the whole body of citizens which is the source of power and which legitimates the execution of government decisions. The governed acknowledge that they
must obey the orders of the governors because they chose those who
give them orders and therefore they remain under their control. This
is what is meant by well-known expressions such as the citizen is
king or the citizen is sovereign. Modern democratic society is
self-constituted; it generates its own legitimacy and no longer draws
on any exterior legitimacy.
Citizenship is also the source of social fabric. In modern democratic
society, the ties that exist between individuals are no longer religious
or dynastic, they are political. Co-existence no longer implies sharing
the same religion, being subjects of the same monarch, or being subjected to the same authority. It implies being citizens of the same
political organization. Modern democratic societys founding principle is to integrate populations through citizenship: by going beyond
their diversity and transcending their dierences.
It is this notion of the transcendence of all particularism which is at
the heart of the citizenship idea. To go back to Article 3 of the
French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789, constituted as a nation, individuals act in the public space not as concrete individuals who bring with them their historical or social
characteristics, but as citizens. This is why they become citizens,
regardless of their historical or religious specicities. The new principle of legitimacy, declared in America and France at the end of
the eighteenth century, armed civil, legal and political equality for
individuals who were diverse in their ethnic-religious origins and
unequal in social terms. Despite the prejudice of the period, in
France, citizenship was extended to Jews in September 1791, only
a short while after the declaration of the new principle of citizenship. The new political organization was based on the philosophical
conception inherited from the Enlightenment that individuals were

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able to distance themselves, at least partially, from their roots and

enter the public space and communicate with others. Man could
cease being the simple product of his belonging to a real group. His
humanity was dened precisely by his ability to break with the determinations which would restrict him to a culture and a destiny imposed
by birth. This humanity was dened by his ability to free himself
from prescribed roles.
Citizenship not only implies the transcendence of particularisms;
it is also founded on the sovereignty of the individual-citizen. This
constitutes one of the tensions of the democratic principle. The tension between the transcendence of particularisms and that of the
sovereignty of the individual can be broken down into three dimensions: the tension between the universal project of citizenship, its
open principles, and the reality of particularisms; the tension between
the necessary social order and human emotions; the tension between
the principle of individual autonomy and the participation of individuals in collective life.
The principle of citizenship is based on a dual historical separation: that of the political from the religious, and that of the ethnic
from the civic. It is based on the growing autonomy of diverse aspects
of social life. More precisely, it is founded on the elaboration of a
civic order as a mode of transcending the ethnic and religious
aliations and passions; that is, emotional identications shared by
particular historical collectivities (collectivits historiques) (Schnapper,
1998: 75). Citizenship was established against the simultaneously
inclusive and exclusive passions linked to the identication of individuals with historical collectivities, which are both ethnic and religious, or ethnic-religious (Schnapper, 1993).
Sociological enquiry has shown, through the study of inter-ethnic
relations, the limits of this process of rationalization in human relations. The very object of studyinter-ethnic relationswould not
even exist if democratic societies fully respected the principle of
citizenship which they claim is theirs. And yet the history of democracies reveals the serious breach of the citizenship principle. We can
evoke what was for a long time perceived as the black problem
in the United States. The history of slavery continues today to aect
relations between those who are socially perceived as Black or
African-American and other Americans, although the universality
of citizenship and equality of their civic rights were declared following the Civil War. The status of Jews in the France of October

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1940 also demonstrates how the most established principles remain

fragile and that it was thus possible to exclude a part of the population from the body of citizens, to the indierence of the majority
of the population, traumatized as they were by the defeat. Colonial
society is another example. It was founded on the legal inequality
of its composing members, although modern democratic legitimacy
implies the accordance of civil, political and legal equality to all.
This is how that legal monstrosity developed, namely the accordance
of nationality without citizenship rights. In 1862, the Court of Algiers
declared that although French, the native was not a citizen. As
one jurist noted: Common citizenship should have led to universal
surage and above all, a single electoral college, with no distinction
between citizens concerning the exercise of their public rights
(Luchaire, cited in Emeri and Zyllerberg, 1991: 135). In colonized
Algeria, full citizenship and its logical consequencethe single electoral collegewas only accorded in 1958, just before the disappearance of a colonial society, undermined by its own contradictions.
In addition to these breaches of the citizenship principle, breaches
that re-occurred on numerous occasions in history, we cannot help
but observe the persistence of identications even within the most
established democracies. The idea of citizenship is certainly founded
on the principle of equality between rational and free beings according to the expression used by Eric Weil as regards natural law, yet
it is clear that it is never actually realized according to such terms.
To argue that citizenship has been realized in this way would amount
to a confusion of the principle or rationale of political organization
and historical reality. The nation is itself a particularism. Being part
of a national society is based on all sorts of particular and particularizing elements, which we can qualify as ethnic: the practice of
a common language (apart from a few exceptional cases), the sharing
by all nationals of a common culture and a singular history, participation in common institutions, whether this concerns school or
the workplace, as well as more strictly political practices. The immediate familiarity that develops between nationals, regardless of the
dierences which distinguish them, is the product of the specic
socialization and a shared experience within a given national society.
Every individual is normally attached to his/her familiar environment
within which, s/he has developed his/her individual identity, linked
to a collective identity. Each individual regards his/her nation and
personal specicities as one of the dimensions of his/her own identity.

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The abstraction and rationality of citizenship cannot, alone, organize democratic society. On its own, the civic principle is not sucient
to allow individuals to live togetherindividuals who need to share
a culture, values and emotions in order to make a society. Democratic
societies cannot only be civic. They are also inevitably and simultaneously ethnic (in the sense of a shared history, be it real or
invented, a shared culture and a common project) and civic
(Schnapper 1994). The specicity of a society organized according
to the principle of citizenship as opposed to other modes of political organization is that the values and institutions of citizenship must,
in the nal analysis, prevail over ethnic or religious particularism,
and over domestic and clan-like solidarities.
Furthermore, the French Revolution demonstrated insuciency of
Reason in regards to the organization of social life. The revolutionaries opposed to the pre-modern world a Reason which was
neither rational nor controlled, but just as zealous as the religious
zeal it was supposed to surpass. The People and the Homeland took
the place of God as objects of identication which, from then on,
were seen as spontaneous. The zeal of individuals in the name of
Reason was no less zealous than their ethnic-religious identications.
In addition, passions are neither necessarily exclusive nor condemnable. It is inevitable and perhaps even desirable to develop
holistic values when they do not contradict common values. As Louis
Dumont argued, the art of politics also involves bending the law,
or rather adding to it secondary elements, which if applied without
limitation, would contradict the original spirit of the law (Dumont
1991: 270). And as Todorov has also pointed out: Demanding equal
legal rights for all does not in any way imply a renunciation of a
hierarchy of values; cherishing the autonomy and freedom of individuals does not oblige us to reject all sense of solidarity (Todorov,
1989: 436).
Should we therefore conclude that the eects of citizenship on the
dierent forms of social life are limited because of the limits of human
rationality, and that the rise of ethnic, religious or ethnic-religious
forms that we are observing today reect the insuciency of rationality in its attempt to respond to the need for shared emotion and
explanation of individual and collective misfortunes which the premodern ethnic-religious world provided?
This interpretation is based on the notion that only rationality can

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characterize modern society. If citizenship emerged out of rationality

alone, then the theories of survival or compensation would eectively
fully take into account the persistence of ethnic and religious revival.
Since humans are not only rational animals, revivals would emerge,
on the one hand, because the past never totally disappears, and on
the other hand, because modern societies only tend to be bureaucratic
and rationalized (survival theories) and because rationality alone
does not respond to the human need to construct metaphysical meaning out of evil and misfortune (theories of compensation). Yet this
explanation seems to me to be insucient, because it does not throw
light onto the utopian or Promethean character of citizenship.
Citizenship as utopia or the refusal of all limits
Rationality is not the only characteristic of citizenship. It also involves
an indissolubly utopian dimension. It is certainly utopian to establish as the principle of legitimacy and as the objective of social organization, the freedom and the legal and political equality of diverse
and unequal individuals. Yet, despite this principle or this utopia,
like all human societies, democracies impose certain constraints, which,
by denition, limit the freedom of everyone; they also remain hierarchical and as a result, curtail the equality of all.
Citizenship goes against nature; its principles are contradicted by
daily social experience. It is possible for everyone to observe that
certain individuals are more equal than others as the well-known
phrase states. Declared equality is often scorned. As a result, does this
not then create the return of the repressed, leading to a situation
where passions and emotions linked to ethnic-religious identications
become reinforced? Does not the utopian character of citizenship
run the risk of causing even more damage than the acknowledged
and institutionalized inequality of the pre-modern social order? Here
we recognize the theory of racism proposed by Louis Dumont.
According to Dumont, in declaring the equality of circumstances, by
eliminating the dierences of status and by not acknowledging the
very real inequalities, modern societies generate a perverse eect
which gives rise to racism. Hierarchy which is unacknowledged by
the declared principles of social order always runs the risk of resurgence, and like all things repressed, its resurgence takes on the pathological and hideous form of racism.

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Without taking this analysis to its logical conclusion, one can argue
that the utopian nature of the society of citizens, allied with the
Promethean project of mastering the natural world through scientic
and technical progress, explains the refusal of all limits which characterizes democracy today. Ill just briey give some examples: the
refusal of limits in the denition of the political body, and as regards
the material and moral well-being of individuals, reticence regarding
the acceptance of a limit to the age of procreation, reticence regarding
the acceptance of adversity, old age and deatheverything which
conditions the human condition.
The dynamic of democracy rst of all exercised its inuence on
the denition of the political body. As we know, after having declared
the universality of the citizen, the revolutionaries of 1791 in France
then proceeded to exclude a whole series of categories of the
population from active citizenship. The poor, indigenous peoples
of the colonies, women, and young people only possessed the rights
of passive citizens. The history of universal surage reveals the
potentially universal vocation of citizenship. Indeed, the above categories of the population were gradually accorded citizenship rights
in the name of the universal values of the Revolution: the poor, and
the indigenous peoples in 1848, women in 1944, young people aged
between 18 and 21 and the newly naturalized in 1974. It was in
the name of universal principles that the colonized peoples demanded
the citizenship rights that the colonizers had declared, but then
reserved for themselves alone. There is an internal dynamic within
democracy, which tends, in accordance with its own values, to enlarge
the political body.
Today, when it would seem that universal surage has been established, three great debates are raging as to the legal limits that still
aect the denition of the political body. The rst of these debates
concerns children. At what age do they really become full citizens?
Up until what age is it legitimate not to accord children the right
to vote, although they are subject to the constraints of the political
order? Some argue that the vote should be accorded at 16 years of
age, or even earlier, as soon as they are obliged to exercise a certain amount of responsibility, be it civil, penal or nancial. The
second area of debate is expressed through the theories of those who
argue in favor of citizenship rights based on residence. According to
those in favor of residence-based citizenship, the exclusion of nonnationals from strictly political practice (the right to vote and to be

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elected), whilst they already benet from equal economic and social
rights, contradicts democratic values, since through their very presence
or residence, foreign nationals are an integral part of the national
society. In other words, imposing nationality as the pre-requisite for
citizenship is regarded as illegitimate. It is argued that citizenship
rights should be automatically granted to all those residing on the
national territory, and some even argue that citizenship rights should
be accorded to those who are illegally resident. Finally, at the instigation of international activists who defend the political rights of
animals, a third debate is developing around the Great Ape project.
This debate, although somewhat absent in France, is very active in
the Anglophone world. These thinkers argue that it is in keeping
with democratic values, that the Great Apes (orangutans, chimpanzees,
gorillas), which share most of their genetic capital with humans and,
like humans, are subject to the consequences of political decisions
in the human societies in which they live, should be accorded political
rights. These thinkers adopt similar positions to the advocates of
deep ecology who argue in favor of according rights to the natural
world. The debates around these theories illustrate the weakening of
the frontier between human beings, dened by their freedom and
responsibility, and animalsa barrier established by Christian tradition and humanist thought. This push to extend the limits of the
political body continues to develop, thus demonstrating the force of
the democratic dynamic. A book which was recently translated into
many European languages over the last few yearsthus revealing
the vast interest in the questiongives us another almost caricaturelike example. The book is entitled Towards a General Democracy: Direct,
Economic, Ecological and Social Democracy. Indeed, the title is explicit; it
is in favor of what we can call total democracy, a democracy that
knows no limits or bounds.1
The contemporary development of social rights in particular reects
the democratic ambition to guarantee concrete equality for all. The
development of the welfare state, which was fully established at the
end of the Second World War in liberal Europe is the instrument
of social rights. The term welfare state should not be limited to
its strict or classic sense, that is, implying the protection of individuals against disease, old age, family dependency, unemployment, nor

Fotopoulous, 2002, See p. 8, pp. 1314 and p. 189.

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should it only be understood in terms of assistance to the poorest

and most marginalized members of society. This original welfare
state, which progressively developed since the mid-nineteenth century onwards and which was consolidated in the aftermath of the
Second World War, is now just one of the dimensions of collective
intervention. The contemporary state, which we can call providential,
is now expected to guarantee everyones security, education, cultural
and sports education and even recognize specic cultural identities.
It is constantly extending its interventions in order to respond to the
needs of individuals. We are aware of the considerable growth in
the amount of money targeted at education through the school and
university system in the widest sense (including specialized and
vocational training as well as continuing education). Likewise, we are
also aware of the growing budget dedicated to so-called cultural
olicy, which, in France,2 is initiated by the Ministry of Culture (this
policy is known to have obtained up to 1% of the whole governmental budget) and increasingly devolved and developed by local
authorities. What we can call the sports welfare state is no less negligible in size, since in France, the ministers aim to obtain a budget
which comprises 0.5% of the total state budget and the local authorities are increasingly organizing and nancing sporting practice at
all levels, through the recruitment of professional sports coaches,
qualied organizers and specialized civil servants.
State intervention is also developing in what we can call the domain
of ethnic identities. It is in this spirit that ocial multicultural policies have been adopted for example in Canada and Australia, both
of which are countries which have received mass immigration. These
policies involve the transfer of a part of the countrys collective
resources so as to ensure the survival of the so-called cultures of
origin of the migrants, thanks to ethnicity administrators: social
workers, translators, specialized teachers, cultural association coordinators and media presenters. In France, the principle of Republican
universalism, which voluntarily ignores all ethnic categories, in theory, opposes the adoption of multicultural policy. However, for the
last two or three years, the increasing ethnicization of public
policy has in fact been developing, under the guise of geographical

2
This phenomenon concerns all European countries, but it is the most developed and theorized in France.

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and social criteria. Hence successive Town Policies have been adopted
over the past twenty years in order to: (1) re-dynamise the poorest
neighborhoods, where the population of foreign origin makes up the
majority of inhabitants, and (2) encourage the integration of these
inhabitants. In the same vein, there is the Education Action Zone
policy (ZEP), involving the accordance of greater funds to schools
in these neighborhoodsa measure which would be described as a
multicultural policy in other countries. In all cases, it is a question
of trying to dene new categories of the population who continue
to be dened in social or geographical termsbut which crudely
correspond to ethnicised categories due to the spatial concentration
of these populationsand allowing them to benet from the transfer of a part of the collective resources, so as to re-establish or
guarantee concrete equality for all.
This is the reason why the welfare state decit is not solely linked
to the economic and nancial crisis. Rather, it is a structural decit.
By denition, the need for security, well-being and equality are
indenite and self-perpetuating as societies transform. Individuals
demands become more and more pressing as they are given satisfaction. This phenomenon is illustrated by the new professions that
are constantly being invented in order to respond to growing demands
and which go as far as to include domestic pets, who have now
become the objects of medical care. The welfare state feeds dissatisfaction because the response to demands is always delayed and
the resources are by denition limited, unlike the unlimited number
of demands.
This desire to guarantee real equalityto use the classic Marxist
opposition between formal and real freedom and equalityhas
the eect of particularizing the states actions. The state decides
which new categories of the population are to benet from a new,
specially designed policy. In the face of the ever-growing demands,
the state responds by ever-more specic measures in order to guarantee more security, more well-being for individuals and greater
equality for all. As a result, state intervention increases and becomes
increasingly specic, and so entrenched that it is not easily reversed.
A section of society becomes welfar-ised, or providential; that is,
it becomes linked to the intervention of the welfare state and its
inevitable bureaucratization.
A nal illustration of the refusal of limits as regards the human
condition: the cult of the body, sporting success, youth and health,

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all of which have become the most important values in democratic

societies; the desire of certain women to bear children after the
natural age of procreation; the refusal of misfortune and hardship
which leads to the use of euphemisms (visually-challenged for the
blind, physically-challenged for the handicapped, people of
reduced height for dwarves); the diculty that democratic society
has in according elderly people a place in society, often resulting in
their marginalization in specialized institutions; the dismay that death
produces regardless of the age when it occursall these phenomena
give us ample examples of this refusal to accept the limits of the
human condition. Democratic modernity sets itself the goal of realizing the Promethean task of overcoming nature and prolonging
human life, thanks to the remarkable advances of science and technical exploits. Democratic society is a society of performance.
The utopia that is fed by democracy is non transcendental. It
aects concrete and everyday life experience; its logic is immediate
in nature. In welfare democracy or providential democracy, each
individuals search for comfort without limitsphysical, mental, intellectual and in terms of identitytends to become the main objective
and legitimacy of social organization, to the point where it becomes
possible to conjugate two seemingly opposite principlestotal liberty
with total protection.3 The democratic individual favors concrete immediacy at the expense of any sort of transcendence, accords legitimacy
neither to tradition nor transmission, and does not aim to construct
a future project in the name of an Idea. Democratic individuals are
unwilling to die for God, nor for the Homeland.
Ethnic-religious emotion in providential democracies
If the sprit of most humans were focused on the search for material goods, one might expect a prodigious reaction in the soul of
some men . . . I would be surprised if amongst a people solely preoccupied with its well-being, mysticism did not make some headway. (Tocqueville 1840, t. 3, 2me partie, chap. 12). The positivism
of the democratic utopia puts up little resistance to the development

Upon arrival in the West, the Soviet writer, Boukovski, argued that what he
had before him was an adolescent society searching to accumulate contradictory
advantages.

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217

of human emotions and human questioning of the ultimate meaning

of human life.
The unlimited vocation of the democratic process and the deceptions that are inevitably fed by a project which is at once utopian
and concrete, leads to the emergence of passions, emotions and
identications of a religious and ethnic nature, the forms of which
are new. We cannot understand the renewal of ethnic-religious identities solely through survival theories, which imply that these identities are destined to disappear as democracy inuences forms of social
life. We cannot understand this renewal only through a theorization
of the compensation of an excessive rationalization of modern society, because this society is not only rational; it is utopian as well.
We should understand ethnic revival and religious revival on the one
hand, in terms of the process of rationalization and on the other
hand, in terms of the utopian ambition of democratic society which
is intimately connected to this process.
The refusal of all limits, added to the demands for concrete and
immediate results, inevitably leads to dissatisfaction and disappointment. The democratic individual cannot help but observe that his/her
aspirations for security and an ever-greater material and mental wellbeing has its limits. Given the ambivalence of the notion itself, highlighted by philosophers ever since Aristotle, the desire for equality
cannot be wholly satised. The passion for equality engenders in
individuals a sense of failure, envy and even resentment. This is all
the more the case as the pre-eminence accorded to the individual
over the collective means that the search for ones authenticity
becomes a value of utmost importance. Everything that characterizes
the individual becomes highly valuable and merits respect. But doesnt the aspiration for equality by contemporary homo democraticus, coupled with the search for authenticity, tend to undermine the principle
of the transcendence of particularisms, which is at the very basis of
citizenship?
Religious and ethnic identications are spontaneous and democratic institutions can but recognize them, even if this recognition
entails their control so that the identication of some individuals does
not threaten the equally legitimate identications of others. Democratic
order therefore necessarily implies that religious and political institutions organize the transcendence of ethnic, religious or ethnic-religious particularisms. The religious institutions on the one hand, and on the
other hand, the political institutions which organize representation

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dominique schnapper

(party membership, electoral participation, the activities of parties,

parliamentary practice etc.) have the function of controlling identication and ethnic-religious emotions. The tensions between the
rational control of the religious and political institutions and spontaneous outbreak of emotion; between the individuals desire for wellbeing and the conditions that govern the latters participation in
collective life, have indeed, been managed or regulated by the
institutions, which in the French tradition are known as the institutions of the Republic, that is, the institutions of what is now dened
as classic citizenship. The Republicans directly reproduced the
model of regulation of beliefs and practices that were guaranteed by
the ecclesiastic institution. Civic morals were directly borrowed from
the catechism; the work of the schoolteachers, by extending it, replaced
that of the parish clergy; the hierarchy of the state was modeled on
that of the Catholic Church. With the establishment of providential democracy, the individual becomes central, particularist identications tend to take precedence over universalist aspirations; the
expression of shared emotion is valued over self-control; church and
democratic institutions are weakened by systematic or radical criticism. Since the individual-citizen is the source of political legitimacy,
he/she is highly unlikely to accept institutional legitimacy in the
name of tradition. The individual-citizen grants him/herself the
absolute right to criticize the very notion of institutions.
A consequence of this is the emergence of religious and ethnic
revival movements whose common feature is the rejection of all forms
of institutionalization and the adoption of forms which are at once
emotional and freein a sort of marketplace for all beliefs and
identications, where each individual can freely choose what suits
him/her. Several sociologists have analyzed these phenomena in
terms of New Religious Movements (see for example Champion and
Hervieu-Lger, 1990). When the legitimacy of the notion of transmission is contested, individuals reconstruct the ties which they choose
or invent, in the religious, family or political domain. It is once again
their well-being that individuals are seeking when they develop
original, individual and temporary stances with regards to religious
belief or when they invent equally individual and temporary collective historically-based identitiesregardless of whether these are real
or imagined identities. Many sociologists celebrate this invention of
ties between free and equal individuals (Singly, 2003), but it would
be foolhardy to forget that this possibility is reserved for those who

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219

have economic, cultural and social resources, i.e., for those who actually have an ability to create ties out of individualism. We should
not forget that strong institutions protect the most vulnerable and
the weakest members of society.
These spontaneous and immediate references to beliefs and historical collectivities challenge the institutions of the community of
citizens. As a result of its own internal dynamic, democratic aspiration runs the risk of undermining its own legitimacy. By increasingly
recognizing ethnic-religious particularisms in the public space, by
legitimating the outbreak of spontaneous emotion at the expense of
institutional control, by challenging the political and religious institutions inherited from the past, democratic practice weakens common
institutions and the control they once exercised over human zeal and
emotion. The civic is a principle of inclusion, even if in reality, it
inevitably has its limits. On the other hand, ethnic-religious belonging
is a principle of exclusion, even if it can in reality be corrected and
amended. The very principle of the society of citizens implies a
society which is open to all those who are able to participate in
political life. A society which is organized around the principle of
citizenship is, by denition, more open to others than communities
which are dened in religious, cultural or historical terms. All national
organizations envisage the foreign nationals right to gain access to
the political community, as long as a certain number of conditions
xed by the state are respected. It is possible to obtain French, Swiss
or German nationality through naturalization, even if the conditions
imposed on the candidate dier in each case. On the contrary, one
belongs to the Corsican people by birth; one does not become
Corsican. Moreover, if Corsica were to become a sovereign nation,
it would not be able to envisage the legal and administrative means
by which certain individuals would be able to obtain Corsican nationality. Rabbis render entry into the Jewish community as it is dened
by religious tradition, dicult. However, the state of Israel has admitted as Israeli citizens, a large number of individuals who are not
Jewish, or who would not be recognized as Jewish by rabbinical
courts.
To what extent is it feasible to institutionally recognize specic
identities without calling into question the shared public domain
where, within a given nation-state, individuals who identify with particular historical communities, can live together thanks to the rules
of citizenship? To what extent can historical or religious multicul-

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turalism be recognized in the public domain without compromising

the values of a common project? In terms of classic citizenship,
the answer is clear. If the cultural specicities of certain groups are
compatible with the demands of a common existence and collective
valuesthat is, the freedom and equality of allcitizens and legally
resident foreigners are entitled to cultivate their specicities in their
private and social lives, as long as the norms of public order are
respected. This right is guaranteed by the principle of the rule of
law and modern democracy. However, these specicities should not
form the basis of a particular political identity, recognized as such
in the public space, which should remain common to all, thanks to
the practices and the language of citizenship.
Today, the thinkers of a moderate or controlled communitarianism
and those Republicans who are sensitive to liberal values, theorize
ways to take into account the democratically-informed objective
which allows all individuals to develop their abilities and project
themselves as authentic. But how is it possible to reconcile the
equality of the citizen and the recognition of cultural diversity within
political institutions? Even if individual identity is eectively inseparable from collective identities, this does not mean that these identities should be recognized in the public domain. It is important to
deal with these problems not only in philosophical or sentimental
terms, but in terms of social and political institutions which allow
us to concretely ask how institutionally i.e. by what institutions, rights
and liberties, which are an absolute imperative, can be reconciled
with identity-fuelled demands.
Whatever conditions govern the recognition of cultural rights, the
legal recognition of particularisms in eect runs the risk of provoking
a process of endless claims. On what basis is it possible to recognize the usage of language in the public spaceArabic, for example, instead of Chinese? Or giving privilege to one of the types of
Breton over another? Why accord cultural rights to certain historical groups and not to others? On which criteria of justice can such
decisions be based? The logic of particularism has, at its ultimate
end, the individual. If it is consecrated by the political institution
of cultural rights, social pluralismwhich is both an inevitable
and desirable aspect of democratic societiescould lead to political
inequality. The danger of social fragmentation within democratic
societies becomes accentuated in a context where the rules of the
market and democratic individualism lead everyone to cultivate ones

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221

own personality. It is not possible to give an example of a modern

society, which through its institutional recognition of cultural pluralism, has not induced social and political pluralism.
Once democratic values encourage tolerance vis--vis everyones
search for ones own authenticity, and once the democratic individuals criticize the institutions which used to manage the dierences
and particularisms through a sphere of common citizenship, the question of how people can live together is inevitably raised. Accepting
the expressions of authenticity made by each individual or group
runs the risk of undermining the citizenship principle, which necessarily implies the transcendence of particularisms through the establishment of common institutions. If the church no longer governs
manifestations of faith and if the Republicin French political
vocabularyor citizenship is no longer able to impose the transcendence of particularisms and ethnic-religious emotions and identications, are we not witness to a double deregulation of what was
once guaranteed by the church and the laws of the Republic (Hervieu
Lger, 1997)? And yet, isnt it necessary to cultivate strong institutions capable of both managing the tensions inherent to the democratic order as well as protecting societys most vulnerable members?
Doesnt this double deregulation of religious and political institutions constitute a risk for the democratic project itself, as well as
for the future of democracies?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

DOUBTS ABOUT PLURALISM

Ralf Dahrendorf
A recurring topos of Shmuel Eisenstadts analyses of the civilisation
of modernity is the distinction between pluralistic and totalistic
modernities. The central focus of the dichotomy between totalising
and pluralistic visions has been that between the view which accepts
the distinctiveness of dierent values and rationalities as against the
view which conates such dierent values and above all dierent
rationalities in a totalistic way. And again: The central focus of
these tensions in the realm of political discourse of modernity was
that between on the one hand the acceptance of the legitimacy of
plurality of discrete individual and group interests, and of dierent
conceptions of the common will, of the freedom to pursue such
interests and conceptions, and on the other hand of totalising
orientations which denied the legitimacy of private interests and of
dierent conceptions of the common good and which emphasised
the totalistic reconstruction of society through political actions.
Einsenstadt is nothing if not subtle, and it is therefore a gross
simplication to say that he likes the pluralistic and dislikes the
totalising modernities. Still it is probably true to say that in the sociopolitical discourse since, say, 1945, pluralism was generally regarded
as desirable, as a condition of the liberal order to which we aspire,
or should aspire, whereas totalising tendencies end up in totalitarianism with its destruction of liberty and human dignity. As an inveterate defender of Enlightenment values, of the open society and the
constitution of liberty, I must therefore tread carefully as I raise one
or two questions about the orthodoxy.
Let me begin at the most dicult end of the issue, that of totalising modernity. As one reads Eisenstadt, one is struck by a possibly deliberated ambiguity between two kinds of such totalisation, one
technocratic and the other, emotional. At one point he contrasts
the pluralists Montaigne and Erasmus with the totalising vision of
reason promulgated by Descartes. Elsewhere however he refers to

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the collectivist features of totalising visions, of their emotional

quality, their tendency to conate the secular and the religious. The
same ambiguity spoilt, in my view, the otherwise powerful end of
the rst volume of Karl Poppers Open Society where the philosopher
seems to conate the rigid control system of a totalitarian order and
what he calls the return to the tribe, that is to essentially premodern relations of status rather than contract. It is true that the Nazis
have used tribal language and premodern images of blood and soil
to camouage the ruthless organisation of all subjects just as the
abuse of religion of modern-type total power in present-day fundamentalist movements is camouage. Ernest Gellners deconstruction
of versions of nationalism has made this point forcefully and
eectively: contemporary nationalisms are for the most part not the
return of primordial allegiance but the deliberate use of a language
of solidarity for the mobilisation of people by ruthless modern leaders.
My own preference would be for using the terminology of closed,
or totalitarian societies strictly for modern techniques of exercising
power without checks and balances. This would enable us to study
ideologies as elements of a superstructure invoked to serve those in
power rather than as causes of totalisation. It is in other words
not variants of Islam which bring about anti-Western mobilisation
but such mobilisation which invokes variants of Islam for its purposes. This approach would then allow us to think without prejudice about the role of substantive values and beliefs in free societies.
Community and religion, family and status group need not be
denounced from the outset for their totalising potential. They, and
other communities of values, can be examined as possible answers
to those questions of belonging which do not seem to go away even
in the most rmly anchored liberal order. They are in fact the core
of the doubts about pluralism to which I now turn.
Living with diversity is one of the great achievements of the
modern civilisation in its liberal guise. Yet, it is in fact a much older
project. Did not Aristotle state that from those who are entirely
alike no polity can be built? The heterogeneous nation-state, nonetheless, is a modern phenomenon. At its best it manages to unite
people of dierent creeds, cultures and ethnic origins under one
constitution. In that sense it is the application of the pluralist vision.
But as we look around the world, we do not nd many examples
of truly heterogeneous nation-states. The United States of America
provided an example of sorts, but it took the country a long time

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225

and much violent conictto come to terms with its minorities and
today Arthur Schlesinger is not the only one to note the disuniting
of America. Switzerland is perhaps an example, but one may well
doubt whether it can be described as a nation-state. Israel is in some
ways an example, but only within the common assumptions of the
varied Jewish communities gathered in this country.
Sometimes I feel that the only real example of a truly heterogeneous liberal community is London whose nearly ten million citizens are as varied as one can imagine. But in London too we nd
one feature which I believe is almost generally characteristic of pluralist arrangements: In the public sphere London is a successful
community of many cultures; but the nearer one gets to the personal sphere, the more separate its cultural communities remain.
Jewish Finchley and Bangladeshi Tower Hamlets, West Indian Brixton
and Indian pockets in many places are clearly recognizable and
unmistakably dierent from each other. There is a plural input into
the common sphere, but at the same time a plurality of separate
cultural spheres.
In the 1960s, some of us fought a losing battle against the slogan, separate but equal. We thought that this was not enough.
Equality was only the beginning of a process which we thought would
end up with total intermixture, e pluribus unum in an almost biological
sense. Today, after the experience of armative action and race riots
in European cities and numerous small and not so small clashes of
civilizations, one is tempted to say that separate but equal is in
many cases the best we can hope for. Pluralism will not mean a
blending of cultures but a clearly delineated toleration of dierences
as long as certain common public rules are accepted. Pluralism fails
to create unity. Above all it fails to create a sense of belonging which
is so important for people. It is one of those abstract ideals which
engage the heads but not the hearts of people.
The consequences of such pluralism without integration are quite
serious. The rules of public life are barely sucient to hold communities together. The groups involved are themselves not static
either in numbers or in aspirations. Demography plays a part:
Catholics, or Palestinians, or immigrantsit is saidhave more
children and will soon try to dominate the rest by the sheer weight
of their numbers. The result is conict, hidden at rst, then occasionally explosive, and potentially leading to deep cleavages bordering
on divisive civil wars. Where this is not the case, the demand for

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rigid proportionality is never far. In earlier days, the Dutch called

this process, verzuiling, the creation of pillars which could not be
moved, pillars of culture the strength of which is dened by the size
of groups. Armative action may have had a benevolent purpose
when it was rst introduced, but if every fth professor has to be
black, and every local government electoral state include a proportion of Asians or whatever, societies freeze and cease to be creative
and open for change.
Is there no other way to deal with plurality, and notably with a
diversity of cultures? What about the good old values of toleration,
of leaving diverse individuals and groups free to do their own thing?
Is there not such a thing as active tolerance, an attitude of acceptance and engagement with respect to a plurality of cultures? And
might this not be the answer to the emotional gap left by the principle of living in a separate but equal condition?
Perhaps this is the case, but as we think it through we soon
encounter another doubt about pluralism, which arises from what
might be described as the post-modern fallacy. You cannot build a
civil and civilised society on the principle that anything goes.
Pluralism as an active project of toleration and freedom has to be
bounded somehow. The other day (on 21 October 2003) the House
of Lords had a debate on one of its favourite, if quaint and somewhat esoteric subjects, hunting with dogs. In the middle of dreary
speeches, a respected young Labour peer of Pakistani extraction, a
television producer who is openly gay, Lord Alli, got up and made
a dramatic speech not so much in defence of hunting as in defence
of pluralism and toleration.
Freedom, in my view, is a precious thing. You have to want freedom very, very badly. You have to want freedom badly enough to
allow two men to walk down a road, holding hands and kissing.
You have to want freedom badly enough to watch British Muslims
burn a Union ag. You have to want freedom badly enough to allow
people to get onto horses and hunt.
The house was impressed. In the end an alliance of libertarians
like Lord Alliand myself, hereditary peers attached to the traditional hunt, and mere opponents of government defeated the proposed ban. Yet Lord Allis powerful words also raise questions. How
about burning the ag? The symbolic value of the Union Jack is
not as great as that of the Stars and Stripes in the US; but it is still
a symbol of the constitution which must surely override the sectional

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227

interests of the plurality. And how about the two men holding hands?
Yes, they should be allowed to do so, but must they do it while
walking down a road, that is in public? Is it not one necessary condition of an eective pluralist society that some of the diversity is
displayed only in private?
Above all: what exactly holds a society for which freedom is precious and which therefore accepts plurality in the preferences of its
members together? How does it avoid self-destruction by the gradual
slide from pluralism to anomy? How does it dene the boundaries
within which plurality becomes fruitful without closing itself o from
the unceasing exploration of new horizons?
Shmuel Einsenstadts analyses are sustained by an impressive developmental optimism. For him, the imagination of societies is virtually
unlimited. If problems such as those of pluralism arise, something
new will be invented, and this will still be a version of modernity.
In all societies these attempts at interpreting modernity are continually changing under the impact of changing historical forces,
giving rise to new movements that will come, in time, to reinterpret
yet again the meaning of modernity. There are truly multiple
modernities including de-Westernised ones which are not only
viable but acceptable.
If this sweeping view of comparative civilizations leaves the Westerner
a little breathless, and one remains nearer home in ones analysis of
the contradictions of modernity, the key question remains unresolved:
How can we avoid the two risks of pluralism, that of tenuous verzuiling,
of separateness without centre, and that of total uidity, of a world
in which anything goes? This is where the distinction between
pluralistic and totalistic modernities ceases to be helpful, because
it fails to enable us to answer the question of the basis of solidarity
in pluralistic societies. A set of dominant values and concomitant
institutions is needed to make diversity fruitful and avoid the twin
risks of anarchy and anomy.
This is of course an old subject, and historical societies have found
a number of answers to the issue. In the case of the United States
what Tocqueville identied as civic religion had and continues to
have a strong binding force. In the case of Britain, the much-maligned
class system served to uphold a sense of dominant values by which
all tended to abide. The same may also be true for countries like
Sweden, though there it is less agrantly based on social class. All
these historical ligatures however have been under pressure for some

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time. The result has been a sense of confusion and dissolution, and
coupled with it, a growing readiness to embrace totalising substitutes
for the loss of benign sources of solidarity. Versions of fundamentalism have often taken the place of traditional linkages.
Liberal alternatives are not easy to nd. Jrgen Habermas has
long advocated what he calls (with a term borrowed from the conservative publicist Dolf Sternberger) constitutional patriotism as a
source of solidarity in pluralist societies. Unless this assumes some
of the features of a civic religion, as it used to in the United States,
it seems a strangely abstract project. This is even more the case if
one follows the more recent attempt by Habermas and others to
apply such sentiments to Europe, the European Union. Some of the
exaggerated hopes of intellectuals in the so-called European constitutionit is in fact merely a treaty between stateshave to do with
the search for an identity which creates a sense of solidarity. In the
light of day however this is a very long way away if it is ever to be
a realistic prospect.
My own preferences are of a more traditional kind. When John
Stuart Mill talked about nationality as a denition of the political
space within which a hundred owers can blossom, he had in mind
sets of values associated with what we loosely call countries. To be
sure, it is hard to contradict Eisenstadt and others when they point
out that the nation-state has lost some of its charm and much of its
power in an age of globalization; but it is still there, and it is still
the most eective space for the liberal order to ourish. Larger spaces
of action are diuse and removed from checks and balances, and
smaller ones have a built-in totalizing tendency.
Beyond the nation-state, I would be more reluctant than Shmuel
Eisenstadt to allow Western values to be submerged in an ocean of
multiple modernities. De-Westernization is more often than not deliberalization. The enlightened belief in the responsible use of reason, and the institutions which go with the acceptance of the basic
uncertainty of the human condition, are quite a good guide to a
world in which pluralism is contained without totalising risks. It may
not be enough to return to Kant and further to Hume, but it is a
good beginning.

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE END OF THE SOCIAL

Alain Touraine
It seems at the outset somewhat meaningless to speak about the end
of the social. Are we becoming pure individuals, determined by
our innate characteristics, by the inuences which we have received
and by the shape of the advertising and propaganda which imposes
choices on us? Should we even admit that there is no longer any
marked dierence between poor and rich, women and men? Obviously,
expressions of this type are meaningless and we are constantly appealing to sociological knowledge to help us get rid of a purely universalistic and individualistic vision of our behavior. This vision seems
to us to contradict our real-life experience which accords so much
importance to the various social circles to which we belong, to our
profession, to the language we use and to our levels of income and
education. This practical experience of sociology is reinforced by the
knowledge that we have of the extension of the interventions of society on its own working and its changes. More information, more
demands and more resources have meant that policies concerning
urban planning, education, labor, employment, etc. have increasingly
modied our surroundings so much, so that today society spontaneously appears to us as the outcome of social policies, plans and
projects which link social life and political action and which have
rapidly caused the geographical or historical determinants of the
forms of collective life to disappear.
We could continue with observations of this type but they are so
elementary that there is no point in so doing. My only aim here is
to avoid a misunderstanding: the title of this chapter, and this must
be clear from the outset, is not proclaiming that I wish to introduce
a new form of moralism and to attempt to discover the non-social
determinants of social action. In fact, the idea I present here is very
dierent. Some societies see themselves as acting on themselves
through specically social categories; we are accustomed to using
categories like classes, norms, institutions and socialization. However,

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we are not unaware of the fact that other societies have used concepts of another sort, in particular political ones, to do the same
task. The rst centuries of modernity were dominated by the use of
political categories and the main elds of analysis were the formation of absolute monarchiesafter that of the city-statesthen the
appearance of nation-states, rst in the Netherlands and in Great
Britain, then later in the British colonies in America when they
gained their independence, and above all in France at the time of
the Revolution. All these political changes have been of major importance. For a long time, our vision of society was shaped on the basis
of political terms and analyses. And since our representation of social
life has not always been social, why should we not wonder today
if this social vision is not beginning to disappear or even whether
it has not already been replaced by another vision? But before making
a judgment about the disappearance of this social representation of
society, we ought to specify the content of this vision. It is primarily dened by recourse to the idea of society, which is not merely
a means of describing a concrete entitywe talk about English society in 1900but also a principle for evaluating Good and Evil, as
a principle of denition of values, norms and forms of authority:
anything which reinforces society, its integration, its capacity to act
upon itself and also to adapt to necessary changes, is good; anything
which undermines this integration, increases its internal conicts and
renders most social relations unmanageable, is bad. This concept of
society is based on notions of institutions and socialization: institutions give legal shape to the treatment of a number of important
social functions and are also responsible for enforcing respect for
established norms. The word socialization has been used to speak
of all forms of education, which implied that the aims of education,
at school or in the family, were eectively to train citizens and
workers. This is an indication of the extent to which the idea of
society has really been the keystone of the whole social representation of social life.
The concept of society is so strong that good sociologists attempt
to restrict its applications rather than to extend them. It is indeed
tempting to consider that all the aspects of a concrete society,
historically and geographically dened, form a system, fullling positive or negative functions for society. In fact, many sociologists have
recalled, quite correctly, that phenomena which were very dierent
in kind, and had little relation to one another, could be juxtaposed

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231

in the same space and time. Marxist sociology has pushed the idea
of society to the extreme by giving an unlimited power of explanation to the idea of capitalism, dened in terms of social relationships
of production, class domination and the subordination of all aspects
of social life to the domination of prot and its beneciaries. We
are still living, in part at least, in a period of post-Marxism in which
we are oered key principles of explanation which are social in
nature and eectively account for a great variety of observable phenomena. The most important example of this post-Marxism today
is provided by radical, particularly American, feminism, of which the
most outstanding analyses endeavor to show that all the categories
concerning women and sexual behavior have been constructed to
provide monopoly to heterosexual relations in which women are
dominated.
The only powerful enemy of the idea of society has been that of
rationalization, that is to say, the triumph of reason. Today, like
yesterday, many defend the idea that human beings act, both individually and collectively, in function of the rational pursuit of their
interests and that social organization calls on increasing rationality
which can be seen both in the use of new technologies and in the
capacity to forecast consumer behavior. But this sort of vision, which
has many practical applications, cannot be easily applied to the population and social organization as a whole. A great deal is said about
the irrationality of the working classes, the bureaucratic routine and
the lack of long-term perspectives for small entrepreneurs or farmers to explain the non-rational aspects of a society. These limits of
a rationalist vision are so powerful that sociology, based on the idea
of society, has always been critical of its optimism and the simplistic nature of this elementary form of utilitarianism. The inadequacies so frequently mentioned of a purely economistic representation
of social behavior have led most sociologists to prefer analyses loaded
with subjective meanings and references to norms and values. This
social representation of society, which corresponds to what we call
sociology or, at least, classical sociology, cannot be identied with a
political position. Nor is it enough to oppose conservatives to radicals or communitarians to liberals.
Firstly, because terms of this sort always have a very restricted
geographical sphere of application: whoever seems a moderate in
Buenos Aires is considered a radical in Boston and a conservative
in Berlin. In fact, by far the majority of sociologists lie within a

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political arena which is fairly well dened by the central importance

given to the concept of society. It is dicult to imagine a Nazi or
Stalinist sociologist and almost impossible to imagine a racist sociologist because, in all cases, the individuals in question would have
to give up what constitutes for the others their denition as sociologists. It is true that a certain number of sociologists have been
members of the communist party, but their membership was almost
always short-lived and without inuence. Specic historical situations,
like the anti-fascist struggle in Europe and in North America may
have pushed some sociologists and intellectuals in general to identify with a vision of the world which was more political than specically
sociological, but none of that lasted very long; whereas the distance
separating Parsons or Weber from Durkheim or Bauman is limited
if we bear in mind the confrontations which have torn the world
apart over more than one hundred years. Sociology has been constructed on an image of society which has had diculty in understanding the most extreme behavior whether good and bad, but has
maintained almost constantly certain criteria for the professional
evaluation of their own work. It would be easy to pursue at length
this evocation of a past which is still to a large extent present and
which some think will reappear practically unchanged in our intellectual future. But I have said enough in defense of the unity of
sociology and also to dene it as a certain way of constructing and
representing social reality based on specically social rather than
political or religious categories. My aim is not to criticize sociology
or to accuse it of having neglected or under-estimated certain aspects
of social life or of having put too much trust in most of its institutions. I have not borne a negative judgment on classical sociology,
any more than I have on political philosophy, as it has developed
from Machiavelli and Thomas More to Tocqueville and John Stuart
Mill. To avoid getting myself involved in an almost endless critical
overview, I have contented myself with indicating the clarity of the
move from a political conception to a social conception of social
life and of stressing the strong unity of the intellectual sphere thus
created. The question which I would like to ask is: has this social
representation of societysociologycome to the end of its history
and do we see the emergence of another image of social life? Or,
on the contrary, are we witnessing an increasing fragmentation of
studies on social life, which means that today we search in vain for
an overall denition of sociology or of what is going to replace it?

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The justication for asking such a wide-ranging question is the

experience that we all have of the over-spilling or the weakening of
an image of society acting on itself, in function of its interests, its
orientations and its resources. We have to take note of the presence
of such large-scale phenomena and trends which are so undeniable
that each on its own is enough to seriously undermine sociology as
it has been dened here. A few words suce to describe this destruction of what was the sphere of sociological thought. On one hand,
there has been an increase in importance of the economic and technological factors which are not socially controlled and which disrupt
social life. From the post-war period until recently, we have gone
from a period dominated by state interventionism to a period in
which markets, nancial and commercial networks, etc. predominate.
Concomitantly, we are seeing a mobilization of beliefs, religious
powers and political-religious demands which exceed what can be
managed by the institutionalized mechanisms for change. The social
sphere tends to disappear somewhere between the economic world
and the cultural universe, interests and beliefs.
We must eliminate the idea that one side represents reason, markets and liberalism and the other an identity often associated with
a nation, an ethnic group or a religion. It is wiser to nd in each
actor the contradictory presence of these two orientations, neither of
which is capable of elaborating the social mediations, institutional or
representative rules which would enable the dual aspect of his or
her behavior to be integrated. Even if it is an over-simplistic manner
of speaking, we could say that today the United States is at one and
the same time the main purveyor of scientic and technical progress
and of nationalism and religious fundamentalism, the most extreme
belief of which is the one which the new conservative ideologists
have formulated into a unilateralism which breaks with the previous
thesis of globalization. On the other hand, the Islamic movement is
impelled by a strong demand for identity, but it often uses nancial
resources which come primarily from oil and which enable countries which are not, in fact, very developed to intervene at world
level.
The fact is that social groups are aected by the decline of the
social frame of reference. Those who speak of desocialization base
what they say on good arguments because all forms of socialization,
ranging from the family to neighborhood groups, are seriously
weakened and, at the same time, norms are disappearing and mass

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culture leaves little possibility to those who wish to impose their point
of view. At the level of personal life, this desocialization often takes
the form of frequent breaks in occupational life which, for many,
consists of a haphazard series of temporary jobs, part-time contracts
or unemployment.
How can we dene ourselves as social actors when our main concern has become to defend ourselves, and our loved ones, against
the misfortunes, crises and catastrophes which can hit us unavoidably
without warning? In fact, the forces which seem to command the
world today can no longer be dened in social terms. The best example is that of money, and in particular of the market; the second is
war, including the monopoly of information and forecasting. The
world which we refer to as social, of which we were attempting to
understand the norms and the procedures, as much to criticize as
to adopt them, seems to be drifting and even disintegrating, torn
between money and war. We could call societies today post-social,
meaning they no longer have internal control over themselves. One
could, for example, imagine speaking about Israel in these terms, a
country founded on a set of collective goals and development projects, a capacity for the integration of newcomers, with scientic
amenities of the highest level and which is dragged by the weight
of war towards situations, conicts and policies which are very far
from the still recent model of construction of the State of Israel.
This remark is even more appropriate for the Palestinians whose
national construction is still in the making and marked by the violence done to them. The eorts to construct a Palestinian society
seem to be constantly overwhelmed and destroyed by being dragged
into war and by the desire of some to ght to the death. When all
that is destroyed, the sphere of sociology, like that of social life, quite
simply disappears. At a much less dramatic level, how can we fail
to see in many parts of the world, the disappearance of what can
be called an economic system? In many countries, domestic production represents a very small percentage of national income. The
main components are the money sent back by emigrants, foreign
subsidies, smuggling and tracking in arms and in drugs. Only
recently the idea that a country could be dened without reference
to its production, its forms of labor and its social relationships of
production, corresponds to real cases. The situation has changed
rapidly and we may indeed ask whether rises in productivity and
the possibility of obtaining a high standard of living in return for a

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limited number of hours of labor would not give more decisive importance to the market and to war than to production and distribution.
In other words, are post-social societies not dominated by violence?
It is however impossible for us to wholly indulge in this type
of vision of the planet at the beginning of the century and the
millennium, for while the forces of death and speculation are powerful, it is not true that the lives of human beings, even those who
live in the worst conditions, can be reduced to the domination exercised by non-controllable forces. Politics have not disappeared, quite
the contrary. In contrast with the rst image which we have just
evoked, it is the extension of the public space which is the easiest
to see. The public sphere formed at the time of the bourgeoisie, particularly in the eighteenth century, was overtaken in the nineteenth
century by the elections and by information and education processes
which involved an increasingly large proportion and nally by far
the majority of the population. Today, we live in a society which
we refer to, quite correctly, as a society of mass communication, and
behind the parties and trade unions which are in decline, associations and NGOs have sprung up, forming what we call rather strangely
civil society, whereas it is in fact a question of a new level, much
broader than the previous ones, of political life. We are all concerned by what is going on in the whole world, from events in our
private lives to the catastrophes and hopes which deeply aect the
population as a whole. Thus political and social facts are visible
everywhere in such a way as to constantly occupy our attention.
However, the world of information and communication remains
relatively external to each of us; that is to say, we do not perceive
our world, our environment and our own existence in political and
social terms. These terms are present in the world of television which,
it is true, has an important place in our lives, but we participate in
it as consumers. Television does not construct our world; it distributes images to us that most of us accept willingly but only in so far
as we do not feel involved. We receive the programs; we do not
create them and if we choose them in function of our demands for
a specic type of consumption, we do not exercise, or at least not
directly, an inuence on the programs.
Should we then content ourselves with this dual image of our postsocial world: the alliance of money and power on one hand; and,
on the other hand, the ubiquitous presence of mass communication
which constructs a world of entertainment around us, but which in

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no way provides us with a mode of construction of our own experience, since the programs from which we have to choose have no
direct reference to our personal life?
Finally, the third component of our experience: the private sphere,
which can also be known as beliefs, culture, passions and anything
which is primarily dened by its non-social content. This world of
private beliefs is not determined in social terms any more than is
the world of the market, of war or of the mass media. In the private sphere, individuals are no longer confronted with anything other
than themselves and their lives can no longer be expressed in any
other terms than those of their experience, which is the denition
of private life. This denition is both weak and strong. It is strong
because the private sphere not only resists by defending itself against
the most brutal forces, but because it occupies all the space which
used to be that of social statuses and roles. But, once again, is it
possible to conceive of a construction of the social sphere on the
basis of the private sphere? Or must we accept in its entirety the
conclusion already envisaged: the complete disappearance of the personal subject, both social and political or even religious, that is to
say, of any principle of organization and representation of social life
or, if we can use this expression, of any subject for itself?
It is impossible to accept this type of conclusion, particularly for
those who have studied collective action and conscience. We must
therefore endeavor to pierce the mystery of private sphere, to nd
there something other than the gaze of self upon itself. There are,
in the private sphere, requirements which are produced by political
or social pressures. The appeal to private life, to a subject oriented
toward itself, is not an expression of weakness but of strength, not
of ight but of positive initiative. What each individual seeks in his
private life is not the trace of past social or political life, which has
been erased; it is the means for a fragmented subject to resist all
the forms of domination and all the languages which have become
restrictive and meaningless. Because we no longer nd any support
around us for the required reconstruction of the sphere of community life, we appeal to what does seem to us essential to defend: pure
interiority, concern for oneself, resorting to all forms of behavior
which bring us back to ourselves, instead of distancing us even further.
We nd similar approaches in all the previous models of struggle
against dependency: the appeal to the nation against the king, to
workers against the employer, etc. An active attitude which implies

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our hope in our possibility to limit the hold of the external world
on us and, inversely, our capacity to construct, in the outside world,
bases of support, forces of organization and communication, institutions and training methods, which reinforce the free subject. This
theme can be easily developed: the subject is the central reference
by which we resist the environment and construct a mode of
evaluation and judgment capable of guiding our behavior.
But we must waste no time in considering this a libertarian form
of protest, like that of a solitary individual clinging to a raft in the
middle of a storm. If there were no other possible images of liberty
and liberation, we would have to lose hope and give ourselves up
to the waves which, sooner or later, would swallow us up. Luckily,
these romantic images do not give an accurate account of our
situation and real activities. Concern for oneself can be based on
what best resists all forms of social domination and all processes of
disintegration.
In the rst instance, reason. The appeal to reason is primarily a
universalist approach. In opposition to money and war, reason,
whether applied to science, law, economics, administration or to
public works, provides an essential element of what is known as
modernity. The belief in rational thought is associated with the idea
of universalthat is, individualrights set above all other social
attributes. A central expression of this respect of individual rights is
the universalist principle of citizenship as opposed to all forms of
religious, political or other communities. Some may wish to add that
rationality implies distribution of resources and in particular rules
for the production and circulation of goods, services and capital
determined by it. But this sort of sentence is fraught with possible
misunderstandings; it is better to leave it aside. It is impossible to
state that freedom of trade ensures the best distribution of resources,
when this is refuted every day by observable facts. On the other
hand, any system of production has to seek a high level of rationality, even if this level is not best reached by the absence of any
social or political control of the economy. This bringing together of
the recognition of individual rights and the universalism of reason
has founded modernity. The 1789 Declaration of Rights states that
everybody, whatever their origin, opinions and interests, had the
same rights.
Maybe this analysis gives the impression of taking a step backwards
from a social and even political denition of social organization,

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based uniquely on natural law, perhaps even on a religious conception of human experience. This impression is not false. To leave
behind a pure social vision of social life, we have to base ourselves on universalist principles; we do this with increasing frequency
and insistence by referring to human rights to better condemn
totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. But this only takes us half way
and we have to round o this reference to the Enlightenment by an
approach which is not in opposition to it but which gives it a content and therefore a very dierent meaning from its own. The appeal
to human rights has long since descended from its metaphysical
pedestal.
In past centuries, in some parts of the world at least, we have
seen natural law becomes civil and political rights. This was proclaimed most explicitly by the Declaration of the Rights of Man and
of the Citizen. But very rapidly, this call for civil rights which
corresponded to a political vision of society, was bypassed and replaced
by major battles for the conquest of social rights and in particular
the right to work, which were developed as from the end of the
nineteenth century, in the rst instance in Germany and in Great
Britain. And now the decline of the social representation of social
life confronts us with the need to defend the right of each individual to defend his or her culture, that is to act according to both
their personal projects and the heritage they have received, especially
from their family and by virtue of their awareness of belonging to
a cultural, religious and linguistic community. It is possible and necessary to go further still by invoking the right to live and to choose
ones sexuality to begin with, and then ones personality as a whole,
shaped both in the family environment and by real-life experience.
The result is that we are getting closer and closer to the theme of
private life as an extreme form of individualism. We demand recognition in all aspects of our personal life. The old idea that the liberty of the individual is best ensured by participation in social life
and its institutions is replaced by the completely opposite idea
namely that the liberty of the individual is only ensured by his
liberationat least in partfrom social roles and attributes. We no
longer believe in the creation of a wise and rational society; on the
contrary, we accept more negative images of society as a terrain
where violence is never controlled.
But it is dicult to be precise about exactly where there is continuity or discontinuity between the universalism of the Enlightenment

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and this more all-encompassing notion of rights that everyone now

demands.
The two terms which have just been linked and of which the
union can dene, I think, a non-social and post-social mode of analysis of social reality: rationality and personal cultural rights, do seem
to be essential for a representation of contemporary culture but each
one of them, in isolation, leads to one of the dead-ends in which
we nd ourselves trapped today. Private life is more present than
any other factor in the construction of reality today. We no longer
stand facing the outside world, dreaming of conquering it and
becoming its master, as Descartes invited us to do; we are introspective and faced with ourselves and even more preoccupied with
the authenticity of our experiences than with controlling our emotions. But private life, left to itself, gets lost in its own reection. In
most cases, what seems to us to be totally private is nothing of the
sort, as is demonstrated by the well-known studies on the choice of
names for children, an eminently private choice and which is nevertheless to a large extent predictable.
The appeal to rationality also appears to be something new, because
the twentieth century has been dominated by thinking which criticized the pretensions and illusions of rationality in reaction to the
scientism and positivism of the previous century. But a pure form
of cultural, political or social dierentialism would make it totally
impossible to construct a general analysis and to establish communications between subjects which are completely dierent from one
another.
We must therefore integrate with each other the two major orientations which have just been dened. If we admit that these two
orientations do share the fact that they are not dened by a social
content, it is permissible to think that the union of these orientations constitutes in itself the greatest force of resistance, either to
domination by money or to domination by the state. This constitutes a break with the previous period, when forms of social organization or conicts were thought of and formulated in terms of
social rights. This is due to the decline, at least in relative terms, of
the nation-state, the social and political framework par excellence
which set its seal on every event in social life.
Let us take one of the most controversial problems of the present day: that of the rights of minorities. No major modern country is confronted with the situation which faced the Austro-Hungarian

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Empire or the Ottoman Empire or yet again the countries where

minority nationalities opposed one another with considerable force.
It is no longer a case of a movement of nationalities, as in the
nineteenth century; today on the contrary we see a certain number
of countries that consider it necessary to reduce their policies for
integration. This is the case in particular in the United Kingdom
and, to a lesser extent, the United States where a sizeable Hispanophone population has settled. In Germany the situation is rather
dierent; there a Turkish population has been maintained in a low
degree of national integration largely due to the German conception
of nationality, which is dened by ius sanguinis.
To summarize this point: the demand for cultural rights today is
of a dierent nature from the movements of nationalities, the demand
for independence or, at least, for autonomy in cultural, educational
and also territorial matters. The movement of nationalities was primarily political but also social, and often the two types of demand
were interrelated. What is striking in the present-day demands for
cultural rights is that their political dimension is weak and often they
are not political at all: take, for example the womens movement or
the defense of sexual minorities. While the former, and still existing,
movements of national minorities tended to nd their unity in demands
which copied the model of the nation-state, the present rise of multiculturalism has to be put in the context of the combination formed
by this idea along with the appeal to reason and the insistence on
the private sphere; I have already stated that there was an extremely
close relation between them and the demand for cultural rights.
What this really means is that the idea of multiculturalism does
not have a general meaning but takes on very dierent meanings
depending on whether or not it is based on a rationalist position
and on the defense of the rights of the individual. In the absence
of an appeal to reason and to human rights, the call for multiculturalism may very rapidly lead to a fragmentation of society into
communities, each of which is governed in an authoritarian manner
or in any event without any reference to the elementary principles
of democracy. Let us not lose sight of the fact that our main preoccupation must benot the merits or demerits of multiculturalismbut the manner of campaigning against the domination of
negative non-social forces such as money, war and violence, by relying
on the two inter-related principles which I have just recalled, which
are non-social or post-social principles.

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The dierence between the demand for cultural rights associated

with the respect for individual rights and reason and the same appeal
for cultural rights, distinct from the two other dimensions, is very
clearly shown in the discussions which have perturbed France and
many European countries in relation to the permission or refusal by
public bodies for girls in grammar or secondary schools to wear the
hijab, the Islamic headscarf within the school precincts. The important thing here is not to take a position for or against this practice
in the name of the general principles which are in fact very confused on both sides. The main thing is to recognize the existence of
two groups amongst these young Muslim girls. The rst category,
the one which emerged most distinctly at the beginning of this social
movement, and particularly in the media, was that of the young girls
who called for their rights, or for their desire to combine their Muslim
appearance with a normal school life. Sometimes this demand is
expressed directly; sometimes it takes more indirect forms when these
young girls indicate that wearing the headscarf makes it much easier
for them to leave the house and to escape the control of their elder
brother or their father. Others mentioned the headscarf as a form
of protection against attacks by boys on the way to school. In any
event, the main idea was the search for a combination of belonging to a religious community and participating in a modern economy
and society. But as the themes of integrism and communitarianism
gained momentum, this category has become less and less visible.
There is no doubt that a higher proportion of these young Muslim
girls who demand the right to wear the headscarf are responding to
the pressure of the family or neighborhood group and that, in the
areas which are being ghettoized, there are appeals for the destruction of considerable aspects of the educational system but also of the
health-care system, often at the initiative of self-appointed imams.
We see grammar school girls who are allowed to wear the scarf then
immediately demanding to be excused from gym, but also from biology classes because they do not accept discussions about sexuality in
terms which are not acceptable to their religion. They also request
to be excused from history classes, especially when the subject-matter
is the creation of mankind. Similarly, in hospitals, a refusal of communication between the sexes is developing: men wish their wives
to be examined exclusively by women. Whereas in the rst case, the
issue at stake was primarily a private cultural right, the right to display ones religious beliefs in a part of the public sphere, in the

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second case, on the contrary, it is a question of an attack which

involves the institutions and the refusal that the organization of the
school or the hospital be dened by rules which come themselves
from laws adopted democratically by an elected parliament.
In the past two or three years, the present circumstances, at world
level, have created a fear of terrorism which leads to a systematic
rejection of everything which appears to be linked to the world of
Islam as a whole. The result is that for a rising proportion of the
population, the young girls who wish to wear the scarf at school
appear to be manipulated by Islamic groups and, consequently, to
constitute a political danger. It is impossible to deny the deep
dierences between these two categories. To speak only of cultural
rights and moral liberty seems to be nave if we do not consider the
attacks which threaten what we consider to be key and even founding
elements of our modernity. But, on the other hand, there is nothing
to justify us denying the sincerity of a considerable number of these
school-girls. We have numerous accounts of their desire to nd a
pathway to modernity which would not force them to break with a
cultural heritage which is in fact transmitted by a strong family and
communitarian organization. The solution to be adopted can only
depend, in the logic of democracy, on the capacity of each of the
groups concerned to make themselves heard and gain the support
of the majority. Today, the fear of radical Islamism is so strong that
the modernizing Muslim girls with their headscarves are almost
inaudible. This should not last because we see everywhere, as far as
Iran, women who consent to wear the hijab as long as they have
access to the world of work and who are very aware of the diculties
which exist in combining Islamic tradition with the modern world,
but also of the need to succeed in so doing.
The intention of this analysis has been to show the eld of problems, ideologies and conicts which characterize the post-social
vision of social life, a vision which, for lack of a more explicit term,
will have to be called cultural, but with the accent on the opposition
which exists between the forces of destruction of the cultural subject and those which, on the contrary, render its existence possible.
The respect of individual rights and the appeal to reason are two
forces which are not social by nature but which have the capacity
to oppose attacks carried out on modernity, democracy and liberty,
by money, war and violence.
This conclusion should enable us to put aside the theme which is

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so widespread today, and considered almost to go without saying,

that of post-modern society. Post-modernity is dened by the disappearance of any unitarian principle of thought and action, of any
correspondence between a unitarian principle of this type and a
historical period or a geographical region. When we used to speak
about industrial or post-industrial society, Western culture, rationalism
and universalism, we were setting ourselves clearly within a historical
period and a geographical zone. This is how sociology came to be
considered a critical form of thinking about modern Western societies, critical thinking which opened up numerous discussions and
which often identied with the domination exercised by the governing elites of this industrial world over all sorts of ethnic, social
or cultural categories. The partisans of the idea of post-modernity
reject this imageat times evolutionist, at times historicistof progress
(its successes and failures), and of its internal struggles. They introduce a profound dehistoricisation into the analysis, reinforced by the
new insistence placed by the humanities on language, communication and signs, whereas in the previous generations the accent was
on the description and analysis of societies. It is indeed tempting
when we see the attributes of industrial society disappearing, even
when it is succeeded by a society of information and communication, to reject en bloc any historical representation of social life. In
opposition to this temptation, I have endeavored to introduce the
idea that the decline and disappearance of the social vision of
social life could be followed, not by the disappearance of any overall representation but by the emergence of a new vision, as dierent
from the social vision as the latter was from the political vision.
I have attempted to stress that a new type of representation and
social action is taking shape under our eyes, and even with our active
participation which deserves the same attention as that which industrial
society dened when it was produced in Great Britain and in a
few other parts of the world. My attempt is even aimed at combating the discouragement and confusion which invade all those who
seek to understand the present on the basis of the past and thus
become increasingly pessimistic. It must be admitted that to defend
the hypothesis of the creation of a new type of society does demand
a more dicult eort than to accept the vague notion of postmodernity.
We must now consider the most visible transformations in the
move from a social to a post-social paradigm. This type of reversal

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is very dierent from the slow but regular advance towards equality
to which so many thinkers have referred in the past. It is true that
we must salute womens victories and support their eorts towards
equality which could result, as many feminists have indicated, in the
gradual elimination of the categories of sex and gender, since in
many professional activities and other areas, it would not matter
whether one dealt with a woman or a man. But the position which
I have just taken is dierent in kind. It is no longer a question of
a gradual disappearance of inequality and consequently of the advance
towards a unisex society, but on the contrary of the reversal, not
from a masculine cultural model to a feminine cultural model, but
from masculine domination to an outdistancing by and for women
of the polarization and ranking which have characterized masculine
society. This remark is conrmed by the fact that the pairs of opposites which have played such a central role over the past centuries
social thought are attacked and demolished. On all sides, the separation between body and mind, intelligence and sensibility, the interior and the exterior, private and public life, war and peace, are
destroyed or transgressed. Everywhere, we see the reconstruction of
a reintegrated, reunied notion, beyond a polarized view of social
life, but quite opposed at the same time to the completely destructured
image of a post-modern society. Thus what seemed to us in the rst
instance to be the decline of the social representation of collective
life can now be re-interpreted as the birth of a post-social, cultural
model of representation and action. This post-social model has nothing to do with post-modernity, but, on the contrary, it forces us to
raise the issue of hypermodernity, because it is in this new model
of representation and action that the self-transforming action of society appears to be the strongest and above all with the least intermediaries. The political model, like the social model, led to the
creation of objects of knowledge and action dened in an almost
natural manner, especially since Auguste Comte, with the result
that political or sociological theories were often tempted to free themselves from a historical analysis to lead into a general theory of systems. This general approach which has nurtured and sustained social
thought brilliantly for so long is now on the way out. The creative
capacity, instead of grappling with outside objects, has turned inwards
to become an end in itself and to better resist both economic and
military forces and communitarian ideology.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

COLLECTIVE IDENTITY AND THE REPRESENTATION

OF LIMINALITY
Bernhard Giesen
Ten years ago I had the privilege and the pleasure of writing a
paper with Shmuel Eisenstadt. Its topic was collective identitya
concept that was starting its intellectual career at that time (Eisenstadt/
Giesen 1995). The main part of the paper addressed theoretical and
conceptual issues and tried to embed the concept into the tradition
of Grand Theory. The article ended with some remarks on the
dierences between Japan and Germany with respect to their way
of coping with the past. Both references set the stage for most of
my intellectual agenda and research activities during the past few
years. Therefore it should come as no surprise that the following
remarks start with some theoretical statements concerning the concept of collective identity and end with some observations concerning
the dierences between Germany and Japan.
Identity as an a priori of action
Collective identity is a notoriously complex and essentially fuzzy concept (Wagner 1998; Brubaker/Cooper 2000; Giesen 1999). This holds
true not only becausefrom an actors perspectiveboundaries are
contested and communities are constructed, but also becausefrom
an observers perspectivecollective identity cannot be conceived of
as a simple descriptive term denoting empirical reality. To conceive
of identity as an empirically observable property of individuals or
groups amounts to falling into the trap of misplaced concreteness or
of reication. But it would be also misleading to think of identity
as a mere artifact of outside observers, as a concept that summarizes or typies naturally dierent persons. Instead, identity has to
be regarded as an a prioriin the Kantian sense of the termof
action, for the actor as well as for the outside observers of action.
If we talk about actions, intentions, aims, interests, plans, responsibility,

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guilt etc. we have to presuppose a source of agency, an actor who

is distinct from his actions, but whose existence relates dierent perceptions and states of mind to each other, who can choose between
a limited set of alternatives and who can hence be held accountable
for his actions (Anscombe 1966).
Individual as well as collective actors have to be viewed as transsituational and continuous from the perspective of outside observers,
as well as from the actors point of view. This a priori reference to
a continuous and accountable self constitutes identity. We cannot
think of acting without implicitly assuming this continuity of the
actor, his/her accountability and intentionality. But in most situations of everyday life we are unaware of these a priori of action.
Only on special occasions does our individual self become the
issue of special attention and awareness. We try to think about it,
reect on it, talk about our personality and how it is expressed in
actions.
In a similar way communality is tacitly assumed in everyday acting.
We act as if we would see the world in the same way, as if we
would have the same interests, as if the sharing of resources would
be natural and self-evident, and when doing so we rarely reect on
our collective self or communicate about the question who we are,
where we came from and what we are heading for. As far as this
most elementary but tacitly assumed communality of perspectives in
everyday acting and the basic solidarity of cooperation are concerned
we may rightly question whether the high-ung concept collective
identity should be used (Brubaker/Cooper 2000). But there are special occasions in social life, when a collectivity takes a reexive turn
on itself and raises questions about who we are and what our enduring collective self is. Here, the distinction between the collective self
and its expression in action comes to the forefront, and here, with
respect to this reexive turn, it makes sense to describe the issue of
social communication as collective identity.
Identity and its representations
Identity as the presupposition of and the reference to a continuous
subject is absolutely certain for the actors, but it is also inaccessible
for empirical observation as it escapes objectication and dees
description. As an analytical a priori, it shares this status with the

collective identity and the representation of liminality 247

concept of nature, of the Kantian Ding an sich, of time and space,
and, of course, with the concept of God in postaxial-age religions.
Nature and objectivity as well as identity and subjectivity cannot be
described and observed, but they have to be categorically presupposed when we describe a particular object or a particular action.
These a priori have to be carefully separated from their symbolic
representations. Modern science has accepted the dierence between
reports about empirical observations and natural objects; although
aiming at truth, empirical statements will never provide an exhaustive and completely true description of natural objects. At its very
best, scientic discourse can allow us no more than to distinguish
between more and less falsity in theories (Popper 1965).
What holds for the relation between natural objects and their
scientic descriptions can also be found in the relation between the
identity of a subject and its representations in social communication.
These representations will never give a complete, exhaustive and
undistorted account of identity. Therefore any attempt to represent
identity in social interaction is not only patterned by embeddedness
in a social situation, but it can always be contested and questioned.
It represents only one perspective among others; at best, it is only
partially true. Any one confronted with a description of his/her identity (or of his self ) can easily reject it: That is only a part of me,
it is a distorted image etc. And this response is not just a desperate
attempt to avoid facing the truth, but instead is perfectly appropriate. What we are ghting about in identity wars and identity
politics is not identity as such, but particular representations of identity, that are claimed and denied, rejected or recognized (the only
case in which identity as such is denied is the case of the victim
who is dehumanized and treated as an object, as a case of a category, without a name and without a place to remember him/her as
a person). In distinction to these symbolic representations, identity
is absolutely certain but untransparent to us. This holds true not
only for our enduring existence but also for the events limiting it.
We know that we have been born, but we cannot report the experience of birth; we know that we will die some day but we are
unable to communicate the experience or our own death. It is only
the birth and death of others that we are able to observe and to
describe.
In talking about representations, a further distinction has to be
made. Representation has at least three dimensions that can be

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separated from the perspective of analysis and observation, but in

many cases from the perspective of actors as well. The rst dimension is the semantic one. From the point of view of semantics,
representation appears as symbolic classication, as a grid of distinctions, even as a text that can be analyzed with respect to basic
codes, oppositions or categories. Symbolic representations of identity
cannot just consist of the name of the actor. The actors name is
just an indexical device hinting at the assumption that there is an
actor at all. Instead, symbolic representations have to position a
particular identity within a symbolic classication, they have to
narrate the story of the actor, they arein this respecttexts.
But representations of identity, although frequently reduced to this
semantic or cognitive dimension, are not just texts. In addition to
this existence as free-oating symbolic structures, representations have
also a performative dimensionthey have to be enacted, practiced,
presented and staged in particular locations. This performative dimension diers clearly from the purely semantic or cognitive one and it
opens up a eld for a new variationthis time on the level of
patterns of action and communication. The same founding myth of
a nation e.g. can be represented as a mimetic ritual, as a sculpture,
an ocial ceremonial address, a private oral narration, a television
broadcast or as a novel that is read by individual persons in privacy.
Each of these practices of representation refers to the same symbolic
structure (script, narrative, text etc.) but it implies a particular mode
of communication that diers strongly from the others, and these
dierences of practices, routines and rituals matter. Communication
in museums is radically dierent from a ritual dance; likewise, reading a novel in privacy is radically dierent from singing an anthem
at a collective rally. All these practices of representing, however, converge in one important aspect: they construct a common collective
identity among the participants and address those who are assumed
to be insiders. The presence of outsiders, if it is not excluded, has
to be ignored or neutralized. If interventions by outsiders cannot be
ignored, they are usually viewed as oensive and as an issue that
provokes strong aversive responses on the part of insiders (Goman
1959). Similar responses can also be observed with respect to the
practices of representing individual identity. Confessions and diaries,
personal letters and conversations with a therapist are usually treated
as condential and are protected by strict rules banning any communication to outsiders.

collective identity and the representation of liminality 249

This exclusion of the outsiders view indicates the extraordinary
vulnerability of representations of identity but it also hints at the
power of outside observers. Only if they do not know the secret,
can we dispense of their recognition. Representations of identity are
obviously, not just an (individual or collective) actors self-denition
that has to be accepted and recognized unconditionally by outsiders.
Let us consider, at rst, the case of individual identity. Ego who
denes his identity cannot dispense of alters approval because egos
own identity remains untransparent to himselfit is almost impossible to think of ones own identity in complete isolation without at
least referring to an imagined other. In order to imagine and to
describe this untransparent identity, in order to calm down his own
insecurity, ego needs the communication with others, their agreement and approval. Thus several individual persons can agree on a
common collective identityI recognize your identity and vice versa
because we are alike and equal.
The construction of collective identity is, however, not just a matter of arbitrary convention and a bilateral contract between insiders. Representing identity is an irredeemable discursive endeavor. It
has to represent identity as legitimate and justied in terms of a
given culture that embraces ego and alter. But the range of cultural
discourse can rarely be conned to the clearly marked boundaries
of a group. The semantics of representation can hardly be concealed
from the view from outside (in Hegels sense, The mind goes wherever it wants). Therefore it cannot dispense with recognition by outsiders, it has to cross the boundaries by communication, it has to
refer to the approval of possible third parties, of a generalized other,
of outsiders, and it has to represent an identity as justied and legitimate to outsiders as well.
Representing liminality
Social reality as distinct from physical reality is constituted by some
fundamental boundaries or categorical distinctionssuch as the distinction between nature and culture, between anarchy and order or
between rule and exception. Demarcating these boundaries, contesting them and reconstructing them is at the core of social life.
The social process is continually spinning around these positions of
liminality. We cannot escape the question whether an action is

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supporting an order or disrupting it, whether it can be subsumed

under a rule, or whether it is exceptional and whether this exception is legitimate or deviant.
With respect to the temporal dimension, we cannot avoid the question of the origin. Setting a mark for the beginning of a community and accounting for the process of origin are as constitutive for
social reality as the distinction between rule and exception or between
order and chaos. This thrust for representation and imagination is
becoming even more urgent since our own originas we have outlined aboveis basically untransparent for us. The second part of
this chapter will present four archetypical gures that imagine the
liminal situation (Turner 1969) between inside and outside and that
account for the question of origin. These gures are the triumphant
hero, the tragically failing hero, the victim, and the perpetrator. As
symbolic representations of liminality these gures can be substituted
for each other if the historical situation and the perspective change;
heroes can be turned into victims as in the case of fallen soldiers in
modern wars, victims can be rephrased as heroes as in the case of
terrorism, perpetrators appear as heroes and heroes as perpetrators
depending on the perspective from inside or outside of the community.
There are, however, general trends concerning the dominant gure
of liminality in the modernity discourse about collective identity. This
chapter will argue that we are witnessing a far-reaching change from
heroic to traumatic gures in the mythical foundations of collective
identityat least in the western world.
Triumphant heroes
Many foundation myths of political communities refer to the gure
of the triumphant hero who rises against oppression and foreign rule
or leads his people to the Promised Land. The triumph over the
adversaries and the conquest of the Promised Land marks the origin of the just order, or the mating of people and land. By denition,
the hero is in a liminal situation: he stands above the rules, dees
conventional wisdom and the risk of death, he crushes the existing
order and ventures out to the unknown (Rank 1910; Campbell 1971).
In a position between gods and ordinary human beings he (or she)
is subjected to no rules, commands a divine violence and creates the
new. The triumphant hero represents autonomy, uniqueness and sov-

collective identity and the representation of liminality 251

ereign subjectivity. With the advent of modernity, the sovereignty of
the monarch relied on this charismatic core of political authority.
The divine right of kings and the notion of absolute princely authority presuppose a superhuman reference as embodied in the gure of
the triumphant hero.
Modern democracy turned triumphant heroism from an individual
into a collective mode. Rising against the personal rule of the prince
or against foreign domination, the people break the unjust social
contract, relapse into a state of nature, violently seize power and
establish a new constitution by themselves. The revolutionary selfconstitution of the demos is the central foundation myth of modern
democracies. It imagines the people as the collective sovereign that
exists before constitution and law are established and that has to be
appealed in order to change it.
The myth of the revolutionary birth of the people not only imagines the origin of the claims, but also legitimizes public protest
marches, acts of civil disobedience or the symbolic occupation of
public spaces by protesters. Because these forms of protest are related to
the collective heroism of the people on the barricade they areto
a certain degree at leastsanctied in democracies. Political authorities
cannot treat them straightforwardly as acts of lawbreakingwhoever violates the parking rules is ned, but thousand protesters
blocking a road are exempted from legal persecution because they
are symbolically related to the revolutionary birth of the demos that
existed before the law did, and that is considered to be the source
of the law.
Solemn ritual performances and annual celebrations remember
and reenact the revolutionary origin of the demos. Its ritual form is
the public parade displaying the power of the people in front of its
representatives and representing the peoples triumphant seizure of
public spaces. The annual Soviet parades celebrating the October
Revolution, the French parades on Quatorze Juillet, the American
celebrations of Independence Day, and the many postcolonial parades
in Africa and Asia are cases in point. Although still quite common
all over the world, the routinized national memorial celebration runs
the risks, however, of all attempts to routinize charismait fades
out and is slowly turned from a serious national ritual into a matter of public folklore and public holidays.

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Tragically failing heroism

The tragically failing hero is defeated by the adversity of the world,

but in his defeat and because of his defeat he can preserve his
pristine purity and sacredness ( Jaspers 1946). In contrast to the victorious hero, who must accept compromises in order to stabilize and
routinize his rule, the tragically failing hero symbolizes the irredeemable tension between sacred and profane. He was defeated but
not rendered profane. He, too, represents liminality but he demarcates the chasm as unbridgeable. The defenders of Massada, the
early Christian martyrs, Imam Husseinthe murdered founder of
the Shia, the defeated Serbs of the battle of Kosovo, the failed Irish
insurrections against the British rule, the Japanese nobility of
failure (Morris 1975), the Warsaw uprising against the German
occupation, the defenders of the Alamo, even the German resistance
against Hitler are mythical embodiments of tragically failing heroism that became an integral part of the respective national or religious mythologies.
The most important ritual form of remembering failing heroism
is not the public parade, but the historical museum or the memorial
site. In the historical museum, mostly silent visitors representing the
living people are confronted with the remainders and relics of the
dead heroes. In contrast to public parades, there is no position for
the ruling political authorities in this ritual form. Telling the stories
of courageous resistance and desperate uprisings not only saves the
honor of the community, but also inspires the peoples resolve to
be on the alert and never again allow the enemy to defeat our
people.
A more complex reference to failing heroism in constructing identity can be found in the melancholic abstention from profane engagements as futile and vain. Existentialism and romanticism, but also
stoicism and monastic retreatism, are cultural movements thatas
dierent as they arecenter the chasm between the thisworldly and
the otherworldly realms and recommend distance and abstention
from profane involvement as the prime path to personhood and subjectivity. Hence, even some ways of constructing the axial-age tension outlined so brilliantly by Eisenstadt crystallize in the gure of
the tragic hero (Eisenstadt 1986c).

collective identity and the representation of liminality 253

Victims
Heroes who, in triumph or failure, were able to remain unique and
sovereign subjects represent the liminal position between gods and
humans. At the opposite end of the human condition we nd the
liminality of the victims. Victims are human subjects who are treated
as objects, as cases of a category without a name, a face and a place
within the community (Bauman 1989; Todorov 1996). The perpetrators tried to scatter their remains and blur their traces in the outlands of human society. Nothing should remind us of their existence.
Like heroes, they are exempted from the regular social order but
unlike heroesthey are pushed beyond the margins of social
community, they live in extraordinary spaces, in camps (Agamben
1995). Heroes are incomparable; victims are counted by their numbers. They were recognized as persons before their victimization and
they are still viewed as persons from an outside perspective, but the
perpetrators have turned them into profane objects that can be killed,
traded, used or deported like cattle (Giesen 2004).
Being a victim means not only to be reduced to a profane object
but also to encounter mortality and, in many cases, death as well.
Death is the liminal horizon of human lifeabsolutely certain, but
impossible to communicate as our experience (Heidegger 1986). The
mind has to ignore the possibility of its own mortality. While death
as voluntary sacrice is invested with profound meaning by most
cultures, death by victimization disrupts the web of meaningit does
not t into a meaningful sequence of narration. It is an inconceivable event (Caruth 1996). Therefore, the experience of the surviving
victims resists being told to others, the trauma remains enclosed in
their bodies.
Only from a distance, after a long time or from the position of
following generations, can the horror and suering be uttered and
worked through (Alexander/Eyerman/Giesen/Smelser/Sztompka
2004). This is exactly what happened in the classical cases of victimization that were ultimately transformed into central representations of collective identity in the respective communities. When they
occurred, the Holocaust, African American slavery, the Great Irish
Famine, the Armenian genocide were widely ignored (Laqueur 1980).
They entered the arena of public attention only after a period of
latency elapsed. Subsequent generations assisted by a few surviving
witnesses, try to preserve the collective memory of victims and to

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give them back their names, their faces and their place within the
community.
During the last century the gure of the victim has gained in
attraction as a symbolic representation of individual and collective
identity (Giesen 2004). A well-known case is that of Benjamin
Wilkomirski who claimed to have escaped the Vilna Ghetto as a
child and to suer from a trauma of victimization. After much public acclaim for his autobiography, critics discovered that it was pure
imagination and ction. The suering of the past seems increasingly
to provide an attractive reference for the imagination of collective
identity: the victim replaces the hero as a gure of heightened
subjectivity.
Conicts and debates about public recognition of a groups claim
to victimhood are, certainly, driven by hidden interests. Big money
is at stake; self-appointed advocates of victims stage their cause in
public arenas and require compensation. But revealing these interests does not answer the question why these claims are publicly
recognized, why people visit monuments remembering the victims of
the past, why, today, serious intellectual debates about collective identity focus more on victims than on heroes?
Explanations of this remarkable phenomenon cannot ignore the
level of structure and culture. The collective identity of victims is,
of course, a retrospective one: it is not our own suering here and
now, but the suering of the past, the suering of others that is
turned into an identity of the present. As individuals, African Americans
and Jewish Americans today can hardly claim to be victims, but they
can claim the collective identity of a group whose members have
been victimized in the past. The gure of the victim seems to gain
salience as a pattern of collective identity when the surviving individual victims are disappearing (Giesen 2004). There is also another
structural reason for the increasing focus on victims. In identifying
with the victims of the past we retroactively avoid the position of
the bystander, the uninvolved third-party who ignored the suering
and failed to intervene (Hilberg 1992). When we identify with victims and remember their suering, we reverse their depersonalization; we give them back their names, their faces, and their place
within the community. A hidden and haunting awareness of the dangers of objectication in modern social systems might foster this
retroactive recognition of personhood. What has been treated as an
object is invested with the qualities of a subject again (Bauman 1989).

collective identity and the representation of liminality 255

Perpetrators
The perpetrator is the counterpart to the victim. Through their
voluntary decision, perpetrators have moved beyond the regular social
order and have trespassed against the basic norms valid in a community. In particular they have, without further authorization, decided
about the life and death of others and thereby have disdained the
sacred core of other persons (Giesen 2004). The liminal position of
perpetrators resultssimilar to those of heroesfrom a sovereign
subjectivity that has cut its ties with regular order and legal norms.
Unlike heroes, however, the extraordinariness and rule-breaking power
of perpetrators, their venturing out into the wild outlands lacks recognition and respect on the part of the social community. It is the
admiration of the social community that sacralizes the often violent
deeds of the charismatic hero. Without this support, heroes are turned
into evildoers, demons, perpetrators. Sometimes this shift of perspective is produced by a major historical eventa defeat or a change
in political authority. Before their death or defeat, Hitler, Stalin, Pol
Pot and Saddam Hussein were viewed as redeemers and as demons
thereafter; their special forcesthe SS, the Cheka etc.were heroes
before and perpetrators afterwards.
Such a total change of perspective is performed by the social
community through ritually expelling the perpetrators, by putting
them on trial, killing them, or banning their actual or symbolic presence. Far more dicult to cope with is the situation of followers and
bystanders, who admired the perpetrators but were not directly
involved in acts of victimization. These ordinary members of the
community had acted according to the regular social order, had
ignored and disregarded the signs of horror and crime, and they
had continued to trust in their political leaders. After the defeat or
the change of regime they had to realize that, by their very inactivity, they had been accomplices in a mass-murder.
This traumatic experience occurred in postwar Germany. After
the war, German national identity underwent indeed a traumatic
sequence. A period of latency, during which a coalition of silence
about German guilt united the new Federal Republic, was followed
by a period of speaking out in which a new generation, the 68ers,
accused their parents generation of responsibility for the Holocaust
(Assmann/Frevert 1999; Dubiel 1999; Giesen 2004). Following this
public accusation of an entire generation, a new political ritual of

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remembering the responsibility for the genocide of the European

Jews was established. It was originated by Willi Brandts sudden and
unexpected gesture of atonement at the Warsaw Ghetto memorial
in 1970 (Giesen/Schneider 2004; Rauer 2004; Schneider 2004). The
German chancellor, undoubtedly innocent as a person (he was persecuted by the Nazis), kneeled down as a representative of the nation
of perpetrators. Here, the individual guilt of perpetrators and
collective trauma of the nation of perpetrators are disconnected. Since
then a new public culture of mourning and confessing the collective
guilt of the nation has been spawned in Germany. It resulted in
historical exhibitions and historical research, TV series and public
addresses and has produced an extraordinary sensitivity of public life
with respect to anything that can be interpreted as belittling the
German guilt.
The ritual of publicly confessing and arming the guilt of the
past was not limited to representatives of the German nation. During
recent decades it has spread rapidly among European nations that
retrospectivelydiscovered their entanglement in collaboration and
their failure to intervene. After celebrating the tragically failing heroism of resistance France is increasingly concerned with Vichy, with
collaboration in the Shoah (Papon) and with the French roots of
anti-Semitism (Sternhell 1996), Poland is debating its own genocidal
involvement in the case of Jedwabne (Gross 2001), the former Norwegian president Bruntland noted that more young Norwegians died
in the ranks of the Waen-SS than as victims of the German occupation, the Pope apologizes for the lack of ocial intervention against
the genocide, the Italian post-fascist leader Fini visits Auschwitz, the
disregarding of reports about the Holocaust by American and British
authorities and the lack of intervention is publicly debated in the
United States (Laqueur 1980) etc. The once clear-cut distinction
between Germany as the nation of perpetrators and the occupied
European nations as the victims is gradually becoming blurred. Most
nations were entangled in collaboration and many now acknowledge
it by ocial apologies oered by political representatives wholike
Brandtare innocent as persons. Germany has reluctantly rediscovered her own victims who died in the Allied bombing raids, as
refugees eeing from the Russian invasion or as prisoners of war in
Siberia or Eastern Europe. A widespread awareness of victimhood
and perpetratorship seems to be providing a new collective identity
for Europe, if not for the West.

collective identity and the representation of liminality 257

Searching for the conditions fostering this surprising turn, we can
point to the structural boundary separating the individual perpetrators from those who claim the collective identity of perpetrators. If
we, as innocent persons, feel shame, remorse and atonement on the
part of the collectivity we belong to, then we strongly oppose the
past of our collectivityit should never happen again. We know that
there is a bond of belonging between the perpetrators and ourselves,
but we strongly disapprove of their actions and identify with the victims. In this axial reversal, we even hope to get rid of this bond of
belonging.
We may ask, however, why this public attention for victims and
perpetrators occurred in the second half of the previous century but
remained a rare and exceptional phenomenon in preceding centuries.
A tentative answer can be found in the changing conditions of international observation. Until the nineteenth century, public celebrations of triumphant heroism and victories were hardly noticed by
the neighbor nation whose members could feel humiliated because
they remembered as a defeat what, beyond the border, was celebrated as a triumphant victory. Today, in contrast, any ostentatious
triumphant ritual is no longer a local aair, but is closely watched
by the international community. When, for example, Ulster Unionists
march in Northern Ireland to remember the victory at the Battle of
the Boyne, they have to account for this global audience that rejects
triumphant heroism which might be oensive to others.
Finally we have to address intercultural dierences in this sensitivity for victims and perpetrators as gures of heightened subjectivity. Obviously not all nations join this move towards ritual confessions
of collective guilt performed by political representatives. For years,
Japan resisted international pressure to publicly admit its national
responsibility for the Nanking massacres, and Turkey even outlaws
any public statement that considers the Armenian genocide to be a
matter of national responsibility. This remarkable dierence is
probably rooted in the basic cultural code of the Judeo-Christian
tradition, in distinction to the Japanese and the secular Turkish ones.
The Judeo-Christian tradition centers the redeemer, the messiah, the
ultimately innocent hero who sacrices himself in order to save the
guilty community. Isaac and Christ are such innocent individuals
and many saints tried to repeat that self-sacrice of the innocent
person. This gure of the innocent self-sacricing hero could be
connected to the Augustinian idea of the original sin that was

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transmitted from generation to generation. Furthermore, the JudeoChristian tradition is a paradigm case of an axial-age culture: the
mundane history is contrasted sharply with the impersonal principles of the transcendental realm, politics and moral are opposites
(Eisenstadt 1996a). Taken together, these cultural codes crystallize in
the gure of the innocent individual who charismatizes himself by
assuming the guilt of the collectivity he represents. In a way the
German chancellor Willy Brandt performed Christomimesis when he
kneeled down and humiliated himself ritually in order to save his
people (Giesen 2004).
In contrast, the non-axial-age Japanese culture can hardly conceive of the community as guilty. Individual persons can be wrong
and guilty, but the Japanese nation is seen as primordially sacred:
the Tenno himself is divine and there is no way of appealing to
higher principles for criticizing the representation of the sacred
(Eisenstadt 1986c). It has been noted before that Japan is a paradigm case of a culture of shame that can be contrasted to the Western
culture of guilt (Benedict 1946). For reasons that are dierent but
equally fundamental, Turkey bans and persecutes any open admittance of a national responsibility for the Genocide on the Armenians.
It was Kemal Atatrk and his followers who planed and executed
the mass-murder committed on Armenians because they were considered to be a threat for the ethnic purity of the Turkish nation
state (Bayraktar/Seibel 2004). Thus genocide lies under the foundation stone of modern Turkey. But since there was no defeat that
forced a conversion of heroes into perpetrators (as in the case of
Germany) the Turkish authorities can continue to revere Atatrk as
the founding hero and ignore his responsibility for the genocide.
The Japanese and Turkish cases testify not only to the importance
of comparative analysis of cultures ( Japan is indeed Gods special
gift to comparative sociology as Eisenstadt constantly underlines) but
they also show the shifting imaginations of liminal gures. Like other
symbolic representations of collective identity they too are cultural
constructions determined by a certain temporal and social perspective.
With history passing and social boundaries being crossed triumphant
heroes can be converted into perpetrators, tragically failing heroes
can be interpreted as victims, and we discover that among the nation
of victims there were also collaborators, and that among the nation
of perpetrators there were also tragic heroes and victims.

PART THREE

RELIGION, NATIONALISM AND PLURALISM

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

WEBERS SOCIOLOGY OF RELIGION AND

ANCIENT JUDAISM
Wolfgang Schluchter
Forward
Max Webers study of ancient Judaism, on which he worked after
1910, is particularly well-suited to shedding light on the approach
of his mature sociology of religion, with its comparative and developmental orientation. This is particularly the case if systematic
questions and those bearing on the history of his works are linked.
Having devoted himself from the very beginning of his career to
Mediterranean antiquity, he was naturally familiar from early on
with aspects of the history of Israelite-Jewish religion. However, this
knowledge did not nd literary expression in his work until 1910.
Neither in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism of
1904/05 nor in his study on the Agrarian Conditions in Antiquity
of 1909 we nd more than sporadic remarks on the history of
Israelite-Jewish religion. This can scarcely be mere chance. It is much
more plausible to conjecture that Max Weber was not working intensively on the history of Israelite-Jewish religion until the period from
1910 onwards. For even in the Replies to Critics, which resulted
from the Fischer-Rachfahl debate, following the publication of the
Protestant Ethic, ancient Judaism does not play a major role. And
the last Reply appeared in 1910. Admittedly, it was not Webers
intention to give a history of the religion of antiquity in the Agrarian
Conditions, nor was the further prehistory of ascetic Protestantism
a subject of controversy in the Fischer-Rachfahl debate, so that no
discussion of ancient Judaism from the point of view of religious
history should be expected in these writings.1 But even if these texts

1
In the Agrarian Conditions, Weber analyzes the capitalism of antiquity as a
system and relates it to ancient forms of state organization. He does not take an
interest in religions and their consequences on economic attitudes. In the Replies,

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are not taken as testimony that the writer was not working on
the religious history of ancient Judaism, there is plenty of evidence
that actually it was only after 1910 that, in connection with Max
Webers now awakened interest in Asian religions, he was also more
specically examining the history of Israelite-Jewish religion. This eventually came to fruition with his study Ancient Judaism, that from
the start encompassed the whole spectrum from ancient Israel to
early Christianity.2
I shall deal with my theme in four steps: I shall start by saying
something about the major projects, which were complementary, though
not executed simultaneously, on which Max Weber was working from
1910 until his death, and which both remained unnished. These
were his Grundriss article, known under the title Economy and
Society, and the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie: comparative studies on the economic ethics of worldor rather cultural
religions (1). 3 There follow reections on the unconventional
combination of comparative and developmental viewpoints which
underlies his reconstitution of major processes in religious history (2).
I shall then show that he takes the creations of the Old Testament,
the Bible of the Jews, as the turning pointone might even say
the point of departurefor one of these great processes in religious
history, the development of the Israelite-Jewish-Christian and Islamic
religions (3). Finally, I shall consider whether it is tenable to designate the ancient Jews as a pariah people which, from the forcible
internment4 onwards, that is to say, from the Babylonian exile until
the fall of the second Temple, voluntarily brought itself into this
situation. Max Webers formula on the subject: from a political to
a confessional community.

his concern is the defence of the original thesis of the study on Protestantism. Weber
does indicate in various places that he intends to extend his investigations forward
and backward, and indeed in his nal reply to the critiques of the Protestant Ethic
of 1910 there is even mention of a projected return to ancient Christianity, though
not to ancient Judaism. Cf. Weber, 1982, p. 322.
2
This choice of title is far from self-explanatory, and signals a special approach
to the topic.
3
The title does indeed specify world religions, but Weber says expressly that
Judaism is not a world religion, but rather a cultural religion. For the distinctions
between the concepts of cultural, world and redemptive religions, see Schluchter,
1988, here vol. 2, pp. 24.
4
Weber, 1920, p. 4 (hereafter: RS III). Weber even goes so far as to assert that
voluntary ghetto life had existed long before forcible internment.

webers sociology of religion

263

1. The uncompleted major projects

It is known that Max Weber scholarly writings from 1910 until his
death dealt with two major projects, which gradually became distinct and then developed separately: his contribution to the Handbuch
der politischen Oekonomie, later entitled Grundri der Sozialkonomik, which
he called rst Economy and Society, then The Economy and the
Societal Orders and Powers and nally, it seems, Sociology (in
the following: his Grundriss article); and his material economic cultural sociology5, the core of which should be sought in the Essays
in the Sociology of Religion (Religionssoziologische Skizzen), later
entitled Comparative Essays in the Sociology of Religion, part of
it being The Economic Ethics of World Religions (Vergleichende
religionssoziologische Versuche). He originally intended to publish
these essays together with his Grundriss article. As this was prevented
by the outbreak of war, he published them separately from 1915
onward in the Archiv fr Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik. Finally he
wanted to publish them as Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie,
in combination with earlier texts, some of them revised, some extended, together with unpublished essays mostly still to be written.
The rst volume of this gigantic undertaking appeared in 1920. Part
of this project was the study on ancient Judaism, which he rst had

5
This quotation is taken from the Preface to the publication of the 1st part
of the Grundri der Sozialkonomik, dated 2nd June 1914. The Preface is written
by Max Weber. The choice of words material economic cultural sociology certainly seems strange. Material is indeed comprehensible in this context, as Weber
was trying in his Grundriss article to disregard the relationship of economics to the
particular elements of cultural content, among which he mentions literature, art,
science etc. (MWG I/221, p. 114). What economic cultural sociology may be,
however, is less clear. It must either be an analysis of culture from an economic
standpoint, or else a sociology of culture. This remarkable conceptual denition
could, though, be the expression of Webers intention of emphasizing the importance of each side of the causal relationship to both his theoretical and historical
ponderings, that is to say the economic conditioning of culture as much as the
cultural conditioning of the economy. More will be said on this later. This would
then lead to an economic sociology of literature, an economic sociology of art, etc.
However this may be, possible candidates for this material economic cultural sociology, apart from studies in the sociology of music, which already existed at this
stage, include the essays in the economic ethics of world religions. As the footnote
of 1915 in the Archiv shows, these were obviously alluded to with the rest.
On the Preface and other documents relevant to reconstructing the history of
the emergence of the major projects, see the compilation of Johannes Winckelmann,
1986, here, p. 165, and for an overall view, Wolfgang Schluchter, 2000, pp. 179.

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wolfgang schluchter

presented from October 1917 onwards as a sort of serial novel in

the Archiv fr Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik.6 But there was to be a
revised version of the Gesammelte Aufstze. Like the Grundriss article,
which breaks o all too soon, the collection ends prematurely with
the revised Intermediate Reection, which leads on to the religions of India. Of the four volumes Weber anticipated, only the rst
one was published with his authorization.
The rst fact to bear in mind is that Webers material economic
cultural sociology, in which I include the essays in the sociology of
religion (Religionssoziologische Skizzen), was originally to appear
as a supplement to the Grundri der Sozialkonomik together with his
article The Economy and the Societal Orders and Powers. This
is shown by the Preface to the Grundri taken in conjunction with
the footnote that accompanies the separate publication of the essay
in the sociology of religion dealing with Confucianism in October
1915. The rst parts, Weber writes here, are published unaltered,
just as they were written down and read to friends two years ago.
And he adds that the essays were originally meant to appear simultaneously with his Grundriss article, in order to interpret and supplement the section on the sociology of religion (though also to be
interpreted by the latter on many points).7 This section, however,
was not available to the scholarly public at the time. Presumably
also written down in 1913,8 it considers, under the title Religious

6
Max Weber starts the publication of the essays in ancient Judaism in October
1917 with a footnote that deserves attention, clarifying his further plans: The following presentation (of ancient Judaism, W.S.) is published here omitting the discussion of the Egyptian, Babylonian and Persian conditions. In a future collection
and revised publication (for China, provided with source references and revised), in
combination with other earlier essays, some of them unpublished, the missing part
will be inserted. Cf. Archiv fr Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik, Volume 44
(1917/1918), p. 52. As Weber never got as far as to ancient Judaism when compiling the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie, the omitted discussion of
the Egyptian, Babylonian and Persian conditions still remained unpublished, possibly unwritten. Nevertheless, comparative references to these conditions occur repeatedly in the study itself.
7
Archiv fr Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik Band 41 (1916), p. 1. Weber
used this expression again in the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie. He
simply changed two years ago to two years before. Cf. Max Weber, Gesammelte
1920, (hereafter RS I) und MWGI/19, p. 83. Where an edition of Max Weber
Gesamtausgabe is available, quotations are also referenced to this.
8
On this subject, see also the editorial report of Hans G. Kippenberg in MWG
I/223, pp. 89f.

webers sociology of religion

265

Communities, on the one hand the class conditioning of religions,

and on the other hand the connection between cultural religion and
economic attitudes. Weber had already expounded the latter relationship in his study on ascetic Protestantism. Now he is not only
pursuing both interrelations, but he also includes all the cultural religions that he considers important, in addition to ascetic Protestantism,
Confucianism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Early Christianity and
Islam. They form the material for dening concepts and for obtaining
regularities, laws, as well as their qualication. As already stated,
the outbreak of the war prevented the publication of the Grundriss
article and the essays at the same time. The section on Religious
Communities was left for revision until after the war.9 Even during
the recasting of the Grundriss article in the years 1919/1920, it
remained untouched. While Weber continued to work on his essays
from 1916 onward, we may suppose on the basis of the old manuscripts, the sociology of religion section of the Grundriss article
remained unaltered. This was not in accordance with his plans, as
we learn from the Preliminary Remarks (Vorbemerkung) to the
rst volume of the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie that he had
submitted for printing. He had still not been able, he writes there,
to use the ethnographic-folkloristic material adequately for his approach
to the sociology of religion. And he goes on: I hope to be able to
do something [to rectify this omission] during a systematic treatment
of the sociology of religion.10 This hope, however, turned out to be
in vain.
The sociology of religion contained in the Grundriss article remained
in the state of 1913, but the historically oriented essays in the Sociology of Religion of 1913 were taken further. Thus the two major
projects did not develop simultaneously. The knowledge gained
in the essays was no longer put to use in the chapter on the sociology of religion in the Grundriss article. Of course, this does not
alter the complementarity of the two major projects. One could
even say that this made it possible for Max Weber to strive for this

9
This is not quite true, as Weber got out the manuscript at least once more,
to use it as the basis for a lecture at the University of Vienna in the summer term
of 1918. This was a sort of probationary term that he had insisted on, to see
whether he could accept the invitation to succeed Eugen von Philippovich. Weber
then declined this oer. See also MWG, I/17, p. 12.
10
RS I, p. 15.

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wolfgang schluchter

complementarity with even greater eectiveness. For while Max

Weber was seeking to broaden the essays by extending the studies on
Protestantism to studies on Confucianism and Taoism, Hinduism,
Buddhism and, via ancient Judaism, on Talmudic Judaism, Early
Christianity, Oriental Christianity, Islam and Occidental Christianity,
he was endeavouring to condense the Grundriss article, on the basis
of the pre-war manuscripts and in the light of new insights. How
this was to be achieved, we can see from the two editions of the
Sociology of Domination: the pre-war version, in the layout of the
Grundri der Sozialkonomik, takes up about 200 pages, while the postwar version as submitted by Weber for printing has been compressed
into about 50 pages.
For the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie we are in possession of a plan sent by Weber to his publisher Paul Siebeck in 1919
which he followed in the preparation of the rst volume. However,
we have no comparable plan for the projected new version of
the Grundriss article. One thing is clear, though: in his work on the
Grundriss article in 1919/1920, Weber no longer adhered to the
table of contents of The Economics and the Societal Orders and
Powers to be found in 1914. According to this table of contents,
the complete analysis was to culminate with the sociology of domination, with which he intended to make the transition from structure to process.11 This idea is now given up, the sociology of domination
is now placed after the economic sociology, but before Class and
Status and before the sociology of communities, religion, law and
the (modern) state. As previously remarked: The revision of the sociology of religion, unlike the sociology of domination, was never carried out. Indeed, with the exception of the remark quoted above,

11
In this connection, cf. in particular MWG I/222, p. 114. This passage is
especially important in clarifying the original objectives of the Grundriss article.
Weber expressly emphasizes that what matters to him is a general analysis, taking
the particular only by way of examples. He intended to discuss only the general
forms of structure of human communities. And further: The content-related directions of community action are only taken into consideration insofar as they generate forms of structure which are specic in nature and at the same time economically
relevant. The limit thus dened is no doubt extremely uid, but invariably means
that only a few highly universal varieties of community are examined. In what
follows, this is done rst only with regard to general characteristics, where-asas
we shall seeit will only be possible to discuss their forms of development with
some degree of precision at a later stage, in connection with the category of
domination.

webers sociology of religion

267

there is also no indication of how he had planned this revision. For

the construction of the chapter on religion in the Grundriss article,
the only evidence that has come down to us is the table of contents
and the manuscripts from the time before the war; for the Gesammelte
Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie, on the other hand, a later plan exists.
Although the development of the two major projects was not simultaneous, their complementarity was conserved. The reason for this
is not merely pragmatic, but also methodological. Max Webers conception of his Grundriss article was meant to achieve a coherent
sociological theory and exposition, as he expressed it in a letter to
his publisher Paul Siebeck in December 1913, while the essays in
the sociology of religion, written in 1913, were meant as historical
investigations. Theoretical constructions with illustrative use of the empiricalhistorical investigation with use of theoretical concepts as the
ideal borderline cases, was the way that, as early as 1904, in the
essay on objectivity, he had dened the relationship between the theoretical and historical perspective in economics.12 This denition is
used again in the Basic Sociological Terms which serve to introduce the new Grundriss article and are applied in general to the
relationship between sociology and historiography: Sociology, he says
here, creates type-concepts and seeks for regularities governing events,
while historiography, in contrast, aims at causal analysis and the
explanation of individual actions, patterns, personalities of cultural
signicance.13 And for this purpose, one might add, a comprehensive sociological theory should be useful. Nevertheless, Weber does
not seek primarily to determine the relationship of disciplines, but
to clarify a scientic stance that employs both perspectives, an approach
that he himself practised. The study on ascetic Protestantism of
1904/05 was already an example, as far as he was concerned, of a
historical investigation, in particular a religious-historical investigation. The essays in the sociology of religion, written in 1913 and
continued from 1915 onward, are the same.
Yet the subtitle, essays in the sociology of religion, not on the history
of religion, which later were even described as comparative essays
in the sociology of religion, certainly seems to contradict this interpretation. Is sociology, to Weber, not primarily a generalizing social

12
13

Weber, 1920, p. 205 (hereafter: WL).

Weber, 1956, p. 9 (hereafter: WuG).

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wolfgang schluchter

science? There is no doubt that it is, just as to him economics

represent a generalizing social science, both being cultural sciences.14
But as in economics, this is not denied by the distinction between
the theoretical and historical perspective within a single discipline.
Not the material relationships of things, but the intellectual relationships of problems, in Webers words, constitute the foundation of
scientic works. On the basis of the specic viewpoints, from which
light may be shed on the meaning of given cultural elements, the
distinction between disciplines will be engendered.15 Thus the analysis of cultural reality is necessarily one-sided, and this one-sidedness
is not only logical, but also pragmatically justied, because the schooling of the eye to observe the operation of qualitatively similar categories of causes and the constant application of the same conceptual
apparatus [provides] all the advantages of the division of labour.16
But the disciplinary commitment to a specic viewpoint does not
invalidate the logical distinction between the theoretical and historical approach. Indeed, for a long time Weber hesitated to characterize his approach as sociological, because he feared that he might
be misunderstood as seeking to overcome the necessarily one-sided
analysis of cultural reality from a special viewpoint by a general social
science which would eliminate this distinction. This he considers
impossible on logical grounds. For this reason he rst expressly
acknowledges the fruitfulness of a socio-economic analysis of cultural
reality. For, to quote the essay on objectivity: Liberated from the
outdated belief that all cultural manifestations can be deduced as the
product or function of material interests, we on our part believe,
on the contrary, that the analysis of social manifestations and cultural
processes from the special viewpoint of their economic conditioning and
consequential scope was a scientic principle of creative fruitfulness
and, applied with care and an absence of dogmatism, will remain
so for all the foreseeable future.17 But parallel to this statement, he

14
In the essay on objectivity, it is stated: If we decide to give the name of cultural sciences to such disciplines as observe the processes of human life from the
point of view of their cultural signicance, then social science in our sense is included
in this category. Cf. Max Weber, WL, p. 165. In his lectures at the turn of the
century, Weber was already terming economics a social science.
15
Ibid., p. 166.
16
Ibid., p. 170.
17
Ibid., p. 166. In this connection, it should not be forgotten that the purpose
of Webers essay, in addition to the aims of the new Archiv fr Sozialwissenschaft

webers sociology of religion

269

also wrote a study that was specically based, not on the economic
conditioning of religious manifestation, but on the religious conditioning of economic manifestations, examining phenomena which
specically do not fall within the compass of an economic viewpoint,
even if, in the context of an economic approach, a distinction is
made between economic, economically conditioned and economically
relevant.18 For economically relevant phenomena are rst and foremost non-economic in nature. And for this reason, Weber is primarily concerned in this study to employ a conceptual-methodical
apparatus which departs from that of socio-economics, and to present a causal attribution which, in a complicated manner, links hopes
of salvation and their religious signicance with economic attitudes.
Here he also intended to show how ideas can operate in history,
specically as factors of conditioning and not always as factors conditioned, as postulated, for example, by historical materialism as
the common denominator in a causal explanation of historical reality.19
But even if we abstain from such a Weltanschauung and content
und Sozialpolitik, was to emphasize continuity with its predecessor, the Archiv fr
soziale Gesetzgebung und Statistik. The latter, however, had treated the topics that
it dealt with as socio-economic matters, right from the start. Ibid., p. 161.
18
This Weber did, as is known, in his essay on objectivity, though here he was
to extend the scope of the socio-economic approach beyond the bounds of the permissible. Cf. ibid., p. 162. It immediately becomes clear that this approach in particular is not sucient to encompass the religious conditioning of such economic
manifestations as the spirit of modern capitalism, since for this purpose, to employ
a subsequent formulation, seen from the economic viewpoint, the other side of the
causal relationship is important. Also, in his distinction between the economic, the
economically conditioned and the economically relevant, strictly interpreted, Weber
does not speak at all of a socio-economic approach, and thus of the specic viewpoint of the analysis, but only of socio-economic problems. In my view, it is therefore erroneous, to dene Webers approach in 1904 and thereafter as socio-economic.
In reality, even the study on ascetic Protestantism denitely does not t this designation. For the processes of daily life, no less than the historic events of high
politics, collective and mass manifestations as much as the unique acts of statesmen or individual literary and artistic achievements are simultaneously inuenced
by [material interests, W.S.],economically conditioned. On the other hand, the
totality of all the manifestations and conditions of life of a given historical culture
exert an inuence on the form of material needs, the way in which they are satised,
the formation of material interest groups and the type of their power resources and
thence on the type of process of economic developmentit becomes economically relevant. WL, p. 163. It is also true that the distinction between the economic, the economically conditioned and the economically relevant can be transferred
in an analogous way to all value spheres and life orders, and to all the regulations
and powers of society. Thus cultural manifestations may be religious, religiously
conditioned or religiously relevant.
19
Ibid., p. 166.

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ourselves instead with an economic interpretation of history20 we have

still to take the non-economic factors of historical life into consideration. From an economic viewpoint, we are concerned with (rational) action under conditions of material scarcity in the battle with
nature and with other people. True, from a religious viewpoint, this
is also our concern (material and ideal interests), but not this alone.
Here the focus is rather on the question of meaning, the question
of ones own destiny of salvation, and the scientic reply to this
question requires an interpretation of history which is not only economic, but also spiritual.21 Sociology is therefore a discipline which,
like economics, sheds light on social manifestations and cultural
processes from specic, and thereby necessarily one-sided viewpoints,
and develops a conceptual-methodical apparatus to this end. This is
exactly what Weber does in his contribution to the Handbuch der politischen konomie, later entitled Grundri der Sozialkonomik, but already
in his dispute with Rudolf Stammler, which is the basis of the latter
work. The dominant viewpoint for sociology is the interaction of
economic and non-economic factors in dierent value spheres and
life orders: the economy and economic powers in their relation to
the other societal orders and powers are at issue, and these relations
are to be examined from a theoretical and a historical point of view.
This leads me on to my second step. I have given it the heading:
Comparison and Developmental history. How does this heading
t into our deliberations so far?
2. Comparison and developmental history
First of all, there can be no doubt that the primary purpose of
Webers revised Grundriss article of 1919/1920 is to establish sociological concepts and to determine regularities, laws of social life.
This is not the case in the studies on the economic ethics of world
religions, where sociological concepts and regularities are applied.
This pronouncement is in no way invalidated by the fact that both
the major projects are based to a considerable extent on the same

20

Ibid., p. 167.
Cf. in this connection WL, pp. 166f. It was not by chance that Weber, in a
letter to Rickert, described his procedure in the Protestantism study as a kind of
spiritual construction of modern economics.
21

webers sociology of religion

271

material. Indeed, Weber expressly states that sociology draws its

material, as paradigms, very largely, though by no means exclusively,
from the realities of action which are also relevant from historical
viewpoints. It constructs its concepts and seeks rules above all also
from the point of view of whether it can thus be of service to the
historical causal attribution of manifestations of cultural signicance.
And he goes on: As in every generalizing science, the peculiarity
of its abstractions dictates that its concepts with respect to the concrete reality of historical fact must be relatively empty of content.
What it has to oer in exchange is the enhanced precision of concepts.22 In this sense, the three pure types of legitimate domination
taken from the revised Grundriss article with respect to the concrete
reality of historical rulership are concepts relatively empty of content, while the description of the structure and culture of Chinese
patrimonial bureaucracy in the study on Confucianism (and Taoism)
is relatively full of content by comparison.
In the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie too, we certainly nd
passages which serve concept formation rather than their application; the Preliminary Remarks (Vorbemerkung), the Introduction
(Einleitung) or the Intermediate Reection (Zwischenbetrachtung)
come to mind, as these passages all adhere closely to the Grundriss
article; in fact they are extracts from Religious Communities.23
They introduce and then lead on to the causal analysis and explanation of individual actions, patterns and personalities of cultural
signicance.24 This is nally also made clear in the Preliminary
Remarks, written in 1919/1920, to the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie. Here it is stated that the collection is intended to help to
identify the specic character of occidental rationalism, and within it,
of modern occidental rationalism, and to explain its origin.25 Weber
requires of himself then, from the point of view of method, a
historical investigation in logical terms, undertaken from a sociological viewpoint. The study on ascetic Protestantism had already been
just such a historical investigation. And the study on ancient Judaism
is another one.
22

Max Weber, WuG, pp. 9f.

The Introduction und Intermediate Reection, in particular, are pre-formulated in the Religious Communities section of the Grundriss article of 1913.
See Schluchter, 1988, II, p. 576.
24
WuG, p. 9.
25
RS I, p. 12.
23

wolfgang schluchter

272

It is certainly not possible to interpret Webers switch from the

theoretical to the historical viewpoint as a lapse into narration in
historiography. The Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie are also
attempts at a comparative sociology of religions, because they not only
have a problem of identication to solve (recognition of the specic
character of the manifestation), but are also conducted from a sociological viewpoint. Specically, the concern here is with both sides
of the causal relationship, as already set out in the Grundriss article of 1913: the class conditioning of religion on one hand, the religious conditioning of economic attitudes on the other. These two
sides of the causal relationship must be comparatively delineated, but
made plain from a historical viewpoint (individualizing, not generalizing concept formation!). To this extent too, the Grundriss article
and the essays in the sociology of religion are complementary. The
rst work pursues these two relationships from a theoretical viewpoint, through generalizing concept formation, the second from a
historical one, through individualizing concept formation. And the
fact that both sides of the causal relationship are now pursued in the
Economic Ethics of World Religions distinguishes them from
the study on ascetic Protestantism, but does not alter their historical caliber. For Weber expressly states that in the study on ascetic
Protestantism he only dealt with one side of the causal relationship,
the conditioning of the emergence of an economic ethic: the ethos;
of an economy by the specic content of the religious creed. In the
studies on the economic ethics of world religions, however, he deals
with both sides of the causal relationship, that is to say that he includes
also the other side that had been voluntarily left in parentheses in
the study on Protestantism. As he formulates it with all the clarity
that could be desired: The later (with respect to the study on
Protestantism, W.S.) essays on the Economic Ethics of World Religions
attempt, in an overall view of the relationships of the most important cultural religions to the economy and to social class, to investigate both sides of the causal relationship in whatever depth may be
necessary to nd points of comparison with the occidental development still to be analysed.26
Thus Weber certainly did not understate the dierence between
the studies on ascetic Protestantismthe 1904/05 study was sup-

26

Ibid., p. 12.

webers sociology of religion

273

plemented in 1920 and now enriched with the almost entirely new
essay on the Protestant sectsand the studies on the economic ethics
of world religions. This can also be detected with very little diculty
from the Table of Contents, authorized by himself, of the rst
volume of the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie. According to
this, the Preliminary Remarks written in 1919/1920 applies to all
the essays, i.e. including the revised version of the Protestant Ethic
and the essay on the Protestant Sects; the Introduction and
Intermediate Reection, on the other hand, apply only to the
Economic Ethics of World Religions, notwithstanding the fact that
all previously published texts were revised. Indeed, the conceptual
apparatus that had been developed since 1904/1905 is used throughout; in the essay The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
spirit now without quotation marks, this is especially true of the
insertions, which, as elsewhere, are the primary constituent of the
revision. (See Appendix C).27
The primary function of comparisons is to identify peculiarities,
not to explain them.28 Furthermore, they serve to construct sociological concepts. As the construction of concepts is not central to
the essays on the economic ethics of world religions, the principal
use of comparisons here is to determine the specic characteristics
of occidental cultural manifestations. As the above quotation shows,
Weber wishes to pursue Asiatic cultural manifestations only insofar
as it is necessary to nd points of comparison with the occidental
development still to be analysed. We could rephrase this: In this
way, the dierence characteristic of occidental development compared with Asian developments will be identied. Once this has been
done, it will be known what crucial turning points await clarication.
With respect to religious history, it is not only the turning point
related to ascetic Protestantism. More relevant are the turning points
that arose before and after. The subsequent phenomenon that Weber
wanted to examine was the Counter-Reformation. For the preceding
turning points, Weber gives the decisive indication in the revised

27

This applies especially to the concepts of asceticism and mysticism.

This formulation needs some qualication, however, in that comparisons naturally also play a role in causal attribution, as any experiment with a control group
will show. Even thought experiments obey the same logic. And it is not by chance
that John Stuart Mill recommended the method of dierences to the moral sciences. Nevertheless, comparison and causal attribution are two dierent things.
28

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wolfgang schluchter

edition of the study on ascetic Protestantism: That great process in

religious history of the disenchantment of the world, which started with
the prophets of ancient Judea, and, in combination with Greek
scientic thought, rejected all magical means of seeking salvation as
superstition and sin, reached its conclusion here (in ascetic Protestantism,
W.S.).29
In 1904/05, in the rst version of the study on Protestantism,
Weber had not yet spoken of a great process of disenchantment of
the world in religious history,30 nor of the signicance of the Hellenic
intellectual culture, the Pauline mission, Roman law, the Roman
church resting on the Roman concept of oce or the medieval
order of estates for the emergence of modern rationalism.31 All this
he includes now in the occidental development still to be analysed.
Of course, one can only comprehend the perhaps decisive turning
point that caused dierences by going back to the creation of the
Old Testament. Part of this creation, however, is ancient Jewish
prophecy, especially prior to the Exile.32
The dierences linked to these cultural manifestations point in one
and the same direction: a religious ethic of innerworldly conduct which
is highly rational, that is to say free from magic and all forms of irrational striving for salvation.33 Seen from the point of view of religious history, this is a development which deviates from those prevailing
in Asia. This becomes clear to Weber in his extremely supercial

29

Ibid., pp. 94f.

Even in the rst version of the study on Protestantism, however, Weber draws
already attention to the anity between Palestinian Jewry and English Puritanism,
also known with some justication as English Hebraism, for the latter shows a
tendency to treat the pronouncements of the Bible like paragraphs of a book of
law (ibid., p. 179), and therefore to disseminate the spirit of formal legality, of
self-righteous, sober legality. Yet this spirit cannot be traced back precisely to the
time of writing of the Old Testament scriptures, but to Jewry, as it gradually
evolved under the inuence of many centuries of formalistic-legal and Talmudic
education (ibid., p. 181). Among the canonical scriptures, he mentioned in this
connection only the book of Job, and in the Apocrypha, the book of Ecclesiasticus,
thought to date from the beginning of the second century BC. This last, however,
is linked to German Pietism, not to English Puritanism (cf. ibid., pp. 179f.). There
is as yet no mention, though, of the creation of the Old Testament, the role of the
Levites and the Prophets, or even of voluntary ghetto existence, the pariah-people
condition. These links are not established until the second version of the essay.
31
E.g. the enumeration in RS III, p. 7.
32
Cf. in this connection RS III, pp. 6f.
33
Ibid., p. 6.
30

webers sociology of religion

275

tour of the world of Asiatic culture.34 For Asiatic developments are

not favourable to the shaping of a religious ethic of rational innerworldly conduct. Weber formulates his position on this question in
the summary of his studies on Confucianism and Taoism, Hinduism
and Buddhism as follows:
Wherever a higher stratum of intellectual strives to fathom the meaning
of the world and its own life by reection, andafter the failure of
this strictly rationalist endeavourto comprehend this through experience and then raise this experience indirectly by rationalistic means
into its consciousness, the way will somehow lead into the silent hidden
realm of Indian indenable mysticism. And where, on the other hand,
a higher stratum of intellectual, rejecting these attempts to ee the
world, instead consciously and deliberately nds the highest possible
goal of inner fullment in the grace and dignity of a beautiful gesture,
it will somehow arrive at the Confucian ideal of nobility. But a signicant
part of all Asiatic intellectual culture is composed of a mingling and
interweaving of these two constituents. The concept of merely acting
in accordance with the challenge of the day to achieve that relationship with the real world which is at the heart of the whole specically
occidental sense of personality, remains as remote from it as the purely
impersonal rationalism of the West, which seeks to master the world
through practical means by discovering its own impersonal system of
laws.35

The occidental development so far analysed and to be further analysed

by Weber therefore requires a developmental-historical viewpoint of
broad scope. Development means to him neither undirected change
nor progress. When Friedrich H. Tenbruck, who otherwise distinguishes
pertinently between religious-historical disenchantment and modernization embracing secularization, opines that Weber has thus switched
his allegiance to the camp of the classical evolutionists, the misunderstanding could not be more profound.36 Weber espouses no theory of inclusive steps, such as that presented in Hegels evolutionary
model.37 Neither does he simply follow Darwins theory of evolution,
although in terms of logic, he comes close to it. His concept of development is conditionally teleological in form, requiring constructs of

34

E.g. RS II, p. 363. (MWG I/20, p. 526).

RS II, p. 377 (MWG I/20, pp. 542f.).
36
Tenbruck, (1975), pp. 703.
37
Cf. for further details the preface to the paperback edition of my book Schluchter,
1998, pp. 25.
35

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wolfgang schluchter

value-related ideal types. These are heuristic means for causal attribution. At issue is always a particular developmental history whose
reconstruction requires three steps: identication (What is the dening
characteristic of a cultural manifestation?), causal attribution (How
did this manifestation arise?) and prioritization (What weight can be
attributed to one causal factor in relation to other causal factors?).38
The rst question can only be answered by means of comparisons,
the second and third only by counterfactual arguments using the categories of objective possibility and adequate causation, as Weber
develops them with reference to von Kries and Radbruch.39 Here
he rightly stresses that the problem of prioritization in historical
processesthe key to judging between adequate causescan mostly
not be settled, or in any case only with diculty. When all this is
borne in mind, it becomes easy to understand why he included the
following remark into his plan for the Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie in 1919: The issue everywhere is how to handle the question of what is the foundation of the economic and social dening
characteristic of the Occident, how it arose and, in particular, how it
stands in relation to the development of the religious ethic.40
Thus in his historical investigations, Weber describes the religious
developmental history of cultures without becoming entangled in the
coils of classical evolutionism. His studies on the logic and methodology of the social sciences as cultural sciences aim to separate two
pairs of questions: the question of the relevance of a phenomenon
from that of its validity, and the question of development from that
of progress. For both these distinctions, it was Heinrich Rickert who
had laid the logical groundwork. A prerequisite for the rst separation is to be able to distinguish between theoretical value relatedness and practical evaluation; the second demands the capacity to

38
The proposition that a consequence can have more than one cause is a commonplace that should not be ascribed to Max Weber. Some Weber interpreters see
this realization as his greatest achievement. If this were so, it would hardly be
worth giving him any attention today. He did indeed have most sophisticated concepts of causality and attribution. To understand this, one need only read his remarks
on objective possibility and adequate causation in the consideration of historical
causality, in which, admittedly, he did not achieve absolute clarity. See also WL,
pp. 266290.
39
In this connection see WL, pp. 271277.
40
News bulletin, 11.

webers sociology of religion

277

distinguish a conditional-teleological construction from a mere sequence

of changes on the one hand and from progress on the other. From
the point of religious history, there are thus, as Weber sees it, a
number of culture-bound developmental histories, each having its
own origin, from which, with the passage of time, lines branch out,
but also intersect and under certain circumstances even merge: the
Confucian-Taoist, the Hindu-Buddhist and the Israelite-JewishChristian religious development, of which the Islamic religious development is a later descendant.41
Weber deals with these religious developmental histories asymmetrically. As the quotation cited above makes clear, he is interested
in Asia only insofar as it provides points of comparison for the occidental religious development which is to be further analysed. Judaism,
Christianity and Islam are indeed used throughout in the Grundriss
article (together with Confucianism, Hinduism and Buddhism) to
serve the comparative viewpoint, based on dierences; in the Gesammelte
Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie, in contrast, they appear primarily in a
developmental sequence. Compared with Asia, their internal dierences
fade into the background, however: the image of the divine that
emphasizes the personal, supernatural creator God, not the eternal
uncreated order; salvation that must be won through conduct willed
by God, not through gnosis; the path to salvation that leads through
actionism and asceticism, not contemplation and mysticism; the
salvation-oriented organization that favours the formation of communities, not the individual master-disciple relationship. By these
dierencesand they are not the only onesthe characteristics of
Near-Eastern-Occidental development are dened with respect to
Asiatic developments. Their expression, however, was also partly
caused by those crucial turning points, that Weber cited at the
beginning of his study on ancient Jewry. They determined the
general direction of Israelite-Jewish-Christian religious development,
which he summerized in the notion of disenchantment.

41

Cf. RS III, p. 2 Fn. and p. 7.

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278

3. The Old Testament as a crucial turning point in the total cultural

history of the Near-East and the West
Among these crucial turning points or switch yards, Weber
accords outstanding signicance to the creations of the Old Testament,
the Bible of the Jews. This was, so to speak, the moment of the fundamental decision that later divided European and North American
cultural developments from the rest, that of Islam included. These
creations are discussed in detail in the study on ancient Judaism.
In this respect, they take on a key role for the portrayal of the special development of the Near-East and the Occident. In the study
on ascetic Protestantism, Weber had come to comprehend the provisional end point of this great religious process of the disenchantment of the world. With the study on ancient Judaism, he now traces
it back to its point of origin.
In this study too, Max Weber combines comparison and developmental history. He starts with an unusual comparison. He takes as
an ideal type the Indian caste system, the ritual segregation of groups
and their interconnection through division of labourintermarriage
and commensality no, commerce yesand compares it with the
position of Jewry, which he terms a pariah people in a casteless
environment .42 At the same time, he emphasizes the dierences that
subsist with respect to the lowest Indian caste, the Pariahs. The
emphasis is on self-isolation, the voluntary ghetto existence of the
Jews compared to the imposed ghetto existence of the Indian Pariah
caste. The promises of salvation also dier: while the Indian must
perform the duties of his caste, with the prospect of individual
promotion within the caste order in a future life, which in fact
stabilizes the caste-system, the Jewish people is promised a God-given
political and social revolution, which will one day elevate it to the
rank of master race. But above all, Weber sees ritual exclusion as
no more than the external manifestation of an inner morality whose
commands make the highest demands upon the believer. It is a religious ethic of rational innerworldly conduct which, as he says, to
a large extent still underlies the European and Middle-Eastern
religious ethic of today.43

42
43

RS III, p. 5.
Ibid., p. 6.

webers sociology of religion

279

Weber takes his unconventional comparison between Indian religion and Judaism even further: thus he contrasts the Brahmins with
the Levites, who represent disparate professional groups versed in
ritual and the law. But he also contrasts Yahweh with Brahman (and
the Tao), the thought of a personal, transcendent creator God with
that of an uncreated, immanent and eternal order, which leads to
dierent conceptions of transcendence.
But the hypothesis of voluntary ghetto existence and the resulting
status of a pariah people is the primary aim of this comparison. I
shall return to this hypothesis in the last part of my exposition. Before
we come to that, it is more important to note that after his comparative introductory section, Weber changes over to developmental
history. He is concerned with the religious creations, which in the
end are decreed by that religious ethic of rational innerworldly conduct: the oldest collection, the Book of the Covenant, and the
Decalogue, which can today be dated to about 1000 to 800 BC; the
Law of Deuteronomy, which presents a programme of reform for
the period during and after the Exile, which probably originated
about 550 to 500, and the most recent collection, the sacred law
and priests codex, which are dated to about 500 to 400 BC. But
what fascinated Weber above all was the prophetic books, especially
Isaiah (including Deutero- and Trito-Isaiah), Jeremiah, Ezekiel and
Amos44and not forgetting the book of Job. But in the prophetic
books, he saw the foundations of a sublimation based on an ethic
of conviction, of the material put together in the collections, which
leads to an ethic of law only.45

44
This arrangement in the canon does not correspond to the supposed historical sequence. After this comes rst Amos (c. 780 to 750), then Isaiah (c. 740 to
700), then Jeremiah (c. 625 to 595), last Ezekiel (c. 600 to 570), who is already a
prophet of the period of Exile. Deutero-Isaiah, the second Isaiah (Isa. 4055), was
already seen as a book in its own right and, as a later interpolation in the Book
of Isaiah, dates its origin to the end of the period of Exile. Weber broadly adheres
to these crude datings. Nevertheless, he does speak of the pre-Exile prophets from
Amos to Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Ibid., p. 281.
45
The Torah numbered 613 rules, 248 commands and 365 prohibitions. To
Webers mind, this normative material forms the foundation of the prophecy. In
his view, these rules from the pre-Exile teaching of the Torah, the Levite Torah,
constitute the content of the Jewish ethic (ibid., pp. 250f.), though this did not deviate strikingly from the religious ethics of other peoples. Only with the prophecy did
it become stamped with its specic characteristics: the central religious conviction
that lies behind it. Ibid., p. 333.

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wolfgang schluchter

Weber is imprecise in his dating, and of course dependent on the

state of debate of his time. In his analysis, he only follows a very
crude chronology (before, during, and after the Exile). Neither is the
study strictly chronological, but is constructed in accordance with
the important analytical viewpoints: it deals rst with the socio-economic and socio-political situations in Syria and Palestine and their
representation in law, especially the covenant with Yahweh and the
constitution of the confederacy, its transformation into a monarchy,
the north-south schism ( Judea and Israel) and the exile in Persia
(Babylon) and Egypt respectively. There follows a description of the
conception of God and of worship, and of the bearers of a theologization of the law: the Levites. Next comes the presentation of the
pre-exile prophetic message as part of a prophecy of doom, which
favours an ethic of conviction, based on the canonized laws systematized by the Levites. (At this point, Weber applies his general
pronouncement about the relationship between priests, prophets and
the laity from the chapter on religious communities in the Grundriss
article to a historical case, continuing with the distinction between
magic and a religious ethic, divine coercion and worship). Finally,
the prophetic message of the Exile (and post-Exile) period is presented as prophecy of hope, especially the prophetic theodicy of
suering (Isa. 4055) with eschatological features,46 formulated in
Deutero-Isaiah, and the gradual transformation of the political
community into a confessional one. The hypothesis: prophecy dies
away step by step in the course of this process.
At the same time, Weber deals with important external factors
of tension too: little Israel is constantly under threat from the
surrounding great powers; the hilly, fertile north provides living conditions dierent from the desert south; the settled farmers co-exist
with diculty with the pastoral nomads; the city, with its urbanbased patrician class stands in opposition to the country side. Weber
depicts the Jewish people as culturally elevated and autonomous, but
marked by the experience of collective menace: the experience of
the irrationality of the world, which he is known to have considered
the driving force behind all religion, takes the shape here primarily
46
Deutero-Isaiah is the rst prophetic book to work out a theodicy, linked here
to an eschatology. What is expressed here for the community is expressed in the
Book of Job for the individual. Apocalyptic elements are also to be found in the
book of Isaiah.

webers sociology of religion

281

of the experience of political deprivation (exile, subjection, inner

enslavement, the downfall of the northern kingdom, repeated exile).
The creations of the Old Testament arose not least as a reaction to
all this. They provide motivation for actively grappling with a situation
threatening not only to the community but also the individual.
But why were they able to become a crucial turning point, a
switch yard of Middle-Eastern and Western development? Because
they supported religious rationalization. Weber indeed determines
the degree of rationalization that a religion has reached by reference
to two yardsticks: in rst place he takes the extent to which it has
rid itself of magic, and in the second place the the extent of the
systematic unity into which it has brought the relationship of God
and the world and thence its own ethical stance towards the world.47
When these two yardsticks are applied to Israelite-Jewish religious
development, it is immediately plain that religious rationalization has
progressed a long way in relative terms. The Levites in particular
rationalized their worship in contrast to the esoteric Egyptian cult
of the dead and the orgiastic cults of Baal in the north, thereby
desacralizing the clan (yardstick 1); the prophetic message, however,
sublimated Levite teaching of positive rituals and ethical commands
into an ethical attitude, emphasizing the central signicance of the
ethical relationship of the people as a whole and of each individual
to the world (yardstick 2). Weber summarizes his view as follows:
Moses was indeed the originator of an important religio-ethical development. But only Levite rationalism in combination with the prophetic
message was successful in stabilizing Israelite-Jewish religiousness
against any subversion from outside;48 only this combination gave
it the capacity to survive even in the face of the most unfavourable
external circumstances. Certainly, this alone would not have been
enough; self-ghettoization, a ritual and also real separation from the
social environment, had to be added to it, especially as the fall of
the second Temple brought with it the denitive destruction of the
political confederacy.

47
48

RS I, p. 512 (MWG I/19, p. 450).

RS III, p. 280.

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4. The (mis-)construction of a Jewish pariah peoples situation from the

Persian-Babylonian exile stage up to the fall of the second Temple
This leads back to the hypothesis that Weber had derived from the
India-Palastine comparison: can it be said that the assertion of
voluntary ghetto existence, of a special position due to ritual separation, of the status of a pariah people in a casteless environment,
is really true of ancient Jewry? There can be no question here of
bringing counter-evidence to bear. This has been done frequently in
the secondary literature;49 I am not historically competent for the
task. What I nd much more interesting is to look behind Webers
construction. What was his motivation for it?
The most striking feature is that Weber depicts the process during
and after the Persian-Babylonian exile, from a cultural viewpoint,
as a constant narrowing of spiritual horizons: the ritual rules move
into the foreground relative to the legal and ethical commands,
the prophetic message is transformed from a prophecy of doom to
a prophecy of hope, and in the end is completely stied by a theocracy
laying hands on everything around it. Thus the cultural narrowing
goes hand in hand with an institutional fossilization. Movements in
favour of renewal within Jewry are opposed, some stied, some
pushed to the periphery, like the Essenes, for example (Weber could
of course have known nothing of Qumran.)50 Jewry formed itself
into an association that was internally homogenous, but externally
insular.
Max Weberlike every reader of the New Testamentknew that
even if we consider only the descriptions of the religious conicts to
be found in the history of the apostles, written about 90 AD, we
nd a strange contrast with this construction of inward and outward
fossilization. The Jesus movement is after all rst and foremost an
internal Jewish movement for renewal, and as it becomes increasingly independent, the inner Jewish conicts persist, and even gain
in strength. Sadducees and Pharisees dispute the role of the Resurrection and the Spirit; the strict Jewry of Jerusalem ghts against

49

Examples of this can be found in Schluchter, 1981.

There is much argument as to whether the Qumran community (sect) and the
Essenes were one and the same. This question I leave open. Whatever the truth
of the matter, the texts from Qumran reveal a Jewish apocalyptic movement which
displays great similarities with certain currents in early Christianity.
50

webers sociology of religion

283

the lax Jewry of the Diaspora; Jewish and Gentile Christians argue
about the role of circumcision, and even of the Jewish ritual prescriptions in general. One gains the impression of a conict-laden
religious pluralism within Jewry and on its periphery, not to mention the conicts with Greek and Roman tradition in which both
Jews and Christians are becoming entangled.51 Weber himself speaks
of a profusion of cults, schools, sects and orders of every kind
characterizing not only Asia, but also the ancient Occident, a religious pluralism restrained only by reasons of state, where it did
nally meet an inexible limit.52 In the fragment on the Pharisees,
Weber again underlines this religious diversity.53 None of this tallies
with the picture of cultural and social rigidity. What led Weber, so
knowledgeable about Antiquity, to this perception?54
We might rst answer: this perception arises as a back-projection
of mediaeval conditions on to antiquity (the ghetto), and a postReformation concept (confessional community) is inappropriately
applied. Yet in my view, this too is only half the truth. There is a
more profound reason for the (mis-)construction. Weber paints a
background against which the Pauline mission stands out in a clear
light. He sees this as an act of liberation of world-historical signicance.
It was this above all that preserved the creations of the Old Testament
for early Christianity as it freed itself from the imposition of Jewish
modes of thought. For, as Weber puts it: Among the most important spiritual achievements of the Pauline mission was that it kept
this holy book of the Jews alive to become a holy book of the
Christian religion; at the same time, it eliminated all those ethical
features taught in it, which specically anchored the Jews ritually in
their characteristic state of a pariah people, as no longer obligatory,
having been annulled by the Christian saviour.55 Without this

51
Belief in the Resurrection and in an eschatological renewal of the world, which
dominated early Christianity and the apocalyptic tendencies in Jewry, were foreign
to Greek thought. Concerning the dispute that arose from this during Pauls stay
in Athens, Acts 17, 16.
52
RS II, p. 364 (MWG I/20, p. 527).
53
On this subject, see the essays in Schluchter, 1985.
54
Of course, this picture is not complete invention. Because of its laws, which
were diverse from all people and bound up with its separation, anti-Judaism was
already existent in antiquity, going hand in hand with acts of violence against the
scattered Jewish communities. An example of this can be seen in Esther 315.
55
RS III, p. 6f. But it should not be forgotten that the opposition between
universalism and particularism was among the fundamental tensions present in

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wolfgang schluchter

construction of the status of a pariah people, the act of liberation

would not be quite so spectacular.
It is a fact that Weber sees a turning point for further development in the disagreement between Peter and Paul, to whom the
company of the apostles had entrusted responsibility for the mission
to the Jews and the Gentiles respectively. For as represented by Paul
in the Epistle to the Galatians, dated c. 54 AD, not only he but
also Peter ate at the same table with Gentiles, thought the latter
denies this to the Jews, which Paul sharply admonishes (Gal. 2,
1121). In the challenge that was bound up with this, of breaking
through ritual barriers, Weber saw an urge towards universalization,
which he calls the hour of conception of occidental citizenship. For
without this emancipation from the ritual, compartmentalized
separation of the Jews, founded on the prescriptions of the Torah . . . the
Christian community would have remained, just like the Essenes and
the Therapeuts, for example, merely a small sect within the Jewish
pariah people.56
It is clear enough that Weber is adhering to a dramatic conception
that brings the world-historical role of Paul to the fore. But it can
also be seen that between ancient Jewish prophecy and ascetic
Protestantism there are developmental links which, in the right
circumstances, can lead to fundamental changes of direction. The
development process does indeed take a long time, but is not inevitable.
Again and again, it is necessary to invent, and from time to time
to re-invent. I close with a quotation that I nd particularly impressive: hardly ever, says Weber,
have totally new religious concepts arisen in the centres of any of the
rational cultures. Not in Babylon, Athens, Alexandria, Rome, Paris,
London, Cologne, Hamburg or Vienna, but in the Jerusalem of the
pre-Exile period, in the Galilee of the late Jewish period, in the late

post-exile Jewry, and that there were denite tendencies, not least under Hellenistic
inuence, towards a world-religious understanding of Jewry, including proselytism.
Weber was fully aware of this, but consideredprobably with justicethat the
opposing trend was the stronger. The peak period for the world-religious orientation
seems to have been during the second century BC, at the time of the re-establishment
of the temple cult in Jerusalem by Judas Maccabaeus and the regaining of political
freedom, though the latter only lasted a short time and was not liberating either.
( Jerusalem was to fall under Roman rule in 69 BC). It was a period in which a
vigorous Diaspora Jewry also developed.
56
Ibid.

webers sociology of religion

285

Roman province of Africa, in Assisi, in Wittenberg, Zurich, Geneva

and in the outer zones of the Dutch-North German and English cultures, such as Friesland and New England, have new rational prophetic
or reformatory entities rst been conceived. The reason is everywhere
one and the same: new conceptions of a religious nature can only arise
where man has not forgotten how to face up to event in the world
with his own questions. And it is precisely the man who lives far away
from the great cultural centres who has occasion to do so, when their
inuence begins to aect him in his central interests and to become
a threat.57

This can also be formulated in the abstract: economics and sociology

are only able to develop into social sciences as cultural sciences when
they are rooted in a theory of human action which does not assimilate
human creativity to mere utility.

57

Ibid., p. 220.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE CIVILIZATION

OF MODERNITY: 1203 AND 2003
Edward A. Tiryakian
The new dynamics of civilization transformed group
conicts into potential class and ideological conicts,
cult conicts into struggles between the orthodox
and the heterodox. Conicts between tribes and
societies became missionary crusades.
S.N. Eisenstadt (2003a: 40)

Preface
Shmuel Eisenstadt is undoubtedly one of the great navigators of
modern social science, one who has taken some clues from an earlier
explorer of modernity, Max Weber, and gone on various expeditions
charting the ocean of modernity and its civilizations. He has steered
safely past the Scylla of marxism and the Charybdis of functionalism to map out the course of the civilization of modernity, and has
recently presented us with various results of his epic saga (Eisenstadt
2003). If we consider that out of his nearly 700 publications in 7
decades, several hundred are comparative and historical, with the
problematic of modernization and modernity, including their disruptive and dark side, as core concerns, and if we consider that he
has circumnavigated the worlds of axial age and non-axial age
civilizations (1986c), from Israel (1992b), to India (2003a), to Japan
(1996b), to the Americas (2001b), and many others along the way,
well, then, in one sense, what we are left to oer him is commentary, rather than new continents and seas that he hasnt mapped.1
My commentary for this occasion springs from Eisenstadts essay
on the Origins of the West (2003a: 578611). We need not spend
1
Willfried Spohn oers an important commentary in making the case that
Eisenstadts treatment of comparative civilizational analysis represents one of the
most forceful heterodox conceptualizations in contemporary macro-sociological
theory, (Spohn 2001: 499).

288

edward a. tiryakian

time on explicating it. Suce to point that it is a pregnant revisit

of that perennial challenge for comparative-historical sociology, Webers
Protestant ethic thesis concerning the development in the West of
the civilization of modernity. I will draw attention as a reference
point to Eisenstadts observation:
Thus, Webers insights about the crucial role of monasteries and
heterododoxies . . . in the playing out of the dierent basic themes and
tensions and in the trans-formative problematic of Western Christian
civilization, were in principle indeed correct (2003a: 590).

The medieval background to the Reformation was indeed noted by

Weber, but was not a primary focus of his account of modernity. It
was still, one might say, a period, a late period at best, of the
enchantment of the world,2 and the modern world was not really
entered until the 16th Century awakening of Luther who opened up
the gate of the Reformation and the new consciousness of the world
with the transformation of the Calvinist sects. My commentary is
a reconsideration of part of the religious and cultural setting of the
medieval period.3 I hasten to make a disclaimer that I have only
a very amateur knowledge of the 13th Century and of its major
historical sources and it is a period I have not previously written
about. But since in an earlier occasion honoring Shmuel Eisenstadt
I ventured some new thoughts on centers of modernity (Tiryakian
1985), this is an opportune time to do so again by taking a somewhat o-beat comparative historical ingress to the civilization of
modernity. And if we take the eort to look at this very distant setting eight centuries or so removed from us, we may nd some unexpected materials that relate to critical themes in Eisenstadts comparative
studies, the themes of creative tensions of heterodox orientations,
multiple modernities, and Jacobin tendencies of modernity.

2
Weber and Marx may be said to share the same view on the medieval period
through the prism of Enlightenment historiography, as exemplied by Voltaire (in
his inuential The Age of Louis XIV). A contrasting view is that of Saint-Simon
who took the medieval period as a prototype of an organic period of Western
civilization, marked by the meshing of structural conditions and dominant ideology.
3
The date 1203 does not have any particular signicance. I use it as a marker
for the setting of the civilization of modernity in the European South, shortly before
the terrible wave of religio-political repression marked by the onset of the crusade in 1209.

the civilization of modernity

289

The 13th Century is, I propose, a very relevant setting to gain a

perspective on the central theme of this conference, the theme of
Pluralism versus Homogeneity, for that tension was a dening point
in Western Civilization at that time. But if the main part of my
commentary is to bring this out, I will also use the outcome of
the setting not only to raise the question of why did the nascent
civilization of modernity have a breakdowna question which is
related Webers problematic regarding non-Western civilizations, especially the high ones comparable to the Westbut also to raise the
deeply disturbing question of whether another civilizational breakdown
is on the verge as a post 9/11 consequence in the country which
perhaps has taken the civilization of modernity to its furthest extent.
I. Does the 13th Century have any import for a critical understanding of modernity, especially where we are concerned in our day
with global aspects of modernity in the frame of homogeneity versus pluralism?4 Although it has had considerably less attention by
non-medievalist scholars than later ones (and consequently closer to
our times), it has been keenly viewed in the 20th Century through
dierent prisms. It may be well to consider several of these before
bringing out our own evaluation of its bearing on the theme of our
book.
One pairing of perspectives is what I would term a maximalist
and a minimalist 20th Century perspective on the 13th Century.
By maximalist I simply mean an author giving maximal gaze on
the totality and importance of that period; minimalist here means
that in its treatment the period is of minimal importance for our
contemporary situation.
The former is shown by an unabashed, unmitigated admirer of
the 13th Century, James Walsh, in a work that had had multiple
editions on the eve of World War I (1912). As the suggestive title
proposes (The Thirteenth Greatest of Centuries), the century saw
the beginnings of modern democracy, the establishment of great universities and centers of higher education, which provided not only
the necessary theological and philosophical knowledge for the ranks
4
That dichotomy, homogeneity vs. pluralism, derived from the globalization literature, is reminiscent of the pattern variables that informed modernization analysis a generation or two ago.

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edward a. tiryakian

of the clergy but also, in the gure of Roger Bacon, the early promotion of experimental study and empirical knowledge based on
observation. Walsh went on to show the creativity of the century in
literature and the arts (Dante and Cimabue as innovators) in law
and jurisprudence, in innovative social services (the establishment of
hospitals), in the advancement of women (Walsh 1912: 331), and
not least in the beginnings of modern commerce (the Hanseatic
League, for instance), linking countries in trade as an alternative to
endemic warfare.5
Briey, this historical perspective is a portrayal of an early and
unsurpassed high point of a Euro-Christian civilization, one that provided a model of an integrated civilization of modernity not only
for traditional Catholicism but also for some sociological gures like
Saint-Simons organic period of social organization and Sorokins
concept of idealistic integration is the cyclical aspect of Western
civilization.
What I term the minimalist view on the 13th Century is provided in one of the least remembered writings of sociologist George
Homans. Unlike his later attempts at theory construction, ultimately
privileging psychological reductionism of social phenomena into their
elementary forms of operant conditioning, his rst major work is
grounded in archival research on village society in 13th Century
England (Homans 1960). Homans sought to reconstruct from records
a whole social order, a sort of the social organization of everyday
social life; and it is apparent from his discussion that he was motivated to carry out this research much the same way that anthropologists (at least at the time of publication) sought to in a monograph
the depiction of the total social order of a society. Homanss English
Villagers is synchronic, not diachronic, and the historical setting is
in the deep recess of the background. The cultural, religious dimension of village life gets some attention as part of an orderly social
system, but not in terms of any signicant basis of orthodoxy/
heterodoxy.6 What is noted by (young) Homans that makes the 13th
Century an ingress worth noting is that it is with that century that

Hansa did more than almost any other institution in northern Europe to establish the reign of Law, (Walsh: 424).
6
Quite dierent, as will be noted in the next section, is the depiction of French
14th Century village life by Annales historian Le Roy Ladurie, drawn from the
context of heterodox and orthodox confrontations.

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291

it is the earliest century from which enough records of the right

sort survive to tell us in some detail about the life of English countrymen . . . [and] the one in which the social and economic order of
the Middle Ages was the most prosperous and least challenged,
(1960: 4).
If there is an almost halcyonic depiction of the period by Homans,
quite a dierent frame is presented in the study of heterodox movement drawn by Cohn in his classic study of eschatology and revolutionary chiliasm (1961). The materials he adduces of radical beliefs
underlying popular movements of insurrection, such as the Radical
Franciscans, the Flagellant Brethren, and especially the antinomian
Brethren of the Free Spirit (1961: 189) challenged medieval hierarchy and on other occasions vented religious fury on the Jewish community. The violent current of fundamentalism spawned in the
Thirteenth Century is followed by Cohn into later centuries, into
the Reformation with an extensive discussion of the Anabaptists and
the prophet-king Thomas Mntzer. From the point of view of the
traditional orthodoxy of Roman Catholicism, Luther was of course
a dangerous schismatic with a salvic doctrine of grace that displaced the authority of the clergy and above all that of the papacy.
However, the Anabaptist challenge to Lutheranism was from the heterodoxic emphasis of the primitive Church taken as a community
of equals sharing all things in common, and therefore being a radical
challenge to the feudal order resting on status and privileges of
wealth.7
Cohn does not view the medieval period (which in his study is
not limited to the 13th Century but also takes in the 14th) as an
integrated sociocultural order much less as a civilization having a
bearing on modernity, except in the negative sense of letting loose
violent social movements of protest, particularly coming from the
poor and dispossessed. Thus Cohn notes in the concluding notes of
the chapter on Mntzer that Marxists have claimed him (perhaps
erroneously, he suggests) as a prototypical hero of class warfare (1961:
171). He concludes his study observing that the millennial beliefs

7
Although beyond the scope of Cohns discussion, it may be said that the
Reformation is a period of clashing interpretations of Christian fundamentalism. In
more general terms, in all great religious traditions there are critical moments when
segments claim for themselves orthodoxy and brand other segments as heterodox.

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edward a. tiryakian

gained currency amidst a disintegrating social order and formed the

source of a peculiar subterranean fanaticism . . . which in our day
have convulsed the world, (1961: 319), probably intending by the
latter the totalitarian regimes which Eisenstadt later encapsulated as
Jacobin aspects of modernity.
Extending Cohns analysis, that antinomian underground legacy
of the 13th and 14th Centuries could be followed later than the
Reformation, in succeeding stages of modernity. The trail leads to
17th Century England among the communitarian and radical egalitarian movements that gure prominently in Christopher Hills classic
study of urban protest (1972), to the early 19th Century revolutionary
movements that linked religious and political visions (Billington 1980),
and down to the turbulent contestations of various new social movements of the late 1960s. The latter joined political protests of a
secular nature with religious symbolism and ecstatic drug-induced
visions challenging the rationality and stratication of the larger
society in often violent movements of protest; yet in other settings,
communal movements of hippies sought a return to a primitive,
egalitarian setting, often set apart from the urban centers of hypermodernity. That broad world of the counter-culture (Yinger 1982),
which I take broadly as a multidimensional, transnational challenge
against authority based on heterodox visions of the good society,
has had far-reaching precipitates from an original antinomian core.8
The three studies of the 13th Century discussed above are essentially descriptive of the European setting; we need to go beyond
them to a more comparative and analytical level to do justice to the
theme of the civilization of modernity.
II. More germane for the purpose of the present essay is the impressive
comparative economic historical study of Abu-Lughod, which straddles
the 13th and 14th Centuries. She undertakes it not as an economic
8
In his introduction to The Origins and Diversity of Axial Age Civilizations,
Eisenstadt notes there were broad common conditions and processes in the rst
Axial Age which, however, became articulated in widely varying dierent modes of
reconstruction of trust, solidarity, power and division of labor, generating dierent
institutional types of answers . . . and dierent possibilities of secondary breakthrough, (Eisenstadt 1986b: 25). On a global basis, it would be highly fruitful for
a comparative civilizational analysis to see the varying responses and precipitates of
the late 1960s to the new challenges of modernity.

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293

historian but as a sociologist seeking to broaden the frame of world

system analysis developed by Wallerstein and behind him by Annales
historian Braudel (Wallerstein 197479, 1983; Braudel 1979).
Recall that for the latter two, European modernity, or at least the
channel of modernity, lay in the development of modern capitalism
from the fteenth/sixteenth century onwards, paving the way for
European hegemony on a global basis. Braudels succinct afterthoughts to his monumental study of the development of capitalism
in the West (1992) is, unwittingly, a note of European triumphalism:
When compared with the economies of the rest of the world, the
European economy seems to have been more developed thanks to its
superior instruments and tools of the bourse and various forms of credit
(1979: 34).

Braudel gently chided Wallersteins theme of the world-system having

come into being in Europe in the 16th Century (the key starting
point of modernity for Marx and Weber before them). Braudel
acknowledged that world economies, understood as the economy of
one area of the Earth forming an economic whole having a center
in a dominant city, existed prior to then, even outside Europe (Braudel
1979: 81). But even with the presence of market systems, outside
Europe there was no capitalism as we have come to know it.
One more observation of Braudel before moving on (or back!) to
the 13th Century. He takes note of Webers claim of modern capitalism being a creation of Puritanism, but promptly dismisses it on
the grounds that the northern European countries which took over
the center of economic development at the end of the 16th Century
invented nothing in either technology or in business management
from the old southern European centers, especially Venice. Webers
error was basically to exaggerate the role of capitalism as promoter
of the modern world (1979: 67). Ironically, Braudel seems to retrace
somewhat hurriedly Webers Eurocentrism but taking a dierent path
of why modern capitalism did not develop outside the West. Where
Weber studied at length the cultural factors which impeded the high
civilizations of China and India. Braudel considers en passant, the
economic ingredients lacking: the absences of fairs and bourses in
China, while fairs in India were linked with a traditional past (1979: 34).
In graded fashion, they and Islam and Japan had many of the layers
of economic life that are relevant for capitalism, but in the last
economic history analysis, they fell short of an economic breakthrough.

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edward a. tiryakian

Abu-Lughod introduces an important corrective to the privileging

of the West in the development of world economy in the past ve
centuries or so. She basically looks at multiple modernities linked
together economically in the same broad time frame of the 13th
Century, a world system marked by commercial interchanges in
broad overlapping zones. Her contention is that if we look at that
period (which in her study spills over into the 14th Century),9 ruptured from the following one by the Black Death that in the aggregate took one-third of the European population in the second half
of the 14th Century, no particular culture had a monopoly on either
technological or social innovations, no particular psychological outlook, no particular religious outlook, no particular form of economic
organization prevailed. Hence, she asserts, it is erroneous to argue
that only the institutions and culture of the West could have succeeded, (Abu-Lughod 1993: 17).
Her comparative-historical perspective critiques sociohistorical interpretations of Western hegemony, grounded in the 19th Century, by
taking as units world cities that were nodes in the great commercial
oceanic and overland trade routes that linked China to Western
Europe, from Hangchow to Bruges. Viewing the 13th Century as
a period of heightened urbanization (1989: 282), Abu-Lughod traces
the rise of commercial urban centers globally, how they had more
in common with one another than with their rural populations, and,
nally, the cycle of decline partly from the Black Death, partly from
internal political conditions, that led several of these centers to drop
o in the following century from the world system.
All things considered, the overarching economic system of international trade was more complex and more sophisticated than any
prior one, and, for that matter, on par with that of the 16th Century.
Components outside the West were not the periphery and the system might have continued to evolve, save for what might be imputed
to historical hazards such as the demographic catastrophe of the
Bubonic plague and political upheavals on the eastern ank with the
collapse of the Mongols. The net result, according to Abu-Lughod,
was a sort of vacuum that made it facile for the Portuguese and the

9
This book . . . takes the position that . . . the century between A.D. 1250 and
1350 constituted a . . . critical turning point in world history, (Abu-Lughod 1989:
12).

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295

Dutch to take over in the new European approach to trade-cumplunder that caused a basic transformation in the world system
(1989: 361).
Abu-Lughod has added an important corrective to truncated EuroWhiggish perspectives on modernity, so to speak, that tell a success story from the 16th Century to the recent modern. But her
story-telling leaves out or minimizes some ingredients. First, although
the focus of Before European Hegemony is on urban centers as
strategic to international trade, she dismisses cursorily rather than
discusses Max Webers pregnant discussion of the distinctness of
Western cities in the development of a capitalist civilization (Weber
1978). For Weber, the Western city, especially that of Northern
Europe, was a unique locus of legal emancipation from seigniorial
authority, which would make possible free labor.10 And besides this
contribution to political economy, Weber also in his discussion of
the medieval city pointed to the cultural import of Christianity in
destroying the religious signicance of clan ties, unlike Islamic cities
of the caliphate which, according to him, never overcame the divisiveness of Arab tribal and clan ties, (1978: 1244). Most of AbuLughods rather meager discussion of Weberunderstandably since
her major stimulus is world-system analysisis aimed at negating
the cultural claims in his comparative religious studies. These argued
that the Wirtschaftethik of the religions of China, India and Islam
provided a hostile environment for the development of modern
capitalism in the form of merchant-accumulators and industrial developers. The latter actors, she posits somewhat enigmatically, were
very much present in the thirteenth-century world; what they lacked
were free resources, (1989: 364).
The cultural aspect of civilization is thus residual in both the major
historical accounts of modernity (or pre-modernity) provided by
Braudel and Abu-Lughod. An important corrective to this is the
suggestive programmatic essay of Wittrock (2001), which has much
more anity with the Eisenstadt paradigm, if we may call it that.
Also arguing like Abu-Lughod for reconsidering the formation of
modernity in the medieval period, Wittrock underscores its central
10
The urban citizenry therefore usurped the right to dissolve the bonds of
seigneurial domination; this was the greatin fact, the revolutionaryinnovation
which dierentiated the medieval Occidental cities from all others, (1978: 1239,
emphasis Webers).

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edward a. tiryakian

importance in a comparative civilizational framework (heavily inuenced

by Jaspers and Eisenstadt) by invoking the notion of ecumenical
renaissance. The term refers to a set of transformations that occur
across the Eurasian civilizations in the centuries around the turn of
the rst millennium ce, roughly from the 9th century to the middle
of the 13th century, (Wittrock 2001: 38). What he suggests as an
extension of the Axial Age hypothesis of Jaspers and Eisenstadt is
that the imperial/political orders of the Eurasian hemisphere (such
as the Ottoman Empire, the Song dynasty, the Fatimid in Egypt
and a revival of Byzantium) had new internal challenges; these led
not only to the transformation of political and economic practices
but to a deep epistemic and cultural shift as well. From these cultural crystallizations that sought to transcend the chasm between the
mundane and the transcendental order came new institutional practices and philosophical reections.
While the emphasis on the cultural and cognitive is an important
addendum to the comparative macroeconomic, urban perspective on
the medieval period, Wittrocks bold brush strokes need renement
in places. Although passing mention is given to intense patterns of
transregional trade in this period, no mention is given to AbuLughods more systematic comparative study of the linkages of hemispheric-wide trading networks, including how these might have a
bearing on the ecumenical renaissance.11 Second, perhaps because
the essay is necessarily a condensed form of a research program,
there is no in depth discussion of any civilizational complex outside
the West nor of intercivilizational encounters that might have stimulated or inuenced the ecumenical renaissance either within or
across borders. The recent illuminating study of Arjomand regarding the interaction in 13th Century Islam of its medieval civilization
and the development of guilds, on the one hand, and the integrative political and religious policies of the Caliphate as its symbolic
center, on the other (Arjomand 2003b: 3), adds needed substance to
Wittrocks comparative framework, the latter being still heavily

11
What seems more important to his perspective is the challenge to political
arrangements institutionalized in the Axial Age period by new political forces (in
the form of new nomadic incursions, largely from Central Asia). These challenges
produced or stimulated new cultural visions and solutions that paved the way for
new institutions, such as, in the case of the West, the university as an autonomous
center of new cognitive understandings and as a center for the training of elites.

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297

weighted towards accounting for Western modernity (2001: 4345).

There is great need to follow this up with comparable studies of
other high civilizational centers that partook in dierent ways of the
ecumenical renaissance in the 13th Century, notably those of India
and China,12 and linking their cultural, political and economic intersections to place in proper perspective the signicance of the period
for an accounting of modernity that gives greater scope to the paths
of multiple modernities.13
What has been advanced so far in this discussion is that the 13th
Century, usually bypassed in the mapping of the trajectory of modernity, is in fact worth the detour. It might even be considered on
a comparative civilizational level as a potential axial age of modernity in the sense of new broad and extensive economic and cultural linkages between major regions, linkages arising from political
as well as economic interactions (not all of a peaceful nature, given
the Mongol invasions in Central Asia and the Western crusades in
the Middle East). Of course, despite the new levels of intercivilizational encounters and their resultants in new roads to modernity
(again invoking Nelson 1981a), no new global civilization of modernity
crystallized in the 13th Century. But something did occur in one
region which has a direct bearing on the Eisenstadt paradigm, that
part of his analysis which points to the tensions between orthodox
and heterodox orientations as orthogonal, pulling the established

12
Regarding China and its cultural renaissance in the Song period in the form
of Neo-Confucianism as a cultural synthesis, see Tu Weiming (2000: 196f.) and
Hsu (2001: 445).
13
Curiously, though Wittrock makes no mention of him, the suggestion for such
an emphasis on the 13th Century was proposed by Nelson thirty years ago in discussing intercivilizational encounters and the civilizational breakthrough in the West
in the moralities of thought and in the logics of decision which open out the possibility of creative advance in the direction of wider universalities of discourse and
participation in the conrmation of improved rationales (1981a: 99). Nelson went
on to discuss in terms of dierential utilization of intercivilizational encounters during this second Axial Shift period of the 12th and 13th Centuries how this provided the West with a new point of departure for the great searching of the
Western spirit (1981a: ibid.). By contrast, if we join Arjomand to this point, an
Islamic medieval breakthrough faltered due to a gap in the reception of Aristotle,
specically the fact that Aristotles Politics, which Thomas Aquinas used and which
had far-ung consequences in the development of Western consitutionalism, was
not translated into Arabic as were other of Aristotles writings (Arjomand 2003b:
4548). For a broader analytical and comparative treatment of multiple modernities, see Eisenstadt (2000b) and the entire issue of Ddalus in which Arjomands
essay appears.

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edward a. tiryakian

social order in dierent paths. These contrasting orientations, grounded

in transcendental visions of ultimate reality, are cultural in their symbolic manifestations and have far-reaching importance for social mobilization as well as institutionalized behavior. In our own lifetime we
have seen periodic moments of heterodox orientations challenging
the social order that the Enlightenment brought as a paradigm of
progresssuch as much of the counterculture a generation ago.
And we in the West are given to believe that the terrorist activities
stem from a heterodox radical form of Islam.
What a civilizational analysis of modernity may benet from at
this point is to take as a case study one instance where orthodox
and heterodox orientations were found present at an early point of
Western modernity after the Axial Age shift, and the point that I
will discuss is the 13th Century, when the institutionalized orthodoxy in the West was severely challenged by several heterodox
currents, with one in particular that became branded as a dangerous foes spawning heretics. What that heresy was, how successful
was it, and what measures were taken to curb it can tell us important aspects of the path modernity took and did not take in the
West.
III. If, as Bowersock states, for the competition of transcendental
visions in the institutional history of the Roman Empire, the second
century is of paramount importance as a formative age, (1986: 281),
the 13th Century is of no less importance in tracing the later path
of modernity in terms of competition of transcendental visions. It
provides an instance where one vision and its institutionalized practices won a major battle, but may have lost the war.
Southern France, the wide region known as the Midi and
embracing the important sub-regions of Provence and Languedoc,
had distinct cultural aspects in the 12th and 13th Centuries. It was
an area where the prevalent vernacular was Occitan or the langue
doc in contrast to the French of the seat of the monarchy in Paris,
which spoke the langue doil.14 The ethos was dierent in various

14
Occitan as a Romance language with variants was the language of the troubadours and is still spoken today throughout the area, shading into Catalan. It had
an enduring literary renaissance in the 19th Century with the Flibrige group of
poets and writers headed by Mistral. In the 1960s and 1970s a new radical region-

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299

respects, in contrast to the greater hierarchical aspects of the feudal

North, the South was more marked by a greater degree of political
participation by local councils and burghers, by greater equality of
women, and in general by a more liberal spirit (Duvernoy 1994: 63).
It was also an area marked by urbanism and commercial wealth in
the midst of a rural agrarian setting.15
For purpose of the present essay, what was salient in the region
was the pluralism of religious orientations, and, remarkable for its
time, the open expressions of heterodoxy, albeit the Catholic faith
which ultimately depended upon the papacy was an essential part
of the institutional order. One might say that for the latter part of
the 12th Century toleration of dissent was the norm, with public
disputations regarding the true Christian doctrine. Unlike Islam which
had been driven out of the Midi much earlier, the Jewish community, scattered throughout the Occitan region (see map in the appendix) but particularly strong in Narbonne (Nelli 1968: 183), although
limited in its civic participation, was not repressed or subject to
harassments it suered elsewhere in Europe. It was in Narbonne that
a gnostic tradition found fertile soil in the form of the Kabbala with
its emphasis on esoteric knowledge, quite dierent from the more
exoteric rationalism of Maimonides (11351204) across the Spanish
frontier, and Grard Isral notes that this and other philosophical
dierences spawned in Jewish communities in Provence a vigorous
eervescence (Isral 2002: 157).
Judaism aside, in the Languedoc that had as a major seat of the
polity the hereditary Count of Toulouse, like elsewhere in the
Mediterranean south, various dualist currents had made their way
westward from distant Middle Eastern origins.16 Dualist transcendental visions had been present for the length of the early period of
Christianity as an organized religion, with the most common form

alist impulse made itself felt seeking for Occitania cultural if not political autonomy from Paris (see Lafont 1973).
15
For a detailed look at everyday life in a typical Languedoc town, Montaillou,
see the masterful study of LeRoy Ladurie based on ocial 14th Century transcripts
of an Inquisitor (Ladurie 1978). A map in the appendix of this essay shows the
location of Montaillou.
16
It might be noted that Nelli (1968: 18386) discusses many interesting points
of overlap between the Kabbala and the doctrines of the heterodox sect that I focus
on, the Cathars. It would suggest there were many points of contact between
religious and intellectual leaders of the two communities.

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edward a. tiryakian

of dualism being the rejection of monotheism and the acceptance of

an evil lord of created matter, and a good God of the spirit. I
will not take space to go into the variations of this dualism, though
it should be noted that it had (and has had) a great deal of appeal,
while at the same time it has incurred theological wrath as the basis
of a very dangerous form of heresy.
In Languedoc in the 12th Century, one dualist sect, which also
had a strong presence in Northern Italy and elsewhere in Germany
in lesser numbers, appeared and rapidly made converts, among the
court nobility and urban patricians as well as among commoners.
This sect, which has historically come to be known as Cathars or
Albigensians, names given by its detractors, was in eect a parallel
Christian church, which rejected the sacraments and the authority
of the established orthodoxy.17 The adherents were both a laity who
could conform to the general practices and beliefs, and the parfaits, a religious elite that included bishops. The laity lived the lives
of ordinary urban and rural dwellers; they did not form a separate
community.
The parfaits (literally, perfects) lived extremely ascetic lives,
abstaining from all meat and meat products, practicing celibacy, and
partaking of strict fasting. They had houses but did not live in
monasteries unlike some of the Catholic religious orders. Because of
their exemplary behavior, they provided spiritual leadership in at
least two important activities. One was the occasional public disputes
that brought together in a symposium Catholics, Cathars, and nonbelievers to argue about the meaning of the New Testament and
the proper behavior for a Christian stemming from the teachings of
Jesus; these public debatesverbal tournaments of great popular
interesttook place in the second half of the 12th Century. Even
when there was no public debate, the parfaits engaged in public
preaching and were attentively listened to by the public, and not
just by believers. A second signicant practice of the parfait was to

17
I will use the name that has stuck, Cathars (from the Greek kataros, pure),
although it might be more proper to use in its place the designation goodmen
(bonhommes) which their neighbors and fellow men in terms of approbation and
to dierentiate them from other non-Catholic sects, such as the Vaudois (Waldensians,
followers of Peter Waldo of Lyon), and the less numerous Beguines (Duvernoy 1994).
For detailed materials on the beliefs, rituals, and organizational structures of the
Cathar religion and its societal setting, see Duvernoy (1976).

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administer the rite of adult baptism by the Spirit, the consolamentum, and thirdly, the rite for the moribund, the convenenza, of
critical importance for the salvation of the soul. All the believers
viewed the creation of the material world, nature and matter, as the
work of the Evil God, while the Good or hidden God was the God
of the Spirit, which in humans is held captive as the soul by the
body.
Essentially, the Cathar religion appears as a simplied form of
Christianity, in beliefs, rituals and organizational structure, from that
of the orthodox Church of Rome. The clergy of the Cathars seemed
on the whole better educated, more conversant with Scriptures, than
a good number of priests, many of whom practiced concubinage and
beneted from the practice of tithing (Ladurie 1978: 30626). The
parfaits won the respect and esteem of all the social strata, from
commoners to nobility and even had the tacit support of the reigning
ruler of Languedoc, the Count of Toulouse. By 1200 or so, Catharism
seemed poised to provide the Midi with a new religious foundation
for its social order, one whose transcendental vision was more consonant with the Occitan civilization than was the vision of Catholicism.
It was for the latter an immense challenge which it answered in
several ways. First, the latter half of the 12th and beginning of the
13th Centuries was not only a period of new wealth and urban opulence (generated by the multiplication of trade and commerce with
the East, as discussed by Abu-Lughod). But it was also a period
where auence bred a reaction of asceticism in the form of grassroots movements of voluntary pauperism as a return to the ideals
of the primitive Christian church.18 Two such movements stand out.
In the case of Peter Waldo and his followers, drawn from auent
urban circles, the ideal of poverty meant that one should venture
forth to preach and lead the evangelical life, even if this meant
deance of the established hierarchical church. As a sect the
Waldensians had a theology practically identical to that of orthodox Christianity, but had no ordained priest and recognized no
bishops much less the Pope. Yet it had much support where it spread,

18
To some extent, the American Peace Corps under President Kennedy, which
sent thousands of middle-class college-educated students to Third World countries,
seems like an echo of the impetus of Peter of Waldo to go out to the countryside
and identify with the poor.

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edward a. tiryakian

especially among the lower urban and rural strata, since the preaching
of the Waldensians was done in the vernacular, not in Latin, and
they refused to pay indulgences; since the Waldensians, like the
Cathars, did not believe in purgatory.19
The dual challenge for orthodoxy of the appeal of voluntary pauperism, especially in the rapid spread of the Waldensians, and of
addressing the problem of a lax ocial clergy which enjoyed a material life that contradicted the ideals of the primitive church was
answered by the other great movement of voluntary pauperism, that
launched by Francis of Assisi. Living an exemplary life of asceticism
outside the monastery, the Franciscan order (which provided the
impetus for the Mendicant orders in Western Christianity) became
a signicant movement to counter the Cathars, by engaging in disputes with the parfaits and becoming an alternative presence in urban
areas.
Orthodoxy also countered the heterodox challenge by seeking capable intellectuals who could argue the true faith with heretics:
this was found in the presence of a newly formed order founded by
Dominic Guzman at the turn of the 13th Century. The Dominican
order was recognized by the Pope and its members excelled in
preaching, being sent to counter the preaching of the heretics.
Unfortunately for the Languedoc as a whole, moral persuasion
did not remain the sole strategy of the orthodox to counter the threat
of heterodoxy. In an age when costly crusades to regain lost territory in the Holy Land had met with uneven success, holding on to
if not regaining the spiritual territory of the Languedoc became a
primary concern for the new prelate of the Church of Rome, Innocent
III. He called for a crusade against the heretics; since these were
Christians, the crusade that took the name of The Albigensian
Crusade (Cathars were particularly numerous in the city of Albi)
was the only of the crusades of the 13th Century directed not at
Islam in the Holy Land but at a Christian sect inside Europe. And
it was not just a holy war to extirpate religious error but also
rapidly became a war of military conquest, of the North and its
allies against the South. The conquest did not take place overnight,
for there was strong military resistance against the invaders by the

19
For major treatment of Waldensians and Cathars, see Thouzellier (1969) and
Duvernoy (1994).

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303

local authorities, whether or not they were Cathars.20 But by the

middle of the century, the superior military power of the North had
triumphed; the hub of Languedoc, Toulouse, was stripped of its
hereditary rulers and the region with loss of its autonomy incorporated into the Kingdom of France.
Perhaps more severe than the military onslought was the orthodox onslought against heterodoxy, for the crusade was dened as a
crusade against heresy, and the heretics par excellence were the
Cathars. The Inquisition was revived and enormously strengthened
in its powers to summon, interrogate, and turn over heretics to the
secular arm, either for extended and even life-long imprisonment in
specially constructed dungeons, or, for cases of unrepentants who
would not abjure their heresy, to be burned at the stake in a public ceremony. And for the most part, the parfaits opted for the stake
rather than recant.
I will not dwell on the procedures of the Inquisition in seeking
and establishing the guilty (Lea 1969); heresy was seen to be a virus
which might manifest itself in seemingly innocuous statements or
practices, and the practices of ferreting out heresy became in eect
an industry, ripe for abuse since the powers of the inquisitors was
in eect unlimited. The inquisitors received specialized training in
the art of interrogating, and when the Inquisition at a later stage
combined interrogation with torture, the eect was to terrorize a
population and induce a state of paranoia as to what might be considered a sign of heresy. The Inquisition became a state within a
state, in a double sense, of having autonomy from secular authorities (at least as long as the established church provided legitimacy
for the ruling powers) and having autonomy within the hierarchical
structures of the Church, since even bishops and cardinals might be
accused of and condemned for heresy.
In eect, at a signicant cost of lives, orthodoxy achieved its goal
by the middle of the 14th Century. Homogeneity in the denition
of the true faith had been achieved and pluralism was taken out
of the public sphere. In place of the lax ambience of Languedoc
civil society of 1200 ad, dissidents had seemingly disappeared by the
middle of the 14th Century. As a form of religious industry, the

20
For an extensive discussion of the prolonged ghting and the ultimate destruction of the last Cathar strongholds in the Pyrenees, see Bordonove (1991).

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edward a. tiryakian

Inquisition in the 14th Century turned its attention to the problem

of non-Christians and saw the Jews as marginally heretical in terms
of teachings of the Talmud regarding the divinity of God. After the
Cathars, it was Jews who became considered undesirable aliens, and
after a period of respite with French popes at Avignon, the return
of the central ecclesiastical power to Rome was attended by increased
harassment of the Jewish community, including the forced surrender
and burning of the Talmud (Isral 2002: 167218).
The signicance of the Cathars as a sect that challenged the institutional church and whose territory became the object of military
attack has had multiple perspectives, though overall it may appear
as a footnote in the history of France and Medieval Europe. Catholic
historians and apologists in the 16th Century saw the Cathars as
precursors of Luther seeking to wreck the unity of Christendom
(Vicaire 1979), while Protestant historians in the 16th and 17th
Centuries tended to look more favorably on the Waldensians than
on the Cathars, though nding in both sects a basis for establishing
a long-term Protestant tradition denying the centrality of Rome
(Bedouelle 1979). In the 19th and 20th Centuries, the historiography changes, with new controversies and newly discovered documents of the period, but an explication of these is outside the scope
of this essay.21
What remains as a sociological research program is the elective
anity if not actual linkage of the Cathars and their social setting
with the Protestant sects of the 16th and 17th Centuries which Weber
(as Parsons has noted) saw as having brought an important breakthrough (Weber 1963: xxix) with the key salvic orientation of thisworldly asceticism. Were there Cathars who managed to escape the
religious and civil authorities and go underground, or managed to
practice in secret their cult (as Christians may have been able to do
in Japan in the 16th Century or some Jews in Spain despite forced
conversions), and become progenitors of the Hughenots? The dualism
that runs in Puritanism and the Protestant sects, the notion of the
elect, is not that far removed from the parfaits and their abstention from the pleasures of the esh. Perhaps the Cathars were a step
ahead since they practiced greater gender equality, and the Cathars

21
For an important set of papers regarding this historiography see Historiographie
du catharisme, Cahiers de Fanjeaux, no. 14 (Toulouse: E. Privat 1979).

the civilization of modernity

305

rejected the Old Testament, but still, there are some intriguing
common denominators. These will have to wait another occasion to
be drawn out, perhaps an international conference to celebrate a
centennial anniversary.
IV. From a comparative civilizational perspective of modernity, the
13th Century oers a rich laboratory of investigation. Perhaps the
key question underlying a research program that might follow in
the wake of Bjrn Wittrocks call for a new global history noted earlier is something like this: why did not a civilization of modernity
emerge and become institutionalized a thousand years ago? There
was unprecedented contacts and encounters between the major centers of the Eurasian land mass and a case can be made for each
the Christian West, the Islamic Middle East, the Hindu South Asia
and the Confucian East Asiahaving a material and cultural
eorescence. Yet, the promise of a civilization of modernity did not
actualize, and if anything, a fragmentation seemed to take place, not
only between themselves but even, to some extent, within themselves.
The materials discussed in this essay do not address this broad
comparative query, but for the case of the West, it suggests that the
repression of heresy, and in particular, the brutal repression of
Catharism was a critical turning point. On the one hand, from
the point of view of orthodoxy, the challenge of dissent that could
undermine the unity of church and state by undermining the legitimacy of both was successfully met, at least for three centuries. On
the other hand, there was a price paid for ontological security,
not only the price paid by the thousands of heretics who were
burned at the stake and the greater numbers who perished in solitary connement. The price paid was also more than the unlawful
conscation of property from families accused of heresy or of
assisting heretics. The price paid was the setting up an institution
which became a veritable state within a state, ultimately responsible only to the Pope, and which could even attack clerical dissent
going as high as Cardinals as being heretical.
It may not be too dicult for readers to discern a certain tie-in
of this with Norman Cohns already mentioned study of 13th Century
chiliastic thought and its legacy for the fanaticisms of the 20th. The
Gestapo, the KGB, the stasi and other agencies of state control of
the 20th Century sought in their turn to extirpate dissidents and
heretics using tactics of interrogation and torture, short of burning

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edward a. tiryakian

at the stake, not altogether dierent from that of the Inquisition and
its secular arm. This could readily be seen as a Jacobin tendency
of modernity, an orientation of bringing about homogeneity of beliefs
and behavior, not by persuasion which is one political option, but
by coercion, which is an alternate political option.
The demise of Nazi Germany and the collapse of Soviet communism seemed to have paved the way for a continuation if not
extension of a civilization of modernity marked by a commitment
to technological progress, political democratization, and the freer circulation of goods and services world wide, while at the same time
allowing for cultural dierences and a new appreciation and respect
for others. Francis Fukuyamas noted essay (1992) at the beginning
of the last decade was, tacitly, a vision of a new onset of such a
civilization of modernity, a rekindling of the vision of the Enlightenment. Carried to its full extent as a new pax Romana guaranteed
by American hegemony, this vision might accommodate a new
era of multiple modernities within an overarching civilization of
modernity.
September 11th has been a rude awakening from this vision. In
the context of this paper what is most troubling is that the response
of the country that has been so much of an epicenter of modernity
in the 20th Century may in fact be taking a sharp turn away from
the moral, normative aspects of modernity and returning to the
regressive, coercive ways that orthodoxy came to deal with heterodoxy in the 13th Century. The war on terrorism is, in one obvious
sense, unfortunately perhaps, a dichotomized clash of civilizations
(Huntington 1996), of radical anti-modern Islam against modern
civilization. But there is a more disturbing way of looking at it,
beyond a sterile barbarism versus civilization prism.
I will not dwell on the irony that the perceived architects of 9/11
terrorism view the United States as a Satanic force not only because
of its support for Israel but also, and perhaps more profoundly,
because it is corruptive of traditional morality and domestic values,
and that this is precisely why the present American administration
and its conservative supporters hold liberals in askance. Structurally,
the fundamentalisms involved are isomorphic.
What is ominous are not the measures for external protection so
much as those for internal protection. The latter are of two sorts.
One is protection from dissent and public debate by a climate of
invoking the war on terrorism as a defense of the country, its peo-

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307

ple and its values; hence, public criticism is muted in the spirit of
patriotism. Second are much more tangible measures and practices
designed to achieve homogeneous conformity, of the domestic population and of overseas allies. Within the United States, the USA
Patriot Act22 and amended provisions of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act have not only greatly increased the surveillance,
searches and data gathering powers of the federal government, beyond
traditional constitutional safeguards, but also set up secret courts
where detainees are kept indenitely without benet of counsel. How
dierent is the lot of the hundreds of detainees at Guantnamo Bay
and those of other inmates at American and British detention camps,
subjected to violent and coercive interrogation, including beatings,
withholding of pain medication, sleep deprivation, and loud noise
intended to be disorientating, with the recalcitrant ones rendered
for questioning to foreign countries (Dworkin 2003: 37), from what
Lea says about the detainees of the Inquisition:
The Inquisition shrouded itself in the awful mystery of secrecy until
afar sentence had been awarded and it was ready so impress the multitude with the fearful solemnities of the auto de f. Unless proclamation were to be made for an absentee, the citation of a suspected
heretic was made in secret (Lea 1969: 159).

Just as the accused and convicted heretic had no appeal in the 13th
Century to customary courts, only to the Pope, so also in the military tribunals set up for terrorists hearsay evidence and involuntary
confessions are admissible and there is no appeal except to the
secretary of defense and the president (Dworkin 2003: 37). Quite
forcefully, Dworkin, among others, points to the grave danger of civil
liberties in the American administrations policies of dealing with
terrorists, including American citizens accused of terrorism. Not only
has the Patriot Act been extended in its purview to investigate and
prosecute more ordinary crimes but also there is strong temptation for this to be seen as having a duration beyond the emergency
situation of 9/11 to something lasting at least a generation, just as
the Inquisition became institutionalized into a permanent organization
that lasted into the 19th Century. Thus, there is need to heed the

22
Formally, the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate
Tool Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001, signed into law
on 26 October 2001.

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edward a. tiryakian

warning that the governments anti-terrorist policies may be an irreversible step to a new and much less liberal state, (Dworkin: 38).
The issue that Dworkin raises is that the American administrations policies regarding terrorists or alleged terrorists, even if technically legal in a national emergency, are of concern to more than
Americans. If these policies violate peoples fundamental human
rightsrights at the foundation of the international moral order
that nations must respect even when under threat (Dworkin: 37)
then these policies are wrong and immoral.
In the 13th Century, human rights had not entered into the consciousness of civilization. The civilization of modernity has accepted
this as a normative cornerstone. But we have already seen tragic
examples in the last century of societies that had identied with the
civilization of modernity breaking o from it and developing Jacobin
enforcement of homogeneity. Terrorism today, like heresy a thousand years ago, is a threat to the social order of modernity. But the
response may itself lead to a reactionary breakdown with far-reaching
unfortunate consequences.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

POLITICAL CULTURE IN THE

ISLAMICATE CIVILIZATION
Sad Arjomand
The primary interest of civilizational analysis is in the directionality
of social change by identifying distinctive civilizational processes
and rationalities, and in the understanding of the diversity of developmental patterns by such devices as comparative typologies. This
interest, however, is by no means incompatible with the kind of
value-relevant analysis Weber took great pains to justify. Like development and modernization as such values a generation ago, there
is today keen interest throughout the world, including the Muslim
countries, in such themes as the conditions for the growth of democracy
and civil society as values not of Western but of modern civilization
as dened by Eisenstadt (2003a, 1: 2325). For instance, the Journal
of Development (ketab-e tawsa'eh), which belongs loosely speaking to the
intellectual wing of the reform movement in Iran, recently devoted
four consecutive issues, 1114 (2003), to origins of despotism in
Iran. Our commitment to understanding civilizational rationalities
and developmental paths is in no way incompatible with valuerelevant and critical enquiries of this nature.1 In fact, I take the promotion of critical, historical and cross-cultural self-understanding at
the global level our professional duty. The ensuing comparisons of
the critical point of divergence of the Islamicate and Western paths
to political modernity is accordingly shaped by a value-relevant
concern with the cultural preconditions of the constitutional rule of
law and democracy.

1
Such commitment should not turn us into apologists of old or new nations and
cultures and result in any kind of feel-good soft-ware support for international diplomacy. In other words, civilizational analysis and explanation of multiple modernities must remain distinct from politically correct cultural relativism and apologetic
pan-modernism or pan-rationalism.

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sad arjomand
Eisenstadt, civilizational analysis and Islam

What we might call the Weberian paradigm for civilizational analysis focused on the impact of world religions on social action and
social organization. Culturally, the impact was through the motivation of social action generally by ethos of the world religions, and
more particularly by their economic, political and social ethics
(dietary, sexual, domestic regulations and rules for ritual purity).
Webers conception of rationalization related this ethical regulation
of the life system to the worldview of the respective world religion
through the requirement of meaningful consistency (Sinnzuzamenhang).
Sociologically, the impact of the world religions was transmitted
through the social strata or classes that constituted their respective
social bearers or carriers (Trger). Here, too, the notion of rationalization as a developmental pattern links the institution-building of the
formative periods to the religious solutions to the problem of the
meaning of human life through the ideal interests of these bearers
of the world religions and their meaningfully consistent reconciliation to material conditions and historical contingencies. (Arjomand
2004)
Eisenstadts comparative civilizational analysis makes more explicit
and amplies the sociological dimension of Webers paradigm. On
the one hand, he oers a more pluralistic picture of civilizational
dynamics by highlighting Webers analysis of the transformative impact
of heterodoxies within the world religions. (Eisenstadt 2003a, 1: 1719)
Tension among contending interpretations and their respective bearers within the same world religion and civilization is stressed by distinguishing orthodoxy and its ocial representatives from heterodoxies
of unocial challengers who oer contesting interpretations of the
central values of the tradition and create movements of cultural and
political protest. On the other hand, he emphasizes the degree of
autonomy of the elites representing orthodoxy in relation to the ruler
and political power as a determinant of the strength of their civilizational impact.2 According to Eisenstadt, whether Buddhism,
Confucianism or Islam remain conned to the religious sphere or

2
I have similarly treated the degree of the autonomy of the Shi`ite hierocracy
from the patrimonial state in dierent periods as a key determinant of their impact
cultural impact on Iran. (Arjomand 1984)

political culture in the islamicate civilization

311

have a broader impact in a civilization largely depends on their autonomy from the rulers. This explains the dierent civilizational impact
of Confucianism and Buddhism in Japan as compared to China and
Thailand, and of Islam in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia
as compared to the Middle East and North Africa. (Eisenstadt 1993b)
In a major work inspired by Webers idea of the world religions
as the core of civilizations, Marshall Hodgson (1974) argued that
Islamic law facilitated great social mobility but not institutional development. The Shari`a ignored public law and state action, and left
too little room for initiative to the Caliph in theory. Consequently,
social activism tended to take the form of revivalist movements outside the framework of the state and of governmental institutions.
Eisenstadt has put forward a model of the inner dynamics of Islamic
civilization centered on constant tension between an Islamic primordial utopiathe ideal of the Golden Age of pristine Islamand
the historical reality of patrimonial Sultanism, coexisting with autonomous public sphere dominated by the religious elite, the ulema,
as the guardians of the Shari'a and orthodoxy. He points to a very
interesting decoupling . . . between the makeup of the public sphere
and access to the decision-making of the ruler. The de facto separation of religious authority and rulership, entailing this decoupling
of a vibrant public sphere, autonomous from the . . . realm of rulership is in fact the distinctive feature of the Islamicate in contrast
to the Western civilization, where the participation in the public
sphere was linked to political decision-making. (Eisenstadt 2002a:
153) Drawing on Hodgson and on Ibn Khalduns depiction of the
cycle of the rise and fall of puritanical Muslim dynasties, as interpreted by the late Ernest Gellner, Eisenstadt further constructs a
model of oscillation between military patrimonial regimes with limited pluralism, on the one hand, and intolerant proto-fundamentalist
and Jacobin fundamentalist ones, on the other. (Eisenstadt 2002)
The tension between the orthodoxy and heterodoxies is incorporated
into this model. Cook (1999: 276) argued persuasively that there is
a striking mist between Webers conception of sect, derived from
Christianity, and the intensely political character of religious schism
in Medieval Islam. Eisenstadt similarly approaches heterodoxy
under sectarianism and political dynamics. (Eisenstadt 2003a, 1:
42129)
Eisenstadts model of the religio-political dynamics of the Islamicate civilization is appealing for its simplicity, for discarding the

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Euro-centric view of social evolution and dynamics, and as he later

explained (Eisenstadt 2003a, 1: 41819), for discarding the myth
of Oriental Despotism. It is, however, too general to account for
the tension between orthodoxy and heterodoxy in Islamic history,
and in fact applies mainly to the protest movements within the
Sunni orthodoxy and not to the Shi'ite and other apocalyptic sects.
I shall touch on this complex issue of orthodoxy and heterodoxy
(whose applicability to Islam has indeed been questioned) only
indirectly and in connection with attempts by the former to control
the latter. Eisenstadts model also leaves out, however, the non-religious political ethos of Muslim societies, and trends in institutionalization and development of non-religious culture. The purpose of
this essay is to supplement his model by ll this gap with respect to
political ideas.
As the focus of Eisenstadts analysis has gradually shifted from the
historical developments in the Axial Age (1986b) to a typological
conception of axial civilizations, the signicance of common or interconnected cross-regional patterns and the role of intercivilizational
encounters has come to the fore. As Arnason, Eisenstadt and Wittrock
(forthcoming, p. 12) point out, the typological thesis forces us to
move from the model of (ahistorically conceived) insulated civilizational complexes with distinctive dynamics to world-historical transformations and intercivilizational processes. This requires historicization
of axial constellation, especially in later formative periods, often
involving intercivilizational dialogue. I will thus consider the reception of Aristotle in medieval Christianity and Islam as a common
encounter with the Greek civilization with, needless to say, dierent
outcomes.
Intercivilizational inuences on the Islamicate and Western transformation
The importance of civilizational encounters in the formative periods
of the Islamicate civilization was exaggerated in the Eurocentric scholarship of the nineteenth and early twentieth century, but has been
minimized or altogether denied as a result of the growing post-World
War II tendency to derive every conceivable feature of the Islamicate
civilization from the Islamic doctrine. To avoid such reduction of
civilization to religion, Hodgson (1974) coined the term Islamicate
(rather than Islamic) civilization, which I have adopted for the same

political culture in the islamicate civilization

313

reason. Hodgsons implicit restriction of the formative era of the

Islamicate civilization to the 692945 period, however, predisposed
him to underestimate the importance of the intercivilizational contacts in the later Middle Ages.
Wittrocks (2001) provocative suggestion of a Eurasian ecumenical renaissance focuses our attention on common patterns of development across Eurasian civilizations, and the search for common patterns
turns to highlighting inter-civilizational encounters as an easy way
of explaining commonalities. The two critical factors making for the
great transformation of the thirteenth century are the Mongol ecumenical empire, with branches in China and Iran as well as Russia,
and the dialogue between the living and the dead involving Greeks,
Arabs [read Muslims] and Europeans. (Hu 1993: 13) Where the
former facilitated the most signicant encounter between the Islamicate
and the Chinese civilizations, the latter marked the divergent path
of late axial development of Christian and Islamicate civilization set
in motion by their respective encounters with the same Greek civilization of antiquity.
The Chinese Islamicate encounter requires a separate treatment
and is beyond my competence, but I will mention one signicant
scientic encounter concerning astronomy as it concerns the protagonist of the next section of this paper. Hu (1993: 50) notes the
transmission of trigonometry to Chinese astronomy through the
employment of Arab astronomers in the Astronomical Bureau in
Beijing from the thirteenth century onwards, he does not seem aware
of the fact that, on the Iranian side, Nasir al-Din Tusi employed
Chinese mathematicians and astronomers in his famous observatory
in Margheh (see below), translated the date of the year of the Pig
(1203) to various other calendars and made extensive use of Chinese technical jargon . . . and the Chinese names for the ten celestial stems and twelve earthly branches of the sexagenary cycle. (Lane
2003: 218) Whatever the impact of such specic cultural exchanges,
there can be no doubt about the ourishing of Persianate culture
and revival of the very idea of Iran, with the pictorial assimilation
of the ancient Persian kings to the new Mongol rulers in the illustrations of Ferdausis Shhnma (Soudavar 1996), in the Il-Khanid
period. George Lane (2003) aptly subtitles his comprehensive study
of the reign of Hleg (125665) and his successor as a Persian
renaissance and reminds us (Lane 2003: 30) that the troops of the
Atabeg of Fars, the great patron of learning and culture and of the

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sad arjomand

great Persian poet, Sa'di of Shiraz (d. 1291), who wrote the most
moving elegy on the demise of the last 'Abbasid Caliph, in fact
accompanied the Mongol conqueror in the fateful siege of Baghdad
in 1258.
The encounter with the Greek civilization was, however, of much
greater axial signicance for Christianity and Islam. The transmission
of Greek scientic and philosophical texts through Arabic and of the
Muslim medical treatises to Europe in the Middle Ages is indisputable. As is generally known, the major civilizational encounter
between Western Christendom and the Islamicate civilization resulted
in the transmission of Greek philosophy and sciences as well as mathematics and medicine as developed in the Muslim world. The importation of institutions has not been proven, however. George Makdisi
(1981) has argued that the institutions of higher learning also
traveled from the Muslim world to the West as a part of this civilizational encounter. But there is little evidence for the inuence of
the fully developed madrasas on the nascent European universities in
the thirteenth century. Makdisis argument for the inuence of the
mosque-khn model on the Inns of Court as the rst English law
colleges set up in London in the twelfth century by the Knights
Templar returning from the Holy Land, cannot be accepted as the
alleged model rests on a misreading of the textual source. (Mottahedeh
1997) Inspired by Makdisi, Monica Gaudiosi (1988) claims the law
of waqf as a source of the English law of trust or use, and argues
that the 1264 statutes of the House of Scholars of Merton, the deed
of trust that set up the rst Oxford College, can be analyzed as a
waqf instrument. (Gaudiosi 1988: 1250) But she can only show
generic similarities between the deeds of trust and waqf rather than
giving any direct proof of borrowing. It is true that the inuence of
the trusts founder was as great as that of a waqf endowment. Walter
de Merton names members of his own family as the primary
beneciaries. Hugh of Balsham, the Bishop of Ely, founded the rst
Cambridge College, Peterhouse, in 1284 pro utilitate rei publice. It was,
however, explicitly modeled on Merton and reserved the appointment of the master and conrmation of fellows for the Bishop.
(Leedham-Green 1996: 2122) Merton College was soon incorporated by a subsequent deed of 1274, however, and it was not the
unincorporated Inns of Court or Peterhouse but, as we have seen,
the corporations of masters and/or scholars of Paris or Bologna that

political culture in the islamicate civilization

315

provided the blueprint for European universities3 and assured their

autonomous civic agency.
Makdisis (1981) argument from the literal correspondence of ijzat
al-tadris and licentia docenti is somewhat stronger, but he goes too far
in claiming that Islamic seeds were planted for what was soon to
become a second magisterium in Christianity, that of the professors
of theology. (Makdisi 1990: 128) Again, this probable original
inuence cannot explain the enormous growth of the university trained
doctors of theology who outnumbered the priests and bishops at the
Council of Basel in 1439 by 300 to 20. (Makdisi 1990: 129)
The political tradition in medieval Islam
One of the least appreciated features of the Islamicate civilizational
synthesis, perfected in the thirteenth century, is the composite medieval
Muslim conceptions of state and society. This is largely due to the
fact that the prevalent interpretations of medieval Islamic political
thought are inordinately inuenced by one particular genre of juristic writing in the form of systematic deduction of political authority
from the caliphate, which H.A.R. Gibb (1955) regarded as dening
the constitutional organization of medieval Muslim polity. The historicity of this view, however, is open to serious questions. The juristic theory of the caliphate emerged fairly late in the eleventh-century,
and cannot be taken as representative of medieval Islamic political
thought, which drew heavily on the Perso-Indian tradition of statecraft and was formally inuenced by the Greek practical philosophy.
My argument, by contrast, is that certain features of pristine Islam
invited the political thought of other civilizations or more precisely,
the Indian science of government and the Greek political science.
With the cultural integration of Iran into the Muslim Caliphate,
especially after the 'Abbasid revolution in the mid-eighth century,
the Indian borrowing via the Middle Persian translation emerged as
an integral part of the Arabic and Persian literature on statecraft.

The rst university at Cracow, established in 1364, was modeled on Bologna,

and students elected the Rector. When it was reestablished in 1400, like Heidelberg
(1386) and other more recently established universities, it used the Parisian model
for its constitution, with the masters electing the Rector. (Podlecki, J. & Walto
1999)
3

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sad arjomand

The reception of the Greek political science was a part of the translation of Greek philosophy and medicine into Arabic a century later,
and was developed into the discipline of practical philosophy or
political science (Arjomand 2001). Rather than focusing on the
caliphate and the sacred law (shari'a), the typical conception of
political order found in the Persian literature of the medieval period
on statecraft and the political ethic was that of a world order constituted by the two powers of prophecy (nobovvat) and monarchy
(saltanat). From the end of the twelfth century onward, this idea of
the two powers constitutive of order was developed into a type of
political theory that is called Islamic royalism in this essay. Islamic
royalism came to represent the constitutional organization of Muslim
polities after the Mongol overthrow of the Abbasid caliphate. (Arjomand
2003a)
Before comparing the Greco-Islamic synthesis I have called Islamic
royalism as expressed by Tusi with the Greco-Christian synthesis
exemplied by his contemporary Aquinas as the point of divergence
of Western and Islamicate political thought, let me briey consider
the failure of a somewhat dierent synthesis of the Shi'ite and Sunni
political theories that excluded the Greek elements and minimized
the Perso-Indian ones. I refer to the constitutional reforms of the
late 'Abbasid caliph, al-Nsir li-Din Allh (11801225), who sought
instead to integrate the Shi'ite Sects and Su Orders into an expansive Islamic orthodoxy under the Caliphate.
The grand civilizational synthesis and its failure
An irreversible bifurcation of supreme authority into Caliphate and
Sultanate (monarchy) began with the Buyid (Arabized as Buwayhid)
seizure of power in Baghdad in the mid-10th century ce, and lasted
for a little over three centuries to the mid-13th Century (1258, to
be precise). The Caliphate and monarchy were dierent concepts
and drew on two dierent political theories. Monarchy was the older
Near Eastern concept, and the imperial (post-Medina) conception of
the Caliphate was elaborated with increasing reference to it. (AlAzmeh 1997) I have argued that a theory of the two powers had
been in the making since the 'Abbasid revolution: the ethico-legal
order grew around the idea of the Shari'a, independently and at the
same time as the conception of the political order as monarchy

political culture in the islamicate civilization

317

(Arjomand 2003a). After the mid-10th century bifurcation of supreme

authority into Caliphate and Sultanate, attempts were made to synthesize the two sets of political ideas and theories. The pair of wellknown mid-11th century revisions of the theory of Caliphate under
the identical title of al-Ahkm al-Sultniyya integrated monarchy into
it as authority (emirate) by seizure.
The condition of dual sovereignty in Baghdad had continued
unchanged, with the Seljuk Sultans displacing the Buyids in 1055.
By the second half of the 12th century, the dierentiation of the two
powers had become much clearer, and the Seljuks forcefully maintained that the function of the Caliph as the Imam of the community of believers (umma) was restricted to the religious sphere (Rvandi,
1921: 334; Hartmann 1993: 109). Al-Nasir tried to reverse this wellentrenched trend through a innovative and long sustained policy of
invigorating and controlling urban associations as an institutional
mechanism for mobilizing support for the Caliphate throughout the
Muslim world. His attempt to end the condition of dual sovereignty
was initially successful. He demolished the Seljuk palace in Baghdad
in 1187, and had the last main-line Seljuk Sultan, Togril III, defeated
and killed at the age of 25 in 1193. But trouble began immediately
with the rival dynasty of Khwrazm-shhs from Central Asia, whom
al-Nsir had used as an ally to destroy the Seljuks. The Khwrazmshh Tekish soon lled the place of the Seljuk Sultan and insisted
on the right of the Sultan to exercise secular power. After his death
in 1200, his son, Mohammad II, went even further and broke with
the 'Abbasid Caliphate altogether, setting up a puppet Caliph, who
was a descendant of 'Ali and whose name was put on the coins and
in the Friday sermon instead of al-Nsir. (Hartmann 1993: 997)
What al-Nsirs called the rightly-guided mission (al-da'wa alhdiya) and I would call his constitutional policy had two important
aspects: one legal, the other sociological. On the legal front, he sought
to strengthen autocracy by bringing the Sunni theory of the Caliphate
closer to the Shi'ite doctrine of the Imamate. On the sociological
level, his goal was the wedding of Su orders and the Futuwwa associations of the men and youths of the city-quarters, including the
artisans. Both these policies also promoted the integration of the
Shi'ite sectarians to the Sunni body politic, especially as the Futuwwa
culture idealized the rst Shi'ite Imam, 'Ali. The urban reforms of
al-Nsir and their sociological consequences have been examined
elsewhere (Arjomand forthcoming). My concern here is with the

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synthesis of Sunni and Shi'ite elements in his constitutional theory.

Although the Caliph himself was the architect of this integrated constitutional policy, a critical role in the formulation of its ideology
was played by his counselor and spiritual master, Shaykh 'Omar
Sohravardi.
As against the traditional Sunni idea of the Caliph as the defender
of the Shari'a, Sohravardis theory of the Caliphate primarily presented the Caliph as the Imam who was the intermediary between
God and the community of believers and an inspired interpreter of
His Law (as in the Shi'ite doctrine);4 and secondarily considered the
Caliph selected by God for [spiritual] perfection (kaml ), and constructed his relationship to the subjects on the model of a spiritual
master and his disciples (as in Susm). The traditional reference to
the consensus of the community (ijm' ) was dropped altogether in
this theory (Hartmann 1975: 11121, 266). Consequently, the autocracy of the Caliph was enhanced in a charismatic and anti-legalistic
direction.
Al-Nsir studied Islamic law and had himself certied as a doctor (mujtahid ) in all the four Sunni (orthodox) schools of law. He also
did not neglect supporting the colleges (madrasas) and orthodox
learning, but added public meetings and debates at Su convents to
the repertoire of activities in the public sphere. This ingenious meeting point of the college and the convent could have had tremendous consequences for the trajectory of Islamicate development. He
even brought the radical Shi'ite Ism'ili sectarians back to the fold
of an ocial, Caliphal Islam, reinforced by Susm, made a major
attempt to reconcile the moderate, Twelver Shi'a and the Sunnis,
and appointed many Twelvers viziers. Last but not least, he recruited
the artisans and urban youths into the Futuwwa, constituted as an
order of chivalry with ranks and elaborate ceremonies, into which
he recruited the princes of the Islamicate world according to his
international policy of reassertion of Caliphal suzerainty over the
entire community of believers. Al-Nsir himself had been initiated
early in his reign, and in 1207 he unied all Futuwwa orders as
the puried Futuwwa, and declared himself its supreme head (qibla)

4
To make good this claim as the heir to the heritage of Prophecy (mirth alnubuwwa), Caliph al-Nsir published and widely disseminate a collection of the
Prophetic Traditions he considered authentic. (Hartmann 1975: 21632)

political culture in the islamicate civilization

319

and pole (qutb), appropriating these terms from Susm. Hunting of

birds and other sports were also brought under the Caliphs supervision and he established his monopoly over raising pigeons to be
used both for communication and for gifts to new nobility who were
ranked according to the kind of pigeon they formally received from
the Caliph. Members of the unied Futuwwa order called each other
comrade (raq), the term being appropriated from the Ism'ilis.
Leaders of the guilds and city-quarters were invested with the Futuwwa
trousers (shalwr) and admitted to dierent ranks. Missionaries (another
idea taken from the Ism'ilis) were sent out to spread the Caliphs
rightly-guided mission and promote his new integrated order. The
trousers and paraphernalia of investiture were sent to Muslim princes
from northern India to Egypt, and the entire subjects of the prince
were admitted to the Futuwwa order upon his investiture! The one
group he wished to exclude from the unied community was the
philosophers, whose libraries in Baghdad were burned. (Hartmann
1975: ch. 2; Mahjub 1971: 5259)
In terms of Eisenstadts model, al-Nsirs reforms represent a
remarkable attempt at the creation of civilizational unity by the incorporation of heterodoxy, in the form of both the moderate Shi'ism
of the Twelvers and the revolutionary Shi'ism of the Ism'ilis, into
orthodox Sunni Islam under the Caliphate. Dierences notwithstanding, all this surely amounts to a remarkable and totally independently conceived analogue to the Papal policies of alliances with
the cities, support for the Dominican and Franciscan Orders and
the promotion of Papal monarchy. The Papacys success in constituting the Franciscan and Dominican orders and maintaining its
authority over their convents in the cities of Western Europe contained heterodoxy by controlling popular religion and stemming the
sectarian tide until the Reformation. Al-Nsirs ambitious attempt
to translate civilizational unity into an integrative power structure,
however, failed even more clearly and faster than the two parallel
Western attempts, namely the Holy Roman Empire and papal monarchy (Arnason 2003b: 10). It was left to the heterodox Nasir al-Din
Tusi, an Ism'ili who later converted to Twelver Shi'ism and served
a non-Muslim, Mongol emperor, to craft a synthesis of the Islamic,
Perso-Indian and Greek political concepts that remained the basis
of Islamic royalism of the early modern Muslim empires. That it
was rst presented to the governor of an Ism'ili fortress in Khorasan
may well have been accidental, but it reinforced a predominantly

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secular conception of royal authority that can partly account for the
remarkable accommodation of religious diversity and tolerance of
heterodoxy in these Muslim empires. Islamic royalism, however, did
not foster democracy, as did the Thomist synthesis of the Greek
political science and the Christian religion.
Dierential reception of Aristotles political ideas
Thomas Aquinas was an exact contemporary of Nasir al-Din Tusi;
they both died in 1274. They were both closely associated with the
institutions of higher learning. Aquinas was a professor of theology
at the University of Paris in the formative era of European universities, and sides with its secular masters in including Aristotle in the
syllabus. Tusi was the supervisors of the religious endowments and
madrasas of the Il-Khnid (Iranian Mongol) empire, and made a serious attempt to capture the madrasas for the teaching of philosophy.
The Roman law of corporations enabled the European universities
to claim that legal status and use it autonomy to make the reception of Aristotle denitive. The law of waqf which was the legal basis
of the madrasas did not have a similar concept of corporation, and
Tusis promotion of philosophy was reversed within a generation as
it lacked a permanent legal foundation. The graduates of European
universities acted as eective bearers of political Aristotelianism in
the long and uneven path to representative government and democratization in Western Europe. Despite his failure to reorient the
teaching in the madrasas, Tusis political ethics was taught there as
practical philosophy in the early modern period. It remained marginal, however, and was not integrated in to the main disciplines of
Islamic law and jurisprudence.
Elsewhere, I have covered the initial reception of the Greek political
science in the tenth and eleventh centuries and argued that the
rational legitimation of religion is the philosophical theory was a
potential challenge to the traditional legitimacy of the shar'i order.
This made a clash between Islam and Greek philosophy, including
political theory, inevitable, and a rejectionist civilizational response
by the pious traditionalists gathered momentum and eventually
displaced philosophy to the margin of institutionalized learning. In
the course of a long and complex Kulturkampf, the rejectionist response
was formulated by the jurists who proposed to revive the institution

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of the Caliphate with a program of Shari'a-based government

(Arjomand 2001). They developed a theory of the caliphate as a
branch of Islamic jurisprudence. In terms of our dichotomy, this
theory realistically allowed for the possibility of authority by seizure,
but advocated the subordination of the political to the shar'i order
under the suzerainty of the Caliph. This is the theory that Gibb
considered the basis of constitutional organization in Islam, to the
exclusion of all other writings on political ethics and statecraft. In
the generation after Tusi, the political ideas of the eleventh century
Caliphal legitimists inspired the Siysa al-shar'iyya (Sharia-based politics
or policy) by Ibn Taymiyya (d. 1328) who lived in Syria and wrote
in the face of the triple threat of the Mongols, the Shi`ites and the
Crusaders.
The science of civic politics, as formulated in Tsis Ethics, had
already subordinating its Greek form to the spirit of Perso-Indian
statecraft. Under his followers, it slowly merged with statecraft, facing
its programmatic Islamic counterpart of theories of shar 'i-government
which may in fact have been increasingly accommodated (Tabtab"i
1994: ch.4). The Muslim synthesis of Perso-Indian statecraft and
Greek political science was thus complete, and henceforth found
expression in variants of the theories of the two powers: monarchy
and prophecy (as embodied in the Shari'a and interpreted by the
ulema). (Arjomand 2003a).
Aquinass major contribution to Western political thought consists
in his transmission of the key Aristotelian political ideas in his reception of politics as an independent science and the most important
of practical sciences (Aquinas 1965: 19899). He also put forward a
remarkably Aristotelian denition of law as nothing else than a
rational ordering of things which concerns the common good, promulgated by whoever is charged with care of the community (Aquinas
1965: 112113). This paved the way for making the integration of
Aristotles natural law into divine law as participation in the eternal
law by rational creatures (Aquinas 1965: 11415) the cornerstone
of Thomism. Human laws proceed from natural law to more particular
dispositions, and are directed to the common good of the city
(Aquinas 1965: 13031). Therefore,
Human law has the quality of law only in so far as it proceeds according to right reason; and in this respect it is clear that it derives from
the eternal law. In so far as it deviates from reason it is an unjust
law, and has the quality not of law but of violence. (Aquinas: 12021)

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Furthermore, Aquinas elaborated his constitutionalism (Sigmund

1993: 21922), using both Aristotles ideas of the commonwealth (res
publica), in which the whole body of citizens rule for the attainment
of the common good, and of a mixed constitution as the judicious
combination of monarchy, aristocracy and democracy, dened by
the participation in some respect of all the members of a city or
nation in government (Aquinas 1965: 14849; Pennington 1988: 448),
together with a corporatist dierentiation of community following
Artistotles division of the city (Quillet 1988: 52630).
Aristotelian political ideas could be readily combined with other
legal notions. In combination with the canonistic corporate theory,
they produced the constitutional conception of the structure of the
church (Pennington 1988: 448). And in combination with Roman
corporate theory and public law, they gave birth to the modern idea
of the state (Canning 1988: 361).
As we have seen, the reception of Aristotle in the Muslim world
had taken place some three centuries earlier, and the Mu`tazilites
had used him as the First Teacher to defend the faith by creating
rational theology (kalm). There was, however, one startling Muslim
omission in the Arabic Aristotelian corpus. Unlike Aquinas, Nasir alDin Tusi and the Muslim philosophers were unfortunate in that the
one and only work of Aristotle which was not translated into Arabic
was his Politics. They therefore tended to mistake Platos Republic as
the natural extension of Aristotles Ethics, as Averroes did explicitly.
To make good the lacuna, Nasir al-Din Tusi had written Akhlq-e
Nseri, a much expanded translation of the commentary on Aristotles
Ethics by Ibn Moshkuya (d. 1037; Miskawayh in Arabized form),
which was to remain the main work on political ethics and statecraft taught in the colleges of the early modern Muslim empires.
Partly for this reason, with Tusi and after him, Persian norms constituted much of the substance of the new political theory, Greek
practical philosophy its form. To give one crucial example, Tusis
treatment of justice begins with an interesting general philosophical
discussion, but when he turns to the topic in the chapter on statecraft and kingship, which is immediately followed by the need for
spies in statecraft, the Greek spirit is subordinated to the ethos of
the Persian social hierarchy (Arjomand 2003a).
Tusis groping toward the missing concepts of the Philosopher is
evident. In Akhlq-e Nseri, he develops (20712 3078) the Aristotelian
notion of the common good (Tusi: 20712 as maslahat-e 'omum;

political culture in the islamicate civilization

323

307308 as khayrt-e moshtarak). In a short tract he wrote much

later for the Mongol emperor Hleg, the idea of common good is
applied systematically to distinguish between the kings personal (khssah) revenue and expenditure and those pertaining to public royal
goods (ml-e masleh-e pdshhi ). Gifts, beneces and jewelry should
be paid for from the privy purse, while the public revenue of the
kings should be spent on the army and the bureaucracy, the poor
and orphans, couriers and ambassadors, and a postal service throughout the empire (Arjomand 2003a). Nevertheless, it is clear that Tusi
could not go far enough on his own, and his synthesis contains only
a remote echo of Aristotelian political thought as compared to that
of Aquinas.
Conclusion: Political modernity and the Islamicate civilization
Through the mutual accommodation of the Shari'a and a political
culture derived from Greek and Perso-Indian sources, the civilizational encounters under consideration introduced an unmistakable
element of pluralismor at any rate, dualismin the normative
order of medieval Islam. The consummate presentation of this medieval
synthesis, which remained denitive for the early modern Muslim
gunpowder empires as well, is found in Tusis Akhlq-e Nseri. Works
on ethics and statecraft by Tusis epigone as well as his own treatise dominated the political thought of the Ottoman, Safavid and
Mughal empires, and other than the immediate Islamic rejectionist
reaction of the Hanbalite Ibn Taymiyya, to be discovered and
cherished by the contemporary Islamic fundamentalists, there was
no Islamic reaction before the reassertion of the Shari'a in the lateseventeenth century Ottoman empire and the reign of Auranzeb and
Shah Wali Allh of Delhi in the eighteenth century.5 So down to
that century, a university-educated European and a madrasa graduate,
if they could communicate in a common language, would have shared
the Aristotelian division of the human sciences into ethics, economics
and politics as pertaining to the management of the individual self,
the household and the polity. This is similarity, however, somewhat

5
The fact that the Islamic reaction was so late in coming should cast doubt on
Hu s (1993) attribution of the failure to develop modern science to medieval Islamic
ethos, which was in fact less hostile to science than the medieval Christian ethos.

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deceptive as the development of political thought in the two civilizations had followed a sharply divergent path.
The unavailability of Politics in the Muslim world meant continued
unawareness of many key Aristotelian political concepts that became
available to Aquinas and others in the thirteenth century and shaped
Western political thought, such as the commonwealth (res publica) and
the rule of law (government by laws and not men), with the citizen
being the ruler and the ruled at the same time (Aquinas 1965:
13839). These ideas penetrated the Islamicate world as the implicit
conceptual substratum of modern constitutionalism in the nineteenth
and twentieth centuries. Only much later did modern translations of
Politics appear, and then as something of an antiquarian text in
the history of philosophy. The real thrust of modernization in the
debilitated early nineteenth century Muslim empires, the Ottoman
and Iran, did not come from the strata with an interest in political
science but from the rulers and the servants of the patrimonial state.
The latters interest in the rationalization and defensive modernization
of armies and bureaucracies gave them no incentive to uncover the
Aristotelian substratum of modern constitutional law or to refashion
Tusis political science in a democratic direction.
Francis Robinson (1999: 241) ingeniously develops the idea that
by taking Webers understanding of developmental history of world
religions and his typology of religious rationalism, we can make sense
of the fact that failures of the Westernized state machinery has often
been accompanied by a reassertion of Islamic world view and a reinstatement of the Shari'a in public life. The result has been an ideologically concocted reinvention of the Islamic political tradition that
bears no resemblance to the historical synthesis analyzed in this essay.
The modernization of the Ottoman (later Tunisian, Egyptian and
Turkish) and Iranian states dispossessed the ulema as an elite by
taking over or eliminating many of their social and judiciary functions.
In the twentieth century, the dispossessed traditional or organic
intellectuals of Muslim societies formulate an Islamic counter-myth
of their own against the idol of the modernized state. The political
edge of this alternative Islamic social myth became increasingly
sharpened as the century was drawing to a close. The late-twentieth-century political Islam obliterated the theory of the two powers
from an increasingly reied and holistic historical memory, and discovered a hero in Ibn Taymiyya, whose apprehension of the abovementioned triple threat matches their fear of suocation by the

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325

Western cultural invasion. Ibn Taymiyyas monistic idea of Shari'abased policy was simplied still further into a vehemently rejectionist
anti-Western myth of the Islamic State with the primary function
of the execution of the divine law. Thus has the Islamic political
tradition been reinvented in our time. Needless to say, this invented
tradition requires elaborate separate treatment, but without understanding their divergence from the historical tradition, we cannot
assess the prospects for democracy in the contemporary Muslim
world.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

MULTIPLE RELIGIOUS MODERNITIES:

A NEW APPROACH TO CONTEMPORARY RELIGIOSITY
Danile Hervieu-Lger
The debate over secularization
How many writings, colloquia, seminars and symposia have been
devoted to the question of secularization in the last thirty or thirtyve years? While no one can be sure, it is certain that the speculation by the sociologists of religion as to the reality of the phenomenon,
its nature and extent, have taken on a character close to obsession.
The diculty of answering these questions has left some constantly
proposing that it is time to abandon this notion, which is now clearly
impossible to sustain. Yet we keep coming back to it, as if unable
to tear ourselves away from the contemplation of a hypothesis which
has governed the social sciencessociology in particularsince their
beginnings: the notion of the irreversible shrinking of the place and
importance of religion in modern societies.
This inaugural hypothesis of sociology has been expressed in many
dierent ways (some of them mutually contradictory) by the founding
fathers of the discipline. We could say, in outrageous simplication,
that it combines three principal themes: that of the rational reduction
of belief in a world disenchanted by science and technology; that
of the religious emancipation of the individual conscience in a world
where individual autonomy is increasingly asserting itself; and lastly,
that of the relegation of religious activity to a specialized sphere.
An analysis, on the one hand, of the historical process by which
religion has withdrawn itself from politics, and the observation, on
the other hand, of the generalized decline of religious practice in
European societies, lent this hypothesis a solid empirical foundation.
This picture of the secularization of the modern world did not imply
the disappearance, pure and simple, of religion. But it did postulate,
at the very least, its inexorable privatization. Religion was evolving
into a personal, private matter of conscience, with little or no

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incidence on the social denition of identities or the political dynamic

of the State.
This view has not stood up to the reality, observed since the late
sixties, of the massive presence of religious manifestations on the
public scene of contemporary societies, and the rise of spiritual movements all over the world. Faced with this evidence that the process
of secularization has not reached completion, even in societies where
the advance of modernity is most extreme, the sociologists of religion have had to make severe modications to their analytical tools.
First came the realization that the continuous renewal of knowledge
and the acceleration of social and technological change, the increasing
uncertainties that go hand in hand with the changeability of conditions and status, and the prodigious development in communications
that has revolutionized our relationship to time and space, far from
causing beliefs to peter out, have in fact all contributed to favouring their proliferation. The ultra-modern age has turned out to be
a period of pullulation of small systems of meaning constructed by
individuals from the resources at hand, to cope with the continual
reshaping of their experience of the world. The individualized production of these little narratives of belief completely turns upside
down the management systems of the great codes of meaning of
which the religious institutions claim to be the guardians. In this
movement, the authorities responsible for the ocial management
of these resources nd that they are now, at least partially, ruled
out of order in their pretensions to announce and prescribe the true
faith for each individual and for society as a whole.
But the generalized practice of do-it-yourself belief construction is
not the last word of religiosity within modernity. Another phenomenon that has become apparent at the same time is the extent of
assertions of community and identity in which the resources of religion
are brought into action. From Latin America to the Balkans, from
the republics of the former Soviet empire to India, from the MiddleEast to the Philippines and Indonesia, no region in the world has
been left out of the rise in the power of the ethno-religions. In North
Americaand even in Europeit has been realized that the position of institutional religion is probably much less transient than had
been postulated by the classical theories of the secularization of modern societies.
What could be done to face up these body-blows dealt to the vision
of secularization as a universal law of the modernization of societies?

multiple religious modernities

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One solution was simply to sweep away the classical theories of

the relationships between religion and modernity and conclude that
the whole concept of secularization had never amounted to any more
than a huge optical illusion or a ction with a purely ideological
foundation. Certainly this way of starting at the other end of the
problem formed the principle of a ourishing school of literature at
the beginning of the eighties, when there was widespread exploration,
for example, of the supposed omnipresence of the sacred in modern
societies (even in football matches and rock concerts) and prediction
of the return of God into the public arena. The intellectual aw in
almost all of this literature lies in the way that the demonstration,
in furtherance of the cause, fails to take account of one inescapable
historical fact characteristic of all modern societies: the denitive
disjunction between the world of belief and the organization of
society.
Another approach, more interesting from the sociological point of
view, emphasizes the interruptions and reversals which have always
been, and still are, liable to perturb the process of modern rationalization and to oppose the logic of disenchantment which is at the
heart of the principle of secularization. This approach itself comes
in two versions. The rst lays stress on the crisis situations and eects
of de-modernizationand hence of de-secularizationthat they
produce. This viewwhich makes religion a compensatory resource
that helps in coping with the hiccups and disillusionments of progress
oers a lifeline in extremis to the classical view of secularization as
a loss of religion by associating contemporary religious developments
with a break (supposedly reparable) in the progression of modernity.
But it is unable to grasp the issues of the religious productions of
modernity itself. It is powerless, for example, to take into account
the spread of spiritual currents and movements underpinning personal fullment, which are in perfect accord with the modern culture of the individual. The interpretation of the so-called New religious
movements at the turn of the seventies brought out a second, contrasting school of thought. This version links these developments, not
to a failure of modernity, but to the appearance of that individual
subjectivity and culture of the self that characterize post-modernity. The growth in individual demands for meaning, the breeding
ground for the contemporary religious renewals, is linked, according
to this view, to the state of uncertainty inherent in societies subjected to an increasing pressure of change. The disqualication of

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the great narratives purveyed by the religious institutions and the

dissemination of small systems of meaning cobbled together by the
individual are responses to this uncertainty. These relate to the logical systems of narrative construction of the self that are inseparable from a world subject to the rule of an individualism of expression
and the culture of authenticity. We recognize here the essential elements of a theme recited with a plethora of variations by the contemporary sociologies of religious modernity.
But although this last view may be able to take into account the
phenomena of individualization and subjectivization of belief that
characterize the spiritual scene in Western societies, it altogether
leaves out the paradoxical aspects of the religious communalization
of ultra-modern societies. For the uidity of individual spiritual paths
does more than nourish those exible forms of networks of religious
communalization whose development was foreseen by Ernst Troeltsh
as early as the beginning of the century. It also cohabits with the
vigorously structured forms of the collective religious identity. On
one hand, it can be seen that the deployment of peer forms of mutual
validation of belief, subject to a exible system of free exchange of
truths, engenders, as its counterpoint, intensive forms of community
validation of belief which give precedence, in contrast, to the exclusive sharing of the truth among pure, redeemed believers. I would
say, in this connection, that the expansion of soft religion paradoxically nurtures the armation of hard religion (or strong religion, to refer to E. Sivans latest work).1 On the other hand, the
great religious institutions continue to occupy privileged positions on
the market for symbolic goods, a market which is admittedly liberalized, but on which the operators are not all positioned on a footing
of pure, perfect competition: the degree of religious impregnation of
non-religious mentalities, practices and institutions, even in the most
laicized societies, should not be underestimated.
Towards a sociology of multiple religious modernities
Entangled in all these contradictions, eorts to renew the classical
analysis of secularization could easily reach a new dead end. They

Almond, Appleby and Sivan (2003).

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331

have been revived by another observation, more recent this time:

this concerns the exceptional character of the religious situation in
Europe, and even in Western Europe, with respect to the religious
changes that are coming about in the rest of the world. It is less
than ten years since the sociologists of religion have been observing
empirically that Europe is the only geographical and cultural area
in the world (in common perhaps with Canada, and certainly with
Quebec) where the ideal-type scenario of secularization as the expulsion of religion is genuinely applicable, in contrast to the other continents, including the United States. Nowhere else than in Western
Europe has denominational religion been eroded to such a point. A
catastrophic fall in recruitment to the clerical body, weakening of
the direct political inuence of the churches, together with a decline
in belief in a personal God, an increase in cultural ignorance of
religious traditions (of Christianity above all), the autonomous expression
of personal moral conscience with respect to the ethical prescriptions
of the religious structures, and nally, accelerated internal secularization of the major churches: all these indicators conrm the steadily
deepening secularization of European societies in both their dimensions:
objective (the institutions), and subjective (conscience and mentalities).
This movement takes on its full signicance within a religious history of politics, which stresses the concrete role that Christianity has
played in the European domain as a religion of the end of religion
(M. Gauchet).
The essence of the problem, then, is to decide how much signicance
to give to this history from the point of view of the genealogy of
modernity as a whole. Does European-style secularization constitute
the ideal-type pattern for all religious modernity, or are we forced
to admit after all that it is only one among a range of possible
congurations? The former view has long dominated the intellectual
landscape. Today, we know that it is no longer tenable. But how
can we transcend it to think through the relationship of modern societies to religion from a new standpoint? Researchers are currently
faced with two tempting options, at rst sight contradictory.
The rst is to replace a general and supposedly universal theory
of religious loss in these societies by a theory no less general, and
with equal pretensions to universal validity, of a generalized fuzziness of beliefs in a globalized universe. This rst deceptive window
on the scene seems today to draw inexorably into itself a sociology
of contemporary forms of religiosity which devotes considerable energy

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to an inventory of the galaxy, which is in unlimited expansion, of

contemporary belief. The empirical conrmation of the individualized
dissemination of beliefs and of the explosion of forms of dialogue
providing for their validation in ultra-modern societies is made to
serve a new, homogenizing reading of modernity, under the vague
heading of globalization. This observation allows us to lump together,
as part of a lagging anti-modern world, all the identifying manifestations of contemporary religiosity, forgetting that these are present
at the very heart of the societies which have plunged fastest and
furthest into this same ultra-modernity. By the same token, it avoids
taking into consideration the major problem constituted by the
polarization of contemporary religious modernity, in all its local variants, between soft religion and hard religion.
But there is a second temptation, which is, conversely, to concentrate solely on the identication of these variants, taking it to the
point where recognition of the empirical diversity of religious
congurations in the dierent historic and cultural contexts of contemporary societies simply destroys all notion of modernity. I shall
give just one example. It is estimated today that the rened identication of the multiplicity of religious cultures existing in Europe has
become indispensable as a counter to the new simplication associated with the recognition of the European exception in religious
matters. But insisting on the articiality of the sociological construction
of this exceptional character, adopted as the pivotal element in the
description of the European model of modernity, can lead in some
cases to a sort of theoretical abdication. The inventory of religious
diversity of the Old World is a way to avoid the issue of analysing
the process of exculturation of religion that transcends this very
diversity, and which it is essential to analyse in order to make a
comparison, for example, between the modernities of America and
Europe.
When I speak of American and European religious modernitiesin
the pluralI already emphasize the new lease of life that can be
found by contemporary religious sociology, now that it is deprived
of the support of the classical analytical tools, in the exploration of
multiple modernities inspired by Shmuel Eisenstadt. If the notion
of multiple modernities furnishes a means of escaping the attraction of the deceptive views that I have just mentioned, it stresses
plurality while remaining anchored in a conceptual framework of
modernity as a specic type of civilisation, even though it simulta-

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333

neously refuses to determine any specic description of modernity.

By basing itself on those dynamics that produce congurations of a
world view in a state of perpetual renewal (a world that is autonomous,
open and in process of realization)a world view positioned in a
set of specic institutional formations, it opens the way for a pluralization of the gures of description of the modern civilizational
model. And this is exactly the tool needed by a present-day sociology of religious modernities. This is a view with which it is possible to take into account the role of Christianity in the construction
of the civilizational matrix which, with the Enlightenment and the
great revolutions, took shape in Western and Central Europe when
the programme of modernity, if I may so express it, went into
orbit. But it also enables usto the extent that it lays stress on the
pluralization of modern modes of thought induced by the contradictions running through the institutional application of this programmeto grasp the diversity of the positioning and role of the
religious in contemporary societies which nevertheless are all participants in this programme. In fact, this view does not just boil down
in the end to a single description of the eects of modernity on religion (the converse of the way the classical theory of secularization
works), it oers an invitation to grasp the historical congurations
of the contradictions inherent in the programme of modernity (the
contradiction between the postulate of the autonomy of individual
subjects and the imperatives of social control, between the necessity
for change and the need to ensure continuity of the collective bond,
between the pragmatic vision of a world to be constructed here and
now, and the utopian call to the advent of a completely dierent
world, between a realist acceptance of the world as it functions and
the reference to transcendence, between the pluralist self-assertion of
communities and the universalist goal of a common, united world,
etc.). These contradictions crystallize in a specic way and, through
the way that dierent social groups adopt them, take their place as
elements in a variety of cultural programmes perpetually reworked.
From this viewpoint, for example, the polarization of the contemporary religious scene (taking all traditions together) between soft
religion and hard religion is no longer positioned on an axis of
modernity/anti-modernity. But within the dynamic of modernity itself,
it can be composed, as it were, of two antinomic modalities, interdependent and inseparable from each other, of a process of reconstruction of the relationship to the universal and the pluralization of

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the systems of truth, which itself derives, at least in part, from the
de-occidentalization inherent in the globalized age of modernity.
The European model: a second look at a singular conguration
of religious modernity
But the prospect revealed by S. Eisenstadt does more than merely
invite us to identify the plurality of the cultural and institutional
congurations that are progressively brought into play on the basis
of, and by ambivalent reference to, the original occidental programme
of modernity. In my view, it oers an equally persuasive invitation
to explore the internal dynamics of the dierentiation and homogenization that produce the continual denitions and redenitions of
the programme itself. Within the constraints of this presentation, I
shall make no attempt to set out all the theoretical and methodological implications of the latter proposition. But I would like to
give a brief illustration of its scope, by taking a fresh look, in this
light, at a few of the elements in the description of the singular
conguration of European religious modernity.
Europeans are further removed than mostas I remarked earlierfrom the gure of the practising believer, receiving his religious identity from the community to which he has belonged since
birth and in which he obeys the prescriptions of observance laid
down by the institution responsible for the transmission of the faith.
I myself have adopted two descriptive gures to exemplify the mobility of the individual paths that characterize the European religious
scene. The rst is that of the pilgrim, following his personal spiritual path, stage by stage. The second is that of the convert, who
chooses the line of belief in which he feels at home.2 These descriptive gures are not valid exclusively in the European area, but it is
in Europe that they best designate the movement towards religious
individualization that disorganizes the classical forms of religious
adherence and dissemination. This process of subjectivization of
religion constitutes the culminating point of the long history of its
gradual relegation to the sphere of the private. Historically, indeed,
Europe (with processes that diered according to nation) was the

Hervieu-Lger (1999). And also: Hervieu-Lger (2001).

multiple religious modernities

335

scene of the assertion of political autonomy in contrast to the tutelage

of every religious norm imposed from above. Europe was the laboratory of the end of religion and of the invention of political
sovereignty, from which emergedfrom the bottom upthe whole
set of norms that govern collective life.3 Today it is the laboratory
of the absorption of the symbolic resources of religion into the
contemporary culture of the individual. This does not mean that
religion has disappeared. It still persists as a personal choice and a
mode of individual identication. But it serves less and less to nourish
collective identities and is certainly no longer, in any country in
Europe, the source of the framework of ethical norms that governs
the life of its citizens.
However, to describe the European religious situation, it is impossible to record only the objective indicators of loss (the decline in
practice and the erosion of traditional beliefs) and to evaluate the
extent of individual do-it-yourself constructions of belief. For such a
view can take us no further than the most visible layer, that of the
relations explicitly cultivated by individuals with the great religions.
To measure the presence of religion in European societies, we have
to delve more deeply. We have to position ourselves at the level of
the politico-cultural structures and the ethical and symbolic structures
that form the framework for communal living in the societies concerned, and which have been moulded in depth by religious traditions,
Christianity in particular. We can then determine that even within
the Christian realm, the construction of this modern problem of
autonomy has followed dierent courses, visible, for instance, in the
frontier that continues to divide Catholic Europe from Protestant
Europe. This dierence can best be illustrated by taking the case of
France and Germany. The German problem of autonomy, anterior
to any political problem of autonomy, was born of the experience
of the Reformation. It is founded on the assertion of a religious
individualism which disputes the very foundations of authority in the
church and frees the believers relationship with God from all
institutional mediation. The conception of the individual and the
sovereignty that this entails is radically dierent from the fundamentally political construction that established itself in France through

Gauchet (1998).

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danile hervieu-lger

the dual and indivisible struggle against despotism on the one hand
and religion on the other that was crystallized in the revolutionary
experience.4
For a more profound analysis of the dierences in the civilizational workings of religion in Europe, we would have to distinguish
other relevant dierentiations within these Catholic and Protestant
sub-groups. Thus, within the broadly Protestant part of Europe,
the English, German and Scandinavian perceptions of the Enlightenment, themselves rooted in dierent constructions of Protestantism,
generated political cultures, conceptions of the relation between the
State and the citizen, and notions of sovereignty and representation,
that are far from homogeneous. Now every society in Europe today
still bears the marks of the religious roots that are specic to it. In
a country like France, where the historical work of laicization went
particularly deep and the objective and subjective loss of religion can
be particularly clearly illustrated, the phenomenon of catholic encoding
of culture, institutions and mentalities remains extraordinarily signicant.
We are all Catholics, Sartre declares in Being and Nothingness. This
formula is noteworthy in its emphasis on the mirror that the laity
hold up to the gure of the Roman church whose direct hold over
society and the individual it had laboured to break. More broadly,
the whole programme of the major institutionsschools, hospitals,
justice, the University, etc.was established, and functioned for a
long period, by reference (rendered implicit, of course) to the Catholic
model.5 It is impossible to comprehend the manner of expression in
public debate of numerous questions which have strictly nothing to
do with religion (from the quality of food to ethical regulation of
science, from the management of hierarchical relationships in business
to the future of rural society, from the expectations that society has
of the State to practices in social activism) without gauging this
Catholic impregnation of culture. But this function of symboliccultural encoding operates in a completely dierent way, though with
equal force, in every country in Europe, from Scandinavia to Great
Britain, from Germany to Belgium or the Netherlands, in Italy or
Ireland. In every country in Europe, the style of political life, the
content of public debate on social and ethical problems, the denition
of the areas of responsibility of the State and the individual, con4
5

Bouretz (2000).
Dubet (2003).

multiple religious modernities

337

ceptions of citizenship and the family, visions of nature and the

environment, but also practical rules of civil behaviour, relationships
to money or modes of consumption (etc.) have taken shape in historicalreligious contexts which continue (up to a point) to direct them today.
This is not because the religious institutions have retained any eective
capacity to impose norms (we know that they have lost this everywhere), but because the symbolic structures that they moulded conserve
a remarkable power of cultural impregnation that survives the loss
of ocial beliefs and the collapse of observances. But this dierentiated
impregnation operates, we must never forget, within a common world
shaped by the long history of dissociation between the spheres of
politics and religion, one of the products of which is the specic style
of a religiosity centred on the individual. The European model of
religious modernity is positioned, with all the dierentiations that I
have just mentioned, in the context of the cultural and political programme of a European modernity which it is no longer possible to
take as the denitive model of modernity as such.
The great question that faces us today is clearly that of the future
of this civilizational matrix, moulded over the duration of a long
historical period. Several sets of factors contribute to the weakening
of this cultural pedestal, at once unied and plural. In each case,
the problems encountered reveal and accentuate the tension which
is growing between the process of homogenization of the European
religious scene by secularization on one hand, and the sometimes
contradictory activation of dierent religious cultures present in this
same European area, on the other hand. The rst factorwhich is
also the most visibleis the cultural and religious pluralization of
Europe linked primarily to the phenomena of immigration, and especially the denitive settlement of the immigrant populations within
the host countries. The heart of this phenomenon of pluralization is
obviously the strong presence of Islam in the dierent countries of
Europe. This presence draws together those European countries that
face the same problems of mutual acclimatization between widely
disparate religious and cultural worlds. It also imposes a comprehensive re-assessment of the relationship between religion and culture in the dierent societies involved. But at the same time, it reveals
the diversity of the responses elicited in these societies to the demand
of Islam for recognition within them. While it is true, for example,
that the size of the Muslim populations in Great Britain, France or
Germany means that Islam can no longer be ignored in these three

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danile hervieu-lger

countries, it is also clear that the road to integration of these populations diers considerably, as a function partly of the political culture
of each country, and partly of the special character of each of the
varieties of Islam concerned (Pakistani, North African or Turkish, in
the three cases in point). The dierent ways of dealing with a question
such as the wearing of the veil in school is a good illustration of the
fact that Islam has become a reality which simultaneously unites and
divides the dierent European countries.
The same dialectic of proximity and distance comes into play with
regard to the phenomena of cultural globalization in which Europe
is involved as much as all the rest of the planet. On the one hand,
the spread of a homogenized media culture, the accelerated development of the circulation of goods, people and ideas, the homogenization of modes of consumption and the generalized subjection of
exchangesincluding exchange of symbolsto the mechanisms of
the free market, tend to erode the cultural idiosyncrasies, especially
religious, of European societies. On the other hand, the dynamics
of this very cultural homogenization engender reactions which may
favour the revival of these same cultural idiosyncrasies and bring
back to the surface national political and symbolic issues relating to
religious matters which might have been thought completely obsolete. While it may be imagined that the growing hegemony of NorthAmerican culture and values may arouse in opposition the assertion
of a European culture armed with its own references and values, we
must also reect that it tends to generate the formation of reactive
identities which, even within Europe, nourish strengthened areas of
competition which may be inseparably denominational and national.
The ght to defend the cultural exception certainly nds nourishment
in the soil that supports the religious worlds that cohabit in Europe,
but these religious worlds, which are themselves dierentiated, may
bring to it elements of content that are in plain contradiction.
The phenomena of internal cultural pluralization on one hand
and external cultural globalization on the other hand have the potential to contribute simultaneously to the erosion and the partial and
paradoxical recreation of dierent religious civilizations in Europe.
It is this dual trend that permanently denes and redenes the singularity of a European religious modernity. It is through this movement also that the place of European modernity is dened and
redened in the constellation of those multiple modernities that
Shmuel Eisenstadt has taught us to consider.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

RELIGION AND POWER IN THE HISTORY OF THE

EASTERN ORTHODOX CHURCH
Michael Conno
The nature of the relations between church and state in Eastern
Christianity is a subject of debate and raises conicting opinions
among scholars, laymen, and clerics. These relations encompass
political, ecclesiastical, and theological issues with numerous ramications and components, closely linked in each given case to specic
historical circumstances. Out of the major topics and their interpretations, this paper will deal with only one which has been
variously formulated as: the presence in Eastern Christianity of a
close identication between church and state; the alternative notion
that there existed rather a situation of interdependence between them;
and the question, Was the church a servant of the state, and to
what extent? These formulas are not mutually exclusive, and there
is indeed some overlapping between them; nevertheless they often
denote distinct interpretations, and in the historiography of the subject they have served at times as code words for dierent approaches.
Obviously, these are also quite complex issues, resistant to one-dimensional conceptualization and clear-cut denitions. In any case, the
main purpose of this paper is not to look for the best formulas, but
to nd out the real operational arrangements which existed in dierent
historical situations between the church and the state in the political and cultural spheres.
Because of the closeness of the latter formulas, and their common
problematic and interwoven arguments, they will be examined here
analytically and comparatively, not thematically one after the other.
Finally, it has to be said from the outset that the limited purpose
of this paper is to add some nuances to the existing body of
scholarship in this eld, and not to tackle the wide range of the subjects complex problematic. Moreover, in a topic encompassing a
wide geographical area, numerous nations, and a long span of time,
there are always, on the one hand, general features, common to

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michael confino

many of the entities involved; and, on the other hand, specic ones,
peculiar to each and every church and nation. Both types will be
touched upon albeit with dierent degrees of emphasis. The paper
is divided into two parts, with the rst devoted to an overview of
some salient features of the church-state problematic in Eastern
Orthodoxy; and the second to an examination of church-state relations mainly in Muscovy and Russia, and occasionally in the Orthodox
countries in the Balkans.
Church and state: the view from the East
It should be noted from the outset that during long periods of time
Eastern Orthodoxy was a very politicized ecclesiastical organization.
Georges Florovksy observes that it was essentially a social religion,
and Pedro Ramet writes that it had from the beginning a social
and political concern.1 This characteristic will be kept in mind in
the present enquiry, with regard to the three main features examined in the rst part of the paper, for their role in the shaping of
church-state relations in Eastern Orthodox Christendom in Europe:
the legacy of the past, the inuence of some basic tenets of its creed,
and its structural makeup.
The weight of the past
The Byzantine Empire lasted almost 1200 years and outlived most
of the other great empires. The inuence of its civilization expanded
from Russia to Ethiopia, through the Caucasus, the Balkans and the
eastern Mediterranean regions. Peoples owe to Byzantium their literacy
and literature (Bulgaria, Russia, Serbia), others the beginning of their
art and architecture (Romania, Georgia), and manytheir Christianity,
including the specic Eastern Orthodox turn of the perennial question of church and state.2

1
Florovsky, 1974, quoted in Pedro Ramet, 1988 p. 3. For some comprehensive
and interpretative works see French, 1951; Schmemann, 1963; Pelikan, 1974; Ware,
1995; Binns, 2002.
2
The literature is immense; for some relevant general works and monographs,
old and new, see: Runciman, 1933; Ostrogorsky, 1940; Angelov, 1946; Every 1947);

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

341

Constantines conversion to Christianity was of the utmost importance not only for the fate of the church, but also for the theology
of an empire, forin the accepted religious beliefhe was converted
directly by God, rather than by ordinary men. This fact sanctioned
implicitly his power both in the church and in the empire and
represented one of the most lasting and solid basis of the emperors
position in the church. The early Eastern Church enjoyed the protection of the Roman emperors who, after conversion to Christianity,
transferred their capital to Constantinople. In the Eastern Roman
Empire, the emperor was head of the church, and the church was
part of the state structure. Emperor Justinian (527565) held that
there existed a relationship of harmony between secular and ecclesiastical authorities. To this should be added the principle of symphonia (rst formulated in 535 in Justinians sixth Novella,) which
became a fundamental Orthodox tenet. In practice the harmony
implied that the emperors took part in the internal life and activity
of the church and at times even in the formulation of cannon law
and the appointment of bishops. In this situation it was in the order
of things that the state would use its power in order to support the
decisions of the church and secure their implementation on its
territory. The concomitant result of this relationship was that the
church used the secular power of the state in order to implement
what it considered religious orthodoxy and to ght schismatics and
heretics. In any case, it has been pointed out that for Byzantine
theorists it was axiomatic that the church could not survive without
protection of the state (a view which requires qualication, as we
will see below); in this view, later on, when Byzantium began to
decline, the church became even more dependent on secular authority
for physical protection and nancial assistance.3
Thus we may say that this relationship, so to speak, spared Byzantium and the Eastern Church a War of Investiture, but although

Berkhof, 1947; Brehier, 1949; Barker, 1957; Browning, 1980; Alexander, 1985;
Hussey, 1957; idem, 1990; Whittow, 1995; Treadgold 1997; Herrin, 2001.
3
See Richard Pipes, 1974, ch. 9, pp. 221245. This succinct and brilliant chapter is a critical analysis of the Orthodox Churchs role and history; it oers insightful interpretations and raises questions open to debate. I have addressed here some
of them as formulated in this treatment; see also Brehier, 1969, pp. 430506; Hussey,
1957, pp. 8599.

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michael confino

such a war didnt take place, the history of Eastern Orthodoxy in

Byzantium and in other countries was a long and protracted tale of
tensions between the ecclesiastical and the secular power. Contests
were permanent and conicts endemic. When harmony existed, it
meant quite often either a willing or a reluctant submission of the
church to the powers. One of the reasons of the churchs opposition stemmed from the fact that Byzantine theory emphasized the
supremacy of the church over the state, and the same above-mentioned church theorists in Byzantium who held that the church could
not survive without protection of the state, extolled also the proud
Byzantine tradition of the primacy of the ecclesiastical power over
the secular.4 If this is so, and if such conicting situations did exist,
then the formula close identication of church and state should
be understood as a kind of precarious equilibrium between common
interests and conicting goals of the church and the state, inuenced
also, of course, by the nature of the personalities, the aspirations of
the secular rulers and the ecclesiastical heads in each and every
historical situation. In a sense, the long and protracted cooperation
cum confrontation between the Eastern church and the state was
quite often a clash of egos and of personal will, and not only an
ecclesiastical and political dissension. Such were the cases, for instance
between loan Tzimisces and patriarch Michael Cerularius in the
tenth century, and between Andronicus II versus Calecas in the
fourteenth.
Finally, if in the early Eastern Roman Empire, Justinian (a man
with a bent for dogma) took upon himself to occasionally make pronouncements in theological matters, this practice did not take roots
and it was not to be seen again in Eastern Orthodoxy in any place
during the following fourteen centuries. Thus, for example, no tsar
of Muscovy or emperor of Russia could or did issue any laws concerning faith or establish any principles of Christian or ethical doctrine, nor did he ever legislate in matters of dogma or ritual; this
was unconditional usage in Muscovy and explicitly formulated in the

4
On this issue the noted historian Michael Karpovich holds a dierent view:
At any rate, neither in Byzantium nor in Russia did the Church as a whole ever
exhibit either a strong tendency to assert the supremacy of the spiritual power over
the secular, or such a tenacity in defending itself against the encroachments of
the State as were characteristic of the Roman Catholic Church in the West
(M. Karpovich, 1944, p. 13.)

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

343

Fundamental Laws of the Russian empire. It was also strictly observed

in current practice. As for the Balkan states in modern times, which,
after their emancipation from Turkish rule, chose kings from various
European dynasties, most of whom were Catholics or Protestants
and some had to convert to Orthodoxy in order to be enthroned,
it goes without saying that none of these newcomers had the standing and the will to meddle in the internal aairs of the local Orthodox church, let alone to utter opinions on canonical matters and
Christian dogma. This was the case, for instance, with the princes
of the Danish Royal House in Greece; the Battenbergs and the SaxeCoburgs in Bulgaria; the Hohenzolern-Sigmaringens in Romania.5
The limits of the secular rulers power over the church can be
clearly seen even in the case of well established emperors with undisputed legitimacy. Thus, when we analyze, for instance, Justinians
attempts to force a compromise between the Orthodox and the
Monophysites, in which even this most caesaropapistic emperor
could not succeed but to force only a shaky dogmatic agreement in
his role of manager of the church. Similarly, the Byzantine emperors failed to impose their views on the church regarding Arianism,
monothelitism, iconoclasm, and those of the crusading period were
no more successful in dictating to the church in the matter of reunion
with the reformed papacy of the West.6 When forced to choose
between preserving the Byzantine state with Western aid or the
integrity of the church, the Orthodox church, in eect, abandoned
the empire and became itself the bearer of the ideal of the universal
Christian community. The empire atrophied, but the Byzantine church
prospered beyond the frontiers of the Byzantine empire, most notably
in Eastern Europe, and proved thereby that it had been less dependent

5
A notable exception in this respect was king Otto I, a Protestant and Bavarian
prince, who, ruled in Greece from 1832 to 1862. He had the church submitted to
the civil authority, interfered in its internal aairs, and made it for all practical
purposes an agency of the state, very much alike the Bavarian Protestant church
after the 1818 Constitution. Deposited in 1862 folowing a military revolt, he was
succeeded in 1863 by George I, a Danish prince.
6
Most of the works listed above in note 1 devote chapters or sections to the
relations between Byzantium and the Roman Catholic west; for two recent monographs and documents dealing with shorter periods see Davids 1995; Ciggaar 1996;
for a brief summary and selected examples of these relations, see also 1967, ch. 4
(The Legacy of Dead Empires), pp. 5069; the sack of Constantinople in 1204
by the crusaders of the Fourth Crusade is a well known historical episode, and does
not need a detailed description here.

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on the empire than one might have thought. As Shmuel Eisenstadt

succinctly put it: Despite its close relations with the state and the
secular world, [the Byzantine church] survived the downfall of the
state and continued to thrive thereafter.7 This fact alone is a clear
refutation of the view, mentioned above, that the church could not
subsist without protection of the Byzantine state. Quite the opposite.
A short aside is in order here regarding the term caesaropapistic.
The inverted commas used above are intentional, for in the long
history of Eastern Orthodoxy from Justinian to Nicholas XI, Russias
last tsar, the term is a misnomer and no more than a metaphor. I
will not elaborate at length on this issue or try to elucidate why
some authors (Arnold Toynbee, for instance) persisted in using this
term with regard to Eastern Orthodoxy, even when proved inadequate.8 The essence of this controversial question was clearly formulated years ago by Shmuel Eisenstadt, to wit: In general, the
relation of the Emperor to the Patriarch, of the secular to the ecclesiastical, in Byzantium is best expressed not by the misleading word
caesaropapism, but as one of interdependence.9 Interdependence
indeed seems to me a more realistic and a more appropriate notion
for the understanding of the Eastern Church. It is also a better alternative not only to caesaropapism, but also a more powerful
paradigm for the analysis of the entire church and state problematic in this case. By the way, the Orthodox tenet of symphony of
powers, mentioned above, holds that sacred and secular power are
inextricably connected and interdependent.
Thus, it appears that in terms of real life situations, even under
Justinian, the state could perhaps control the institutional church,
that is, the hierarchy, but could not control the charismatic element
in the church, the monastics and the laity who looked to them for
leadership, and the churchs strategic decisions regarding its integrity,
theology, and canonical independence. It is important, in several
respects, to keep in mind these characteristics, particularly when
discussing the so-called Russias Byzantine heritage. The most
obvious reason is that since Byzantium did not have a caesaropapist

Eisenstadt, 1963, p. 55; see also p. 191.

For Toynbee, see below, note 10; see also Cyril Toumanos one-sided and
negative essay, 1946, pp. 213243.
9
Eisenstadt, p. 54. See also Ahrweiler, 1975, pp. 130132.
8

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

345

regime, it could not bequeath such one to subsequent generations

of states, polities, and ecclesiastical organizations. And the same can
be said about the even less appropriate notion promoted by Toynbee
and others that Byzantium and the Orthodox Church were totalitarian organizations.10 Alexander Kazhdan, a specialist in Byzantine
history and culture, also holds that Byzantium was a totalitarian
state, but he adds also four important qualications and elucidations
which make one wonder what exactly the term totalitarian should
mean in this context.11
At about the same time, and during long periods (approximately
from the fth to the eighth century), there were not yet strong monarchies in the west with whom the Roman church had to compete
(because of the collapse of political authority and the ensuing feudalization of the social order). Thanks to this relative power-vacuum,
so to say, the church developed secular interests of its own, not only
in Rome and in Italy, but also in wide areas of western Christendom.
When vigorous secular authority made its appearance in the west,
there too the road was open toward conicts and confrontation. The
western church asserted its superiority and several popes, in particular
Gregory the Great (590604), proclaimed the supremacy of church

10
See Toynbee, 1948, pp. 164183. Here is, in Toynbees words, a short summary of his thesis: What are [Byzantines] society salient features? Two stand out
above the rest: the conviction (mentioned already) that Byzantium is always right,
and the institution of the totalitarian state. Subsequently, when the state succeeded
to transform the church into a department of the medieval East Roman state, it
reduced the church ipso facto to a position that made it totalitarian too. And nally
(exculpating in fact Lenin, Stalin, and even Ezhov, at the tune of Cest la faute
a Byzance), this is the heritage which Byzantium bequeathed to Russia from St
Vladimir to the Bolsheviks.
11
11 Kazhdan, 1989, pp. 2634; he writes: . . . we can call the Byzantine empire
a totalitarian state. And it was the only totalitarian state of the European Middle
Ages. As such, Byzantium gives us material to observe a totalitarian state over a
long period and to analyse its liabilities and assets, its roots and mechanism. (p. 32).
The four elucidations are: 1. Kievan (Rus) temporal society absorbed very little of
Byzantium in terms of political thought and practice, weaponry, etc.; 2. As for
Muscovy, Only in the fteenth century when Russian grand princes began to
build up their centralised monarchy did they discover their Byzantine ancestry;
Russia did not inherit Byzantine totalitarianism but used the model for their [sic]
political ends (p. 34); 3. Countries like Bulgaria, Serbia, and Romania, that were
in direct contact with Byzantium, did not develop a tendency to totalitarianism; 4.
On the other hand, totalitarian governments could be traced in various European
countries whose contacts with Byzantium were very slight, such as Spain and France
from the fteenth century onwards (p. 34).

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michael confino

over state, and required the implementation of all the rights and
prerogatives attached to this status. But this state of aairs didnt
last long. The militant stand of the papacy and the gradual strengthening of the secular power led inevitably to acute and endless conicts,
during which the secular rulers interfered in church aairs and in
the nomination of popes, and above all arrogated to themselves
the investiture of clerics and the distribution of spiritual oces.
Sucient to read the list of wrongdoings which Pope Gregory VII
( 10731085)famous for bringing emperor Henry IV to Canossa
attributed to the brachium seculare to see the extent of the churchs
submission and its manipulation by emperors, kings, princelets, dukes,
and lesser notables. Gregory VII issued indeed his dictatus papae on
papal world dominance, but the subsequent history of the papacy,
with its popes and antipopes, scandals and nepotism, embezzlement
and luxury, futile dethronments and contested excommunications,
bears witness that the church didnt enjoy a status of supremacy (nor
of spiritual leadership) over the secular rule. After all, the Reformation
came, at least in part, as a result and as a remedy to this deplorable
situation.
Thus, in spite of conventional wisdom, it seems that in many
respects till the beginning of the early modern times (about the sixteenth century or so), the western church cannot be advantageously
compared to Eastern Orthodoxy, including the cardinal issue of
church-state relations. In any case no substantial dichotomy or
fundamental contrasts can be observed in this regard between the
western and the eastern churches. How things evolved in this respect
during the subsequent periods is a weighty question which deserves
serious treatment in its own right.
Doctrinal inuences on church-state relations
The tenet postulating the supremacy of church over state was rarely
implemented, not only because of unfavorable political constellations
and the overwhelming strength of the secular power, but also because
of inner tensions within Eastern Orthodox theology and worldview,
tensions which hindered the drive toward hegemony of the church
(at least till the late Middle Ages) and facilitated its submission to
the state. It has been said also that in Eastern Orthodoxy another
strong inhibiting factor of the drive to hegemony has been its propen-

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

347

sity to elevate the tenet of resignation and humility. As succinctly

formulated by the noted scholar Richard Pipes:
The basic doctrinal element in Orthodoxy is the creed of resignation.
[. . .] An aspect of this resignation is humility and dread of hubris.
Orthodox theologians claim that their church has remained truer to
the teachings of Christ and the practices of early Christianity than
either the Catholic or the Protestant ones on the grounds that the
latter, having become tainted by contact with classical civilization, have
attributed far too great a role to analytic reason, a stand which has
led them to the sin of presumption, whose main manifestation is the
ambition to appropriate prerogatives pertaining to the state. Orthodoxy
preaches patient acceptance of ones fate and silent suering.12

This interesting interpretation invites several questions. Thus, are

humility and resignation a dierentia of the Eastern Orthodox church?
Dont they exist also in the creed and teaching of western Christianity?
And why, under certain circumstances, the tenet of resignation did
not prevent the church in the west as well as in the east to try to
achieve hegemony in the state and over the secular power? Finally,
resignation is certainly a signicant tenet of Christianity, but the
question has always been: resignation to whom and to what purpose? The practical behavior of Christian churches in history indicates that resignation was existentially mandatory in certain cases,
but criticized and counterindicated (on theological grounds) in others.
Furthermore, with the passage of time there were more and more
exceptions to the ideal (and idealized) attitude of resignation and
humility in the worldly dealings and political activity of the Orthodox
churches in most countries. Indeed, notwithstanding the churchs
purported other-worldliness, once the inquiry switches from theological and religious attitudes to what the church as an institution
did, one seesparticularly in Russia and in Greece (during and after
the Ottoman rule)that it was to a great extent implicated in the
internal and foreign aairs of the realm, and above all with the burden of survival, with all the compromissions that this entailed. In
the case of the Greek Orthodox church, for instance, this attitude
led it to search and obtain the Sublime Portes support in carrying
out an abusive and debilitating policy of ecclesiastical Hellenization

12

Pipes, pp. 221222.

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michael confino

(with its inevitable inuences on the wider national culture) towards

the sisterly Orthodox churches of Bulgaria, Serbia and Romania,
and on the rst placein trying to impose the Greek language in the
liturgy and prayers of these non-Greek-speaking Orthodox Christians,13
(this came in addition to the Greeks backing occasionally Turkish
repressions of the Bulgarians).14 For that reason resentment and distrust of the Greeks were not less intense in these nations historical
memory (even to these days), than their harsh feelings toward the
Turks.15
In the case of Russia, otherworldliness did not always inhibit
(even among the black clergy) active participation in secular aairs
(from politics to dynastic conspiracies). This was so even in cases
when one would expect a greater urge to avoid worldly aairs; thus,
discussing the revival of starchestvo (holy eldership) in Catherinian
Russia, Laura Engelstein writes: Though the [spiritual] elders emerged
in answer to the aggressive secularism of the eighteenth century, they
did not preach withdrawal from the world. Perhaps reecting prevalent Enlightenment views, they counseled a spiritual life that encouraged engagement as well as retreat.16 This was, then, a relative
withdrawal of sorts.

13
In the case of the Bulgarians, this represented an ironic and unwelcome twist
of history. In the 860s, when the Bulgarians decided to convert to Christianity, they
chose Byzantium over Rome as their mentor (after a erce competition between
the two). One of the main reasons for this decision was that the Byzantines did
not insist on the use of Greek in the liturgy, while the Roman Church required
Latin. In fact, two clerics, Cyril and Methodius, had already invented a cyrillic
alphabet for the translation of holy books and prayers from Greek into Old Slavonic.
14
See Ramet, 1988, pp. 78.
15
It has been often observed that anti-Semitism was extremely weak and inconsequential in Bulgaria. I can venture here from personal experience (being born
and raised there) a hypothetical proposition that for Bulgarians anti-Hellenism served
as a substitute for antiSemitism (you may have to hate somebody, but not everybody). Negative stereotypes of the Greek were similar to those attributed to the
Jew in other countries, such as Greece and Romania for instance. From elementary school onward, kids were bred (before and after the 1930s) with intense
anti-Greek feelings and representations. Textbooks, in rst grade and up, told as a
rule the story of Emperor Basil 11 Bulgaroktonos (Bulgaroubietz: Slayer of Bulgarians), who, after the battle of the Belassitsa (Balathista) Mountain on 29 July
1014, had over 14,000 Bulgarian war prisoners blinded leaving a one-eyed man to
every hundred to lead them back to tsar Samuel, who died of the shock. The story
was illustrated with drawings of endless columns of hapless blinded soldiers heading home in vast and gloomy plains.
16
Engelstein, 2001, p. 141.

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

349

In other words, even if we admit the role of resignation and

humility in the shaping of the Orthodox mindset, the question remains
as to what was their practical eect in everyday life, that is in the
political performance of the church, since we have to look not only
at what some theologians preached and monks practiced, but also
in what the church as an institution did. Actually, not unlike the
papacy and most Protestant churches, in rules of practical conduct
the Orthodox churchespecially in Russiatried to adapt itself to
changing circumstances, and still preserve, even if in an imperfect
form, what it regarded as its fundamental spiritual values. The result
was that at times it found itself under the domination of the state,
helping (or not opposing) it to oppress and persecute so-called
enemies of the state, but also schismatics (thus serving the
policies of the churchs orthodoxy). But this happened in western
churches too (Spanish Catholicism being maybe the most telling
example), and the dierence between the Orthodox church and the
others seems to have been one of emphasis rather than of substance
(and the extreme case of some Catholic and Protestant churches
under Nazi rule in the Third Reich, and also in Croatia, Slovakia
and France bears witness to this). In the end, as will be seen below,
the Orthodox church in Russia, for instance, lost its institutional
autonomy under Peter the Great, and became a part of the state
bureaucracy, but this development should be analyzed within the
specic historical circumstances under which it occurred (and about
which more will be said below).
Organization
Another integral characteristic which may have had an inuence on
church-state relations is the Eastern Orthodoxy Christianitys internal organization. In simple terms the latter is, in fact, a confederation of independent churches without any central authority. Its unity
is founded on the possession of a common dogma and on the theoretical possibility of holding Ecumenical Councils. In matters of
faith each national church is bound by the decisions of the ancient
Ecumenical Councils, but in all other respects it enjoys complete
independence vis-a-vis the others. The dierent churches dene themselves within the combined framework of the state and the nation,
the state being either a national Christian one (like Bulgaria or Serbia,

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michael confino

for instance), or a poly-ethnic non-Christian one, like the Ottoman

Empire in the Balkans from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century,
or a multinational multi-Christian non-Orthodox monarchy, as the
Habsburg Empire. In the Ottoman and Habsburg empires it was
the link between nation and Orthodoxy that played a major role
both for the local church and for the national awakening and identity, as was the case for example in Bulgaria, Serbia, and Romania.
(Paradoxically, in spite of this role of the church in preserving group
identity, most of the leaders of the struggle for independence were
anticlerical, inuenced by ideas of the Enlightenment and the French
Revolution, and wanted the subordination of religion to the secular
power; theirs was, in short, a secular nationalism.)
Thus, being composed of independent national units, the Orthodox
church is by denition decentralized. Its basic organizational principle is autocephaly; each of the national units is autocephalous or selfheaded, and has its own head who is not submitted to a higher
ecclesiastical authority.17 It may be said that it has no papacy (or
equivalent institution) and consequently it has no central and higher
authority to give it cohesion. (The case of Bulgarias temporary
dependence of the Patriarch of Constantinople is an exception
conrming the rule, and Kievan Rus and Muscovys links with the
Patriarchate of Constantinople will be examined below.) On the
other hand, looking at the history of the papacyparticularly from
the early Middle Ages to the nineteenth centuryit cannot be
said that the existence of a central authority was an unmitigated
blessing, in view of the scandals, internal strife and unsavory situations which befell the Catholic church as a result of the papacys
policies and behavior (a fact which should not conceal the Eastern
Orthodox churches own internal ghts and blemishes.) Thus the
lack of a papacy, i.e. of a central and superior authority, cannot be
held as an organic shortcoming of the Eastern Church, although
theoretically the structural decentralization may have weakened at
times Orthodoxys ability to stand up to secular authority. The question is, as Michael A. Meerson put it, If there is no superior bishop
or pope, in the Orthodox church, what then holds it together? In

17
For a recent examination of this topic see Walters, 2002, pp. 358364; see
also Ramet, pp. 319.
18
Meerson, p. 33.

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351

his view: Attachment to the heavenly king, [and] the act of communion in sacraments.18
This structural decentralization contributed to promote the right
of the Orthodox churchs national branches to use the local language in liturgies and theological writings. This practice brought
the church closer to the people, and had the twofold eect of
strengthening the bonds within the community of believers, and also
separating the various national churches from each other. In this
respect the Orthodox church seems to be closer to the Protestant
congregations; and although it has been often asserted that it had
nothing corresponding to Latin to give its members a sense of
oneness transcending national boundaries, such positive eect is highly
dubious considering the fact that in the Catholic church only the
hierarchy understood Latin, while the mass of the believers did not,
and one wonders what kind of oneness this gap could generate.
(And has this oneness ever prevented bloody wars between western
nations whose peoples attended mass ociated in Latin?) In fact,
as John Meyendor has convincingly argued, instead of being a
weakness, part of the inner strength of the Orthodox church was its
traditional theology, transmitted to the laity through the medium of
the vernacular liturgy.19
Historical events and circumstances, not less than theological tenets
and ecclesiastical policies in Eastern Europe, South-Eastern Europe,
and the Middle East during the centuries, resulted in that the main
trend of Orthodox Christianity was centrifugal, away from the ecumenical and towards the regional and the national. And this trend,
in turn, has tended to blur the distinction between church, state and
nation, which means also, by the same token, that it has tended to
strengthen the bond between the church, the state, and the nation.
This was so in Russia, and to an even greater extent in the Orthodox
churches in the Balkans.20

19
See Meyendor, 1982. To illustrate this point I may add the following example. Recently a guest of mine, an Italian Catholic, attended mass in the church of
Abu Gosh, an Arab village near Jerusalem; as usual mass was conducted in Arabic.
When leaving the church, my guest had this comment: It was very strange and
perplexing. I imagine that during the centuries this must have been the feeling of
millions of western Catholics when mass was read in Latin.
20
Pipes, 1976, p. 224.

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michael confino
Russian Orthodoxy: traditions, old and new21

For about two centuries after the introduction of Christianityfrom

988 till 1240Russia formed, ecclesiastically speaking, part of the
Patriarchate of Constantinople. The metropolitans and the bishops
were Greeks by birth and education, and the ecclesiastical administration was guided and controlled by the Byzantine patriarchs. But
from the time of the Mongol invasion, when the communications
with Constantinople became more dicult and educated Russian
priests had become more numerous, this complete dependence on
the patriarchs of Constantinople ceased. The Russian princes gradually arrogated to themselves the right of choosing the metropolitan
of Kielwho was at that time the chief ecclesiastical dignitary in
Russiaand merely sent their nominees to Constantinople for consecration. In about 1448 this formality was abrogated too, and the
metropolitan was consecrated by a Council of Russian bishops. A
further step in the direction of ecclesiastical autonomy vis--vis
Constantinople was taken in 1589, when during the reign of tsar
Fedor I, Boris Godunov succeeded in procuring the consecration of
a Russian patriarch, equal in dignity and authority to the patriarchs
of Constantinople, Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria.
During this long period of several centuries, in the words of the
noted historian Michael Karpovich, the church
played a great and creative part in the history of Russian culture and
the State. Not only did it control the spiritual life of the people, being
the only educational agency in the country, but also became the chief
guardian and exponent of the slowly growing idea of national unity.
When, in the later part of the Middle Ages, the princes of Moscow
undertook the political unication of Russia, it was the Church that

21
There is a vast literature on Russian Orthodoxy (exegesis, theology, catechetics, canon law, church history, monasticism, etc.). It is richer on pre-Petrine Russia
than on the imperial period. In terms of ecclesiastical publications the Soviet regime
is a hiatus during which appeared either anti-religious propaganda or (after the late
1930s) nothing at all. At that time the center of activity moved to the west (mainly
to France) where emigres scholars and theologians, and non-Russian specialists
published from the 1920s original and valuable studies. In Russia a renewed interest in these subjects is apparent in the 1990s (on this trend see Freeze, 2001, pp.
269278). For some general works see: Dvornik, 1926; Florovskii, 1937; Fedotov,
1946; Taube, 1947; Seraphim, 1952; Kartashev, 1959; Talberg, 1959; Smolitsch,
1964; Billington, 1968; Pascal 1976; and the works cited in note 1 above.

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

353

rendered them the most determined and particularly eective support.

It contributed to the rise of the Tsardom of Moscow by lending it its
own moral prestige and, in the persons of some of its outstanding representatives, it took a direct part in the work of national consolidation. Moreover, it supplied the young Russian Monarchy with a
ready-made theory of divinely ordained royal absolutism which it
borrowed from its spiritual parent, the Church of the Byzantine Empire.22

At that time, in all matters of external form the patriarch of Moscow

was a most important personage in the inner circle of government.
He had an inuence in civil as well as in ecclesiastical aairs, bore
the ocial title of Majesty (Velikii Gosudar; lit.: Great Lord), which
had previously been reserved for the civil head of the state and
habitually received from the people scarcely less veneration than the
tsar himself. But in reality he possessed very little independent power.23
And in spite of the churchs frequent objections, the tsar was the
real ruler not only in civil aairs, but to a certain extent in ecclesiastical matters as well. Nevertheless, as the late Marc Szeftel
succinctly put it,
a religious coloration imparted in Muscovy to every aspect of public
life gave unique status to the authority of the church, which it so
blended with that of the tsar as to create the impression of diarchy.
During the imperial coronation, the thrones of the tsar and the patriarch stood side by side in Moscow Cathedral of the Dormition. If the
tsar participated in the churchs crucial moments, he did so not because
he had the right to govern the church but because as an Orthodox
sovereign he had the duty to protect it. Two factors bolstered this
position. First, the tsars autocracy never was legally dened in Moscow.
Second, there was a limit with regard to the Orthodox church beyond
which no member, even a tsar, could pass. Above all, whatever inuence
he exercised over the life of the church, internally the latter remained
completely autonomous, ruled by a national synod which elected the
patriarch of Moscow.24

22
Karpovich, 1978, pp. 1213. On this and other important topics, there are
valuable informations and interpretations in the following collections of articles:
Nichols and Stavrou eds., 1978; Le Christianisme russe. Entre millenarisme dhier
et soif spirituelle daujourdhui, a special issue of Cahiers du monde russe et sovihique, 1988; Hosking, 1991; Batalden, 1993; Kivelson and Greene, 2003.
23
Karpovich concurs to this assessment: And yet, in reality, almost from the
outset the Church became a subordinate member of the alliance, with the State
rmly retaining full measure of control (Church and State, p. 3).
24
Marc Szeftel, 1978, p. 128 (emphasis added); see also Bushkovitch, 1992; Baron
and Kollman, 1997.

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michael confino

During the Time of Troubles (15981613) (also remembered by the

people as a time of impostors), when there was no Tsar and no
master, and chaos reigned in the land, the church-state relations
were overshadowed by the internal and international turmoil which
befell upon Russia. After the stabilization which followed the rise of
Mikhail Romanov to the throne (1613), and particularly after the
promulgation of the new Code of Laws ( Ulozhenie) in 1649 by his
son tsar Alexei Mikhailovich (16451676), the relations between the
very religious but authoritarian tsar Alexei Mikhailovich and the very
ambitious and impetuous patriarch Nikon of Moscow (16521667),
a staunch proponent of theocratic diarchy, had the potential to
generate conict.25 The crisis erupted in 1658 and lasted till 1667,
when the tsar had a Church council attended by the patriarchs of
Alexandria and Antioch (representing also those of Jerusalem and
Constantinople) decide to deprive Nikon of the patriarchal see and
of the rank of bishop, and order his incarceration in the remote
Therapontov Monastery.26
Nikons policy and ambitions for a theocratic diarchy in the realm
were not an exception in the tradition of the Russian Orthodox
Church. In the past, and particularly since the fteenth century,
Russian Orthodoxys creed, endeavor, and policy strove to establish
a regime of diarchy in the tsardom, in which the tsar is rst, and the
church holds a wide array of spiritual and administrative functions
in accordance with the tsars policies, and in common assent with
him. At times the church succeeded to fulll this aspiration, at times
it did not. In any event, there were periods when such a regime of

25
Karpovich thinks that patriarch Nikon attempted to advance in Russia the
medieval Western doctrine of the supremacy of the spiritual over the secular
power . . . (Church and State, p. 14). This view is open to debate, and is not
endorsed in this paper. Kliuchevskiis psychological portrait of Nikon remains a
classic piece of historical analysis, and worth to be read again despite the one
hundred years and more since it was published (see Kliuchevskii, 1957, vol. 3, pp.
298313. Aristeides Papadakis follows Karpovichs view and holds that Nikon sought
to break the Byzantine past by setting the church above the state, and he denes
the patriarch as a Russian Hildebrand. (Papadakis, 1988, p. 54).
26
For an exhaustive and still useful treatment see Kapterev, 1909. This conict
should not be confused with Nikons attempts at liturgical reforms which led to the
great schism in 1666; in his magisterial work (1959), Pierre Pascal gives a brilliant
analysis not only of the religious schism (raskol) generated by them, but also valuable information on the church and state issue at that time and the personalities
involved.

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

355

diarchy existed de facto.27 The break in this traditionand it was

indeed a deep and lasting oneoccurred under Peter the Great
(16891725), when the subjugation of the spiritual power by the state
became almost complete.28 The attachment to tradition and to the
letter of external observances characteristic of Russian Christianity
was rudely shaken by the tsars militant iconoclasm; and the resulting feeling of indignation and bewilderment among the clergy and
the believers was aggravated by Peters ruthless methods.29
The last patriarch in imperial Russia was Adrian; after his death
in 1700, Peterhaving in mind perhaps the lessons of the conict
between his father tsar Alexei and patriarch Nikonleft the vacancy
unlled and appointed Stefan Yavorsky (a cleric loyal to the throne),
keeper and administrator of the patriarchal see, an oce he held
formally until his death in 1722. But the year before, in 1721, Peter
had already issued the Ecclesiastical Regulation or Church Statute
(Dukhovnyi reglament) which provided for a reorganization of the church
administration, a program of education, and the abolition of the
patriarchate, replaced by a collegial body called the Ecclesiastical
College. At its rst session the latter renamed itself the Most Holy
Ruling (or Governing) Synod, (Sviateishii Pravitelstvuiushchii Sinod ). The
Ecclesiastical Regulation was written for the most part by Feofan
Prokopovich, an Orthodox bishop strongly inuenced by Protestant
doctrine, who was entirely devoted to Peter and shared his views on
ecclesiastical reforms.30 The Holy Synod was organized according to
the same administrative principles as the other colleges (Kollegii, or
ministries, inspired by the Dutch and Swedish models), except that

27
This was the case, for instance, during the reign of the rst Romanov, when
patriarch Filaret (16191633) was the virtual co-regent with tsar Mikhail, and was
ocially recognized as such. It should be said, though, that in addition to his skill
and prestige, Filaret owed his elevated position to the fact that he was the tsars
father.
28
Karpovichs interpretation is dierent, and he sees Peters ecclesiastical reform
as less revolutionary that it might seem at rst glance. It was a consummation of
a long historical process rather than a sudden break with the past (Church and
State, p. 15). In this respect he follows the grand interpretation of Vasilii Kliuchevskii
who held that Peters reforms were a continuation of trends and changes that began
in the second half of the seventeenth century; in his view Peters innovations consisted less in the substance of things, than in the harsh and brutal means he used
to implement the reforms.
29
For a good treatment of this subject see Cracraft, 1971.
30
Muller, 1972.

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michael confino

its twelve members, appointed by the tsar, were drawn from the
ranks of the higher hierarchy, including the monastic clergy. Its main
functions were dened as the preservation of the uncorrupted
doctrine of Orthodox Christianity and proper norms for the conduct of church services, the combating of heresy and schism, the
verication of reports concerning miracles and saints, the extirpation
of superstition, the supervision of preaching, the choice of worthy
hierarchs (bishops, archbishops, and metropolitans), the supervision
of ecclesiastical schools, the censorship of ecclesiastical books, and
several others.31 The Holy Synod was under the supervision of an
Over-procurator (ober-prokuror), always a layman, who acted as the
sovereigns eye; he had for all practical purposes the status of a
cabinet minister,32 and although formally not a member of the
Synod, he became the actual head of the church administration
(the ocial and statutory title held by the tsar was not Head of
the Church, but Supreme Judge). The Synod employed an array
of ocials to carry out its ecclesiastical, administrative, and policelike functions.33 This synodal system of church governance was adopted
also, after their emancipation from Ottoman rule in the nineteenth
century, by Greece, and later on by Bulgaria.
Although the Russian Orthodox church, not unlike those in the
west, never succeeded to become the supreme power in the realm
(a status it didnt aspire to anyway), it had, until 1721, as mentioned
above, its autonomous administration, headed by ecclesiastical dignitaries (rst the metropolitans of all the Russians, then the patriarchs, and nally the keeper and administrator of the patriarchal
see) who recognized no secular authority except that of the Crown.
The tsars interfered at times in ecclesiastical aairs, but there was
some truth in Feofan Prokopovichs view that the Church continued
to remain a state within a state. If this was also the perception of
the tsar, then the reform was intended to bring it to an end with
the creation of the Holy Synod in 1721. And although in purely
religious matters the Holy Synod was to exercise the full rights and
power of the patriarch, this signied also the incorporation of the

31

Treadgold, pp. 2223.

Szeftel, 1978, p. 133; for a dierent opinion on this point see Gregory L.
Freeze, 1985, pp. 9091.
33
See Muller, pp. 142153.
32

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

357

Church within the framework of the state administration. This curtailment of the churchs autonomy had at least one positive result;
in the view of Gregory Freeze, an authority on Russian ecclesiastical history, this link between the church and the state structure was
instrumental in creating an improvement in the church administrative functions. It allowed also the Holy Synod to exercise a more
eective control over the various ranks of the clergy, and to enhance
the training of the priests.34 On the other hand, Freeze questions the
notion of the church incorporation within the state, and considers
that the church preserved until 1917 its special status as an institution
parallel to, not inside, the state apparatus. Moreover, he holds also
that, Set apart structurally and organizationally from the state, the
Synod retained considerable operational autonomy and, especially,
the capacity to defend ecclesiastical interests, to function more like
an interest group than a mere department of the state bureaucracy.35
This is certainly correct, but it does not invalidate the fact of the
churchs incorporation in the state structure. As is well known, in
bureaucratic organizations, and particularly in state bureaucracies,
various departments (ministries, agencies, bureaus, etc.) achieve various
degrees of relative independence and autonomy from the central
government or from superior authorities. (And this is so even in the
most centralized and authoritarian regimes.) In Russia, the case of
some provincial Governors (for example Mikhail Speranskii in Siberia,
General C.P. Kaufman in Central Asia), who took great liberties
in fullling their task and acted almost as Vice-Roys or Roman
proconsuls, is well known. Thus, in real life, the Synod was part of
the state bureaucracy, and at the same time held a considerable
degree of autonomy thanks also to the spiritual aura attached to its
eld of competence.
The Holy Synod continued to function as a ministry of ecclesiastical
aairs until the fall of the monarchy in 1917, when the patriarch
ate was restored. Tikhon, the rst patriarch, was elected in 1918;
after his death in 1925, the Soviet Government, like Peter the Great,
abolished de facto the patriarch ate and did not let an ecclesiastical
assembly to convene in order to elect a successor.36 Later on, by an

34
35
36

See Freeze, 1977; 1983.

Freeze, pp. 89, 92.
See Evtuhov, 1991, pp. 497511.

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ironic twist of history, the patriarch ate was restored in 1943 by no

other secular ruler than the ex-seminarian Iosif Stalin. It was not by
accident, as Marxists use to say, that at exactly the same time and
for the same political reasons, the same Iosif Stalin disbanded the
Cominternthis epitome of the greatest secular religion in the twentieth century.37 Apparently, both religions were linked in more than
one way.
On the face of it, Peters ecclesiastical reform, then, seems to
represent a turning point in the history of the Russian Orthodox
Church. With various qualications, such is the prevalent view in
the historiography of the subject from P.V. Verkhovskoi, to lames
Cracraft, to Marc Szeftel, to Richard Pipes; as seen above, Kliuchevskii
and Karpovich shared this view too, while stressing also the continuity
of some intellectual and spiritual trends originating in pre-Petrine
Russia.38 Gregory Freeze holds a more nuanced view on the role
and status of the church after the Petrine reform; without explicitly
calling into question that this was a turning point in the Russian
Churchs history, he implicitly shows that the change in its status
and functions after Peter was not as profound as usually assumed,
and that the church enjoyed a non-negligible degree of autonomy
and self rule. 39 To the best of my knowledge, the only truly
dissenting voice from these relatively concurrent views is that of
Pierre Pascal, prominent scholar, remarkable teacher, and great expert
on Russia thanks to the many years he spent there. On the question of when did the break occur, he holds that in terms of the
churchs spiritual life the break was in the great schism generated
by Nikons ecclesiastical and liturgical amendments in 1666. In his
words: Depuis Nicon, la Russie na plus dEglise. Elle a une religion dEtat. De la la religion de lEtat, il ny a quun pas. La religion de lEtat a t instaure par le pouvoir qui en 1917 a succd
lEmpire.40

37
The tting expression secular religion in reference to marxism and twentiethcentury communism was coined in the 1930s by Raymond Aron, a credit almos never
given to him.
38
Verkhovskoi, 1916; the other works have already been quoted above.
39
Freeze, 1985.
40
Since Nikon Russia has no church. She has a state religion. From that point
to [establishing] a religion of the State there is just one step. The religion of the

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

359

Opinions diverge, then, on the scope of Peters transformations,

and on the subsequent status and role of the reformed church, for
on the one hand, traditions, beliefs, and practices dont fade away
overnight, but on the other hand, the reform set for the church
possibilities for new directions of spiritual evolution, internal organization, and rapport with modernity. Against this background, two
more questions need to be addressed. First, what were the goals
which prompted Peters reform? Second, what were the sources and
inuences on church-state relations which inspired them?
Peters ecclesiastical reform: goals and inuences
The goals of Peters outright reforms have been extensively researched,
well described and meticulously analyzed, and they dont need here
a detailed presentation. His aim was modernization for the sake of
eciency and rationalization: modernization of the army, of the
central and the local government, of the administration, of the ecclesiastical establishment. These transformations entailed secularization
(a crucial element regarding ecclesiastical matters), rationalization,
bureaucratization, and standardization of all the branches and subdivisions of the state apparatus and of the social fabric. Mandatory
shaving o the beards was an anecdotic but also telling example of
this urge to modernize, to regulate, to equalize. The church did not
escape this mighty urge carried out with ruthless determination and
the harshest of means.
What were the sources of inspiration of these policies in the ecclesiastical domain?

State was established by the government which succeeded the Empire in 1917.
Pierre Pascal, Avvakum et les debuts du raskol, p. 574; quoted in Agursky, 1988,
p. 493. Strangely enough, recent research has conned to oblivion both Pascal and
Agursky in spite of their authoritative works in Russian religious history; alternatively, when ndings and ideas of theirs are used, no credit is given them and no
attribution of authorship. One such example is the above mentioned article of
Agursky: post-Soviet historiography in Russia and in the west discovered (and
presented as innovations) religious aspects in the bolshevik project, and religious
motivations in Stalins bent to monolithic ideology, contracted, as it were, during
his seminarian years. None of these cases mentions Agurskys (let alone Boris
Souvarines) pioneering works in this eld. For the new Stalinologists, Souvarine,
author of the rst major book on Stalin and stalinism (1935), remains taboo as in
the Soviet times.

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michael confino

On this issue too there are dierent schools of thought. Arnold

Toynbee, for instance, in his article Russias Byzantine Heritage
(quoted above) and in other writings, argued that the church-state
relationship in Russia (like her entire political and spiritual development before and after Peter) stems from Byzantine tradition and
is predicated by the fact that Byzantium was a totalitarian state, that
the Orthodox church was subjected to it and by the same token
bore the features of this totalitarian polity. This was, according to
Toynbee, the essence of the Byzantine heritage bestowed from the
times of Justinian to Ivan the Terrible to Peter the Great to Stalin.
Unfortunately, Toynbee did not explain how he understood the
meaning of the term heritage, and how heritages (spiritual,
political and otherwise) are handed down the centuries to dierent
peoples in various places. Moreover, he didnt say either whether,
in his text and in this context, totalitarian is a metaphor or just
an anachronism: an additional blemish of his obviously a-historical
thesis.41
Another view holds that the sources and inuences of Peters ecclesiastical reform, as those of his administrative reforms in general,
can be established with a considerable degree of certainty, and therefore there is no need to resort to metaphysical speculations and conceptual anachronisms to explain them. In this view, Peters system
of church-state relations derived from two sources: rst, from the
Byzantine tradition as interpreted by old Moscovy; second, from the legal
pattern existing in Protestant states, which was the model for many
Petrine reforms. Let me begin with the later.
This second source of the 1721 ecclesiastical reform was the example of legal church-state arrangements in Protestant lands (British,
German, and Swedish), for it incorporated essential features inspired
by this states such as canonical territorialism, the collegial principle,
the bureaucratization of the church, and the oath to the tsar by the
Holy Synod members (including the priests and the monks). Synodal
members resented the oath, and in particular the quality of high-

41
Toynbee, 1948 see above n. 10. As another example illustrating the weakness
of the Byzantine heritage thesis one may turn to the often cited theory of Moscow,
the Third Rome. In fact, this theory was not identical with Byzantine universalism. The messianic and nationalistic elements with which it was tainted had little
to do with Byzantine tradition, and were not part of a Byzantine heritage.

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

361

est judge attributed to the graceful Sovereign, that is to the tsar

(or tsarina). But this was also the limit of the Protestant model in
Russia, and Orthodox doctrine made it impossible for the Russian
monarch to follow the Protestant pattern of summus episcopus, for, in
the rst place, he did not belong to the clergy, and secondly because
Eusebius idea of the emperor as a koinos episkopos was never accepted
by Byzantine as well as by Russian Orthodoxy. But even if applied
this would not have meant neither totalitarianism, nor casaropapism, and Toynbee would have been surprised maybe to nd such
an heritage coming to Russia not from Byzantium but from Lutheran
lands.42 Actually, Russian emperors and empresses were not more
caesaropapist than the kings and queens of England, and, for the
sake of argument, in Marc Szeftels view they were even less.43
The other originated from the resilience of Orthodox faith and
practice. The reform of 1721 did not destroy entirely the Muscovite
version of Byzantine tradition described above; Peter adjusted it to
conform with his ideas and political requirements. Hence, both the
Orthodox church and the Russian state strongly emphasized the
religious and mystical qualities of the tsars power which continued
to resonate strongly in the popular mind, not only during a short
span of time after 1721, but until the Revolution in 1917. What was
the Muscovite legacy? Following Byzantine example, which they
adapted to the local conditions, Muscovites stressed the intimate
association between the temporal and spiritual powers, an association
which at times, as explained above, looked like a diarchy. Church
and state worked hand in hand against any foreign enemy, domestic
rebellion, or heretical challenge in order to protect a world order
established by God. Inevitably, as in Byzantium, such an alliance
made the church dependent upon the tsar for protection, but there
was nothing totalitarian in this lien de dpendance: in Russia as
elsewhere the church became dependent upon the tsar not because
of some totalitarian propensity, but mainly because he also had the

42
A similar case can be seen in the Greek Constitution of 1833 which made
Orthodoxy an extension of the state. Papadakis writes that this settlement, authored
by king Otto I and the German Protestant Georg von Maurer, was fundamentally
Protestant and Western, alien to Byzantine tradition of church-state relations. It was
[. . .] inspired largely by the modern secular state rather than by any Byzantine
pattern (Papadakis, 1988, p. 51.)
43
Szeftel, 1978, p. 130; see also Karpovich, 1978, p. 16.

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michael confino

big battalionsles gros batallionsand it was wiser not to ght them,

as the hapless patriarch Nikon of Moscow learned from personal
experience.
But in spite of certain continuities with seventeenth-century political, intellectual, and spiritual developments, Peters reform modied
the Muscovite pattern in that the highest administration of the church
underwent change, not by initiatives from inside, but as a consequence of external factors and state legislation. Thus, administratively,
the church passed under state control (and the degree of its strictness
or leniency is immaterial in this context.) Moreover, the secularization
of Russian public life, accompanied now by a clear denition of
autocratic absolutism, removed the last restraints on the sovereigns
power over all of his subjects, including the church. This was,
in fact, the Russian version of Europes enlightened despotism,
as practiced at that time in other countries too, and as advocated
by the philosophes and a pleiade of eighteenth-century enlightened
luminaries.44
Summing up the essential features of the relationship which obtained
since the eighteenth century, Marc Szeftel writes: Whatever the
relative weight of church and state during the imperial era (and there
cannot be any doubt that the state dominated the relationship), the
two forces were closely intertwined. The state gave the Orthodox
church complete support in many essential ways. Orthodoxy was the
dominant faith of the empire, enjoying a monopoly on religious
proselytism. It exercised censorship over the religious content of all
books. Bishops delegated clergy to attend ex ocio the meeting of
zemstva self-government institutions. Governors were required to act
as the churchs brachium seculare on behalf of Orthodoxys struggle
with heresies. But most of all, the church enjoyed the states material
support.45 Moreover, for most of the period under examination,
while granting this support the state did not establish direct control
over the church nances.46 Above all, the religious and mystical
44

In Russia, by the middle of the eighteenth century, this led to what Viktor
Zhivov has called the cultural synthesis of absolutism, which included religious
and secular forms of expression; see Zhivov, 1996, pp. 368369; see also Nichols,
1978, pp. 6789.
45
Szeftel, 1978, p. 136. This support was of paramount importance after the
secularization of the church landholdings (and the serfs attached to them) by Catherine
II in 1764; this act deprived the church of its main source of income.
46
Freeze, 1985, p. 88.

religion & power in the eastern orthodox church

363

qualities of Muscovite church-state relations persisted at least until

the beginning of the twentieth century, and its most striking and
important manifestation was the rite of coronation with the primordial
role played in it by the church. As brilliantly demonstrated by Richard
Wortman in his Scenarios of Power. Myth and Ceremony in Russian Monarchy,47
the rite of coronation, on the one hand, conferred sanctity on the
new tsar, on the other hand, placed him rmly within the context
of traditional Orthodox tsardom. Whatever the important political
meaning of this ceremonial may have been, the religious element
carried much greater weight. It was an unalterable fact that only
the church could confer sanctity; the tsars knew this well and
subsequenty it remained alive till the very end of the monarchy. It
may serve as an ironic reminder that Nicolas XI, the last Russian
tsar, was a forceful albeit pathetic and fatal incarnation of this belief
and behavior.48

47

Wortman, 1995; vol. 2, 2000.

On this period see Curtiss, 1940. Paradoxically, after the constitutional reforms
of 1906, the church came under the legislative control of the Duma; see Szeftel,
1978, pp. 131135.
48

CHAPTER NINETEEN

FROM RELIGION TO NATIONALISM:

THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE JEWISH IDENTITY
Eliezer Ben-Rafael
Religion, nationalism and identity
Many researchers see in nationalism a modern phenomenon produced by post-Enlightenment culture (Stille, 2003). Nationalism, it
is argued (Vujacica, 2001), is a by-product of industrializationa
secular ideology that overcomes the resistance of traditions and gives
meaning to necessary sacrices. For Gellner (1983), nationalism consists in the emergence of a culture which invents the nation. Hobsbawm
and Ranger (1983) see in the nation practices which inculcate new
values by assuming continuity with the past. The nation-state with its
territory and language is a product of modern social engineering,
replacing kin and religion as loci of individual loyalty (Anderson,
1991).
Yet many scholars share today a view that stands more in accordance with the multiple-modernities perspective (Arnason, 2003a;
Eisenstadt, 2003a, vols. 12). Brubaker (1992; 1996) grounds nationalism in both modern civic values, which dene the community as
a voluntary fraternity, and the idea of an organic collectivethe
nationunited by a culture stemming from traditions. Looking at
this vision, one unveils the role of religion as a founding element of
nationalism. Sahlins (1989) shows that religious strife in sixteenthand seventeenth-century Europe was the early phase of the development of nineteenth-century nationalism. Colley (1992) emphasizes
that nationalism often started with the demonizing of a religious
other and the description of ones own camp as a holy nation (see
also Marx, 2003; Armstrong, 1982). Shafer (1972) describes the nationalization of religions and churches in England or Swedennot to
mention Russian and Greek Orthodox churchesin relation to the
development of nationalism. Moreover, a religious war engendered
the Netherlands and was the rst example of a national liberation

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eliezer ben-rafael

war. In all these, religion was the ally of nationalism and, with the
rise of latter, left strong prints on its further evolution. Religion itself
might undergo politicization and play a role of its own within the
politysanctifying the nation-state through messianic politics, for
instancewhile nationalism itself may tend to become a political
religion.
All in all, nationalisms draw on the religious background of the
population, even where the nationalists reject it personally. Nationalism,
says Anthony Smith (1991; 1998), emerges on religious foundations
and is infused with their motives, though in each society, it may mix
sacred and worldly notions in a dierent manner and with dierent
consequences. Nationalism raises new concepts of collective identity
that transform traditions and religion but rarely turns its back on
them. It draws symbols from the warehouse of traditional symbols
and alters their meanings, but still uses them to indicate an allegiance to a past that is both idealized and criticized. Idealized because
it asserts a collective historical destiny, and criticized on behalf of
new civic values (Schama, 1989; Tamir, 1993).
This perspective throws light on Jewish nationalism, since the religion-people link has always been a primary code of Judaism; this
anity of Zionism to values of traditional Judaism has been noted
(Katz, 1960; Avineri, 1981; Eisenstadt, 1992b). What has not yet
been considered is how, more precisely, religious value contents were
transformed to become ingredients of the national identity, and what
specic consequences this process entails for the new society. The
more intriguing of these issuesas nationalismhas here eectively
created a new society, not only thanks to references to religious
axioms but through confrontation with religious forces. Moreover,
the reliance of national identity on religious contents, it appears here,
does not necessarily follow one path only, and this may account for
tensions and conicts that may then constitute new endemic features
of the public scene.
It is against this background that we focus here on the question
of collective identityas widely understood in the literature (LeviStrauss, 1961; Giddens, 1991; Taylor, 1998). We see by denition
(Ben-Rafael, online 2001), a collective identity as necessarily implying
three facets associated with dierent basic principles or dilemmas
between principlesin Levi-Straussian terminology, one would speak
of deep structures (Levi-Strauss, 1958). The rst asks how people
describe their link to the collective and their obligations to it; that

from religion to nationalism

367

is, the practical implications of their self-denition as members of

a collective. The second asks how individuals describe the social,
cultural or moral singularity of the collective. The third facet asks
about how individuals perceive the collectives locus vis--vis others
that is, out-groups. These three facets of collective identity are not
necessarily perceived in the same manner and with the same acuity
by all individuals within the same collective, and dierent formulations
may emerge as a result of circumstances, inuences, experiences or
value preferences.
We contend that the Jewish case of national identity illustrates all
the patterns whereby traditional contents, symbols and axioms undergo
structural transformations (Ben-Rafael, 1997). By this we mean that
principles of action disembedded from their conceptual anchorage
are integrated in a new perspective and granted newbut related
meanings. Regarding our specic purpose, we mean that nationalism
integrates basic principles of action vis--vis the world and society,
by disembedding them from the religious cosmogony and setting
them in a new perspective with new meanings. Once a part of the
national identity, such principles take on meanings that accord with,
and support, its aspirations to justify the establishment of a nationstate. A transformation that implies drastic changes of attitudes of
individuals vis--vis their experience and environment, but which is,
at the same time, presents itself as the culmination of the collectives
destiny. It is with this perspective in mind that the following analyzes
the transformation of the Jewish religious identity into ingredients of
various formulations of the national Jewish identity.
The caste syndrome
Traditional Judaism has always been characterized by an emphasis
on religious faith as the primary element of the collectives uniqueness and its most crucial identity attribute. The Jews, says Saadia
Gaon (quoted in Weinberg, 2002), are a People only thanks to their
Torah (Gods Teaching). From the Biblical era and the epoch of
the Talmud to Hassidism and rabbinical culture, this identity did
change emphases under the inuence of the environment (Schmueli,
1980), but at least ever since the Talmud, the principle of the God
and Torah of Israel was Judaisms dominant aspect. It justied the
preservation of the Jewish people as the carrier of the word of God,

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eliezer ben-rafael

and gave signicance to the numerous commands that it took on

itselfincluding collective responsibility for fellow Jews. These commands, moreover, also included allegiance to the Land of Israel as
both the past and destiny of the People, implying a relation to nonJewish others as alienas also implicit in the dietary laws that
forbade eating non-Jews food. Yet the Jewish faith is also fundamentally monotheistic, which commands a no less fundamentally universalistic perspective. This tension between the particularism of the
People of God and the universalism of God itself is solved by the
principle stating that by its own redemptionthrough obedience to
the Commandsthe nation will redeem not only itself but also the
world as a whole. This is the meaning of the portrayal of the Jewish
nation as a Chosen People charged with the redeeming humanity
by observing its obligations within itself and among itself.
We nd it most appropriate to label this type of collective identity
as caste. It consists of social practices merging discourse and action,
on the grounds of religious legitimacy and through a perception of
purity (Smith B., 1994). Maintaining purity requires keeping at
distance from non-members, which is paradoxically justied by an
image of the society and the world that inserts the caste, as a distinct
collective, within the wider setting (Dumont, 1977). In the eyes of
its members, this collective plays a transcendental role in view of
a supreme purpose, for the benet of all including those who see
the people of the caste rather as despicable, even as pariahs.
Modernity and the questioning of axioms
With the coming of the modern era and Jewish emancipation, the
caste syndrome found itself in the eye of a storm of revolutionary
ideas, and soon lost much of its inuence over the Jews. Many now
expressed their Judaism in new ways, and championed the notions
of equality and personal freedoms (Russell, 1996). They were convinced that economic and technological developments would bring
down social barriers and discrimination. Indeed, the processes that
took place in the course of the nineteenth century triggered a radical
change in relations between Jews and non-Jews, bringing them closer
together. On the other hand, the same process spawned modern
anti-Semitism: at the same time as the Jews were allowed to return
to England and make their home there, for example, it became the
fashion in elite circles to try and persuade them to convert to Chris-

from religion to nationalism

369

tianity (Ragussis, 1995); while Jews were admitted into the French
army, the Dreyfus aair sparked a wave of anti-Semitism.1 Above
all else, the transformation of the Jews was spurred by their internal dilemmas, which were cast in a new light by Europes national,
democratic and industrial revolutions. Post-traditional outlooks regarded
the basic issuesthe deep structures of Jewish identityas questions
that could be given new answers which would ultimately construct
the space of modern Jewish identities.
A rst question related to the concept of the Jewish People, and
asked whether it could still indicate a collective whose denition was
primarily religious, or whether it should now be seen as a community in the social, cultural, and even ethical sense. In other words,
did the term still refer to an actual collective whose existence in the
modern world needed no justication beyond the mere fact of its
being a collective entity? A second question, related to the concept
of the God and Torah of Israel, i.e. the singularity of the collective
in the traditional identity, is how could the singularity of Jews be
indicated in the new secular reality? In reaction to the previous religious attitude, growing numbers began to wonder whether Judaism
might not better be seen as a culture, a collection of symbols and
a history. A third question concerned the concept of the Land
of Israel, the response of traditional Judaism to the place of the
collective which denes any other place as Galut, that is, exile. In
the traditional view, the Land of Israel is an actual geographical
location to which the Jews will return at the time of redemption.
It was now asked whether this was in fact the homeland of the Jews,
or whether it could be treated as a metaphor with moral, cultural,
or ideological meaning. The traditional answers of Judaism were only
the lot of a minority, the Orthodox (Urbach, 1971). Numerous other
answers to these three questions can be found in the plethora of
new forms of Judaism (Ben-Rafael, 2002)from Jewish enlightenment and Reform Judaism to the Bund and territorialism. Among
all these, ZionismJewish nationalismwould soon take the lead
among those dierent forms of Judaism.

1
In the early 1890s, it was discovered that someone in the French army was
spying for the Germans. The generals chose to place the blame on Alfred Dreyfus,
a Jewish ocer. Tried and found guilty, Dreyfus was exiled to Devils Island. As a
result of tireless eorts on the part of his family and well-known writers and public
gures, Dreyfus won a retrial in which his name was cleared.

370

eliezer ben-rafael
Zionists identity transformation

At the end of the nineteenth century, Zionism proposed a national

solution to this crisis of orientations that then prevailed among Jews.
From the traditional beliefs, it retained the traditional denition of
Jewish life outside the Land of Israel, as exile, but instead of placing
its hopes for redemption on observing the commandments, it called
for acting. In point of fact, Zionism was inuenced by Europes
nationalist ideologies that based nationhood and statehood on the
principle of territory. It thus called for a territorialization of Judaism
whereby Judaism would be converted into a national identity by
immigration on the very piece of land that would be the site of
messianic redemption and was also the land from which we came
(Katz, 1960; Avineri, 1981). This reference to traditional-religious
values in a modern-nationalism mode explains the echo that Zionism
obtained among the many, and especially the elite in search for a
cause that would represent a Jewish collective future.
Hence, Jewish nationalism breaks away from traditional Judaism
by requiring redemption independently from religious devotion,
through the establishment of a Jewish nation-state in the Land of
Israel. This rupture, however, represents a secular and political answer
to a question which, in itself, is religiousthe denition of the diaspora not just as a demographic fact, but as exile. Moreover, it is
toward the promised land that Jewish nationalism aspires to lead
the people and to remove it from Galut. Hence, Zionism exits the
caste syndrome but not Judaism. It agrees that this people has only one
religion, and that this religion has only one people. The Jew who embraces
another faith abandons Judaism, and the non-Jew who converts to
Judaism integrates into the Jewish people. This symbiosis is reected
in traditional symbols retained as national emblems as well as in
institutional arrangements grounded in religious aliation.2
Yet from another perspective, Zionism is at a disadvantage in
respect to traditional Judaism. The caste model links the redemption of the Jews to that of the whole world, while Zionism aspires

2
The most notable institutional arrangements in this context is the Law of Return
which stipulates that Jewsand this notion refers here to the child of a Jewish
mother or an individual who has converted to Judaismare allowed to immigrate,
acquire Israeli nationality and benet from special aid for integration.

from religion to nationalism

371

to Jewish redemption alone, or according to its termthe normalization of the Jewish people. Seemingly conscious of this shortcoming, the Zionists have long tried to give universal meaning to
their image of the Jewish future by stressing its connection to some
universally utopian conceptsuch as with the notion of Socialist
Zionism. In other words, they tended to present Zionism as oering
an example of a social utopia for the world at large. By doing so,
they denied the principle of caste, foregoing any aspirations that
conicted with the demands of secular society, with which Zionism
also associated itself. The price they paid, of course, was exposing
Zionism to the criticism of proponents of the caste model, who saw
it as a form of collective assimilation into the non-Jewish world.
The Zionist leadersDavid Ben-Gurion, Moshe Sharett, Berl Katznelson, Zalman Shazar and othersresponded to the critics by claiming
that Zionism endeavored to build an enlightened society in the
Land of Israel, where the Chosen People would be a light unto
the nations. In their opinion, that was what the normalization of
the Jewish people meant (Gorny, 1990). By taking up this challenge
to combine a modern secular ideology with a uniquely Jewish inspiration and orientation, the Zionists hoped to present an ideological
alternative to the view of the Jewish nation as the carrier of the
promise of messianic redemption. The notion of exemplary society
(hevra le-mofet) which this aspiration conveyed included the republican
principle of cultural unity (mizug galuyot or fusion of exiles) that should
direct the engineering of the ingathering of the exiles (kibbutz galuyot).
The intention was not only to welcome Jews from all over the world,
but to create a new national Israeli culture as well, whose exemplary
character would be determined by its dedicationin a secular spirit
to the ethics of Judaism, socialism and liberalism.
A crucial element in achieving this objective was the revival of
Hebrew as a spoken language and its adoption as the legitimate
national tongue. Essentially, the successful creation of a spoken language from classical Hebrew3 was due to the fact that in the collective memory of Jews almost everywhere, Hebrew was the original
Jewish tongue and the language of Scriptures. The Zionists in Israel

This was greatly facilitated by the work of the secular writers of the Jewish
Enlightenment movement that developed in nineteenth-century Central and Eastern
Europe a rst wave of modern Hebrew literature and journalism.

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eliezer ben-rafael

could call on this knowledge to turn Hebrew into a national language

to be used also for secular, everyday, purposes in a sovereign Jewish
society, out from Diaspora.4 This revival of Hebrew is the best example of this appropriation attitude of Zionism toward religious and
traditional values. Plucking a holy language from the sacred texts
and tossing it out onto the street to be used for the most prosaic
of activities might be considered iconoclastic. It is particularly surprising in view of the fact that those who reinvented Hebrew as a
spoken language already had a common tongueYiddish.5 Adopting
Hebrew, more than any other pattern showed the basic aspiration
of Zionism to present itself as the heir of the Jews long history, and
as the potent agent of a secular/nationalist transformation of this
people into a culturally unied and modern nation.
This example shows how far Zionism aspired to be perceived as
a movement that was breathing new life into Jewish symbols and
endowing them with contemporary signicance. It was one of the
prime sources of Zionisms power: it broke the monopoly of Orthodox
Judaism over the symbols of Jewish tradition. The devotion to these
symbols would also be the foundation on which universal Jewish
solidarity with the State of Israel would later be built. Hebrew thus
became the central hallmark of the new society, symbolizing the
unique Jewish experience in Israel as an alternative to life in the
Diaspora, and implying that this experience was superior to any
other Jewish reality (Glinert, 1990). Here lies the source of Zionism
as a new form of Jewish identity, creating a distinction between the
Jewish people in general and the Jewish nation in Israel. Taken
out of the exclusive hands of scholars and rabbis, Hebrew became
the marker of a new collective.
The linguistic revolution also served as the basis for implementing
the ideology of national integration when mass immigration began
to arrive from numerous countries (Bachi, 1974). Nevertheless, the

4
Obviously, the initiators of this linguistic revolutionthe pioneers of the rst
decades of the twentieth centuryactually had to invent its lexis and syntax to
meet the demands of a new time and place, and thereby, to expose it to a plethora
of inuences, bringing it closer in nature to European languages, as well as to
Yiddish and Arabic.
5
This is the only case in history in which a new language, not native to any of
its speakers, successfully became the language of a group which already shared a
common tongue.

from religion to nationalism

373

desire for linguistic and cultural unication did not only contribute
to the unity of the new society but also to further divisions therein.
In fact, the same models that sought to produce unity promoted new
distinctions. The very call for unication indeed implied recognition
of the special status of those portrayed as the worthy role models
the generation of pioneers. Furthermore, as in any immigrant society where newcomers are striving to put down new roots, here too
being native became a source of social prestige. It is the children
of immigrants who fulll their parents lofty ambitions and ensure
the success of their endeavors. In the case of Israel, the native-born
also carried the bulk of the security burden and the armed struggle
that developed with the Arab environment from quite the earliest
stages, reinforcing their image as the salt of the earth. In addition, the sons and daughters of the pioneers were also highly conscious of being the children of people who had adopted a new
national Jewish identity, and of themselves representing a new kind
of Jew who had never known life in the Diaspora. The fact that
they were also a minority group for a long time, within a population of where the majority was made of immigrants, added to their
luster. As an elite which prided itself on this status, they created
their own symbols, the most conspicuous of which was a typically
nonchalant use of Hebrew that could be acquired only by being
born within the language, that is, in the country (Katriel, 1986).6
This inuence was linked to the Zionists self-image as the antithesis
of Diaspora Jewry that in their eyes bore the signs of dependence.
Quite a few of the sons and daughters of the pioneers displayed
a similar attitude to the Diaspora Jews who settled in the country,
seeing in them people who continued to bear the stigma of the
Diaspora. In contrast, they saw themselves the essence of Israeliness
that sprouted from the new form of life in the country. For a long

6
A no-nonsense languagea laconic style of speech which abhorred euphemisms
and high language in generalthis Hebrew underscored the connection to the
Middle East by incorporating numerous Arabic words, and encouraged a blunt,
casual, and natural way of speaking. By doing so, it expressed repugnance for
verbosity, protocol, formality, and sophistry, all traits attributed to Diaspora Jews
(Rubinstein, 1977). The sabra activities of hiking the length and breadth of Israel,
belonging to a youth movement, spending time on a kibbutz, and serving in the
army produced new words that were unfamiliar to those who didnt belong
(Shamir, 1970).

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eliezer ben-rafael

time, entry into this elite was not easy, for those who had arrived
in Israel as youngsters but were not born here, those who had left
the ultra-Orthodox community but were still close to forms of religiosity, or Yemenites who had been in the country for many years
but remained attached to community values.
That culture has, however, undergone profound change over the
decades. The collectivistic approach that prevailed prior to the establishment of the state and in the rst years of statehood has been
replaced by a much more individualistic model following demographic, economic and political developments. The tatist ideology
that gained in strength during the 1950s and 1960s stressed the need
to move from utopia to nation-building. Pioneer was redened to
relate to anyone who contributed to the state: not only farmers
and settlers as in the past, but also professionals, public functionaries,
and business people. The country born out of war and strongly
aicted by security concerns reserved a place of honor for the armed
forces, and now placed great stock on a military career. Mass immigration which tripled the population within a few years brought to
the country a broad array of cultural groups that diused new perspectives and perceptions. Thus a new social order came into being.
In this new social reality, numerous myths were shattered, among
them the superiority of physical labor, which had been central to
the pioneering ethos. Now higher education and professionalism were
also considered legitimate pursuits. At the same time, immigration
and wars resulted in a constant strengthening of Israels relations
with the Jewish world, now viewed as the countrys natural partners,
in contrast to the anti-diaspora mood in vogue among Zionists years
before.
These economic, social, and cultural processes also had an impact
on the drastic change that overtook the leading forces of society.
Along with a constantly growing middle class came features of Western
consumer society while the 1948-generation (the generation of the
War of Independence) had become bureaucrats, nanciers, politicians, and businessmen. As this elite came to be dened in terms of
achievements, the meritocracy adopted a more formal standard language. The disdain for foreign languages disappeared as international communication gained in importance. English became virtually
a second language at all levels of education, professional life, and
business, and uency in English was now a status symbol.
Even in this context, some signiers of native culture persist today

from religion to nationalism

375

and can still be discerned in patterns of speech, dress, and behavior,

but their sources are now mainly the army, high school, the university, or pubs. While many of those identied with this culture at
the start of the twenty-rst century belong to the middle or upper
class, nativeness has, however, inevitably lost a considerable chunk
of its appeal as it now characterizes a relatively large sector of the
population, and not a restricted cohort anymore. Paradoxically, this
fact encourages more than a few individuals to preserve their own
features. People who have not internalized the (currently quite unclear)
sabra version of Israeli culture, whether born in or outside the country, stand at some distance from it. Though these distinctions seem
today quite secondary in comparison the wide middle-classization
that can be indicated under the inuence of the cultural impacts of
the Israeli experience and modernity itselfthe inuences of which
run from consumerist culture to liberal and civic values. It is this
wide social category that can be labeled Israels non-ethnic middleclasseven though mostly of Eastern and Central European (Ashkenazic) origins.
Today, this class is the principal carrier of Jewish nationalism in
Israel. This Jewish nationalism articulates its singularity in secularized
symbols and in a new Hebrew culture, referring to a territory from
where Jewishness is viewed as distinguishing Israel from the diaspora.
Even here though, the debated questionshow Jewish, Jewish in
what way, and in what sense Jewishremain more than elsewhere part of the public agenda and are debated by a number of
parties. Hence, here too, one speaks of several Jewish Israeli identities, rather than of one. To understand this pluralism, however, it
is necessary to emphasize that Jewish nationalism, like other nationalisms, also convey civic values, is attached to democracy, and since
the creation of the state develops toward liberalism.7 Though, that
no regular Constitution exists yet is due to the fact that it would
require formalizing the status of religion and its relation to the
national principle. The diculty of clearly distinguishing religion and
peoplehood is the major reason that this task has not yet been undertakenfty years after the creation of the state. Any attempt, indeed,
to nd a denitive modus vivendi re-awakes unavoidable confrontations

7
This is expressed in Fundamental Laws regulating the work of institutions and
warranting individual freedoms.

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eliezer ben-rafael

of irreconcilable approachesespecially between those who insist on

the necessity in democracy of subordinating religious symbols to civic
values and those who, on behalf of religion, raise exigencies from
the political center unacceptable to the secular public. These debates
whichtireless and stemming from several directionsare instructive of how the special relation of religion and nationalism that exists
in Israel is bound to the formation of signicant cultural and political cleavages within the national society. One line of division involves
the ultra-Orthodox and targets the very roots of the legitimacy of
the social order.
Ultra-Orthodoxy: an alternative to nationalism?
Orthodoxy emerged in Germany in the rst half of the nineteenth
century. A minority now in many Jewish communities where the
winds of modernity blew powerfully, this stream numbered all those
who aspired to retain their dedication to the belief in the divine
source of the commandments and the ban on altering them. Quarrels
between modernists and traditionalists throughout Europe led in 1912
to the creation of Agudat Israel in Katowice, Poland. This political
party of a special brand aspired to reinvent a concept of Jewish
People able to challenge modern individualism (Mittleman, 1996).
The partys founders, including Germans caught between tradition
and modernity, as well as Eastern Europeans, turned more resolutely
toward the retention of modes of life symbolizing the past.8 In essence,
the new framework sought to respond to the secularization of social
life that was pushing religious observance to the sidelines and was
placing enormous diculties in the path of those who remained faithful to halacha (Talmudic law).
Interestingly enough, the way in which this form of Judaism chose
to organize itselfthe model of a political party with a comprehensive platformwas itself an indication of the inuence of modernism. Agudat Israel wished to bring together all observant Jews
and tried to put this principle into practice by means of an organi-

8
They consisted of Mitnagdim from Lithuania who adhered to Jewish classical
holy learning, and members of major Hassidic movements which emphasize the
value of spontaneous and emotional religious experiences. The Hassidim are themselves divided into dierent groups led by charismatic leaders.

from religion to nationalism

377

zation typical of secular public lifeits own Bible-inspired denial of

any distinction between religion and politics notwithstanding. The
question of how much to modernize was, however, soon to cause
dissensions between Germans and Eastern Europeans in the new
party. The former displayed willingness to make concessions to
modernism, while the latter regarded the party primarily as a tool
for fending o the new inuences. Germans like Hirsch, Rosenheim
and others held that Judaism was, above all, a humane religion, and
that Agudat Israel propounded a message of universal redemption.
In contrast, Eastern Europeans, who were more numerous from the
very start, demanded that the party devote less time to ideological
debates with modernism and more to the conict with secular Jewry.
In time, it was this attitude that prevailed (Bacon, 1996). While the
German modernists who sustained the integration into general
society of observant Jews soon detached themselves from Agudat
Israel, the more radical Orthodoxwho would ultimately become
known as ultra-Orthodoxconsidered themselves committed to the
higher aims of Judaism: a life of religious study and intense involvement in Jewish communities.
It is from this point on that the ultra-Orthodox in Israel evolved
in their own way. From the time of the arrival of the rst Zionists,
they isolated themselves, using Yiddish as their vernacular, and developing their own educational system (Friedman, 1986). Yet despite
this monastic tendency (Friedman, 1986), over time they could not
entirely keep themselves apart from Israeli Jewish society. Hebrew
gradually seeped into the families and communities, until the younger
generation was speaking more Hebrew than Yiddish. As the women
do not attend yeshiva and often work outside the home in addition
to their family responsibilities, Hebrew became their major language
of communication, and Hebrew has gradually become the rst language of the major groups in the ultra-Orthodox public. This trend
is encouraged by the fact that the ultra-Orthodox initiate contact
with the secular sector to promote their own specic interests, and
are also determined to benet from all the facilities oered by the
welfare state.9 These developments are evidence that with the existence of a Jewish state, the ultra-Orthodox can hardly remain

9
Hence, Yeshiva students require exemptions from the army and large families
request special housing assistance.

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eliezer ben-rafael

indierent to their environment. Furthermore, the nature of the

connection of ultra-Orthodox with secular Jewish society also derives
from their view of Jewish identity. As we have seen, they regard
themselves as fullling the true destiny of the Jew which alone will
bring about redemption. This destiny, however, will be realized only
when it is recognized by the whole of the Jewish people, therefore
virtually compelling the ultra-Orthodox to pay heed to their status
in society as the genuine guardians of Judaism.
This orientation is not necessarily understood by the secular who
may see their conspicuous markersdress, rituals, esoteric interests
as expressions of alienation from the prevailing culture. This does
not, however, prevent the ultra-Orthodox from considering themselves an active and signicantindeed, perhaps the most signicant
force in society. This is evidenced by the fact that, unlike their
counterparts in other places, in Israel they use the ocial language
of the country among themselves, have their own political parties
that participate in national politics, and are deeply involved in all
spheres of public life. In this sense, even if they remain an integral
part of world ultra-Orthodoxy, Israels ultra-Orthodox are decidedly
Israeli and grant positive signicance to their participation, if not
to a Jewish State, at least, to the State of the Jews. They tend then to
get closer to the national religiouseven though they are still very
dierent from them at crucial respects.
The radicalization of the national-religious
For years, national-religious Israelis have taken an active part in
political Zionism, representing its observant wing. On this basis,
the national-religious leadership developed frameworks that replicated, in religious forms, those of secular society: kibbutzim (collective settlements), moshavim (cooperative villages), a university, and
so on. On the linguistic front, they always wereagain, in contrast
to the ultra-Orthodoxamong the most zealous defenders of Hebrew,
and were responsible for standard versions of religious texts for ritual
use in nationwide frameworks (the army or national ceremonies).
This is a reection of their aspiration to make a unique contribution
to Israeli national culture through their familiarity with traditional
sources.
This sector, however, is also confronted by a fundamental dilemma.

from religion to nationalism

379

As a community openly professing to be part of mainstream society

they view themselves as fully belonging to modernitythe nationalreligious are committed to a exible approach to the secular public
in matters of religion. At the same time, their religious orientation
denes the Jewish faith as the faith of the Jew and this orientation
drives them, like the ultra-Orthodox, to aspire to inuence the Jewish
society as a whole. It is in this context that a vanguard-like approach
has developed, starting in the 1960s, within a group of activists who
opposed the established leadership of their movement and its eorts
to maintain accommodative religious-secular relations. The Six-Day
War and the occupation of areas such as Samaria and Judea, which
are part of the Biblical Land of Israel, pushed these activists onto
center stage. Citing sacred texts that spoke of the Divine promise
of the Land to the Jews, the new leadership claimed it was a religious duty to hold onto and settle these areas at all costs. It should
become, they believed, a central principle of national policy. With
the rise to power of the right-wing parties in 1977, their endeavors
gained momentum, as dozens of new settlements were created across
the pre-1967 border between Israel and its Arab neighbors (BenRafael and Sharot, 1991; Ben-Rafael, 1994). As Israeli-Palestinian
negotiations began about the establishment of a Palestinian state
alongside Israel, political contention with the national leadership over
withdrawal from the territories intensied, leading to the emergence
of extremist groups, some of which even became involved in underground activity. The crisis point was reached in November 1995
with the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by a fanatic
opponent to the Oslo Accords.
Unlike the ultra-Orthodox, for whom religious law represents the
collectives behavioral and moral principles, the national-religious
camps ideology consider the singularity of the collective to lie in its
overriding duty to ght for the control of the holy land. The concept of the Land of Israel is not merely the most important of the
three aspects of Jewish identitya hierarchy found in probably all
varieties of Zionismbut it also takes on uncompromising mythical
meanings that also redene, in totalistic terms, the singularity of the
collective as a territory-bound entity. Leibowicz (1976) comments here
that this nationalist-religious orientation represents an imagined world
that draws from the sacred descriptions of the Biblical Kingdom
of Israel on the one hand, and from the no less mythical descriptions of a messianic future on the other. A political messianism that

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eliezer ben-rafael

engenders tensions with those in the national-religious camp who

continue to represent the originaland pragmaticdesire of observant Jews to integrate the national society rather than to lead it.
Fighting over about legacies: the Mizrahim
In Israel, however, religion also intervenes in the polity in questions
relating to the development of ethnic problems. Underlying the ethnic rifts among Israeli Jews is a particular form of ethnicity that we
label eda (pl., edot). This Hebrew term refers to a group whose members see themselves a priori as part of the broader collective, but who
share their own singular understanding of that collective. Hence, for
instanceand this is variously true of most groups that immigrated
from North Africa and the Middle-East (Mizrahi; plural: Mizrahim)
Yemenite Jews, the ideal-type of this kind of group, always thought
of themselves as part of the Jewish people, and were thus ready,
upon arrival in Israel, to consider themselves part of the IsraeliJewish collective. Their immigration was largely motivated by their
religious traditionalism, which had led them to understand that the
establishment of a Jewish state in Israel heralded the time of redemption.10 Yet they soon found that typical patterns like styles of prayers,
rites de passage or family models appear here as somehow peculiar to
themeven though they themselves had always considered them as
Judaism itself. Hence, while they showed readiness to adapt to their
new environment,11 they still felt no eagerness to waive whatever
made them Yemenite Jews and which they clung to for centuries
when in the country of the non-Jews.
Later, by attending post-secondary schools or universities and taking
up a career, Yemenite children became part of new social frameworks and were more exposed to the culture prevailing in their
environment. The more willing they are to turn their back on their
traditions, the easier it is for them to cross over and join the

10
As Yemenite Jews saw it, it was their faithfulness to this Judaism throughout
the generations that had brought them to the Holy Land by Divine Will. According
to this traditionalist Zionism, religious fervor in the Diaspora had been as important as the eorts of the pioneers who set down the basis of the Jewish State.
11
In fact, the last of the Yemenite Jews to immigrate to Israel, who arrived in
the 1990s, could barely recognize themselves in their Israeli cousins, and several
asked to return to Yemen.

from religion to nationalism

381

middle class which, although predominantly Ashkenazi, wishes to

illustrate an all-Israeli secular culture and is ideologically open to
the social integration of Mizrahim, at least when they are entitled
to this status. Secondly, as an eda, the Yemenite population believes
the Jews are to be one nation. This is true even among the underprivileged who are unable to implement this aspiration themselves,
have little exposure to the dominant culture and show a tendency
to stick to their communities (Ben-Rafael and Sharot, 1991).12
Interestingly enough, however, those communities which remained
inuenced by religiosity and tradition, in time produced a religious
elite that became increasingly powerful. In the early stages, it won
the support of the Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox, casting it as an ultraOrthodox group. Yet it did not take long for Mizrahi yeshivas to be
established under the leadership of their own rabbis and scholars.
Moreover, unlike Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox who operate within a
population that sets itself apart from the secular public, the Mizrahi
ultra-Orthodox remain an integral part of their community at large,
particularly in low-status areas, in the context of the conspicuously
traditional character of this population. Furthermore, and again
in the context of their traditionalist environment, their activities in
the community are not limited to religious aairs alone. Rather,
they serve as public, nay even political, leaders, as was quite typical
for religious authorities in the past. This process was to lead to a
breaking of the long-standing public taboo, in Israel, against any
attempt to establish a party on the basis of eda. And indeed, Shas,
a Mizrahi ultra-Orthodox faction carved out a rm place for itself
in the political arena, politicizing the new Mizrahi religious elite
under the leadership of a charismatic Mizrahi rabbinic authority,
Ovadia Yossef. By signicantly increasing the proportion of religious
representatives in the Knesset, Shas established itself as a leading
force in the religious sector in general while, at the same time, it
presented demands typical of a low socio-economic communityits
genuine electoral constituency.

12
As Weingrod (1990) demonstrates, the hilulaa festive visit to the tomb of an
individual considered a sainthas been gaining in popularity. Another example
of this phenomenon is the Moroccan Mimouna, the holiday of bread that follows
Passover, which gradually became so established that it now has the nature of a
public holiday for all edot. In addition, the religious practices of the dierent communities are often preserved in the many synagogues constructed for a specic eda.

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In a very similar manner to the elitism of the Ashkenazi ultraOrthodox as well of the national-religious, here too the motivation
behind the partys eorts reveal an ambition to ultimately dene an
all-Israel calling. In this case, this self-appointed mission is revealed
in the systematic replacement of Mizrahi by the term Sephardic
in the movements rhetoric. This latter term generally denotes a relatively small cohort of descendents of the Jews of Spain. Yet, it is
Yossef s contention that the Sephardic culture that predominated in
the yeshivot in the Land of Israel for hundreds of years, constitutes
the variety of Judaism which is the only one that can be truly considered to belong to the Holy Land. This legacy should therefore
be adopted by all Israeli Jews in the area of public, let alone national,
cult and rites. Since, moreover, the Judaism practiced by Mizrahi
communities is assumedly closer than that of the Ashkenazim to the
Sephardic legacy, this endows the Mizrahim with a calling of Israelwide signicance, namely, bringing Israels religious culture back to
its true legacy. In this spirit, Shas is working to introduce new
forms of prayer and ritual into those Mizrahi synagogues that are
willing to do its bidding (Leon, 2003), which, admittedly, is demanding
considerable sacrices from these communitiesi.e. setting aside their
own traditional rituals and texts.
Religious cleavages, Russians and Israeli Jewishnesses
In sum, the relation of nationalism and religion in the case of the
Jews has brought about a variety of cleavages. One cleavage revolves
around the role of Talmudic law in the codication of the social
order; a second, around the link of religious beliefs to national policies, and a third, around the competition of legacies in areas where
the religious rite applies. In all cases, it is spoken of actors moved
by a kind of mission who aspire to gain inuence over the center without making do with the widening of their space of freedom,
outside centers control.
The context of the evolving of these cleavages, which by no means
simplies the problmatiques that these cleavages represent, is the allegiance of Israeli Jews in generalincluding the non-observantto
traditional symbols. Surveys indicate that the majority of Israeli Jews
by no means disassociate themselves from the sources of Judaism.
Many of those who do not hesitate to describe themselves as secular

from religion to nationalism

383

celebrate the Jewish holidays and observe some of their rituals. As

a rule, they respect the custom of a family dinner on Friday night,
at which women light Sabbath candles; the majority fast on Yom
Kippur, have Hanukkah candles on their table, and take part in the
Passover ritual meal. A broad consensus approves the practice of circumcision, bar mitzvah, and a religious wedding. Actually, many
Israeli Jews, including the non-observant, equate Jewishness with
Israeliness (Farago, 1989) and strongly identify with both Jewishness
and Israeliness. It is as Israeli Jews that they feel themselves part of
world Jewry (see Levy, 1996; Oron, 1993).
It is on this basis that Liebman and Katz (1997) claim that the
inuence of religion is greater than what might be assumed from
the fact that a large proportion of the secular public expresses disapproval of the religious parties. Levy (1996), however, cautions that
the same symbols are given dierent meanings by dierent groups.
The dierences, according to Oron (1993), relate less to behavior
than to attitudes where the rift between the religious and the secular
is real. Hence, Israelis believe the country is split between the religious and the secular, with the two sides having conicting interests,
while, at the same time, most respondents tend to fall into intermediary categories in terms of behavior, e.g. partially observant
rather than strictly observant at the one end, and absolutely nonobservant at the other (Katz, 1997).
Against this backdrop, where the option of religiosity is always
open, one also nds a new religiosity that exhibits some of the
features depicted by Danile Hervieu-Lger (1998) as religiosity without church. This phenomenon spreads over under the forms of
theater groups, clubs, artistic milieus, places of learning or festivals,
and illustrates an emphasis on direct religious experience. It binds
religiosity to soul-searching by underrating ideological and political
commitments. It is widely open to external inuencesin fact, it
originates from the outsideand has become an important phnomne
de socit that might nd expression, some day, in the shaping of
Israels national agenda (Friedman, 2003). On the other hand, the
above also explains why the Israeli society, where the majority is not
observant, is, paradoxically enough, not too friendly to non-Orthodox
liberal Judaism which, in the diaspora, is most popular among Jews.
Besides the vicissitudes of politics and power games, one major reason is that Orthodox Jewry shares with Zionismeach from its own
anglethat Jewishness is the primary collective identity of Jewish

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individuals. This approach contrasts with ethno-religious forms of

Jewishness that, in the diaspora, take for granted that the Jewish
identity is secondary to encompassing non-Jewish national identities.
Hence, in spite of the fact that non-Orthodox Diaspora and nonobservant Israeli Jews are close to each other due to their aversion
for religious bigotry, they dier deeply in their attitude of principle
toward Jewishness.
The relation of religion and nationalism in Israel bears a particularly complex impact when it comes to the absorption of a large
group of non-religious individuals like Russian Jews.13 These immigrants cherish the Russian values and symbols that they brought with
them, and which they consider a basic part of their identity. They
constitute a force for multiculturalism in society, on the basis of
markers of singularity that are essentially non-Jewish, and the large
number of newspapers and journals in Russian which they have
founded in Israel testify to this aspirationand so do the continued
creation of Russian literature by immigrant authors, the frequent
public events held in Russian which they organize, and more (see
Ben-Rafael, Olshtain et al., 1996). Yet this by no means denies the
Russians strong desire to integrate themselves in Israeli society, their
gradual familiarization with notions of Judaism, and their rapid acquisition of Hebrew. To some extent and despite their original distance
from everything Jewish, they come to adopt patterns already illustrated by the veteran non-observant population for which the synagogue is the house of prayer which they do not visit. This rapprochement
to Judaism, we clearly see here, is basically due to the embeddedness of Jewish symbols in the national culture as it is developed by
schools, literature and the public lifenotwithstanding the no less
tangible fact that Russian Jews are also the staunchest support of
any proposal entering the public agenda aiming at the limitation of
religious laws. In brief, the introduction of a non-observant group
of immigrants like the Russian Jews is also strongly inuencedin
a variety of directionsby the singular relation that exists here
between religion and nationalism.

13

These immigrants began to arrive in Israel in 1989, and by 2003 constituted

some 17 percent of the Jewish population. This category was generally lacking in
any Jewish culture and education, after 80 years of Marxist-Leninist culture.

from religion to nationalism

385

Israels Arabs: the alternative models

Another outcomeof no less signicanceof the link between Jewish
nationalism and religion concerns Jewish-Arab relations within Israel.
Here it concerns the meeting of two distinct religion-nationalism
alliances, since on the Arab side too, nationalism and religion are
by no means alien to each other. The very notion of Arab today
includes Muslims as well as Christians, but at least in view of the
Arab Moslem overwhelming majority, the Arabs religion is unquestionably Islamthough not only theirs. Hence, throughout the Arab
world, no single state can be found that is not dened as a Muslim
or Muslim-Arab republic or monarchy. The tensions that are specic
to the Israeli case, as a Jewish state, derive from the fact that it also
aspires to constitute a liberal democracy.
Arabs are ocially recognized here as a national minority and
consequently aorded the rights that accompany this status: Arabic
is the countrys second ocial language and the language of teaching
in Arab public schools; political institutions, parties, associations, press
and literature constitute the Arab populations life framework. In line
with the attitude of the Israeli establishment, the Arabs themselves
are determined to preserve an Arab-Palestinian identity (Nakhleh,
1975), notwithstanding their exposure in numerous areas to the
modernity-side of the prevailing culture and their concomitant acquisition of Hebrew and of English as well (Ben-Rafael and Brosh,
1995).
Yet one must also admit that the free ow of relations between
Jews and Arabs is damaged in the context of the conict that sets
Israel in opposition to its Arab environment and, mainly, the Palestinians next door. While this reality should not prevent continuous
eorts to fasten the status of the Arab minority in a democratic
country, it is probable that it is only when this conict comes to
some end, that opportunities will be fully available to reconcile Jewish
nationalism and its obligations vis--vis the Arab minority. Even then,
however, the particular relation that exists between religion and
nationalism excludes a solution la Franaise, at least as far as Jews
are concerned.14 The Frenchhomogenizingmodel of all-national

14
This model nds diculties among Moslem Arabs as well, as illustrated by
the example of the Muslim population of France itself.

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eliezer ben-rafael

identity, indeed, excludes any religious or ethnic particularism from

the denition of the national collective. This model invites all groups
to join the Nation by rejecting to the margins of their social, political and cultural endeavor any loyalty that does not accord with allegiance to the Nation itself which, as described by Schnapper (1998),
delineates a communaut des citoyens. In this model, anyone can mix
provided that she or he withholds public expressions of their anities
with specic sociocultural identities. To be sure, such a zero-sum
model where individuals may win every privilege of citizenship if
they accept the rules but face exclusion if they dont, is not conceivable in the Jewish case. In this case, the all-national identity is
deeply embedded in references to religious legacies and cannot
admitunder current formulations at leastthat membership in
other religions is compatible with membership in the Nation.
On the other hand, a model that might be more appropriate to
the Israeli situation may well be the United Kingdoms wherein
a pluralistic veinthere too, one nds a state-religion, Anglicanism,
topped by the supreme national authorityin this case, the Queen
herselfeven though millions of nationals belong to dierent faiths
(Sachs, 1993). A model that remains anchored in democracy thanks
to legal dispositions and prevailing values which minimize the costs,
and valorizes the benets, of non-membership in the dominant group.
The post-Zionist debate
For the time being, however, the Israeli case cannot be compared
to the UK, since Jewish-Arab relations in this country are, in one
way or another, inuenced by the evolving of the states conict with
its neighborsthe non-Israeli Palestinianswho always were a focal
point of identication for the minority. What is more, in the same
context of the relation of Jewish religion and nationalism, allegiance
to the Jewish world outside Israel is, furthermore, a basic given
of Israeli Jewishness. This allegiance may be understood as somehow
contradictory to the natural tendency of Israeli Jewishness to develop
an unmediated allegiance toward the region and its peopleswithin
and outside Israel. This problmatique which is at the heart of ongoing polemics among Israeli Jewish intellectuals also relates to the
ways religion is bound here to nationalism. Zionism, one should
recall, was born in the diaspora and it is from there that it issued

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387

the call for the territorialization of Judaism in the Land of Israel.

This aspiration, however, commanded another one, that of inserting
Jewish national existence in a new and unfamiliar environmentthe
Middle East. Understandably, the emphasis on the link to the Diaspora
underlines the fact that Zionism represents the continuity of a Jewish
history where religion and nation are deeply interwoven. On the
other hand, emphasizing insertion in the Middle-East signies insisting
on the newly territorialized Jewish nation as an entity in its own right.
Both poles coexistwith tensionsin Zionism. Hence, Zionists
who settled in the country and underwent a radical change of life
conditions and styles were led to contrast their experience from the
diaspora. By adopting Hebrew as their rst marker, they came to
view themselves as another kind of Jew, and many even used the
term to contrast themselves with diaspora Jews. Hebrew seemed
appropriate because, like the language, through reference to the Bible
it underscored the links with the land and the region, and at the same
time signaled an allegiance to a historical culture. This solution,
however, only revealed the fundamental tension in Zionist ideology
which aspired, as an national ideology, to speak on behalf of all Jews
the world over, but at the same time, aorded higher moral status
to those who renounced the diasporic endeavor and settled here, to
be a part of the new territorial nation.
As early as the 1930s, several intellectualseventually called
Canaanitestook this tension to its ultimate conclusion and advocated
that Jews who had immigrated to Israel should cut themselves o
entirely from Diaspora Jewry, renounce the label Jew and keep
only to a de-Judaized Hebrew in order to enable the development
here of a nation comparable to any other.15 This program proposed
to directly relate the new Hebrew-speaking community to the distant past in this country as narrated in the Bible, and to willingly
ignore the two thousand years of diaspora. From the beginning, this
Canaanite stance was sidelined to the margins of the public scene,
but over time, it joined forces with the post-Zionist left. At the
dierence from the Canaanites, post-Zionistswhose presence has

15

In 1951, Ratosh founded the Young Hebrews Center whose organ, Alef,
lobbied for a constitution that would dictate total separation between religion and
state and annul the established connection between the Jews and Israel (Gorny,
1990).

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eliezer ben-rafael

been felt mainly since the early 1980sare not critical of Diaspora
Jewry, but of Israeli Jews themselves, who dene the country as a
Jewish state and not the state of all its citizenswhich should
include non-Jews on equal footing with Jews. This camp focuses on
the Israeli-Palestinian conict, placing the blame for the hostility on
Israel and Zionism, and more importantly with respect to this analysis, it advocates eliminating the reference to Judaism as the basis of
national identity (Furstenberg, 1995) contending, in the spirit of nave
materialism (Orr, 1994), that, as a religious belief, Judaism is doomed
to disappearjust as all other religions will presumably disappear
in the wake of the advance of science and secular culture. In this,
both Canaanites and post-Zionists agree to assert a common velleity to detach the country from any religious allegiance and to request,
on this basis, its de-Zionization. The Israeli nation, they contend,
should be based on territory and be socially and culturally pluralistic.
The Jews in Israel belong to the Israeli nation in the same way that
those who reside elsewhere belong to other nations (Agassi, 1990;
Agassi, Buber-Agassi, and Brant, 1991). Anti-nationalists, whether
Canaanite or post-Zionist, see Jewish nationalism emptied from its
substance as soon as it is detached from the contributions of religion, and this detachment is necessarily bound to dissolve Jewish
nationalism. Hence, in addition to the quarrels between the religious
and the non-observant that the relation of religion to nationalism
brings about here, one more ground of dissension concerns the
question of the validity itself of a nationalism that eectively responds
armatively to the accusation of maintaining links to religion (see
also Silberstein, 1996).
In one way or another, these critical approaches which denounce
these links in the contemporary Israeli reality are not without reminding the two-three generations of Jewish intellectuals and militants
who, at the turn of the previous century joined radical causes like
revolutionary socialism and communism, and did not care to sacrice
their anity to Judaism on behalf of an utopia where Jewishness
like any particularismwould necessarily lose any social, political or
cultural raison dtre.
For the time being, and as far as the overwhelming majority of
Israels Jews are concerned, crucial importance is widely attached to
the Jewish identity which, more often than not (among observant
and non-observant alike) mixes religious ingredients with nationalism.
Israeli Jews are not ready to reduce Judaism to either religion or

from religion to nationalism

389

to a bluntly secular nationalism completely detached from Jewish

legacies; moreover, they are not ready to revive in this country the
diaspora condition of an ethno-religious group. Their basic aspiration is to continue to make up a nationwhatever the precise formulation of this nationalismand they are conscious that by dening
Israel as the state of the Jews, Zionism spawned complex problems
which, in one way or another, relate to the fundamentalundeletable
relation between religion and nationalism.
In conclusion: the structural transformation of Jewish identity
Our analysis leads us to several conclusions that might provide input
for comparative projects of nationalism studies. We may state the
following succinctly:
(1) The Israeli case clearly conrms that religion or religious motives
may be important components of nationalism. As in other well-known
cases (from England to Greece), we have here a nationalism that
was well prepared by a national religion which contributed important ingredients to the nationalistic ideology.
(2) The notion of structural transformation may designate the
pattern illustrated by Jewish nationalism when it adopted basic principles of action vis--vis the world and society originally embedded
in the caste syndrome, but which now received new meanings and
consequences in the context of a new perspective. We exemplied
this pattern with the notion of Redemption which referred traditionally to the messianic era, but was taken over by Zionism to mean
the voluntary Return to Zion. Similarly, Zionism endorsed the
traditional understanding of Diaspora as problematic (that is, as Galut)
but inserted it in a nationalist perspective that insisted on the suering
bound to dependence and non-sovereigntyinstead of the longing
for Gods mercy. Ingredients of Zionism, these principles set Jewish
aspirations under the same light as the aspirations of other peoples
to a nation-state of their own. Moreover, transformed, these tokens
requested a drastic change of attitudes by Jews vis--vis themselves,
their life experience, and their culturethough, by no means, did
they now require a total detachment from Judaism. In actual fact,
they concurred with the traditional assertions that the ultimate destiny of the People is Redemption, and that this Redemption is to

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eliezer ben-rafael

take place in the Promised Land. In this manner, Zionism adopts

traditional symbols, secularizes and nationalizes their meanings,
and draws from the singularity that they draw out, its legitimacy as
the culmination of Jewish history.
(3) A most crucial element that Zionism draws from traditional
Judaism concerns the endemic link between Judaism as a religion
and Jewishness as Peoplehood: it has denitely retained that Judaism
is the only religion that Jews may adhere to and that any other
aliation ousts Jews from the community.16 This position remains
an article of conviction among Zionists, notwithstanding the fact that
many of them are not observant or even believers. Zionism, however, still removes itself from traditional Judaism in this respect when
it does not specify that the Orthodox rite commands the non-Jew
to become a Jew.17 Hence, here again continuity and discontinuity
are interwoven: the basic association of religion and Peoplehood is
respected, but it is also re-dened in a way that allows for new
meanings and contents.18
(4) Nationalism, in the Jewish case like in many others, also draws
its inspiration from ideas stemming from cultural developments that
took place outside the sphere of religion in the last centuries. Here,
we think primarily of the ambition to create a nation-state, the
justication of new contours of the collective and the installment of
new civicuniversalistic values. This concerns Zionism to no lesser
extent than other kinds of nationalism: its aim has always been the
creation of a nation-state for Jews similar to others. It denes the
ingathering in the country in terms of a new Jewish nation which
diersthrough solidarityfrom Diaspora Jewry. For decades, the
main Zionist streams have viewed civic values and democracy as
essential to their endeavor.
(5) The Israeli-Jewish case also illustrates that religion may make
dierent contributions to the crystallization of diverse formulations

16
According to Talmudic law, even a converted individual remains a Jew but
this law has been overshadowed by the ancestral custom of considering the conversion of Jews to other faiths as loss.
17
In Israel itself the Orthodox holds a monopoly over conversion for mere
political reasons, but individuals who have been converted to Judaism by liberal
rites are accepted as such upon immigration, by the Israeli legislation.
18
As a rule, liberal conversion insists more than the Orthodox rite does on social
allegiance than on religious rigor.

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391

of nationalism. Hence, while the non-observant insist on the secularization of traditional symbols and tend to emphasize general and
universalistic values, other forces remain more straightforwardly faithful to versions of nationalism that are closer to original religious contents. These forces become breeding-grounds for cleavages and political
confrontations that mark the evolving of the setting. As a rule, in
the very context of the specic relation of religion and nationalism
in this case, religious forces tend to present themselves as a special
elite, i.e. as authorized guardians of religious interests assumedly
of general crucial importancethe role of Talmudic law in the
social order, the relation of religious commands to national policies
or the predominance of given legacies over others in public cult.
(6) The Jewish case of nationalism also shows that the link to religion, in a majority-minority setting, excludes the eventuality of mutual
assimilation of the two camps. This denies the validity here of a
republican model which would ignore the particularism of both the
majority and the minority. It is rather a pluralistic model, in a vein
reminiscent of the UK, that should be of relevance in the attempt
to reconcile the ambitions of a dominant group to determine the
collectives overall personality and its obligations to respect the rights
of the minoritys full democratic participation through the proliferation of compensatory rights and privileges.
(7) Last but not least, we also learn from the Israeli-Jewish case
how far a society grounded in a nationalism which draws values and
symbols from religious traditions may be prone to intellectual and
academic debates about the very validity of its national ideologies,
on the ground of the eventual total detachment of protagonists from
religious values per se.
All in all, the Zionists reliance on religious motives was certainly a
contributory factor to their success but it also widely accounts for
the development of the cleavages that have wracked it ever since.
To be sure, as a modern society, Israel also experiences other conicts,
and especially class quarrelsin fact, it rates among the highest
among the nations of the world in the number of labor disputes and
strikes. Yet in spite of its eventual acuity, this dimension remains
secondary in national politics, where two other parameters clearly
dominate. The rst is the right-left cleavage which refers here mainly
to hawkish versus dovish attitudes toward Israels conict with the

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Palestinians. Obviously, this parameter is the direct reection of

Israels life circumstances. The second parameter pertains to our
present discussion; it refers to forces stemming from communities
and sectors who have claims relating, in one way or another, to the
relationship between religion and nation.

PART FOUR

MODERNITY AS WORLD REALITY

CHAPTER TWENTY

WHO INVENTED MODERNITY IN SOUTH INDIA,

AND IS IT MODERN?
David Shulman
Introducing the term
Let us assume that a word like modern, if it is not empty or
merely tautological, implies, among other things, a certain kind of
awareness, and that this awareness, if it is real, does not emerge
without some institutional, socio-cultural depth. We might also posit
that a newly modern awareness, widely shared, would be transformative of social and institutional dynamics in any given historical
context. A set of analytical features characterizing such changes
can no doubt be suggested. I would want to examine, for example,
changing notions and roles of the individual person and his or her
self-denition; shifts in the metaphysics of politics; newly emergent
temporalities and with them a strong sense of (retrospective) history;1
a reorganization of spatial modes; the appearance of new elite formations, with related developments in the conceptual or ideological
spheres within which they compete; the discovery of a modality, or
a sensibility, that might be called secular, in some specic sense;
perhaps above all, an expansion and transguration of the collective
imagination. I will return to some of these themes in the conclusion
to this essay.
It would seem unlikely that such an awareness together with its
wider concomitants would rst come into play in a rather peripheral
setting like that of the town of Vizianagaram in what is today northern
Andhra Pradesh, not far from the Orissa border. In the eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries, Vizianagaram was a frontier town, recently
founded, not large by the standards of those times, and very remote
from the historic centers of south Indian Telugu civilization in the

See Motzkin 1992.

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david shulman

deltas of the great rivers or in the inland plateau of Telangana. Yet

it was here that in 1892 the maverick genius Gurajada Apparao
composed his famous play, Kanyasulkam (Girls for Sale)almost
universally acknowledged as the rst fully modern text in Telugu.
This play, rst published in 1897 and republished in a much expanded
version in 1909, became the classic statement of Telugu modernity
and, though often misunderstood, largely set the agenda for a century
of wide-ranging cultural experimentation and innovation in Andhra
and in Madras Presidency more generally. In what follows, I will
attempt briey to introduce the poet, his text and context, and to
speculate on the historical logic that brought him, and his new modes
of thinking, to the fore.
One problem, before we begin, has to do with our habitual insistence on a rather narrow time slot within which modernity is considered plausible. There is, indeed, much that is new, indeed unparalleled,
in Apparao; but in many ways he is also directly continuous with
developments rooted in the history of late-medieval Andhra, from
the fteenth century on. I have argued elsewhere, together with V.
Narayana Rao, that features we think of as modern achieve systematic expression in Telugu in the works of Annamayya (15th century),
Pingali Suranna (late 16th century), and in the Telugu Nayaka poets
of Tanjavur and Madurai (17th18th centuries).2 Such features include
a highly developed sense of the autonomous individual subject, freed
from ascriptive ties and newly centered in his or her singular body;
a considerable historiographical literature, at least as modern as
Gibbon or his immediate predecessors;3 a distinct political vision
embodied in small-scale state-systems of a new order and in kings
who claimed to be divine;4 an aestheticized, secular culture cutting
through communal boundaries;5 a certain air for cultural experimentation linked with skeptical currents, on the one hand, and with
emergent, radical epistemologies, on the other.6 This is not the place
to rehearse the arguments; suce it to say that, in our view, modernity in south India begins several centuries before what is usually

2
I want to thank Velcheru Narayana Rao for illuminating discussions of all the
Telugu works mentioned in this essay.
3
Narayana Rao, Shulman and Subrahmanyam 2001.
4
Narayana Rao, Shulman and Subrahmanyam 1992.
5
See Shulman, in press.
6
Narayana Rao 1996.

modernity in south india

397

thought of as the modern age, and that it evolves mostly organically, from within, without being dependent on sustained contact
with external, especially Western, forces. Thus Apparao is, in a way,
the culminating voice in a long series of innovative poets and thinkers
hence, perhaps, the remarkable resonance and impact of his work.
Kalinga
There is also a more specic background to the Kanyasulkam and the
Vizianagaram cultural production of which it was a part. The city,
some 50 kilometres north of todays large port-city of Visakhapatnam,
very close to the coast, is situated in the heart of the region sometimes known as southern Kalinga. It is a setting of remarkable physical beautya fertile, rice-growing plain bounded by the sea to the
east and the high hills of the Eastern Ghats to the west. Vizianagaram
District is mostly Telugu speaking, but culturally this area is perfectly continuous with the Oriya-speaking northern Kalinga (presentday Orissa) and marked o by many conspicuous diagnostic features
from deltaic Andhra to the south. Historically, too, Kalinga, in both
its segments, has its own particular integrity. There is, for example,
a pronounced tribal element, evident both in the formation of the
major ritual systems (such as the Jagannatha temple at Puri) and in
the political domain. Tribal kingdoms and city-states, Hinduized
in various degrees, still exist in the uplands; they have profoundly
inuenced the development of all the little kingdoms on the coastal
plains, including Vizianagaram. If we go further back in time, we
can see traces of the ourishing proto-Mahayana Buddhist civilization that once saturated Kalinga with stupas, monasteries, and schools.
These Buddhist communities were eventually replaced by Brahminical
institutionsalso of a distinctive typebut a vital substratum of
diverse heterodox traditions survived here right up to the present
day. A particular variety of Tantric Yoga developed in Kalinga and
continues to generate living lineages of teaching. We can see something of it in Laksmidharas famous sixteenth-century commentary
on the Saundarya-lahari; and there is a strong local tradition that
Santarama, the author of the foundational text of Tantric Yoga, the
Hatha-yoga-pradipika, came from Kumili, just north of Vizianagaram
(the original home of the Pusapati dynasty that concerns us here).
Whether or not this tradition is historical, there is unquestionably a

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david shulman

strong presence of esoteric currents, probably rooted in the ancient

Buddhist milieu, throughout the wider Vizianagaram area.
This point is far from trivial. Kalinga esotericism is eloquently
represented within the Kanyasulkam itself, as it is in many of the
courtly productions from nineteenth-century Vizianagaram.7 It is not
by chance that a modern consciousness rst broke through to the
surface in south India, as in the West, in a setting rich with active
links to the medieval heterodoxies.8
We know something of the foundation and rise of the Vizianagaram
state in the rst half of the eighteenth century (although the Pusapati
dynasty traces its origins back to one Madhava Varma in the seventeenth century, from Pusapadu, near Vinukonda in the southern
delta).9 Devotees of the golden goddess Kanaka Durga of Vijayavada,
the Pusapati kings set oallegedly with the blessing of the Nizam
state of Hyderabad, nominally ruling under the aegis of the Mughals
to seek their fortune in the wilderness (manyam or manne) of southern
Kalinga.10 Ocially, the Pusapatis became tax-farmers within the
Hyderabadi-Mughal system and consequently won the high-own
title Manne Sultan Bahadar, Sultan of the Wilderness.11 In reality,
they were largely independent competitors in the century-long tugof-war among a host of local palegallu rulers for control of the regions
rich resources. By the early years of the eighteenth century, this
struggle had eliminated all but a few major players: the Pusapatis
(ruling from Kumili), and the small-scale dynasties centered in
Madgulain eect, a tribal kingdom with its ritual center situated
high in the hills, at Paderuand the low-land fortied city-states of
Srngavarapu Kota, Golakonda, and Bobbili. Our sources, mostly
kaiyyats written by village accountants (karnams) at the request of the
famous Colonel Mackenzie in the early nineteenth century, allow us
to reconstruct the nal stages of this conict; largely through the
ruthless machinations of a wily diwan, Burra Buccanna, Vizianagaram

7
Kanyasulkam 5.4. The Mukhalinga-ksetra-mahatmyamu oers another perspective on this layer of the tradition (see below).
8
See Eisenstadt 1999.
9
See Pusapati rajulayokka purvottaram, 1; discussion by Berkemer 1993: 252.
10
According to the Ranga-raya caritramu of Dittakavi Narayanakavi (1.115),
Madhava Varma came to this region together with a Mughal adventurer called
Sher Muhammad Khan; for his services, Madhava Varma was rewarded with the
Vizianagaram kingdom. See Narayana Rao, Shulman and Subrahmanyam 2001: 63.
11
Pusapati rajalayokka purvottaram, 4.

modernity in south india

399

succeeded in dominating its rivals and drawing them into an emergent scal and military system operating from the new capital of
Vizianagaramfounded in the second decade of the eighteenth century (according to tradition, on Vijaya Dasami, in the autumn
Navaratri festival, in the Vijaya year 17131714).
Several traditions speak of the founding of this aptly named city
of victory (more properly transliterated Vijaya-nagaram; I retain the
old Anglo-Indian spelling in order to dierentiate it from the wellknown imperial state far to the south in the western Deccan). The
site was, not surprisingly, chosen for security considerations: large
hills protected it to the east and north; to the west was the village
of Devulapalli; the fort-palace was constructed on the edge of a lake
fed by mountain rivulets.12 Originally, there was nothing here but
wilderness and a small village called Rega; the area was full of tigers
and subject to predatory raids by Muslims (mlecchulu). Still, after the
founding of the fort by the rst real royal gure, Peda Vijaya Rama
Raja, the entire Pusapati clan, with its women and children, marched
there from Kumile in four days.13 Some say that Peda Vijaya Rama
Raja rst discovered the site on a hunting expedition; to his amazement, his hunting dogs were savagely attacked there by the rabbits
they were hunting. The king asked a Muslim saint, Denkha Shah
Wali Baba, who was meditating in the shade of a tree, about the
meaning of this strange reversal. Denkha Shah said: Kumili will be
ruined. Build a new fort here. Heroic manliness ( paurusam) is in the
soil. So Vijaya Rama Raja moved his kingdom to Vizianagaram and
built the rst, mud-walled fort. An oral account collected by Georg
Berkemer insists that the founders of the forttwo royal brothers14
deliberately ignored the Muslim saints directions for building the
fort nearby, instead constructing it precisely on the spot where the
hunting dogs were attacked by a (single) hare; as a result, the new
state lost its chance to conquer the entire world.15 Denka Shahs
tomb is situated today about halfway between the royal fort and the
Square Shrine (sadur gudi) of the dynastys tutelary goddess, Paiditalli
another golden lady.

12

Ibid., 910.
Ibid.
14
This seems to be a memory of the historic rivalry between the brothers Peda
Sitaramaraju and Peda Vijaya Rama Raju.
15
Berkemer 1993: 275.
13

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david shulman

It is perhaps necessary to stress the inter-communal aspect of the

foundational myth as well as its typically heroic coloring. Even more
salient is the states self-perception as a wilderness kingdom, remote
from the more settled and stable political systems of the delta and
the interior. This is a kingdom of tigers and tiger-like warriors who
inhabit a peripheral domain alive with sorcery, magical Yoga, tribal
deities, shermen, hunters, and powerful local goddesses, rather wild
themselves.16 Conspicuous by their absence are the Brahmin communities usually associated with various patterns of political homeostasis in south India. Although we do hear, occasionally, of land-grants
to Brahmins,17 and we can also trace the rise of large-scale Sanskritized
temples (at Mukhalingam, Rama-tirthalu, Padmanabham, Palukonda,
and so on), it seems that the early Vizianagaram state legitimized
itself mostly without Brahmin assistance. This state is founded upon
a heroic, wilderness ethos, the local goddess who creates a habitable
space for kings and subjects, and a motley crowd of itinerant magicians, alchemists, musicians, poets, wrestlers, tiger-dancers, and unconventional Yogis. Indeed, this peculiarly Kalingan mix continued to
ourish at the Vizianagaram court throughout the nineteenth century, right up to the generation of our unconventional Brahmin
dramatist, Gurajada Apparao. Such is the mise en scene of incipient
modernity in Andhra. Like so much cultural innovation, the invention of the modern takes place not where we might expect it (in this
case, in the great political and commercial cities of Rajahmundry,
Nellore, or Madras) but somewhere on the remote margins of south
Indian history, a spooky, rather sleepy provincial town in the shadow
of the tribal domain of the mountains, completely surrounded by
forest.
There is one more critical feature of the historical process at
eighteenth-century Vizianagaramthe nal loss of coercive force by
a dynasty that claimed to generate only heroes and that based its
claims on their physical and moral prowess. I cannot rehearse the
details of this process, some rather well known by now.18 Suce it
to say that in 1757 Vizianagaram successfully manipulated a French-

16
Don Handelman and I are preparing a monograph on the cult of Paidi Talli
at Vizianagaram and the socio-political universe in which it is enacted.
17
Thus an early king, Raghunatha, a Vaisnava, is said to have given two or
three agraharams to Brahmins: Pusapati rajulayokka purvottaram, 3.
18
See detailed discussion in Narayana Rao, Shulman and Subrahmanyam 2001.

modernity in south india

401

Hyderabadi band of irregulars under Charles de Bussy to attack

and destroy its last real enemy, the Velama rulers of Bobbili; but
following this Pyrrhic victorywhich cost the life of the Vizianagaram
king, Peda Vijaya Rama Rajathe Vizianagaram state found itself
pitted against a new and far more powerful force, that of the English
Company centered in Madras. A futile last stand at Padmanabham,
very close to Vizianagaram, in 179419 paved the way for the English
takeover of the kingdoms nances. When the dynasty was granted
control over its own fate once again, in 1848, it understood that
politics and warfare could no longer mix. As a result, the kings
turned their energies to the intense cultural production that eventually included Apparao and his radical text. The acme of Vizianagarams
golden age was attained under the relatively short rule of the legendary
Ananda Gajapati (r. 18791897), the so-called Abhinava Andhra
Bhoja (that is, a re-embodiment of the paradigmatic patron and
connoisseur of medieval India, Bhoja of Dhara, now present again
in the Telugu land).20
Gurajada Apparao and the Kanyasulkam
The poet was born in 1861/6221 into a Niyogi Brahmin family well
versed in the ways of political power and closely linked with the
Vizianagaram court; his father, Venkata Rama Das, was a revenue
ocer and khiledar occasionally employed by the Pusapati ruler. After
early schooling in Cipurapalli, Apparao shifted to Vizianagaram town,
where he completed a B.A. in 1886 at the Maharajas Collegeat
that time, one of the nest educational institutions on the east coast
of India. The following year he began teaching at the college (English,
Sanskrit, and history). Soon he was also appearing at court, where
he became close to the king and eventually received an appointment
as court epigraphist. Although he published a body of poetry (rst
in English, later in Telugu), some of it remarkable, the Kanyasulkamu
is unquestionably his masterpiece. After the death of Ananda Gajapati
in 1897, Apparao maintained his role at court through his close ties
19
See ibid., 7992, following the Padmanabha-yuddhamu of Chatrati Laksmi
Narasa Kavi. The second (Chinna) Vijaya Rama Raju lost his life at Padmanabham.
20
See Rama Rao 1985.
21
There is a dispute about the precise date, which depends on a reading of his
horoscope.

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david shulman

to the late kings sister, Riva Rani. At his early death in 1915, aged
53, he left behind several unpublished works including another seminal but unnished play, Bilhaniyam, an extensive diary of many years
(still unknown in its original Telugu), and a comprehensive history
of Kalinga. His house, just around the corner from the palace-fort
in Vizianagaram, is today a public library and national monument.22
These bare facts tell us little of his achievement. Throughout the
twentieth century, Andhra modernists claimed him as their main
precursor (together with Kandukuri Viresalingam, who was active
further south, in Rajahmundry); but for the most part, they misunderstood the subtle awareness that he sought to express. His agenda
coincided only rather supercially with the meliorist social vision of
the reformers. As Velcheru Narayana Rao has written, His program
was to clear the path so that a modern Telugu prose could emerge,
and to modernize Telugu sensibilities with a new kind of poetry
a sort of cultural revolution, to create the basis for the emergence
of a new class of people who would have both the cultural condence
to assimilate alien inuences without being defensive, and who would
also possess the intellectual strength to retain what was valuable in
their past.23 To this end, Apparao fashioned almost single-handedly
a Telugu prose based on vernacular speech instead of the somewhat
articial language of the panditsthough he was familiar with the
robust prose of the karnam historians who preceded him. No attempt
to come to terms with his work can ignore this intensely controversial linguistic and stylistic break-through, which goes well beyond
the realm of language per se. The characters Apparao puts on stage
speak a rich, colloquial, highly individualized Telugu; each of them
is a strong subjective presence giving voice to a personal experience
of the world. Nothing like this had ever been seen before in Telugu;
some would argue that a century later this precise, symphonic, oral
eloquence has yet to be imitated or successfully extended. On this
level alone, Apparao is modern through and through.
As its name implies, Brides for Sale thematizes one of the classic
reformist targets in late nineteenth-century Andhra: the practice of
22
A vast secondary bibliography exists in Telugu on Apparao. Noteworthy is the
incisive biographical study in Russian by Petrunicheva 1985. See, rst, Narayana
Rao 2003: 28187.
23
Ibid., 284.

modernity in south india

403

marrying o young girls, for sizable fees, to older men, often widowers. The usual result was a life of misery for the young bride,
inevitably widowed at a young age. Apparaos royal patron at
Vizianagaram, Ananda Gajapati, an active modernist in many ways,
initiated legislationthe Kanyasulkam Billin the Madras Legislative
Council with the aim of prohibiting such marriages; this initiative
was not approved. In the program advocated by the Andhra reformists,
proscribing the sale of young brides was only half the struggle; the
other side of it was enabling widow remarriage. Both these issues
gure prominently in Apparaos play.
The plot, to summarize very baldly the extraordinary profusion
of witty dialogue and melodramatic events, revolves around the desire
of an elderly Brahmin villager, Lubdhavadhanlu (Greedy Scholar),
to buy as his new bride the young daughter, Subbi, of another
Brahmin, Agnihotravadhanlu. The latter is more than willing to go
through with the deal, but the girls mother is staunchly opposed; she
induces her brother, Karataka Sastri, to stop the match by a ruse
in hard bargaining, he sells Agnihotravadhanlu another bride, who
is none other than Karataka Sastris own (male) disciple, disguised
as a girl. The complicated masquerade requires deft manipulation
by the plays true heroine, the world-wise courtesan Madhuravani, who
brings her most recent lover, Ramappantalu, into play as a middleman. After the wedding is duly performed, the eager bridegroom
soon realizes the catastrophe he has brought upon himself; and when
the new bride disappears, Lubdhavadhanlu nds himself in danger of being charged with murder. Interwoven with the main plot
is the somewhat disingenuous love of Girisam, a man about town
with half-baked education in English and an innite resourcefulness
in advancing his selsh interests, for the young widow Buccamma,
Agnihotravadhanlus other daughter. A supporting cast of lawyers,
policemen, a village priest-magician, corrupt ascetic, astrologer, and
servants, lls in the contours of this varied and, in a certain sense,
realistic social universe.
Elements of the plot, and the sophisticated parodic impulse working
through it, have medieval sourcesfor example, in the tenth-century
Sanskrit drama by Rajasekhara, the Viddha-salabhanjika, which was
well known in Andhra. We could also trace a clear line of succession
from the sixteenth-century Telugu novels by Pingali Suranna, mentioned above. But the development of the plot is, in a way, less crucial than the particular tone or tones Apparao has established. Here

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the entrepreneurial cad Girisam, the rst voice we hear on stage,

may be said to have pride of place. He is somewhat reminiscent of
Musils Mann ohne Eingenschaften, a near-contemporarydriven by the
same inner confusion and strangely attractive hollowness. No summary
could ever do justice to Girisams role in the play; nor can we begin
to explore seriously, in the present context, the cultural and psychological complexities that form the Kanyasulkams true subject matter.24
Still, to convey at least something of the avor, I want to cite one
extended passage from Act 4, near the mid-point of the play (in
Velcheru Narayana Raos supple translation).
The bogus wedding has just taken place, and the scene reverts to Agnihotravadhanlus house where Girisam is instructing his pupil, Venkatesam, in
questions of practical metaphysics:
Venkatesam: [explaining why he was slapped by his father] I didnt say my
morning prayers.
Girisam: Couldnt you at least pretend you were praying?
Venkatesam: I thought he [my father] wasnt watching.
Girisam: You should never do that. When you pretend, pretend all the time.
Not just when someone is watching you. You know I meditate every
day, like a heron in the lake.
Venkatesam: What do you meditate on?
Girisam: On food. I say to myself, God, please let this old man end his
worship soon so I can get food on my plate.
Venkatesam: You should pray to god with the right chants. Is it not a sin
to ask for your meal?
Girisam: Ignorance!25 You dont know anything about religion. I should train
you in religion after this wedding is over. I have studied all religions,
taken the essence of all of them and created a new religion. I am going
to spread it in America. But let me answer your question now. What
was your question? Is it right to meditate on food? See what your
Upanisad says: annam brahmeti vyajanat. It says, you fool, know that
food is God. What does the white man pray for every day? Fathe, give
us our daily bread. So what should we pray for? We should pray for
rice and lentils. [. . . .]
Venkatesam: [I should ask for] thick curds and pretzels.
Girisam: Excellent! Thats originality. Even your own mother will not give
unless you ask. God doesnt either. Make a list of all the things you want
and insert it into your chant. [. . .]

24
V. Narayana Rao is preparing a complete study to be published with his translation of the text.
25
Italics marks the verbatim insertion of English terms into the Telugu text.

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Venkatesam: You stole a pack of tobacco from the Bhuktas. Wont god be
angry with you for your sin?
Girisam: See, when I was young, my unclewho was a rebrand like your
fathertwisted my earlobes and made me read Upanisads. In one of
those Upanisadsdamn it, I forget the namea student asks questions
and a teacher answers them. You are the student and I am the teacher
just like in that Upanisad. If someone records your questions and my
answers on a palm leaf, it will be a sacred textafter a couple of hundred years it will be known as Tobaccopanisad. Whats so sinful about
stealing tobacco? You just smoke it away, right? Moreover, its good for
the world to steal tobacco from those idiots who inhale snu.
Venkatesam: Hows that good for the world?
Girisam: Ill tell you how. If you smoke cigars, the smoke goes to the sky
like steam from a locomotive and turns into clouds that rain. If you
inhale snu, the sky gets dry from that pungent smell. Only your nose
drips a few drops, making your clothes dirty. So we should, by all means,
steal all the tobacco from those who inhale snu and smoke it all as
cigars. If God, however, says: Sir, Girisam-garu, you did commit a sin
and you have to honor hell with your presence, I will give him a lecture and confuse him.
Venkatesam: Whats your lecture going to be on? Im curious.
Girisam: What will that be? O Almighty God, did you create me to be
independent of you or dependent on you? If I am created to be independent of you, I did what I did and who are you to ask? If you trouble
me with your questions, I will organize a National Congress in Heaven.
Or, if I am created to be dependent on you, you are the one to take
responsibility for my sins and you will be the one to be punished.
Therefore, you go to Hell yourself. If you give me power over Heaven
in your absencefor just six hoursI will x a few mistakes in your
creation.
Venkatesam: What are those mistakes, sir?
Girisam: Serious mistakes. You yourself will agree. Is it not a mistake to
create a stupid person like your teacher in the high school?
Venkatesam: Yes, it is a mistake.
Girisam: Making a beautiful young girl like your sister a widowis it a mistake or not?
Venkatesam: Surely a mistake.
Girisam: There are a million more like this. And how much of Gods creation is wasteful? For instance, how many seas are there?
Venkatesam: Seven.
Girisam: Seven senseless seas. After creating a sea of milk, why do you need
a sea of curds and a sea of claried butter? This is pleonismredundancy. Now, another stupid mistake: God dumped this totally useless
salt-water sea in our neighborhood and placed seas of milk, curds, claried
butter, and sugar-cane juice in places impossible for anybody to reach.
If God hands over his power to me for one year, I will bring the ocean
of milk to Bhimunipatnam, the ocean of fresh water to Visakhapatnam,

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and the sea of sugar-cane juice to Kalingapatnam. I will make the entire
Eastern Ghats a tobacco forest. When I give this lecture, you know what
God will say? He will say, This man is impossible to defeat. [. . .] Then
God will ask his angels to take me on a horse cart, show me around
heaven and let me choose the best house in the place. I will tell them
that I want my favorite student Venkatesam to live with me. They they
will bring you on an airplane. We will live happily ever after. Enough
religious instruction for today.26

We can pause for a moment to notice the brazen iconoclasm of

Girisams lecture (he himself uses the English word). No one, I
think, would deny that Girisam is a true modern. It is not only a
matter of the obvious skepticism recruited to rationalize self-driven
needs. There is also the limitless pretension: even heaven and its
ruling deity are no limit for Girisams condent vision. He would not,
it is true, be the rst Telugu hero to beat God at his own game
Nirankusa, a medieval trickster, triumphs over Siva in a fateful game
of dice and walks away with the ultimate prize27but Girisam seems
to see further, not so much into the farther reaches of the cosmos
as toward an open-ended human world of opportunity and adventure. In this, he lampoons the famous Swami Vivekananda, who
brought a Neo-Vedantic, refurbished Hinduism to the World Congress
of Religions in Chicago in 1895. In Apparaos caustic prose,
Vivekananda turns into another egotistical pretender, probably less
capable and self-aware than our Vizianagaram dandy.
Then there is the ruthlessness and its shameless rationale, another
clearly modern feature: When you pretend, pretend all the time.
(Literally, Girisam is speaking about putting on a guise, vesam
veyyadam). Logic is brought to bear, with devastating eect: stealing
tobacco is no sin if God has made the thief independent, and if
he hasntthen the sin is Gods. Needless to say, the theological
point is familiar from classical discussions; never, however, has it
been used to such single-minded subversive eect. Similarly with the
recycling of puranic geography and Upanisadic cosmological lore
the past is never absent, never redundant, only reframed ironically
so as to unravel and dissociate its semantic burdens. The cycle of
life and death so powerfully set forth in Brhadaranyaka Upanisad 6.2.116

26

Kanyasulkam 4.5 (pp. 99101).

Nirankusopakhyanamu of Rudrakavi: see Handelman and Shulman 1997:
96106.
27

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and Chandogya Upanisad 5.310those who sacrice and give charity

pass from the smoke of the cremation pyre into the night and thence,
by stages, reach the moon, becoming space, air, rain, food, and
semenhas been turned into a sly argument in favor of smoking
cigars. Tobacco smoke goes to heaven and induces rain. Cosmology,
simplied and touched up, now serves a nihilistic, perfectly modern
hedonism.
I have used the term parody and will stand by it. Girisams
speech, like any real parody, is committed simultaneously to two
incongruous codes, neither of which can be wholly set aside. But
this is, again, a peculiarly familiar, modern form of parody, in which
both codes, the ridiculed classical and its apparent, materialistic replacement, are doubly twisted and turned back on themselves. This is
just where the modernists went wrong in reading Apparao. They fail
to see how savagely he has mocked the language, the social program,
and the limited intellectual horizon of the nineteenth-century reformers.
If the Upanisads are, in the end, no more to the point than an anachronistic cosmo-map of oceans of curd and sugar-cane juice, neither are
the recently formed national Congress or the utilitarian ideology
of the British and their south Indian epigones of any real relevance
to the baed citizen of late nineteenth-century Vizianagaram.28
There is more. A third pillar of the reformists campaign, after
widow remarriage and the banning of the trade in child-brides, was
the so-called anti-nautch movement aimed at outlawing the institution of courtesans (nautch girls) that had helped preserve classical
artistic forms for well over a millennium throughout south India. A
lethal combination of Victorian prudishness and Brahminical Puritanism
had, by the 1890s, already begun to wreak havoc with the lives of
many accomplished Madhuravanis, thus threatening the corpus of
poetry, dance and music that they represented (also the social fabric
in villages and small towns). Apparaos Madhuravani is, perhaps, his
most powerful portrait as well as the only one of his characters to
emerge unscathed and triumphant at the end of the drama. In the
immediate sequel to the section cited above, Girisam makes yet
another attempt to win the shy Buccammas aection; and in the
course of his ood of arguments, the anti-nautch campaign, too,
comes in for implicit ridicule:

28

See also discussion of this passage by Petrunicheva 1985: 51.

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Girisam [to Buccamma]: You are still protected by your parents. No man
can approach you. But your parents wont live forever. Once they are
gone, you, too, will be independent. Who knows how your mind will
work then? Once you stray from the straight path, you will regret not
marrying Girisam the proper way. You will think: If only I had married
him, I would have children and wealth and all happiness. Where will
I be then? In heaven, waiting for you. After this wedding, Venkatesam
and I will return to the city. I will long for you and give up food and
sleep. How long can anyone live without food and sleep? I will keep
thinking of you and spend many sleepless nights. Then one day in the
middle of the night, Ill be sitting in an easy chair, in front of me there
will be an electric lamp and a life-size mirror and I will look at myself
in the mirror and I will say to myself: This handsome face, these wide
eyes, this charming mustacheall these are of no use. What good are
they, when my Buccamma doesnt want them? In despair I will open
the drawer and pick up the double-barreled pistol, aim it at my heart
and shoot myself.
Buccamma: Dont, dont do that. If you say such things, Ill cry.
Girisam: Immediately the gods will send their sky-chariot and take me to
heaven. Will I be happy even in heaven? No. The gods beauty queen
Rambha will come bedecked with jewelry and will fall all over me, cooing, My sweet Girisam, I have never seen a more handsome man than
you. Come, give me a kiss. And I will say to her: Go away, I am
anti-nautch.29

It is hard to imagine a sharper blow at the reformers with whom

Girisam ostensibly identies himself. We might also note that a new
ideology of romantic love, conspicuously present in Girisams seductive conversations with Buccamma, is also pointedly and repeatedly
subverted. A similarly delicate undermining of innocent romance
takes place in two of Apparaos best-known poems, The Comet
and Gold.30
On Experimentation
If we were to stick to the level of literary explication, it would, no
doubt, be possible to elaborate a theory of modern irony as characteristically marked by this kind of double twistan initial ironic
or parodic perspective itself rendered ironic in a wider, more com-

29
30

Kanyasulkam 4.5 (p. 103).

Narayana Rao 2003: 59, 22729, with the translators remarks, 28487.

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prehensive vision woven into the rst-order statement of subversion.

A similar case could be made for what passes as modern realism,
another salient feature of Apparaos play. Realism of this type includes
a hidden core of dark fantasy that borders on the grotesque (as in
real life). In general and theoretical terms, probably only the notional
spectrum of alienation, the true staple of all modernist poetics, remains
dependably nave. But in a volume honoring Shmuel Eisenstadt, we
should, I think, try for a somewhat more integrative approach.
Gurujada Apparaos Girls for Sale is only one, particularly hardhitting reection of the changes that overtook southern India in the
late nineteenth century, though it does have the merit of being the
rst full-edged literary articulation of these changes. We are unable
to oer a deeper analysis here; much work remains to be done on
the enormous cultural output of the nineteenth-century Vizianagaram
courtthe sources are there, waiting only for a serious reader. Still,
given the particular background sketched out above and our small
sample of the text, we can, I think, make several tentative points.
The particular conguration of a distinctive modern ethos and its
associated institutional dynamics emerged much earlier in this part
of the world than in the West. Its roots lie in late-medieval developments that intensied in scope and impact in the course of the
eighteenth century. A particularly charged and eective eld came into
being in the peripheral zone of northern Andhra (southern Kalinga),
with its strong continuities to the ancient heterodoxies and its ongoing generation of esoteric and iconoclastic visions (the Kalinga lineages of Tantric Yoga and the performative traditions of dance,
martial arts, and local rituals). The political structures of Apparaos
Vizianagaram rested mostly upon these promising, somewhat novel
foundations.
Nonetheless, these structures clearly remained weak in comparison with the state-systems of the Nayaka south, for example, or even
of the late-Mughal north. Vizianagaram produced no true Jacobins
the opportunistic Girisam is the polar opposite of the typeand also
no Weberian bureaucrats in their iron cages. A once-heroic kingship transformed into an aestheticized, non-sectarian, in some sense
secular political domain became preoccupied not so much with
the culture of power as with the power of culturethat is, with the
elaboration of a certain kind of public space. In this respect, weakness in the domain of coercive force and centralized resources became
a major source of strength.

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What were the characteristics of that new space? It certainly

included new values that were largely context-free, always an innovation in South Asia. We can hear them in Girisams skepticism, his
utilitarianism and his ludicrously overstated, ultimately supercial
belief in progress. Elsewhere in the play we nd the notion of an
abstract, normative body of law that includes some element of
egalitarian rights. A radical individualism lies at the heart of this
newly crystallizing sensibility; it infuses every line of Apparaos great
work. It was, I think, there before, but in Apparao we nd it
thematized, explicit, and mature.
But there are at least two other, newer dimensions to the space
of kingship in colonial Vizianagaram. One has to do with a concept of society that far transcends earlier Telugu models. Both Girisam
and Madhuravani think in terms of an organic social worldinhabited by exotic and conicted groupsthat has become a domain for
large-scale human experimentation. Within this domain, still remarkably inclusivist in the traditional Hindu mode, it is easy to detect
the sort of turbulence that derives from conicting claims to legitimacy.
Madhuravani thus boldly confronts the somewhat stolid, priggish
gure of the modern lawyer, Saunjanya Rao, with his strong antinautch prejudices and reformist ideology; a medieval set of values
incarnate in the sophisticated, humane and worldly courtesan achieves
one last victory over an emerging system of supposedly universal and
abstract norms. ( Jan Heesterman claimed long ago that the dening
feature of South Asian modernity, in contrast to the medieval Hindu
organization of social and political life, is its re-internalization of
totalistic, transcendent truth-claims, now vested in the state.)31
In nineteenth-century Vizianagaram, kingship presided over this
laboratory of social transformation in mostly instrumental ways. What
is even more strikingthis is the second dimension of changeis
the fact that politics has itself acquired an experimental charge. The
Kanyasulkam was naturally dedicated to the king, Ananda Gajapati,
who had made the campaign against selling child-brides his own special concern;32 and while Appararaos play, like many of the courtly

31

Heesterman 1971 and 1979.

See the authors English preface, always reprinted in editions of the text: No
one is better aware than the writer himself, how great are the imperfections of the
piece, and how unworthy it is of presentation to such an exalted personage and
32

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411

productions at Vizianagaram, was intended for a public far wider

and more diverse than the court, its congenital relation to the poets
enlightened patron and to the cultivated sensibilities he fostered should
never be forgotten. We could formulate this relation in various ways,
taking account of the dramatically expanding spheres of cultural consumption in Apparaos generation; but here again an important
insight of Shmuel Eisenstadt can help. In classical South Asian polities, the political sphere has its necessary presence, dynamic structures, and integrityyet it is usually not seen as embodying, in itself,
the ultimate existential values of the civilization. In Eisenstadts term,
the political has been de-ontologized in Hindu India. It would, of
course, not be dicult to cite exceptions; and we have argued elsewhere that the Nayaka states of late-medieval Tamil Nadu show us
the beginning of a new pattern, in which the domains of kingship
and divinity have begun to merge.33 Still, by the time we reach
Ananda Gajapati Raja at Vizianagaram, it is clear that we are dealing
with a small-scale state, a center for unusual intellectual and cultural
intensity, which has re-ontologized precisely this domain. Politics
has become a sphere for critical existential experimentation. The
Kanyasulkam shows us how this happens in almost every scene.
Such is the stu of a transgured imagination, as hinted at the
outset of this essay. Ananda Gajapati, the prototype of the modern
Andhra monarch, only a generation away from the moment when
the kings of Vizianagaram would successfully transform themselves
into elected politicians, needed Gurujada Apparao to imagine him
into existence. Indeed, this role belongs traditionally to all the great
Telugu poets who enjoyed the patronage of some local or trans-local
king. It is the poets task to re-conceive his patron as king. Dependence
has always been asymmetrical along this axis. At the same time, the
Vizianagaram kings were eager to forge their own links to ultimate
values, or to the ultimately real, and to enact these links in a range
of telling milieux.

ripe Scholar as Your Highness, but he has ventured to seek your Highnesss indulgence, as he deems it the highest honour and his greatest ambition to be permitted
to dedicate the fruits of his intellect, poor though in merit, to a Prince with whom
knowledge is an absorbing passion and whose appreciative encouragement of letters,
has attracted to his court literary stars of the rst magnitude and inaugurated a
brilliant epoch in the history of Telugu literature.
33
Narayana Rao, Shulman and Subrahmanyam 1992.

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david shulman

Thus in Kakaraparti Krsna-kavis Telugu poem on the famous shrine

of Mukhalingam, to the north and west of Vizianagaramanother
nineteenth-century text generated from the matrix of Vizianagaram
patronagewe meet King Visnuvardhana Madhukarna Gajapatideva,
a puranic counterpart to the Pusapati kings. This mythic ruler conquered the entire world and then arrived, somewhat fatigued, at the
bank of the Vamsadhara River, near Mukhalingam. He went to
sleep and dreamt that the god, Mukhalingesvara-Siva, told him the
long, complicated story of his, the gods, arrival there and then
ordered the king to build him a temple. One royal function, clearly,
is to listen to a god eager to relate his autobiography when the mood
strikes. The story complete, the king awoke; the god, naturally, had
disappeared. Where, exactly, was the Gajapati ruler to build the new
temple? There were lingas everywhere, and no way to know which
one belonged to the deity who had spoken in the dream. In this
quandary, desperate for a practical solution, the king consulted his
minister, who sagely advised him to go back to sleep. With luck,
Siva would appear one more time in his dream, this time with more
adequate and detailed directions.34 Then again, he might not.
It is not every Prime Minister who would send his superior to
bed (though many might want to). Not every kingdom would put at
its core a dreamy, visionary king, straining to shape reality in the
elusive contours of his dream. It might, however, happen in a small
town perched on the edge of a vast wilderness ruled by no-longerheroic connoisseurs, the patrons of Yogis, wrestlers, singers, local
gods and local poets, themselves intent on re-imagining a radically
unsettled world. The story, no doubt, is an old oneits retelling at
the Vizianagaram court, a moment entirely modern.

34
Mukhalingesvara-ksetra-mahatmyamu 3 (pp. 5357). I am indebted to Velcheru
Narayana Rao for making this text accessible to me.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

IS ISRAEL WESTERN?
Sammy Smooha
Israel is Western in its self and international image. It is also considered Western in social science writings though not always explicitly.
Some scholars see Israel as an exceptional case, and many do not
openly declare it as Western, but few question its deviation from to
the Western model. Troubled by lingering doubts about this stock
view of Israel, I will examine the degree to which Israel qualies as
Western and attempt to uncover the forces that expedite and inhibit
its Westernization.
A better understanding of Israeli society is the main but not the
sole purpose of this study. The Israeli case can shed some light on
the necessary conceptual distinction between Western, modern and
developed, on possible non-Western trajectories of modernization
and globalization, and on the question whether the post-Communist
states that joined the European Union in May 2004 are indeed
Western.
Distinguishing Western
A distinction must be made between modern, developed and
Western. To become modern means to abandon old traditions
and practices and to replace them with new patterns. The essence
of modernization is the capacity, desire and legitimacy to change
and to adopt novel norms and habits. The process of modernization is pervasive in all contemporary societies.
While most societies are modern in the basic sense of being nontraditional and change-oriented, only a minority of them are developed. Developed countries are high in human and economic
development and capital. They have advanced market economies
and democratic political systems. The United Nations (UNDP 2003)
and World Bank (2003) gather and publish data on various indicators

414

sammy smooha

of development. The top group of countries in their development

scales is considered (highly) developed. They are high in human
rights, per capita income, non-poverty, employment, gender equality,
school attendance, technology diusion, life expectancy, health services, personal safety and environmental quality. Most of the highly
developed countries are members of the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD).
As developed is a subcategory of modern, Western is a subcategory of developed. The term Western refers to the countries
of Western Europe and to their overseas transplant societies. Thus
the West includes the United States, Canada, Australia and New
Zealand, all of which were formed by West European settlers. The
United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Sweden are
no doubt the leading examples of the Western model.
Although Western states dier in language and culture and in the
exact shape of their political system and economy, they have a great
deal in common when compared to other countries. They are all
rich, democratic, secular, not so nationalistic, and bourgeois in outlook and way of life. Lest the picture is too positive, it must be
stressed that the West is also plagued by a decline of community,
loss of warm relations between people, tough competition and an
over-use of alcohol and drugs, to name just a few of the social ills
of the West. Although each of these characteristics can be found in
many non-Western countries, this conguration is unique to the contemporary West. For instance, Kuwait is rich, India is democratic,
Japan is highly industrialized and Turkey is ocially secular, but
none of them is Western because none displays the other features
of the Western model.
The West is not only modern and developed but also postmodern to some degree. The economy is based on high-technology
and post-industrial (only a small portion of the labor force is engaged
in production). Rationality, scientic knowledge and materialism are
no longer considered as desirable absolute truths. The nation-state
is incapable of homogenizing and uniting the diverse population.
New Age is a viable subculture in the Western culture. These and
other traits of post-modernity or late-modernity characterize certain
population segments in Western countries.
The distinctiveness of the West is a controversial issue. Although
many accept the idea of multiple modernities and the side-by-side
coexistence of world civilizations, they disagree on the nature of relationship and degree of uniqueness of the present civilizations. On

is israel western?

415

the one hand, Fukuyama (1992) posits a relatively homogenous world

created by the eventual triumph of the hegemonic and homogenizing
Western civilization. On the other hand, Huntington (1996) emphasizes the separation and clash between unique civilizations. Eisenstadt
(2003a: 519533) takes a middle-of-the-road position that recognizes the
prevalence of dierent civilizations but accentuates the interactions,
and the great diversity and conicts within each civilization that blur
the boundaries dividing them. He sees marked dierences within the
Western civilizationbetween the United States and Western Europe,
between countries within Western Europe, and between cultural and
institutional patterns and trends within each Western country.
The endeavor to answer the question Is Israel Western? can
benet most from Huntingtons view of Western civilization as unique.
He singles out eight cultural and institutional forms that characterize
the West: the classical legacy, Western Christianity, European languages and a single common language, separation of the secular and
religious authority, rule of law, social pluralism and civil society,
representative bodies and individualism. What makes Western civilization unique according to Huntington is, however, not each of
these features:
Individually, almost none of these factors was unique to the West. The
combination of them was, however, and this is what gave the West
its distinctive quality. These concepts, practices, and institutions have
simply been more prevalent in the West than in other civilizations.
They form at least part of the essential continuing core of Western
civilization. They are what is Western, but not modern, about the
West. In large part, they are also the factors that enabled the West
to take the lead in modernizing itself and the world (1996: 72).

While drawing on Huntington, Eisenstadt, and other comparativists,

my operative model of Western civilization includes various characteristics that Western societies share in common at the beginning of
the twenty-rst century. To be Western, a society should satisfy all
or most of the Western criteria, among which are the following:
1. Permanent and clear borders of state and society.
2. Western image, orientation, ties and membership.
3. Demography of zero or negative population growth, non-familism,
economic regulation of immigration, and a population that is nonWesternized or Westernized to a limited extent.
4. High levels of research and development and an advanced higher
education system.

sammy smooha

416
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

A post-industrial economy.
Separation of military from society.
A liberal or consociational type of political democracy.
Separation between state and religion.
A civic-territorial form of nationalism.
An individualistic and bourgeois way of life.

This is a partial list of characteristics possessed by Western countries.1

It is based on the simple supposition that to belong to the West is
to display all the standard requirements of group membership; namely,
a desire to be a member, admission by that group as a member,
observance of the groups code of behavior and maintenance of
strong relations with group members. The list can serve as a test of
tness to the Western model, and its use would provide an all-round
view of this rather complex issue.2
Applying the Western model to Israel
Israel has been the subject of many macro-analytical studies but none
has dealt with the question of the degree to which Israel is Western.
The implicit assumption of these studies is that Israel is indeed
Western and should be judged by Western criteria.3 The Western
qualications of Israel within its pre-1967 borders will be assessed
below by the above ten criteria of Western society, state and culture.
Permanent and clear borders
The preliminary and most fundamental characteristic of Western
countries is possession of permanent, recognized and peaceful state
borders and an unambiguous membership in society.4 Israel evidently
fails this critical test. It still lives in a hostile environment, has inse-

For a list of indicators of Westernization, see Lauristin 1997: 30. With regard
to individualism as the core value in Western culture, see Triandis 1995.
2
The comparative sociological literature does not identify the Western model
as a distinct social type. Other terms are usually used, including developed, postindustrial, advanced industrial, capitalist and core. See, for example, Lenski 1994
and Hopkins et al. 1996.
3
These studies include Eisenstadt 1985, Horowitz and Lissak 1989, Shar and
Peled 2002, Kimmerling 2001, and Barnett 1996.
4
Divided Ireland is an exception in this area as in some other spheres, the most
important of which is the continued central role of religion in state and public life.

is israel western?

417

cure and internationally unrecognized boundaries, and controls extensive territory beyond the Green Line. Its borders are in dispute, both
internally and internationally. There is a sharp discrepancy in Israel
between state borders demarcated by control and frontiers delimited by sovereignty (Kimmerling 1989).
Israel further fails the related test of clear-cut societal boundaries
that distinguish Western societies. Israel controls over 10 million
people in the area of Mandatory Palestine, but over a third of them
are non-citizen Palestinian Arabs, subject to some form of military
rule. It also has about a quarter of a million foreign workers whose
stay in the country is neither permanent nor temporary. Israel declares
itself the homeland of the Jewish people and extends the automatic
right of immigration and citizenship to any Jew or to any person
closely related to a Jew. This makes 9 million Diaspora Jews and
an additional 34 million persons related to them eligible for immigration and instant citizenship and accords them a certain right of
hold over Israeli society. While 1,025,000 Arabs are citizens of Israel,
their societal membership is not considered full in a society that
denes itself as Jewish. Besides, the Israeli law is applied to a quarter
of a million Jewish settlers in the West Bank and Gaza but not to
the Palestinians there. Horowitz and Lissak (1989) see these ambiguous
territorial and social boundaries as a distinguishing feature of Israeli
society, thereby indirectly conceding the un-Western character of
Israel.
Image, orientation, ties and membership
Israel clearly passes the test of Western image, orientation and ties,
and even membership in the West as much as possible.
Image. Israel projects the image of a Western state. Israels political
and intellectual elites claim that the state is indeed Western in its
culture, economy, political democracy and way of life. The West
and the international community in general reciprocate by viewing
Israel as part of the West.
Orientation. Israel has a strong orientation to the West. When Israelis
think of their conduct and achievements, they always refer to the
West. Public leaders, intellectuals, journalists, judges, scientists, academicians, sportsmen, entertainers and other leading gures evaluate
Israels and Israelis performance by Western standards. In Israel,

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the general statement this is the way it is done in the world means
this is the way it is done in the West.
Israels powerful attraction to the West should not be taken for
granted because there are several good reasons for Israel to shy away
from the West. Zionism, Israels founding and main ideology, lacks
a clear goal to make Israel Western. Among all branches of Zionism,
as well as among the Jewish elites and the Jewish majority, there is
consensus that Israel should be Jewish, democratic and modern; however, none of these three objectives requires Westernization. In addition to Hebrew, Jewishness may refer to Orthodox Judaism, Jewish
heritage, or anything created by Jews, but it does not necessarily
imply the adoption of Western ways and values. The founders of
Zionism and Israel undertook to cast a new Jew and a new Jewish
society that would be unique and exemplary, but by no means clones
of a Western mold.5
The Jews have another strong reason to be reserved about the
West. It is under Western Christianity that they were accused of
killing Jesus, treated as a pariah people and subjected to centuriesold, virulent hatred, persecutions, pogroms and anti-Semitism. It is
in the West, and as recent as the past generation, that the hatred of
the Jews climaxed in unprecedented proportions: a systematic scheme
to exterminate the Jewish people by Nazi Germany, a Holocaust
that the Western powers did little to stop.
Another possible reason that Israel might be reluctant to be Western
is related to its geo-political location. Since it is located in the Middle
East and interested in living in peace with the Arab world, Israel
may feel a need to be integrated into this region in order to be
accepted by the surrounding peoples and countries. By becoming
Western, Israel reveals its alien nature and its objection to Middle
Eastern patterns, which reinforce Arab antagonism.
Despite these potential substantial objections, Israels actual pull
to the West is staggering. Of the Jews polled in a representative public opinion survey, conducted in March 1995 (TSC 1995), 47.9%
wished Israel to be most similar to the United States and Canada;
34.8% to Belgium, France and the Netherlands; leaving insignicant
proportions attracted either to Italy, Spain and Greece (3.4%), and

5
For a succinct presentation of Zionism and its continued relevance, see BarOn 1993.

is israel western?

419

to Jordan, Egypt and Morocco (2.4%) (11.6% did not answer). When
further asked to choose where Israel should be integrated in terms
of culture and way of life, 73.9% preferred Europe and America,
compared to only 9.8% who favored the Middle East (11.0% rejected
both, and 5.3% did not know). In another survey taken in September
2003, 78.0% of the Jews favored Israels integration into the Western
world rather than into the Arab and Moslem states in the region,
and in the area of culture 68.3% preferred Israel to integrate into
Europe-America rather than the Middle East.6
Several key reasons apparently underlie Israelis staunch disposition
toward the West. In their eyes, the contemporary West constitutes
success, richness, abundant opportunity, power, progress, freedom,
protection of individual rights, a sense of morality and advanced science and technology. Western countries dominate the world economy,
politics and media and are at the forefront of cutting-edge developments. Since Israeli Jews identify themselves with all these values
and assets, they want to be Western. They explicitly adopt Western
standards in various areas of life and judge their practices and accomplishments accordingly. They are driven by excellence and take the
successful West as a model of emulation.
Israels rm Western commitment also stems from the substantial
assistance it receives from the West. Many believe that Israel could
not have been created and would not have survived without Western
backing. Israel lives on political, military, economic and moral support
from the West.
The Western composition of the Jewish Diaspora also pulls Israel
to the West. Seven out of the 9 million non-Israeli Jews live in the
West: 5.3 million in the United States and about one million in
Western Europe (mostly in France, the United Kingdom and Germany)
and the rest in other parts of Europe. But the hearts of the two
million Diaspora Jews who reside outside the West (mostly in the
Commonwealth of Independent States and Latin America) lie in the
West, and they would move to the West if forced out and if admitted
to the West. Zionist and Jewish, Israel maintains ties with and receives
ample help from Western Jewry. A non-Western orientation on the
6
This survey was conducted by the author as part of the project of index of
Arab-Jewish relations. It was based on telephone interviews with 700 Jews who constituted a representative sample of the adult Jewish population in Israel. Sampling
error is 3.5%. The eldwork was carried out by Dahaf Research Institute.

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part of Israel may adversely aect the status of the Jews in the West
and harm Israel-Diaspora relations.
The founders and leaders of Israel spoke with admiration about
the West and with contempt about the East. The idea of the Jewish
state, set forth by Herzl, the founder of Zionism, was reminiscent of
bourgeois Austria at the turn of the twentieth century. Jabotinsky,
the leader of right-wing Zionism, and Ben-Gurion, the leader of
labor Zionism and the founder of the State of Israel, expressed a
denite desire to make the new Jewish state European and warned
against the cultural danger posed by the Jewish immigrants from
Arab countries.7
Ties. Israel does not only meet the criterion of being imagined as
Western and oriented to the West but also satises the requirement
of rm and ramied ties with the West. Israel passes this test very
well. Indeed most of Israels current military, commercial, scientic,
technological, cultural, tourist and sports relations are with the West.
In world politics, Israel is part of the Western bloc. It maintains
very close relations with the United States and good ties with Western
Europe. The United States acts as a political protector, defending
Israel in the United Nations and other international forums. It is no
small matter that during the 1980s and 1990s Israel enjoyed onethird of total United States foreign aid, and it is still one of the highest per capita foreign aid recipients. Israels special standing in the
United States also stems from the strategic activity of the Jewish
community in domestic American politics. Thanks to their concentration in urban centers and key states, strong political consciousness
and activity, contributions to campaigns and access to the mass
media, American Jews are able to master political clout that is disproportional to their meager numbers (less than 2% of the population).
Israels perceived and actual ability to inuence decision-making in
the United States, directly or through American Jewry, is an asset
that attracts other countries to Israel in hope that it would intercede
on their behalf with the United States.
Israel is part of the Western global security system. Its military
capability and the threats to its survival are taken into account by

7
For a sample of quotations from Zionist leaders in this regard, see Smooha
1978: 8789.

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421

the Wests defense strategy. The West is committed to Israels survival and counts on its strength for its own defense. For this reason,
Israel can be considered a de facto ally of the West. Israels military technology and tactics are Western. Many Israeli-made weapons
have essential American components and hence their sale is restricted,
requiring the prior approval of the United States. Israel contributes
to the West by testing and upgrading some of the Western weapons.
It also shares in Western intelligence-gathering and in the ght against
terrorism.
The Israeli economy is equally tied to the West, and the bulk of
Israels trade is with the West. In 2002, Israeli imports totaled 33.1
billion US dollars, of which 72.8% came from Europe, North America,
Australia and New Zealand; exports amounted to 29.3 billion US
dollars, of which 74.4% went to these Western destinations (CBS 2003:
Table 16.5). A formal treaty provides for duty-free trade between
Israel and the United States although Israel continues to impose sales
tax and VAT on American goods as a source of revenue and as a
means of protecting Israeli products. Yet Israel is bound by the joint
agreement to gradually reduce these taxes.
Israels cooperation with the West in the area of science and technology is remarkable. Most Israeli scientists are at least partly trained
in the West. They are integrated into the Western scientic networks
and communities and take part in Western research and development
projects.
Israelis are frequent travelers. Although they reach almost every
corner of the globe, most travel to the West, especially to Western
Europe and the United States.8 The only exception to this rule are
the young backpackers, who prefer to go, following their discharge
from the army, to South America or to the Far East, mainly for
budgetary reasons.
Membership. Due to its geographical location in Asia, Israellike
Australia and New Zealand which are located in Oceaniais not
and is not expected to be a member of Western international organizations, especially the Western bloc in the UN, NATO and the

In 1999, 2.3 million trips abroad by Israelis were reported, of which 53.6% to
Europe, 21.9% to United States and Oceania, 12.8% to Asia, 1.8% to Africa and
9.9% were unknown (CBS 2003: Table 23.5).

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EU. It does however maintain close and special ties with them. For
years Israel has waged a failing struggle to join the Western bloc in
the UN because it is denied membership in the Asian bloc and as a
result deprived of representation in certain UN committees and organizations. On the other hand, Israel is not interested in becoming a
NATO member or an ocial US ally, in order not to be limited
in its national security policies and military actions.
Israel is an associate member of the EU, enjoying a favored status
that makes it easier and cheaper for her to trade with Europe (Monin
2003). It is also earmarked to join the new Wider Europe program
of the EU. Full membership in the EU is not a goal that the Jewish
state is seeking, because it may reduce its sovereignty. The EU is
based on the principle of free movement of goods, capital and people.
Most importantly, Israels immigration policy of admitting Jews only
will be annulled. As an EU member and a holy land, Israel may
be ooded by millions of Moslem and Christian immigrants from
Europe. The Palestinian right of return can also indirectly be fullled
through European citizenship.
Israel is a full member of many European organizations. It is a
member of the Council of Europe, a part of EU scientic and
research organs, and a participant in European sports and songs
contests.
It is the vision of Israeli elites to end the Israeli-Arab conict in
order to exit from the Middle East and accede to the Western world.
The conict ties Israel to the region, disrupts its globalization and
inhibits its integration into the West.
Demography
Being a modern and developed society, Israel is basically similar to
the West in demography. To illustrate, in 2001 life expectancy for
men was 76.1 years and for women 80.9 years, and infant mortality
rate per 1,000 live births was 5.1, putting Israel on a par with OECD
and Western states (CBS 2003: Table 28.2).
Israels divergence from the West in socio-demographic characteristics is rather striking, however. Most signicant is the total fertility rate of 2.89 in 2002 (CBS 2003: Table 3.12) that places Israel
much higher than the West which is marked by negative replacement rates. Israels annual population growth, which consists of both
natural increase and immigration, was 1.9% in 2002 (CBS 2003:

is israel western?

423

Table 2.5), compared to zero or even negative rates in most Western

countries. The Israeli population is younger than in the West. In
2002, 28.4% of the population were children under 15, compared
to 20,2% in 2001 in the OECD countries; the aged (65 and older)
constituted 9.9% and 13.3%, respectively, of the two populations
(CBS 2003: Table 2.18; OECD 2003: 67).9
Israel diers appreciably from the West in its familism, namely,
the centrality and strength of the family. Israeli familism is expressed
in universality of marriage, a low rate of divorce, a small percentage
of children born out-of-wedlock, a small proportion of single-parent
families and the lifelong support of children by parents (Katz and
Peres 1986). For instance, in 1995 only 3% of Jewish men aged
4549 and 5% of Jewish women aged 4549 in Israel were never
married (Della Pergola 2004: 30) and in 2001 only 15.4% of all
married couples in Israel got divorced within 15 years of marriage
(CBS 2003: Table 15.4). These Israeli rates are very low in comparison to Western countries. Parents in Israel are expected to nancially
support their children all their lives, and not until graduation from
college or marriage as is practiced in the West (Spilerman and
Elmelech 2003). For this reason parental wealth plays a central role
in the living standards of young adults in Israel (Spilerman 2004).
Contacts between parents and married children are also extremely
common and intense.
Israel also diverges markedly from other Western countries in its
strict ethnic policy of immigration. As a society of immigrants, it
keeps the doors open to Jews and, with negligible exceptions, does
not admit others. For this purpose, it denes Jews in terms of ethnic
ancestry and religion, and ignores economic and political considerations. The 4 million Palestinian Arabs and their descendents who
left as refugees from the area that became Israel in 1948 are denied
the right of return.10 While in Western immigration countries, like
the United States, Canada and Australia, ethnic criteria have also

9
For an analysis of demographic trends in Israel in a comparative context, see
Goldscheider, 2002, and Della Pergola 2004.
10
In 2003 the Knesset enacted a temporary law denying a right to Israeli citizenship to Palestinian Arabs on the West Bank and Gaza who marry Israeli Arab
citizens. The ocial grounds for this human right violation are the use of marriage
as a means for fullling a right of return to Israel and the involvement of some
naturalized Palestinians in terrorism.

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played a signicant role in immigration policies, Israel is unique in

applying such a policy exclusively and consistently. Israel is also
almost alone in extending basic services to immigrants and most
importantly, in granting them automatic citizenship and the immediate right to vote for parliament.11
Furthermore, over a quarter of Israels total citizen population is
denitely non-Western: Israeli Arabs and ultra-Orthodox Jews. The
Arab citizens, who make up 16% of the population, are increasingly
modernizing but have remained either reserved about or opposed to
the West. They regard themselves culturally and nationally as part
of the Arab world and the Palestinian people and do not wish to
be Western. Constituting around 10% of the total population, ultraOrthodox Jews try hard to keep the old ways as much as possible,
to reject Western values and to believe that redemption will come by
strict observance of traditional Judaism. While Western countries do
have non-Western populations, such as indigenous peoples and Islamic
immigrants, none has the substantial proportion that Israel does.
Unlike Western countries, the dominant European group in Israel
has constituted a numerical minority. Jews from Moslem areas and
Arab citizens comprise the majority of the population. With the
mass-immigration to Israel from the former Soviet Union, European
Jews are increasing in number, but they still form a minority of
around 47% of the entire population. This ethnic composition of
the population gives a somewhat Mediterranean look and avor to
Israel, not found in any other Western state.
Another special feature of Israel is the extreme scale of residential
separation along religious-national-linguistic lines. About 90% of its
Arab citizens live in all-Arab villages and towns, and a large majority
of the rest reside in separate Arab neighborhoods within the Jewish
towns. Although this almost total residential isolation is a historical
legacy and substantially voluntary, it has considerable implications

11
Germany is quite similar to Israel in its law of return, extending admission
for settlement, automatic citizenship and support to ethnic Germans. The German
law of return is, however, restrictive when compared to the unrestrictive Israeli law.
It does not give a right of return to Germans who voluntarily left Germany (for
instance, millions of German descendants who live in the West are not entitled to
return). Quotas are also imposed on the number of ethnic Germans who return
annually. For similarities between Israel and Germany on immigration policies, see
Levy and Weiss 2002.

is israel western?

425

for the provision of equal rights and opportunities to the Arab national
minority.
Although Israels demographic divergence from the West has
declined over the years, it has remained substantial.
Research & development and higher education
Advanced industrial societies invest considerably both in research
and development and in higher education. Both are necessary to
maintain and to develop the economy and the high level of services.
Educational standards are rising continuously because of the increasing use of sophisticated computers, communications, automated
processes and technological machinery. The excellence of higher education and attendance rates provide the main key in these societies
for adequate functioning, economic growth and quality of life.
Israel does well in research and development and is at a par with
the advanced West. In 2001, it spent 4.8% of its GDP on civilian
research and development, a very high percentage that puts it at the
very top of countries in the world (CBS 2003: Table 28.14).12 It is
very high and rst in the world on various indicators of information and communications technologies (ICT) and in the registration
of patents (CBS 2003: Table 28.15 and Table 26.8). Israeli scientists publish about 1% of all publications that appear in refereed
scientic journals all over the world in the natural sciences, medicine and technology (Council for Higher Education 1994: 54). On
the index of scientic publications per capita, Israel ranks sixteenth.
Israel also compares well in expenditure on education and higher
education. In 2000, Israel spent 8.2% of its GDP on education (the
OECD average was 5.9%) and 12,508 dollars per college or university student, higher than most OECD countries (CBS 2003: Table
28.13).
Israel underwent a near revolution in the system of higher education in the 1990s. The number of students rose from 76,000 in
1990 to 180,229 (not counting the 36,710 students studying in the
Open University) in 2002, of whom 65.2% were in universities,

12
In 2001 Israels expenditure per capita on research and development was 1,029
dollars (in terms of purchasing power parities) which was 122.7 points compared
to the 100 US baseline points and 23 higher than the OECD rates (CBS 2003:
Table 28.14).

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23.7% in colleges, and 11.1% in teacher training institutions (Council

for Higher Education 2003). The enrollment rate of people aged
2029 in 2000 was 20.1% in Israel as compared to 21.2% in the
United States, 21.2% in Germany, 23.6% in the United Kingdom
and 33.4% in Sweden (CBS 2003: Table 28.3).
About half of the students studying for undergraduate and graduate degrees attend one of Israels seven universities, which are
devoted primarily to research and only secondarily to teaching. These
research universities enjoy full academic freedom and institutional
autonomy, despite the fact that the bulk of their funding comes from
the government. Faculty are hired and promoted according to merit
and scientic productivity, measured mainly by publications in English
in refereed journals. The strict application of these meritocratic standards compels Israeli faculty to seek training in Western universities,
to strive for research grants, to take active part in international conferences, to promote contacts with Western researchers, to spend
sabbaticals and leaves of absence in the West and to compete hard
for publication in top journals.13 This standard is intended to protect Israel against provincialism and low quality. As a result, Israeli
universities can be ranked among the top twenty universities in the
United States in terms of research productivity and publication record.
Economy
Israel fullls the Western economic standards only partially. The
Israeli economy is a post-industrial, market economy that scores
positively on some economic indicators. To mention just a few, 26.4%
of all people aged 15 and over in the labor force in 2002 had
college education (CBS 2003: Table 12.7). Israels occupational distribution in 2002 resembles that of the most industrialized societies:
1.5% were employed in agriculture, 26.9% in industry and 71.6%
in services (professional, technical, managerial, clerical, sales, and
personal and public services) (ibid.: Table 12.19). This favorable structure prevails only in several select countries, including the United
States, United Kingdom and France, in which 66% to 73% of the
13
Israeli scientists non-provincial orientation can be illustrated by their international contacts. In 2001 46.6% of them traveled abroad for two months or more
during the past 5 years (usually for sabbatical years and extended leaves), 85.5%
traveled abroad for up to two months (for conferences and other short-term stays)
and 54.7% hosted foreign scientists (CBS 2003: Table 26.6).

is israel western?

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labor force is engaged in services (Israel Institute of Productivity

1994: 32).
Furthermore, Israel excels in the forefront branches of technology.
It is the only small country in the world that is said to have a nuclear
capability, in both the production and delivery of nuclear weapons.
The development of missiles and communications and medical
equipment is another high achievement. The Western industries of
electronics and computer software are also the fastest growing industries in Israel, contributing to a rising share of the GDP.
Yet, despite all attempts since its proclamation in 1948, Israel has
remained at the bottom of the Western core economies. Israels GDP
per capita in 2001 reached 17,505 dollars, signicantly lower than
the Western average. Israel trails behind the West even in terms of
PPPs (purchasing power parities). In 2002 the PPP per capita in
Israel was 20,437 dollars as compared to 26,300 dollars in Germany,
30,000 in Ireland and 35,200 dollars in the US. Israels PPP per
capita was 86% of the OECD average and its GDP per capita was
83% (CBS 2003: Tables 28.728.9). In 2001 Israel was placed in
the high human development category, that contained 55 countries, on the United Nations Human Development Index; it ranked
22, at the very bottom of the Western countries (UNDP 2003: 237).
In 2002 unemployment reached 10.3% in Israel, double the OECD
rate (CBS 2003: Table 28.5).
The Israeli economy is heavily subsidized by capital imports, without which the standard of living would fall signicantly; many services would have to be cut, which would in turn shift many employees
from services to production.
Lower participation in the labor force is one of the most crucial
reasons for Israels economic under-achievement. Of all people aged
15 and over in 2001, only 54.3% participated in the labor force as
compared to 64.2% in Sweden and 66.9% in the United States
(standardized gures, CBS 2003: Table 28.4). The low participation
rate in Israel, which adversely aects its GDP per capita, is due
partly to the large number of people in the military and partly to
the non-participation of Arab women (only 17.1% in 2002; CBS
2003: Table 12.10) and ultra-Orthodox men.
Israel has been undergoing economic globalization since 1985, and
Israeli governments have voluntarily pursued the economic policies
that are obligatory for EU member states. The policies of privatization and deregulation have liberalized Israeli economy to the extent

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that in 2004 it ranked 29 on the economic freedom index of 161

countries, scoring 2.36 on the 15 scale and placed in the mostly
free category (Miles, Feulner and OGrady. 2004). Despite these
changes, the non-private sector of the Israeli economy is still one of
the largest in capitalist societies93% of the land is publicly owned,
and intervention in the economy by the Israeli government is unprecedented for non-socialist economies. The government maintains a
policy of full employment, owns the public utilities and the militaryindustrial complex, has a very large public service, imposes certain
controls on hard currency transactions (Israels own currency is not
convertible), licenses imports and exports, xes interest rates, supplies
subsidized loans to industrialists and to certain categories of citizens
in need, controls the budgets of local governments, signs wage agreements for the entire work force, collects very high taxes and fees
and renders many services.
Economic globalization and liberalization have augmented inequalities in Israel to alarming proportions exceeding Western levels. In
2002 poverty, dened as a disposable income below 50% of the
national median income, inicted 18.1% of families, 21.1% of adults
and 29.6% of children in Israel. The Gini index of disposable income
inequality was 0.36 and of gross income inequality 0.54 (Institute of
National Insurance 2003). These gures turn Israel into one of the
most inegalitarian countries in the West. The situation worsened
during the second Intifada because of the zero economic growth and
the severe cuts of transfer payments during 2001 to 2003.14
Military
The Israeli military is considered Western in its organization, knowhow, high technology, ghting spirit and subordination to the civil
authority. A closer scrutiny would show, however, its particularity
and deviation from Western standards.
In Israel the military is still a peoples army, unlike the professional
military in the West. Army service is compulsory for both men and
women and some of the men also serve in the reserve army for an

For gures relevant to inequality in Israel compared to other countries, see

the annual report and international comparisons on the website of the Adva Center:
http://www.adva.org.
14

is israel western?

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extended period. Men are not given an option to substitute civil for
military service. Military service is regarded as a cornerstone of civic
status and persons who do not fulll their army dutyArabs, ultraOrthodox Jews, the disabled and evadersare frowned upon and
considered not full Israelis. The military experience is part of being
an Israeli, a quite unique Israeli situation.
Israel diers from the West in having its military central not only
to individual and family life but also to society at large. The military
is a cardinal institution in Israeli society. Seen as a guarantor of
national survival, it commands a lions share of state resources and
9% of the GNP. National security considerations and concerns pervade all Israeli spheres of life. Decisions about layouts of infrastructures, such as highways, include heavy security components. The
relatively large number of children per family is also inuenced by
the high-risk attributed to soldiering in Israel. Free Jewish immigration to Israel is not only fulllment of an ideological Zionist mission
but also a coveted addition to the national ghting capability. A
major obstacle to gender equality is the edge accorded to men for
their military service and combat duties.
The question of militarism poses a critical issue. Some scholars
deny the existence of militarism in Israeli society (Lissak 2001). They
claim that the military, its ethos and commanders, have not grown
out of proportion despite the constant state of belligerency. But even
from a functionalistic-structuralistic perspective, militarism is necessary
for a society that has had to survive in a hostile environment for
over a hundred years. People should be socialized and believe that
the military can solve problems, including territorial-political disputes
like the Jewish-Palestinian conict. Over the years, as both soldiers
and civilians, the Jews have developed an iron wall mentality that
helps them ght the Arabs and makes them insensitive to the Arabs
(Lustick 1996). This is the kind of cultural or civilian militarism that
many Israeli Jews internalize (Kimmerling 1993; Ben-Eliezer 1998;
Levy 2003).
While the military in the West has, over time, become professional,
removed from society and geared to peacetime, the Israeli military
has maintained symbiotic relations with Israeli culture, politics and
society and has been fashioned for protracted violent conict.

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Democracy

Israel prides itself in being the only genuine democracy in the Middle
East, and indeed it maintains a good democratic record. The elites
and general public show a strong commitment to democracy. All
citizens enjoy all types of rights: human rights like dignity and privacy, social rights like social and welfare services, civil rights like
freedom of speech and association, and political rights like the right
to vote and to stand for public oce. The judiciary is impartial and
independent. The Supreme Court is liberal and active in checking
governmental actions. The press is free and highly critical of the
government. The army is under civilian control and does not unduly
inuence political decision-making. While still enjoying a fair amount
of freedom of action, especially in dealing with non-citizen Palestinians,
the secret services are steadily being brought under public scrutiny.
The political parties play an active role, have elected governing bodies
and most of them hold primaries for their heads and parliamentary
candidates. Parliamentary and municipal elections are fair and held
regularly. The civil service and the governing elite are not corrupt.
Israeli democracy has survived deep divisions and wars since 1948
without any severe crisis or breakdown.
These features make Israel a resilient democracy, but not necessarily
a rst-rate democracy. According to the Freedom House 2003 world
surveys of independent countries, Israel scored 1 (rst on a 17
rating) on political rights and 3 on civil rights, and was classied as
a free country (Freedom House 2003). In 2003 Israel Democracy
Institute launched the Auditing Israeli Democracy project for comparing Israeli democracy with 35 Western and non-Western democracies and for monitoring its quality over time. The fundamental
assumption of the project is that the political system in Israel is a
Western democracy. The comprehensive evaluation uses 31 objective indicators as well as public survey attitudes toward democracy.
Since the authors refrain from ranking the countries on an overall
index of quality of democracy, they nd Israel uctuating on the
various indicators and failing to meet high standards:
In comparison with democracies elsewhere in the world, Israels situation ought to arouse concern among proponents of democracy. Although
its relative position in the institutional aspect is good, in general, even
this aspect is not without its problems: voter turnout is decreasing, and
belief in the integrity of government has diminished somewhat. Israels

is israel western?

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problematic area is concentrated in the rights aspect: freedom of the

press is low, infringement of human rights is high (the evaluation
includes the territories of Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip).
The percentage of incarcerated criminals is mounting, inequality in
distribution of income is rising, and the inequality between the Jewish
majority and the Arab minority remains unchanged. Moreover, it is
apparent that comparatively, Israel suers from instability. In sum,
from the relative ranking across all the indicators, Israel may be classied
as a formal democracy that has not yet succeeded in incorporating the
characteristics of substantive democracy (Arian, Nachmias, Navot and
Shani 2003: 296).

The quality of Israeli democracy is worse than this reserved assessment. Israel does not have a constitution or an equivalent of a constitution, and as a result the rights of individuals and minorities are
subject to restrictions. In 1992, the Knesset passed two laws: Basic
Law: Freedom of Occupation and Basic Law: Human Dignity and
Freedom. Although they are each entitled basic law, both were
enacted by a simple majority, and they lack a binding constitutional
authority (Gavison, 1998). Yet the Supreme Court takes advantage
of them in buttressing its judicial activism for broadening the limits
of democratic rights and freedoms.15
Israel is also situated in a permanent state of war. During the
War of Independence in 1948, the government declared a state of
emergency that has never been lifted. Consequently, the government
and the military possess sweeping legal powers, including administrative detention, declaration of curfews, closure of areas, land
conscation, use of military courts against civilians and censorships
and banning of books and the press. These excessive powers are
used to legislate parts of the budget law and to deter and to restrict
minorities and dissidents (Hofnung 1996; Barzilai 2003).
Furthermore, Israel declares itself as both democratic and Jewish.
Along with equal rights for all, Jewish dominance is institutionalized
and Jews are accorded special status. Israels language, holidays, days
of rest, times of remembrance, emblems, symbols and heroes are all
Jewish. Through the Law of Return and immigration policy, the

15
The leader of this undertaking is the President of the Supreme Court, Aharon
Barak. See Barak 1992.

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sammy smooha

state reserves and enlarges the Jewish majority. The teaching of

Jewish heritage, traditions, history and literature are mandatory subjects in the schools. Zionism is a de facto state ideology. The Zionist
organizations (the National Fund and the Jewish Agency), although
they ocially cater only to Jews, are entrusted by the state with certain vital state functions, such as the planning and funding of new
localities and the extension of additional services to the elderly. It is
legally forbidden to form a political party that denies Israels right
to be a Jewish and democratic state, and a party and a person that
take such stand are not allowed to run for Knesset elections.
As a democratic and Jewish state, Israel does not t either model
of Western democracyliberal or consociational. Liberal democracy,
best exemplied by the United States, is built on the principle of
equal individual rights, free association and mixing of people, and
privatization of group statuses. Consociational democracy, typied
by Belgium, provides, in addition to individual rights for all, collective rights for minorities and cultural groups. It is based on the idea
of accommodation through the retention of group dierences, and
the management of disagreements and conicts between communal
groups through negotiation, compromise and power-sharing (Smooha
2002a).
Rather than dealing with its deep Arab-Jewish division through
liberal or consociational democracy, as in the West, Israel resorts to
ethnic democracy, that is, a non-Western system that combines
democratic rights for all with structured dominance of the majority
over the state and its exercise of control over the minority. Inicted
with tensions and built-in contradictions, this political system provides
fewer rights to the minority than do Western types of democracy
(Smooha 2002b).
Israeli democracy does not maintain civic equality, treating Arabs
and women as second-class citizens. Its Jewish character confers a
favored status upon Jews. Non-Jews are seen as outsiders and totally
or partially denied certain entitlements, such as access to some lands
or benets to discharged soldiers. The spread of religious compulsion
imposes restrictions on the non-religious majority and has an adverse
impact on women, because personal status is regulated by religion.
In addition, rule of law is highly decient in Israel. On the one
hand, Israeli law, courts and law-enforcement agencies are shaped
by Anglo-Saxon traditions, operating impartially and eectively.

is israel western?

433

Political corruption, nepotism and bribery are at the same level as

in Western countries and are much less widespread and serious than
in Eastern Europe and developing countries. On the other hand,
there are several major problems in the maintenance of rule of law.
Equality before the law is neither considered as a sanctied norm
nor a well-observed practice. Arabs, both citizens and non-citizens,
do not enjoy the same rights and protection of the law as Jews
(Rattner and Fishman 1998). Some Israeli laws and regulations deny
certain rights and privileges to non-Jewish citizens (Kretzmer 1990).
Another diculty is the inadequate attitude of the average Israeli
citizen toward the law. Whereas a Westerner takes the law as universally strict and obligatory, the Israeli citizen regards the law as
soft and negotiable. When the law is inconvenient, the Israeli tries to
get around it, to bend the regulations and to argue with law-enforcers
(Sprinzak 1986). The Israeli resorts to protektzia (personal favor), when
needed and available, in dealing with the bureaucracy. In the public eyes, the use of protektzia is not considered a law violation or an
infringement of the principle of equality before the law (Danet 1989).
In addition to rank and le illegalism, there is also elite illegalism
(Sprinzak 1993). Some political leaders are prepared to modify or
even deviate from established democratic procedures and laws that
are not in tune with security considerations, partisan interests, or
their own political survival. If many High Court rulings go against
it, the government triesand in many cases managesto amend
the law in its favor in order to avoid the political cost of such rulings.
Law-abidingness and law enforcement in Israel have been subject to
an erosive process over the years (Hanegbi 2004).
The protracted occupation of the West Bank and Gaza casts a
giant shadow on Israeli democracy. Although the 3.5 million Palestinians who live under military rule live outside Israels ceasere borders and do not wish to become Israeli citizens, the fact that they
have been denied civil and political rights since 1967 is incompatible with democracy. Under Israels control, dierential and unequal
laws and separate legal systems apply to dierent populations.16

16
These fundamental deciencies of Israeli democracy, especially its built-in
inequalities and exclusions, prompt some scholars to argue that Israel is not democracy
at all. See, for instance, Ghanem, Rouhana and Yiftachel 1999.

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Religion
The West is by and large secular. The wars between state and religion were fought during the modern era and ended, in the last century, in de jure or de facto separation of church from state. In
consequence, religion is squeezed into the free market to compete
with other institutions for attention, support and money.
In this respect Israel is denitely non-Western. No war has as yet
been waged between state and religion, and the conict is pushed
to the backburner. The population is divided into religious communities and everyone is registered by the Ministry of the Interior into
a single religious category. The ocial religious communities are
entrusted with a monopoly over marriage, divorce, custody of children,
burial and, in the Jewish case, also with the crucial denition of
who is a Jew. The state lavishly funds religious services, synagogues,
religious schools, yeshivas (Talmudic colleges) and a plethora of other
religious associations and activities. It exempts scores of thousands
of yeshiva students from military service and provides them with
tuition and subsistence allowances. The state recognizes and empowers
only Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox Judaism, ignoring Conservative
and Reform Judaism. Public transportation does not run on the
Sabbath and Jewish holidays. The public schools and mass media
are infused with many religious symbols and contents.
This integration of religion and state generates considerable tension among Israeli Jews. To mention just the most serious hardships,
Jewish women are clearly discriminated against in secular Western
terms (some of them are not allowed to marry or are left deserted:
they are neither permitted to serve as religious judges nor as witnesses in rabbinical courts). The ospring of mixed-marriage couples
encounter the hurdles of ambiguous status. Many people are denied
the right to marry because there is no provision in the Israeli law
for inter-faith and civil marriage. Conservative and Reform Rabbis
are neither recognized nor authorized by the state to fulll ocial
religious functions, such as ociating at marriages. Unlike Judaism
in the West, that stresses its universalistic, humanistic and moralistic aspects in an open, competitive environment, the monopolistic
Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox Judaism in Israel is excessively ritualistic, politicized, nationalistic and ethnocentric (Liebman 1993;
Liebman and Cohen 1990).
The central place of religion in state and public life in Israel and

is israel western?

435

the marked measure of institutional religious compulsion run counter

to the limited religious observance by Israeli Jews. Although they are
attached to Jewish traditions (Levy, Levinsohn and Katz 2002), most
of them do not practice religion, even in comparison with American
Jews (Oren, Lewin-Epstein and Yaar 2003). For most of them, Judaism
means Jewishness (membership in the Jewish people) rather than the
Jewish religion. It is more a historic heritage, land, language, customs and folklore than religious beliefs and precepts. Almost all Israeli
Jews think that one can be a full Jew without being religious.
Nationalism
Nationalism in the West is predominantly civic, territorial, subtle,
receding and undemanding. Jewish Israel clearly deviates from this
liberal pattern.17
Unlike Western countries, Israel, as a state and a society, lacks a
nationalism of its own. There is no Israeli nationalism based on a
common citizenship and territory and shared by all Israeli citizens.
There is Jewish nationalism for Jews, and Palestinian Arab nationalism for Arabs. The base of Jewish nationalism is Jewish ethnic
descent, Judaism ( Jewish faith) and the Jewish people (Hebrew language, Jewish history, Jewish culture). This is an ethnic nationalism
of a kind that is widespread in Eastern Europe but is weak in the
West. It is by nature a divisive, less tolerant nationalism, constituting
a rm basis for ethnic democracy, militating against the separation
of religion, nationality and state, and making for a certain degree
of exclusion and inferior status of Arabs and other non-Jews in Israel.
It grants Diaspora Jewry a right of intervention in the internal aairs
of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people. A shift by Israel to
liberal-civic nationalism and to privatization of religion may result
in intermarriage, emergence of a new Israeli nation composed of
Jews and non-Jews, and estrangement of Israeli Jews from Diaspora
Jews. Zionism, Israels ideology of Jewish nationalism, curbs these risks.
While nationalism in the West has been on the decline since WWII
and has been tempered by globalization, regional cooperation and

17
For a discussion of the dierent types of nationalism and presentation of Zionism
in comparative perspective, see Smith 1992b and 1995.

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sammy smooha

unication, and by multiculturalism, Jewish and Palestinian nationalism still run high in Israel. National identities, interests and commitments are still paramount, deeply dividing Jews and Arabs within
Israel and in the region.
In Israel, contribution to the public good is still an ever-present,
major demand; while in the West individual concerns are pivotal.
Israelis are expected to take the national interest into consideration,
not just to cater to their private careers and kin. They are supposed
to make personal sacrices for society, to volunteer for various tasks,
to ght and to die if necessary for the country, to pay high taxes
and to feel guilty when emigrating from the country. Israeli Jews
are also expected to feel a close anity and strong emotional solidarity with millions of Diaspora Jews and to welcome and help new
immigrants, though in fact many feel indierence, even a conict of
interests vis--vis non-Israeli Jews and newcomers. Israeli Jews are
constantly mobilized for national projects, such as the settlement of
the Negev, the Galilee, and even the controversial Golan Heights
and the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The long-term trend points, nevertheless, to a decline in Jewish
nationalism in Israel. Private aairs are increasingly gaining priority
and legitimacy. This is well reected in the spread of the Freier syndrome (the opposite of the pioneer), according to which the Israeli
will not do anything without getting a fair reward for it and will
not let others or the state take advantage of oneself (Roniger and
Faige 1992). Israelis are becoming more and more bourgeois in their
mentality and conduct. Despite this general trend of change of Israeli
society, individualism as a value and a behavior has to compete hard
with collectivistic and communitarian orientations (Roniger 1999)
and nationalism runs high and at a signicantly higher level than in
the West (Don-Yehiya and Susser 1999).
Way of life
The Israeli way of life is still not Western although it is increasingly
becoming so. There is a continuous trend toward the embourgeoisement of Israeli Jews, bringing them closer to Westerners.18 This

18

For discussion of the trend of The Americanization of Israel, see Israel

Studies, special issue, Spring 2000, volume 5, number 1, and especially Azaryahu
2000.

is israel western?

437

Israeli drift toward the West is incomplete, though, and remains far
from eroding the special Israeli way of thinking and behaving.
Israelis resemble other Westerners in their modern way of life. In
2002, 92% of them lived in towns and urban localities (CBS 2003:
Table 2.12) as compared to under 80% of the populations in highincome countries (World Bank 2003). Israeli Jews come closest to
Westerners in the set of values known as the Protestant ethic. They
share with Westerners the belief in the ability to control ones life
and destiny and in hard work, the drive for achievement and excellence, tough competition, a positive orientation toward change and
innovation, setting a high amount of income for saving and wealth
accumulation, a high regard for science and technology, a wide exposure to media, an emphasis on information gathering and learning
and a strong consumerism and materialism. Israeli Jews also increasingly adopt Western leisure pursuits. The young are engaged in pop
music, disco dancing, movie going, television watching and Internet
usage, much like other Western youth. Compared to Westerners,
however, Israeli youth and adults have remained remarkable in their
high rate of book reading, intensive domestic and international tourism,
and a high incidence of beach-going and sun-bathing (Katz et al.
1999).
In some key areas, Israelis dier appreciably from Westerners.
Social relations are still strongly marked by spontaneity, warmth,
personal and non-technical contacts, neighborliness and a sense of
community. These patterns stand in contrast to the alienation and
impersonality that characterize social relations in the West. Israeli
manners are also peculiar. Israelis are known for their directness,
chutzpah, use of rst names, roughness, informal but fashionable
dress, assertiveness, aggressiveness, impoliteness, frequent invasion of
privacy, inattentiveness, interrupting speaking manner and inconsiderate driving. Improvisation is also a common Israeli trait. Israelis
tend not to plan ahead in detail, but leave a wide margin for improvising. They believe in their ability to cope with contingencies and
embarrassing situations.19

19
An exploratory study of software development in Israel reveals the commando
syndrome of Israeli developers. To quote: Clarifying the meaning of the term
commando in the Israeli mind may be best done with a list of terms closely associated with it in the Israeli culture: imaginative, unconstrained, informal, quick,

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Other spheres of life in which Israelis dier appreciably from

Westerners are socio-demographic characteristics, familism, and the
army as a central life-interest that are discussed above.
Factors promoting and impeding Westernization
The overall picture of Israel is of a modern and developed, but only
semi-Western, country. The forces and processes of Westernization
are potent, however. Among them is the overwhelming reality that
the West is Israels best ally and chief source of military, political,
economic and moral support. Israel is strongly attracted to the West
also for being perceived as the most auent, progressive, ethical,
democratic and successful region in the world. The democratization
that Israel has been undergoing increases its resemblance to the West
in political system and values. Besides, globalization draws Israel
closer to the West in economy, politics, law, culture and leisure. The
historical shift toward non-belligerency, despite serious setbacks,
strengthens the Western values of individualism and materialism in
Israeli society. Finally, the Jewish Diasporas current concentration
in the West obligates Israel to attach itself to the West as long as it
retains its vision as the homeland of the Jewish people.
If these forces in favor of Westernization are so diverse and decisive,
why then has Israel not developed as a Western society and what
is inhibiting its development in this direction? Israel as a society was
built by non-Westerners. The origin and life experience of its Jewish
population are basically non-Western. Less than 10% of the present
Jewish population originated from the Westmostly from Germany,
France and the Anglo-Saxon countrieswhereas over 90% hailed
from Eastern Europe and the Middle East. The fact that only a
small proportion of Israeli Jews came from the West or experienced
life in the West rst-hand is true also for the Ashkenazic dominant
group in general and for the leaders in particularthose who have

small-scale, exible, resourceful, front line, hard work, dicult, self-reliant, aggressive,
lack of sense for order and administration, specialized, intensively trained, eective,
action-oriented, trouble shooting, elitist, arrogant, improvisational, reactive,
Commando properties are very useful in product development and focused software problem solving but are less so for long-term business strategy, marketing planning, patient attention to customer needs, or the immersion in dierent cultures to
understand subtleties (Ariav and Goodman 1994: 21).

is israel western?

439

shaped and managed Israeli society from its inception. While these
East European Jews may have been Western in orientation, they
have been preoccupied with concerns incompatible with Western
patterns.
Another key factor is the fusion of ethnicity, religion and nationality
in historical and contemporary Judaism that has precluded the emergence of a new Israeli civic nation grounded in a common territory
and shared citizenship. Despite being a modern, secular and revolutionary national movement, Zionism accepted this peculiar nature
of Jewry because of its East European roots.20
Israel is a relatively new entity that emerged in the mid-twentieth century. It lacks the centuries-long history of Western civilization. Like immigrants and descendants of immigrants to Western
countries, Jews who come to Israel endure rapid change; in Israel,
however, change takes the form of modernization, not Westernization,
because no Western model has been in existence for the immigrants
to follow. With the passage of time, though, Israel may gradually
lose its peculiarities and converge with the West.
The Israeli-Arab conict, which has been part and parcel of Israeli
society from its inception, is a primary factor forestalling its full
Westernization. The implications of this conict are evident in many
areas. To mention just a few, the dispute with the Arab world feeds
the Arab economic boycott of Israel, severely limits investments by
multi-national corporations and deters the government from shifting
fully to pro-market policies because of fear of social dislocations.
National security considerations and survival threats dictate a policy
of Jewish immigration at all costs, maximal mobilization of society,
collectivistic orientation, cohesion and other clearly non-Western
patterns.
Some of these historical impediments combine with other current
obstacles that block Israels way to the West. Zionism still constitutes a powerful force containing Israeli Westernization. It is a nonWestern form of ethnic nationalism which is central in the lives of
Israeli Jews. As such, it magnies the particularistic forces of Jewish

20
Sternhell (1998) analyzes the far-reaching implications of the East European
origins of Zionism for Israeli society. He shows that the project of Zionism was
ethnic nation-building rather than forming a just, socialist society. Shapiro (1977)
also traces the low-rate and formal nature of Israeli democracy to its East-European
origins.

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ethnicity, nation, language and religion at the expense of common

territory and shared civility. As long as Zionism remains the main
ideology of the state, and thus emphasizing its Jewishness, Israel will
encounter diculties in becoming fully Western.
Among Israeli Jews there are a strong political right-wing and a
religious sector that reject Israels Westernization project. They are
suspicious of globalization and orientation toward the West, fearing
their destructive impact on Judaism and on Israels Jewish and Zionist
mission. Religion and Jewish survival and identity are by far more
precious for them than universal values and materialistic success.
They see in the West the evils of anti-Semitism and assimilation.21
Another main stumbling-block is the volatile character of the
Middle East in which Israel is situated. It is an unstable, unreliable
and undeveloped region, making the Jews feel insecure and apprehensive. While they wish to disengage from the Arab and Moslem
world and to be absorbed into the West, they sense the need to
maintain a high level of mobilization in order to secure their survival. The continuity of the Israeli-Arab conict in even a mild form
militates against full incorporation into the West because it slows
down the transformation of Israel from a mobilized to a civil society.
Conclusion
The examination of the issue whether and in what way Israel is and
is not Western aims not only to better understand Israel but also to
raise questions about what is Western, the possible trajectories of
modernization and globalization without Westernization, and the
problematic transformation of post-Communist states.
Western is a sub-category of developed which in turn is a
sub-category of modern. It refers to the civilization of Western
Europe and its derivative settler societies in North America and elsewhere. Western encompasses the set of features distinguishing these
countries. A society outside the original Western bloc is classied as
Western if it displays a minimal combination of these qualities. Like
other concepts in the social sciences, the term Western lacks an

21
Ram (2003) calls this Israeli stream neo-Zionism and argues that it has
become dominant since Rabins assassination.

is israel western?

441

accepted standard denition, but it is possible to identify the institutional characteristics common to Western societies.
A detailed application of the Western model shows that Israel
qualies only partly. Israel is Western in self-image, orientation and
ties, science and technology, higher education, market economy, procedural democracy and Protestant ethic. But it is not Western in the
absence of permanent borders, blurred criteria of membership in
society, high natural increase, centrality of family, focal position of
the military, state intervention in the economy, not-high standard of
living, strong role of religion in public life, lack of robustness of the
law, weaknesses of democracy and salience of ethno-nationalism. The
main causes for Israels failure to become Western are the nonWestern origin of the founding fathers and charter group, the entangling unity of ethnicity, religion and nationality in Jewry, the East
European roots of Zionism, and the need of total mobilization for
surviving in a hostile environment. These inhibiting forces continue
to slow down the ongoing process of Westernization that Israel has
been going through as a result of steady democratization, accelerated
globalization and painful transition to the peace (non-belligerency)
era. Israel in the 2000s is much more Western than it was in the
1950s and 1960s, and it is constantly Westernizing in many areas
of life. Israelis are becoming increasingly more individualistic, materialistic and bourgeois, adopting more openly and fully the positive
and negative traits of the West. Israels Western image, desire to
extricate itself from the Middle East and to integrate into the West
are potent forces that draw it closer to the West.
The Israeli case-study demonstrates that the Western model is not
readily exportable, globalization can occur without Westernization
and the claim of the post-Communist European states for being
Western should be scrutinized. The examination of the Israeli case
rejects the thesis that globalization necessarily leads to homogenization of and convergence between societies all over the world and to
their recasting into the hegemonic, capitalist, Western mold. The
non-Western origin and experience of the Jewish population, the
short-span of Israels development, the protracted Israeli-Arab conict
and the ethnic nature of Zionism are powerful and historically specic
factors discouraging Westernization. Israel responds to the forces of
globalization and close ties with the West by combining emulation
of certain Western patterns with new ways and syntheses.
Semi-Western Israel makes it clear that there are non-Western

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alternatives of development and modernization and that globalization leaves much diversity and localism in the world today. What is
true of Israel may hold true for Japan, China and South Korea in
the Far East and for some post-Communist states in Central-Eastern
Europe.22 A study of the transition of Estonia, for instance, conceives
of its re-independence in terms of return to the Western world,
namely, that Estonia was Western during the inter-War period, was
forcibly annexed to the Soviet-Eastern civilization in 1940, and it
has made its way back to the Western civilization after its liberation
in 1991 (Lauristin and Vihalemm 1997). Although Estonia, like Israel,
meets certain Western criteria, it fails other standards, as evidenced
in its ethnonationalism, the appropriation of the state by its ethnicEstonian majority and the denial of citizenship to most of its Russianspeaking residents (Linz and Stepan 1996). The accession of Estonia
to the EU in 2004, along with nine other countries, would accelerate
its Westernization but it would not necessarily make it suciently
Western. The Israeli case shows that despite globalization, international images and wishful thinking, societal change takes various trajectories and molds, and that there are alternatives to Westernization.

22
For a discussion of the limits of homogenization resulting from globalization,
see Barber 1995, Warde 1994, and Eisenstadt 2003a.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CULTURAL TRANSLATIONS AND

EUROPEAN MODERNITY
Gerard Delanty
A wide range of social theorists have developed arguments for a conception of multiple modernities. These approaches have provided an
important corrective to the association of modernity with Occidental
cultural modernity and the view that modernity succeeds tradition.
In particular, the work of S.N. Eisenstadt has provided a foundation
for a theory of modernity based on globalization and a comparative
historical sociology of civilizations that rejects such dichotomies
(Eisenstadt, 2003a). What remains undeveloped is the application of
this theorization of modernity to Europe. Much of the debate on
multiple modernities has referred to nonwestern modernities and a
good deal of it has been inuenced by postcolonialism (e.g. Gaonkar,
2001). The proposal in this chapter is that theorizing on Europe
itself can greatly benet from the notion of multiple modernities and
that current transformations be seen in light of a wider transformation of European modernity.
To speak of European modernity presents an immediate problem:
given the diverse nature of Europe how can we speak of European
modernity? Is the multiplicity of Europe to be understood as an
expression of multiple modernities? If this is the case, as I believe it
is, the problem then is what is the nature of the relation of the
modernities. Unless every national culture is to be seen in terms of
a model of modernityin which case modernity will be innitively
pluralized to a point the concept losses meaningwe need a conception of modernity that, on the one hand, reects the fact of
dierent forms and routes to modernity and, on the other hand,
retains to some degree a universalistic dimension. Is is possible to
conceive of modernity as entailing multiple forms and at the same
time speak of modernity? This problem has often been discussed in
terms of reconcilling universalism and particularism. In this paper a
case will be made for conceiving modernity in a way that avoids
the universalistic and particularistic dilemma.

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gerard delanty

Drawing from a theory of cultural translations, it will be argued

that modernity entails a particular cultural logic by which translation becomes the very form of culture. Modernity is ultimately the
condition of universal translatability. In this view, what is universal
is the capacity, or cultural competence, to translate cultural particularality. This does not mean the obliteration of all cultural dierences
or the imposition of a universal global culture on the local; it means
rather the emergence of a universal language or cultural framework
into which all cultures can be translated. If all cultures were eradicated by universal translatibility, there would be nothing left to translate and this clearly has not occurred; in fact the opposite has been
the case. As a condition of universal translatibility, modernity arises
when cultures become embroiled in the logic of translation. The key
feature of this is the communicative relation of cultures to each other
via the medium of a third culture. This third cultureglobality,
world culture, universalistic discoursesdoes not necessarily exist as
a distinct overarching culture or a lingua franca, but as a medium of
translation and increasingly is becoming more and more embedded
in local cultures. Throughout history the world religions and universalistic languagesLatin, Sanskrit, Englishserved this purpose
which today is being carried forward by the Internet and ofter media
of communication as well as by new discoursessuch as democracy
and human rights. The result is that cultures are becoming more
translatable.
What is signicant is less the fact of multiple modernities than
dierent modes of cultural translation, which can be related to major
civilizations. Thus, what is often called multiple modernities is best
seen as referring to dierent modes of cultural translation rather than
simply to multiple societal forms. In this view, modernity is a particular way of transmitting culture which transforms that which it
takes over. A central contention of the paper is that European modernity was shaped by cultural translations between its major civilizations which gave rise to dierent, but interpenetrating, forms of
modernity. The European civilizational constellation was based on
an intensive project of cultural translation in which modernity was
engendered in dierent civilizations. Emerging out of this was a transformation of culture itself into the very form of translation.
This chapter develops this argument in three steps. First, I discuss the idea of cultural translation as a sociologically relevant notion.
Second, the idea of cultural translation is related to modernity with

cultural translations and european modernity

445

the argument that the multiple dimension of modernity can be seen

in terms of dierent kinds of cultural translation. Thirdly, a notion
of modernity as a condition arising from cultural translations is applied
to Europe, which, it is argued, consists of a civilizational constellation.
It is shown that European cultural modernity was based on dierent
logics of translation that arose in the encounters between these civilizations. In particular, it was animated by a culture of translatability that gave to Europe some of its enduring characteristics but
which are ultimately to be identied with a condition that is inescapably
global.
The idea of cultural translations
The idea of cultural translations is a relatively new notion in social
theory and is related to theories of translation developed in a variety
of elds of inquiry. The theory of translation can be divided into
four bodies of literature, which can be briey commented on: (1)
linguistics and comparative literature (2) philosophy (3) sociology and
(4) cultural/postcolonial studies.
(1) The most developed use of the idea of translation is in linguistics and comparative literature where it is largely addressed to
the translation of texts (Gentzler, 1993; Graham, 1985; Venuti, 1992;
Venuti, 2000). However, in a few studies within cultural history, the
question of translation has been applied to a broader concept of
culture, but has not been developed beyond some suggestive ideas
(Bassnett and Lefevere, 1990; Cronin, 1998; Shamada, 2002). In
general, the idea of translation remains of the level of the translation
of texts. A major exception being the volume Budick and Iser (1996)
and Assman (1997), but the application of the concept of the translatibility of culture has yet to be developed to modernity.
(2) Within philosophy, there is an important body of literature
stemming from the hermeneutical tradition. A key work in this tradition is H.-G. Gadamers Truth and Method as is Alisdair Macintyres
signal essay on the topic, Tradition and Translation (Gadamer, 1975;
Macintyre, 1988). In recent times, and from a largely postmodern
perspective, there has been a new interest in translation based on
Walter Benjamins classic 1923 essay, The Task of the Translator,
which argued that in translation the original undergoes a change
and something new is created (Benjamin, 1982). The essay introduced

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the idea that in translation an element of foreignness is brought into

culture. The politics of translation has also been discussed as a central
idea within many philosophical works, since Wittgenstein introduced
the idea of language games (Sassower, 1995, see Chapter 5, Translation
as a Political Agenda; Quine, 1960; Fuller, 2002). Postmodernist/poststructuralist conceptions of translations have emphasized more and
more the idea of a radical cultural dimension to translation (Benjamin,
1989).
(3) Within the social sciences, the idea of translation has been an
assumption in much of British social anthropology, although until
recently this has not been acknowledged (Asad, 1986). In sociology
it has been slower to develop, but there have been some important
developments. The sociology of translation was rst presented as a
general methodology within the social studies of science (Callon, Law
and Ripp, 1986). In this usage, translation referred to the process
whereby one thing represented another thing so well that the voice
of the represented was eectively silenced. According to Steve Fuller,
commenting on the idea of a sociology of cultural translations, actornetwork theory is built on it (Fuller, 2000: 367; see also Fuller 2002).
Johan Heilbron has written on the sociology of book translation as
constituting a cultural world system.
(4) Increasingly the idea of translation is making its way into cultural studies/cultural theory and postcolonial studies where it draws
from cultural history, anthropological and philosophical ideas (Cronin,
1996, 1998; Anderson, 1998: 281). The idea of cultural translation
has been most prominently highlighted by Homi Bhabha in his book,
the Location of Culture (Bhabha, 1994: 22435). In a chapter entitled
How Newness Enters the World: Postmodern Space, Postcolonial
Times and the Trials of Cultural Translation, he argues for a conception of translation as the performative function of communication. Central to his discussion, which remains on a purely speculative
level, is the question of the discursive constitution and contestation
of cultural phenomena, such as the Rushdie blasphemy controversy.
Related to this, but not directly discussed by Bhabha, are questions
of symbolic violence and cultural translation. The idea of cultural
translation as initiating innovation has been briey commented on
by Selya Benhabib, in a work on multiculturalism and the cultural
challenge to democratic theory in which she argues against any notion
of radical untranslatability (Benhabib, 2002: 23), and by Stuart Hall.

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One of the most detailed applications of the idea is James Cliords

work on travel and cultural translation (Cliord, 1997). Here cultural
translation is related to the cultural dimensions of globalization, such
as various kinds of localization, hybridization and vernacularization.
(See also Ang, 2003).
In sum, there is yet little of a systematic theoretical nature developed
on cultural translations or little empirical application of the concept.
Yet, the existing literature oers a useful point of departure for an
innovative research programme on multiple modernities. The idea
of cultural translation is more than interpretation and also points to
something more than the cultural hermeneutics of textual translation:
it entails a connection with societal encounters and the process by
which social imaginaries are shaped.
The basic idea to be developed is that translation is inherent in
the very nature of culture, which is not static but dynamic and transformative. The essence of culture in modernity is the translation of
otherness; it is a mode of communication rather than being identiable
with particular norms, beliefs or values. Collective identities and cultures are formed in a continuous process of cultural translation, which
can be understood as a mode of self-understanding based on a relation to otherness. The concrete implication of this is that collective
identities themselves become altered by cultural translations. Culture
is never translated neutrally, but enters into the self-understanding
of collective identities. An analysis of the cognitive mechanisms and
modalities of such translations is important for an understanding of
how culture is constituted.
The capacity for translationof languages, memories, narratives,
experiences, knowledges, identities, religionis the basis of communication, tradition and cultural possibility and entails a continuous
process of social construction. Translation as a cultural process is a
mode of cultural transmission in what is critical is the nature of the
transmission. It has been widely recognised that translation is not a
simple act of replication. As Hans-Georg Gadamer has argued, every
translation is at the same time an interpretation (Gadamer, 1975:
346). The very idea of translation refers to something that transcends
both self and other. In Gadamers words: The horizon of understanding cannot be limited either by what the writer had originally in mind,
or by the horizon of the person to whom the text was originally
addressed (Gadamer, 1975: 356). Translation can never overcome the

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fundamental gulf between two languages, he argued in this seminal

work on the nature of truth, tradition and interpretation. Translation
arises, he argues, because of a need to bridge this gap but it cannot overcome it. While Gadamer makes the point that translation
is never the norm in ordinary communication (which is based on
mutual understanding of a shared language), or even when one
speaker is speaking a foreign language, it is increasingly becoming
the space in which many forms of communication are played out.
Migration, globalization, and new information and communication
technologies have changed the nature of communication to a point
that cultural translation has become a central category.
The suggestion, then, is that the cultural logic of translations tends
towards mixed or, to use a recent term, hybrid cultural forms; it is
a logic of mutations, innovations, appropriations, borrowings, recombinations, transferences and substitution. Cultural translation in this
sense concerns the symbolic and cognitive process by which cultural
aspects of a given collective identity are appropriated by a dierent
one, which will variously adapt, transgure, subvert it. In the resulting
re-codication of identity, new symbolic orders, cognitive structures
and social imaginaries are created. The kind of hybridity that is
suggested by it, in the words of Homi Bhabha, is not simply appropriation or adaptation; it is a process through which cultures are
required to revise their own systems of reference, norms and values
by departing from their habitual or inbred rules of transformation. Ambivalence and antagonism accompany any act of cultural
translation because negotiating with the dierence of the other
reveals the radical insuciency of our own systems of meaning and
signication (Bhabha, 1997). This could be called the condition of
living in translation.
Translation as a cultural process is also about power; as Talal Asad
has pointed out, it presents a challenge to critically examine ones
own language through the lens of another (Asad, 1986: 157). This
is particularly relevant with respect to multicultural encounters where
there can be signicant questions of power at stake in cases when
one cultural form as opposed to another is privileged in the act of
translation. For instance, secularization, which can be understood as
a process of cultural translation, is now a major challenge for multicultural societies to address in terms of democratic politics (Gutmann,
2003). As Habermas, has argued: Secularization that does not vanquish reveals itself in the mode of translation (Habermas, 2001: 29).

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449

The upshot of this is that cultural translations cannot be discussed

without considering some of the negative aspects that may arise from
cultural dierence; that is, the dislocations of culture, mutations and
even pathologies than can result when cultures meet each other.
Whether we are talking about secularization, vernacularization, the
invention of tradition, or multiculturalism, cultural translations can
have a destructive or unsettling moment built into them, producing
reications, racisms, misunderstandings, symbolic violence or misrecognition. It is the nature of cultural translation that they destroy
stable reference points and constitute new locations; producing costs
as well as benets for those who live in their margins. This is to
address the question of failures of translation; whether failures will
result in self-conscious critical awareness, in acts of resistance or
empowerment (cf. Cliord, 1997: 1823). How to achieve reciprocity,
which will have dierent cultural meanings, understanding and justice
is what is at issue.
With regard to the question of European identity, Paul Ricoeur
has argued translation constitutes a model which is suited to the
specic problem that the construction of Europe poses (Ricoeur,
1996: 5). Like Gadamer, he invokes the von Humboldtian idea of
translation as a medium in which one views ones own culture as
foreign. Culture is the capacity to view oneself from the eyes of the
other.
In sum, three generic kinds of cultural translation can be identied,
that is dierent ways culture can be translated: translation of the
culture of the other, universalizing translations, and translations of
the past.
Translations of self and other. Translations of this kind can be a simple
matter of the translation of one culture into another; they may take
the form of an adaptation or a partial, or indeed, whole-scale borrowing. Such forms of translation generally assume a degree of sameness
in the cultural presuppositions of the form of life of the given culture.
With the advancement of civilizations and the encounter of cultures
that are very dierent, a new mode of translation invariably emerges
and is based on a shared system of exchange. In this case the direction of the translation is into a third culture, which serves as a mode
of universal reference. Examples of this, what is often called, syncretism, vary from a lingua franca to a common system of exchange
to universalistic religions. In this case the integrity of the local culture

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is not necessarily in question and can even be protected since the

native culture does not have to translate itself into the categories of
another (see Assmann, 1997; Macintyre, 1988).
Translations of the local and the global. In these translations the local
culture is translated into an overarching universalizing culture, which
in turn undermines the autonomy of the local culture. Examples of
this tendency towards universalization range from money and cartography to nationalizing projects, to the universalistic culture of modernity such as science and law. While this can lead to hegemonic
projects of westernization and uni-linear, or top-down, globalization,
the reverse can also occur, with the translation of the global into
the local. This localization of the global takes many forms, ranging
from vernacularization to hybridization and indiginization.
Translations of the past and present. Since the present is dened by its
relation with the past, this often takes the form of a translation of
the past into the present. Such translations may take the form of
an invention of the past which will entail the construction of an
imaginary past, be it a shared past or the past of another culture;
they also take the form of a logic of renunciation by which the past
is translated into a new symbolic codication. The nature of the
translationwhether it is nostalgic or revolutionarywill depend on
the understanding of the present. The past can be translated into
the shared present time of a given culture or into a globalized present.
The nature of translation thus entails a relation to otherness, to
the universal, and to an origin which are all experienced in terms
of a cultural logic of distance or loss. Translation arises in the rst
instance because of the fact of cultural dierence and plurality, but
never overcomes the fact of dierence. As Gadamer has argued,
translation can never overcome the fundamental gulf between languages. (Gadamer, 1975).
In sum, cultural translations have existed since the beginning of
civilization, but have become increasingly intensied with the rise of
modernity, which has brought about a culture of translatibility in
which all of culture has become translatable. Modernity as a form
of translation comes into play when culture becomes the condition
of translation and when there are only translations. In this cultural
form, translation is more than a medium of communication; it is itself
a form of communication and expresses the condition of culture as
communicatibility.

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Modernity and cultural translations

Rather than dene modernity as a singular or as a multiple condition
it can be dened as a condition of translatability. In this view, modernity is a condition that can exist within cultures as a cognitive form
or structure in which the various parts of a culture are translated
not just into a universal languageas may have been the case in
an earlier modernitybut into each other. The multiple forms of
modernity are nothing more than the diverse expressions of this
orientation towards universal communicatability. Modernities do not
simply exist as coherent or stable units, but are in a constant process
of change. This is due to the nature of the particular forms of interaction, selection, combination, adaptation and processing of cultural
codes, resources, imaginaries etc. While the capacity for translation
has always existed, at least since the advent of writing; it is only
with modernity than translation or translatability, has itself become
the dominant cultural form. Prior to modernity, translation served
the function of communication and was not the basis of a given culture. The tendency to multiplicity within modernity was always present, but is only becoming fully apparent today when the logic of
translation has extended beyond the simply belief that everything
can be translated into a universal global culture to the recognition
that every culture can translate itself and others.
In my view this represents an advance over some of the current
notions of multiple modernity, such as conceptions of global modernity, hybrid modernity, entangled modernity, alternative modernities.1 By pluralizing modernity into multiple modernities, the concept
is in danger of being emptied of its specicity and, taken to an
extreme, it comes indistinguishable from nations; restricting it to a
singular form, on the other hand, runs the risk of failing to address
the diversity of societal models and civilizational contexts. The argument of this paper is that modernity should be dened neither in
the singular nor in the plural as such; it is a condition that arises
as a result of universal translatability and expresses itself in the belief
that every culture can translate itself and others. Modernity is

1
See for example Gaonkar (2001), Taylor (1999), Eisenstadt (2000b, 2003a),
Pieterse (2004), Dirlik (2003), Therborn (2003), Featherstone et al. (1995).

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specically dened by a mode of cultural translation in which culture is itself a mode of translation. Modernity might be seen as a
condition in which the form of culture is one of translation. The
encounter of self and other, local with the global, past and present
takes multiple forms, determined largely by the forms of cultural
translation inuenced by civilizational patterns and historical interactions and conicts. This suggests an isomorphic view of modernity; that is, an approach that stresses common features amongst
diverse elds. It needs to be said that the suggestion of uniformity
in it is neither an homogenizing nor a harmonious one: it is a social
isomorphism of structurations, mechanisms, translations and processes
rather than a condition that is simply either heterogeneous or homogeneous. In other words, it is a uniformity only in socio-cognitive
structures, forms of consciousness, legitimation processes and certain
kinds of practices and rationalities; in sum, particular modes of translation. Modernity entails common ways of doing things, certain universalistic values such as democracy; but uniformity does not extend
beyond these levels since the global is appropriated, or translated,
dierently by the local. This is an attempt to explain how modernity emerges in dierent places, at dierent times, and in dierent
societal forms without recourse to either an inexplicable notion of
heterogeneity or an over-deterministic notion of homogenization. The
multiple crystallizations of modernity cannot be explained monocausally by reference to a homogenizing and linear evolutionary
process of modernization to which all societies adapt. It is neither a
question of convergences nor of divergences, but one of the diusion
of a culture of translation by dierent societies by social actors. The
argument, then, is that modernity derives from the fact that social
actors all over the world are increasingly dening themselves by
reference to global culture. But in doing so, they are not all saying
the same things; andto make this more complicatedglobal culture
is not constant but evolving, since translations are never static, for
people continuously reinterpret their situation in light of their ongoing encounter with others. The proposal I am making, then, is to
see globalizationas a process that intensies connections, enhances
possibilities for cultural translations and deepens the consciousness
of globalityas the principal motor of modernity.
Integral to the project of modernity is a culture of translation.
What we are witnessing today is the completion of the transformative
project of modernity whose origins go back to the axial age (Eisenstadt,

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453

1986b). If modernity arises in the encounter of the particular with

the universal, the local with the global, it can be found in many historical contexts. The European Renaissance, Enlightenment, the social
movements of the nineteenth century were all expressions of this
movement, which today has spread across the globe in a process of
continuous social transformation. The forms, inter-relations and
dynamics of modernity are varied and uneven, but underlying them
is the most basic impetus towards self-transformation, the belief that
human agency can radically transform the present in the image of
an imagined future. This view of modernity as a break from the
past seems to accord with the major philosophical and cultural understandings of modernity as a dynamic process that has made change
itself the dening feature of modernity (Habermas, 1987; Heller,
1999). Modernity is thus a particular kind of time-consciousness which
denes the present in its relation to the past which must be continuously re-translated; it is not a historical epoch than can be periodized. Modernity unfolds in dierent ways, according to dierent
paces, modes of translation and can take multiple societal forms.
Viewed in this light, there is a possible solution to the perplexing
question of whether modernity had an independent origin in the
non-Western world; for example whether there a tradition of civil
society and the public specic to Muslim societies. While historical
instances can be found of tendencies towards modernity, the inescapable
conclusion is that although modernity in Muslim societies evolved in
the encounter with the Westwhether through colonization or cultural
diusionit is possible nevertheless to speak of independent societal
forms of modernity; that is, diverse local responses to globality.2 This
is also true of debates about human rights and other discourses of
rights in the rest of the world. Universalistic notions of rights and
particularistic cultural traditions are today mutually elucidated in
each others discourses (Cowan et al., 2001).3
Globalization can be dened simply as the intensication of modernity across the entire world which is becoming a mosaic of cultural
translations. Global modernity is the emergent form of modernity

2
See the growing literature on civil society in non-western societies and especially in Isalmic societies, Eickelman and Salvatore (2002), Hann and Dunn (1996),
Kamali (2001), Chambers and Kymlicka (2002), Hoexter et al. (2002).
3
We also have every reason to be sketpical of false notions of relativism (see
Cook, 1999).

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today and is nothing more than the fact of intensied interconnections resulting from accelerated social transformation, new possibilities for cultural translation and diminishing boundaries between
the dierent parts of the world. Global modernity can be examined
by reference to such processes of cultural translation such as crossfertilization and societal interpenetration, dynamics of dierentiation
and integration, producing convergent or divergent patterns. Its diverse
forms are varied and shaped by what ever responses localization
generates. This connection of the local and global has been much
discussed by authors such as Appadurai (1996), Hannerz (1996),
Friedman (1994), Robertson (1992) and Tomlinson (2000) and does
not need to be repeated here other than to stress that globalization,
which entails agency, is articulated in local contexts, leading dierent
kinds and degrees of indigenization, creolization, vernacularization,
hybridization, cosmopolitanism, transnationalism. Viewed in this way,
modernity is globally inclined but is neither universal nor western.
Modernity is not universalistic; it does not rest on a universal moral
or cultural foundation; as a tendentially global dynamic and consciousness, it is as much an agent of localization/particularization as
universalism. Yet, on the other hand, it intensies the longing for
universalistic ideas and frameworks, while making their realization
dicult, if not impossible.
Global modernity does not yet exist as what Niklas Luhmann has
called a world society, but only as a set of diverse trends (Luhmann,
1990). However, what we can say is that global modernity is the
primary form of modernity today, for modernity is no longer dened
by reference to premodern civilizations or traditions untouched by
any dimension of modernity. Modernity has had an impact on virtually every part of the world, including indigenous societies, which
have been transformed by the impact of world culture and have to
reinterpret their own culture in this light. The self-transformative
impetus of modernityin capitalism, in science, in state formation
and democratization, in technology, in communications, in collective
identities and cultural patternshas been multilinear and uneven,
but it has had its impact on almost every corner of the world and
has led to a modernity that is no longer specic to any nation, society
or culture. The advent of a now more fully globalized modernity
has in fact allowed many parts of the world, societies and groups to
reconstruct themselves in the image of modernity.
In sum, I am arguing that what is often called multiple moder-

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nities is best seen as referring to modes of cultural translation. It is

also not the case that modernity is converging into a unitary, homogenous form; rather modernity denotes an isomorphic condition of
common aspirations, learning mechanisms, visions of the world, modes
of communication. As such modernity can arise anywhere in the
world; it is not a specic tradition or societal form but a mode of
processing, or translating, culture. Modernity is particular way of
transmitting culture that transforms that which it takes over; it is not
a culture of its own and therefore can take root anywhere at any
time; this is because every translation is a transformation of both the
object and the subject. The essence of modernity is a capacity to
transform culture in a continuous process of translation. This will now
be considered with respect to Europe and its modernity which, I
argue, was characterized a culture of translatability that was embedded
in its civilizational form.
European modernity as cultural translation
On the basis of the preceding remarks the thesis can be advanced
that European modernity can be theorized in terms of a model of
cultural translation. Of course, this is not unique to Europe, for all
civilizations have entailed cultural translations of dierent kinds, such
as those mentioned earlier. The argument made here is that what
is particularly characteristic of Europe was the creation of a culture
of translatability and that Europe and its modernity is ultimately
nothing more than this condition of living in translation. Europe is
better dened in terms of its mode of cultural transmission than in
a particular cultural heritage, origin or content.
But what is Europe? To speak of Europe is to refer to a civilizational constellation of dierent but interrelating civilizations. As
a constellation, the term Europe refers to a juxaposed rather than
a xed or integrated cluster of changing elements, which do not
have a common foundation or underlying meaning.4 Europe is a
term that is best used to refer to the relation amonst things that are
dierent and all that constitutes its reality is precisely the mode of
relating to otherness, a relation that includes a relation to its own
4
The term concellation is used here in the way Adorno adapted it from
Benjamins usage.

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history. The European civilizational constellation is a constellation

in this sense of a structure or gestalt that is apparent only in multiple links. As a result of centuries of cultural translations, the civilizations of Europe are overlapping and interpenetrating. Viewed in
this way, we can arrive at a more dierentiated view of modernity,
which cannot be equated exclusively with the Occidental Christian
civilization, which is merely one civilizational form and one that itself
has been greatly shaped by Eurasian inuences. One of the most
striking features of European civilization is the fact that its three
major historical reference civilizational pointsAthens, Rome and
Jerusalemwere not particularly European in the western sense of
the term European. Classical antiquity and origins of Christianity
were Mediterranean (with a strong North African dimension) and
even more, they were also Eurasian.5 It was not until the separation
of the Roman and Byzantine Christianity from 1054 that the equation of the former with Europe, understood as the Occident, became
established. This Occidentalization of Europe, should not allow us
to neglect the fact that Europe is not essentially western. Fernand
Braudel showed how much Europe was embedded in the wider
Mediterranean worldwhich included north Africa and the western
regions of Asiauntil the sixteenth century (Braudel, 1972).
According to Rmi Brague, in an important study, this European
culture was in fact more Roman than Christian and its central feature was it capacity to transform otherness. The Romans have done
little more than transmit, he argues (Brague, 2002: 32). Roman culture was based on innovation, commencement, a search for the new.
To say that the European are Romans is the contrary of identifying
Europe with a great ancestor, he argues; it is to recognize that
fundamentally Europe has invented nothing, but simply has learned
how to transmit the cultures of others. Thus what distinguishes Europe
is its mode of relating to itself, which is one of distance, Brague
claims. Europe constantly has to confront a consciousness of having
borrowed everything from sources that can never be regained. Brague
associates with Rome a form of cultural translation in which something new is always created in the act of interpretation.6 Where
5
Neither the Greeks nor the Romans considered themselves Europeans as such.
On the history of the idea of Europe, see Delanty (1995a).
6
Curiously, Wachtel has made this claim too about Russian civilization (Wachtel,
2001: 64).

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457

Brague sees this culture as emanating from the Roman heritage, I

see it as having a wider resonance in the European civilization constellation and having an earlier origin in Hellenization.
This may be the answer to the problem of how it is that the roots
of Europe are not Occidental: Europe is better dened in terms of
its mode of cultural transmission than in a particular historical origin or content. The point to be emphasized, then, is that modernity was given a particularly strong foundation in certain cognitive
dimensions of European civilization, in particular in those forms that
allowed the Europeans to take over, transform and make their own
of the culture of others. It was this capacity to invent and transform
culture that allowed Europe to orient itself more fully than other
civilizations to world culture, even to the point of equating itself with
world culture. In Europe translations became a primary cultural
form, rather than a medium for the communication of a content.
The history of Europe can be seen in terms of a series of translations of culture, beginning with the translation of the non-European,
a category which frequently included what in later times would be
European, translations of the pastranging from renaissances, reformations and revolutionsand translations into universal systems of
meaning, such as science and law. These translations were constitutive of a culture that was transformative; they did not involve simply transference of meaning from system of reference to another but
involved negation, rejection, repudiation. European cultural translations did not occur within a neutral medium or lead to authoritative translations. Some of the major translations were the basis of
revolutions or disputes over the nature of authority and others lead
to major transformations in European self-understanding. The translation of the Other was often as likely to be a translation of the self.
It is thus possible to suggest that modernity inherited this heritage
and made it the basis of a new culture.
The Enlightenment, for instance, was in many respects possible
only by a relation to otherness. The extreme interpretation, and in
my view now discredited interpretation, is that the Enlightenment
was based on an orientalization of the East, which was the necessary
Other for the European We to be dened and a strategy of colonial domination. While there is little doubt that the western heritage
was used to legitimate imperialism and that in many cases it entailed
a fantastication of the nonWestern Other, a more dierentiated
analysis is needed. The category of Otherness in Enlightenment

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thought can equally well be seen as an expression of the distance

that many Europeans were to their own culture, which they could
view only through the eyes of the Other. This Other was indeed
very often the Orient, as in Montesquieus Persian Letters, but in this
case and in many others it was a critical mirror by which the decadence of Old Europe could be portrayed. In many other cases the
attempt for genuine understanding of the ancient cultures of Asian
cannot be underestimated, not least because much of the Enlightenment
culture was formed in precolonial contexts, such as eighteenth and
early nineteenth-century Germany (Clarke, 1997; Halbfass, 1988). It
was the capacity for distance that gave a crucial cultural foundation
for the critical and reexive dimensions of modernity to develop.
European cultural modernity thus came to be very strongly associated
with the critique of tradition and scientic reason. This was as likely
to be used against Europe and as much as against the non-European.
It is important to note that the capacity for cultural dialogue, transcendence and critique is not something exclusively western European
and is present in many other traditions and is especially integral to
the wider European civilizational constellation, which includes Jewish,
Byzantine and Islamic traditions as well as in the wider world.
Cultural translations have been central to these traditions but it is
undoubtedly the case that their modes of translation did not lead
directly to a culture of translatability as such. The Judaism has been
based on a preservation of the old; the Islamic tradition has been
based on a strong belief in the veracity of the translation. The
Byzantine tradition did not survive the passage to modernity, save
that which has survived within the Orthodox churches. But to draw
the conclusion that the western European tradition was the basis of
the culture of modernity would be wrong. That culture itself would
have been inconceivable without its encounter with those other civilizations within the wider European constellation. As a culture of
translations, Europe engendered a culture that could never be completed and which could never be entirely possessed by Europeans.
If this analysis is correct it leads to the crucial point that European
modernity can be identied by a mode of cultural translation rather
than by reference to a particular cultural content (such as Christianity)
or to allegedly universal norms (such as human rights or democracy)
or territory or forms of statehood. Because of the dierent civilizations that make up the mosaic of Europe and the fact these were
embroiled in each other through centuries of translations, Europe

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459

must be seen as a constellation consisting of links rather than stable

entities or enduring traditions. In emphasizing the role of translations in this, I have attempted to draw attention to roots of modernity in the European civilizational constellation.
Conclusion: The idea of a post-Western Europe
A perspective on European transformation based on the theory of
multiple modernities and cultural translations oers a new view of
the current situation. It highlights the deeper civilizational context
of modernity and its major social transformations. In concluding
this paper, I would like to remark in a speculative manner on the
reshaping of Europe in a post-Western direction. Especially in light
of the on-going enlargement of the European Union and more extensive relations with Russia and the Islamic crescent of Eurasia as
well as with north African countries, the likely prospect of Turkeys
eventual membership of the EU, Europe can no longer be dened
exclusively by reference to the West. The wider global context, too,
makes the very notion of the West increasingly questionable, in
particular with growing dierences between Europe and the USA.
A now increasingly more condent European Unionwith ever
stronger ties between France and Germanyno longer sees itself as
the eastern frontier of the USA. As the Cold War becomes a fading
memory for many peoplein the way the Second World War has
already lost its capacity to dene the European social imaginary
new cultural models and imaginaries will arise. Given the role of
war in the shaping of modernity and in particular in codications
of European identity, we can expect that the outcome of the war in
Iraq will have implications for European identity.
The skeptics will of course say that the EU does not need such
an identity because it is merely an inter-governmental organization
and that there can be no European transnational culture however
desirable it might be (Seidentop, 2000). What such perspectives neglect
is that the logic of Europeanization extends beyond the institutionbuilding projects of the EU. Moreover, national societies have themselves been transformed by the many dimensions of globalization
as well as by the EU. Already there has been a major reworking
of borders and frontiers within the existing framework of the EU
(Dingsdale, 2002; Zielonka, 2002). As a result of the enlargement

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process and the wider processes of globalization, it now appears that

the eastern frontier of the EU is becoming, like borders elsewhere,
more and more porous. This represents a major shift in the identity
of Europe, which has historically been based on a relatively closed
eastern frontier (Delanty, 1996a; Whittaker, 2000). A signicant factor in this is a move towards more positive attitudes of Islam, which
has often been regarded as the Other of Europe (Delanty, 1995a).
The global institutionalization of modernitythe world-wide impact
of modernityhas meant that the civilizations of Europe have all
been transformed by the enhanced momentum of globalization and
are losing their distinctiveness. But more importantly, within the
European context, the major social transformations of the past decade
or so have led to new encounters between the European civilizations.
As a result of the end of communism and the subsequent democratization and formation of market economies in post-communist
space, the expansion in information and communication technologies, the enlargement of the European Union and other developments,
European modernity has entered a new phase and which cannot be
understood simply as a project of westernization. It is unlikely that
in the increasingly global world that it will make sense to speak of
a new European civilization, but there are many indications of cosmopolitan currents that are constitutive of a new modernity.
The current transformation of modernity in Europe is taking place
under conditions of globality, but is also shaped by increasing intersocietal, cross-cultural fertilization and civilizational interpenetration.
In my view, of particular importance are new relations between
Europe and Asia. In consideration of the fact that two European
civilizations have contained within them a major Asian component
and the fact that due to multiculturalism and transnational migration today Asia is integral to western Europe, it can be suggested
that we are witnessing a de-occidentalization of Europe. If it is
correct that the cultural translations that have been constitutive of
the European civilization made possible a form of translation, decisive
for modernity, that consisted of the capacity to view ones own culture as other, then it follows that cosmopolitan pluralism is integral
to European modernity.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CENTER-PERIPHERY, CREOLIZATION
AND COSMOPOLITANISM
Ulf Hannerz
The idea of multiple modernities presumes that the
best way to understand the contemporary cultural
worldindeed to explain the history of modernity
is to see it as a story of continual constitution and
reconstitution of a multiplicity of cultural programs.
Eisenstadt (2000b: 2)

Shmuel Eisenstadt is a sociologist who has engaged in a continuous

long conversation with anthropologists, and who has always maintained an analytical concern with society as well as culture.1 As
a sociologist, he has been more inclined toward a birds-eye view
and a long-term view of human life, while anthropologists, at least
as ethnographers, may often be more inclined toward the concrete
minutiae of the local here and now. Yet at least some of us also
have a macro-anthropological inclination, concerned with the big
picture, the best way to understand the contemporary cultural world,
And Eisenstadts sense of that world as shaped by diversity and ux,
and the narrative of multiple modernities he suggests, we may then
nd quite congenial. On the whole, the latter may be the story whose
narrationthroughout my career as an anthropologistI have contributed to.
In what follows, as a contribution to that interdisciplinary conversation, I will review and reect on some of the conceptualizations
which have been central to my endeavors over the last quartercentury or so (in fact, about the period that I have known Shmuel
Eisenstadt) as I have grappled with sociocultural aspects of what,

The conversation with anthropologists began, one might note, when Eisenstadt
was a postdoctoral scholar at the London School of Economics, in 194748 (Eisenstadt
2003a: 12).

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more or less during that period, has been labeled globalization:

center-periphery relationships, creolization, and cosmopolitanism.
These are notions which have been under some debate in the human
sciences, across several disciplinesanthropology, sociology, cultural
studies and othersand taking stock of where the debate stands, or
at any rate recording my own understandings of it, may be an appropriate oering to my respected friend. Shmuel Eisenstadt has consistently incorporated center-periphery structures as important elements
in his view of civilizations; while creolization may not have been
part of his own analytical vocabulary, it seems to match his interest
in cultural creativity; and cosmopolitanism as a cultural orientation
shows up briey here and there in his writings, more recently following his identifying it as a source of ambivalence in the contemporary
world. Besides, a recent sociological commentator on cosmopolitans
has argued that they typically imagine the world from the vantage
point of frequent travellers, easily entering and exiting polities and
social relations around the world (Calhoun 2002: 89). Perhaps that,
too, might make it a topic of some personal interest to a scholar
who also tends to gure as a frequent ier in the folklore of the
global academic community.2
Center and periphery: the spatial asymmetries of culture
It seems right to begin with concepts of center and periphery, as
they are fundamental in the discussion of creolization and cosmopolitanism and their history, in a way, intermeshes with Eisenstadts
biography, in that one of his mentors, Edward Shils, is responsible
for introducing the center-periphery pair of concepts into the vocabulary of academic social science. Eisenstadt (1987: 6574) himself
has written about center-periphery relations in small European states
and perhaps it is to some degree because I am from one of these
states that I am acutely aware of such relationships.
I will begin with a recapitulation of history.3 The spatial organization of inequalities in the world has been an enduring theme in

2
I cannot refrain from noting here, too, that it was Shmuel Eisenstadt who at
one time, noting my travel habits, persuaded me that I should get an airline bonus
card.
3
I draw here partially on Hannerz (2001).

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463

scholarship, and concepts of center and periphery have been in the

scholarly vocabulary for a considerable time. Perhaps by now, however, the sense of their origins may be fading away, and our assumptions about these terms may not be entirely obvious or shared.
Principal sources may be half-forgotten by some of us and only
vaguely known to others, although still contributing to the intellectual
load of the terms we use. Let us note, then, that there has actually
been a cluster of related conceptual pairscenter and periphery
but also core and periphery, metropolis and satellite, metropolis and
province. And if we remember who inserted what pair into the
relatively recent past of social thought, and the contexts of their
appearance, we realize that they have not been simply synonyms.
Shils paper Center and Periphery appeared in 1961, but there
was a close anity between it and a number of his other publications around that time.4 The overall conception of society and culture in Shils perspective was consensualist; but was not, he asserted
in a later comment, merely a facile expression of the mood of an
era. In his view, the importance of consensus to social life had been
underestimated (Shils 1975: xi). Thus he concentrated on notions
such as tradition, ritual, deference, and charisma.
Notably, in his Center and Periphery paper, these two terms
were used in a metaphorical sensecentrality had nothing to do
with geometry and little with geography. The center was identied
with what was ultimate, irreducible, and sacred in the realm of symbols, values and beliefs; it was also identied in the realm of action
with those roles and institutions which embodied such cultural understandings and were most actively engaged in propagating them. Yet
in Metropolis and Province in Intellectual Life, published in the
same year, the facts of uneven spatial organization which are now
usually linked to concepts of center and periphery become clear, and
are set in what we would now describe as a transnational context.
Drawing on his study of the situation of intellectuals in India, Shils
argued that in their minds, people have varyingly extensive maps of
the world signicant to them, and that a major feature of such maps
would be their portrayal of ones qualitative proximity to or distance
from the metropolis (Shils 1972: 356).
4

Mostly these are available in more recently published volumes of Shils

collected writings, especially Shils 1972 and 1975. As these may be more conveniently
accessible than the originals, I will use them in citations here.

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In the former of these two papers, then, the center is a locus of

excellence, of grace; the periphery defers to it. In the latter, the
metropolis is a center of vitality, a seat of creativity. The province,
on the other hand, Shils notes, is frequently taken to be in itself
rude, unimaginative, awkward, unpolished, rough, petty, and narrow
(1972: 357). Cultural salvation lies in involvement with the metropolis.
The choice seems to be one between impoverished autonomy and
enriching dependence.
If Shils was a theorist of consensus and cultural authority, the
metropolis/satellite and core/periphery pairs, as introduced into the
debates of the 1960s and 1970s, pointed in an entirely dierent
direction, resonating with another political mood. Metropolis and
satellite were the terms used by the economist Andre Gunder Frank
(e.g. 1967), engaging with the growth of largely Latin American
dependency theory. And then in the 1970s, introducing world-system
theory, Immanuel Wallerstein (e.g. 1974) contrasted core with
periphery.
Both Frank and Wallerstein were primarily concerned with political
economy, and with the expanding control and exploitation of the
material resources of the periphery or satellite on the part of
the core or metropolis. Seemingly, the points of view represented
by Shils, on the one hand, and by these two writers on the other,
were not often brought into direct confrontation. Over the years,
however, they may have come to interact and blend with one
anothersometimes in imprecise, half-understood ways. By now, if
center-periphery concepts are more passingly referred to, or criticized, in scholarly argument, it may not even be entirely clear which
of the varieties is involved; if not some opaque and perhaps unlikely
combination of them.5
Clearly there is a eld of tension here between studies focusing
on distributions of material assets and the exercise of power on the
one hand and studies of culture on the other; between views suggesting consensus and views emphasizing conict; and between views
treating the social organization of meaning and meaningful forms
somewhat in isolation and other views which insist on setting it in

One might note that a recent encyclopedia of anthropology links center-periphery

concepts only with socio-economic structures and world system theory, and makes
no reference to the Shilsian tendency (Barnard and Spencer 1996: 597).

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

465

the context of political and economic structures. Probably all would

accept, however, that centers and peripheries imply each other. We
are dealing with relational phenomena: there is no center without
periphery, no periphery unless there is a center. And the particular
way the center is a center is also reected in the way the periphery
is a periphery.
If, however, our conception of center-periphery relationships is
that they are relationships of inequality existing in geographical space,
such relationships can be dened at very dierent levels of specicity.
At present the extreme macroview may be that of a center North
and a peripheral South. Much of the cultural and political debate
over center-periphery relationships, involving notions such as Orientalism, Occidentalism and Eurocentrism, remains mostly at such levels
of identication. Alternatively identications may indeed be made at
the national level: the United States or France are seen rather more
as centers than Sweden, Romania, or Burkina Faso. And in other
instances, centers are yet more specically placed. World cities,
such as New York, London or Paris, may be seen as generalized,
multi-purpose centers, combining various kinds of power and drawing the attention of the periphery for many dierent reasons. The
contemporary global structure of center-periphery relationships, however, can be understood as more internally dierentiated. Cities or
regions may be centers in particular ways to particular people, dispersed in a transnational peripheryRome to the Catholic world;
San Francisco to gay people not only from elsewhere in the United
States, but also from other continents; Silicon Valley to people in
the information technology business. As we see, attachments of very
diverse kinds are involved. The contemporary proliferation of centerperiphery relationships of transnational reach is undoubtedly related
to a greater ease of transportation and communication, making centers
easy to get to, and easy to stay in touch with. As the participants,
practitioners, adherents, activists and employees of more subcultures,
life styles, ideologies, disciplines, occupations, or corporations use new
means to extend their circles beyond local or national habitats, new
far-away centers are discovered, or even made.
There seems to be much to suggest that concepts of center and
periphery can be very useful in the continued mapping of the global
sociocultural landscape. It is striking, then, that we now rather frequently hear voices criticizing center-periphery concepts, or proposing
the decline of center-periphery structures. It is said that the world

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economy is becoming increasingly decentered. Human life, it is also

argued, is increasingly deterritorialized. People move quickly between
places, are rooted in none of them, and have relationships that belong
to no place in particular. As would-be centers and would-be peripheries are closely in touch, by way of electronic media or jumbo jets,
the cultural lag that previously divided them is no longer there.
Even if they are sometimes closer to futuristics than to the really
existing world, there may be something to such arguments. Asymmetries
may indeed only be relative, culture ows are not entirely one-way,
the world is crisscrossed by more symmetrical relationships as well,
and there are many centers, and many kinds of centers, rather than
only one. Centers also rise and decline. At times, however, both the
concepts criticized and the alternatives to them need to be elaborated
more precisely. Indeed we must be sensitive to the ambiguity of our
terms, and to the actual range of variations out there. But centerperiphery conceptualizations now deserve to be scrutinized and developed, rather than merely rejected. It is notable that the end of centers
and peripheries appears often proclaimed by commentators whose
own vantage point is at the centerin this case not a privileged
position.
It is in the nature of their asymmetrical relationship that center
and periphery take dierent views of it, and may even be dierently
aware of it. A periphery has to attend to its center. The center for
its part may at times be preoccupied with its internal aairs, hardly
even noticing that the periphery looks in over its shoulder, and may
not have a clear grasp of the more widely dispersed consequences
of its actions. The periphery tends to have a more developed, more
detailed, sometimes more imaginative and sometimes more knowledgeable idea of the center than vice versa. (This is obviously a spatialized aspect of the general tendency that the subordinate knows
more about the dominant than the other way around.)
I can see a danger that the notion of center-periphery relationships, which is now sometimes rejected, is a straw man, oversimplied
and assembled from out-of-date materials. Perhaps what is needed
now, is a more subtle understanding of the complexities and ambiguities of perspectives toward center-periphery relationships, particularly from the periphery.
Emotions may be attached to such linkages. Center-periphery relationships generally do not leave people cold, passionless, neutral. In
the consensualist view, centers generate warm, deferential attitudes

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

467

at the peripheries. In the conict perspective, in contrast, center and

periphery are primarily dened by political and economic structuresand we may then see their cultural concomitants at the periphery in the responses to control, coercion and constraint. Along such
lines, the many forms of cultural resistance have been a major theme
in the portrayal of center-periphery relationships. The periphery may
defend itself symbolically against intrusions through a celebration of
the self and its local and traditional roots, but there may also be a
denigration of the other, an uncomplimentary representation of the
center. (The remaining superpower may at times be described in
some circles as the great Satan, but it seems to remain a center
nevertheless.)
Yet the responses of the periphery to the center are not always
clear-cut. For one thing, claims to center-periphery consensus now
increasingly meet with skepticism. With Gramsci as a source of theoretical inspiration, observers may interpret deference in the more
complicated terms of hegemony. It is likewise possible, however, that
people at the periphery may genuinely be of two minds about a center. If ambivalence is a prevalent quality of social life, as Neil Smelser
(1998) has argued, perhaps this is even as common a response to a
center as any more one-sidedly favorable or unfavorable stance. It
may be a place one loves to hate and hates to love. One may feel
that good things come from there, and at the same time resent its
inuence, or what may seem to be its narcissism.
All views of the center, however, and all messy feelings toward it,
are not necessarily to be found in any single inhabitant of the periphery. They may rather be complicatedly distributed among its population. We must avoid any tendency toward homogenizing peripheral
people and social life, for indeed we can see that center-periphery
relationships can also be the foci of intense debates and conicts.
One persons center may be his neighbors anti-center. Such variations may be a major factor structuring local life at the periphery.
Creolization: the conuence of cultural currents
Some of my own insights into, and preoccupation with, centerperiphery relations, to repeat, may have to do with my roots in a
small nation in Europe. But they also draw on my experience doing
research during the 1970s and early 1980s, in central Nigeria, in a

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town built in the colonial era around a new railroad junction. I had
actually intended to do a study focusing on local social organization,
but then the eld experience itself gradually drew my attention in
another direction. Some of my new acquaintances in the town would
pull my sleeve and suggest that they and I ought to get into an
import-export business together; they had lots of ideas about desirable goods to import from overseas (but fewer ideas, it seemed, about
what to export). Or that they would propose that I take a promising
young nephew of theirs along when I would return to Europe, to
put him into my university where he would get a good education
and from which he could come back to Nigeria as a rich and powerful
manwhat had quickly become known in West African English as
a beento. Obviously these were people whose horizons did not
coincide with local town limits. Rather, their imagined worlds were
in large part overseas, constructed from ideas about credentialed
knowledge as well as material opulence.6
Most strikingly, moreover, there was in my eld that young urban
culture which was quite basically and dramatically a result of the
intricate and shifting blending of West African, European and by
now North American cultures as well. From within Nigeria, and
from just about every corner of it, people of a great many ethnic
groups had arrived in the town, to nd their places in its life. Even
as they brought some parts of their traditions along, however, there
were also the meanings and messages from further away. Music emanating from the loudspeakers of the small record stores switched back
and forth between American televangelist gospel, Afro-American soul
music, Caribbean reggae and Nigerian popular music genres such
as highlife and juju. And since Nigeria had oil and was at least for
some time a quite prosperous country, over the rusting zinc roofs
of the one-storey or two-storey houses, one could now see new television antennae being installed.
Here I could see the growth of global interconnectedness; but as
I became more inclined to focus my attention on this, I also became
more critical of the two ways of telling the story about it which were
more routinely available in Europe and North America at the time.
One was still the early version of modernization theory; the other

6
The formulation about imagined worlds, I need hardly point out, draws inspiration from Appadurai (1991).

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

469

was the critique of cultural imperialism. While their political and

ideological inclinations diered, both oered scenarios of cultural
homogenization. Yet what I saw seemed to be rather more of a creation of new culture, even perhaps another civilization, born in the
cultural encounters of global connections. This was neither a simple
persistence of West African traditions nor the wholesale acceptance
of ideas and cultural forms imported from overseas. It was not just a
matter of cultural loss, as a necessary consequence of homogenization.
Nor did it seem to me that I could easily t what I saw into the
still dominant overall anthropological conceptual format of a global
cultural mosaic, with neatly bounded and essentially static units
what has lately also been described as the cookie-cutter view of cultures. Reacting both to the assumption of a cultural mosaic and to
the scenario of global homogenization, I borrowed the concept of
creolization from the sociolinguistics of the period, as a rootmetaphor referring to a process whereby new culture is born on a
signicant scale, in the conuence of two or more cultural currents
historically separate from one another.7 What I liked about the
metaphor, in relation to my Nigerian experience, was not only its
suggestion that mixing and mingling can be creative, but also that
a creole culture, like a creole language, can become an elaborate,
comprehensive phenomenon which with time acquires its own historical depth, and also that it points toward a more open cultural
organizationI saw an internally diverse cultural continuum, stretching
out along a transnational structure of center-periphery relationships
from European or American metropoles to West African bush,
characterized by inequality in power, prestige and material resource
terms, where dierent individuals and groups could engage with
partly dierent ensembles of culture, but nonetheless be in communication with one another through their overlaps.
It was a center-periphery perspective which to a degree combined
Shils and Wallerstein, culture and power, but which also had some
other facets. Above all, it focused on the creative potential of cultural mixture. In this latter emphasis, it quickly became clear, the
creole metaphor shared an intellectual space which, in the nal
decades of the twentieth century, would become quite crowded.

7
My use of notions of creolization is most fully elaborated in Hannerz (1987,
1996: 65.).

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Hybridity, collage, mlange, hotchpotch, synergy, bricolage, masticate, mineralization, syncretism, transculturation, third cultures; some
of these terms were perhaps used only in passing as summary images,
others made stronger and more durable claims to analytical status.8
Some were new and others retrieved from the past, others again had
more identiable regional or thematic strongholds. At present, hybridity
seems to have become the more favored general term.
What this entire vocabulary suggests, again, is a critique of essentialist assumptions of cultural purity and timelessness, as well as of
scenarios of homogenization. If that critique has now won wide
acceptance on the academic scene (as well as in the arts, not least
due to the inuence of writers like Salman Rushdie). Meanwhile,
the central metaphors have themselves come under scrutiny. Some
would be unhappy with the biologistic avor of hybridity; and if
the rhetorical trick often seemed to be to turn past prejudices about
the social and cultural worth of impure forms upside down, it was
perhaps not always certain that the trick would succeed.
As far as terms of Creole and creolization have been concerned,
it has evidently been one complication that their particular historical roots lie in the New World societies of plantations and slavery,
and that some of the meanings and associations out of that past,
with its extensions into the present, are not carried into the more
generalized sociolinguistics from which I (and others) have drawn
the term into cultural analysis. The argument that sometimes arises
over that is of a kind which is recurrent when terms originating in
some particular cultural tradition are made to travel and become
generalizedcaste, taboo. I see the point that their meanings
may be impoverished and even corrupted when borrowed for a wider
usage, and still feel that social and cultural imagination in the world
would also be poorer if such travel were restricted.
More often, perhaps, it has been proposed that creolization or
hybridity concepts merely push essentialism one step back, implying
that what comes together are the same old kind of presumably pure
and timeless entities. That may seem at rst sight like a good argument, but I do not think it necessarily is. In linguistics, there are
many English-based Creole languages, but probably hardly anybody

I discuss some of them in Hannerz (1997).

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

471

would claim that English is historically a very pure, bounded language. There may be creolizations all the way down, or at least a
medley through history of more creolizing and relatively more integrated, homogenized forms following upon each other. It is not that
some cultures, or people, are forever mixed, and others equally forever pure. Creolization is rather a process characteristic of periods
when major cultural currents which have previously been more separate come to engage more intensely with one another, with a potential for new outcomes. We may all be moving in and out of more
noticeably creolizing phases; and as we try to understand this we
should be concerned, for one thing, with periodization.
What I thought I could see in creolist sociolinguistics (although
not so many others seem to have taken much note of this) was probably above all a stronger sociology than I found in syncretism,
hybridity or other terms of blending. Once again, it was an attempt
to combine social and cultural analysis. That sociology, of course,
at least makes my notion of creolization more specic than some of
those other terms, not simply a fancier way of saying that something
is mixed. And the notion of the open cultural continuum organized
by center-periphery linkages has a major part in this.
The understanding of creolization here, however, also contributes
to a certain renewal in the understanding of center-periphery relationships. Anthropologists have recently had little inclination to accept
the assumption of passive reception at the periphery. They are far
more likely to see an active periphery, involved in the management
of diusion from the center: the periphery accepts this, rejects that,
modies one thing, and synthesizes something else with items from
its own local cultural inventory. Creolization involves all of that.
Furthermore, anthropologists generally like to draw attention to the
multicentricity of cultureand not least, to instances of cultural
counterow, to diusion from periphery to center. In the latter case,
one might perhaps still suggest some rather unexciting caution. At
times, the enthusiasm over discoveries of counterow could lead us
to deny or disregard even quite basic asymmetries of cultural diusion.
One should try to be constantly aware of the danger of Eurocentric
culture history, but some net asymmetries seem to me undeniable
during recent centuries, involving for one thing much of whatever
is shared among modernities. This complex of asymmetries has in
itself created some of the conditions for those later cultural counterows
and crossows in space which we now nd so intriguing.

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Nonetheless, a signicant part of what has happened in world

center-periphery relationships in recent times seems to involve the
ways in which the periphery helps make the center what it is. As
a center comes to be recognized, it may draw to itself the most
committed of the periphery, as immigrants, tourists, participants, contributors, observers, commentators. And thus the periphery not only
adds to the centers external reputation; it may contribute directly
to the richness of its internal life. As the center is in the periphery,
so to a degree the periphery may establish its presence in the center.
That presence of the periphery at the center, furthermore, may
suggest another, at least complementary, view of why the center is
a center. Especially perhaps in the classic view of the center as a
place commanding deference, it is a place which is in itself the ultimate source of good things. Perhaps in an early stage, the center
really functions that way, with meanings and meaningful forms owing
mostly outward. Yet center-periphery interaction may shift over time.
If we grant that the periphery is an active recipient, doing new things
with whatever is more or less insistently oered by the center, these
new emerging thingssyntheses, creole formsmay turn out to be
less alien, more accessible, more attractive to the center than what
has been there before them. Thus in the next stage, a counterow
is more likely to occur. The relationship may yet be asymmetrical
in the balance, and the counterow is perhaps still in some way controlled from the center. Yet when world music is heard in the
centers cultural market places, and when the Empire strikes back
in literature, we again sense that the center is where peripheries
meet. It then becomes something more like a cultural switchboard;
a ludic, liminal space, rather than a place toward which deference
is the proper attitude. It is rather more in this light we now see
world cities such as New York, London or Paris. We may seem to
have come quite far from Edward Shils here; but Shmuel Eisenstadt,
who has conducted seminars about liminality with Victor Turner
(the originator of the concept) no doubt sees the point.
And then these center-periphery structures can change. I am now
somewhat amused that only fteen years ago or so, in a fairly early
phase of my attempts to understand the global cultural ow chart,
I could write that Japan, on the whole, has at least so far kept a
rather lower cultural prole in the world . . . Most of what it exports
does not seem to be identiably marked by Japaneseness (Hannerz
1992: 219220). That may have been more or less true at the time,

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

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but since then Japanese popular culture has certainly had a major
global impact. Shmuel Eisenstadt sometimes describes Japan as Gods
gift to comparative sociology, in its capacity to oer early and continuous evidence that modernity can appear in other than Occidental
forms. Perhaps it is beginning to take up a similarly important place
in the study of transnational cultural process. It is true that the
Japanese have also invented the entire intellectual eld of Nihonjinron
to theorize forms of national uniqueness, but since the country
endedwas forced to endits isolation from world markets and
world culture in the mid-nineteenth century, it has been remarkably
preoccupied with its handling of the inux of culture from elsewhere.
I can hardly fail to consider as evidence of the capacity of that
metaphor to travel that a group of Japanese and Japan-based scholars
have recently referred to the age of creolization in the Pacic as
they describe post-World War II cultural processes in the JapanAmerica borderlands (Matsuda 2001). But then another analyst of
the emergent place of Japanese popular culture in the world can
persuasively argue that this, to a degree, by now also involves recentering globalization (Iwabuchi 2002). We can indeed see multiple
modernities in motion here.
Cosmopolitanism reconsidered: culture and politics
Now I turn to my third key concept. My own engagement with the
notion of cosmopolitanism began with a departmental colloquium at
an American university in the mid-1980s, where I had sketched some
of my interests in the cultural aspects of globalization, and one of
my local colleagues asked if I had given any thought to cosmopolitanism.9 Essentially, my answer had to be no, but the question
stuck in my mind as one I ought to do something about. An opportunity later presented itself with a conference in Seoul, where I presented a paper titled Cosmopolitans and Locals in World Culture.
Later on, the paper appeared in the journal Theory, Culture and Society,
in a special issue on global culture. That issue was also published
as a book, which has thus been the publication reference for my
paper (Hannerz 1990). Riding on a wave of growing interest in the

As it later turned out, my colleague had (Rabinow 1986: 258).

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sociocultural aspects of globalization, that book eventually did extremely

well in the marketplace, and thus probably a great many more people
may have read that essay of mine than some other of my writings
which I consider more central, and actually more weighty. Occasional
later commentators may even have come to assume that it summarizes
my understanding of what globalization in culture is about, which
it surely does not.10
In any case, as the title indeed suggests, it was an essay on cosmopolitanism in culturemore specically, on the cosmopolitan as
a type in the management of meaning in an interconnected but culturally diverse world.11 I tried rst of all to show that in an increasingly
mobile world, not all mobility need entail much of what I thought
of as the core of cosmopolitanism: an intellectual and esthetic openness toward divergent cultural experiences, and an ability to make
ones way into other cultures. Much tourism, I argued, does not
really entail any more generalized openness. Drawing eclectically,
and rather lightheartedly, on an essay on travel by Paul Theroux,
the novel The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler, an International Herald
Tribune feature story on Nigerian market-women trading between
Lagos and London, and reections on exile by Edward Said, I found
that going abroad and encountering otherness might involve rejection
or narrow, controlled selection, rather than openness. The tourist
often seeks out quite particular qualities of a distant place (such as
sunshine) rather than embracing it as a whole; in other ways, the
place should perhaps be as much like home as possible. The exile,
having a foreign haven more or less forced on him, might prefer to
encapsulate himself as much as possible with others, possibly also
from home, and in similar straits. The business traveler may nd it
convenient and comforting if all the hotels in major chains stretching
across the world look and feel much the same.
What I thought was characteristic of the cosmopolitan management
of meaning was a certain combination of surrender and mastery.

10

For an example, see Tsing (2000).

Although locals are also in the title of the essay, they did not really have a
prominent place in the argument. Presumably their handling of meaning would be
more of the kind ethnographers have usually describedor merely assumed. The
title was also inspired by the pioneering study of cosmopolitans and locals in an
American town authored by another modern-classical sociologist, Robert K. Merton,
to whose memory a recent set of Shmuel Eisenstadts collected writings is dedicated
(Eisenstadt 2003a).
11

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

475

Cosmopolitans, ideally, would seek to immerse themselves in other

cultures, participating in them, accepting them as wholes. Yet in not
only embracing these cultures but also displaying their skills in handling them, there is also a sense of mastery, not infrequently with a
streak of narcissism. Moreover, the surrender to otherness of cosmopolitans is usually situational. Cosmopolitanism is protean. There
is no real commitment to any particular other culture, I suggested,
as one always knows where the exit is.12
In my essay I then went on to suggest a certain anity between
cosmopolitanism, as I understood it, and the conception of intellectuals developed particularly by the Hungarian writer George Konrad
and the American sociologist Alvin Gouldnerespecially relating to
the latters notion of cultures of critical discourse. The latter could
be described as an overall orientation to structures of meaning which
would be reexive, problematizing, concerned with metacommunication, and generally expansive, pushing on and on in its analysis.
It seemed to me that people who are habituated to working actively
with such explorations of orders of meaninghoping eventually to
master themmight also be inclined toward cosmopolitanism.
After this essay, I did not pay much active attention to ideas of
cosmopolitanism for some time. As I would soon realize, however,
others didas the 1990s went on, the interest in them was animated
by a new series of conditions and experiences.13 Before identifying
these, however, we should remind ourselves of the multifacetedness
of the notion of cosmopolitanism. Indeed the term carries a heavy
historical load of meanings and associations, accumulated in many
periods and places. Yet two main kinds of referents can be readily
identied: one cultural and experiential, the other political. The former involves a recognition of human diversity, even an appreciation
of it, and skill in handling itthis was what I had attempted to deal
with in my earlier essay. The latter has to do with community, society and citizenship at a more or less global level.
What stimulated the renewed interest in cosmopolitanism in the
1990s was, most obviously and generally, the accelerating growth of

12
Apart from those citations which are in the original text, as some readers have
noted my references to surrender and proteanism, I might add here that they
were inspired by Wol (1974) and Lifton (1968) respectively.
13
For some of these developments in the study of cosmopolitanism see e.g. Cheah
and Robbins 1998, Beck 2000, Vertovec and Cohen 2002 and Stevenson 2003.

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ulf hannerz

many kinds of global interconnectedness, and the increasing consciousness of this fact. Importantly, too, the Cold War, with its great
divide running through humanity, came to an end, and this appeared
to allow new possibilities in organizing power as well as responsibility. Furthermore, if the term globalization had to a remarkable
extent been appropriated to refer to the deregulation of markets and
the triumphant march of capitalism, cosmopolitanism suggested
that human beings could relate to the world not only as consumers,
or members of a labor force, but also as citizens. This could mean
that cosmopolitan ideas could indeed oer a critique of at least certain qualities of global capitalism, and involve a search for ways of
constraining it.
With time, it also turned out that the passage of the Cold War
order had not everywhere gone altogether smoothly. New wars and
other conagrations such as those of the Balkans had involved atrocities which contributed to placing human rights prominently on a
cosmopolitan agenda. Environmental changes were also seen as
matters requiring active handling at a level beyond the nation-state,
as they could not be contained within its boundaries. Risk became
a key word here; it could cover more gradually evolving dangers as
well as the threat of disasters of an apparently more sudden nature.
And as much as ever, the politics of cosmopolitanism could also
stand opposed to nationalism, nativism, and xenophobia, adversary
responses to global interconnectedness which could be reactions to
the inux of migrant labor forces as well as refugees, but sometimes
also to other social and cultural trac across borders. Eisenstadt
(e.g. 2003a: 556) notes here, as one characteristic of present times, a
continuous oscillation between cosmopolitanism and particularistic
tendencies.
Toward the end of the twentieth century and continuing into the
early years of the new millennium, many of these developments were
obviously more toward the political side of cosmopolitanism, in
thought as well as practice; but not all. In any case, while cosmopolitanism is a very old topic in social thought, it could now make
a remarkable comeback across a range of scholarly pursuits, from
political philosophers by way of social theorists to ethnographers,
from law to cultural studies. It is also clear that as a keyword in
recent debate, it has not stood alone, but has belonged in a wider
eld of arguments revolving at the same time around such other

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

477

keywords as multiculturalism, identity politics, diaspora, transnationalism, and civil society; even political correctness.
I am coming back now myself to a more active engagement with
ideas of cosmopolitanism for various reasons.14 One is because of a
curiosity about the current distribution of cosmopolitan orientations
in the world. In my rst paper on the topic, I obviously came rather
close to what may have been the more or less classic notion: cosmopolitanism has tended to be a privilege associated with other privileges. Perhaps that has meant that in the twentieth century it has
shifted from the aristocracy to the professions, but it still involves
education, the freedom to travel, and a certain material security.
Calhoun (2002), in the essay I cited early in this chapter, is also
among those who basically shares in such assumptions.
During the 1990s, with the renewed interest in cosmopolitanism,
there was, however, increasing questioning of that somewhat exclusive notion of its locus in society. A recurrent reference has been
James Cliords (1992: 108) notion of discrepant cosmopolitanisms,
generated through displacement and transplantation, often through
violent histories of economic, political and cultural interaction. As
Cliord was more generally concerned with the part of travel in
constituting the contemporary world, he oered little discussion of
cosmopolitanism as such, but he eectively made the point that for
a long time this has not been a world divided between haves who
move and have-nots who stay put.
Along such lines, a number of ethnographers have recently found
cosmopolitans where they have not been noted beforeand not even
always among frequent travelers. Huon Wardle (2000), drawing on
eld materials from working-class urban Jamaica, notes the enduring harshness of Caribbean living conditions and the historical and
continued openness of the region to inuences from the outside world,
and he notes the mobility and the transnational networks in which
ordinary Jamaicans are engaged. But proceeding beyond material
circumstances and practical adaptations, Wardle nds a cosmopolitan
philosophy and a shared community esthetic emerging in sociality,
out of the uncertainty and ux of life: recognizable for example in
playfulness and in narratives of adventure.

14

For a rst statement, see Hannerz (forthcoming).

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ulf hannerz

When James Ferguson (1999) nds cosmopolitans in the classic

anthropological territory of urban Zambian Copper Belt, we are
among people who have traveled little outside their own country.
But Ferguson identies a distinct cleavage of cultural styles between
cosmopolitans and localists, where the cosmopolitan style is one of
accomplished, cultivated performance capacity, a matter of seeking
worldliness and at the same time distancing oneself from more
parochial ties and traditions. But there are high and low varieties
of cosmopolitanism here. Not a few of the more conspicuous Copper
Belt cosmopolitans are hoodlums and prostitutes. And the latter group
raises the issue of gender. The classic notion of cosmopolitanism may
have had a bias toward identifying it with men, but Nava (2002)
makes the point that groups with reason to be dissatised with their
positions and experiences in the established local order of things may
seek alternatives elsewhere, and may therefore be open to other cultures and their expressions; furthermore, women have often been in
such situation. While Navas research has focused on early twentiethcentury women in Britain, Kelskys (2001) study of Japanese women,
western dreams also oers an instance of such cosmopolitanism.
And then, as one nal instance of the ethnographic discovery of
cosmopolitans in other places, we have Charles Piot (1999: 23) staying
with the Kabre, cereal cultivators in the heart of the West African
savanna (in Togo), and arguing that they are as cosmopolitan as
the metropole itself, if by cosmopolitanism we mean that people partake in a social life characterized by ux, uncertainty, encounters
with dierence, and the experience of processes of transculturation.
For one thing, Piot notes, the Kabre inhabit the world together with
invisible spirits and ancestors who communicate through non-verbal
signs requiring complicated interpretationa great deal of ambiguity
and uncertainty is already in place.
On the one hand, if in some of these ethnographic explorations
there are discoveries of people who have in some sense been cosmopolitans all the time, only not previously recognized as such, it
may mostly have to do with the career of the concept, and a current
inclination on the part of scholars to test its boundaries. There may
also be a risk, however, that in the drive toward nding cosmopolitanism in more places, understandings of it can at times become
quite attenuated, or almost unrecognizable. There may be some
virtue, after all, in not straying too far from the ordinary dictionary
denitions. In any case, perhaps it is time to make more distinctions,

center-periphery, creolization and cosmopolitanism

479

and speak of cosmopolitanisms in the plural. So the Kabre, the

Japanese women, the Copper Belt street sophisticates, and the Jamaican
proletarian city dwellers are thus all to be covered by the same
labelbut does cosmopolitanism actually mean the same thing in
all these instances? I would hypothesize, for one thing, that one may
nd that some people are cosmopolitans mostly in a more instrumental sense, having cultivated a skill in dealing with diversity in
their habitats, while the actual appreciation of cultural diversity for
its own sake, as a consummatory value, need not have quite the
same distribution.
On the other hand, it also seems likely enough that the real social
distribution of the qualities we identify as cosmopolitan has changed
in the recent era, so that more people outside more or less elite
groupings are also sharing in them. Again, although mobility does
not equal cosmopolitanism, when a great many people are on the
move in one way or other, at least the possibility of a growth of
cosmopolitanism may be present; even if for some it is only a reluctant cosmopolitanism, an increased ability to make ones way through
newness and uncertainty, as well as perhaps a certain faith in that
ability. For others, again, that instrumental cosmopolitanism may be
something acquired as a skill not because they have been mobile
themselves, but because at some point they nd themselves sharing
their old habitats with newcomers and strangers.
Moreover, meaningsand the forms which carry themmay travel
even when people do not; and consumer goods and not least media
consumption habits have recently had the potential of greatly changing
peoples imagined worlds. I could see that in my Nigerian town, and
I am fairly sure the street cosmopolitans of urban Zambia are people
whose horizons are also extended in more or less the same way.
But, to put it very briey, that may raise a quite fundamental question
about where cosmopolitanism, as exposure to and involvement with
another culture, is now. What counts as cosmopolitanism can often
not be disentangled from center-periphery relations. Probably it is
still widely taken for granted (again, as an integral part of that classic
conception of the phenomenon) that cosmopolitanism belongs to the
center of the worldthe auent Occident, Europe and North
America. Its inhabitants have long had the means to travel and familiarize themselves with those people who are the locals elsewhere.
Now that people from the periphery travel in large numbers to the
center, however, or have it prominently displayed in their imagined

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worlds, they may be more directly and deeply involved with cultural
alterities than those inhabitants of the center who, even as they travel,
may more easily encapsulate themselves in their own kinds of institutions and comfortsperhaps more expatriates than cosmopolitans.
So that assumption about where the cosmopolitans are may need to
be reconsidered. The Indian culture critic Ashis Nandy (1998: 146)
raises the issue bluntly: Europe and North America have increasingly
lost their cosmopolitanism, paradoxically because of a concept of
cosmopolitanism that considers Western culture to be by denition
universal and therefore automatically cosmopolitan. Believe it or not,
there is a cost of dominance, and that cost can sometimes be heavy.
Shifting understandings of the loci of cosmopolitanism may again
be a part of the history of multiple modernities. I am also drawn
toward scrutinizing ideas and practices of cosmopolitanism again,
however, precisely because of that two-facedness of the concept: cultural and political. What is actually the relationship between the two
clusters of meaning sharing a space in the dictionary? Are we dealing
here with an arbitrary lexical cohabitation, an (originally at least)
characteristically western confusion? In my original essay, I concentrated entirely on the cultural dimension of cosmopolitanism. Now
I wonder if there is at least some sort of elective anity between
the two. Political philosophers, who have recently been contrasting
cosmopolitanism with patriotism (or nationalism), have mostly concluded that the former may be noble, but is also thinthere is a
symbolic, experiential decit which makes it dicult to mobilize people around it.15 Is that really always so? Again, consider those two
faces. In its cultural dimension, cosmopolitanism tends to show a
happy face, enjoying new people, new intellectual and esthetic experiences, new skills, a new sense of security. Political cosmopolitanism is
often a cosmopolitanism with a worried face, trying to come to grips
with very large problems. But perhaps the one can at times be a
resource for the other. If these two senses of cosmopolitanism must
not simply be conated, the intertwining of the two may yet proceed along dierent lines and take many shapes. Why should there
not be as much scope for variation and complexity here as there
has been in the case of nationalism? It may be time for the political
philosophers of cosmopolitanism to let more ethnographers in.
15
See in particular the volume of essays by Martha Nussbaum and others (Cohen
1996).

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And then perhaps as another reason for engaging now with cosmopolitanism, there is one more recent turn in human history. I
noted in my rst attempt at understanding cosmopolitanism that the
cosmopolitan, engaging with another culture, typically knows where
the exit is. Something that can be called home is available. If the
combination rootless cosmopolitans has been recurrent, more cosmopolitans may actually have been rooted somewhere, and making
their excursions from there. In a somewhat similar vein, it seems to
me, the well-known scholar-journalist Michael Ignatie, identifying
himself as a cosmopolitan, writes in his Blood and Belonging (1994: 9),
on late twentieth-century nationalist conicts, that cosmopolitanism
is the privilege of those who can take a secure nation state for
granted. A decade or so later, that is worth thinking about again,
whetherafter 2001any nation state, not even the strongest, may
seem quite so entirely secure. After the end of the Cold War, a
politics of cosmopolitanism seemed for a period perhaps not only
desirable, even necessary, but more than ever before possible too. It
may now have to survive in times of widespread, diuse fear; when
even a term like civilizations becomes part of battle-cries. In such
times, it is good to have scholars like Shmuel Eisenstadt, with a
respect for pluralism and a sense of being at home in the world.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

EUROPES MULTIPLE MODERNITY

Erik Allardt
It is remarkable how denitions of the concept civilization are usually
missing in sociological textbooks and readers on societal development.
The word appears only rarely in indexes of the content of such
books. When it does appear, it is mostly in texts aiming to describe
very general overall patterns of the development of the human world,
as for instance in the works of Oswald Spengler and Arnold Toynbee.
These two scholars are also among the most diligent in using the
word civilization, as can be ascertained from a number of texts
on the fundamental developments in human societies. In the trendsetting two-volume reader on the Theories of Society (Parsons et al.
1962) Spengler and Toynbee were among the contributors who, in
addition to Alfred Weber and Pitirim Sorokin, spoke about civilizations. Toynbees article was headed The Disintegration of Civilizations
(pp. 13551364), whereas Spenglers contribution was entitled On
the Style-Patterns of Culture (pp. 13431355). Spengler referred to
civilizations, but it is revealing that he, like most authors focusing
on the overall development, spoke about culture and cultural change.
In many texts civilization virtually stands for general descriptions of
the style-patterns of culture.
In the sociology that developed and unfolded after the Second
World War civilization was a rarely used concept. It has been regenerated by S.N. Eisenstadt who, however, as a leading theoretician
of societal change and modernization, rarely used the word civilization in his earlier works (see e.g. Eisenstadt, 1963, 1966). For
descriptions of large and total social congurations, concepts such as
empires, total societies, historical orders etc. were utilized. It is during
the last decades of the twentieth century that Eisenstadt (for instance
1986c, 1987, 2000a) started to refer to civilizations in a systematic
way. By civilization he refers to congurations that integrate the
social, political and cultural traits of societies or regions. It is assumed
that civilizations are societal congurations that have an exceptional

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historical durability, and that have created a high degree of consensus about some basic values and cultural programs. The most
typical civilizations are the so-called historical Axial Age Civilizations,
a concept that emphasizes the integration of the religious and mundane orders, as was the case in ancient Israel, in European Christianity,
ancient Greece and China, the Islamist world, Hinduism etc. However,
a search for a uniform and generally applicable denition of the
civilization concept in the texts of Eisenstadt would be in vain. In
fact, a consistent and unequivocal civilization concept cannot be
found in his texts. This view is not here presented as criticism. On
the contrary, the lack of an unequivocal denition of the civilization
concept is, so to say, in the very nature of large-scale social phenomena. They contain so many dimensions, slightly diering qualities and, in particular, ever-changing but nevertheless related attributes,
that a denition presented once and for all would be grossly misleading. This is a methodological predicament which has been observed
only diusely in the textbooks of social science methods. As judging
from leading scholarly texts, the fruitful way to proceed in the presentations of many general sociological concepts appears to be descriptions made as accurately as possible but without the ambition to give
a nal, all-time, precisely valid and completely covering denition.
A seminal way to advance is to make the conceptual descriptions
continuously more telling and precise in future presentations. At any
rate, Eisenstadt proceeds in a very fruitful way when he avoids dogmatic and seemingly universally valid denitions.
The avoidance of universally valid denitions is related to the traditional distinction between nominal and real denitions. Nominal
denitions are agreements on the meaning and use of words, whereas
real denitions are empirical statements about the nature of the real
world. Accurate real denitions are of utmost importance in sociology,
but there is a lack of analyses about when and how real denitions
should be used. As empirical descriptions, real denitions cannot be
assumed to remain constant and unchangeable, but there are no
rules governing how much they can change until a new wording is
invented. At any rate, fruitful use of real denitions is a sign of creativity in sociology.

europes multiple modernity

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The concept of multiple modernities

Modernity is another concept which is not nominally dened but
which contains propositional statements about the real social world.
There are variations in the notions of modernity but they have a
common core. Usually it is assumed that modernity consists of institutional forms such as the democratic nation-state, a market economy,
research-oriented universities and epistemological assumptions that
achieved knowledge can be questioned. As Eisenstadt (2000, 129)
emphasizes, such modernity originated in the Western world. In the
framework of multiple modernities, social forms have ceased to be
taken for granted. Reexivity about ones own social and cultural
conceptions has been a central trait of modernity. These modern
views emerged in the West but were not automatically taken up and
adopted in other societies across the world. The various sites of
modernitythe economic institutions, the political arena, institutions
for socialization and education, etc.were combined in very dierent
fashions in dierent societies. Variability in the modernization process
has, according to Eisenstadt, been enormous. This variability is what
he tellingly describes as multiple modernities.
In Far Eastern, Middle Eastern and African societies, the basic
model of modernity has been the territorial state and the developmental patterns of the nation-state. Both the elites and their opposing forces in those societies adopted many of the central features of
Western modernity. However, they did it by selectively accepting
and rejecting dierent features to their own advantage. Thus, the
selection of Western features of modernity entailed a continuous
selection, reinterpretation and reformulation of Western ideas. As
Eisenstadt says, the development did not give rise to just one civilization. On the global scale, the new habits of questioning social
forms and conceiving the social world has produced a plethora of
cultural agendas.
The term multiple modernities has been a crucial and ingenious
addition to the discussion of what modernity entails. It is clear from
Eisenstadts texts that there are on the global scale multiple modernities. What is more uncertain is whether it is reasonable to assume
that in the European and North American countries has existed and
exists a distinct and uniform European modernity. On at least three
counts it seems inaccurate to assume a common and uniform modernity. First, there are contradictions and strains in the mentality and

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value climates in the European and North American culture which

makes it very doubtful to assume a common conception of modernity. Second, there is in the Western world a continuous and rapid
rise of new social and political movements questioning the basic
assumptions of modernity. Third, especially in the studies of the former Communist and Socialist countries it has been shown that they
became modernized in distinctly dierent ways. These doubts about
a common European and Western modernity are discussed at a later
point in this chapter.
The polarity between instrumental rationalism and communal romanticism
There are some denite contradictions and strains included in what
has been conceived as the European civilization. Very often, however, the notions of a European civilization tend to emphasize its
non-contradictory features. According to scholarly tradition emanating
from Max Weber, the characteristic European specicity has been
the tendency towards an overall rationalization of social life. Eisenstadt,
whose interest focuses on analyzing civilizations, is more comprehensive in his descriptions. He points out that there are several crucial traits in European civilization. Of special importance are the
following four: (1) a high degree of multiplicity in the attempts to
solve tensions between cosmic, cultural, and social orders; (2) a high
level of commitment by dierent groups and strata to those orders;
(3) a high degree of pluralism in commitment to the dierent orders;
and (4) a denition of the individual as an autonomous and responsible unit as regards access to these orders (Eisenstadt 1987, 4749).
Yet in a broad sense they all amount to a tendency to an overall
rationality in social life. The tendency to multiplicity emphasized
in all four points is hardly possible without a central striving for
pluralism.
Nevertheless, it must be asked whether rationality and the tendencies to rationalism have been overemphasized in both Max Webers
and Eisenstadts conceptions of the uniqueness in the European civilization. There is in Western sociology a distinction that has appeared
in many forms but that denitely records two entirely dierent cultural styles as typical for the European and Western civilization.
There is a strong opposition between two crucial tendencies, a striving for a primordial social integration, on one hand, and the attempt

europes multiple modernity

487

to build a derived integration by rational means, on the other. This

contrariness is expressed in many of the traditional dichotomies of the
denitely Western attempts to sociological theory-building. As wellknown examples we have the distinctions between Emile Durkheims
mechanic and organic solidarity, Ferdinand Tnnies Gemeinschaft and
Gesellschaft, and C.H. Cooleys primary and secondary groups (Osterberg
1988, 93100). These dichotomies were sometimes presented by their
authors as alternatives to each other, but basically they have an obvious common core. As an additional case, one may mention Ernest
Gellners fascinating description of the tensions between a communalcultural-romantic vision and its counterpart, an atomic-universalist-individualist
vision, typical of the tensions in the old Habsburg empire (Gellner
1998). In Gellners posthumous book and in its foreword by Steven
Lukes (1998, xiiixix) it is also described how the same polarity has
been important in European philosophy. As representatives of the
rationalistic vision, we have Descartes, Hume, Kant, Ernst Mach
and Bertrand Russell. In the eld of ction, this visionary pole is
exemplied by Robinson Crusoe. This vision is, as Lukes emphasizes,
variously identied with empiricism, rationalism and positivism, and
with Gesellschaft, with economic markets and political liberalism, and
bloodless cosmopolitanism. There is also, however, another vision,
the organic counter-picture, rst lived and practiced unreectively,
then articulated by Herder and by countless romantic organicists,
nationalist populists, and romantic rightists, stressing totality, system,
correctedness, particularism, cultural specicity, favoring Gemeinschaft,
roots, closed cozy communities, Blut und Boden.
Gellners analysis is focused on the Habsburg lands, particularly
Poland and Austria, but it seems fair to say that the polarity of the
two visions has been important all over Europe. At any rate, it is
reasonable to call into question the notion of European modernity
in terms of a rationalistic vision. Indeed, the strain between rationalism and romanticism was central to European society and culture in the twentieth century.
On the basis of Eisenstadts analyses it is easy to accept the notion
of multiple modernities. There is indeed on the global scale a multiplicity of cultural and culturally-based political programs. Because
of the multifarious expressions of the confrontational attitudes against
Western modernization it is not easy to nd and formulate their
joint elements. Moreover, in Eisenstadts presentations the basically
common ground in the various civilizations seems to be the cultivation

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and enhancement of their own cultural traditions. This is, however,

the basic element also in the tendencies to communal and romantic integration existing in all European societies.
It can of course be maintained that, notwithstanding the European
examples of communal and Gemeinschaft-emphasizing tendencies, the
basic and unique orientation in European civilization is, nevertheless,
the tendency to a rationalization of the world. Yet there are strong
grounds for arguing that the most successful European cultural, governmental and societal solutions are hardly outcomes of purely rationalistic strivings. The lasting and satisfaction-producing solutions usually
represent a combination of rationalistic and communal-romantic tendencies. There are indeed a number of almost classic research ndings,
indicating how in the world of work the integration of instrumental, rationalistic and expressive, communal orientations are likely to
produce the best and lasting results both in terms of the interests of
the management and of the workers (Etzioni 1961, 89126; Turk
1963, 2837; Merton 1957, 199207).
The ndings showing the fruitfulness of the societal and cultural
combination of expressive and instrumental attitudes cannot be taken
simply as reecting the fact that the tendency to emphasize rationalistic, instrumental solutions is nevertheless the most desirable and
best element in social and human policies. It appears that the very
opposition between purely rationalistic solutions, and solutions based
on a combination and fusion of instrumental and expressive sentiments, is a very crucial opposition and contrast in todays European
societies. In fact, the opposition between purely rationalistic attitudes
and the mixture of rationalism and romanticism is one of special
importance in European politics. It is a distinction with crucial consequences both for more mundane political choices and for the basic
optionfor or against democracy.
The relationship between a democratic stance and the dimension
of instrumentalism to expressivism was explored in a systematic
fashion by Ulf Himmelstrand (1960) in a treatise which at the time
did not receive all the attention it actually deserved. To describe his
point of departure very briey, Himmelstrand basically related two
categories of phenomena. One was the disposition to democratic
behavior, measured both by attitudes and actual political participation
in political decision-making, and the other was the dimension going
from a preference for purely emotional, expressive political reactions
to a preference for calculative, rationalistic political standpoints. This

europes multiple modernity

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last mentioned dimensional measure Himmelstrand called the L-scale,

standing, as he termed it, for the degree of aective loading in verbal
attitudes. Without going into his lengthy methodological discussions,
Himmelstrands main ndings can be summarized by saying that the
number of individuals with democratic attitudes was signicantly
highest among those whoin combining instrumental and expressive
orientationsachieved middle scores on the L-scale. In contrast, the
strongly expressive individuals were the least democratic, and the
strongly instrumental individuals were clearly less democratic than
those who were both instrumental and expressive.
It may be argued that Himmelstrands measures simply deal with
attitudes, and that it is simple-minded to draw general conclusions
from attitudinal studies. I have not myself studied attitudinal measures
of rationalistic instrumentalism and romantic expressivism, but coming
from a country which clearly in the past experienced both Nazi and
Communist threats and strivings but which nevertheless succeeded
to avoid domination by those political movements, I refer to visions
based on both my own both research and national experience.
Among people with either Nazi or Communist leanings there was
an overrepresentation of two extreme psychological types, on one
hand more or less instrumental calculators, and on the other hand
aective believers. People who avoided these extreme political stances
usually succeeded in combining instrumental and expressive viewpoints: in their political reactions they were very much in the middle
on the dimension from instrumentalism to strong aective loading.
In my studies of Finnish Communists in the decades after the Second
World War, there was an overrepresentation of two types, people
strongly socialized into beliefs in systematic Communist planning and,
on the other hand, uprooted, aectively reacting people (Allardt 1971,
488497).
The studies mentioned above on political attitudes and behavior
point to a type of modernity which cannot be characterized as a
tendency to an overall rationalization of social life. Indeed modem
human beings may not be doomed to live in a Weberian iron cage
of blind rationality. The new mixture of European modernity was
tellingly expressed by Ernest Gellner in the following passage:
The real intellectual problems that modem society faces, consist, in
very large part, of the relationship between the two styles, between
universalism-atomism, which helps explain the success of the new science and thereby itself acquires a certain authority, further reinforced

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by the superiority of the market form of production over centralized
and socially oriented ways of running the economy, and, on the other
hand, by the yearning for meaning, social coherence, the fusion of
value and fact, the absorption of the individual in a supportive and
loving community, which in turn blends into the natural background.
These are the terms of reference for our problems. Anyone who simply proposes one of them and ignores or dismisses the other, has little
to tell us. That might have been possible once, but it is not so longer
(Gellner 1998, 190).

Another philosopher that has explicitly expressed Gellners wish for

the blend of rationalism and emotional social coherence in todays
world is Charles Taylor. He has systematically focused on the strains
and interconnections between the enlightenment emphasizing rationality and romanticism centered on aective solidarities in social life.
In terms of concrete social analysis, this is markedly contained in
his presentation of the Politics of Recognition (Taylor, 1994). The
world has to be rationally planned, but this must include the recognition of multiculturalism and the great variety of cultural specicities.
Thus, the importance and social value of the blend of rationality
and aective social coherence has been expressed with dierent formulations by, for instance, Ulf Himmelstrand, Ernest Gellner and
Charles Taylor. They emphasize a dierent world than Max Weber
and most of those who have developed theses about the nature of
European modernity. They have rendered scientic descriptions of
the modem society, but they also advocate an ideal consisting of a
blend of rationalism and romanticism. This blend is not a completely
uniform entity and it can hardly be exactly described because its
specic content varies from discipline to discipline. Yet it has a
common element in its fusion of rationalism and romanticism. This
is an attitudinal complex or a belief system which seems to have
become particularly strengthened during the later decades of the
twentieth century. In this sense, it is indeed a new type of modernity
distinguishable from the modernity developed and advocated in the
late nineteenth century and the rst half of the twentieth. The new
type of modernity emphasizing the blend of rationality and romanticism is not unanimously accepted as the great guide of modem life,
but that blend has denitely assumed a special importance during the
latter decades of the twentieth century. At least it seems permissible
and telling to speak about a European multiple modernity.
Scholars who follow, to a greater or lesser degree, Eisenstadts tradition of research on modernity have pointed out variations in Euro-

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491

pean modernities. A rich and illuminative analysis about the nature

of modernity in Communist regimes has been presented by Johann
Arnason (2000, 6190). His main point is that the Communist ideology and policies advocated forms of modernity but in a manner
deviating from what was the case in Western Europe. According to
Arnason, the Communist version was in many senses a failed modernity with a dysfunctional, self-destructive potential. Arnasons description is rich and informative, but has a dierent point of departure
than the view advocated in this paper. Here, the basic characteristic
of Communist modernity is not that it was a failed version in the
sense of the conventional meaning of the term of modernity, but
that the central feature of Communist modernity was that it did not
succeed in developing an understanding of both the rationalistic and
romantic underpinnings of modernity. That is not to say that the
Communist modernity conformed to Max Webers dominating view
about modernity as truly rationalistic endeavor. Weber conceived the
tendency to the overall rationalization of social life as a threat to mankind, as a danger of putting all humans in an iron-cage, whereas Communism contained a basically positive belief in overall rationalization.
Postmodern society as a deviation from conventional modernity
Most descriptions of European societies rely heavily on the formations
that were developed in European civilization during the process of
industrialization. These formations were strongly enforced by the outcome of the Second World War. This was especially true for political
life and for the unchangeable nature of the European political party
system during the rst decades after the Second World War. In
Western Europe there was a development of what has been labeled the
frozen party system. As S.M. Lipset and Stein Rokkan emphasized
in a basic book of political sociology, the party system of the 1960s
reect with few but signicant exceptions, the cleavage structures of
the 1920s (Lipset and Rokkan 1967, 5057). At the time, continuity
and immutability in European politics was taken as a matter of fact.
The political alternatives were the same as those that had already
developed in the 1920s.
In the 1970s, however, the European political landscape began
to change, and changes were increasingly observable in the 1980s
and 1990s. The changes were captured in the term postmodernity,
and there was a wealth of observations of new political movements

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and aspirations. One crucial phenomenon was the weakening importance of traditional class conicts. In scholarly, conceptual presentations of the new developments, the institutional aspect of modernization
in particular was played down and relativized. A telling example is
the concept reexivity, in the way the term has been used for
instance by Ulrich Beck. For him, reexive modernization refers to
a type of society beyond simple modernity in which there is an
acknowledgment of the impossibility of knowing the unintended consequences produced by modernization . . . (Beck 1998, ch. 7, Nash
2000, 278279). Similarly, Goran Therborn presents a denition in
which while empirically traceable the proposed concept of modernity does not contain any concrete institutional references, but leaves
the latter as causes, eects and contingencies for investigation
(Machonin 2000, 150).
The emphasis on reexive modernity, in the sense of Beck, Nash,
Therbom and Machonin, comes very close to what was included in
the phrase the postmodern turn in sociology, as it was developed
by Zygmunt Bauman (2000). It implies a view of society in which
social institutions and structures are ongoing processes. Postmodern
sociology declares an interest in the study of how social phenomena
and social categories are constantly constructed, and socially dened
and interpreted. Thus the concept of reexive modernizationas
well as the phrase the postmodern turn of sociologyimplies a
vision which was already emphasized in the preceding section of this
paper. Modernity is no longer simply a tendency to overall rationalization and to the creation of rational and systematic institutional
mechanisms. Modernity implies a constant ow of interpretations of
what is considered important and valuable in social life. Cultural
and moral issues are emphasized, while established bureaucratic structures are increasingly questioned.
The terms postmodern and postindustrial are sometimes
regarded as just journalistic descriptions designated to appear mostly
in popular magazines. Yet they describe truly fundamental societal
changes. A newor at least a rejuvenated concept in social analysis
is agency. One leading precursor in introducing the concept of agency
was Alain Touraine (1984). His approach has been christened The
New Social Movement Theory (Nash 2000, 130133). Revealing analyses
of crucial tendencies in present-day advanced societies have been
presented by his students, the Danish scholar Peter Gundelach and the
Italian Alberto Melucci. Gundelach emphasizes grassroots movements

europes multiple modernity

493

arising almost anywhere in contemporary societies. Increasingly, people

are only weakly bound to social classes and similar, structurally
dened social categories. In trying to cope with new threats and
adverse circumstances, they tend to form highly voluntary organizations
at the grassroots level. In doing so, they are strongly focused on the
cultural denitions of their predicaments (Gundelach 1984). Melucci
emphasizes that there are numerous collective identities and movements
in present-day societies, often formed at the local level on the basis
of everyday experiences. Many current disputes and debates are
struggles over identities and have a denite cultural content (Melucci
1996).
Kate Nash (2000, 133143) in her presentation of contemporary
political sociology, underscores that the New Social Movement Theory
in the spirit of Touraine is focused on the social conditions of selfdetermination and the cultural orientations of actors. Political conicts
are increasingly conicts over interpretations and denitions of cultural identities although Touraine avoids speaking of cultural politics. The emphasis on cultural interpretations and constant redenitions
of cultural identities is especially pronounced in the studies by Melucci.
New social movements, he maintains, are not principally concentrated on the production of material resources or their distribution.
What is emphasized is the access to information and the use of symbolic resources. The important contestations are in cultural realm.
Conicts are increasingly struggles over identity. Meluccis point is
exemplied by the womens movement. It has been more explicitly
directed towards a change in social denitions of the sexes and analyses of the nature of gendered inequality, than in attempts to oer
concrete suggestions for a change in the distribution of wealth and
economic goods.
At any rate, the New Social Movement Theory strongly stresses
the emergence of social forms and cultural goals which clearly go
beyond the limits of those existing in present societal formations.
The goals of the new social movements cannot be dened in terms of
the material interests of the dominant strata of the industrial society,
nor can they be dened as a striving for overall rationalization. Social
coherence and meaning are considered increasingly important, but
in the struggles for an establishment and recognition of supportive
social formations, the new social movements also emphasize new
public institutions and spaces for systematic and rationally formulated articulations. There is indeed a striving for combinations of

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erik allardt

instrumentalism and emotionally supportive social solutions. At any

rate, it seems evident that new forms of modernity emerged towards
the end of the twentieth century.
Variations in modernity in countries abandoning socialism
The post-socialist countries represent an interesting type in the study
of European modernization. The transition from Communism in the
former European Communist and/or socialist countries has also been
analyzed as a case of modernization, as shown in the informative
book Structural Change and Modernization in Post-Socialist Countries
(Adamski, Machonin and Zapf 2002). Johann Arnasons (2000, 6190)
paper on Communism and Modernity, with a denite focus on the
USSR, has already been referred to. Such points of departure are
in many senses natural and at least expected. As already noted, some
of the most obvious features of traditional European modernity were
the emphasis on liberal democracy and market economy.
Nevertheless, the post-socialist countries are problematic and doubtful cases in studies of modernization. One obvious reason for such
an uncertainty is that before their regime transformation, the socialist
countries had already set out on clearly dierent paths towards
modernization. Another problematic feature is that the regime change
in its initial phases was met with inertia, and encountered problems
that were very dicult to overcome. On the other hand, in the initial phase of the institutional changes some post-socialist countries
had already approached solutions and new social forms that seemed
to be on their way in Western Europe as well. It seems fair to say
that a number of the analyses of the post-socialist regime changes
unconsciously emphasized ideals and structures that were clearly
declining in the Western democracies too. Probably, some of the new
tendencies were even more readily realized in the regime-changing
post-socialist countries than in stable Western democracies. At any
rate, the modernization processes in post-socialist countries had many
qualitiesbut being simple was not one of them. It is not the intention here to present a comprehensive analysis of modernization developments in the post-socialist countries, but rather to briey show
some snapshots supporting the view of multiple European modernities.
It is well-known that under Communist rule there were considerable dierences in the standard of living in the Central European

europes multiple modernity

495

countries. According to most reports, East Germany was in terms of

the material standard of living the most advantaged of the Communist
bloc countries. Mortality statistics, for instance, were clearly lower
than in other Central European socialist countries. Many specic
statistical data can be added. According to most statistical measures,
the material level of living conditions were better in both East
Germany and Czechoslovakia than in Poland. At any rate, there
were obvious veriable dierences between the countries.
On the issue of human rights, though, the picture was dierent.
Many reports on modernization and political development lump all
post-socialist countries together, assuming that in terms of civil and
political rights they were basically similar. This assumption is based
on questionable grounds. Admittedly, my own experiences are based
on mainly academic contacts. In terms of personal experience as an
ocial of the Finnish Science Council, I visited all the Central
European socialist countries. However I dare say that, like most
Scandinavians, I held Hungary and Poland to be considerably more
free and open in their political climate than East Germany and
Czechoslovakia. External tokens of this were seen in Poland and
Hungary, not only in the existence of small private businesses and
in the position of the Catholic Church, but also in a more permissive attitude toward modem social research. There were of course
oscillations in the strength of Communist rule. In all post-socialist
Central European societies there had been uprisings and attempts at
revolutions, but at least during the two last socialist decades, in the
1970s and 1980s, Poland and Hungary diered clearly from the
other socialist states. As Janina Frentzel-Zagorska (1991, 95) wrote,
Poland and Hungary are the two Eastern European countries in
which collapses of the communist system did not happen overnight
(as in Czechoslovakia and East Germany) or by a violent revolution
(as in Romania). At any rate, it is obvious that the degree of freedom of thought were far from similar in all Communist countries.
It is worth noting that one of the rst politically successful modern
grass roots movements was the Solidarity movement, which emerged
in Socialist Poland ruled by the Communist Party. It has been shown
that the young workers supporting Solidarity were not motivated
by an attachment to the values of a liberal economy. Rather, the
supporters seemed to be strongly aected by negative ideological
sentiments aimed primarily against the Communist Party monopoly

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of power at the grassroots level (Adamski, Zaborowski and PelczynskaNalecz 2002, 155169). An important part of the picture is that the
strength of the movement did not last long, and that it soon became
the victim of a new grassroots process. Solidarity was the rst successful grassroots movement in the socialist countries, but a signicant
feature of the 1989 revolution was the absence, in all the countries
involved, of an organized revolutionary movement with an explicit
and systematic ideology. The revolution began at the grassroots, and
it was over almost at the same time it started.
During the 1990s there was a vast output of studies of democracy
and democratization in Central Europe. The basic query often
concerned the extent to which the Central European countries copied
or renewed Western European models of democracy and representative institutions. Many studies and conclusions speak about a partial
success. In an issue of the International Political Science Review on elections
and parliaments in East Central Europe in the early 1990s, Janos
Simon (1997, 361379) emphasized how the Central European countries succeeded in both partly copying the Western models and in
returning to their own historical traditions.
Despite dominantly positive conclusions about the tendencies to
democratic developments in the post-socialist societies, it is obvious
that the democratization process in the 1990s abounded in problems. There were a great number of analyses pointing to a lack of
stable national parties representing the interests of crucial groups in
the social structure (Rychard 1992, 167179), to an inated number
of political parties (Simon 1997, 372377), and to a lack of crystallization in the party system (Adamski 1997, 69823; Holmes 1998,
232248). It was emphasized that a reasonable degree of correspondence between the actual political attitudes of the citizens and
the support for dierent parties was lacking. A telling description
was presented by two Dutch sociologists, Gijsberts and Nieuwbeerts;
they showed that while the members of the dierent classes diered
in their views about income inequality and social security, those
dierences were not reected in their voting behavior. People in the
emerging democracies in Eastern Europe had been unable to translate their political preferences into party preferences.
There are of course also other aspects and facets of democracy
than party politics. However, as Jean Blondel (1998, 157) once
remarked in a discussion about the challenges facing liberal democracies in the twenty-rst century, it is dicult to imagine how democ-

europes multiple modernity

497

racy could exist without parties. Yet as a number of political scientists from dierent countries maintain, at the beginning of the twentyrst century, party systems are facing many threats that could weaken
their role as guardians of democracy. This is, however, as much a
West European phenomenon as something characteristic of postsocialist Central Europe. According to Peter Mair (1998, 161174),
the political parties became more distant from society, on the one
hand, and more strongly linked to the government and the state, on
the other. They suered from a clear decline in their appeal to and
their distinctiveness for the citizens. A telling, although by no means
unique, example is provided by the Scandinavian countries. Some
decades ago there were often references to the Nordic model implying,
among other things, a consistent search for consensus and a playing
down of ideological dierences. The Scandinavian ve-party model
has been eroding since the 1970s. New parties such as the Greens
and populist parties on the radical right have emerged. Novel issues,
such as those related to ecology, to the power of peripheral regions,
the European Union, and to cleavages of gender and sex, lie basically
outside the traditional political divisions. In the parliamentary elections,
the new developments have resulted in higher voting volatility,
decreases in voting participation among the youngest voters in particular, and in an obvious decline of class voting (Allardt 2000,
129141). In fact, many of the facets emphasized as post-modernity
are observable. The West European societies are, in fact, as far from
the traditional West European model as are the post-socialist central
European countries. Many of the traits observable in the elections
and political life of the Central European post-socialist countries
often pointed out as doubtful from the point of view of democracy
seem to have emerged also in the West European countries.
It is signicant for the traditional conception of European modernity that the fall of the Communist regimes in the socialist countries
of Central Europe and their consecutive development has been considered as a case of modernization. It is true that some institutional
changes during this great European transformation strongly support
such a notion. There was a clear transfer to both political democracy and market economy. On the other hand, a closer look at what
happened in Europe during the nal decades of the twentieth century
also provides reasons to further scrutinize the modernization concept.
It is apparent that the processes of modernization diered among the
various post-socialist societies. Those countries that were economically

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erik allardt

most successful were not the ones that had more political freedom.
Modernization seems to be more of a multidimensional process than
was traditionally assumed. More important still is that some of the
features resulting from the regime change in the post-socialist lands
also have tended to emerge in Western Europe, and that the former
socialist countries in East Central Europe on some counts may have
developed faster in a new direction than the traditional European
democracies have. At least for the time being, nal conclusions about
political developments in Western and in East Central Europe are
too related to political opinions in order to be accepted as scholarly
ndings. Nevertheless, it seems permissible to conclude that multiple
modernities are characteristic of todays European societies.
A concluding note: Divergent modernities
To speak about modernity is a risky business, as there is a wide
range of dierent denitions. In a lucid presentation of the key ideas
in sociology, Peter Kivisto (1998, 119152) shows that practically all
founding fathers and recent leading theoreticians have had something
to say about modernity, usually in terms of their own terminology.
Here the point of departure was Max Webers view of European
modernity as a tendency to an overall rationalization of social life,
and in particular its continuation in S.N. Eisenstadts more comprehensive and research-based conception of European modernity, with
its emphasis on multiplicity and pluralism. Institutionally, the core
of European modernity has meant an accentuation of the democratic
nation-state, the market economy, research-oriented universities and
the importance of questioning achieved knowledge. In its emphasis
on universality and reexivity Eisenstadts view has some anity with
the conceptions of Anthony Giddens who especially emphasized the
basic social processes of modernization. According to Giddens (1990,
1927) modernization has entailed what he has called distanciation from the ties to particular locales, and a weakening of the
embedment of social ties to specic locales and primary groups. Here
we have followed Eisenstadt, at least partly, in the assumptions that
research, reexivity and the questioning of knowledge are crucial in
modernization. However, regarding the points made by Giddens, this
paper advocates a dierent view. In recent decades there has emerged
an increased depreciation of the ideas about increased distanciation

europes multiple modernity

499

and disembedment. There is now an accumulation of research ndings

pointing to the social importance of ties to localities, solidarity groups
and physically conceivable social units. It is evident that this new
return to an embedment of social ties can create increasing conicts
because of the highly increased migratory movements in the world
today. People no longer live in isolated communities and by a local
culture dominated locales (Beck and Beck-Gernsheim 2002, 209213).
However, despite the highly increased mixtures of people from
dierent social and cultural backgrounds and the consequent grave
risks for conicts, there also exists the clearly increased wish and
urge to recognize dierent cultures and to understand people from
dierent backgrounds. It is clear that such strivings fail in many
cases; yet nevertheless, the new modernity is composed of attempts
to understand people from dierent cultures. In fact, it is a strong
movement and even a dominant trend observable in practically all
European universities and student bodies. There is indeed a new
research-based and thought-out modernity emphasizing the importance of recognizing and accepting cultural dierences.
It is also evident that the new European modernity mentioned
above and described in this paper is based on a combination of
rationality and romanticism. This mixture of accepting and analyzing
localities and particular solidarities is very dierent from the blind
acceptance and rationalization of ones own cultural and racial symbolism and value orientations. A basic option available to Europe
today is to choose between belief in an overall rationalization on the
one hand, and belief in the importance of combining rationality and
recognizing particular cultural orientations, on the other. The latter
option stands for a new European modernity.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CIVILIZATIONAL RESOURCES FOR

DIALOGIC ENGAGEMENT?
Donald N. Levine
The notion of dialogue stands in contrast to two other formats of open
communication. It avoids both the uninhibited expression of mutual
antagonisms and the assumption that under conditions of ideal conversation, the concerned arties will ultimately arrive at identical position. Instead, dialogue signies a type of discourse in which parties take
turns listening respectfully and responding genuinely to one anothers
expressions. It implies, in the words of that prophet of dialogue
Martin Buber, the acceptance for otherness (Buber 1992, 65).
The possibility of this openness is precluded by the claim that
diverse civilizations are marked by core symbolic complexes that are doomed to
clash. That claim rests on three truths. As social scientists have armed
ever since William Graham Sumner (1906) provided the language,
all human groups manifest ethnocentrism. This designates a syndrome
marked by an exaggerated view of their own virtues; a pejorative view
of others; a relation of order, law, and industry among members of
the in-group; and a relation of predation against out-groups. Related
to these elements is a tendency to exaggerate the dissimilarities
between in-groups and out-groups. The universality of this pattern
can be linked in part to the ways in which it satises at once two
of the most powerful human needs: the need for attachment and
the need for dierentiation.1
Second, as systematic studies on the matter have shown, the more
complex and technologically advanced a society, the stronger is likely
to be its level of ethnocentrism (LeVine and Campbell 1972).
Third, ethnocentric beliefs become fortied when intertwined with
imperatives that stem from strong cultural mandates. Certain of these

1
These needs, as recent social neuroscience has demonstrated, are hard-wired
in the human species (Smith and Stevens 2002).

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donald n. levine

mandates derive from the work of elites who have produced transcendent ideals for reconstructing worldly relations, ideals that were
elaborated in what have been called the Axial civilizations (Eisenstadt
2003a, I, chs. 1, 7).
The great civilizations, consequently, have often defended and
extended their domain through gloried ethnocentric processes involving conquest, conversion, and assimilation of those outside the pale.
In Greco-Roman civilization, for example, Hellenes came to disparage
outsiders who were ignorant of Greek language and civilization,
thereby uncivil and rude. Calling them barbarians (barbaroi) disposed
the Greeks to conquer, enslave, and colonize others who were deemed
culturally inferior. This conceit continued in Roman times, as Roman
citizens justied their extensive conquests of alien peoples (barbari) in
ways that coerced them into adopting the Latin language and their
religious beliefs. In the case of European civilization this pattern
found its denouement in the missione civilatrice whereby Italian airplanes rained poisoned gas on shoeless Abyssinian peasants armed
with spears, and Nazi armies attempted to expand their notion of a
superior German culture throughout Europe.
The Greek/barbarian paradigm can be found in all other major
civilizations. Among those I shall consider here, it appears as
Hindu/mleccha, nihongo/gaijin, Christian/pagan, mumin/kar, and Chosen
People (am segulah)/gentiles ( goyyim). In what follows I shall relate
each of those dichotomies to certain core values in each civilization,
suggesting how these values have been used to justify disparagement
if not aggression against others. However, since each civilization has
evolved patently contradictory sub-traditions, they all contain elements that promote hospitability toward strangers, tolerate diversity,
and cultivate understanding and compassion, and so promote a more
inclusive orientation. Beyond that, I shall show that in the course of
the past century, three of these civilizationsIndia, Japan, and
Western Christianitygave rise to developments in which traditional
symbols were invoked in ways that heighten levels of openness and
inclusiveness dramatically. These developments represent resources
for dialogical engagement that could inspire ways of reducing clashes
among contemporary civilizations.
To adumbrate the modern transformational pattern I want to identify, let me begin with a prototype of the process, which appeared
in Greco-Roman civilization. The concept of physis (nature) formed

civilizational resources for dialogic engagement?

503

one of the central notions of the Greco-Roman worldview, nature

not in the post-Newtonian sense of an inherent force which directs
the world but as signifying the essential quality of something in a
universe of substances. Hellenic philosophers moved from questions
about the nature of inorganic and organic bodies to a concept of
nature that could be taken as a foundation for ethics. The texts of
Plato and Aristotle aorded a basis for superseding conventional
notions of morality with a search for what is good by nature as distinguished from what is good merely by tradition or convention
(Levine 1995).
At the same time, however, the notion of nature provided a basis
for dividing people into superior and inferior categories on the basis
of naturally given characteristics. This distinction was used to reinforce the Greek/barbarian dichotomy, in that all barbarians were
held to be slaves physei (by nature). Aristotle quotes a line of the
poets, It is tting that Hellenes should rule over barbarians, commenting that this was as if they thought that barbarian and slave
are by nature the same thing (Politics, Book 1, ch. 2, trans. altered).
In the minds of other Hellenic thinkers, however, the notion of
nature was employed to overcome such political oppositions by envisioning a single polis of the entire world. Diogenes the Cynic thus
proclaimed the doctrine of a world state (cosmopolis) in which all
humans would be citizens. This became a central doctrine of the
Stoics, based on the assumption that all humans possess by nature
an identical divine spark (apospasma). Accordingly, Stoicism undermined distinctions based on race, class, and even gender. These ideas
were amplied by Romans like Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, who
enlarged the doctrine of humanitarian cosmopolitanism. These doctrines
drew on the core Greco-Roman idealization of nature in ways that
articulated the notion of a universal human nature, as a means for
transcending the pejorative attitude toward outsiders that proponents
of the civilized/barbarian dichotomy had fostered.
In the civilization of India, the idea of purity (suddha) gured as
one central symbolic theme. This was one of several categories (varna)
used to divide people into cosmogonic human types. These varnas
categorize people in a single ranked moral order, which has counterparts in the realms of body and mind as well. Thus, a person
who is pure morally can be presumed also to be pure biologically
cool, rened, and stableand mentallydispassionate, truthful, and

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donald n. levine

enlightened (Marriott 2003). The Brahmins were the social grouping

( jati ) that manifested the quality of purity most fully.2
Commitment to this ideal of purity had well-known consequences
of an exclusionary character, both internally and externally. Within
Hindu society, one varna category designated a set of jatis who came
to be known as the Untouchables, those whose impurities were so
great that others would seek to avoid contact with them. Considered
irredeemably impure, they were excluded from such goods as rights
to own land and opportunities to perform certain rituals. In addition,
Hindu doctrine considered those outside their religious traditions to
be impure as well. Groups who did not respect the Vedic rituals
and the ban on killing certain animals were called Mleccha or outsider, a term that generally connoted impure. Mleccha and Untouchables
were often thought of as being in a similar or identical status category. Hostility toward Muslims thus was grounded to some extent
ideologically on their being impure.
On the other hand, the enormous heterogeneity of Indian culture
together with the absence of political pressures to impose religion
and an egalitarian strain in Hindu culture all accounted for the
proverbial syncretistic cast of Indian culture as well as the conspicuous
absence of wars of religion. Evolving from such background a position
of radical egalitarianism and inclusiveness, Mohandas Gandhi devoted
himself to overcoming those established polarizing animosities. He
strove to secure equal rights for the Untouchables, even renaming
them as Harijan, children of God. He also worked continuously for
unity between Hindus and Muslims, aspiring to promote the notion
of Indian nationals living together in a civic society. He strove valiantly
to prevent the creation of a separate Islamic state following Indias
Independence, but in vain. Identifying with the traditional Indian
notions of mleccha and impurity, a Muslim League under Muhammed
Ali Jinnah established a Nation of the Pure, Pakistan.3

2
They were obliged to provide literary instruction, priestly duties, and certain
magical services, and to support themselves from gifts, not by earning a salary.
Although Brahmanic status rested on birth, to become a fully accredited Brahman
a man had to study the Vedic texts, learn certain ritual practices, and acquire a
holy belt.
3
In an eort to win over Muslims who were averse to his model of barefoot,
mendicant, vegetarian asceticism, Gandhi subdued his satyagrahi persona. He also
sided with Muslims who were being murdered by Hindus. Fearing widespread civil

civilizational resources for dialogic engagement?

505

Although Gandhi failed to prevent the Islamic split-o and the

ensuing massacre of millions, he created a Way for Hindus to transcend tenacious animosities stemming from deeply held cultural convictions by drawing on other aspects of Indian tradition. He did so
by turning to classical symbols and fusing the varna category of ahimsa
(nonviolence), an ideal particularly emphasized in the Jain tradition,
with the Brahmanic devotion to truth (satyagraha). He categorically
ruled out the use of violence on the ground that it inhibited the
search for truthsatyagraha excludes the use of violence because
man is not capable of knowing the absolute truth and, therefore,
not competent to punish (2001, 3). In Gandhis teachings, the use
of satyagraha to overcome injustice required considerable training and
condence. Training included regular meditation and ceaseless renunciation of selsh wishes and impure thoughts. To transform the mind
of an opponent, a satyagrahi needed this mental purity.
Around the time of Gandhis transguration of Indian notions, a
comparable breakthrough was taking place in Japan, with eorts to
reorient the heirs of the culture of Japanese warriors. For Japanese
civilization, the core symbol to be considered here is makoto. Usually
mistranslated as sincerity, makoto signies a disposition to discharge
ones social obligations with utter delity, suppressing personal utilitarian goals. Considered the highest virtue of the Japanese hero,
makoto connotes the value of calm action in whatever circumstances.4
Although the focus of makoto has varied in dierent periods of history,
a constant theme has been the disposition to act in a self-eacing
manner on behalf of the well-being of others. As Eisenstadt (1996b)
has made clear, the ultimate ideal of Japanese civilization lies not
in some transcendent value to which worldly actions are held accountable, but to the authority gures of this world, on whose behalf
makoto actions are dedicated. Since the Middle Ages, the samurai
were expected to display this conduct most consistently. The pleats
of their traditional garb, the skirt-like pants known as hakama, allude
to what are understood as the components of makoto: loyalty, honor,

war between Hindus and Muslims, he nally encouraged the Congress Party to
accept partition. For this alleged betrayal, he was assassinated by a Hindu nationalist
soon after India became independent.
4
Success is not the criterion here. Ivan Morris (1975) suggests that the value of
makoto action may be enhanced by failure. Other aspects of makoto are described
in Gleason 1995.

506

donald n. levine

respect, aection, and sincerity (shin). The samurai ethos diused

through Japanese society; economic entrepreneurs recast the notion
of samurai makoto in ways that favored Japans economic modernization (Bellah 1957). It also was utilized by political modernizers
following the Meiji Reformation, who directed it into passionate allegiance to the emperor as symbol of the Japanese state. That symbolism, however, also turned Japan in externally destructive directions.
It fostered frequent violent combats among trained martial artists. It
also eventuated in the imperialistic ambitions that led Japan to embark
on brutal conquests under Emperor Hirohito.
Yet those same samurai ideals served to transform Japans traditional martial arts in an opposite direction. This began with the work
of educator Jigoro Kano, who recongured the traditional teaching
of lethal unarmed combat, ju-jitsu, into a practice of judo utilized
only to develop character. It eventuated in the teachings of Morihei
Ueshiba, who reoriented martial arts training away from competitive struggle of any sort toward practices designed to produce an
attitude of respect for all living beings and to serve as a bridge to
peace and harmony for all humankind (Ueshiba 1984, 120). Ueshiba
failed to persuade Japanese militarists to desist from launching war
against the United States, just as Gandhi failed to prevent the partition of India. Nevertheless, as Gandhis teachings in South Africa
and India inspired subsequent political leaders like Martin Luther
King, Jr., and Nelson Mandela to relate to their political opponents
in a respectful, nonviolent manner, Ueshibas teachings, through the
practice he created, aikido, have inspired millions worldwide to
embrace a Way that would enhance inter-civilizational dialogue.
Christianity was founded on an ideal of universal love. Funneled
through the Greek word agape, the teachings of Jesus propounded
the virtue of unselsh and benevolent concern for the welfare of
others. The universalistic cast of this teaching received classic formulation in the words of the proselytizing convert Paul, himself
inuenced by Stoic doctrines, who announced: There is neither Jew
nor Greek, bond or free, male or female; for ye are all one in Christ
Jesus (Gal. 3:28). In society after society, these teachings have
promoted restraints on violence and generosity of spirit.
On the other hand, Christianity holds the record for the number
of people from other cultures slain on behalf of a religious emblem,
including millions of native Americans, Africans, and aboriginal
Australians, not to mention, from among its own members, huge
numbers of heretics and witches. Western Christianity created a

civilizational resources for dialogic engagement?

507

tenacious pattern of anti-Semitism that, acknowledged in the recent

statements of Pope John Paul II, played a nontrivial role in destroying
the civilization of Continental European Jewry. Although Christian
gures from time to time espoused a turn to the ethos of Jesus and
early Christianity, almost none of them grappled conspicuously with
the challenge of using the foundational statements of Christianity to
oppose the waves of persecution launched against the Jewish people
in their midst.
None of them, that is, until pastor Dietrich Bonhoeer. Inspired
by the social activism of the Abyssinian Baptist church in Harlem,
which he assisted during a postdoctoral year at the Union Theological
Seminary in the early 1930s, Bonhoeer returned to Nazi Germany
to join Martin Niemoeller in his work with the Confessing Church
(Bekennende Kirche), the center of Protestant resistance to the Nazis.
He directed one of the underground seminaries of the Confessing
Church in 1935. After the Nazis closed down the seminaries, he
went on to engage in underground assistance to helping Jews escape
and was associated with the conspiracy to assassinate Hitler. The
theological and ethical statements that he worked out in the course
of this resistance became a benchmark for a new brand of Christians.
In justifying courageous pastoral intervention against Nazi oppression,
he worked out a justication of political activism in an immoral
world, based on a notion of venture of responsibility: It is better
to do evil than to be evil, he decided. His theological creativity has
been described as forging a kind of religionless interpretation of
biblical concepts in a world come of age (Bonhoeer 1963, 5).
Bonhoeer thereby paved the way for the more inclusive kind of
rapprochement that many German Christians have displayed since
the War, and has been described as a key theologian for leading
future generations of Christians.
For Islam, the core symbolic notion is, evidently, Islam, i.e., submission. This signies a posture of humble acceptance of and outward
conformity with the law of God. The term is derived from Arabic
'aslama, to surrender or resign oneself, in turn derived from Syriac
'aslem, to make peace. Islamic tradition focuses on a complex of laws
found in the Koran and promulgated by Muslim clergy, laws which
cover everything from family relations and civil accords to criminal
codes.
Among the notions to which Muslims owe submission, nothing is
more motivating than the injunction to pursue jihad. And nothing
illustrates the capacity of civilization to promote dierent directions

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donald n. levine

better than the dierent meanings this term has acquired in Islamic
civilization. On the one hand, jihad refers to aggression against
Unbelievers through the legal, compulsory, collective eort to expand
territories ruled by Muslims. Most scholars argue that despite ambiguities about the term in the Koran, this has been the principal line
of interpretation of the doctrine in Islamic tradition. Thus, jihad was
invoked to instigate the conquest, beyond the Arabian peninsula, of
the region from Afghanistan to Spain within a century of Mohammeds
death, and later to spur Muslim invasions of such territories as India,
Anatolia, Balkans, Ethiopia, Sudan, and West Africa. More recently,
it has been dramatically revived in modern Islamic fundamentalism
by inuential gures such as Sayyid Outb, who argues that the only
way for Muslims to achieve religious purity is to establish an Islamic
state through jihad.
On the other hand, jihad has been interpreted as a struggle for
personal moral improvement, in the sense of living more closely in
accord with Islamic Law. Thus, in language that parallels Ueshibas
formulation that in his form of martial art, there are no enemies
and that the greatest victory is the victory over oneself, the 11thcentury theologian Abu Hamid al-Ghazali maintained that the soul
is an enemy which struggles with one and which must be fought,
and that this jihad against the soul constitutes the greater jihad. In
this sense of the term, it extends beyond overcoming baser instincts
to a struggle for social justice. So understood, it could be viewed as
an injunction to live peaceably with everyone, and to cooperate with
people of all faiths in a quest for social reform. This position has
been embraced by virtually all Su theologians. It accords with the
absence in Islam of any particularistic ethnic emphasis, apart from
the status of Arabic as a sacred language (Eisenstadt 1992b, 41). In
fact, in many contemporary societies until recently, including Ethiopia
and India, the norm was for public displays of solidarity between
Muslims and other religious groups.
Although some progressive Muslims wish seriously to promote and
extend the latter denition of jihad, no charismatic gure, such as a
Gandhi or a Bonhoeer, has arisen to challenge authoritatively the
contemporary drift toward an escalation of the other view.5 In the
5

This view was propounded with particular virulence by heirs to the 13C jihad
revivalist Ibn Taymiyya and his 18C disciple, Mohammed Ibn Abdul Wahhab Najdi,
from whom the fundamentalist Wahabi sect derives.

civilizational resources for dialogic engagement?

509

past dozen years, Muslims appealing to the symbol of jihad have

launched a worldwide campaign involving assassinations, vandalism,
and terrorist actsagainst Christians in Indonesia and Yemen, Jews
in Israel, Hindus in Kashmir, and traditional religionists in Sudan;
and against Buddhists through demolition of their world-prized mountain sculptures in Afghanistan. This trend has been exacerbated by
another tenet of Islamic faith, the notion that the requirement to
act in accordance with Gods decrees as a condition of salvation
possible but dicult to fulllmay be short-circuited when fullling
the religious obligation of jihad, thereby enhancing ones chances of
being sent to heaven at the Last Judgment or, if one dies a martyr,
going directly to heaven.
For Jewish civilization, a core symbolic notion is brit, or covenant.
This has reference to biblical accounts of the covenants made between
God and the Jewish people, whereby God would provide certain
benets for the people of Israel in exchange for their loyalty to Him
and obedience to his moral directives. Accordingly, a central distinguishing feature of Jewish civilization, in Eisenstadts insightful account,
consists of the semicontractual relationship with the Higher Power,
in contrast to the absolute status of the transcendental symbols in
the other Axial Age civilizations.
Over time, as related in the Bible, the content of Gods promissory
note changed. With Abraham, it had to do with the Eretz, the Land,
of Israel. With David, it had to do with legitimizing the political
authority of a lineage. But the heart of the divine covenant for Jewish
civilization lies in the central chapters of the Book of Exodus, where
God promises to consider the Jews a Chosen People, in exchange for
their adherence to the numerous commandments enumerated therein.
The quality of being Chosen set up a constant invidious comparison with other peoples, referred to in what later became a pejorative Yiddish term, the goyyim. This dichotomy never led to conquest
or aggression, although when a 6th Century South Arabian king
Dhu Nuwaas converted to Judaism, he began to persecute Christians
(thereby provoking the Ethiopian Christian emperor at Aksum to
send troops across the Red Sea to overthrow him). However, the
conceit of chosenness produced at times an arrogant attitude toward
outsiders that wounded their narcissism. (One account relates that
Mohammeds turn against Jews was based on their rejection of his
appeal for support at the beginning of his mission.)
On the other hand, the evident meaning of chosenness, as the

510

donald n. levine

covenant is spelled out in Exodus 1924, signies the adherence of

Jews to a system of maxims that enjoin ethical behavior toward
a wide range of people. Prominent among those maxims is the
commandment to take care of strangers. Whatever narrow, cultic or
particularistic grounds for the Covenant are entailed in the covenant
with Abraham, or later with King David, are far overshadowed in
the history of Judaism by moral imperatives. And this history of
Judaism is itself an essential part of the core symbolism. The central
text of Jewish Civilization takes the form of a historical narrative,
not a straight listing of absolute commands or mythic portrayals.
The course of its history moves steadily away from the primordial
cultic observance and toward a universalistic ethical dimension. This
shift is itself a subject of attention in the sacred text itself, as when
God rebukes those who simply following old ritual prescriptions for
fasting, just bowing their heads, and spreading sackcloth and ashes
under them: Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the
bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the
oppressed go free? (Isaiah 58:6).
Even so, the particularistic aspects were never completely transcended; People and Land were perpetually celebrated. And when
the time for the Great Return arrived, there were those who sacralized
it in terms of the earliest covenant. More recently, this notion inspired
a drive to reclaim territory by building settlements on a vulnerable,
contested area, which became a provocation to others who also had
claims to sharing this piece of the earths surface. This appeal to the
earliest covenant has been defended in some fundamentalist Christian
groups more avidly than by most Jews.
My thesis is plain. The major source of civilizational clashes in
the coming generation lies in the actions of those Muslims who insist
on the aggressive side of jihad. One way these symbols can be recast
is through the emergence of a charismatic leader or group who,
steeped in traditional symbolism, will connect Islam with its deepest
roots in ways that point to new, inclusionary imperatives.
Although Jews can by no means be seen as an equally disruptive
source, some extremists appear to play a part in keeping the harshest
jihadists going. That stems from those who occupy the West Bank
settlements, not as a tactical move, but out of deepest conviction.
As militant jihadists draw on deeply rooted Islamic beliefs to inspire
their terrorist attacks, so, in a less overtly destructive way, do some

civilizational resources for dialogic engagement?

511

of the ardent West Bank settlers draw on archaic biblical symbols

to justify their occupation.
My argument thus points to the need for creative, charismatic
Muslims and Jews to forge prophetic formulations that draw on the
resources for overcoming particularistic antagonisms, resources that
each tradition contains in abundance. Within the Islamic tradition,
for example, the potential for turning jihad in a nonviolent, inclusionary direction was demonstrated by Badshah (Khan Abd al Ghaar)
Khan (18901988), a Pathan (Pushtun) Muslim from Afghanistan.
Khan dened Islam as a faith in the ability of every human being
to respond to spiritual laws and the power of muhabat (love) to transform human aairs. So oriented, Khan raised a nonviolent army
of some 100,000 Pathan warriors and worked closely with Gandhi
to use nonviolent techniques to promote social justice and independence (Easwaran 1999). Indeed, some three dozen years after Gandhis
death, Khan asserted that the world needs Gandhis message of
love and peace more today than it ever did before (7). In this same
vein, statements against Islamic terrorism have been issued by contemporary Islamic spokesmen such as Abdal-Hakim Murad, who
nds the taking of innocent civilian lives unimaginable in Sunni
Islam, and Hamza Yusuf, a popular American Muslim speaker, who
has declared that the real jihad for Muslims is to rid Islam of the
terrorist element.
As in Islam, the potential for overriding such exclusionary claims
lies near to hand in Judaism. A substantial portion of the world
Jewish community has long considered the moral covenant of Exodus
to supersede the territorial part of the covenant with Abraham, just
as archaic prescriptions for ritual sacrice were authoritatively superseded by prophetic ethics. More recently, the Talmudic tradition has
been drawn on by Aaron Lichtenstein, in The Seven Laws of Noah
(1981), to argue that observance of the Noachide laws suced to
include non-Jews in the divinely approved community. Figures such
as Joseph Abilea have eloquently endorsed a nonviolent, universalist
position, as have participants in such groups as Oz ve-Shalom, the
Jewish Peace movement.
To make these new openings does not require a purist ex nihilo.
The charismatic innovators needed could come from perfectly conventional backgrounds, as did the exemplars whom I described above.
Gandhi began as an elitist who shared the white South Africans

donald n. levine

512

disdain for blacks. Ueshiba served proudly in the Japanese army in

1904 and trained ocers of the Japanese military academy until
1941. Niemoeller, a submarine commander in World War I, supported
the National Socialists until they came to power in 1933. Bonhoeer
began as a conventional German who refused to perform the marriage
ceremony of a relative to a Jewish woman around 1930. What all
of them shared was a deep grounding in their respective traditions,
which earned them credibility, and then a powerful impulse to break
out of their elitist/ethnocentric molds in response to the ethical
demands of the current world situation.
In a brief essay composed just after World War I, What Is To
Be Done? Martin Buber confronted the dilemma of our time in
the voice of unknown comrades:
Some say civilization must be preserved through subduing. There
is no civilization to preserve. And there is no longer a subduing! But
what may ascend out of the ood will be decided by whether you
throw yourselves into it as seeds of true community. No longer through
exclusion but only inclusion can the kingdom be established. . . . Silently
the world waits for the spirit. (1957, 111)

Table 1. Exclusionary and inclusionary concepts of selected civilizations

Civilization Core idea

Benign
consequences

Exclusionary
framework

Expanded
Inclus.
concept

Creative
agents

Greco-Rom nature

rational ethics

civil/barbar

cosmopolitanism

Stoics

Indian

purity

Brahmanic
leader

pure/impure

satyagraha

Gandhi

Japanese

makoto

social order
modernization

nihon/gaijin

aikido

Ueshiba

Western
Christian

agape

domestic
pacication

believer/
pagan

Confessing
Church

Niemoeller &
Bonhoeer

Islamic

submission

pacication

ummah/kuar

greater jihad

???

Jewish

covenant

moral law

chosen/gentile

universalism

???

PART FIVE

CHALLENGES OF COLLECTIVE IDENTITIES

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

FRENCH AND GERMAN JUDAISMS FACING MODERNITY

Rolland Goetschell
The emancipation
During the nineteenth century, both France and Germany were transformed from semi-feudal societies to industrial powers. Both countries possessed a Jewish population which comprised a not insignicant
part of society. Before the Revolution, from forty to fty thousand
Jews resided in France and by 1914 their numbers had grown to a
population of close to a 190,000 thousand; while in Germany during
the years 18421844, the Jewish population was 400,000 thousand
and by 1910 it had reached 615,021. It is certain that this dierence
in population numbers played a not insignicant role in the emancipation process. However, the more signicant factor was the dierence
in the conditions that led to the emancipation in each country.
In France, events unraveled quite quickly. The following is a
synopsis of key events that led to Jewish emancipation. In the eighteenth century, Louis XVI abolished the right of physical toll with
the decree of January 17, 1784 and subsequently the ideas of regeneration and emancipation spreadas is shown in the report of the
Grgoire Essays on the physical, moral, and political regeneration
of the Jews (1788). The French Revolution then accelerated the
movement. On January 28, 1790, the emancipation of the Portuguese
and Spanish Jews, and the Jews of Avignon, was approved. The
following year, on September 27, 1791, seven days before its dissolution, the National Assembly granted emancipation to the Ashkenazi
Jews and the Jews of Paris. Then, as is known, in the Assimilationist
Will Napoleon convened rst the Assembly of the Jewish Notables
in 1806, then the Sanhedrin (March 317, 1807) which published
Doctrinal Decisions. However, Napoleon returned to discriminatory
policy with his Infamous Decree of March 17, 1808, which remained
in force for ten years. After the fall of Napoleon, Louis XVIII, in
1818, did not extend the Infamous Decree against the Charter of

rolland goetschell

516

1814. Under Louis Philippe, emancipation was completed with the

granting of a budget for the Jewish cult in 1831 and the abolition
of the oath more judaico in 1846. Ultimately, it took about sixty years
for the Jews of France to obtain their full emancipationequality
of rights with their Christian fellow-countrymen.1
Unlike the battle for Jewish emancipation in France, in Germany
the process was a long march. Under the inuence of the French
Revolution and the wars of Napoleon, emancipation began in 1808
with equality for Jews who resided to the east of the Rhineexcept
for certain economic limitations, for a period of ten years. The Jews
were granted full equality in the Hanseatic cities incorporated in
France and especially in the realm of Westphalia, where there was
the unique case of the Great Duchy of Frankfurt, in which the Jews
obtained equality by paying annual installments.
In Prussia, which was at that time among the most economically
advanced countries, Baron Karl von Stein created the law on government reform which granted Jews the right to vote and to appear
at elections for all the citizens. His successor, Karl August von
Hardenberg, through implementation of the law of 1812, granted
the Jews both citizenship and a plenitude of other civil laws. Exceptions
related to the corps of ocers, public administration oces, and the
judiciary. After Napoleons defeat and the victory of the Holy Alliance,
they quickly reverted to the former state. Although the Congress of
Vienna (1815) decided to preserve the rights granted to the Jews of
the German states during the Napoleonic period, the new government interpreted the treaty in the most restrictive sense and returned
to the status quo ante. Indeed, the German Federal Act of June 8,
1815 stipulatedin Article 16 of the Federal Act of the Germanic
Confederacy of 1815, incorporated into the General Act of the
Congress of Viennathat:
The belonging to dierent parties of the Christian religion shall not
cause any dierence in the enjoyment of civil and political rights in
the states and regions of the German confederation. The Federal
Assembly will deliberate on a procedure as uniform as possible by
which a civil betterment of those who profess the Jewish faith can be
brought about in Germany and how especially the enjoyment of civil
rights can be secured to them, they assuming, correspondingly all civil

Feuerwerker, 1976.

french and german judaisms facing modernity

517

duties in the confederate states. Until then, however, those who profess the
Jewish faith shall retain those rights, which they have already been
granted by the several confederation states.

At the last minute, the formula in the confederate states was revised
to read in the individual confederated states.
Thus, individual states were obliged to rearm via their own
sovereign institutions. This meant that the individual states were
allowed to question the emancipation granted to the Jews, which
had been decreed by a foreign power. The Revolution of 1848, in
which the Jews took an active part, and the National Assembly of
18481849, were a result of the latter act of congress. The Constitution
of March 28, 1848, in part VI 144148, granted civil, political and
religious equality. In May, once again, after the Revolution, the Jews
were disappointed and emancipation was postponed to the Greek
Calends. During the forty years that elapsed from the Congress of
Vienna to the Revolution of 1848, the promises of Article 16 of the
Federal Act were not honored.2
Under Bismarcks rule, the Jews situation started to change. When
Germany crushed Austria in Sadowa on July 3, 1866, the road
became clear for the reorganization of Germany. With the exception
of the states of the SouthBavaria, Wurtemberg, Bade, and HesseDarmstadta Confederacy of Germany of the North was formed,
dominated by Prussia. Politically, the time was marked in the Reichstag
and the Prussian Chamber of Representatives with the emergence
of the national liberals. Bismarck was ready to grant them a measure of liberal reform compatible with his foreign policy. Thus, the
emancipation of the Jews came as part of a package of liberal reforms
included in the reshaping of laws intended for the institution of the
Reich to be implemented. The Act of Reichstag of the Germanic
Union of the North in July 3, 1869 specied: All remaining limitations of civilian and political rights derived from the dierence in
religious creed are hereby abolished. In particular, eligibility for participation in municipality and state representation and for the high
rise of public oce shall be independent of religious creed. Although
the Jews were not mentioned, a debate between Edouard Lasker and
a conservative representative opposed to the law proves that the

Straus, 1966, pp. 107138.

518

rolland goetschell

Jewish problem was in the mind of members of the Parliament of

the Confederation of the North. Emancipation was achieved only
after the war of 1870 when the three German states of Southern
GermanyBade, Wurtemberg and Bavariajoined the second Reich.
German Jewrys struggle for emancipation took 55 years: that is, a
little over half a century was needed for German Jews to obtain
what the French Jews had obtained in 1791.3
Entry to civil society
In France, the entry of Jews into civil society was eected in a
relatively smooth transition. In the arts and letters, names such as
Rachel and Jacques Oenbach are obvious examples. Jews were
quickly integrated in the universities, for example Salomon Munck,
Derenbourgs, Adolphe Franck and Emile Durkheim.4 Similarly, in
the political arena Jews quickly rose to key-positions; this is reected
in the signicant number of Jews in the Third Republicin which
171 Jews held such positions as prefets, councilors of state, generals,
magistrates, representatives, and senators.5 In this matter, it may be
noted that the Quai dOrsay and the Army resisted more than other
institutions the promoting of Jews to high-ranking positions of inuence
and/or authority. In the industrial and banking sectors, we need
only draw on the case of Rothschild or Pereire6 to conrm the
growing opportunities for Jews to join civil society and assume key
inuential positions.
We now turn to the case of Germany. How dierent was German
Jews entry into civil society? During the forty years between the
Congress of Vienna and Revolution of 1848, the promises of Article
16 of the Federal Act were not honored. During that period remarkable social and economic progress was nevertheless achieved. In place
of the existing social order, comprised of a scant elite of royal bankers,
businessmen and a few doctors at the top, and a mass of beggars
at the bottom, Jews began to enter the professional markets and
business world. Rich property owners, manufacturers for the domes-

3
4
5
6

Hamburger, 1969, pp. 366.

On the Wissenschatt de Judentume in France see: P. Simon-Nahum, 1998.
Birnbaum, 1992.
Benbassa, 1997.

french and german judaisms facing modernity

519

tic and foreign markets now began making their appearance. The
Jewish banks were based in Frankfort, Karlsruhe, Mainz and other
places. Jews also participated in the construction of the railways. The
numbers of Jewish doctors increased considerably and Jewish writers
and journalists made their rst appearance. Nevertheless, unlike in
France, the public service sector remained closed to Jews, consequentially, Jews had no access to such positions as judges, schoolteachers, and professors.7 The Prussian monarchy eventually forged
strong ties with Germany, that were signicant in constructing the
German nation-state. In creating a signicant European state in 1871,
Bismarck fullled the expectations of the liberal middle class by implementing Herrenreform. Revitalizing the monarchy and the army became
an important part of the political structure by which imperial Germany
distinguished itself from Western Europe. Preserving the monarchys
military character was connected to the idea that the state (Staatsragende
Schucht) could claim for itself, without having to justify itself by means
of the social order. The pact between the monarchy and the noble
landowners remained intact, although the ties weakened from the
late eighteenth century onward and during the later period of reform.
Consequentially, Jews were forbidden to enter the reserve ocers
corps (without exception, conrming the rule in Bavaria in 1885).
Both as a community and as individuals, Jews never crossed that
border in civil society as long as the monarchy lasted.8
Intellectual Revolution and Reformation
Emancipation also presents an intellectual aspect that was embodied,
rst and foremost, in Wissenschaft of Judentum, and then in Reformation.
With Wissenschaft of Judentum, one can say that Judaism committed
itself to modernity. In 1823, the movements program was published
in the form of a speech by Emmanuel Wolf in Zeichrift fuer die
Wissenschaft of Judentum, which bears the exact title eber of Begri einer
Wissenschaft of Judentum (On the concept of a Science of Judaism).
In that text, Wolf denes this concept and his understanding of
Judaism:

7
8

Ricarz, 1975, pp. 6977.

Angress, 1972, pp. 1942.

520

rolland goetschell
When it is a question of the science of Judaism, it is obvious that the
term Judaism is taken in its acceptance in its broadest sense, as the
quintessence of the set of circumstances, specic characteristics and
performances of the Jews in touch with the religion, the philosophy,
the history, the law and the literature generally, the social life and
human aairs and not just in the restricted sense of simple religion of
the Jews. [. . .] Judaism, such as represented here, as a whole (als ein
Ganzes) rests on an appropriate internal principle and is contained on
one hand in an impressive literature, but also in a particular life and
a texture of a numerous class of human being that is capable and
requires in itself and for itself (an und fr sich) a scientic treatment.
Until now it was never presented scientically in all its parts, from a
completely independent point of view. If the total content of the Judaism
owed, in itself and for itself to be the object of scientic investigation
and if Wissenschaft of Judentum must be formed, one can understand
that there is a question here of all methods. The contents of this special science are then systematic development and presentation of its
object in all its parts, in itself and for itself and not just for external
ends. Let us apply this to the Wissenschaft of Judentum:
1. Wissenschaft of Judentum understands Judaism in its fullest scope
2. It unfolds Judaism according to its concept and makes a systematic
statement of it where the particular is returned permanently with
the fundamental principle of everything.
3. It treats its object in and for its own sake, the appropriate interest,
and not for any special purpose, or denite intention.

This brings Wolf to the following two-dimensional denition of his

objective:
1. Knowledge of Judaism in the historic and literary documentation.
2. A statistical study of Judaism in connection with all the contemporary Jews of all the countries of the world.
Beyond the Hegelian or Fichtean echoes of this founding text, Wolf s
speech, Lopold Zunzs papers, and the speech of Edouard Gans in
the same spirit, mark the passage of Judaism to modernity.9 After
Wissenschaft of Judentum, and partially spurred by its modernity, a fundamental modication of the traditional community began in Germany,
with the appearance of reforms. Introduced in 1810, at the Temple
of Israel Jacobsohn in Seesen, which contained an organ and a belltower, reforms were aesthetic and introduced the use of organs and
sermons in German. In 1818, the Temple of Hamburg was built in

See the special number of the review PARDES, no. 19/20, 1994.

french and german judaisms facing modernity

521

the same style as that of Seesen and launched another important

innovationa new prayer-book. In its text, the movements universalism is apparent in, for example, the abolition of everything concerning the Jewish origin of the Sabbath rest and all allusions to
animal sacrices. Another example of the shift to universalism is the
change from the phrase the request of the messiah who will return
Israel to Palestine to the phrase with the demand to bring redemption to Israel and to all humanity.10
These changes did not fail to arouse harsh reactions from the
orthodox Jews of Hamburg, in the form of a collection of responsa
entitled Eleh Dibrey ha-Berit. The strongest opponent of the reformation was Moses Sofer, known as Hatam Sofer (17691839), who
organized the orthodox world under his aegis and led the ght under
the slogan Hadash asr min-ha-Torah (Any innovation is forbidden by
the Torah) with the intention that any novelty, no matter how minor,
was forbidden.11 The Reform Movement, under the leadership of
Abraham Geiger and Samuel Holdheim, summoned a rabbinical
assembly in Brunswick in 1844, then in Frankfurt in 1845, and in
Breslau in 1846. A subsequent reaction was led by Zacharias Frankel
(18011875), who supported more moderate reforms. Frankel spoke
at the Congress of Frankfurt concerning the use of Hebrew, in the
name of his conception of a positive historical Judaism ( positive
historisches Judentum): in his eyes, Judaism was the great historic truth.
That is, Judaism is the truth, but the truth which gives itself to the
people in and through the history of the people. The term positive
originates in the legal distinction between positive law and natural
law; Frankel underlines, against the radical reformers, the halachic
character of Judaism.12
This discussion regarding trends in Judaism would not be complete without noting the appearance of neo-orthodoxy. This stream
developed from the work of Samson Raphal Hirsch (18081888).
The conception of neo-orthodox originates from the situation in
Hungary during the late eighteenth century, when the status of orthodox communities was recognized by the government in 1871 (after
the Congress of Hungarian Judaism 18681869) as separate entities.

10
11
12

See Phillipson, 1967 and W.G. Plaut, 1963.

See Katz, 1967, pp. 118149.
See Goetschel, 1994, pp. 107132.

522

rolland goetschell

In a memorandum sent to the authorities, representatives of orthodox

Jews of Prussia asked to allow the Jews to leave their local community
organizations for reasons of conscience. In 1873, the Prussian Landtag
debated a law that would allow every man to leave his church; the
intention of the law being to allow the existence of those that had
no religion. According to Edouard Laskers proposition, an amendment to this law was ratied, stating that a Jew is allowed to leave
his local community for religious reasons, without leaving Judaism.
Objections on behalf of the reform movement against the amendment
were not accepted and in July 1876, the Law of Secession (Austritgesetz)
was passed, creating a legal basis to elaborate a specic organization
for the neo-orthodoxy. The Separatist movement (Austritsgemeinde),
with the exception of Adass Yechouroun of Frankfurt, was joined by
small groups of orthodox Jews, primarily drawn from Berlin, Koenigsberg, Wiesbaden, Cologne, and Giessen. By and large, however,
most of the orthodox remained in their original communities. In
1885 Hirsch established Freie Vereinigung fur die Interesse den orthodoxen
Judaism.13 Likewise, those who created the other trends in Judaism
established their own rabbinical seminary.
Returning to the case of France, the question arises why French
Judaism did not undergo a reformation similar or parallel to that in
Germany? Radical programs for reform certainly existed in France,
but their conception stemmed from secular individuals, who had little inuence. Albeit in France the Judaism that existed did include
many characteristics that in other countries would have been considered
as stemming from non-orthodox tendencies. Nevertheless, rabbinical
authorities in France tried above all to maintain the communitys
unity. In 1856, Salomon Ulmann convened a rabbinical conference
in Paris suggesting acceptable reforms, for example: use of the organ
was allowed but not desirable, French could not be substituted for
Hebrew in prayer, the number of piyutim must be reduced, women
and children should be allowed in the synagogue, and other minor
reforms.14 The major reason underlying these reforms was that the
dominant stream of thought in French JudaismFranco-Judaism
was close to the historico-positive Judaism of Germany. French

13
14

Breuer, 1992.
Cohen-Albert, 1982, pp. 121141.

french and german judaisms facing modernity

523

Judaism was regrouped into a single coherent theoretical formulation

which reected the essence of Judaism and the essence of France
during the Third Republic. The theorist who framed the basis of
the above idea was the Orientalist James Darmsteter who said Since
the emancipation, there is no more history of the Jews of France;
there is only a history of French Judaism, as there is a history of
Calvinism or Lutheranismnothing else and nothing more.
The Jew could adopt France because France had risen to the
superior level of humanity that Judaism tried hard to promote. The
ideology of revolutionary France was in fact the ideology of Judaism;
since the Prophets, Judaism rested on two great principles: divine
unity and messianism. Each had a relation with the modern world
that emerged in 1789. Divine unity, the biblical concept of monotheism meant the unity of the law in the world; however, messianism
implied faith in the earthly triumph of justice in humanity, faith
in progress and in social improvement which constituted the driving
spring of the Revolution. It was that ideology that, consciously or
unconsciously, asserted itself in French Judaism.
The price to be paid for French Judaism was religious indierence,
reected in the following two quotations: I have not enough religion to change it (attributed to Mrs. Strauss, Genevive Halvi) and
what our ancestors knew how to maintain in spite of their pursuits
in centuries of intolerance and inhumanity, we shall not let them
remove by our coreligionists in an era of freedom and emancipation
(a remark by Adolphe Crmieux).
However, after the aair of Damascus (1840) and later the Mortara
aair (1858), the Jews of France stood in unity with the creation of
the Alliance Israelite Universale in 1860. The Alliance was founded by
J. Carville, I. Cohen, N. Levin, the secretary of A. Cremieux, A. Astruc,
and the poet E. Manudans. The founders met at Charles Netters
house to devise the alliance and in June 1860 they published a
manifesto which contained the following three points:
1. Working everywhere for the emancipation and moral progress of
Jews.
2. Helping Jews suering from anti-Semitism.
3. Encouraging publications promoting these objectives.
The manifesto attracted Jews of all social backgroundsfrom Count
Camondo, to Adolphe Franck by way of Joseph Reinach and Zadoc

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rolland goetschell

Kahn. LAlliance established a real internal bond in the Jewish

community. It contributed to the formation, in a modern ideological
form, of a tradition of Jewish solidarity that inuenced in particular
the communities around the Mediterranean.15
The last years of the nineteenth century
If the beginning of the nineteenth century was a time of hope, the
second half was marked by disillusion. In France, anti-Judaism developed in 1880. In 1886, Drumonts La France Juive appeared, and his
newspaper La Libre Parole was launched in 1892. The Dreyfus Aair
(18941906) and the wave of anti-Jewish terror that accompanied it
called into question the principles of Franco-Judaism, even though
retrospectively, the Aair was considered a childish crisis of the Third
Republic.16
In Germany, the minister Adolf Stoecker, Chaplain of the Court,
founded in 1878 the party of Christian-Socialist Employees that positioned anti-Jewish sentiments at the center of its program. In 1879,
Wilhem Marr created the Anti-Semitic League that was intended to
reduce the inuence of the Jewish race in German public life. In
particular, though, the pamphlets by the great historian Heinrich
von Treitschke and their after-eects, moved the Jewish world and
aroused responses in others, such as Lazarus, Hermann Cohen and
Graetz.17 To defend themselves, the Jews tried to set up a central
community structure and gain recognition from the authorities. At
the end of the Wilhelmian era the Jews were refused. In a letter
written on August 8, 1901, Studt reveals the real motivation for the
refusal: To add to the real power which the Jewish citizens have
in disproportion achieved through money and property, the weight
of a Jewish political organization would set up a dam against the
assimilation of the Jews with the rest of the population and would
harden the dierences which it is in the obvious interest of the state
to level.18

15
16
17
18

Isral, 1968.
Marrus, 1971.
Leyer, 1966, pp. 137170.
Lamberti, p. 11.

french and german judaisms facing modernity

525

With the outbreak of war in 1914, the French community, then

190,000 strong, found in the union sacre the realization of its
patriotic faith and its expectations from the Rights of Man in France.
Foreign Jews volunteered en masse. For the Jews of France, it was
necessary to overcome the enemy both as an invader and as a source
of anti-Semitism. Evidence for their patriotic zeal was provided by
7,500 deaths.19 In Germany, the war was welcomed by the Jews with
the same enthusiasm as the rest of the nation. After the Emperors
proclamation on August 4, 1914 concerning Brgfrieden, many forms
of anti-Jewish discriminationparticularly in the service of the state
disappeared. Jews were names as ocers, storekeepers, and scholars.
Moreover, Jewish academics were invited to support the war eort
and occupied posts of responsibility in the governmental agencies
and oces, in particular in Kriegsgesselschaften. However, this was a
short period. In autumn, the anti-Semitic press resumed its attacks,
accusing the Jews of running away from military obligations and
beneting from the situation. The result of this indefatigable campaign was the Judenzhlung of October 11, 1916, in which all
German ocers were requested to calculate how many Jews subject
to military duty were serving at that time in every unit of the German
army. It was the ultimate anti-Jewish act carried out by the German
military caste before the collapse of 1918.20
Conclusion
To conclude this comparison between France and Germany one can
ask the following questions:
1. Was emancipation imposed from the outside by armies of occupation and foreign ideologies or did it develop internally? The
answer is clear: in France, emancipation was a product of the
French Revolution. However, in Germany, the rst emancipation
was the direct or indirect result of the occupation by Napoleon.
2. Was it a prolonged or a fast process?
In France, it was a fast process. In contrast, in Germany it was a
development that extended over a long period.
19
20

Landau, 1992 pp. 305320.

Andress, 1978, pp. 117135.

526

rolland goetschell

3. Did political emancipation precede and facilitate, or follow economic and social incorporation? In France, political emancipation preceded and facilitated economic and social incorporation.
Regarding Germany, the opposite is true.
4. Was emancipation a part of the new nationalist assertion, or part
of the liberal political movements with which the Jews were
aliated? In Germany, it was clearly the support of liberal political movements that assured the emancipation of the Jews, while
the conservatives and nationalists took all possible steps to prevent it.21 In France, emancipation was a result of the activity of
individuals more than of movements.
5. Once obtained, did emancipation proved itself long-lasting or were
there episodes of restoration that tried to question its results? In
France, Napoleons dcret infme in 1807, was a minor inuence.
In Germany, the decisions of the Congress of Vienna delayed the
emancipation of German Jews.
In both cases, modernity did not mean the disappearance of the two
communities, but rather adaptation to the appropriate conditions of
social, economic, and political life in the two countries.

21

B. Rrup, 1976, pp. 5968.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

FROM EAST EUROPEANS TO EUROPEANS

Piotr Sztompka
The rst of May, 2004 marks both an end and new beginning to
an era in European history. The enlargement of the European Union
signals the beginning of a new phase in the history of Western
Europe, and, for the new members from Eastern Europe, the end
of a long period of exclusion and separation. Commentaries on this
epochal event usually focus on hard institutional factors such as
political rearrangements, legal coordination and economic readjustments, etc. In this work, I would like to focus more on the soft
cultural and human factors; what I consider to be the intangibles
and imponderables of a new, emerging Europe as I am convinced
that culture really matters in social life.
When sociologists speak of culture, they have in mind a much
wider category than that used in the vernacular; Sociologists talk
about what Emile Durkheim, the French father of the discipline,
called societal facts. These facts are supra-individual phenomena
that do not derive from individual mental states but emerge from
the collective consciousness. They are shared by the majority of people and exert external pressures and constraints on each member of
society. They include social values and norms, beliefs and convictions,
symbolic meanings, half-conscious habits of the heartto borrow
a phrase from yet another of sociologys founding fathers, Alexis de
Tocqueville. Culture, to a great extent, determines what people, as
members of collectivities, think and do; it shapes their actual social
practices, their ways of life.
The various components of a culturewhether axiological, cognitive, or symbolicall come together to form the self-denitions
that people construct of themselves, i.e. their collective identities.
This topic will be my narrower focus. I will examine how accession
to the European Union can aect the collective identities of peoples
from the former communist countries. I will look at how this process
may help erase the current somewhat peculiar and crippled EastEuropean identity and clear the way for a fully-edged and proud

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piotr sztompka

European identity. I also claim that the revolutions of 1989 will not
be completed until such transformations of identity come to a successful
conclusion. Being invited to enter the European house does not
necessarily mean automatically feeling at home or that newcomers
will necessarily be treated as one of us by the current tenants. This
metaphor is useful for grasping the opposition of hard institutional
arrangements and soft cultural orientations. House means the architecture; home means solidarity, loyalties, attachments, trust. To
reside in the house does not necessarily mean to consider it ones
home.
Rudiments of the theory of identity
Human society is the product of a dynamic process in which society
continually reconstructs itself. Society is constantly becoming; it
is never simply being. It is a process rather than a substance
(Sztompka 1991). This process is driven by societal agency which
refers to the potential of a society to eectively transform itself. A
crucial component of societal agency is collective identity, which is
at the same time both a pre-requisite for the future collective social
practices as well as the outcome of those social practices, accumulated marks of past experiences. Collective identity must be distinguished both from personal identity and mass identity. Personal
identity is the individuals concept, self dened in terms of belonging
to a specic social group or organisation, ones status or societal role,
etc. Thus, I consider myself: a Pole, a Krakowian, a Catholic, an
academic, a male. Mass identity, on the other hand, is the sum of
specic individual identities found in a particular collectivity. As
such it is an artifact: a statistical average devoid of ontological hard
reality. It tells us only that there are a certain number of individuals with a particular type of personal identity. In contrast, collective
identity can only be produced by the exchange of meanings through,
for example, public debate, artistic expression, conversation, argument
and the media; what is sometimes referred to as the meaning
industry. It emerges in interpersonal interactions as a record of
common social experiences. It is created not so much as a result of
individual biography, but rather in the course of societal history. In
a way, collective identity can be seen as sedimentary rock built up
of layers of social practices and traditions.

from east europeans to europeans

529

Collective identitylike all other components of societal agency

emerges as the combined product of two categories of determinants.
On the one hand, the individual endowment of the actors: their
motivations, beliefs, convictions, competencess, and on the other hand
the cultural, political, legal, economic and geo-political institutional
structures in which the social actors are involved. Emergence of identity only becomes real when both of these two interacting determinants are ascribed a specic meaning through interpersonal discourse
in the public space. This meaning species both what we want to
achieve and what we realistically can achieve, given our personal
limitations, and received, inherited institutional environment. The
Durkheimian, societal, quality of collective identity has three characteristics: rst, it is shared by the whole of society, second it is
external with respect to each individual (not personally devised, or
freely chosen) and third, it is constraining, normatively binding and
determines the way individuals feel about themselves and about
society.
Closer analysis reveals that there are two divergent aspects of collective identity: the forging of bonds and the dening of boundaries
(Eisenstadt 2003b: 75134). Collective identity means belonging to
one group and diering from another. Thus the rst, armative
aspect of collective identity is the denition of WE: who we are,
whom we resemble, whom we share with, whom we trust, whom
we are loyal to and with whom we feel solidarity. This sense of we
is apparent through the presence of moral bonds, such as trust,
loyalty, solidarity, reciprocity and empathy among its members. The
foundations for such bonds can be found at four dierent levels.
First, there are the primordial commonalities of territory, landscape,
environment (e.g. village vs. city, mountains vs. seaside, desert vs.
agricultural lands). Second, there are historical commonalities of past
experiences, traditions, collective memories, emblematic heroes, common ancestorswhether real or mythical. Third, there are cultural
commonalities of language, religion, customs, ways of life, life style,
currency. Fourth, there are ideological commonalities of Weltanschauung,
positive visions of a special mission, calling, a role in the wider world,
or negative visions of a particular oppression, exploitation, dependence, pain and suering. At this last level the typical forms of ideological articulation are positive or negative auto-stereotypes: idealisation
of self, aggrandizement, superiority complex, or the oppositeselfagellation, self-victimisation, inferiority complex, sacrice.

530

piotr sztompka

The second, negative aspect of collective identity is the denition

of THEM: the others, whom we dier from, whom we oppose,
who threaten us, and against whom we must defend ourselves. This
denition of them or the others is formulated on a scale of otherness. Sometimes others are perceived as dierent in the sense of being
special, a new experience, something exotic with a particular kind
of worth. We call this a positive tolerance. However, the others
may also be perceived as strange, a necessary and unavoidable burden that has to be endured. This is still tolerance but with a dierent,
negative overtone, hence referred to as a negative tolerance. Further
along the scale, the others are seen as alien: unacceptable, repulsive, to be avoided and rejected. This would be referred to as
intolerance. The most destructive concept of otherness is when
others are perceived as the enemy: as threatening embodiments
of evil, polluting poison, illegitimate encroachments on our well-being,
something to be defended against, and ultimately to be destroyed,
even exterminated.
With others we tend not to forge bonds but are more likely to
construct boundaries. Sometimes these boundaries are quite tangible
such as, for instance, barbed-wire fences, check-points, wallsthe
Berlin Wall and the recently erected wall dividing the Israeli settlements from Palestinian territories, etc. However, less obvious, more
symbolic and even virtual boundaries can also separate us from the
supposedly polluting inuence of others. Examples include, separate seating on buses for racial minorities, restricted places of entertainment under the conditions of apartheid, the Star of David on
the arms of persecuted Jews, or in a much less signicant area
remote corners for smokers at airports. From the perspective of a
given society, boundaries most often face outwards, that is, borders
ward o outsiders: tribes, ethnic groups, nations, civilizations. But
people also erect internal boundaries within their own society, keeping
other races, ethnicities, immigrants and refugees at a distance.
Images of others are also articulated by means of stereotypes.
Racial, national and ethnic prejudices give rise to practices of segregation, discrimination or persecution. It has been shown that
negative stereotypes initiate vicious circles involving isolation, hostility,
conict and wars. On the other hand, positive stereotypes strengthen
moral bonds and, thus, initiate behaviour patterns that encourage
contact and enhance relationships that lead to mutual understanding
and peaceful coexistence. They act as self-fullling prophecies armed

from east europeans to europeans

531

by the putative truth of their eects. Stereotypes also enter cycles of

dialectic reciprocity: the more we are disliked the more we dislike,
and vice-versa, the more we are liked, the more we like. The crucial
factor in shaping our auto-stereotypes and the stereotypes of the
others is the way we are treated or, better, perceive to be treated
by the others. This famous mechanism described by Charles H.
Cooley for individual cases as the looking-glass self , operates also
on a collective scale in shaping collective identities.
Given the theoretical framework in this section, we will now move
to consider two historical illustrations of collective identity: the
European and East-European identity.
The European identity
Not only was Europe one of the rst areas to develop a continental-wide, strong feeling of unity, but also perhaps the only continent
to produce an identity of this kind. Francis Bacon already referred
to nos Europai, we the Europeans in 1623. This kind of continent-related collective reference does not seem to occur in the other
continents. Admittedly, it could be argued that it currently occurs
in America. However, it seems to me that in the case of the US it
resembles more the traditional forms of nationalism (loyalty to the
New Nation of immigrants), or constitutional patriotism (the strong
allegiance to the Constitution of the US, the anthem and the ag),
than the identity with the whole North American continent. European
exceptionalism in this regard is emphasised by the contemporary
commentator, Anthony Pagden: Europeans are, I suspect, unusual
in sharing in this way a sense that it might be possible to belong to
something larger than the family, the tribe, the community, or the
nation yet smaller and more culturally specic than humanity
(Pagden 2002: 53).
The foundation of the European identity is built on paradoxes.
To begin with the primordial level, Europe is merely a vulnerable
peninsula of the huge Asian or Eurasian continent; its Eastern borders tentatively holding back the vast steppes of the Orient. As the
British historian Norman Davies puts it in his monumental history
of Europe: All there was, for ve million years, was a long, sinuous
peninsula with no name, set like the gurehead of a ship on the
prow of the worlds largest land mass (Davies 1997: xvii). The

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Eastern limits of Europe have always been contentious, which is best

demonstrated by its historically changing denitions, with the gradual
expansion of the idea of Europe apparently now brought to a halt
at the Ural mountains. The unity or homogeneity of the continent
is also problematic, in view of the tremendous diversity of landscape,
climate, environment, as well as of states and other political units.
Paradoxically this diversity has often been treated as a common, unifying feature of Europe, as its unique value, or richness, as illustrated
by Bertold Brechts proud proclamation: We Europeans cross borders
as often as others change their shoes.
The more obvious foundation of the European identity is its
common history. As is widely recognised, Europe has its origins in
three great traditions. The rst pillar of Europe is ancient Greece,
with its tradition of art, philosophy, science, cultivation of the body
and rst delineation of democracy. The second pillar is ancient Rome,
with its tradition of law and a legal culture, as well as an ecient
administration of the state. There is no doubt that the third pillar,
in spite of all the reservations raised by the fanatics of political
correctness, is Judaism and Christianity with their concept of human
dignity and their idea of freedom, liberation, emancipation, as well
as of linear progress. But even in the domain of history we discover
a paradox. For although Europes history has been characterised by
numerous dividing and disruptive conicts, struggles and wars, the
memory of such calamities accompanied by the dream of peaceful
order and stability, have become strong unifying factors. As we know,
the political project of a European Community, and later of a
European Union is legitimised precisely by the eort to escape from
a conict-permeated and war-ridden past.
But perhaps the most important foundation of the European identity is cultural. As Vaclav Havel once put it: Europe is a domain of
our common thoughts, values and ideals. Many other authors and
politicians have emphasised a common pool of values. For example
Norman Davies mentions religious tolerance, human rights, democratic government, the rule of law, the scientic tradition, social modernization, cultural pluralism, a free market economy and the supreme
Christian virtues such as compassion, charity, and respect for the
individual (Davies 1997: 26) as values Europeans share. The most
comprehensive ocial list, however, is to be found in Article 2 of
the project of the European Constitution, in which values such as
human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, rule of law, human

from east europeans to europeans

533

rights, pluralism, tolerance, justice and solidarity have been mentioned. Signicantly, such an apology for common values corresponds
with the recognition of Europes rich diversity of languages, lifestyles
and customs, which are to be preserved in everyday life.
Rather more problematic is the fourth foundation of unity, the
Euro-Centric ideology claiming that Europe is the cradle of the expanding West (including the US). According to this ideology, the West
is considered synonymous with the most dynamic, developed and
progressive civilization. It assumes, somewhat in line with Spencerian
social evolutionism, that there is only one scenario for social development and only one road leading to modernity and beyond, which
all societies have to follow, as if we were all riding one giant escalator, with the more privileged people at the top, and the less fortunate down at the backward bottom. By implication Europe was
said to be entrusted with the civilizing mission of pulling up the laggards, realised by its domination across many continents. The geopolitical consequence of such a theory has been European imperial
expansion and colonialism. In 1800, thirty-ve percent of the land
was controlled by European powers. This rose to sixty-seven percent
in 1878, and nally, to eighty-four percent, in 1914. Such an absolutization of European path to modernity is presently challenged
by the notion of multiple modernities, put forward by scholars
such as Shmuel Eisenstadt, Bjorn Wittrock, Johann Arnason and
others.
In spite of all these commonalities Europe has always raised numerous boundaries, both internal and external. Internal dividing lines
have separated its core from the peripheries. There have been various
types of divisions, such as: barbaricum versus civilization; the North
(as dened by Voltaire to include Scandinavia, Baltic countries,
Poland) versus the Mediterranean South, the cradle of Europe;
Western Christendom (Catholic, Protestant) versus Byzantine culture
and Orthodox religion; the economic backyard or under developed
areas versus the developed, highly industrialized and urbanized countries; urbanized areas versus rural areas; the former centres of empires
or imperial states (Britain, France, the Netherlands) versus small
states; communist countries versus the free Europe, or in dierent
terms, Western versus Eastern Europe; EU countries versus others;
recently acceded countries versus the rest within the EU, and potentially, the two-speed future development of the EU, with the core
countries versus the rest.

534

piotr sztompka

The external boundaries of Europe have also always created resistance to other areas of the world, to other continents and civilizations. The earliest fault line separated it from the Orient. As Edward
Said puts it: The Orient is not only adjacent to Europe; it is also
the place of Europes greatest and richest and oldest colonies . . .
its cultural contestant, and one of its deepest and most recurring
images of the Other (Said 1979: 1). A more recent fault line is the
opposition toward Islam prophetically described by Samuel Huntington
as: the war of civilizations. The most recent boundary emerging
after the collapse of communism is the one erected against the US
(as the opposition against American hegemony in a no longer bipolar, globalising world). It raises the spectre of age-old anti-American
sentiments, expressed for example already in 1900 in the statement
describing Americans as: Clients of Europe which have become its
rivals (dAppolonia 2002: 177).
The East-European identity
I claim that specic historical circumstances in the Eastern part of
Europe have led to the emergence of a particular type of collective
identity, which I label as the East-European identity. After a period
of considerable economic and political success and inuence under
the Byzantine and Ottoman empires in the southern anks of the
region (the Balkans, Hungary), and under strong monarchies in the
northern part (Poland, Lithuania, the Czech lands), which lasted until
the end of the seventeenth century, the region lost its importance
faced with the birth and expansion of modern capitalism in Western
Europe. Ever since, it has retained its pervasive peripheral status
vis-a-vis Western Europe. There are many reasons for this: Firstly,
the geographical shape of the European peninsula made the Eastern
part into a kind of residual area for Europe without any obvious
geographical boundary from Asia. Secondly, the region has been
economically underdeveloped and has fallen into backwardness also
regarding its civilization and technology. This underdevelopment
resulted in a relatively large proportion of rural settlements with
relatively rare and small urban centres, and a rural population. The
region was often conquered and politically dominated by Western
powers (e.g. in the case of Polands partitions throughout the whole
nineteenth century, or the Nazi occupation in the twentieth century).

from east europeans to europeans

535

After World War II it became politically isolated from the West,

and lost its sovereignty as it was incorporated into the communist
bloc. (The complicity of Western powers in such a division, often
referred in Eastern Europe as the Yalta treason, led to the erection
of an additional barrier of distrust, and suspicion as to the Wests
political intentions.) For a considerable timeas if to support suspicionit was excluded and kept outside of the emerging European
Community or European Union. Even with the present expansion
of the EU toward the East, there are still a number of Eastern
European countries, which will remain outside of the politically united
Europe, at least for the time being.
These were the historical factors that were breeding Western stereotypes of Eastern Europe, which in turn were reected in the autostereotypes of the East Europeans. Already in the eighteenth century
Europeans as they traveled beyond Germany into Catholic Poland,
Orthodox Russia, and the still Ottoman Balkan peninsula, felt themselves to have suddenly entered an alien and archaic world of vast
distances, enserfed peasantries, and brutal petty ocialsa world
that corresponded all too easily to their received notions of oriental
despotism (Pocock 2002: 6667).
As a result two cultural syndromes were born. One with deep
historical roots, which I will call the early East-European syndrome,
and another of much more recent origin, which is variously called
the satellite mentality, the bloc culture, or the Homo Sovieticus.
The early East-European syndrome was marked by several characteristics: rst, by insecurity and unclear self-denition, wavering
between being European and being other than European; second,
by an inferiority complex toward the West, compensated by an superiority complex toward societies further East; third, by an idealization of the West with its political freedoms and economic auence,
resulting in negative stereotypes of societies further East; fourth, by
xenophobia and strong defensive attitudes toward neighboring countries; and nally this syndrome was inuenced and maintained by
various Slavic solidarity movements and myths, such as pan-Slavism
and folklore depicting Slavic suering and heroism.
The opportunity to escape from this early East-European identity
has for a long time been reserved for cosmopolitan elites or emigrants. The aristocratic circles close to the royal courts had intensive international contacts via diplomacy, regional markets and fairs,
festivities, common leisure patterns, similar lifestyles and the use of

536

piotr sztompka

Latin (and then French) as a common language. The intellectual and

academic elites surrounding the universities took part in regular international exchanges, traveled widely, and participated in the crossEuropean exhibitions and demonstrations of art, science, philosophy
and high culture. Finally, there was a large diaspora of East Europeans
in the West, the immigrant communities in Western countries, who
kept in touch with home and mediated in the inuence of Western
ideas, ways of life and values, contributing greatly to what sociologists call the demonstration eect of Western superiority.
The later variety of the East-European syndromethe satellite
mentality, or bloc culture (Homo Sovieticus)developed as a
result of the last political and military division of Europe after World
War II. One of the eects of the communist takeover was the imposition of a cultural premise radically opposed to the West, and hence
isolating Eastern Europe mentally and culturally from the rest of
Europe. The wall in their heads was erectedto use the phrase
from one of the rst report on 1989 revolutions by Andrew Nagorski,
Newsweek correspondent for Eastern Europe at that timeperhaps even more solid than the Berlin Wall itself. It was created in
two dierent ways: rstly, through direct indoctrination, anti-Western
propaganda, and the socialising impact of non-Western institutions,
such as autocratic politics, a centrally planned economy, and a controlled and restricted circulation of thought and cultural expression;
and secondly, as an adaptive reaction to this institutional framework
and to dire living-conditions, which in reality had little to do with
the declared communist ideology. Some examples of such adaptations include: parasitic innovativeness (e.g. talent for nding loopholes and beating the system), the evasion of laws, claimant attitudes
toward the state, opportunism, nepotism, favoritism and clientelism,
camouage and double moral standards.
It was this subjectively constructed amalgamation of the Homo
Sovieticus syndrome combined with an idealised image of the West
that contributed to the emergence of the crippled, inferior, decient
and defensive identity of incomplete Europeans. This, in turn, was
enhanced by the patronising, mistrusting and condescending attitudes
of Westerners. These attitudes were not only customary in political
contacts and economic exchanges, but also at a most crucial level
of everyday life starting from extended visa procedures, thorough
and humiliating security and customs checks at border points, the
demand of extra nancial guarantees at hotels or shops, discrimina-

from east europeans to europeans

537

tory practices at employment agencies, etc. Being treated as secondrate persons always contributes to the development of a decient
self-identity. Allow me an aside: lecturing often at Western universities, both in Europe and in the US, I have always been aware of
a certain guardedness among my students and an initial suspicion
of that professor from Eastern Europe and it takes a lecture or two
to convince them that I am not a polar bear that drinks vodka.
The slow return to Europe at the level of a collective identity
started already with the birth of a democratic opposition and various
forms of contestation against the existing communist regime. The
slow erosion of the communist bloc culminated in the revolutions
of 1989, which brought about the collapse of communism. The main
aim of the revolution was to escape from the grip of Asia and move
toward Western Europe, and to nally realise old pro-Western aspirations and ambitions (Sztompka 1996). This aim is best expressed
by the concept of rectifying revolutions proposed by Jrgen Habermas
(Habermas 1990). The immediate result of the revolution was twofold: it changed the boundaries, both the tangible and the symbolic
borders separating Eastern Europe from Western Europe, and it
changed the content of the value-system with which the people had
identied.
The main symbolic boundary disappeared already with the destruction of the Berlin Wall. The metaphor of the Iron Curtain lost its
physical representation, and hence any validity in social consciousness. The free ow of persons, goods, cultural products, and massmedia began soon after. The next step was the incorporation into
Western institutions and supranational structures: World Bank, IMF,
OECD, NATO. But, the nal conrmation of a European status
came with the accession of Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic,
Slovakia, Slovenia and the Baltic States to the European Union. A
likely prospect for the future is the elimination of the last symbolic
signs of dierence: border checkpoints and a separate currency. These
changes will hopefully take place with the incorporation of Eastern
Europe into the Schengen area and Euroland.
However, while old boundaries were being brought down, new
boundaries emerged or became strengthened. First of all, a stronger
dividing line appeared from the East, separating East and Central
Europe from the former Soviet republics. Borders were sealed o,
and visas introduced. At a symbolic level old resentments were dug
out, dormant historical enmities reawakened and the memories of

538

piotr sztompka

Soviet domination and oppression brought to the forefront of public

debates. A new boundary also appeared between the traditionally
most pro-Western, and most developed countries of Eastern Europe
Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Sloveniaand those lagging
behind. The most visible indication of this division was the invitation of only some, selected countries to join the EU, with the accession of others indenitely delayed. There is also the disturbing prospect
of yet another boundary arising in the two-speed European Union,
one between the old members and the newcomers. This would mean
a re-emergence of the division between the core and peripheries in
a new guise, but this time within the connes of the Union. And
nally, by entering Europe, former socialist countries automatically
inherit all of Europes external boundaries. These include the more
traditional ones such as the boundaries separating Europe from the
Orient and, in particular, opposing the Islam, but also the relatively
new boundary set up against the US and its hegemony. The latter
has generated loyalty conicts, as for many East-European societies
it is the US which was the traditional ally and idealised hero, the
symbol of freedom, democracy and prosperity. It has also been a
dream land for massive waves of emigrants, which, in the case of
Polish immigrants, reached numbers of more than four million. Their
personal contacts with their home country, their families, and local
communities,through letters, mutual visits, homecomings after retirement, but also through ows of money and investmentshave created a kind of bridge with America, over and above Western Europe.
Of course, there are enclaves of Polish emigrants in many countries
of Western Europe as well, but they are usually better assimilated
to their recipient countries, cutting their links with a homeland more
easily. Moreover, as they are also widely dispersed among the various
European countries, they do not exert the same measure of inuence,
as the relatively badly assimilated masses of my compatriots in
America, who still have strong imaginary links with their mother
country.
Immediately after the revolutions of 1989 and subsequent collapse
of the communist system, the rules, values, norms and expectations
of the new regime were shaped by two dierent forces: rst by the
rejection of the Homo Sovieticus, as a backlash against the old
way of life, complete at the ideological level, but meeting with some
resistance and inertia at the level of common practices, and second
by the uncritical embracing of a highly idealized and in many ways

from east europeans to europeans

539

anachronistic image of Western culture, economics and politics. The

West was perceived as a kingdom of freedom and prosperity, and
its dominant rules were modeled after a vision of nineteenth-century
capitalism, of free markets, rampant individualism, ruthless competition, robber barons, and rags to riches kind of careers. In some
countries, notably Polanddue to the large diaspora of Polish emigrants and strong cultural contacts with Americathis simplistic
image of the West was enhanced by the special inuence of the
United States, with the result that Western ways have often become
synonymous with American Creed. The predominance of a neoliberalist ideology in the years immediately after the revolution was
a result of this way of thinking.
In eect the divergence between the East and the West has become
polarized in the social consciousness of East-Europeans and has been
dened in dualistic terms. Thus the value system of the Homo
Sovieticus, which was deeply embedded in the mentality of communist
society and somewhat resistant to change, was perceived to be in
direct opposition to Western culture (Sztompka 1993). This conict
may be best described using the following nine oppositions:
collectivism as opposed to individualism;
the emphasis on security as opposed to taking risks;
acceptance of status stability as opposed to personal career and
success;
expectation of conformity as opposed to the imperative of innovativeness;
seeking state protection and raising claims against the state as
opposed to self-reliance;
blaming the system for personal failures as opposed to self-blame;
privatization of life, rejection of a public sphere as opposed to
public participation;
demand for egalitarian distribution of wealth and income as opposed
to meritocracy;
dogmatism and intolerance (in thought) as opposed to the recognition of pluralism and tolerance.
The ideal types of the opposite systems, one with attached negative
connotations, and another with positive associations, were taken as
realities. The enthusiasm for new values and the radical rejection of
old values led to the exaggerated hopes for the future, which were
expected to bring freedom and auence almost immediately. But

540

piotr sztompka

the dismantling of the old system turned out to be quite arduous

and protracted job. As the famous three clocks hypothesis by Ralf
Dahrendorf was postulating, the Clock of politics was running fast,
the clock of economics much slower, but the clock of civil society
runs in the rhythm of generations (Dahrendorf 1990). It is not easy
to radically rebuild institutions. But it is even less easy to eradicate
old habits of the heart, mental frames and attitudes. Certain measure
of axiological disorientation, normative chaos, or what Emile Durkheim
would label as anomie, became characteristic for the period immediately after the revolutions of 1989. At the same time, very soon,
a bit anachronistic quality of the picture of values ascribed to the
West became unraveled, adding to the disorientation and producing
cultural trauma (Alexander et al. 2004). In the same way that real
socialism diered from the ideal type of communism, real capitalism proved to be dierent from the ideal type of capitalism.
The anachronistic quality of these oppositions to the West derives
from the fact that after 1989 Eastern Europe was confronted with
a Western Europe that had already been transformed by more than
a century of its own development. Paradoxically the West came closer
in many ways to socialist or communitarian values, and further from
Max Webers spirit of capitalism, than the people in former communist countries were aware of. The emphasis on collectivism has
long been visible in certain countries of Latin Europe, (e.g. France,
Italy, Belgium and Greece), while other values and adaptations to
political conditions typical of communist societies, such as egalitarian
distribution, the mistrust of politics and the public sphere, and the
raising of social claims against the state, have become characteristic
of several Western countries, as manifested by the principles of social
democracy, or the welfare state, as well as the problems of democratic
governance and disillusionment with politics. Thus the image of
the West held by the people in post-communist societies was, to a
considerable extent, already obsolete. But one of the fundamental
truths discovered by sociologists is that people act on beliefs, images
and convictionsand not necessarily on realities. As the American
social psychologist, William Isaac Thomas, has put it: If people
believe something to be real, it is real in its consequences.
But the content of the value systems changes not only due to
changing imaginations, but also due to some more tangible factors,
namely institutional pressure. Once the democratic and market system

from east europeans to europeans

541

is in place, the contents of value-systems change inadvertently under

the impact of newly established institutions. These institutions exert
a strong socializing (or should one say re-socialising) inuence, slowly
eliminating the old communist patterns that had lost their practical
usefulness and ideological validity when confronted with democratic
politics, a capitalist market economy and a free and pluralistic culture.
As a result the Homo Sovieticus syndrome is slowly disappearing
and a new cultural syndrome has emerged, especially among the
younger generation, which is a replica of the idealized West-European
image built around such values as individualism, risk-taking, personal
success, self-reliance, self-blame, public concern, meritocracy, pluralism
and tolerance. This condition is enhanced by trans-European institutions, such as the European Commission, the European Parliament
and the European Court of Justice, becoming salient and signicant
actors in the politics of each post-communist society. In eect, at
least for the time being we have become more capitalist than the
capitalists, and more Western than the West. The pendulum has
swung to another extreme. Some balance is needed.
A better visibility and rst-hand experience of West-European life
styles, values, concerns, beliefswhether direct or mediated(the
earlier-mentioned demonstration eect) exerts such a moderating
inuence. Already under the communist regime there was an inevitable
ow of texts and images (and consequently, of creeds, styles, fashions,
etc.) via TV, lm, Internet, the press, and this ow of information
has only become greater. No wall can hold back communication in
our globalizing world. Presently, this process has been strengthened
by increased personal contact, travel and tourism. It leads to the
eradication of negative stereotypes and stops the vicious circle of
hate and suspicion, clearing the way for an atmosphere of solidarity
and mutual trust. One may also notice on the positive side the erosion of the naive idealization of the West, and a growing critical
recognition of some weaknesses of Western democracy, such as its
ungovernability, non-viability of the welfare state, the degrading eects
of rampant consumerism, etc. In this way Eastern Europeans are no
longer only ardent fans of the West, but have become equal partners in all-European debates dealing with the future shape of European
institutions and ways of life.

542

piotr sztompka
The new landscape of identities

The collapse of the communist bloc has had a double eect on the
collective identities of East-European societies. The rst eect we
focused on in this work was the slow fading away of the EastEuropean identity and the incorporation of East-European societies
into a wider continental European identity. But, we also saw that at
the same time new boundaries had emerged and a growing diversity was now visible within the former Soviet bloc. In this second
development we witness the reappearance and rearmation of old,
temporarily latent national, ethnic, religious and cultural dierences
and identities, which unfortunately in some cases, like in the Balkans,
or post-Soviet republics, have tragically led to destructive wars.
Although they might at rst sight appear so, both tendencies are
not necessarily contradictory. In this late modern period, identity has
become multidimensional, multilayered, dierentiated. It is produced
as a personal construction built of multiple repertoires of options.
People craft themselves, rather then receiving themselves readymade. Transnational, continental, or even global identities appear as
new additional options, but do not necessarily eliminate other identities or orientations linked to, region, nation, ethics, religion, occupation, gender, sexual preference, life styles, consumer communities,
fashion-communities, leisure-communities, etc. Multiple identities imply
the enrichment of bonds, social networks and opportunities for experience and expression.
The best way to ensure the development of a balanced and trouble-free identity is to break up the age-old unity of national (tribal,
ethnic) identities and citizenship (Miller 2000). Since the birth of the
nation-state, as a hyphenated notion, both these identities have been
unconditionally united. Attachment to the nation was considered
synonymous with loyalty and allegiance to the state, and vice versa.
This need not be the case. Citizenship, dened as the set of rights
and obligations making one a competent member of a political
community (Everson and Preuss 1995: 12), may be detached from
nationhood, as the set of allegiances to the heritage, language and
customs of ethnic community. Ones identity should no longer be
tainted with exclusion, but rather become inclusive. The emergence
of what David Held calls cosmopolitan citizenship (Held 1995) is
imminent, expedited by both institutional and ideological factors.
The institutional factor is the globalisation of politics and the various

from east europeans to europeans

543

forms of political integration across the borders of states, of which

the EU is certainly the most salient case. The ideological factor is
the birth and dissemination of the idea of human rights, creating
moral bonds and obligations not only with members of ones own
tribe, ethnic group or nation, but with all human beings on the
planet. Nationalism, when detached from citizenship, and ethnic
belonging, when separated from state membership, need not be divisive, breading hatred, conicts and wars. These national qualications
may become an important addition to a transnational citizenship,
giving it the special quality of local attachment and loyalty. Thus
with their incorporation into the European Union, the societies of
Eastern Europe join in the ongoing project of creating a single
European-wide citizenship. They will help shape a citizenship that
bets the plurality of peaceful, cooperative and solidary European
nations; a citizenship that belongs to one Europe of many homelands
and to one European house of many tenants making it their home.
Let me end on a personal note. I do not nd anything self-contradictory in my being a sociologist, a Catholic, a Krakowian, a Pole,
and becoming together with my compatriotsa full edged
European. I am simply freely participating in the concentric order
of allegiances, from the family to the nation, from the nation to
Europe, from Europe to the world (Ariane DAppolonia: 174). My
being a Pole does not stand in the way of transnational loyalties and
solidarities, whether it be belonging to a cosmopolitan community
of scholars, or an ecumenical community of Christendom, or even
to the economic, juridical and political community of the European
Union. But by the same token my transnational loyalties do not
stand in the way of local and particularistic attachments: to a Polish
heritage and tradition, to Polish national heroes, to my ag, my
anthem and my national holidays, to a local cuisine and to folk customs, and even to the Polish landscape. These multiple identities
give me the feeling of personal richness and a more complete, more
full self-realisation. Unity and distinction may be two sides of the
same human fate, its perennial and irrevocable duality.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

IS HINDU-MUSLIM CLEAVAGE THE PARADIGMATIC

CASE FOR CONFLICTS IN SOUTH ASIA?
Stanley J. Tambiah
India no doubt is the most populous and territorially largest country, and the dominant presence in South Asia. But of course it is
not the only country in the region. The question therefore arises for
scholars as to how we are to weigh and compare the multiple ethnonationalist conicts and political violence in the region. For many
scholars writing on political conict in India, the Hindu-Muslim
divide has been the major point of reference and preoccupation. The
subaltern school of historians seem to highlight the divide in two
divergent ways. For example, Gyanendra Pandey in his book The
Constitution of Communalism in Colonial North India powerfully
argued that the British employed the Hindu-Muslim communal
divide as the master narrative to explain all riots and public disturbances in which Hindus, and Muslims (and others) were involved,
and moreover to characterize quite a few incidents in which no trace
of communalism can be found in the historical record.1
Commenting on the characterization of political developments
in India before and after independence, Pandey has remarked that
the nationalist discourse has tended to celebrate the Independence
struggle, and to reduce the Hindu-Muslim strife to being a minor
phenomenon in the main anti-colonial struggle for Independence
from British rule. The Partition was for the majority of people living
in what are now the divided territories of northern India, Pakistan,
and Bangladesh, the event of the twentieth century, and dierenceinspired strife between Hindus and Muslims persists in India today.2

1
2

Pandey, 1990.
See Tambiah, 1996, pp. 23, 31322 for a summary of Pandeys submissions.

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stanley j. tambiah

The Hindu-Muslim divide has been most denitely since 1947 a

continuous cleavage that has been kept on the boil on account of
the Kashmir dispute. It is well known that the contemporary ideologues of Hindu nationalism have viewed the approximately 120
million Muslims residing in India as the enemy within, and the
Muslims living in Pakistan as the enemy without, and that they
orchestrated the demolition of the Babri mosque in December 1992
in armation of an alleged Hindu cultural unity and identity.
At another level and context, that of academic commentary, some
of the prominent recent texts that focus on Hindu Nationalismfor
example, works authored by Jarelot, Hansen, Van der Veer, Lise
McKean3entail discussion of the Hindu-Muslim divide. Or if others
focus on political violence and riots, they also foreground HinduMuslim clashes as the primary episodes to considere.g., Sudhir
Kakars The Colors of Violence deals exclusively with Hindu-Muslim
antagonism in Hyderabad city, and so do large parts of Paul Brasss
Theft of an Idol, especially the violence that occurred in Kanpur
city in 1990.
Much of Asghar Ali Engineers writings also concentrate on HinduMuslim confrontations.4 The most recent in this genre is Ashutosh
Varshneys attempt to provide a causal analysis of the variance in
Hindu-Muslim riots in three pairs of cities.5
Scholars concerned with ethnic/ethno-nationalist conicts in South
Asia as a region have yet adequately to deal with some comparative
issues both temporal and spatial. First, with regard to Hindu-Muslim
antagonism, how far back in time have they occurred? Marc Gaborieau
has asserted that there is a long literary legacy ranging from AlBeruni in the 11th century to Jinnah in the twentieth expressing sentiments of opposition and dierence between Hindus and Muslims.6
Others have referred to a long cultural memory and remembrance,
how continuous and consistent it is not clear, of clashes between

3
Jarelot. The Hindu Nationalist Movement in India. op. cit.; Thomas Bloom
Hansen. The Saron Wave: Hindu Nationalism and Democracy in Modern India.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992. McKean, 1966.
4
For example, Engineer, 1991.
5
Ashutosh Varshney, Ethnic Conict and Civic Life, op. cit. The cities are
Aligarh and Calicut, Hyderabad and Lucknow, and Ahmedabad and Surat.
6
Gaborieau, 1985.

hindu-muslim cleavage

547

Hindus and Muslims. Such characterizations seem to have an anity

with the primordialist thesis. The term primordial is dened in
the dictionary as existing from the beginning, rst formed, and
more loosely used in social science literature to denote long established pre-modern ties of kinship, tribalism and racial identity.
Sudhir Kakar in Colors of Violence seems to view the Hindu-Muslim
enmity as primordial in this sense.
There are certain historical viewpoints which see occurrences of
Hindu-Muslim communalism in pre-British times as predating the
communal divide coined or exploited by the British.7 Coming to
later times, aside from the violence engendered by the Partition and
the memories and traumas that ensued, it is signicant that, as
Varshney has indicated, there are a number of Indian cities which
during the period of 19501995 (and of course thereafter) have experienced intermittent riot episodes between Hindus and Muslims.
Such long term frequency of conicts in India between Hindus
and Muslims is not matched in any other part of South Asia between
any two ethnic groups. However, an historian may rightly point out
that contextual and motivating issues and circumstances of HinduMuslim conicts in India may have been dierent in individual occurrences, and therefore cannot be lumped together.
Whatever the long history of intermittent and episodic HinduMuslim urban riots in India, there is no doubt that the years stretching from 1980 to 2002 have experienced Hindu-Muslim violence in
frequency and scale unmatched since the Partition of 1947.8 The worst
occurrences have been in the quite recent past, notably in the wake
of the demolition of the Babri mosque, typied by the horrendous
violence unleashed against Muslims in Bombay in December 1992
and January 1993, and in Ahmedabad in 2002.9 This intensication

Bayly, 1985, pp. 177203.

The principal Hindu-Muslim riots, which were marked by anti-Muslim bias by
the Police, and by the killings and destruction of property, occurred in urban locations such as Moradabad (1980), Biharsharif (1981), Meerut (1982 and 1987) and
Delhi (1987). Commissions of enquiry submitted reports which remained unpublished and were not laid before the legislative assemblies. Jarelot (op. cit. 1996,
p. 333).
9
For the Bombay riots see Hansen (op. cit., 2001) and Tambiah, (op. cit., 1996,
Chapter 9). For the Ahmedabad riots, see India Today, March-April issues, 2002.
8

548

stanley j. tambiah

is primarily related to an interrelated complex of developments such

as the following.
The Ayodhya dispute is shorthand for the complicated, confused
controversy surrounding the sometimes violent attempts by Hindu
nationalists to destroy the mosque called the babri Masjid in Ayodhya,
if possible, and to build a Hindu temple devoted to the god Ram
(Rama, one of the avatars of Vishnu) in its place. If this was not
possible, it was felt, the next best move would be to build a temple
to Ram at an adjoining site.
In 1984, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the militant wing of the
Hindu organizations, began its campaign to have the mosque opened
for regular worship by Hindus. The Ayodhya issue, which itself served
as a condensed symbol of many criticisms and grievances on the
part of the Hindu nationalists against the governments in power, in
particular the Congress (I) regime, became the prime electoral issue
for the political party of the Hindu nationalists, the BJP, whose
leader, L.K. Advani, leapt into prominence as the political challenger
of successive prime ministers, notably V.P. Singh, the leader of the
Janata Dal Party in 1990, and later Narashima Rao of the Congress (I).
Focusing on the Ayodhya issue enormously helped the BJP to
achieve electoral success. From a mere two seats in the Lok Sabha
in 1984, the BJPs tally rose to 85 in 1989, and two years later it
had expanded to become the main opposition, with 120 seats. In
1991, the building of the Ram temple was the main issue, which
like an immense umbrella encompassed many others, such as alleged
favoritism toward Muslims and the corresponding plight of the Hindu
majority, as instanced by the Shah Bano case (1980) and the Rajiv
Gandhi governments decision to allow Muslims to follow their own
personal laws; the recommendation by the Mandal Commission
of armative action in favor of the backward classes, which highercaste Hindus found threatening; the violence in the Punjab and the
threatened secession by the Sikhs; the violence likewise in Kashmir,
exacerbating Hindu-Muslim animosities; the need for a uniform civil
code for all Indian citizens; the alleged pseudo-secularism of the
nation-state fathered by Nehru and perpetuated by Congress (I); the
rejuvenation of the nation by making Hindu culture a bulwark against
Western secularism, consumerism, and sexual eroticism; the continued
corruption of the Congress (I) regime and the train of scandals it
had spawned. All these grievances were grist for the rhetoric, propaganda, and slogans purveyed on the road to Ayodhya. This com-

hindu-muslim cleavage

549

bative rhetoric came to a climax in December 1992, when the Babri

mosque was demolished.
In answer to the question as to the degree to which the HinduMuslim cleavage and conict should be taken as the paradigmatic
long dure case for understanding other ethnic conicts in the South
Asian region, I would submit the following counter examples:
The Hindu-Sikh political violence that came to a boil in North
India in the 1980s was a new eruption. In Leveling Crowds10 I have
cited Harjot Oberoi as demonstrating that the militant Tat Khalsa
in its latest form was one among other Sikh traditions, such as the
Sanatan, which in the past had associational and ritual links with
Hinduism. Bhindranwales fundamentalist militancy aimed against
Hindu hegemony as he saw it and his advocacy of Khalistan came
to a head only in recent times. In any event, the 1984 anti-Sikh
riots in Delhi (and elsewhere) after the assassination of Mrs. Gandhi
were singular, and on the Sikh side organized violence by radical
secret fraternities had subsided by the mid-1990s.11
Let me briey allude to a few other ethno-nationalist conicts
whose origins are recent. In Pakistan the Muhajir-Sindhi conicts
and the Pathan-Bihari clashes in which Muslims were pitted against
one another were engendered by issues relating to migration, demographic proportions, control of urban space and electoral competition,
etc. These violent clashes peaked in the 1980s. Again, Bal Thackerays
mobilization of the Shiv Sena on behalf of the advancement of the
interests of the Maharashtrian sons of the soil was launched originally in the 1960s against South Indian migrants entry into clerical
occupations. And later his Shiv Sena joined the Hindu nationalist
cause and was vigorously and violently involved in the Bombay riots
of 1992 and 199312 which were targeted against Muslims, who rst
came in numbers from the Deccan and North India in the late 19th
century, to central Bombay to work in the cotton mills as weavers
and spinners, and lived there in both ethnically mixed and separate
neighborhoods. This residential pattern changed as a result of the

10

Tambiah, 1996, op. cit. Oberoi, 1994.

See for example Juergensmeyer, 2001. Chapter 5, Sword of Sikhism, pp.
8492.
12
Relevant discussions are, among others, Jarelot (op. cit.), Hansen (op. cit.).
11

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stanley j. tambiah

199293 riots when Muslims ed to and became concentrated in

their own majority areas like Nagpada.13
However, there is a sense in which in the mobilization of Shiv
Sena, Thackeray was tapping into the military traditions in the
Deccan, principally the mythologized glory of Shivaji (16271680)
who founded the Maratha Kingom, and staged raids against the
Mughal Empire. This legacy of the Maratha past serves today as
an important mythical reservoir for virtually all political forces seeking
justication in the regions history.14 Thackeray fused this Maratha
militant regional nationalism with the wider Hindutva RSS-BJP style
nationalism at the time of the Aydohya campaign and the subsequent politics of the Maharashtra State. The question is whether the
Bombay style Maratha chauvinism is some kind of deeply entrenched
animosity focused on Muslims, past and present, or whether it is a
generalized xenophobic resentment against all immigrant outsiders
who are perceived as threatening Maratha interests and identity: as
exemplied by campaigns at dierent times in the later part of the
20th century, against South Indians, against Muslims, and against
Gujaratis.
Let me now turn to Sri Lanka, and comment on whether the
alleged entrenched Hindu-Muslim cleavage in India and the periodic
political violence that it has generated, bears resemblance to recent
Sinhalese-Tamil conicts in Sri Lanka. I have in my writings on Sri
Lanka15 submitted that while there is a long tradition of chronicles
composed by literati-monks which may be read as asserting a Sinhala
Buddhist identity and hegemony over the island, and in tandem antiTamil sentiments, there is also the countervailing evidence in Sinhalese
history of streams of migration into the island of a variety of South
Indian peoples who together with their religious and cultural practices
were beneciaries of tolerant assimilation and incorporation. The
recognition of these processes of Sinhalization and Buddhicization of
these peoples should serve as an antidote to the strident Buddhist

13

See Hansen (1999, op. cit., Chapter 6, p. 160.).

Hansen (op. cit., p. 25). He gives a summary of various twentieth century
works on Maratha history.
15
Tambiah, 1992, especially Chapter 13, in which I discuss Sinhalese Identity
and the Legacy of the Past, and cite a number of sources, and the submissions
by an array of scholars on historical memories and processes.
14

hindu-muslim cleavage

551

nationalism of recent decades propagetad by certain right-wing

elements, who initiated a series of anti-Tamil riots, which in turn
produced a violent Tamil resistance and counter-assaults.
In any case, many other commentators have also made the judgment
that the post-1983 occurrences of Sinhala-Tamil riots, as indeed the
earlier 1915 Sinhala-Muslim riots,16 have had their genesis in late
19th century British colonial times, and subsequently more relevantly
in the dynamics of post-independence nation-state making in a plural
society dominated and driven by majoritarian democratic electoral
politics, which subordinate and marginalize minority concerns and
voices. It is hoped that the current peace negotiations between the
Sinhalese, Tamil, and Muslim groups will produce a peace settlement
according to a federal arrangement.
There is a long line of writings, that taking a broadly civilizational
approach has opposed the West as a whole to Islam as a whole. To
mention a few examples, this contrast goes back to Baron de
Montesquieu in his LEsprit des Lois (Geneva, 1748), and in the last
quarter of the 20th century, to Marshall Hodgsons The Venture of
Islam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974), and in the 21st
century, to M.J. Akbars The Shade of Swords, Jihad and the Conict
between Islam and Christianity (London: Routledge, 2002); to Samuel
Huntingtons The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World
Order (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996), and Gilles Kepels
Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
2002), and to Bernard Lewiss What Went Wrong? The Clash between
Islam and Modernity in the Middle East (New York: Oxford University
Press, 2002).17
In South Asian history, although India was greatly aected by
Islamic penetrations and conquests, as well as enriching cultural infusions and exchanges which reached their climax in the time of the
Moghul Empire, there is no correspondingly long literary tradition
of contrasting antithetically Muslim and Hindu polities and religious
systems.
But, especially with the post-1947 Partition enmities between India
and Pakistan and the recent upsurge of Hindu nationalism, and

16

See Tambiah, 1996 (op. cit., Chapter 3, The 1915 Sinhala Buddhist-Muslim
Riots in Ceylon, pp. 3681).
17
See for a review of relevant literature, Cliord Geertz, 2003.

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stanley j. tambiah

the heightening of animosities over the control of Jammu and Kashmir,

and the devastating riots, following the demolition of the Babri
Mosque in Ayodhya, in major Indian cities like Bombay and Ahmedabad, there has appeared in certain circles a strand of politically
charged rhetoric that alleges a long-term struggle on the subcontinent
between the Crescent and the Saron Robe, a jihad and a counterjihad, that would match for persistence and violence the antagonism between the Cross and the Crescent.
I submit that while the Hindu-Muslim cleavage on the subcontinent cannot be equated with the longer term Christianity versus
Islam cleavage in the West, it has, however, a longer period of discontinuous persistence than the other ethno-nationalist clashes in
South Asia I have referred to. Also presently in India there is a
rising level of rejection of Muslims as rightful citizens of India among
certain segments of the public that was not expressed in such exclusionary terms before. There is also an accompanying strand of militant
anxiety regarding the alleged conversion of Hindus to Islam and
Christianity. The traumatic event for Hindu nationalists was the conversion to Islam of a thousand members of Schedule Caste status in
1981 at Meenakshipuram in Tamil Nadu in South India, and the
counter-movement to reconvert them to Hinduism, and to uplift their
social conditions. Hinduism under siege became a rallying cry.
Propagandized by activists of militant Hinduism, exemplied by
members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, and on the other side, by
militant Muslims, the Hindu-Muslim cleavage in the subcontinent is
being assimilated to the grand theme of the clash of civilizations,
and to the outbreaks of so-called global terrorism.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

DEMOCRACY IN LATIN AMERICA:

THE ONLY GAME IN TOWN?
Luis Roniger
Only two decades ago, most Iberoamerican countries embraced
democracy and neoliberalism enthusiastically. After suering long
periods of authoritarianism, political and civil unrest, military takeovers
and state repression, these societies emerged as most fervent supporters
of the democratic credo, in the changed global environment of the
post-Cold War.
There is nothing surprising in such enthusiastic adoption of representative democracy in the 1980s and early 1990s. Resulting from
the global immersion of the region and its self-representation and
reexivity, these societies have been discursively and institutionally
biased toward the modern. Since independence in the early nineteenth century, local elites adopted the institutional frameworks of
modern constitutionalism, while projecting onto society the visions
and future-oriented projects of Illuminism, Liberalism, Positivism and
capitalism, challenged by alternative visions, some of whichsuch
as Anarchism or Communismwere too rooted in Western sources
and ideas.1 In the late twentieth century, after the traumatic experiences of political polarization and repression, the political and social
elites in these societies turned once again to the forefront of universal ideas to pick up those models that would lead their countries
into global integration and sustainable growth. The credibility of the
external models was buttressed through:

1
Reasons of space preclude developing fully the claim that this is part of a longterm trend of global insertion and connection, which shaped a forward-looking stress
on progress and development; and, which generated its own countervailing forces,
again related to trends and ideas at the forefront of Western multiple modernities.
On this see the contributions in Roniger and Waisman 2002, especially the works
by Whitehead, Eisenstadt and Roniger.

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their appeal to the bright and ambitious;

their academic and public prestige, especially in the centers of
power and
learning in the West;
their promise of inclusion;
the weak resistance of tatism and nationalism, no longer seen as
hegemonic;
and last, but most importantly, the trend away from collective
concerns due to the legacy of human-right violations, at least in
countries such as those of the Southern Cone.
In this framework, representative democracy was heralded as the
harbinger of a new age, to dier from previous waves of democratization, as it resulted from the growing role of social movements
and civil society, which were instrumental in both dismantling dictatorial rule and replacing earlier strong tatist trends. Political liberalization was to be combined with policies of structural adjustment,
transformation and liberalization in the economic realm, buttressed
by the supposed retreat of the states from their former control of
the economic domain.
By the late 1990s and early 2000s, both representative democracy
and the new macro-economic policies were discredited. And while
in the global arena the West wrangled with forces spearheaded by
religious radicalism and terrorism, adding to the lack of a regulated
global order, in Iberoamerica the heralded triumph of democracy
and neo-liberalism led way to parallel dynamics of erosion of institutional trust and disenchantment. This revealed the resilience of
old-new forms of politics, along with various innovative experiences
to cope with the malfunctions. These policies have generated an antiglobal protest, especially through their impact on indigenous and
rural communities and property relations. In some cases, the reforms
have eectively undermined rural property. Thus, in addition to the
trend sparked in Porto Alegre, there is also the vein stemming from
Chiapas, which adds the element of grievances stemming from the
heart of the indigenous and peasant populations. For others, these
policies have been perceived as threatening rural lifestyles. Whatever
the specic case, neoliberalism has been identied with the state,
and this has enabled movements such as the Zapatistas in Chiapas
or the Movimento Sem Terra in Brazil to target the state nationally
and internationally, globalizing on a symbolic and organizational

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555

level their claims over land and, at the same time, over the recognition of cultural identity. These movements of protest reject, or at
least express a sense of uneasiness with, policies which reinforce
exclusion, huge socioeconomic gaps and marginalization. The open
protest is but the tip of an iceberg of large sectors wrangling to
understand the failure to meet the dreams heralded by recent market openings. Precisely because of these struggles and in spite of what
analysts dene as politics of anti-politics, expressed in calls to get
rid of politicians (Caetano, Moulin and Yankelevich 2002), politics
remains a central arena and state institutions are still the locus of
political articulation and public life.
In the last generation authoritarianism has receded throughout
Iberoamerica. Democratic hopes and expectations spread to the entire
region in the quarter-century since the Ecuadorian and Dominican
elections of 1978 (Alcntara 2003). And yet, while democracy has
become the only game in town, we should still ask in what forms
and through which dynamics has it been installed in these societies?
In this regard, the trends are contradictory and deserve analysis.
They involve some innovative experiences institutionalizing democratic
controls at the local scene, but also various forms of neo-populism
and neo-clientelism.
In this chapter I would like to reect on the signicance of these
contemporary trends in one of the regions in which, contrastingly
to the Islamic or Chinese societies, the confrontation with Western
modernity took the form of countervailing currents derived from
within the hegemonic ideas and institutions themselves, that is, in
terms of the latters own malfunctions and disillusions. Thus, this
confrontation turned to be, in Shmuel N. Eisenstadts terms, a clash
of multiple modernities, mutually implicated and challenging one
another in terms of their unfullled visions and global iconic standing.
Disenchantment and loss of public trust
The most conspicuous element we can identify in the process of routinization of democratic institutions at this stage is the decrease in
public trust, which public opinion surveys reect.2 From the surveys
2

Even if aware of the limitations of public opinion polls, we should recognize

they are highly instructive of trends and changes, especially when taken across
relatively long time periods and following consistent criteria of data collection.

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by Latinobarmetro for the year 2002 (published in 2003), for example, it appears that even though most of the citizens interviewed
supported democracy, preferring it over other forms of government,
the rates of support decreased since 1996 in 13 out of 17 countries
covered by the survey, with 5 nations showing a very low percentage, in the range of 37 to 45 percent. In this range of the scale in
2002 were Colombia, Brazil, El Salvador, Paraguay and Guatemala.
In 11 out of 17 countries the level of dissatisfaction and disenchantment
with the functioning of the democratic system crossed the line of the
50 percent of those surveyed between 1996 and 2002.
The parallel trend is that the level of support for authoritarianism
has increased in 8 countries between the years 1996 and 2002. This
is accompanied by a persistent increase in the popular demand for
hard-line policies against criminals. Marginal elements were also
traced, even in countries in which the population was strongly in
favor of democracy after long periods of authoritarian and military
governments, such as the Southern Cone countries.
These gures indicate a signicant lack of condence in the democratic system, despite its formal acceptance. Paraguay and Argentina
have been extreme cases, with over 90 percent of dissatisfaction in
2002. Mexico was another case of great discontent with democracy:
over 80 percent, in a country which started a process of transference
of government after a decades-long period of single-party rule, corporatism and clientelist politics. In Colombia, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia,
Peru, and Ecuador, the disenchantment with the system was around
the 60 to 80 percent of the representative samples. Citizens express
very low levels of public trust towards politicians and the ruling
class (Latinobarometro 2003).
What are the implications of such public disenchantment? It may
be assessed as an expression of failing democratic consolidation. But
it may also reect a trend found elsewhere in mature democracies,
which by denition are pluralistic and open to criticism and civilian
control. In order to evaluate the signicance of these trends, it may
be useful to take two parallel lines of analysis: one comparative and
the other longitudinal across time.
Taking the comparative lead, it is necessary to keep in mind that
in the postwar democracies of the so called trilateral countries
the USA, Europe and Japanthere has been a constant concern
with the crises of democracy, at least since the 1970s. Diverse indi-

democracy in latin america

557

cators reected a deep disappointment with representative democracy, as it was shown already in the germinal report of Crozier,
Huntington, and Watanuki (1975). The more recent work on the
deterioration of public trust by Susan Pharr and Robert Putnam
(2000) indicates that this is more than an ephemeral trend in these
democracies.
Coming back to Iberoamerica, this lead may suggest that the critical attitude of the population may be related to the fact that these
democracies managed to become established. Indeed, at least in terms
of the formal criteria advanced by Robert Dahl or Adam Przeworski,
the longevity of democracies in the region stands out. And, yet, their
citizens express low levels of public trust towards politicians and the
ruling class. So, perhaps public distrust may not necessarily be a sign
of institutional immaturity (See also Uslaner 2003).
While we can contextualize the current disappointment being
expressed toward democracy, by taking into account the high expectations in the 1980s and 1990s, we should assess whether representative democracy can be sustainable in such a context of widespread
disenchantment and loss of condence in institutions, if these come
together with a failure of democratic culture to reach down to the
entire society and with a cynical approach toward the supposedly
public commitment of political elites? I would like to suggest that is
precisely now, when representative democracy turned to be the only
game in townat least in the Westwhen in some countries coups
dtat are launched in the name of democracy and to deepen democracy, and when various forces aim to criticize it in terms of its own
rationality and unfullled vision, that we should approach analytically this crucial dimension of institutional fragility.
Institutional fragility and democratic persistence
As emphasized by Eisenstadt, every democracy is fragile (Eisenstadt
1998, 1999b; see also Bobbio 1987). The Iberoamerican systems were
especially fragile during the Cold War, when they collapsed under
mounting mass mobilizations, guerrilla and paramilitary groups, and
military takeovers.
It is well known that these trends destabilized civilian rule in the
1960s and 1970s. We should also recognize that such fragility has
been reenacted after the restoration of democracy in the current

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wave of democratization and in spite of an internationally propitious

framework. To mention just three cases, at the start of the twentyrst century the Argentinean political system was about to sink, under
erosion in the midst of economic disarray; Venezuela entered into a
process of acute polarization and economic crisis, losing its political
stability; and in Colombia the high rates of violence were a blemish
which over-determined the problematic operation of democracy.
In the analytical framework of the 1960s and 1970s, we tended to
think of fragility as leading to a breakdown. But in the context of the
1990s and 2000s, we should address the concomitant crystallization
of both institutional fragility and the persistence of democracy.
Paradigmatic is the case of Colombia, a country ridden by violence
and pressures derived from the presence of guerrillas, paramilitary
forces, drug trackers, state repression and criminal and social violence. According to local observers, the patterns and traditions of
violence have been recorded by re in the esh and memory of
generations of Colombians, becoming one of the most persistent traits
encoded in Colombian collective identity and habits. And yet, the
political system has stood by democracy and great parts of its elites
have shown a strong political will, trying to elaborate institutional
mechanisms designated to improve the democratic capabilities of the
polity and public administration.
Similarly, in the Southern Cone, Brazil and Guatemala, representative democracy corresponds with an endemic institutional fragility
in countries pulling out of previous authoritarian rule in the 1980s.
In these cases it is precisely under democracy that people have raised
questions and expressed their doubts concerning the representative
character of their political system. It is also under democracy that
criminal and social violenceand in the case of Guatemala also state
violence in the 1980sincreased, following closely the liberalization
of the public sphere. No wonder that many citizens wondered whether
the institutional channels were functioning eectively, and whether
they were wide enough, limited, or perhaps too wide in connection
to their early expectations.
The solution, of course, is neither a return to past authoritarian
rule nor the curtailment of civil rights and free public spheres.
However, there is no doubt that due to the conditions generated
under democracy, considerable sectors of the population expect the
security forces to act severely against sectors thought to be threatening the social order, be they criminals or marginal individuals. While

democracy in latin america

559

this demand for harsh measures follows its own logic within the context of social deterioration and economic decline, it constitutes a
problem for the newly established democracies as far as civil and
political rights are concerned, even if the current systems have professed to condemn the use of repression as carried out by the previous de facto governments.
Pooling these cases together, violence emerges as a central concern in terms of combined institutional fragility and viability. Whether
related to the political system as in Colombia, where violence crystallized very early on fuelled by party identities, or in countries such
as Brazil, where social and criminal violence mounted in relative disconnection from the political system, violence generates a process of
amalgamation of identities. Violence cuts o the ties of shared identity between strangers, while replacing them with the illusion of
nding security and stability through the construction of an image
of the other as an enemy. This process of reconstruction of collective identities predicates exclusion and the adjournment of dialogue
(Bowman 2001, Feitlowitz 1998, Touraine 2002). In Iberoamerica
such seclusion takes place primarily along class lines and secondarily
along ethnic identities. It may trigger a dynamics of ghettoization
of identities, to use Ralf Dahrendorf s term (2003) or of spatial segregation as typical of the mega-cities but also found in rural areas,
especially in countries of continental dimensions and long-standing
regional seclusion such as Colombia (Rojas de Ferro 1998).
As violence persists, it has crucial implications for the institutional
vitality of democracy. When segregation occurs and a restrictive sense
of collective identity is forged, individuals cling to distrust and exclusion towards the members of other classes, social groups or ethnicities. This is even more pronounced if occurring together with a
deterioration of traditional norms and forms of reciprocity and its
replacement by high residential mobility, the weakening of ties of
locality and connections, the perception of authoritative gures as
arbitrary and unexpected, and the perception of the public sphere
with suspicion and lack of condence.3

In the last decade, parallel processes have contributed to a fragmentary point

of view, among them a decline of old political commitments and the weakening of
trade unions (Clark, Lipset and Rempel 1993; Birle 1999).

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Personal security is a public good. The issue of protecting the

public goodsmaintaining their quality, or at least, compensating
for their faultsis transformed into a central problem that aects
the political and social agenda of democracy (Roniger 2002). In some
of the metropolitan areas of Iberoamerica, such as Caracas or the
Greater Buenos Aires area, the issue of public security has reached
alarming aspects. Although evident for decades, the growing social
gaps have deepened the problem, especially as parts of the middle
class and the lower-middle class suered downward mobility. As
resulting from the loss of governance, loss of sociability, loss of normative rule-abiding, growing violence, mendacity and the expansion
of the informal sector, some of these cities have become battleelds
of crime and survival (Rotker 2002). The line between victims of
structural marginality and victimizers is often blurred under such
conditions (Mockus and Corzo 2003). Within a context of social
complexity, images of uncertainty and despair are generated under
these conditions. Supposedly, the more complex society is, the higher
the levels of uncertainty and risk, as pointed out by Ulrich Beck
(1992) and Zigmunt Bauman (2000) among others.
Iberoamerican societies are highly stratied and individuals are
sharply separated by class lines and life chances. This, combined
with raising expectations of participation, turns sociability into a problematic area through which the willingness of citizens to see themselves as part of society is assessed. This exacerbates a general trend
by which, whenever the codes of sociability are disrespected, every
interaction carries the risk of turning into violence. Consequently,
urban space has fractured and become privatized, with social groups
refraining from entering the neighborhoods of other sectors and
classes. Urban deterioration has followed and distrust has become
generalized in some of these cities (Espinosa 2003: 12).
Under these conditions, there is a rising demand for harshly punitive short-term measures rather than structural long-term solutions,
as if personal security could be secured through harsher terms of
retaliation against criminals. Respect for human rights seems particularly problematic in this framework of such highly divided and fractured settings. Due to such pressures and expectations, democracies
have not yet found the way of combining the demand for personal
and public security with respect for human rights (Roniger and
Sznajder 1999).

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561

The solution becomes a problem when the ethics of impunity is

projected into the ranks-and-le of the public security forces. In cases
such as sectors of the Argentinean and Mexican police, this leads to
abuses, extortion of bribes and extra-legal payments, wrong use of
their power and an easy trigger tendency, violating civil rights as
much as the application of the law. The methods of action used by
the forces of order under civil governments have contributed to their
generalized distrust among large sectors of the population of these
countries, the same sectors which on a declarative level support
harsher punishments to build-up a sense of personal security.
It is often claimed that the control of product quality can be
entrusted to market self-regulation, but such a proposition is harder
to sustain in the domain of the control of violence and the promotion
of institutional guarantees for personal security. There, the operative
balance of institutions has an immediate eect on the image of institutional capability, with consequences on the capacity of attraction
of investments and the maintenance of a powerful population in
the country.
In the rst plane, we nd that none of the Iberoamerican countries with the exception of Chile have made it into the 20 top ranks
of the Global Competitiveness Reports published by the World
Economic Forum. In addition, the lack of institutional guarantees
has another, perhaps no less crucial impact: it leads inuential sectors to opt out, leaving the country of origin. Since the nineteenth
century, two basic forms of escape have crystallized. One is the exile
of political oppositions, magnied in the twentieth century by the
mass phenomenon of refugees. The second form is the escape of
professionals, intellectuals and individuals from all social classes, driven
by their lack of condence in the future of their country of origin.
Under democracy, about 500,000 individuals have departed from
Iberoamerica yearly, trying to settle down in other countries. Between
the years 2000 and 2003 a million and a half people have emigrated
from Ecuador. Almost 2 millions have left Brazil, and about 600,000
have left Peru. From Argentina as much as 160,000 individuals
migrated annually in this period. From Colombia approximately
1,360,000 people left between 1996 and 2001. Even if it is close to
impossible to discern which category corresponds with all the millions
of habitants who have left Iberoamerican countries and live abroad
at a certain point in time, most likely this phenomenon reects the
loss of vitality of those nations which, instead of being a focus of

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attraction, are becoming, at least in the short and intermediate term,

centers of expulsion of part of their own population. The fundamental
problem strikes roots in institutional fragility, which brings us to
rethink the basic boundaries and the operative dilemmas of democracy,
analyzing them beyond the formal plane.
The key issue in this connection is whether democratic institutions
can thrive by becoming the vectors of a sense of a community and
polity committed to collective life and public goods, rather than
entering into a spiral of recurrent fear, suspicion and violence.
Institutional performance and public goods
This sense of belonging, which aects institutions and participation,
has been increasingly aected by the new modes of articulation
between the political-administrative sphere and the markets of goods
and services, particularly the ones considered to be public services.
Individuals evaluate institutions by their performance, i.e. by their
actions, ecacy, style, and more than anything else by their concrete
product. The quality of the air we breathe and the state of personal
security in the public realm are examples of generalized goods that
we cherish and that aect our perception of institutional ecacy.
Due to their generalized character, once existing they cannot be
denied to those entitled to them, or otherwise; once deteriorated, no
one can escape from their corroding eects, independently of the
contributions individuals have made towards nancing their production, as indicated by Albert Hirschman decades ago (1970: 101).
These are complemented by other goods acceded through the markets
or consumed in the private sphere, which require public intervention
in the form of regulation or the setting of non-market criteria for
their dierential provision to various groups or individuals. Examples
can be found in areas such as education, healthcare quality, electricity
and water consumption.
Ever since the crisis of the developmentalist capitalist model related
to the protectionist and/or populist state, the Latin-American countries have endorsed to dierent degrees neo-liberal capitalist models.
Although we are used to thinking that the shift was enacted due to
the international demonstration eect of the policies of Thatcher and
Reagan and the pressures exerted by those organizations connected
to the so-called Washington consensus, we should keep in mind that

democracy in latin america

563

in Iberoamerica this was preceded by the implementation of the Plan

Ladrillo in 1975 by the government of General Pinochet in Chile
(Fontaine Aldunte 1988; Delano and Traslavina 1989).4
Whatever the details of this transformation, we must realize that
a profound change has taken place in the collective imagination
regarding the role of the state and its relations with the markets.
First, the state is perceived as part of the problem of lack of development and not as a part of the solution to the problem. While, in
fact, states continue to perform many roles, by the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the present one, the idea of the
withdrawal of the state and the self-regulation of the markets prevails in the social imagination.
The change initiated over the past few decades heralded the possibility of depolitization of the economic realm, even though the new
view is no less ideological than the former, since it prioritizes the
realm of economics almost as a matter faith, i.e. as part of the projection of some worldview that I would dene as market fundamentalism. This is how, dierently from the past in some countries
and in others as a possibility for the near future, particular issues
could be addressed as discrete problems without being immediately
politicized, as was the case in the past. The negative side of this
trend is that economic decisions can be secluded so as to be treated
by experts, and are not perceived as tending to be open to public
debate. This can imply, as mentioned above, the political diculty
of delineating alternatives and debating them publicly. According to
Martin Hoppenhayn of the CEPAL,
The good thing is not letting any specic problem to spread . . . [But]
a relationship between politics and economy is created, in which the
economy is so powerful, so structural and so rooted, that it is not
merely an ideology transmitted by discourse, but it has been incorporated in daily behaviors. It is an incarnated ideology. Therefore,

4
Experiences cannot be reproduced, even in countries with similar institutional
dynamics. The local anchoring of change is crucial. In Chile the change of policy
was adopted by a highly authoritarian and repressive government. In spite of the
social price demanded, Pinochets government was able to overcome the crisis of
the early 1980s and managed to transfer its institutional model during the transition to democracy. In Argentina, in a formal democratic framework, many of the
changes were introduced by presidential decree, against a background of disarticulation of the opposition and the widespread fears of the population about the perils
of hyperination, as experienced in the late 1980s.

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politics and politicians or at least some of them have to make a tremendous eort in order to stop the tendency to make politics merely instrumental and technocratic. This is an eort that in some way is meant
to fail, but on the other hand it must be done in order to generate a
certain resistance against the total technocratization. (Hoppenhayn 2000)

This has had various consequences for the provision of public services and goods. There are consequences related to state responsibility and others, which are related to the changing relationship of
the population with the political system and with the public spheres.
In a certain way, whatever occurs in one of these realms aects the
others. The idea that the state left behind the central role which it
played in the era of protectionism, aects in the rst place the states
responsibility to guarantee the quality of public goods and intervene
in cases of market failure.
These aspects are articulated in the public sphere, through expressed
condence in the institutional channels and guaranties for the regulation of services and markets, the possibility of access to public
education and healthcare, or the provision of security, running water
and pollution control as public goods. In many cases, consumers
have been unable to appeal to institutional channels when they
encountered widespread problems in their reliance on market mechanisms. For example, in Argentina in the 1990s there were numerous
incidents of gastric problems and hospitalization, the consequence of
consuming unhealthy products. In countries with normative codes
and appropriated institutional channels of appeal, like the USA or
Western Europe, such incidents would generate a judicial prosecution
and a demand for monetary compensation. In Iberoamerica, at the
most, those involved lamented the case, and in other cases neither
that would happen, it just ended with a generous smile. The institutional frameworks often failed to sustain the bond of trust between
costumer and vendor, that once disavowed, could be taken to superior instances for adjudication. If such eective protection of consumers existed, the aected party could opt to bring the claim into
relief, which beyond the specic merits of the case, would have wider
implications in terms of duciary trust. That is, the eect of repairing the damage if the case warranted it and, what is even more
important for the public sphere, an ethics of market responsibility
sustained whenever consumers realize their expectations of market
fairness have not been deceived.
Whenever this is not possible, expectations of impunity are con-

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565

solidated. In important essays, the late Argentinean sociologist Carlos

Nino and the Colombian analyst John Sudarsky have analyzed the
devastating consequences of this for the public condence in both
markets and institutions supposedly charged with regulating such
cases of malfunction of mercantile and associative transactions (Nino
1992, Sudarsky 1988). The problem is not conned to the national
borders, but rather has international implications as well. States cannot ignore their duty to guarantee the control of quality of products
and services used by their population without running the risk of
losing credibility and the capacity of their rms to enter markets
abroad.
The impact of the change is even more conspicuous in the privatized companies and their provision of what were formerly conceived as public services. Privatization was destined to confront the
scal problems and the external debt, and to gather funds for the
public companies, halting the pressure exerted by the debt and thus
obtain their renancing (Ramamurti 1992, Glade 1995: 9698). Referring to the case of Argentina, Oscar Oszlak observed that
In the rst period, the privatizations had a very high support. The
right climate was created, there were talks about all types of corruption in the public companies, from people who took bribes for any
repair to the entire system of purchase and supply of the companies.
Supported by things that indeed happened, the campaign that was initiated in those years had an enormous public consent. Nowadays the
surveys show a high level of dissatisfaction among the customers of
the services, due to the high taris, problems in the scope of services.
Surveys show more than 50 percent of dissatisfaction with the results
of privatization (Oszlak 2000).

Once they were carried out, the gap between the expectations of
public benet and the opaque and sometimes little eective way in
which many privatizations were done created public discontent.
Every process of privatization touches upon accountability, regulation and policy results. The urgency and mode by which privatizations were sometimes carried out implied some serious faults in
the subsequent regulation of the functioning and provision of the
privatized services. Outstanding in this respect were the early privatizations in Argentina, done irrespective of procedures and creating
what many saw as conditions for corruption and scandals that reached
top government ocials, their associates and families. This also
aected the issue of equality and access to services and goods related

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luis roniger

to the so called third-generation rights, e.g., healthcare and education. Peter Knapp and his associates, among others, have indicated the importance of these realms, stating that there is a level of
inequality beyond which the ideals of basic equal opportunities, social
equality and inclusive community are transformed into a vacuous
claim (Knapp et al. 1996: 202; see also Chalmers et al. 1997 and
Kliksberg 2000).
Dealing with these aspects of institutional performance and malfunctioning turns crucial for public trust, as it is central to the public
perception of an eective functioning of institutions and the formation of a view of the political and administrative leadership that is
committed to the collective well-being of the population in an eective
manner.
Politics and representation
Turning to the political realm we need to focus on representation and
representation, democracys sine qua non. No matter what denition
we followwhether Dahls concept of polyarchy, Lord Dahrendorf s
pacic regulation of socio-economic conicts, or Adam Przeworskis
denition of representative democracy as the system in which political
parties lose electionsthe core of democracy refers to its systemic
and normative regulation of competition for power. Its inner logic
is built upon a shared commitment not to stop the ever-renewed
competition following short-term political triumphs over adversaries.
As such, the comparative advantage of the democratic political system
vis--vis its late alternatives (namely, Fascism, Nazism, and Communism)
has been its built-in exibility for incorporating new demands and
interests by groups and political movements. One of the most basic
conditions for such perpetuation is the existence of channels of open
representation.
Studies concerning representation emphasize the aspect of formal
structure of the electoral systems, expecting representation by political parties to express social pluralism. They also conceive that the
parliamentary organs are those charged with holding a serious and
informed debate over the actual and future alternatives, as part of
policy formation process. According to these views, power-holders
are supposed to take decisions in a calibrated way, being fully informed
and able to assess information rationally, combining discrete interests

democracy in latin america

567

with the common well-being. To what extent do Iberoamerican

systems function according to design and model expectations?
Elections seem to function well in the region. Manuel Alcntara
(2003) mentions that out of the nearly 100 electoral acts conducted
since 1978, only in four cases there were indications of impropriety.
And yet disenchantment with the politicians is rife, both in settings
where clientelism remains widespread and in those settings less prone
to be pervaded by it. The problem is reected in the discredit of
traditional party politics and the rise of ballot absenteeism and noncondence votes. Even in Colombia, where, compared to other countries in Iberoamerica, party identication was very strong and volatility
in the behavior of politicians was smaller than say Brazil, in the
1990s one could perceive a slight increase in electoral absenteeism
and non-condence vote, reecting the publics apathy towards its
representative institutions.
Democracy cannot survive without ensuring institutional channels
of representation and participation, whether through political parties
or alternative channels. To put it dierently, the expression of dierent
interests must be articulated normatively, since otherwise democracy
will be drained. The question is how to implement those norms
predicated constitutionally and legallywithout reducing the exibility
of the democratic system of renewing itself by incorporating new
demands and interests.
In every democracy, the pluralism at the basis of representation
is in tension with the constitutional elements that express certain
common vision of common goals and interests, well beyond the mere
discrete interests of particular social sectors. This is why even those
individuals and groups that may gain in the short-term from policies beneting their particular interests, can be unsatised with the
overall performance of the system. Two parallel aspects are crucial
for evaluating the systemic capabilities of democracy. First, there
is the general obligation to abide by the normative framework of
democracy; and second, the combination between the balance of
interests and the sense of condence and will to live in that society,
especially in an era of open frontiers and global horizons.
The weakest point of democracy in the region seems to be the
relationship between governance and public accountability (ODonnell
1994, 1998; Alcntara 2003). Historically, these democracies maintained a gap between the formal and rhetorical level and the practical level of operation of politics and governance. Ever since their

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initiation as independent states, it is possible to note such gaps between

those principles aimed to generate systemic legitimacyfor example,
the division of powers, parliamentary representation, constitutionalism, and the entrenched legalismand the mechanisms aimed to
ensure the aggregation of interests and the elaboration of consensus,
mechanisms such as presidential executivism, authoritarianism and
clientelism. In accountability I would like to stress its element of
inner motivation to keep a public mission rather than merely the
administrative review of conduct or the rhetoric of the public good.
The essential thing in this respect is to generate and generalize a
personal motivation towards the public well-being. This view does
not imply the search for a communitarian vision and neither the
subordination to an authoritarian will, but the building of public
goodwill. Without governance, there is a sense of widespread loss of
public trust and disillusion. Under such conditions, public commitment
cannot be generated and the personal interests become prioritized
to public concerns, without being balanced by a certain visionof
course, pluralisticof collectivity.
The combination of representation with governance and public
commitment in terms of some shared vision of the public good is
important. In the past few years Venezuela seems to have lost that
shared vision and has witnessed political crises and urban and economic deterioration as a result. Contrastingly, after being exhausted
by violence, Colombia seems to have reached the point of recovery,
on the basis of initiatives made by its most dynamic elites, which
have a profound vision of a democratic public co-existence, as shown
in the last three administrations of the capital city of Bogot, a trend
that will probably continue under the new mayor, elected in October
2003.
Neo-clientelism and neo-populism
In this connection one of the most striking developments of recent
years in Iberoamerica is the emergence of old-new forms of populism
and clientelism. Regarding neo-clientelism I shall be brief, as I
discuss it elsewhere (Roniger 2002). Historian Richard Graham
characterized clientelism as an action-set built upon the principle of
take there, give here, enabling clients and patrons to benet from
each others support as they play in parallel at dierent levels of

democracy in latin america

569

political, social and administrative articulation (Graham 1997). Clientelism involves asymmetric but mutually benecial relationships of
power and exchangea non-universalistic quid pro quo between
individuals or groups of unequal standing. It implies mediated and
selective access to resources and markets from which others are normally excluded. Perhaps it is not surprising that, under the changing
macroeconomic policies and the reality of poverty in which 200 out
of the 516 millions of habitants of the region exist, clientelism has
reappeared, despite the predictions of modernization theories, which
forecasted its decline. What is striking is the transformation of its
forms, which become intertwined with civil society and the new discourses of democratic participation and representation.
As the new social movements revolutionalize politics, establishing
alternative discursive arenas, challenging dominant practices and
achieving at the very least a measure of symbolic power, new constituencies committed to the ideal of rights emerge (Alvarez et al.
1998). This in itself does not eliminate reliance on clientelism, yet
it reshapes the terms in which relationships are expressed, as well
as the tactics employed by those using them, from favors in a patrimonial sense to public services that clienteles demand as their own
right. To quote from an analysis of this phenomenon in the Brazilian
urban landscape by Robert Gay, in Brazil and probably in other
settings as well, clientelism seems increasingly to be
a means for pursuing the delivery of collective as opposed to individual
goods. This means that political clienteles are less likely to assume the
form of loose clusters of independently negotiated dyads than organizations, communities or even whole regions that fashion relationships
or reach understandings with politicians, public ocials and administrations. In other words, contemporary clientelism exhibits both hierarchical and relational elements and elements of collective organization
and identity (Gay 1998: 14).

Despite their dierences, in most cases of clientelism one can trace,

in one way or another, such networks are related to the problem
hereby discussed, of disjuncture between principles and practice in
the political level, clientelism being only one of the major modes of
managing access to power by building networks of supporters and
followings.
Another major trend since the 1980s is the re-emergence of populism, which challenges representative democracy from within, in
major parts and sectors of these societies, and prompts rethinking the

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workings of the mechanisms of representation in these democracies.

In both the more traditional societies (e.g. Bolivia) and in the more
mobilized polities (e.g. Chile), leaders have emerged, whorelying
symbolically on a popular or even anti-establishment messagehave
launched promises of immediate solutions to veteran and unsolved
problems. Some of them, like Hugo Chvez Fras of Venezuela, are
rather personalistic and have forwarded an anti-neoliberal program
and rhetoric. Others, such as the mayor of Las Condes and 1999
presidential candidate of the UDI, Joaqun Lavn, have based their
support on rightist agendas, while still relying on a strong popular
basis and rhetoric. Another example of an anti-neoliberal populist
was president Alan Garca of Peru, while presidents Carlos Menem
(Argentina), Alberto Fujimori (Peru) and Fernando Collor de Mello
(Brazil) were supporters of the globalizing model of economic development. Indeed, Michael Connieditor of two major books on
populism in Iberoamerica, one in the 1970s and the other in the
1990sevaluates that, with the exception of Hugo Chvez, the wave
of populist leaders of the 1980s and 1990s was characterized by their
exposure to the international arena, their mastering of global talk
and their ability to pose themselves as the embodiment of the new
global trends, including the use of political marketing as part of their
strategy of being in touch with the people.5
What is involved in this new wave of populism, which is increasingly identied in the literature as neo-populism? What does it tell
about the workings of these polities, which have enthusiastically
endorsed the combined models of democracy and free market and
yet are ridden with a generalized sense of disenchantment?
A most evident trait of most contemporary instances of neopopulism is its leader-people nexus, with the leader claiming to be
the true voice of the democratic sovereign and locus of legitimacy:
the people. This is reected in the attempt to launch an antiestablishment alternative from within the political center. Reecting
the widespread distrust of traditional politicians, many of the populist
leaders portray themselves as expressing the will to get rid of the
5
I shall stress that many statesmen in Iberoamerica are not populist. Alfonsn
in Argentina and Sarney in Brazil, who supported the old vision of the protectionist
state, while launching the process of redemocratization in the 1980s, did not lead
a populist strategy. And neither were later presidents as Fernando Henrique Cardoso
in Brazil, Jorge Battle in Uruguay, Frei or Ricardo Lagos in Chile, whose policies
embraced many of the principles of the so called neo-liberal model.

democracy in latin america

571

old forms of elitist and uncommitted politics. Rather than merely

supporting the idea of retreat of the state, they reconstruct the latter
within the terms of a promise of reform promulgated by the executive
leader, well above the formalities of representative democracy.
Another major characteristic is the attempt to recreate a modernist
certainty in an era of uncertainties. Whereas in the global arena
post-modernism legitimizes the presence of multiple perspectives
(asserting that truth assertions are fundamentally victories in argument rather than an accurate representation of reality) and multiculturalism breaks the homogenous cultural program of the nation-state,6
neo-populism holds the promise of recreation of a certainty, reected
in rhetoric and speech that at times is as totalistic as decades ago
even if far from totalitarianand sometimes even embedded in religious truth.
Often, there is an attempt to recreate the collective identity of the
nation. The vision of the neo-populist leaders is that they defend the
integrity and spirit of the people. Whereas in the past, the enemy
was the US and its internal supporters, nowadays the terms shift
mostly to the internal arena, but the vision is at times as Manichean
as in the past. Probably the most outspoken in this has been Hugo
Chvez in Venezuela, who portrayed himself as the avenger of
people, leading a Bolivarian Revolution against the partitocratic
oligarchy entrenched in the institutions. Resulting from this is a
re-foundational republican aspiration, which found its way into the
reformed Constitution of 1999.
There is much in these phenomena which resembles the populism
of the 1940s and 1950s and yet many other features are new, which
possibly justify their identication as part of neo-populism. In common
with the old forms of populism in the region, the current forms
evince the following components:
the leader-masses bond, rooted not only in cognitive-rational elements but in emotive bond, buttressed by a certain style of addressing the masses, directed to the most popular sectors in the population;

6
In the last decade Iberoamerica has moved strongly in this direction, albeit not
without conicts. Yet, the shift is strongly reected constitutionally and culturally
in many countries, from Peru to Brazil and from Bolivia to Guatemala, both in
terms of ethnic and linguistic diversity and to a lesser extent in terms of gender.
See Alvarez et al. 1998; Braig 1999.

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a permanent call to plebiscitary-like decisions. There is a symbolic

empowerment of popular sectors through these calls to the people
instead of citizenship, thus obviating horizontal and vertical accountability;
the correlate appropriation of voice by the leader, reinforcing what
ODonnell dened as delegative democracy;
an emphasis on executive power overriding the division of powers,
and often leading to legislation by decree;
consequently, a politics of anti-politics: the weakening of some
of the basic institutions of representative democracy or their manipulation; this reects and buttresses a more general trend, in which
political parties cease to be the promoters and mediators of utopia,
in the terms of Manuel Alcantara Senz;
the reliance on multi-class support and concomitantly the tendency
to detachment from coherent, clear-cut ideologies (this does not
mean ideologization is lacking);
last but not least, it addresses those social forces beaten harshly
by the new macro-economic policies of structural adjustment and
privatization, and projects promises of existential solutions, even
when in practice most of them do not disengage from the systemic adherence to free market policies.
These basic components are problematized by other features, which
are new when compared to the old forms of populism:
they are attuned to the global spin of criticism of the political
class. Once the system failed to sustain its previous standards of
tatist patronage, this triggered the erosion of trust in the political class, even where representative democracy seemed to have
been stabilized, as in the case of one of the most enduring democracies of the subcontinent, Venezuela, which lived through a long
period of multiparty and bi-party democratic stability (195873
and 197393 respectively);
the new leaders have had global exposure and are keen to adopt
global talk about civil society, democracy, free markets, and global
integration;
whereas the old populism suggested a program of economic independence, shaped by the old model of autarkic capitalism analyzed by Carlos Waisman, most neo-populist projects abide by the
logic of integration into global and regional markets;
they play in a changed political scenario in which franchise has

democracy in latin america

573

possibly reached its maximum scope, in contrast with the old

populist leaders, which rode into power through the enlargement
of political and civil rights;
they use the most modern techniques of mass media and political marketing for recreating the imagined bond between the leader
and the people. In parallel, they refrain from some of the old
forms of corporatist organization of mobilized support;
yet, they rely on all sorts of networks stemming from civil society.
As opposed to the old scholarly interpretation of Gino Germani
and others of populism striving among a disorganized mass population, the new forms of populism seem to rely both on associations
and NGOs, as well as on a myriad of brokers, patron-brokers and
activists, who organize and mediate between local populations, the
populist leaders and the public administration;
that is, they do not adopt the old authoritarian modes of control
and consequently can nd themselves removed from power through
popular mobilizations and coups dtat aimed at renewing democracy as in Ecuador in 1997 and 2000, or through impeachment,
as in the case of Brazil in 1992;
most of them seem to acknowledge the limits of their power and
do not attemptsave very rarelyto opt out of the democratic
game. They rather claim to be working to democratize democracy,
which makes sense to many witnessing the huge socioeconomic
gaps maintained under democracy.

There are signicant variations, not only regarding the stance toward
neo-liberal economy, as discussed above, but also in political terms.
In relatively high institutionalized polities, the styles described are
geared to the creation of what I would call a certain third tier of
democratic resonance, as identied and expressed by the leader. A
typical case is that of Joaqun Lavn, leading a populism coming
from one of the forces that supported Pinochet and who, while personalizing politics, launched policies to mobilize the young, popular,
and women populations, through a combination of old and new, that
strongly recalls Gianfranco Finis political bases of support in Italy.
In less institutionalized polities such as Ecuador or Bolivia, the
logics of neo-populism become entrenched in the perception of participatory, cum-direct democracy as the true democracy. In these
societies, substantial sectors recognize an aboriginal ascendance and
relate to images of autochthonous models of leadership and communal

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accountability, which dier from the Western models. Accordingly,

there are widespread unfullled expectations of a more responsive
form of doing politics, which under the proper circumstances can
derive into street demonstrations and occupations of public space,
interpreted as the expression of direct popular democracy. This
mounting pressure and popular mobilization has been rather eective
in recent years in bringing leaders on the country-wide scene to opt
out from power. Thus, in Ecuador mass mobilization led to coups
dtat and the removal of presidents Bucaram and Mahuad in 1997
and 2000 respectively. In Bolivia the continuous public presence and
protest by Indians in SeptemberOctober 2003 contributed to bringing
down a national president who despite his rhetoric of participation
led a program of privatizations and closer economic ties with the
US and Chile.
The tensions inherent in this logic of doing politics are obvious.
First there is a constant threat to the institutionalization of representative democracy in its minimalist version. Second it reects the
persistence of unfullled countervailing visions of democracy. Third,
there is the projection anew of the old organicist ideas of the people as sovereign and the republican commitment to their entitlement to social justice, which stands in contradiction with the logics
of the free market, equally endorsed and often burdened by political corruption. That is, some visions of communitarian and participatory democracy can be expected to persist, buttressed by recurrent
outbursts of occupation of public space, which the combination of
populist rhetoric and ineective polices recreate into the center of
the public sphere.
Participatory democratic practices
The G-7 societies have been able to maintain high levels of voluntary
participation in local politics and organizations out of civil society.
Sydney Tarrow has traced some of the characteristics of this profound transformation:
It brings activists further into the realms of tolerated and prescribed
politics and makes possible relations of working trust with public ocials.
It has produced hybrid forms of behavior that cross the boundaries of
the polity and link grass-root activists to public interest groups, parties, and public ocials. On the one hand, these new forms of activism

democracy in latin america

575

are unlikely to sustain high levels of condence in government, and

they may discourage public trust by demonstrating the inadequacy of
governmental performance. On the other hand, they do not create
enduring negative subcultures. Their variable form and shifting organizations, their tendency to produce rapid and rapidly liquidated
coalitions, and their focus on issues of short- and medium-term issues
rather than fully edged ideologies do not produce enduring membership commitments or deeply held loyalties outside the polity (Tarrow
2000: 289).

Various macro-sociological factors have led to a deep change in that

direction: the erosion of the centralizing models of the authoritarian
and communist countries, the diusion of the participatory model of
civil society in the tradition identied by De Tocqueville in the USA
and the erosion of the idea of the nation-state in its homogenizing
and dominative character. All these have contributed to generating
the conditions for the legitimacy of a new participatory pluralism.
In this new format, citizens are conceived as able to disagree democratically, to develop public will and to acquire skills that once were
limited to the traditional political and administrative elites. In this
pattern, typical of the auent societies of the West, citizens have freeoating resources that can be invested in the public arena, through
organizational impetus and associational networks for example.
Both from the perspective of republicanism and in procedural
terms, this trend is expected to reinforce democracy. From a republican perspective, the political community perceives itself as autogovernable, which in complex and pluralistic societies forces negotiations
over public programs and shared normative frameworks. From the
perspective of procedural democracy, participation is fundamental
too, facilitating the structuring of deliberative models, be they those
of Jrgen Habermas, built upon rational and legal procedures of
deliberation and formation of public opinion, or on a model like
that of John Dewey, for social cooperation and the practical establishment of reexive and autonomous initiatives, in the tradition of civil
society.
In Iberoamerica many sectors lack such free-oating resources.
The existential realities of widespread poverty, unemployment or partial employment, urban and rural violence reinforce the logics of
exclusion. We witness in these societies a double process of dualization,
rst between stronger and weaker socio-economic groups that somehow function as civil societies at dierent levelsthrough social and

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political articulation and through protest. The second process of dualization separates the above groups, which somehow relate to the
state, and those marginal groups that live outside organized society,
beyond the formal economy and outside the control of the state, be
it positively or negatively phrased (Sznajder and Roniger 2003). In
this kind of democracy it is typical for large sectors to be sidelined,
with little autonomous access to goods and services, and lack a capacity to fully participate in the public spheres due to their marginal
placement at the margins of society, economy, and politics. In parallel, other sectors continue to have a mediated access to markets of
goods and services and to use the clientelist networks to connect to
the political system and the public administration.
And yet, there is a long tradition of parallel attempts to generate
such participatory social and political capital, mostly futile in the
past and recently crowned with success. Practices such as the electoral control in Mexico or the model of participatory budgeting
in Brazilian cities such as Porto Alegre and Belo Horizonteare
exemplary. In Brazil, following the reform of the Constitution, there
has been a process of institutional innovation based upon a tripartite structure that involved public administrators together with professionals and local delegates representing civil society, in the process
of provision of public services, tying the translation of macro policies to the daily practice of making decisions over the nature of services, their costs and the quality of their provision. In Brazil, one
could witness in the impoverished and dry hinterland of Cear, one
of the poorest settings of the Northeast, a new willingness to contribute resources to public projects, in addition to the funds delivered
from the federal and state levels, as a result of these changes in the
articulation of local participation in decision-making (eldwork,
MarchApril 2002).
According to researchers of Iberoamerica, the recent experiences
suggest an alternative to the elitist theories of democracy. According
to the elitist theories, democracy will exist wherever there will be a
fair political game of recurring competition for power, structured
through electoral decisions. The origins of such minimalist denition
focusing on the selection of political leadership and the election of
governmentcan be traced to the inter-war period in Europe, when
wide mass mobilizations disrupted the political systems of the rst
wave of democratization. Something similar occurred at the end of
Cold War, when violence on the right and the left disarticulated

democracy in latin america

577

many of the democratic systems of the Third World, through the

wave of protests, manifestations and mass mobilizations, which led
to the crystallization of guerrilla warfare, para-military and state violence. The legacy of such collective experience had its political impact
in the form of the wide acceptance of theories that, like Dahls,
looked for the minimal parameters of operation and survival of
democracy. In contrast, authors such as Boaventura de Santos,
Leonardo Avitzer, Adriana Delgado and, beyond the American continent, Chantall Moue as well, have suggested that these experiences
should prompt a wider view of the relations between democracy and
the formation of a public space in which citizens participate as equals
and public decisions are taken through the open discussion of political
projects.
This alternative approach puts emphasis on practices taking shape
in the public sphere, where rulers and citizens meet and have a
mutual inuence on each other. It suggests viewing democracy as a
series of social practices, which can be deepened through citizenship
participation: practices such as the electoral control in Mexico, the
committees of communal action in Colombia and the participatory
budgeting and tripartite commissions of health and education in
Brazil. In the latter, clear-cut and transparent criteria for budget
transference are determined in advance, aimed at reducing the misuse of public monies, combined with criteria of subsidiarity that contemplate the dierential needs of the various regions, provinces and
states. This pattern is particularly important for the federal countries
of the region. Through steady participation and deliberation, these
avenues of citizen involvement emerge as a major means for intensifying democracy, especially in those societies in which there are
strong pressures for participation and, on the other hand, exclusion,
remnants of elitism and widespread public distrust, especially among
the popular classes.
By invigorating democratic practices at the local level, the destabilizing potential of limited democracy and the anarchic disarticulation of the public sphere could be defused. These initiatives could
overturn the tendency of erosion of public condence in representative
democracy while taking advantage of the capacity of democracy
over alternative political systemsto address pluralism, dynamically
incorporate new demands and reinforce the constitution of free public
spheres. In the context of Iberoamerica these initiatives may perhaps
also reduce the populist and clientelistic trends, still in existence.

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Conclusions

Even though the work of Shmuel N. Eisenstadt has raised our awareness to the crystallization of not one but multiple models of modernity, research still tends intuitively to look for the ideal institutional
format which will be the denitive solution for the problems of
democracy. Related to this intuitive tendency, political marketing has
become fashionable, orienting the use of media strategies as political weapons for identifying preferences, orienting public opinion and
capturing votes. And yet, even if one recognizes their importance,
the emphasis on the ways we do politics cannot obviate dealing with
dierences in the workings of public institutions. In order to invigorate
democracy, political marketing and media strategies are insucient
guidelines.
The search after the ideal model has led many to think, for example, that some democracies are successful due to their electoral format, which seems to be better than others, or that the issue of
optimal representation can be formally resolved by an intelligent use
of the mass media or a referendum. We should keep in mind that
the problem of development of representative democracy cannot be
dissociated from the nourishing of shared ideas regarding the public
good, elaborated democratically in various ways in dierent societies,
and from the generation of social capital, vital for institutional transformations.
Accordingly, this work has analyzed some innovative experiences
for Iberoamerica, aiming at the institutionalization of democratic
controls in the local scene, but also the phenomena of neo-clientelism
and neo-populism. These two trends seem almost contradictory and
yet both indicate the need to address current problems in the current
workings of representative democracy and in the connection between
the public agenda and the markets.
Beyond its concrete focus, this analysis has made a claim on the
importance of rethinking the public realm in the widest possible
terms, that is, as a focus for the forging of collective identity, the
recreation of sociability and the building of a shared sense of future.
In practical terms, for democracies overloaded with poverty, unemployment and exclusion, this means that work has to be done to
improve public performance and ecacy, to promote and safeguard
public goods and, in parallel, to intensify the equation of growth,
redistribution and inclusion instead of the inverse equation of stag-

democracy in latin america

579

nation (recession or decline), widening socioeconomic gaps and exclusion. The latter is crucial in societies such as those of Iberoamerica,
overload with pressures derived from their huge socioeconomic gaps
combined with raising expectations of democratic voice and participation, which are often manipulated by populist rhetoric and clientelistic intercession.

CHAPTER THIRTY

THE EUROPEAN IDENTITY

Alberto Martinelli
The problem of a distinctive European identity is both an interesting
research question and a politically relevant issue. It is a complex and
controversial research question for two main reasons: rst, Europe
has traditionally been an open and multiple world, with several cultural identities, which has constantly put into question its common
beliefs and unifying ties, a kind of great social laboratory where unity
and multiplicity have interacted in continuous tension; as a result,
some scholars consider it more appropriate to speak of European
identities, in the plural. Second, the culture of Europe has become to
a large extent the culture of modernity and various basic components
of the European identity have been globally diused, making it
dicult, according to some other scholars, to identify what is today
specically European.
As far as the rst argument is concerned, I will argue that the
variety of cultural codes and paths toward and through modernity
of the European peoples does not exclude the existence of a genetic
core of specic values and attitudes, which have been distinctive
European traits since ancient times, but with the advent of modernity crystallized into a specic cultural and institutional setting, fostering bold institutional innovations.
As far the second argument is concerned, I maintain that recognizing
that modernity has become a common global condition (Wittrock,
2000) and that a set of modern technological, economic and political institutions of Western European origin have become diused
across the globe, does not imply the view that modernization, once
activated, moves inescapably toward establishing a certain type of
mental outlook (scientic rationalism, pragmatic instrumentalism, secularism), or that certain types of institutional order (popular government, bureaucratic administration, market-driven industrial economy)
exist irrespective of the culture and politics of a given place; rather,
what we are witnessing is the growth of multiple modernities (Eisenstadt,

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alberto martinelli

2000b) or varieties of modernity, through the continuous interpretation, reinterpretation and transformation of the modern project.
European identity is also a key political issue. There is widespread
criticism that the European Union is today a limited project, since
the economic integration of Europe has not been transformed by a
parallel cultural integration into a true political union. It is argued
that a decit of cultural integration exists because the communitarian
process is based on economic rationality rather than on a feeling of
common belonging and that a shift from interest politics to identity
politics is needed. Actually, the current construction of the European
Unionas a process of building a loosely coupled, open system
through a set of supra-national, supra-state normative institutions
is made possible by a common historical heritage and by shared cultural attitudes. The formation of a united Europe developed from
the desire to put an end to centuries-long European civil wars and
from the recognition of common economic interests for the peoples
of Europe, and grew through the development of a unied European
market where persons, capitals, goods and services can move freely;
but the cultural dimension has also been, and remains, present in
the process of European integration, and a common European identity is not opposed to, but linked with, common interests.
Shared values and cultural attitudes, however, should be better
specied and strengthened in order to dene a clear and distinct
European identity. The drafting of the European constitution aims
at meeting such a need. In the debates that took place during its
drafting. the questions were raised whether the building of the
European Unionparticularly with the admission of former Eastern
European communist countriesrequires the denition and the
armation of a distinctive European identity, whether such an identity exists, which are its specic features, and how it can be fostered.
In the rst draft of the European Constitution, specic reference was
made to the tradition of the Enlightenment, but no analogous reference
was made either to Christianity or to Greek and Roman antiquity.
Subsequently the preference was to eliminate any reference to cultural
traditionsalthough well entrenched in the historical experience of
the European peoplesboth in order to avoid ideological quarrels
and to emphasize the open, multicultural nature of the new Europe.
But the question of the specic features of a distinctive European
identity is of the utmost importance and a key issue of debate in
the European public space.

the european identity

583

In this chapter I aim to contribute to this debate by arguing that:

a) there are both several dierent identities of the European peoples and a European common identitywhich can be dened,
rst of all, as a set of common cultural roots (Greek and Roman
antiquity, the Christian religion) and, at deeper level, as a genetic
core of specic cultural attitudes, which are organized around the
dialectic relationship between rationality and individualism/subjectivity);
b) these cultural roots have been distinctive European traits since
ancient times, but crystallized into a specic cultural and institutional setting with the advent of modernity, fostering bold institutional innovations through a process of historical learning (science
and technology, market-led industrial capitalism, representative
democracy, nation-state citizenship);
c) the European project is still a modern project; in fact, it is an
expression of radical modernity, given modernitys particular conception of time which denes the modern age as an epoch oriented
toward the future, conceived as being novel and better than the
present and the past, and given the fact that the modern project
is still far from being accomplished (Habermas, 1985);
d) a European common identity has not only a common memory
to build on, but must be constructed on the future as well; it is
the realization of an open-ended project rather than the expression
in the passive conservation of past values; and it is actively fostered
day-by-day through institutional building (the European Parliament,
the euro);
e) the European project was founded on the decision to put an end
to European civil wars and on the perception of common economic interests, but is made possible by the legacy of specic cultural values and social norms (individual rights, freedom of science,
welfare, inter-culturalism);
f ) the European project can be dened as the achievement of unity
through diversity, denying the old belief that what is dierent is
potentially hostile, and renouncing the construction of a specic
identity based on the opposition us versus them. A European
identity of this kind is not exclusive and may be weaker than traditional national identities, but is more apt to contribute to a
democratic form of global governance, in terms of mutual understanding, peaceful relations and multi-layered cooperation.

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alberto martinelli
One or many European identities?

Apparently, there is no single European identity, but rather many

dierent European identitieswhich developed in the history of the
European peoples and were formally recognized and fostered in the
process of nation building of the European nation-statestogether
with an array of other sub-national and trans-national ethnic and
cultural identities. The multiplicity of cultures which characterized
its history has been the source of deep cleavages, violent conicts,
idiosyncratic controversies, and even of many errors and crimes, but
it has also proved to be highly capable of assimilation and integration, as well as of creating extraordinary opportunities for scientic
and technical development, economic growth and social and cultural
innovation.
European civilization was characterized by a very high degree of
multiplicity and cross-cutting of cultural orientations and structural
settings but, at the same time, by a high degree of commitment by
centers and periphery alike to common ideals and goals (the most
important of which were the tension between the transcendental and
the mundane orders and the denition of the individual as an autonomous and responsible entity) (Eisenstadt, 1987). Europe has traditionally been an open and multiple world which has constantly put
in question its common beliefs and unifying ties, a kind of great
social laboratory where unity and multiplicity have interacted in a
continuous tension. As Johannes Weiss states, the culture of Europe . . .
cannot be regarded as a unied culture, as homogeneous, but at
best as a kind of stabilized tension between deep, indeed antinomian contrasts (Mongardini 2001, p. 17). The recognition of this
European specicity allows us to avoid two opposite and equally
unsatisfactory responses to the question whether a European identity exists: on the one hand, the claim to be able to dene precisely
a pattern of stable and well established cultural elements which are
typical only of the European peoples and distinguish them from the
rest of the world; on the other, the denial of any common cultural
feature and the denition of a European identity only in negative
termsas a permanent conict and a confused crucible of ethnic,
national and local cultures.
The identity of Europe is actually made possible by a common
cultural heritage which cuts acrossin various ways and to varying
degreesthe several European ethnos, but can develop only through

the european identity

585

the growth of a European demos, which is dened in terms of shared

rights and obligations and which is capable of consolidating the ties
of citizenship within freely chosen democratic institutions.
The attempt to identify what European identity is today can only
take place through the critical reappraisal of the great historical
processes which resulted in the formation of modern Europe; through
the analysis of the dialectic between change and persistence, and of
the alternation of Europes openings toward other cultural worlds
and closures within its own geographic and ethnic borders; through
the study of the sequence of struggles, at rst between supra-national
entities such as the Pope and the Emperor and national and regional
political entities such as the city-republics and the emerging sovereign
states, and, later, among the various nation-states for the economic
and political hegemony of the continent; through the appraisal of
the great cleavages between centre and periphery, state and church,
land and cities, bourgeois and workers, in the path toward and
through modernity, as they are portrayed in Rokkans geo-political
map of Europe (Rokkan, 1970, 1973).
From this kind of historical appraisal it clearly emerges that contemporary Europe is a Europe of dierence and diversity and that
a primary feature of European identity is the extraordinary complexity
of its historical-cultural heritage, where great diversities co-exist in
forms which are both conicting and cooperative, without losing their
specicities. The great political wager of the new Europe is that the
plurality of dierent cultureswhich for centuries fostered a semipermanent state of local or generalized warscan now be reconsidered
as a common good and a basic resource for the development of a
free and prosperous community, harmoniously diversied inside and
peacefully open to the outside world.
Key features of European identity are the constant dialectic among
dierent and often conicting Weltanschauungen and the development
of a critical mindthat continuously puts into question temporarily
hegemonic beliefs and conceptions and that forms the basis of
European scientic thought.
Recognizing this specic character of the European mind does not
however imply denying the existence of some constitutive elements
of the European culture, a kind of genetic cultural code which,
although constantly modied and very dierently declined in historical
contingencies and geo-political particularisms, identies a European
specic.

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alberto martinelli

These basic elements can be found in varying degrees and forms

in the dierent parts of a Europe of varying geometrical order,
which sometimes goes beyond the geographical borders of Europe
and at other times stops at the boundary of so-called Western
Europe which more or less coincides with what was Charlemagnes
empire.
These basic elements are of an institutional nature but they are
rooted inand at the same time fosterclosely related values, norms,
attitudes and languages, which can be identied in the constant tension between subjectivity/individualism and rationalism as both opposing and complementary principles. Let us briey review these core
common cultural and institutional roots of the European peoples.
The core cultural and institutional roots
Rationalism and individualism/subjectivity as both opposing and complementary principles characterize European history, from Greek philosophy and Roman law to the Judaic and Christian religious traditions,
but they crystallize into a specic cultural and institutional setting
with the advent of modernity. They express the tension between
individual liberty and social organization. As core cultural roots, they
contribute to the development of the specic modern attitude which
consists in the absence of limits. European identity is that of a civilisation that has constantly exceeded limitsinternal and external
that has freed itself from the bonds, thus creating its own distinctive
mark (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b, p. 134). The portrait of Ulysses in
Dantes Inferno is the appropriate metaphor here. The un-limitedness
that denes modernityand European identity as its place of origin
is primarily evident in the innite quest for knowledge.
A similar view was expressed by Jaspers in the heated discussion
about the foundations for the reconstruction of Europe, at the end
of the Second World War. He identies three factors constituting
the essence of Europe: liberty, history and sciencethree factors that
know no limit. The rst factor, the longing for freedom, is universal but only in Europe has it has developed with full awareness. It
means victory over despotism, a sense of justice transformed into
concrete institutions, and it fosters among Europeans a constant state
of restlessness and ferment. From liberty stems the second factor, the
need to understand historical time. True liberty is for Jaspers mostly

the european identity

587

the quest for political freedom within the community, i.e. the development of the individual together with the social world around him.
The third factor, science, is also related to liberty insofar as it is
dened as the constant eort to arrive at the heart of everything
that can be penetrated; knowledge and the love for knowledge makes
human beings free, giving them not only the external freedom achieved
through the knowledge of nature, but alsoand foremostinternal
freedom.
The quest for knowledge is a distinctive European trait since
ancient times, but it is with modernity that it acquires a new impulse
because it is freed from the subordination of knowledge to a given
religious truth or to a single political end. The incessant quest for
knowledge is the product of the critical mind, which has its roots in
the Greek philosophical ethos and develops with the Enlightenments
permanent critique of our historical era. The development of science is linked together with the driving force of capitalism and the
massive development of technology, both related in their turn to the
belief in continuous progress. European modernity is the age of
Prometheus unleashed, which corresponds to the absence of ethical
and religious limits to the technical dominion of nature. Capitalism
is a mode of production based on technical instrumentality and on
the maximization of economic rationality for successful competition
in the market.
European rationalism has manifested itself in a variety of dierent
forms, from Romanesque architecture to Renaissance painting, from
the philosophy of Descartes to the music of Bach, from the democratic man of the Enlightenment to the homo economicus of capitalism.
It can be dened lato sensu as the capacity of the human mind to
know, control and transform nature (according to a conception of
the world as an environment that can be molded to the fullling of
human needs and wants) and as the condence of human beings in
rationally pursuing their own ends and, in the nal analysis, being
the masters of their own destiny.
In its condence in the power of reason to control and transform
nature, European rationalism is the breeding ground of scientic and
geographical discoveries and technological and entrepreneurial innovations; it is related to the perception of an absence of limits (as
mentioned earlier), to that particular restlessness of the European
people, as it is portrayed in paradigmatic gures of European literature from Dantes Ulysses to Goethes Faust, and it is exemplied

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in many events of European historyfrom transcontinental sea voyages

to colonial adventures, to the spirit of the frontier which is a distinctive trait of the American variant of the European culture.
At the same time, reason is conceived as a system of shared rules
which makes social coexistence possible. Kant does not write the
apology of reason, but enquiries into its limits. The rational mind is
strong only if it is conscious of its own limits, does not pretend to
know the truth, opens the way to an endless search. In this sense,
reason is by denition anti-totalitarian and directly related to individual freedom.
Rationalism is closely linked, complementary with, and opposed
to, the other core cultural traits of European identity, namely individualism and subjectivity. Individualism has found many dierent
expressions in the time and space of Europefrom Evangelic personalism to the individualism of the free citizens in the late medieval
independent republics, from the individual economic actor in the
market to the individual rights of the free citizen in modern liberal
democracies, and to the reexive subjectivity of contemporary
Europeans. Individualism, like rationalism, has developed in the cultural heritage of European history, but emerged fully only with the
advent of modernity. As Polanyi, Gauchet and Baker (among others)
have pointed out, the rise of individualism was not only a symptom
of the dissolution of the primacy of the community in its traditional
religious meaning but also a necessary condition for the discovery
of society in strictly secular terms. Not until the ideological primacy
of individual interests and passions was postulated could constraints
upon those interests be discovered in the operation of an autonomous
social and political order subject to its own laws.
Individualism is at the root of the principles of liberty and equality
which were armed by Ius naturalismus (which holds that all human
beings are equal insofar as they are endowed with reason), by English
political thought and by French and German philosophy of the
Enlightenment; they were recognized in the prerogatives of the English
Parliament after the Glorious Revolution of 168889 and solemnly
proclaimed in the American Constitution of 1776 and in the Declaration
des droits de lhomme et du citoyen of 1789.
These principles arm the inviolable individual rights to life, freedom and the full accomplishment of his/her potentialities. Liberty
expresses itself both as negative freedom, i.e. as protection of human
rights from the abuses of power, and as positive freedom, i.e. as the

the european identity

589

citizens right to participate in the formation of the common will.

Equality was rst of all dened as equality of the rights and duties
of citizenship and citizens equality before the law, but it soon became
equality of opportunities and life chances as well, thus opening the
way to the conceptions of progressive liberalism, social democracy
and welfare policies which became integral parts of the political culture of Europe in the twentieth century. To be European means
striving to realize both principles of equality and freedom; the struggle
over the balance between equality and freedom is a leitmotiv in the
history of European political thought (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b).
Individualism and subjectivity are of course not identical. There
is a tendency to use the former term among scholars who prefer
positive accounts of modernity (the societal)where the individualistic
understanding of the self is put alongside the growth of scientic
consciousness, the development of a secular outlook, the doctrine of
progress, the contractualist understanding of society as a basic characters of modernity; whereas the latter concept is preferred by the
supporters of the alternative view of modernity (the cultural), which
is critical of middle-class pragmatic calculations, soulless pursuit of
money and lack of moral passion, and is on the contrary concerned
with the care of the self, spontaneous expression, and authentic experience. In fact, political and economic individualism and aesthetic
and moral subjectivity are dimensions of the same principle and this
principle is dialectically related to the principle of rationality. They
are not at the roots of two alternative types of modernity (the supportive and the critical, the societal and the cultural), but are elements
of the same cultural and institutional syndrome. The world of the
capitalist entrepreneur is a world of incessant change and deadening
routine which provides the proper context for the aesthetics of the
self as well. Imagination and reason are not enemies, but rather allies
in the work of the scientist as well as in that of the artist. Both wish
to explore and experience everything, without limits.
The dialectic relationship between the principle of rationality (with
its institutional forms such as market-driven industrial economies,
bureaucratically administered states, functionally organized metropolitan cities) and the principle of subjectivity/individualism also manifests itself in the double matrix of change and routine in which the
modern self lives.
Each of those unforgettable gures of modernityMarxs revolutionary, Baudelaires dandy, Nietzsches superman, Webers

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alberto martinelli

social scientist, Simmels stranger, Musils man without qualities,

and Benjamins aneuris caught and carried in the intoxicating
rush of an epochal change and yet nds itself xed and formulated
by a disciplinary system of social roles and functions (Gaonkar,
2001, p. 3).
The list (to which I would add Schumpeters entrepreneur) is
strictly European, further proof that the culture of modernity is closely
linked with European identity (including the peoples of the Europe
outside Europe), although to-day it is no longer conned to the
West.
Rationalism, individualism/subjectivity, the incessant quest for
knowledge, innovation and discovery, the constitution of the self as
an autonomous subject, the refusal of limits, the principles of liberty
and equality of rights and opportunities, represent the core elements
of a European identity, nurtured in European historical heritage
rst of all in the legacy of Christianity and Greek-Roman antiquitybut fully developed in the civilization of modernity which
crystallized rst in Western Europe and then expanded to other parts
of Europe, to the Americas and throughout the world, giving rise
to continuously changing cultural and institutional patterns which
constituted dierent responses to the challenges and possibilities
inherent in the core characteristics of the distinct civilization premises
of modernity (Eisenstadt, 2001b, Martinelli, 1998, 2003).
These cultural values and attitudes fostered and were fostered by
a relatively open and autonomous social structure characterized by
(1) a multiplicity of centers, (2) a high degree of permeation of the
peripheries by the centers and of impingement of the peripheries on
the centers, (3) a relatively small degree of overlapping of the boundaries of class, ethnic, religious and political entities and their continuous restructuring, (4) a comparatively high degree of autonomy
of groups and strata and their access to the centers of society, (5) a
multiplicity of cultural, economic and professional elites, (6) a relatively high degree of social mobility, and (7) a legal system relatively
independent from politics and religion, highly autonomous cities
(Eisenstadt, 1987).
In the civilization of modernity, the values, attitudes and interpretations of the world which crystallized in a distinct cultural program, combined with the development of a set of new institutional
formations which were both European-born and spread all over the
world, and assumed a variety of forms: the capitalist market and

the european identity

591

rm, the nation-state and the democratic polity, the university and
the research academy.
Let us briey look at these above elements: rst, European science
and technology, i.e. a particular approach to the knowledge of physical and human reality capable of transforming nature for the fulllment
of human wants. The depth of Indian and Chinese religion and philosophy, the richness of Muslim scientic and religious thought, and the
advanced astronomic knowledge of Mesopotamia and pre-Colombian
America are a few examples which demonstrate that Western knowledge is not exceptional. What is distinctive and specic in European
culture is a greater capacity to unite abstract theory and empirical
research and, even more importantly, to link together scientic discovery, invention and technological innovation under the constant
pressure of either war or commercial competition, as well as a greater
ability to design institutions particularly suited to the formation and
diusion of knowledgefrom the Italian and French medieval universities to the seventeenth-century British scientic academies, from
the nineteenth-century German research universities to the great
research laboratories of the present. European modernity was not
simply a package of technological and organizational developments;
it was intimately linked to a political revolution, and to an equally
important transformation of the nature of scholarly and scientic
practices and institutions (Wittrock, 2000). Europe has invented and
perfected an understanding of science, which has become a global
example and role model. The main characteristics of this understanding of science, as it has developed since the Renaissance, are,
as Rudolph argues, the recognition of mathematics as the measure
of exactness in science, the unity of freedom of scientic enquiry
and scientic criticism, and the dependence of empirical knowledge
on conceptual reection (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b).
The second element is market-driven industrial capitalism. The
governing principle of capitalism is the constant search for the rational maximization of individual utility in order to successfully compete in the market. The ecient combination of the factors of
production in the industrial rm and the exchange of goods and services in the self-regulating market slowly expanding all over the world
are the two basic institutions of capitalist development. The industrial revolution of the eighteenth century (a most powerful process
of innovation, capital accumulation and market expansion) developed
thanks to agricultural surpluses, long-distance trade surpluses and the

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availability of iron and coal; however, the industrial revolution was

rst and foremost related to the specic linkage with the scientic
and technological revolutions of modernity. Trades and markets
ourished in the early empires and in many non-European parts of
the world as well, but the particular combination of the industrial
revolution with a self-regulating market was a European specicity
which gave capitalist growth an unprecedented strength and dynamic.
The third basic element of the European heritagethe nationstateis more controversially related to the values of rationalism and
individualism than to scientic curiosity, the technical domination of
nature, or the capitalist market and industry. The nation-state is the
institutional embodiment of political authority in modern society, an
impersonal and sovereign political entity with supreme jurisdiction
over a clearly delimited territory and population, claiming a monopoly
of coercive power, and enjoying legitimacy as a result of its citizens
support. It is a particular institution which is the result of the encounter
between a sovereign, autonomous, centralized political organization,
and a community (simultaneously real and imagined) grounded on ties
of blood, language, shared tradition, and collective memory. Since
the late Middle Ages, Europe, at least in its Western part, came to
be increasingly made up of societies of peasants, lords recognizing
the authority of a king, city merchants and artisans, all united by a
commonality of blood, language and religious beliefs (Mendras, 1997).
The nation-state, characterized by the unity of a people, a territory
and a distinctive cultureslowly took shape in opposition to the
multi-ethnic empires and to the supra-national church, and developed
historically through the growth of a civil bureaucracy, an army and
diplomacy, and through the formation of a nation as an imagined
community (Anderson, 1991), resulting from the action of nationalist
elites in the modernization process (Gellner, 1983) and capable of
evoking primordial ethno-symbolic roots (Smith, 1991). It is a typical
European construction, which has been exported to the other parts
of the world.
The relation of the nation-state to the culture of individualism and
rationalism is both ambivalent and complex. One of the two components, the nation, has long been rooted in primordial ties, making
appeal to emotions, and emphasizing collective goals. The other component, the state, is a rationally organized construction which develops
through the development of law and an ecient bureaucracy.
The degree of congruence with the values of individualism and

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593

rationalism increases with the advent of representative democracy

that democratizes the nation-state. Representative democracy, i.e. a
political system made of elected ocials who represent the interest
and opinions of citizens in a context characterized by the rule of
law, which is based on the consensus of citizens and is developed
in order to protect their basic rights, is a fourth element of European
identity. The Greek polis, the Roman republic and the free cities of
medieval Italy and Germany, are all antecedents of this European
specicity. The various forms of parliaments, majority rule in government and the protection of minority rights, free and periodical
elections, the separation of powers, the free press, are all institutional
innovations which were born and developed in the culture of Europe
and of that Europe outside Europe which is the United States of
America (the rst new nation constructed by European immigrants)
in the course of the three major democratic revolutions, the English,
the French and the American. Today, the nation-state is undergoing the double pressure of the growing global interconnectedness of
social relations from above and of the rearmation of regional and
local identities and claims of autonomy from below. But it is still
the basic political organization and the key actor in international
relations, as well as a more or less successful export of European
culture all over the world, judging from the growing number of independent states.
The list of distinctive elements of the European identity is not
complete without an appraisal of the role of Christianity both at the
cultural and at the institutional level. The Christian religion is a
transcendent monotheism that postulates the direct relation of every
creature with its Creator. It fostered great collective movements and
gave birth to one of the oldest and most durable institutions of
human history, the Roman Catholic Church. The two aspects, the
subjective onewhich originates from the individualism of the message of the Evangel and periodically re-emerges in mysticism and
asceticismand the collective/institutional aspectwhich expresses
itself in the church hierarchical organization, in liturgical rites and
ceremonieshave often been dialectically opposed, as in the centuries-long conicts between Rome and Byzantium and the church,
in the ghts against the heretical movements, and in the religious
wars of the Reformation.
The relation of the Christian religion to individualism/subjectivity
and to rationalism is ambivalent. On one hand, Christianity together

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with Roman law has contributed to the development of European

individualism. And, as Weber argued, the great rational prophecies
of the Old Testament, the rational life plan of the religious orders,
and the theory of predestination, all contributed to the growth of
the rational mind. On the other hand, Christianity had from the
start a strong communitarian elementwhich is apparent in several
ways, as in the early Christian communities, the transformation of
the hermits into the religious orders from Saint Benedict onwards,
and in the mediation between the believer and God provided by
religious rites and the clergy. This communitarian spirit acts as a
complement and an antidote to the subjective dimension of the faith.
Christianity has deeply inuenced European institutions and mentality, sometimes as a source of inspiration, sometimes as an opponent: our highest values and associated norms, such as human dignity
and its inviolability, the rights of the person, individual conscience
and responsibility, cannot be extrapolated fromyet have developed
their specic form throughJudeo-Christian theology and religion.
The distinction between the temporal power and the sacred, achieved
through centuries-long struggles, is a well-grounded principle of
modern democracy.
On the other hand, the notion of the absence of limits and the
belief in man as the master of his own destinywhich are distinctive
aspects of the modern mindhave found strong opposition in the
anti-modernist stance of the Catholic church. Although Christianity
was not born in Europe but in the East, its borders came more and
more to coincide with those of Europe until the spread from Europe
to the rest of the world through colonial expansion from the fteenth
century on. Through the evangelization of the barbaric peoples of the
north and the east and the centuries-long confrontation with Arab
and Turkish Islam, the Christian religion tends to coincide with
European identity. This holds in spite of the fact that, as Adriansee
remarks, the religious factor in the cultural identity of Europe is not
a simple undierentiated unity (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b). Religions
other than Christianity, rst of all Islam, played in fact an important role; there has been great religious diversity within Christianity
itself, with the many heretical movements, the schism between the
Orthodox Constantinople and the Catholic Rome, and the Protestant
Reformation.
These dierent cultural and institutional elements do not form a
coherent system; they have actually conicted with each other as in

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595

the case of market and democracy, religious beliefs and scientic

research, nationalism and peace. Neither have they produced only
desirable eects or positive outcomes. But they have contributed to
the denition of the identity of Europe and can orient the formation
of the European Union and its future path in the international community, provided that the principles are living principles which orient
human action and that the institutions can undergo necessary changes.
The political identity of Europe is grounded on these common cultural and institutional roots, but should be oriented to the future
and be built around the European project.
A few basic qualications
A few basic qualications are needed in order to avoid misunderstanding and to respond to possible objections to this synthetic picture of the core characteristics of the European identity.
First, the core elements which I have identied are not necessarily
all-pervasive in contemporary Europe: what is needed in order to
dene them as core elements is that they have been relevant in the
making of European identity. The case of Christian religion is paradigmatic. Many facts exist in contemporary Europe which show the
continuing importance and inuence of religion. A sizeable percentage
of Europeans arm that they belong to one of the Christian churches
and sects; despite the constitutional separation of state and church,
church institutions and leaders enjoy considerable inuence in the
political and cultural life of the European Union member countries;
close links exist between Christianity and non-religious ethics; the
great creations of European culture in architecture, ne art, music,
literature, and also philosophy and science, are not conceivable without the presence, benevolent or critical, of religious doctrine and
authority. In spite of all the above, however, there is some truth in
Adriansees argument that in the cultural identity of Europe the
religious factor is predominantly a matter of memory. Religion is
what Europe has been (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b, pp. 3132). But,
even if this is the case, we should not forget that in any denition
of identity, individual or collective, what one has been is very much
part of what one is and will be.
Second, these core values and institutions are not necessarily positive or unambiguous. As I remarked earlier, European history has

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been at the source of deep cleavages, violent conicts, idiosyncratic

controversies, as well as many errors and crimes. Both the values of
rationalism and individualism and the institutions of the market and
the nation-state have given rise to numerous contradictions, violations and deformations, as is shown by the deep contradictions
between capital and wage labor, economic growth and environmental
conservation, colonial and neo-colonial exploitation and the quest
for freedom, not to speak of wars, mass murders and genocide.
Indeed, for almost every core element of the European culture we
have polar positions: the Christian faith of universal love has inspired
some of the most intolerant attitudes and bloodiest religious wars
ever; in the heart of twentieth-century Europe, democracy has collapsed into devastating totalitarianism; the free market continuously
reproduces monopoly and oligopoly; the quest for political independence has degenerated into aggressive nationalism.
Some critics think that it is impossible to isolate substantive values
or concrete cultural contents that would unambiguously characterize
European culture since, as Jaspers remarks, for every position Europe
has also developed the exact opposite (Benda, 1947). In other words,
it is impossible to discover any value that Europe has promoted
without at the same time promoting the opposite value: faith/
reason, tolerance/religious war, democracy/totalitarianism, etc. But
this is not a convincing objection: we certainly do not cease to
consider ancient Athens as the cradle of democracy because of the
fact that it also experienced tyranny, the opposite of democracy.
Some critics also argue that we cannot consider values and institutions which had negative eectsproducing violent conicts, suering
and crimesas constitutive elements of a European identity. But
they forget that in this way a process of learning from past errors
has taken place. What is important for contemporary European identity is precisely that this history has been the object of reexive
reassertion through a process of historical learning. The religious
wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as well as the national
wars of the twentieth century were culturally rooted in contradictory values, which were shared by the vast majority of Europeans;
but, they were later perceived as lessons of the past from which unity
could take shape, given the premise that it is in fact true that
European integration was born of the desire to put an end to the
centuries-long European civil wars. The new European identity is
the product of a learning process from painful past errors and crimes.

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As Therborn argues, The conception of history that underlies the

eorts to establish an ever closer union of the peoples of Europe is
not couched in terms of some manifest destiny of Europe, or in
terms of Europeans as a chosen people . . . rather, it is the view of
historys disciples and not of its masters. Europe is a process of
historical learning and a focus of institutionalisation . . . This construction has its cultural prerequisites, but the cultural underpinning
of the new European set of normative institutions is not a deep and
ancient culture of Europeans, rather it is a collection of Western
European lessons from recent European modernity: nationalism and
any other ism is dangerous and must be regulated (Therborn, pp.
73, 85). I agree; however, I would not conne the process of historical learning to lessons from recent European modernity, rather
I would extend it to the whole European history (an example of this
attitude is John Paul II asking pardon for crimes committed by the
Catholic Church and his reiterated demands for religious peace and
ecumenical dialogue). In this respect, I share Cacciaris view that,
rather than a celebration of European culture and identity, the European Union can be seen as a silent maturation of the coming of
Europe into the serene evening of its stormy history (Cacciari, 1994).
Third, the core elements of the European identity are not exclusive in todays world; but the reason for this non-exclusiveness does
not lie in the fact these elements were shared from their origins with
other peoples, but because they have been successfully exported
and assimilated in other parts of the world. The civilization of modernity was born in Europe and then spread all over the world. This
fact induces some scholars to think that in its spreading world-wide,
Europe loses its specic character; in other words that European
identity, being intrinsically de-territorialized, can no longer dene
the specicity of a single part of the world. According to DAndrea,
the Europeanization of the world is also the beginning of Europe
as an entity in itself (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b, p. 141).
This is certainly true for the West, or what I call Europe outside Europe. European identity is not easily distinguishable from
the identity of the West, i.e. the part of the world that has assimilated all fundamental traits of the European spirit. In fact, some of
these traits, such as individualism and economic and scientic rationality, appear now to be even more distinctive of the North-Americans
identity rather than the Europeans. Without entering into a comparative cultural analysis of the societal models at the two borders

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of the Atlantic, signicant dierences do existwhich have to do

with the ways in which common cultural roots have been transformed in the various paths toward and through modernity (Martinelli,
2003). Specic institutions (like the social market-economy or the
welfare state) and shared values (not only individualism, but also
solidarity) are specic features of the European version of a common
Western identity and can provide specic European responses to the
challenges of globalizationwhich are not limited to meeting the
functional demands of global competition, but take into account key
questions like environmentally sustainable development, social cohesion, and universal human rights.
Dierences, however, are much greater for the non-Western parts
of the world. One can argue, as DAndrea himself admits, that the
Europeanization of the world does not imply that all the characteristics of European identityall the dimensions of social life comprising the paradigms of modernityare destined to be equally
successful the planet over. Technology, science and capitalism are
the dimensions of European identity that are most widespread in the
world, because they are those that have more fully taken the form
of cognitive and practical machinery that are indierent to ends and
capable of surpassing in eciency any other rival instrument. Modern
individualism has proved itself to be a lot more dicult to export . . .
because of the resistance in many parts of the world to the surpassing of holistic or traditional views of the individual-society relationship in favour of the culture of human rights and the democratic
process (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b). I am not fully convinced by
this argument. On one hand, I think that any transition to modernity requires a process of creative adaptation and does not imply
the inexorable establishment of a certain type of mental outlook
(scientic rationalism, pragmatic instrumentalism, secularism). And,
in fact, traditional culture and modern technology have to some
extent co-existed in twentieth-century Japan and the market economy is linked together with the political authoritarian state in contemporary China. On the other hand, it is arguable that the products
of the European spirit can work elsewhere even when the spirit
needed to set them in motion is completely absent. But if this is the
case, if Europe had managed to export the products of its spirit
rather than its actual spirit, there would be a European specicity
(I think, rst of all, of the critical mind, democratic representation
and the rule of law) which is worthwhile to arm as a distinct

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European contribution in a peaceful process of cultural cross-fertilization with other cultures in the world.
An open European identity as part of the European
project of unity through diversity
So far, I have argued that the peoples of the European Union countries have common cultural roots, and both values and institutions
that have ancient origins have crystallized in the process of European
modernization, yet spreading later to the other parts of the world.
This common cultural heritage contributes to European political integration, but it cannot (and does not need to) produce a distinctive,
coherent identity which legitimizes the specicity of Europe as a single political entity in the way national cultures legitimized the formation of European nation-states, because the political building of
the European Union cannot follow the path of national building and
cannot be grounded on the opposition us versus them. Identity
and otherness are of course closely related; at least to some extent,
I identify with somebody because we both feel dierent from somebody else. As Fontana (1994) argues, in the course of their history
Europeansand more precisely those groups which were culturally
hegemonicdened a distorted identity through the deforming
glasses through which they looked at the other (the barbarian, the
heretic, the savage). But the lessons of historyreligious fundamentalism and bigotry, ideological dogmatism, nationalistic aggressivenessteach us that this negative and arrogant way of dening an
identityan identity against somebody elseand its use to build a
political entity, is no longer advisable in the world today. Besides,
in the Europe of nations it would be hardly feasible. European
identity must deny the old belief that what is dierent is potentially
hostile. For this reason European political identity cannot become a
rigid and closed set of beliefs and attitudes but must be built around
a project; it cannot be deduced from its origin, but rather from its
future. The notion of absence of limitswhich I discussed above as
typical of modern European identity (Cerutti & Rudolph, 2001b)
provides the basis for conceiving Europes present political identity
as a project in the making and in terms of its consequences.
The legitimacy of the process of European integration cannot be
deduced from a separate cultural identity, rather it is linked to the

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existence of a shared political plan and to the possibility that the

foreseeable results on a planetary scale of such a plan are morally
and politically defensible as viable responses to global problems. The
accomplishment of this project implies a political subject of regional
dimensions, a set of communitarian institutions which guarantee
democratic accountability and a certain degree of homogeneity in
the living conditions of the people, a common cultural heritage and
shared values, and multiculturalism of complementary cultures.
The model of the European Union should be a specic and novel
one, both institutionally and culturally. It should be a multicultural
entity with a core of shared values (democratic institutions, basic
human rights, civic responsibilities, peaceful coexistence with all people on earth, free competition) that are at the foundations of common institutions, together with the respect for dierent cultures,
languages and heritages. And it should be a supra-national union
where decisions are taken both by a body representing the governments of the member countries and regions (a reformed Council of
heads of states and governments) and a body representing the peoples of the member countries and regions (a reformed Commission,
whose members should be elected by the European Parliament, with
a stronger President elected by the European people).
According to this model, unity should be achieved through diversity. Already in ancient Greek philosophy we nd the notion of harmony stemming from contradictory elements. If one postulates unity
at the beginning, it follows a tendency toward the continual coming
back to the lost original model; if, on the contrary, one postulates
diversity at the beginning, unity is seen as the continuous eort stemming from conict and competition, never predetermined. As Eliot
argued, European culture must be dierentiated and plural, united
in its diversity (1948).
Unity should induce the redenition of identities, both those of
the European peoples and those of immigrants from other parts of
the world, rather than impose their abolition. And citizens should
share multiple identitiesthe city, the regional, the national, and the
supranational. However, the recognition of multiple cultural identities within a single state can be a destabilizing factor for national
unity, since it alters the delicate balance between ethnos and demos.
For this reason, although European political unication should be
built around the notions of unity stemming from diversity and of

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multiple citizenship, in the process we should also foster those elements of traditional nationhood that are compatible with the multicultural supranational model. Let us consider for this purpose the
basic components of nationhood as dened by scholars of ethnicity
and nationhood (A. Smith, 1991, Tullio-Altan, 1995): ethnos, logos,
topos, ethos, and epos. We cannot rely on ethnos (that is, on ancestral
ethnic origins), since it fosters closure, exclusion and discrimination,
and runs against the core values of the EU. We cannot rely too
much on logos either; if language is taken as the basis of logos, European
citizens cannot be forced to speak a single language, since multilingualism is considered a basic requisite for the respect of dierent
cultural identities. Topos, the symbolic transguration of the space
where Europeans live, can help to some extent. There are, in fact,
distinctive common characters in European cities, buildings, squares,
and public and private spaces, but this goes together with such a
great variety of natural and human landscapes that it can be hardly
considered a strong identifying element.
We are then left with ethos and epos. We can certainly invest more
in ethos (the basic core values, vision of the world, and practical
knowledge that dene the new European identity and outline the
basic rights and responsibilities of democratic citizenship), and in
epos (the great gures and events that testify as to the common
European heritage in arts, science, and culture). Both ethos and epos
should be basic components of educational programs for the next
generations and should orient the activities of the media and various
manifestations of public discourse, in order to create a real European
public space grounded in a shared political culture, which could
orient peoples choices on matters of common concern.
Moreover, the process of union building will be helped by an
increasingly interconnected economy (favored by the euro), a homogeneous European social fabric and the growth of a European public
space. The strengthening of a common culture, I want to stress again,
should not be seen as a means for excluding others, but rather as
a necessary basis for the dialogue among civilizations.
If this project fails, it will provide support for the theory that
nation-states continue to be built only upon either a homogeneous
culture or a hegemonic culture capable of integrating immigrants
into a melting pot. If the project succeeds, the European Union can
become a model for other regions of the world to form large supra-

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national and multicultural unions, and thus can contribute signicantly

to democratic global governance. Our pride as Europeans can be
based not on the arrogant memory of a great past, but on the commitment to a project in the making which aims at universal peace,
individual freedom and social justice.

PART SIX

EPILOGUE: MODERNITY AS PROGRAM

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

BASIC MECHANISMS OF MORAL EVOLUTION

IN DURKHEIMS AND WEBERS FOOTSTEPS
Raymond Boudon
Moral evolution: an obsolete idea?
The evolution of norms, values and institutions is a classical issue of
sociology from Durkheim to Parsons, Hayek to Eisenstadt. The thesis
which I will try to defend here is that in developing some basic intuitions of Durkheim and Weber, to the point at which professional
historians of sociology would possibly protest, some basic mechanisms
making social evolution more intelligible can be identied. It seems
to me the two classical sociologists have sketched a theory of evolution which overcomes the objections rightly raised by Popper (1957)
against historicism. None of them introduce the idea that there
would be such things as laws of historical development. As Pareto
has written, when an idea is discredited, this situation tends to
generate the view that the contrary idea is true. This gure is clearly
illustrated by the case of evolutionism. From the moment at which
the evolutionary theories appeared as discredited, the idea that the
notions of evolution and progress are obsolete tended to acquire the
status of an evident truth. Postmodern thinkers tend to adhere to
what I might call an absolute or integral version of relativism, which
sees the notion of progress as a mere illusion. Weber and Durkheim
refused the idea that there would be laws of history. But they would
also have vehemently refused the idea that the notions of progress
and evolution would be empty ones.
To postmodern philosophers and sociologists the notion of progress
would have been irreversibly discredited, as the notions of truth, objectivity and generally the notions describing values; postmodern sociology
would have shown that such notions cover up mere illusions. This
view is evidently self-contradictory. Postmodern sociologists claim to
have produced a progress by describing progress as an illusion and
stating that this illusion is irreversibly condemned. Postmodernist

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philosophers and sociologists claim that, until they deconstructed

the notions of progress, truth, etc. mankind lived in illusion. LvyBruhls evolutionary theory, which opposed a conjectural primitive
mentality to a modern positivist mentality, or the views on social
evolution proposed by Victorian anthropologists appear prudent and
sophisticated when compared with the views developed by the deconstructionist and constructivist schools.
Obviously, constructivists and deconstructionists have not convinced all social scientists. Still, most contemporary social scientists
treat the particular evolutions they observe and analyze as contingent. Thus, a number of writings deal with the changes in sexual
norms from modernity to postmodernity, but few attempts have
been made to explain why these changes give the strong feeling of
being irreversible and why they probably are. By contrast, Weber
saw that the disenchantment of the world was irreversible, and
tried to explain why. While he explains evolutionary phenomena, most
contemporary sociologists describe phenomena of social change, for the
notion of evolution is commonly considered today as obsolete. Now,
irreversibility is the feature that makes evolution distinct from change.
The evolutionary theory which I propose to draw from some central intuitions presented by Durkheim and Weber provides an alternative to postmodern relativism and avoids the objections which have
been raised against current evolutionary theories. Thus, Hayeks
(19731979) theory pays much attention to innovations with an adaptive function and too little attention to ideas which have the status
of absolute innovations; to some extent, he has also neglected the
role of contingency in political and social life.
A crucial Durkheimian intuition
I would like to begin with an essential intuition proposed by Durkheim
(1960 [1893], p. 146). In his Division of Social Labor he writes: . . . individualism, free-thinking appeared not in our days, nor in 1789, nor
in the Reformation time, nor with scholastics, nor with the decline
of Greek and Roman polytheism or of oriental theocracies. It is a
phenomenon which begins nowhere, but which develops continuously
through the course of history [lindividualisme, la libre pense ne
datent ni de nos jours, ni de 1789, ni de la rforme, ni de la scolastique, ni de la chute du polythisme grco-romain ou des thocraties

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orientales. Cest un phnomne qui ne commence nulle part, mais

qui se dveloppe, sans sarrter tout au long de lhistoire].
The rhetorical tone of the passage, stressed by the sequence of
nor which brings us to the dawn of history, was certainly meant
in Durkheims mind to stress the importance he attached to the idea
that individualism begins nowhere. While many comments on The
Division of Social Labor insist on Durkheims thesis that individualism
develops continuously through the course of history, most comments
disregard the rst part of the sentence, which states that individualism begins nowhere. In contradiction to this passage, current comments on the Division of Labor maintain that Durkheim would have
regarded individualism as a consequence of the growth of the division of labor and would have seen it as beginning with the Protestant
Reformation. The same comments see individualism as a particular
doctrine which would have the status of a philosophical viewpoint
among many others. The text which I have just quoted totally contradicts this current interpretation. It is true that in Durkheims mind
the increasing complexity in the division of laborbecause it favored
an increasing diversication of social roles and qualicationscontributed to reinforcing individualism; more precisely, that it has given
birth to institutions making easier the expression of individualistic
values. It is true that Protestantism bears an indirect testimony in
favor of the development of individualism during the Renaissance as
it stresses the believers freedom and responsibility in interpreting the
Holy Scriptures. Protestantism expresses, on a theological register,
the fact that the development of the division of labor has increased
the sense of their singularity in the mind of individuals. These statements, which handbooks and comments insist upon, are eectively
present in Durkheims Division of Social Labor. But they constitute only
one part of his theory.
Durkheim makes as clear as possible, as I have said, that, to him,
if individualism grows continuously through history, it should also
be recognized that it begins nowhere. My guess is that the reason why
few commentators pay attention to this part of Durkheims sentence
lies in the fact that it appears to them as contradicting the evolutionary theory developed in the Division of Social Labor. How could
individualism possibly have begun nowhere, but be present in all societies
and increase continuously?
The meaning of this formula seems to me very clear though, and in
no way contradictory to Durkheims evolutionary theory. It indicates

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that individuals as such have always represented the reference point

if not unique, at least fundamentalfrom which the relevance and
legitimacy of norms and generally of institutions in the broadest sense
of this latter notion can be appreciated, as well as the tacit norms
which regulate small informal groups, as the norms which take the
form of ocial collective decisions legally enforced, or as all the
intermediary cases. The formula indicates that in all societies, archaic
as well as modern institutions are perceived by individuals as more
or less legitimate, more or less acceptable. As to the criteria according
to which they are judged as more or less acceptable or legitimate,
they are the same in all societies; people appreciate or reject them
depending on whether they have the feeling that they respect their
dignity and vital interests.
The notion of individualism should obviously not be confused with
the notion of atomism. It does not assume that societies would be
made of a mere juxtaposition of individuals, but rather that, in any
given society, people tend to consider an institution, a norm or a
value X as good, or an institution, a norm or a value Y better than
Z if and only if they have the impression that X is good or that
Y is better than Z for all individuals in the society and notably for
themselves.
This remark leads to the statement that in the same way as individualism should not be confused with atomism, it does not entail
egoism. As individualism grants an equal dignity to any individual, it
assumes that a particular individual will tend to consider an institution as good or bad depending on whether he/she has the impression
that any other individual would also have a tendency to judge it so.
We can check immediately that it is dicult to state or even to
believe that an institution is good or bad if one does not have the
impression that other people would also tend to judge so. This does
not mean that there are no conicts between opinions. The believers
in phlogiston and their adversaries believed that their stance was
grounded on solid reasons. The two groups believed that their reasons
were objectively valid and hence shared by others. As conicts of
opinion in science, conicts of opinion on moral, legal or political
issues also oppose adversaries who hold dierent views; but they all
believe that their reasons are grounded. An individual cannot consider
some statement as true or some institution as good if he doesnt feel
that other people would also nd the statement true or the institution
good.

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Briey, I propose to read the half sentence individualism begins

nowhere as indicating that, once an institution is proposed to or
imposed on a collectivity, a member of the collectivity will tend to
consider it as acceptable or not, good or bad, legitimate or illegitimate, etc. depending on whether he/she has the impression that it
tends to be good for each of them, and notably for her/him. That
actual institutions in all societies tend to be evaluated, judged good
or bad, legitimate or not, on the basis of this ideal principle does
not mean, of course, that individuals are entitled or permitted to
express this evaluation nor that they are in all cases explicitly conscious
of it; nor, as we just saw, that there are no conicts of opinion.
The only objection which can be opposed to this interpretation
of Durkheims thesis that individualism begins nowhere is the conjecture
of historicism according to which individuals would have become conscious of their singularity only in modern societiesa controversial
idea which Durkheims formula directly contradicts. This controversial idea rests upon the doubtful metaphor which sees individuals as
the product of the social environment they are embedded in. It derives
from a rough confusion between categories. The social context determines the parameters individuals have to take into account when they
behave or act in such and such a fashion; it does not determine their
actions or behavior properly, even less the fact that they would or
not be aware of their dignity and vital interests. The fact that some
societies are more coercive than others is beyond doubt; as is the
fact that individuals are more respected in some societies than others;
or the fact that the conception people have of their rights or of their
dignity varies from one society to another. But the fact that there
are no societies where people would not have the feeling of their
dignity and of their vital interests and of the dignity and vital interests of the people close to them is equally clear. It seems advisable
as Durkheim proposes to do according to the quoted sentence from
the Division of Laborto take all these facts into account, the fact
that individualism begins nowhere, as well as the fact that it is more
developed in some societies than in others, rather than to oppose the
former to the latter, as historicism and culturalism wrongly propose.
The two statements that individualism begins nowhere and that
it grows through history are contradictory exclusively if one sees
self-interest as historically determined. Against this metaphysical view,
Durkheim maintains that self-interest is a constituent of any human
being in any time and social context and also that depending on

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the parameters characterizing each society, human beings may be

able to feel and express that self-interest more or less clearly and
satisfy it more or less adequately.
Notably, under the inuence of positivism, Marxism, and structuralism, the essential distinction between the notion of cause and the
notion of parameter has been deleted. The distinction is fundamental
and simple. In order to go from street A to street B, I have to cross
either street C or street D. This fact is a constraint I must accept:
a parameter I have to take into account but which does not determine
my decision of going from A to B, nor my choice of crossing, say,
street C rather than D. When the notions of cause and parameter are
confused with one another, individuals are naturalized, that is, their
behavior is analyzed as the eect of outside forces, while it derives
from decisions under constraints. Though Marxism and structuralism
are now rightly widely considered as obsolete, some of their principles
are still active in many minds.
Durkheims intuition empirically conrmed
Many studies provide an empirical conrmation of Durkheims statement according to which in all societies, traditional as well as modern, individuals have a sense of their dignity and vital interests.
Popkins (1979) Rational Peasant seems to me particularly illuminating
in this respect. Against a received idea defended by many anthropologists, he has shown in a convincing fashion that in the village
societies of South-East Asia or Africa the rule of unanimity is a
widely accepted constitutional rule, because it is perceived as the
rule most likely to generate a respect for the dignity and vital interests of all. Against this interpretation, anthropologists have contended
that the diusion of the unanimity rule would reect the fact that
individuals in archaic societies have no sense of their singularity and
would see themselves as mere parts of the collectivity. The interpretation reveals the importance of the metaphysical representation
according to which the sense people have of their self-interest would
be a dependant variable: it would be present in some societies, absent
in others. To Popkin, the rule was devised and accepted because
any other decision rule would entail serious threats to the societys
economically weakest members. Village societies of Africa or SouthEast Asia, he explains, are small-scale societies, based on a subsistence

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economic system, with few exchanges being conducted with the outside environment. In such societies, the weakest members would be
considerably threatened if collective decisions were taken, say, on the
basis of the majority rule. Consequently, such a constitutional rule
would not be considered as legitimate. Popkins interpretation, diering
from the current interpretation of most anthropologists, recognizes
the obvious fact that the unanimity rule maximizes the power of
each individual, as shown by the fact that it has another name: the
veto right. Moreover, Popkins interpretation accounts for the fact
that in the village societies with the unanimity rule as a basic constitutional rule, decisions generally take a long time and occur in a
climate of confrontation and institutionalized conict. On the whole,
this type of study shows convincingly that the sense of all for their
individuality and singularity is characteristic of societies where solidarity is mechanical, to use Durkheims vocabulary, as of societies
with organic solidarity. Individualism meets more favorable conditions
in the latter, i.e. modern societies; but it characterizes the former
as well.
Possibly without being aware of Durkheims statement according
to which individualism would begin nowhere, Simmel (1990) considers
as evident the fact that the individualistic virus was already present
at the dawn of history. It explains the abolition, in antique Germany,
of the Wergeld, a judiciary practice which indexed the sanction on
the social rank of the victim. Once abolished, any human life had
in principle the same value. Once the abolition of the Wergeld
was introduced, it became irreversible because it represented a step
forward in the establishment of individualism. To Simmel as to
Durkheim, individualism begins nowhere, but it leads the selection
of ideas and institutions and explains that some of them are irreversibly adopted.
Such studies illustrate the powerfulness of the social sciences. Once
they follow a scientic ethos and care about scrupulously examining
data, they display their capacity of eradicating the ethnocentric representations of ordinary sociology. Durkheim, Simmel and nowadays
Popkin show that the viewaccording to which individualism (in
the sense that Durkheim takes the concept) would be exclusively
characteristic of modern societiesis the product of an ethnocentric
illusion. Popkins powerful study shows that ethnocentrism can be
strong even among professional anthropologists; many of who seem
to believe that, since the people they observe behave dierently from

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the way they behave themselves, they should be dierent. The imagery
of the fusional community where individuals would have no consciousness of their own self and would exist exclusively, so to say,
through the group, is treated by many anthropologists as going without saying, while it is a mere ethnocentric illusion. Equally ethnocentric is the representation that people would have been in the past
submitted to collective representations and values they would have
passively accepted, while in modern and postmodern societies, they
would pick up the representations and values they please. Ethnocentrism
can be historical as well as geographic, vertical as well as horizontal,
as it were. Unfortunately, studies like Popkins are too rare. A lasting
ethnocentric tendency leads on the contrary to the current view that
individualism is a cultural distinctive feature of modern western society. Like Durkheimand Adam Smith before himthe economist
of Indian origin Amartya Sen has stated that the rst value for any
individual, Indian or European, is to be able to consider himself
with respect.
The a-historical character of individualism
It is important to note immediately that the basic principle of individualism (organizing society in order to respect as much as possible the vital interests and the dignity of each) has been permanently
thwarted by all kinds of historical forces, to use Webers phrase.
Durkheim aims to stress, evidently not that the dignity of individuals has always been respected in reality, but that they have always
had the sense of their dignity and of their vital interests; that this
feeling is the ground on which the history of institutions and even
history shortly unfolds; more precisely, that the dignity of individuals
and the respect of their vital interests is the ultimate criterion of the
legitimacy of any norm or institution, whatever its level, microscopic,
societal or intermediary.
Thus, the Greek devised institutions which have been justly praised
and imitated because they aimed at being respectful of the dignity
of citizens. But they considered slavery as legitimate, for they were
convinced of its functional interest for society as a whole. Aristotle
did not conceive of a society without slaves. Montesquieu held slavery
as being against nature (contre la nature), but thought that if slavery
was abolished in the Antilles, the price of sugar would rise too much.

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This mixture of axiological and instrumental rationality lasted until

slavery was abolished in the sites where, as in the Southern United
States, it played an important economic role. Today, slavery has
been abolished almost everywhere, but it has reappeared under the
eect of historical forces (e.g. child prostitution in South-East Asia).
But these modern forms of slavery are condemned and clandestine,
for a negative value is irreversibly associated to this institution; today,
nobody would dare legitimate slavery. This simple example stresses
an important point: institutions are reversible, while the value granted
to institutions can be irreversible. Slavery reappeared in our contemporary world, but not the idea that slavery would be a good
institution.
Against Huntingtons (1996) view, individualism is consequently
not a value which would be characteristic of Western modern society
and which would have appeared in the fourteenth century. What
appeared in the fourteenth century were institutions which made
easier the expression of individualism; not individualism itself.
Huntingtons view is unacceptable; equally unacceptable is the view
of these anthropologists who prefer individuals to be self-conscious
exclusively in a Gesellschaft, but not in a Gemeinschaft.
This can be checked by an analogy. Should the libido sciendi be
considered as characteristic of Western societies and as having appeared
at the end of the eighteenth century in consideration of the fact that
modern sciences are institutionalized in Europe at that time? Such
a contention would generally be considered as absurd. The Victorian
anthropologists themselves, as well as the positivist sociologists who
held the Comtian law of the three states as an ultimate truth, treated
the primitive as animated by a libido sciendi. According to Comte,
in the theological Age, men tried to explain the world by making it
the product of Gods will; in the metaphysical Age as the product
of abstract entities, as Nature; in the positive Age, of mechanisms
to be discovered by science. But in all three ages, men displayed a
libido sciendi. It would be absurd to contend that the latter was born
with the positive Age. It is equally absurd to consider that individualism was born in the fourteenth century in the exclusive context
of Western societies; that individuals started having a value in their
own eyes only from that moment; and that this value would be characteristic of the Western civilisation.
By stating that individualism begins nowhere, Durkheim contradicts a priori the latent historicism that characterizes many sectors

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of the contemporary social sciences. It borrows the idea, though,

from a long philosophical tradition. As Weber has noted, Aristotle,
Pascal and most philosophers have statedeach in his own terms
that at all periods, individuals have followed the goal described in
Deuteronomy of having a long life and happiness on earth, that individuals have always evaluated institutions in the light of this goal.
Durkheim elaborates on this idea when he states that individualism
is a permanent feature of human history.
Durkheim also made clear that, under the eect of structural features (such as the growth of the division of labor) or of contingent
events, institutions developed which made easier the expression of
individualism. Contingent factors, as Luthers conict with Rome,
themselves owed their inuence to structural factors. Luthers Reformation became inuential because it appeared at a time when individuals had a growing sense of their individuality as a consequence
of the increased division of labor. But individualism itself is ahistorical: the sense for self-interest is present in all societies.
I may perhaps note incidentally that I nd conrmation for the
interpretation I propose of Durkheims statement according to which
individualism begins nowhere in the fact that he was always strongly
impressed by Kants philosophy. Stating that individualism begins
nowhere amounts to stating that the eects of institutions on the
vital interests of individuals represent the only reference point which
can possibly be used in evaluating them. If I am correct when I
stress the inuence of Kant on Durkheim, individualism, in the sense
from which Durkheim takes the notion, would be comparable to a
Kantian a priori category: it would represent the frame within which
institutions would be evaluated. It should moreover be noted that,
by introducing this neo-Kantian category, Durkheim proposes an a
priori more acceptable than the a priori on which Kant had proposed
to ground moral evaluations. Durkheims a priori is clearly less mysterious than that of Kant.
An objection can be opposed to this a priori in that it presupposes
the existence of a human nature, a notion which many sociologists consider unacceptable. But is this a serious objection? The idea
according to which the social sciences would have discredited this
notion irreversibly has the status of a received idea; that an idea is
broadly accepted does not show obviously that it is valid, though.
Wilson (1993) has shown on the contrary that it could be used to
explain a number of moral facts observed by historians, sociologists,

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615

anthropologists and psychologists. But it should immediately be made

clear that the notion of human nature can be accepted only if it
is reduced to a number of undetermined principles as the principle
of individualism in Durkheims sense.
More precisely, sociologists belonging to the tradition which can
be qualied as liberal have one point in common: for Weber, as for
Durkheim, people are similar in all cultures, but they are embedded
in various social and historical contexts. People everywhere are selfconscious, self-interested; they have objectives, intentions, projects;
notably, they evaluate rationally the institutions in the context in
which they live. But they make use of their autonomy in the framework of the context in which they are embedded. The features of
this context constitute, as I proposed to call them before, the parameters to which their feelings and actions are submitted, but which
in no way determine these feelings and actions.
In this respect, a wide gap separates Weber and Durkheim from
many sociologists. To Comte, Lvy-Bruhl, the culturalists or the structuralists of all obedience, human behavior should be analyzed as
determined by the socio-historical context in which they are embedded.
To Durkheim and Weber, their behavior must be seen by contrast
as reecting their autonomy, given that the latter is bounded by the
parameters dening the context. Both sociologists have strongly insisted
on the existence of a long-time trend toward the extension of individual autonomy. To a great extent, both took their inspiration from
Kant. This is not only true of Durkheim, but also of Weber. The
two knew the importance Kant had granted to the notion of autonomy. Both saw that recognizing the existence of a socially bounded
autonomy is a condition to be met if sociology is to be scientic
to describe reality as it is. By contrast, positivism, structuralism and
culturalism see the autonomy of individuals as an obstacle. As to the
main reason why the social sciences have a hard time becoming
genuine sciences, sciences as scientic as the natural sciences: they
have the impression that mechanics is the model of science. For this
reason, they try to picture individuals as determined by the social
structure and try to explain human behavior as the eect of forces.
By contrast, Weber and Durkheim dene science by the old notion
of the adequation between things as they are and the way the intellect sees things, the adequatio rei et intellectu.
Concerning individualism, Weber developed intuitions close to
Durkheims: in dierent words and in another style, Weber (1999

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[19201921]) sketched some ideas that converge with those of Durkheim. The similarity, it seems to me, is striking.
In his Essays in the Sociology of Religion, Weber comments on a passage of St. Pauls Letter to the Galatians in which Paul reprimands
Peter. In the passage, Peter suddenly takes his leave from a group
of Gentiles because he sees Jews coming to them. In this anecdote,
Weber writes, he sees a crucial episode in the history of Western
civilization. It signals the birth moment of the idea of citizenship
in the West [Die Geburtsstunde des Brgertums im Okzident]. Peter did
not dare remain in the company of the Gentiles when the Jews
appeared, while Paul would have expected that, by remaining seated,
he would have meant that, beyond their dierences, all men are
equally worth; that they are consequently all entitled to sit at the
same table; that a legitimate political order must recognize this equal
dignity; briey, that individuals should be regarded as persons and that
a necessary condition for them to be treated as persons is that they
are treated as citizens. The realization of this idea, says Weber, was
considered from this moment as a basic objective; this objective was
bound to lead the history of the West for centuries. Where does the
strength of this idea come from? From the fact that the crucial innovation represented by the notion of citizenship that underlies the idea
of commensality, the idea that all should sit at the same table, appears
immediately as giving an expression to the idea of the intrinsic value
of any individual, with the corollary that good institutions are institutions that would be approved by all.
Individualism begins nowhere, Durkheim has written. But it
develops constantly throughout history. In the Letter to the Galatians,
individualism appears, writes Weber, as responsible for a crucial innovation which was to inspire the history of the West for centuries,
beyond doubt because it is an answer to a latent universal demand.
Weber proposes in other words a programmatist view of social evolution, if I may use this disgraceful neologism: a view that sees evolution led by programs: a familiar concept in Eisenstadts evolutionary
theory. Weber invites us to consider the history of political institutions, the history of religions or the history of morals, as guided by
a diuse program aiming at dening institutions, rules, etc. which
would most eciently respect the dignity and vital interests of all.
The invention of the notion of person is a crucial step in the realization of this program. As early as the rst century, Weber writes,
this program was advanced in a spectacular fashion thanks to the cre-

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617

ation of the notion of citizenship (the word is not used by Paul, but
the notion underlies the anecdote reported by Weber).
In order to make clearer the interpretation I propose of Durkheims
and Webers intuitions, one can insist, as Weber often does, on the
analogy between the history of morals and of political philosophy
and the history of science (Boudon, 2000, Ch. 5). Science is born
from a vague program which can be dened as describing the real world
as it is. The value of this program cannot be demonstrated, for ultimate values cannot be demonstrated acceptable or not, legitimate or
not: an obvious statement well stressed by Webers famous conference on Science as Vocation. I will leave aside here the undesirable
comments, such as those of Leo Strauss (1953) and of his numerous
followers who saw in this statement the expression on Webers part
of a relativistic stance, while Weber simply meant that any theory
starts from principles which cannot be demonstrated if not by other
principles which would have to be demonstrated, and thus ad innitum.
Once this program is proposed (if one can say so, since, as individualism, the program begins nowhere), it has inspired and still inspires
a constant ow of speculations and researches.
In this conference, Weber states clearly that, not only science but
the other districts of thought, is governed by a process of rationalization: Scientic progress is beyond doubt the most important fraction of this intellectualization process to which we are submitted since
millenaries [Der wissenschaftliche Fortschritt ist ein Bruchteil, und zwar der
wichtigste Bruchteil, jenes Intellektualisierungsprozesses, dem wir seit Jahrtausenden
unterliegen] (Weber, 1995 [1919], p. 18).
Similar to the history of science, the history of morals and of political philosophy is that of the realization of a program, whose objective is to conceive institutions able to respect as far as possible the
dignity and vital interests of individuals. As the validity of the program science, the validity of such a program cannot be more demonstrated. And this program is as fuzzy as the program of science; the
notion that science should describe the world as it is is unclear; as
unclear as the notion of the dignity of the person. The validity of the
two programs cannot be demonstrated and they are equally vague.
In fact, they are even necessarily vague, one might add, since they
are dened by a regulatory idea which requires that their meaning
is made more precise. They are never completed; they guide human
action in several of its dimensions. An indirect proof of the fuzzy
character of the program described by the notion of science can be

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read in the fact that, while many works in the philosophy of science
have been devoted to identifying the demarcation criteria between
science and non-science, they were never found. The Vienna circle
tried to make veriability the criterion of science. Popper rejected it
and proposed falsiability instead. That criterion was accepted until
many objections were raised against it. Finally, a commonly accepted
view today is that there are no general criteria that would make it
possible to distinguish science from non-science.
The success of Christianity and later, in an entirely dierent conjecture, of socialism is due to the fact that the two movements may
be viewed held as major steps in the realization of the program
described by Weber and Durkheim. As Simmel (1984 [1892], 1990)
has rightly noted, the two movements, as dierent as they are in
many respects, have one point in common: they owe their inuence
to the fact that they have been perceived as advancing the individualistic program. In other words, they are thought to stress the respect
owed to each individual independently of his or her competence and
merits. In order to avoid possible misinterpretations, it should be
noted that Simmel clearly evokes the socialist movement in the state
where it was in his own time, when it had not yet gained power
anywhere.
It can be noted in the context of the Simmels association between
Christianity and socialism, that regular religions have a crucial advantage over secular ones. Given the symbolic character of their doctrine,
the former are immunized against criticism, while the latter are not,
since they claim to be scientic. This explains why Christianity
seems today to be in better health than socialism.
Before sociologists, philosophers were well aware that programs
can be proposed that include their own denition among their objectives. Thus, Hegel saw that many ideas can become clear only once
they are realized; he was also well aware that ideas can be fought
by social forces and that, nevertheless, they could survive in human
minds. However, as Popper (1945) rightly states, Hegel did not escape
the fallacy of historicism. With Max Weber, this undesirable feature
is eradicated. To him, some ideas appear irreversible because they
are the product of a rational selection; but historical forces can always
have the consequence that they are not really inscribed in the real
world. I will come back to this essential point in Webers intuition
in a moment.
If the elaboration I propose of Durkheims and Webers intuitions

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619

is accepted, one should see in the moral and political evolution of

the Western world the realization of a diuse program dened by the
leading idea to which Durkheim has associated the notion of individualism. Its objective is to dene norms and institutions aiming at
satisfying the dignity and moral interests of individuals. Again, it
should be made clear that these interests are by nature undened
and depend on the state of societies.
In the case of modern societies, the deployment of this program
is particularly remarkable. We have, writes Durkheim (1960 [1893],
147), for the dignity of the person a cult which, as every cult, has
already its superstitions [Nous avons pour la dignit de la personne un culte
qui comme tout culte a dj ses superstitions]. As this sentence obviously
shows, the cult for the human rights did not start in our time.
Durkheims statement could very well have been attributed to
Weber. The notion of the dignity of the person, Weber claims, is
present throughout the history of the West. But this idea is more or
less active and of course dened in various ways; fuzziness is a characteristic of the notion of the dignity of the person as it is of individualism.
And the fact that it is more or less present and dened in various
ways depends not only on structural factors, but also on contingencies and innovations. These factors aect both the more or less
intense awareness that people have of this notion and its very realization. Consequently, there is no guarantee that regressions will not
appear. Historical forces are able to generate and have eectively
generated such regressions.
The diuse realization of political, juridical and scientic ideas
Like any program, the program dened by the notion of the dignity of the person is governed by a process that Weber called diuse
rationalization (Durchrationalisierung). It is an essential process. It
explains that certain ideas become irreversibly accepted by public
opinion. As Durkheim states, it explains that individualism develops
constantly throughout history.
Weber makes wide use of the notion of rationalization, as shown
by Sukale (2002), but never denes it in an explicit fashion. I have
devoted a small book to the question of rationality and rationalization (Boudon 2003). I will content myself with saying here that the
notion of rationalization describes on the one hand the process through

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which, given a program or a project, better means are sought to

promote it; this dimension of the process mobilizes the instrumental
type of rationality. Thus, legal notions such as habeas corpus or the
principle of the freedom of opinion are associated with legal instruments
that are crucial as far as the enforcement of individual rights is concerned. In the same fashion, the abolition of the above mentioned
Wergeld represents a crucial instrument in the realization of the individualistic program.
On the other hand, the notion of rationalization designates the
process through which a programs nature is made more precise,
and theories are developed which forward its realization: this dimension of rationality can be called cognitive. Cognitive rationality is at
work in a particularly clear fashion in science. It guides the production of scientic theories. The activity described by this notion
aims at devising better explanations of the phenomena the scientist
is interested in; at realizing the goals of the program science: explain
better; explain more; explain in a more coherent fashion, etc. Sciences
advances depend on external conditions and on structural data; but
they are also produced by an endogenous process of diuse rationalization, in the cognitive sense of the word.
This rationalization process characterizes, according to Weber, the
history of law and legislation, as well as the history of morals or of
political philosophy and even of religion too (Boudon 2000, Ch. 5;
Sukale 2002). All these activities are animated by the objective of
nding better rules and better explanations for the phenomena under
their jurisdictionrules and explanations which aim at being more
eective, simpler, more reciprocally coherent, and at more clearly
arousing a feeling of legitimacy or of validity in the public. Arguably,
the idea that rationalization is at work in all areas of human thought
is one of the most important ideas developed by Max Weber. Its
importance is not always underlined, probably because it contradicts
the common view according to which the progress of science would
be endogenous, while law, politics or religion would be essentially
aected by exogenous factors, either contingent or structural. This
contrast between the way that science progressed on the one hand,
and law, morals or political theory on the other, also reects the
received idea according to which a wide gap would separate is and
should, norms and facts, values and facts. I have tried to show elsewhere that this gap is less wide as it seems, as Weber clearly saw
(Boudon, 2003).

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

621

The similarities between the rationalization processes at work in

the history of science, morals, law and religion do not mean of course
that there are no dierences between these activities. Science rests
upon the principle that all its statements and notions can be criticized, while religion considers some of its statements and notions as
immunized against criticism. The latter accepts to explain visible
phenomena by the action of supernatural forces; the former does not.
But, beyond these obvious dierences, the procedures of verication,
falsication, generalization, simplication, etc., characteristic of scientic
thinking are also characteristic of moral, political or legal thinking.
This crucial idea inspires the most path-breaking studies of Weber
and Durkheim in the sociology of morals, law, religion and magic
(Boudon 1999, 2000, 2001).
Legislation tends in the same fashion to create systems of norms as
ecient and as compatible with one another as possible; as adapted
as possible to the demands of the public as the legislator sees them;
as likely as possible to be considered legitimate by public opinion.
Rules perceived as illegitimate are obviously a source of social tensions
and conicts. Taking this implicit requirement of legitimacy into
account is essential, since it at once disqualies so-called juridical
positivism. The endemic tension between natural right and positivism,
that Goyard-Fabre (2002) has shown to characterize the philosophy
of law from Ancient Greece to the present time, shows that it is
impossible to understand the evolution of law if one does not see
that a new norm can only be accepted by the public if it arouses a
feeling of legitimacy. On the other hand, such feelings of legitimacy
or illegitimacy can only appear on the occasion of concrete laws.
The political theories inspiring the construction of institutions are
equally subjected to the same process of rationalization. Thus,
Montesquieus principle of the separation of political powers drafts
a type of political organization aimed at guaranteeing the rights of
citizens. It has been accepted with diculty. Its history has not yet
come to an end and will likely never do so. The French constitution of 1958, out of fear for the power of the judges, granted them
an autorit (authority) rather than a pouvoir (power). But, in spite
of this resistance, the validity of the idea according to which a good
political system should include several powers independent from one
another appears to have been widely accepted. Like scientic ideas,
it has been rationally selected. It has been retained in the course of
this selection process because it has the consequence that it gives

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birth to a more ecient form of political power; that it reduces the

probability of a violent solution of social tensions and conicts; that
it oers citizens a greater guarantee that their rights will be respected
by the public authority; that consequently citizens will accept the
latter more easily.
At the same time, social evolution has the consequence that working
out the principle of the separation of powers constantly meets new
questions, challenges and obstacles. Thus, the growing power of the
media in communication societies has inspired new institutions as
the mediators attached to newspapers, TV or radio stations.
In spite of this permanent adaptation of the principle to new situations, the principle itself has been irreversibly selected; the idea
according to which each power should be balanced by a counterpower is considered as solid as the most solid ideas produced by
natural sciences. The reason of this selection lies in the fact that the
principle generates denitely positive outcomes.
Simple and well-known as it is, this example shows that the processes
by which ideas are selected in the eld of political, legal or moral
theory are not dierent in nature from the processes by which ideas
are selected in the natural sciences.
It is essential to note on this chapter of the rationalization processes
that they obviously do not generate automatically happy outcomes.
They can also produce undesirable eects. Many contemporary
societies are accordingly aicted by what has been called in the case
of France a symptom of legislative ination. As soon as a group has a
nuisance power, it can be tempted to use power to impose hastily
devised legislative changes that are likely to produce negative eects.
In the short term the new law restores social peace, but in the long
term it produces negative eects.
The origin of the irreversibility of ideas
The origin of the irreversibility of a new idea lies in the fact that
when competing ideas are presented on the market of ideas, the best
one tends to be selected preferably to the others. This process is
easily observed in the history of science. Torricelli and Pascal proposed
a theory to explain the phenomenon that mercury rises in an empty
tube, a phenomenon which would later give birth to the invention
of the barometer, by making it the eect of the weight of atmosphere.

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

623

Their theory was irreversibly selected against the competing Aristotelian

theory (nature abhors a vacuum) for precise reasons: because the
weight of the atmosphere is an empirical notion, while the horror vacui
naturae is a metaphysical one; and also, because Torricellis and
Pascals theory predicts correctly the height to which mercury raises
in a tube under various conditions, while the Aristotelian theory has
nothing to say on this point.
The same kind of process can be observed as far as not only
scientic but axiological ideas too are considered. The principle of
the separation of political powers has been irreversibly selected against
the principledefended for instance by Beccaria and Bodinaccording to which political power should be concentrated in order to be
eective. As a result of this selection process, totalitarian or even
authoritarian regimes are currently considered illegitimate. The irreversibility of the basic principles dening democratic regimes explains
that the communists decided to call the regimes they grounded after
World War II peoples democracy. Though the Marxist tradition
had since long condemned democracy as serving the interests of the
bourgeois, the communists clearly saw that the idea that democracy
is preferable to other types of regimes had been irreversibly selected.
For that reason, they decided to call the totalitarian regimes they
grounded in such a way as to imply they were democracies born at
a higher level of perfection: they were more than democracies; they
were peoples democracies. Webers intuition that moral, political
and juridical ideas, like scientic ideas, are subject to a process of
diuse rational selection, could easily be illustrated by a host of other
examples.
The fact that irreversible ideas are easily found in the domains of
law and of political philosophy derives in part from the fact that
axiological rationality and instrumental rationality, as Weber has also
stated, though distinct from one another, are currently mixed with
one another in practice. In simpler terms, a system of reasons leading
to the belief that X is good, legitimate, fair, etc. includes in most
cases factual statements beside normative statements. Now, factual
statements can be confronted against data, for instance when they
state that some means are better, given that some objective has to
be reached. Thus, the prohibition of alcohol consumption in the
USA showed that coercion could be a counterproductive method of
social control. For this reason, other methods of control have been
devised in order to attempt to limit the eect of the consumption

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of drugs on public health. In such a case, instrumentally rational

statements are introduced in a system of reasons including also axiological ones. In still simpler terms, law and politics have technical
aspects. Now, technology is a type of activity where the notion of
progress can be dened in entirely unambiguous terms, as Weber
clearly stated.
It can be noted that these remarks refute the idea according to
which should could not be derived from is. We can very well draw
a should conclusion from a system of reasons in which all reasons
are of the is type, while only one is of the should type can be drawn;
in other words, we can often draw a normative conclusion from
reasons all of which except one are factually grounded. So, though
popular, Humes theorem according to which ought cannot be derived
from is, or the notion made popular by Moore (1903) of the naturalistic fallacy is a wrong one. Ought is not separated from is by an
unbridgeable gap.
A common impression is that the evolution of ideas is rational
as far as knowledge is concerned and contingent as far as morals,
political theory or law are concerned. But this impression is grounded
on the fact that political, moral or legal discussions are held on the
public stage, and develop in a context of sound and fury, while
scientic discussions take place in the conned atmosphere of scientic
colloquia or of laboratories. Behind this apparent contrast however,
all ideas are indistinctly aected, as Weber has stated, by a process
of diuse rationalization.
Another similarity can be identied between the processes at work
when the objective is to determine that X is true and when it is
to determine that Y is fair , that Z is legitimate, etc.
This similarity is the following: there are no general criteria on the
basis of which it would be possible to decide that a theory is true,
but only particular criteria, variable from one case to another, on the
basis of which it is possible to decide that a theory is better than
another one. Those who look for general criteria of truth, writes
Kant in a crucial but rarely mentioned passage of the Critique of Pure
Reason, evoke the story told by ancient writers of the idiot who tried
to milk a male goat while his equally dumb companion held a bucket
under the belly of the animal.
One can even go further than Kant on this point. Against Poppers
falsication theory, there are no more general criteria of falsity than
of truth. For one reason among others: because falsication theory

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

625

is contradicted by the so-called Duhem-Quine thesis according to

which, when a successful theory is contradicted by some fact, as the
scientist does not know which part of the theory is wrong, he will
normally assume that it is true, but that some minor point has to be
revised. So, a theory cannot be said to be false as soon as it appears
to be contradicted by some data. In the same way, there are no
general criteria on the basis of which it would be possible to declare
that a theory is true. But there exist in many cases well-dened criteria on the basis of which a theory can denitely be preferred to
another and lead to the (provisional) conclusion that the former is
true, while the latter is false. To come back to my earlier example:
we consider Torricellis theory as true and its Aristotelian competitor
as false on the basis of criteria which are well-dened and precise, but
which cannot be extended to all other comparisons between theories.
Going a further long step beyond Kant, the same analysis could
be conducted on other evaluative adjectives. As there are no general
criteria on the basis of which the statements X is true or X is
false could be held as valid, there are no general criteria on the
basis of which the statements Y is fair, legitimate, good, useful, etc or
Y is unfair, illegitimate, bad, useless, etc. could be held as valid. But
in many cases it is possible to assert on the basis of well-dened criteria that Y is fairer, more legitimate, better, more useful than Z. Other
criteria would be used to confront other pairs of theories, as U and
V (Boudon, 2003).
These considerations explain that the process of diuse rationalization which is the origin of the fact that irreversible ideas appear in
the eld of science, is also found in other eldsin the history of
law, of political theory, religion or of morals. Weber did not give
the reasons for the importance of his notion of rationalization. But he
was well aware of its importance and, above all, was positiveagainst
the common representationthat diuse rationalization is at work in
all areas of human thinking.
The irreversibility of moral ideas revealed by contemporary empirical research
The rationalization process I have just cited appears as being at work
in contemporary societies. One can check it in many surveys, notably
in the famous inquiry on world values conducted by Inglehart et al.
(1998).

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By comparing the younger respondents to the older, it is readily

checked that the younger tend to have a rationalized conception of
moral values in the sense that they tend more frequently than the
older to consider exclusively as valid those moral rules that cannot
be considered taboos. They tend to consider that the ultimate ground
of moral rules is a value which they regard as basicrespect for
other people; that any rule which does not give the impression of
being rationally grounded should be considered with skepticism; that
authority is legitimate and hence acceptable exclusively when it is
rational; that charismatic and traditional authority should be regarded
with skepticism; that a rule grounded on tradition but giving the
impression of not being rationally grounded is of weak validityit
is perceived as a taboo.
In the same fashion, the younger tend to have a more rational
view of religious beliefs. They tend to reject the elements of religious
doctrine which cannot be easily given a symbolic interpretation; when
they believe in God, they believe much less frequently than the older
in a personal God. They believe less frequently than the older in a
life after death. On the whole, they tend to develop an immanentist
view of religion.
In terms of political values, they would like to see the political
personal as more respectful of citizens wishes; they want new rights
to be denedrights that protect minorities and respect the right of
all to freely dene their identity; they push toward the development
of an opinion democracy beside representational party democracy;
they believe less often than the older, all things being equal, that
political problems have easy solutions. For this reason, they reject
extremist political programs more often than the older do. These
various data are illustrative of what I called, after Weber, a rationalization process. A more detailed presentation of this interpretation
of Ingleharts data is presented in Boudon (2002).
The same process of diuse rationalization is present more generally
in many trends characterizing modern societies. Reciprocally, the
basic intuitions sketched by Weber and Durkheim and which I
propose to develop here are crucial tools for the understanding of
modern societies.
Thus, the decrease of social control (la diminution du contrle social)
evoked by Durkheim appears as a permanent objective of criminal
policy: misbehavior must be punished, but in ways as compatible as
possible with the dignity of individuals. Contemporary moral sensi-

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

627

bility cares about the dignity of criminals to such an extent that it

has welcomed the idea that prevention should be substituted for repression. The utopia prevention instead of repression has been so popular in Western societies in the ultimate decades of the twentieth
century that the notion of dissuasion itself seems to have disappeared
altogether, probably becausesince it includes the notion of threat
was perceived as being as unpalatable as repression itself. This preference for prevention generated unwanted eects, and played a role
in the increase of delinquency. This example oers the opportunity
of stressing the fact that rationalization should not be equated with
progress: it can produce unwanted eects alongside desirable ones.
On the whole, modern morality tends to be restricted to a single
leading principle with all its possible consequences: that the forms
of behavior which can exclusively be forbidden are those entailing
a negative impact on others; conversely, if it can be demonstrated
that a given piece of behavior is not a nuisance to others, it should
be allowed. One tends to consider as a taboo the prohibition of any
form of behavior entailing an undetrimental eect on other people.
It is generally considered that holding opinions that some people
consider shocking cannot be forbidden, since such a prohibition would
be contradictory with the notion of the freedom of opinion, which
is itself a corollary of the principle of respecting the dignity of all.
This rationalization process explains that trash literature is sometimes promoted to the status of an important literary event (see e.g.
the cases of Michel Houellebecq or Catherine Millet in France). The
seriousness of this literature makes it entirely distinct from the erotic
tradition: it has attracted a great deal of attention thanks, not to its
literary qualityit displays a minimal power of seductionbut to
its ideological meaning: it stresses individuals rights to choose their
sexual practices with an entire freedom provided only they cause no
undesired nuisance to others.
The extension of rights in modern societies
The same phenomenon of diuse rationalization explains that rights
tend to become more numerous. T.H. Marshall (1964) had already
identied this process, which is still at work. New rights are constantly identied which have the propertycurious if not monstrous
from a legal and juridical viewpointthat they are not enforced by

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raymond boudon

any laws or regulations. As an example, see the French droit au logement (literally: the right to a home). For some decades, this notion
has been part of the common language, while this so-called right is
not legally enforced. Some lawyers have proposed to call rights of the
third generation as the right to peace or the right to right, i.e. those rights
which have little chance of being ever legally enforced since it would
imply the abolition of force in national and international processes.
This stammering character of the development of new rights is
unavoidable. It conrms the characteristics of any program in the sense
where I use this concept here. The notion of the dignity of the person
is fuzzy; hence its content is unstable, and hyperbolic interpretations
of the notion are consequently unavoidable. See for instance, particularly in the USA, the hyperbolic views developed by the feminist
movement or by the movements struggling for the defense of minorities rights. Utopias are a normal component of the rationalization
processes through which new rights are identied and dened.
But it should also be noted that, at the same time, these utopias
and hyperbolic interpretations are exposed to a process of rational
selection. Obviously, this selection process does not result from a discussion between experts; it results rather from a confrontation between
actors; including public opinion, social movements, intellectuals and
lawmakers. That such rational selection processes develop currently
in a context of conict should not occult their underlying rationality.
Unfortunately, such an occultation is typical of the so-called sociological theories of conict and domination.
The inationary extension of rights which can currently be observed
is a symptom of the development of the program dened by the
notion of the respect of the person, as are many other features characteristic of contemporary societiesthe development of the right of
interference with the sovereignty of other nations (in French: droit
dingrence), or the creation of international penal tribunals. Episodes
like Pinochets arrest in the UK or the indictment of Milosevic by
an international court of justice are easily explained by the rationalization processes I have described. Their importance lies in the
fact that they illustrate the case where the rights of individuals are
perceived as having a priority with regard to the principle of national
sovereignty. The constant attempt at devising means of social control intended to minimize cases of misbehavior and at the same time
to express the utmost respect for the person of the criminal, is another
example of the action of these rationalization processes.

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

629

The identication and analysis of the dynamics, thanks to which

a necessarily fuzzy program gives birth to various interpretations
which are submitted to a process of rational selection performed by
various collective actors is, it seems to me, one of the major theoretical ndings of the social sciences. They have made obsolete the
static Kantian notion of the dignity of man. Kants formalism forbade
him to give the question of the content of this notion the crucial
importance which it has.
Rationalization does not mean standardization
An important caveat should be introduced at this point: one should
not draw from the evolutionary theory I have developed on the
basis of some intuitions of Durkheim and Weber idea that the
various cultures should be deemed to become progressively more
standardized.
For instance, the idea that an organization of political power in
the style of Montesquieu is better than an organization in the style
of Bodin is irreversibly established. It derives from the process of
rational selection that governs the choice of ideas. But it should also
be noted that in most cases there are many ways of realizing the
same idea. Thus, the organization of the separation of powers is not
the same in France and in the UK. The judiciary power is not organized in the same way in France and in Germany. In France, prosecutors decisions have a jurisdictional character and an administrative
character in Germany. They are taken by magistrates in France and
by civil servants in Germany. The conception of right is inquisitorial in the UK and accusatory in France or Germany. In the former
case, the State is supposed to have the function of arbitrating conicts
between parties and to determine what is right or not, fair or not,
on the occasion of these conicts; and in the latter case, as having
the function of prosecuting oences.
On the other hand, many norms derive from customs. There is no
other ground than custom to the fact that politeness is expressed in
one way here, and in another way elsewhere. This derives from the
fact that the relation between a symbol and its meaning can be arbitrary; whence a same meaning can be translated in various ways.
Technical objects themselves show that, while technical advances
produce irreversible constraints, they also leave a wide margin of

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raymond boudon

freedom to the people who conceive of them. In todays market, one

cannot propose an over-noisy or energy-greedy airplane, or a fountain pen that tends to leak; but, once these constraints are taken
into account, there are many ways of conceiving a plane or a fountain pen. The same could be said of all the domains where Webers
diuse rationalization process is at work.
Finally, some competing ideas cannot be ranked against one another
for basic reasons. The case of religions illustrates this point. All religious explanations of the world have the common feature that some
of their components are held as immune against criticism. All religions
have their theologians, though theology is more developed in some
religions than in others. Even in the case where theology is very
developed, the identity of a religion is protected against criticism by
the immunization of some points of the doctrine. For this reason,
religions are deemed to coexist. Rationalization processes can only
make this coexistence more peaceful. On this point, it must be added
that, under the eect of these rationalization processes, the principle of the freedom of opinion has become more rmly established.
Consequently, atheism tends currently to be treated as one possible
worldviews among others. On the other hand, the dominant religion
of the Western world has nally accepted that it cannot consider
itself as better than others; that what matters is, in Durkheims words,
that individuals recognize the existence of the sphere of the sacred. I
have submitted in Boudon (2000) that Durkheims notion of le sacr
can be translated in our modern vocabulary by the notion of values.
Durkheim himself could not use this word since, in his time, it was
not currently taken in this sense. Beside its economic meaning, it
meant courage. The modern sense is due to Nietzsche and became
current only after World War I.
These various reasons explain that, beyond the rationalization
processes common to various societies, they keep up a strong identity and singularity. The existence of rationalization processes does
not necessarily imply that societies are deemed to become standardized. Conversely, the persistence of various cultures does not
imply that rationalization processes are not at work in most of them,
or that there are no universal values. A permanent debate opposes
those who believe in the existence of universal values and of processes
transcending the singularity of societies, to those who insist on the
singularity of societies and of cultures. The philosophers of law have
always hesitated between a natural theory and a positivist theory of

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

631

law. Many anthropologists see the world as composed of a juxtaposition of singular cultures. Once it is realized that institutions should
be interpreted as deriving from the realization of a program, those
dilemmas disappear. Among the norms enforced in a given society,
some express their singularity, others are the outcome of processes
of diuse rationalization.
Finally, the evolutionary theory I propose to draw from Durkheims
and Webers intuitions is open in the sense that it does not claim that
evolution would tend toward some end. Evolution results from the
realization of programs led by a rationalization process. The cases
of ethics, law or political theory are not in principle dierent from
the case of science. Like the evolution of science, the evolution of
these other dimensions of thought is doomed to never reach an end.
Advantages of a programmatist theory of social evolution
It seems to me that the programmatist theory I propose to derive from
sketchy intuitions by Durkheim and Weber has a certain number of
distinctive features when compared to others. It insists on the importance of ideas in social evolution; on the importance of innovations;
on the unpredictable character of many ideas; on the role of contingencies; on the fact that new ideas can reect the realization of
a program; that for instance the notions of citizenship, person, rightto, belong to a widely undened program which they contributed to
deploy progressively; it insists on the fact that ideas tend to be rationally selected; that a selected idea can be realized in an indenite
number of fashions; on the fact that many norms are unaected by
these rationalization processes, because they are connected with some
values in an arbitrary fashion (as in the case of customs); on the fact
that evolutionary processes cannot be always interpreted as adaptation processes, but are often generated by innovations with no adaptation function properly; that the notion of rationalization combines
the cognitive and the instrumental dimensions of rationality.
These various features characterize the theory of social evolution
proposed by Eisenstadt (2002b). Eisenstadt uses the notion of program
explicitly and abundantly. He shows well how collective identities
are generated by programs made up of a mixture of singular and universal features, resulting from the interplay between rationalization
and singularities.

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raymond boudon

The well-tempered evolutionism which I propose to derive from

the intuitions of Durkheim and Weber and which I identify in
Eisenstadts work must be distinguished from another evolutionary
theorythat of Hayek. Hayeks evolutionary theory is certainly one
of the most interesting modern theories of social evolution. But, probably because it is essentially inspired by Hayeks reections on the
history of economics, it appears incomplete to the sociologists eye.
The process he qualies as group selection is but one of the selection
processes at work in social evolution. Hayek evokes here notably the
ineluctable victory of liberalism on socialism (Nadeau 2003). Now,
the selection of ideas by such and such group is another essential mechanism beside group selection. An example of such a process can be
drawn from Weber: monotheistic cults born in the Middle-East were
preferred by Roman civil servants and military personal to the traditional Roman polytheistic religion. This selection process had
immense consequences. Among them, the fact that notions as person
or of universal citizenship were proposed on the market of ideas. As
Hayek pointedly stresses, unanticipated consequences of intentional
actions are an essential component of social evolution; but equally
essential is the idea that the selection of ideas results from individual
choices and the individual choices from reasons. Thus, the Roman
military personal had strong reasons of preferring the monotheistic
cults to the Roman polytheistic religion. As stated by Nadeau (2003),
Hayeks version of methodological individualism is synthetical, it
insists on the non-intentional eects of individual actions. But methodological individualism has also an analytical side, it insists on the
logic of individual actions, and notably of these essential actions that
lead to the endorsement or rejection of an idea. The addition of
such actions creates a collective belief. Moreover, it is indispensable to
insist on the fact that, though in many cases competing ideas can
be ranked with respect with one another and can give birth to a
rational selection process, it is not true of all ideas. This distinction
contributes to explain why all societies include universal and singular features.
The fundamental notions I have introduced here ( program, rationalization, rational selection) can be used in various circumstances. I
have evoked in the above examples very general programs: the programs underlying the history of morals, science or political theory.
These notions can also be applied to narrower subjects. In everyday political life, programs are developed which begin with slogans,

basic mechanisms of moral evolution

633

for the content of these programs is often reduced to a leading more

or less vague idea that has to be made more precise in the course
of action, for instance, decrease the consumption of tobacco and
reducing the rate of unemployment. These narrower programs are
also subjected to the rationalization process evoked by Weber.
A question remainsaccording to Durkheim, individualism begins
nowherewhile it seems that, to Weber, the disenchantment of the
world and the central role given to the notion of citizenship are features characteristic of Western culture. In fact, the two authors can
be seen as very close to one another on this question. The demand
for the respect of the dignity of all is universal, even though it is
currently thwarted by historical forces. Historical contingencies have
led to this demand being satised earlier and more constantly in
Europe than in other parts of the world. But it can be easily seen
that this demand is present today in all societies. The veils worn by
the young Iranian women from the bourgeoisie are becoming more
elegant and more personal; a satirical press emerges in Iran; jokes
are circulating; as in the communist countries during the Cold War,
they are directed against the political authoritiessuch as, never
queue up at a taxi station close to a mullah, since no taxi would
stop. Other jokes, on the mode of black humor, indicate a preference
for certain features of Western culture: the 9/11 attack against New
York could not have possibly been carried out by Iranians, for they
would have landed the aircrafts in Hawaii.
Finally, the previous remarks conrm the idea, evoked above and
rightly presented as evident by a well-recognized historian of liberalism, Bellamy (2002), that Durkheim and Weber belong to the liberal
intellectual tradition. Both consider autonomy as an essential category.
As stated by Bellamy, they owe their originality within this tradition
notably to the fact that they were conscious that the realization of
the liberal program is exposed to all kinds of risks and diculties.
It is important to stress this point at a time when Weber and
Durkheim are seen by certain sociologists as the putative fathers,
respectively, of relativism and holism.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

COLLECTIVE IDENTITY AND THE CONSTRUCTIVE

AND DESTRUCTIVE FORCES OF MODERNITY
Shmuel N. Eisenstadt
Introduction
The confrontation between pluralistic and totalitarian tendencies is
inherent in the constitution and dynamics of modernity and is closely
related to that between the constructive and destructive tendencies
thereof.
In this concluding chapter I would like to explore the relations
between these tendencies and one central dimension of constitution
of social order in generalespecially of the institutional orders of
modernitynamely the constitution of (modern) collective identities.
I shall rst briey discuss the roots of modern destructive tendencies as they are related to the constitution of collective identities in
general, and then proceed to an analysis of the modern scene.
The destructive potentialities of the constitution of collectivities
I. Genocidethe extermination of one group of people by another,
be it through war or deliberate policy or intergroup violenceconstitutes a very widespread, potentially universal aspect of human
society and history, a basic manifestation of the destructive potential
of human behaviorbut its concrete manifestation, intensity and
impact vary greatly between dierent societies.
The general tendency to destructive intergroup behavior is rooted
in the very core characteristics of the constitution of collective boundaries and identitya basic component of human societies, of human
social interaction. Collectivities, collective identities and boundaries
be they ethnic, national, religious, civilizational or under whatever name they are designatedare not, as has been often assumed
in relevant literature, epiphenomenal or secondary to power and economic forces and relations constituting imagined communities which

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shmuel n. eisenstadt

in modern times developed in response to the expansion of capitalism,

industrialism and imperialism; nor are they continual semi-natural,
primordial and ontologically independent entities, existing as it were
almost in eternity.
The constitution of collective identities and boundariesa construction which has been going on in all human societies throughout human historyconstitutes, like the exercise and regulation of
power, the production and distribution of economic resources and
the structuring of economic relations with which it is indeed continually interwoven, and a basic component of social life, of the construction of human societies. The central core of this analytical
component is the cultural, symbolic and socialorganizational or
institutionalconstitution of boundaries of collectivities, and of trust
and solidarity among the members of such collectivities.
The construction of boundaries of collectivities constitutes an aspect
or component of the more general human tendency towards the construction of symbolic and organizational boundaries of social interaction. This general tendency is rooted in the openness of the human
biological program; in the concomitant development of basic indeterminacies in the structuring of any continual interaction between
human beings and in the consciousness among them of such indeterminacies.1
The most crucial of those indeterminacies in any continual social
interaction are: rst, those among actors, whether individuals or collectivities; second, among actors and their goals; third, between actors
and their goals on the one hand, and the resources at their disposal,
including the activities of other actors, on the other hand. It is the
rst indeterminacythat in the relations among actors interacting
in any situation, also in continual interrelation with the othersthat
is of special interest from the point of view of our analysis. This
indeterminacy is manifest in the fact that the range of actors who
are, as it were, admitted to any such situation of continual interaction is not specied either by genetic programming or by some
general rules or tendencies of the human mind; and that neither the
boundaries of such interaction, nor the criteria determining who is
entitled to participate, are automatically given by either of those

1
Mayer, 1976; Wilson, 1980; Portman, 1944; Gehlen, 1971; Plessner, 1966,
Diederichs, Plessner, and Augen, 1982.

collective identity and modernity

637

determinants, and hence they necessarily constitute a focus of continuous change and of at least potential struggle.
The existence of some degree of such indeterminacy in patterns
of behavior and interaction is true of many other species, although
in a more limited way than among humans. But human beings are
also conscious of that indeterminacy and of the openness of their
own biological program. Such consciousness is closely related to the
consciousness, manifest in the construction of burial places, of death
and of human nitude, and it generates among human beings a core
existential anxiety and a closely related fear of chaos. This anxiety
is exacerbated by the human capacity for imagination, so brilliantly
analyzed by J.P. Sartre, i.e., by the ability to conceive of various
possibilities beyond what is given here and now,2 and in the closely
related universal predisposition to play.3 All these lead human beings
to problematize the givens of their own existence and to undertake
a quest for the construction of meaningful order as an integral part
of their self-interpretations and self-awareness, and of their selfreexivity.
Such anxiety and fear of chaos and the quest for the constitution
of a meaningful order through which that chaos can seemingly be
overcome, generate among human beings the strong predisposition
to construct a realm of the sacred, in which direct contact with the
roots of cosmic or social order is established, and which serves as a
focal point for the construction of symbolic and institutional boundaries inherent in the constitution of such an order.
It is such construction of the realm of the sacred that constitutes
the core of human charismatic activity. Such activity, oriented towards
the construction of a meaningful order, entails not only constructive
but also destructive tendencies or potentialities. Such destructive
potentialities are rooted in the fact that the constitution of such an
order cannot do away with either the indeterminacies inherent in
any pattern of continual human interaction, with the awareness or
consciousness thereofhowever dimor with the core existential
anxiety. Indeed, the very construction of such an order generates a
strong awareness of its arbitrariness and a strong ambivalence towards
it in general and towards any concrete social and cultural order in

2
3

Sartre, 1972.
Huizinga, 1970; Caillois, 1961; Brunner, Jully and Silva, 1979.

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shmuel n. eisenstadt

particular. The construction of such an order often gives rise to a

dim, yet deep, awareness that any concrete answer to the problem
of potential chaos imposes limitations on the range of possibilities
open to human beings, giving rise in turn to a yearning to break
through any such restrictions and actualize some dierent possibilities.4
Hence the fervor attendant on many charismatic activities may
also generate fear of the sacred and hence opposition to it, and contain a strong predisposition to sacrilege, manifest for instance in the
close relation between the consciousness of death and search for the
sacred to be found in many sacricial rituals; and it may breed opposition to any more attenuated and formalized forms of this order.5
Needless to say, the awareness of the openness of human biological
programs, the fear of chaos and the concomitant search for a meaningful vision rooted in the realm of the sacred are not equally developed among dierent people, and are not structured or dened in
the same mode within dierent societies and cultures. Nor are they
necessarily central to most daily activities of most people. But the
general propensity to such awareness and reexivity and to the quest
for the construction of a meaningful order is inherent in the human
situation and is of far-reaching importance in the constitution of
social life.
II. The constitution of collective identities and boundaries provides
one of the most important manifestations of the search for constitution of such an order and of charismatic human activity. The central focus of the construction of collective identities is a combination
of the denition of any collectivitys distinctiveness with the specication of criteria for membership in it; and of the attributes of similarity
of the members of these collectivities. Or, in D.M. Schneiders terms,6
it is the combination of identity and membership in dierent collectivities; dening the attributes of similarity of members of a collectivity with the specication of the range of codes available to
those participating in such collectivitiesdelineating in this way the
relations to other collectivities, to various othersthat constitutes the central focus of the construction of collective identities.

4
5
6

Bateson, 1972; Taylor, 1985; Van der Lieuw, 1957, pp. 324353.
Bateson 1972; Taylor 1985; Eisenstadt, 1995b, pp. 167201; 22889; 378380.
Schneider and Smith, 1973.

collective identity and modernity

639

The construction of collectivities and collective identities entails

the specication of the distinct attributes of such collectivities as
related to basic cosmological and ontological conceptions and visions
i.e. to a specic cultural programand the concretization thereof in
specic location in space and time.7 The construction of collective
identity or consciousness is also related to the distinction, recognized
long ago by Durkheim, between the sacred and the profane, and to
the dierent combinations of these two dimensions of social order.
The attributes of similarity of members of a collectivity are manifest
in the formation of the human types and patterns of behavior which
seem to be appropriate for such membersbe it the English gentleman; the good bourgeois, or, to follow Norbert Elias,8 the civilized
person; the good Confucian; and the like. The construction of similarity of the members of any collectivity entails the emphasis on
their contrast with strangeness, on the dierences distinguishing them
from the other or others. It is that emphasis on the similarity of
members of a collectivity which provides Durkheims9 pre-contractual
elements of social life, the bases of mechanical solidarity, and of
solidarity and trust.
Dening the other or othersand the relations to such others
poses the problem of crossing the boundaries of how a stranger can
become a member; of how a member can become an outsider or a
stranger. Religious conversion and excommunication represent obvious
illustrations of the crossing of boundaries.
III. The construction of collective identities is inuenced or shaped,
as is that of most arenas of social activity, by distinct codes, schemata
or themes, rooted in ontological or cosmological premises and conceptions of social order to be found in all societies. The major codes
or themata which shape the construction of collective identity are
those of primordiality, civility, and sacredness (sacrality) or transcendence
each of which delineates distinct patterns of specication of the boundaries of collectivities, of the range of codes or patterns of behavior,
as well as the allocation of resources and regulation of power.
The theme or code of primordiality10 focuses on such components
7
8
9
10

Eisenstadt, 1995, pp. 167201, 378380.

Elias, 1982.
Durkheim, 1933.
Shils, 1975, pp. 111126; Geertz, 1973, pp. 255310.

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shmuel n. eisenstadt

as gender and generation, kinship, territory, language, race, and the

like for constructing and reinforcing the boundary between inside and
outside. This boundary, though constructed, is perceived as naturally
given. The second themethat of civility or civic consciousness, the
civic codeis constructed on the basis of familiarity with implicit
and explicit rules of conduct, traditions, and social routines that
dene and demarcate the boundary of the collectivity.11 These rules
are regarded as the core of the communitys collective identity. The
third themethe sacral or transcendentlinks the constituted boundary
between us and them not to natural conditions, but to a particular
relation of the collective, subject to the realm of the sacred and the
sublime, be it dened as God or Reason, Progress or Rationality.12
This code, just as the rst two, can be found in all including preliterate and above all archaic societiesin which it was usually
embedded or interwoven in the two other types of codesbut the
purest illustrations of such distinct sacred codes are the Axial-Age
religions which will be discussed later on.13
These three themes are of course ideal types. Within each there
may develop many variations. Thus, to give only two illustrations,
within the general framework of primordial orientation there may
develop dierent emphases on territory, culture, language, or other
components of primordiality, and on dierent conceptions of collective time. Similarly, the dierences between, to follow Webers nomenclature, this-worldly and other-worldly Axial religious ontological
conceptions and orientations, have been extensively analyzed.14
The construction of collective identities entails the concretization
of themes and the specication of their dierent contents; and of
dierent combinations thereof, and the designation of dierent institutional arenas as the bearers of such codesas for instance the
emphasis on primordiality in local or ethnic collectivities; on civil
rules in the political collectivity or in broad religious ones. The
dierent combinations of such codes or themes and the specication
of the institutional arenas in which they are implemented vary greatly
between dierent societies and social settingsand it is the specic

11
12
13
14

Durkheim, 1933.
Tenbruck, 1989.
Eisenstadt, 1983; Eisenstadt, 1987a.
Eisenstadt, 1983.

collective identity and modernity

641

ways in which such themes are dened, combined and institutionalized that constitute the distinct characteristics of dierent collectivities. Whatever the concrete specication and combination of such
themes in any collectivity, the construction of collective identity entails
somehighly variablecombination of mostusually all ofsuch
codes or themes, and continual tension between them.
IV. The construction of collective identities is eected by various
social actors and situations, especially by various inuentials and
elites in interaction with broader social sectors. The core of this interaction is the activation of the predisposition to and search for some
such order, which is inherent, even if not fully articulated, among
all, or at least most, people. Such predispositions or propensities are
activated by dierent inuentials and actors who attempt to attain
hegemony in various settings. Of special importance are those actors
like for instance the dierent promulgators of the visions of the Great
Axial Civilizations or the bearers of the modern Great Revolutions,
or of dierent conceptions of modern statehood and nationality
who attempt to promulgate distinct visions of collective identity, and/
or distinct cultural programs. In so far as such activists nd resonance
among wider sectors of the population, they are able to institutionalize
the distinct symbols and boundaries promulgated by them, and crystallize dierent concrete collective identities and boundaries. Such actors
often compete with each other, as was the case, for instance, of the
competition between dierent religions in late antiquity.15
The competition between such activists is not purely symbolic
and the construction and promulgation of collective identities is not
a purely symbolic exerciseit is manifest not only in the symbolic depiction of the boundaries of the collectivity, but also in the
institutionalization thereof. The institutionalization of boundaries of
collectivities takes place through the interweaving of the promulgation
of such models of cosmic and social order and of the visions of distinctiveness of any collectivity, and of the attributes of similarity of
its members, appropriate to the members of these collectivities, with
the control of the production and distribution of resources, with the
regulation of power and access to such resources.

15

Brown, 1978, 1982, 1992; Burkert, 1987.

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shmuel n. eisenstadt

V. The construction of collective identities and boundarieslike that

of any continual social interaction, of any social orderbears within
itself both constructive and destructive possibilities. The constructive
dimension of such construction lies in the fact that it is that construction which generates trust, without which no continuous human
interaction can be assured and creativity take place (Eisenstadt, 1995),
but at the same time by its very nature such a construction entails
exclusiveness and exacerbates the ambivalence toward social order.
The destructive potentialities inherent in the construction of collective identities are also inherent in the very structure of the situations in which the charismatic dimensions of human activity and
interaction are promulgated. The promulgation in such situations of
the models of cosmic and social order attempts to imbue the given
order with charismatic dimension, to bring it into closer, often direct,
relation with the sacred, and concomitantly to convince the members of a given society that the institutional order in general, and
the concrete order of their society in particular, are the correct
ones. The symbols and images portrayed in these models extol the
given orderthe purity of the world inside the boundaries, and
the danger of the world outsideor the need to remain within the
boundaries despite the continuous attraction of the world outside,
reinforcing, as it were, the existing ideologies or hegemonies.16 Yet
paradoxically, at the same time there develops in such situations an
awareness of the arbitrariness of any social order and of the limitations on human activities which it imposes, as well as a growing
awareness of the possibility of constructing new themes and models.
Hence in such situations there tends also to develop a potentially
strong ambivalence to any social order and especially to the given
concrete social order, enhancing the attraction of stepping outside
the boundaries thereof, as well as the anxiety about doing so.17
Such ambivalences and the consciousness of the arbitrariness of
social order and of its fragility are intensied by the fact that the
promulgation of such models is connected with the exercise and legitimation of power.18 Consequently there may develop in such situations

16
17
18

Eisenstadt, 1995b, pp. 30627.

Eisenstadt, 1995, pp. 167201.
Burkert, 1983, 1998; Vernant, 1991; Rappaport, 1999; Bloch, 1992.

collective identity and modernity

643

strong tendencies to sacrilege, transgression, violence and aggression

manifest among others in the close relation between the consciousness
of death and search for the sacred which is apparent in many
sacricial rituals and in the concomitant tendencies for the exclusion
of others, making them the foci or targets of such ambivalence,
depicting them not only as strange but also as evil.
It is also in such situations that the continual reconstitution of the
concrete specications of the major themes of collective identity
became most visible. One of the most interesting aspects of the
processes of reconstruction of collective identities is the continual
reconstruction of primordiality. Contrary to some of the recent studies
on nationalism and ethnicity which assume that the primordial components of collective identity are almost naturally and continually
given, and on the whole unchanging; in fact those components have
been continually reconstituted in dierent historical contexts and
under the impact of inter-societal forces. Although primordiality is
always presented by its promulgators as primordial, as naturally
given, yet in fact it is also continually reconstructed under the impact
of such forcesand in close relation to the promulgation and continual reconstruction of othercivil or sacred, above all universalistic
codes or orientations.
The construction of collective identities and boundaries in modern societies:
The cultural and political program of modernity
VI. The constitution of collectivities and collective boundaries continuously interwoven with struggles for power and economic resources
has been going on throughout human history, but their concrete
manifestations varied greatly between dierent societies and institutions.
In all societies, the distinctive ways in which collective boundaries
are constituted and in which destructive potentialities or tendencies
developed were closely related to the combination inherent in them
of the specic cultural program that was promulgated and the internal contradiction and tension in these programs, and the specic
historical experience of these societies. It would be beyond the promise
of this paper to present a systematic analysis of such variations19 and

19

Eisenstadt, 2002b.

644

shmuel n. eisenstadt

we shall focus here on the distinctive characteristics of the constitution of collectivities and of their destructive potentialities as they
developed in modern societies.
With the emergence of modernity, of modern civilization, there
emergedin close relation to the distinct cultural program of modernity and to the specic historical context of the development of the
institutional contours of modernitya new pattern of constitution of
collective identities. That constitution was characterized by some very
specic characteristics, which have greatly inuenced the entire modern
historical, social science and general discourse about collective identity,
especially of nationalism and ethnicityoften presenting them as if
they were the natural attributes or forms of collective identities, but
which have to be analyzed in the broader comparative and analytical
framework.
The cultural and political program of modernity as it developed
rst in the West, in Western and Central Europe, entailed distinct
ideological as well as institutional premises. It entailed a very distinct
shift in the conception of human agency, of its autonomy, and of
its place in the ow of time; one of the major characteristics thereof
was the loss of the markers of certainty and continual attempts and
contestation about their reinstatement. Accordingly, this program also
entailed a very distinctive mode of construction of the boundaries of
collectivities and collective identities. In some, even if certainly not
total, contrast to the situation in the Axial Civilizations, collective
identities were not taken as given or preordained by some transcendental vision and authority, or by perennial customs.
At the same time the most distinct characteristic of the construction of modern collectivities, very much in line with the general core
characteristics of modernity, was that such construction was continually
problematized in reexive ways, and constituted a focus of continual
struggles and contestations.
Those continual contestations were borne by distinct social actors
be they political activists, politically active intellectuals, and distinct
social movements, above all national or nationalistic onesoriented
to the constitution of such new collectivities. Indeed, one of the most
distinctive characteristics of the continual process of reconstruction
of modern collective identities was the centrality in this process of
special social and political activists, and above all organizations bearing
distinct visions of collective identities and ideologies, and mobilizing
wide sectors of the population. The best illustrations of the latter are

collective identity and modernity

645

of course distinct social movements, especially the national or nationalistic ones, as well as the closely related promulgation of distinct
ideologies, above all national and also modern ethnic ones, of collective identity.
It was these activists and movements that were the bearers of contestations and struggles, often couched in highly ideological terms,
around the far-reaching transformation in comparison with the preceding Axial periods, of the codes of collective identity and of the
relation between them.20
The development of new, mainly secular denitionscouched in
highly ideological and absolutized termsof each component of collective identity were among the most important of such transformations of the themes of collective identity which were both attendant
on the development of modernity and rst emerged in Europe. The
key transformations of the components were the civil, primordial and
universalistic and transcendental sacred ones; the growing importance of the civil and procedural components thereof; of a continual
tension among these components; and a very strong emphasis, in
the construction and institutionalization of the collective identities,
on territorial boundaries.
Concomitantly there developed intensive tendencies toward the
establishment of a very strong connection between the construction
of the political order and that of the major encompassing collectivities, a connection that later became epitomized in the model of
the modern nation-state. The crystallization of the modern nationstate and its institutionalization entailed an emphasis on congruence
between the cultural and political identities of the territorial population; strong tendencies to attribute to the newly constructed collectivities and centers charismatic characteristics; the promulgation,
by the center, of strong symbolic and aective commitments of members of society to the center and the collectivity; and a close relationship between the center and the more primordial dimensions of
human existence as well as social life, as well as the civil and sacred
ones. In most modern societieswith the partial exception as we
shall see of Japansuch relationships did not entail denial of the
validity of the broader, civilizational orientations. Rather there developed strong tendencies for the new national collectivities to become

20

Eisenstadt, 1999a, 1999b.

646

shmuel n. eisenstadt

also the repositories and regulators of these broader orientations

but at the same time there developed in them continual oscillation
and tension between the national and the broader universalistic ones.
The central characteristic of the model of the modern, especially
the nation-state, was the strong emphasis on cultural-political homogeneity of the population within the territorial boundaries. A central focus of such homogeneity, closely related to the basic premises
of the cultural program of modernity was the image of the civilized man as analyzed by Norbert Elias and, albeit in a rather
highly exaggerated way, by Michel Foucault, and more systematically by John Meyer, Ron Jepperson and others, and as presented
above all both in the great works of modern literature, especially in
the great novels, as well as in the more popular literature which
thrived in this period, in all of which the mission civilisatrice of modernity, of the modern period, were promulgated.21
A very central component in the construction of collective identities was the self-perception of a society as modern, as bearer of
the distinct cultural and political programand its relations from
this point of view to other societiesbe it those societies which claim
to be, or are seen as,bearers of this program, and various others.
Concomitantly, the images and attributes of such homogeneities
and modernity have been promulgated as John Meyer, Ron Jepperson
and others have shown through a series of very strong socializing
agencies, such as schools, often the army, the major media and the
likeall of them emphasizing very strongly the idea or ideal of a
politically and culturally homogeneous entity.22 A central aspect of
such homogeneity was the conception of citizenship that entailed a
direct relation of members of the collectivity to the state, unmediated
by membership in any other collectivities, and the tendency to
relegate the identities of other collectivitiesreligious, ethnic, regional
and the liketo the private spheres as against the unitary public
sphere which was seen as constituting the major arena in which the
relations of citizens to the state and to the national collectivity were
played out. The centers of these states become the regulators of the

21
Meyer and Jepperson, 2000, pp. 100120; Meyer, Boli and Thomas, 1987,
pp. 1238; Meyer, Boli, Thomas and Ramirez, 1997, pp. 144182.
22
Meyer and Jepperson, 2000; Meyer, Boli and Thomas, 1987, pp. 1238; Meyer,
Boli, Thomas and Ramirez, 1997.

collective identity and modernity

647

relations between the central identity and the various secondary, primordial or sacred universalistic identitiesreligious, ethnic, regional
and the like.
The distinctive visions of the new modern collectivitiesabove all
indeed, of the nation-stateconcomitantly entailed the promulgation
of distinctive collective memories in which the universal, often sacred
components rooted in the universalistic components of the cultural
program of modernity and the particularistic national ones emphasizing their territorial, historical and cultural specities came together
albeit in dierent ways in dierent societies, but constituting in all
of them one of the major and continual foci of tensions and contestations.23
These dierent orientations of the overall collectivities were often
symbolized or dened in distinctive gender termswhere the state,
with its civic components, as well as with the organization of political
force was often portrayed in masculine terms, and the nation, with
strong primordial, nurturing and vitalistic components, in feminine
ones. Both these gendered symbols were usually brought together
under the canopy of the overarching nation state, yet at the same
time constituting a focus of continual tensions and of distinct, potentially competing identities.
Yet despite the strong tendency to conate, in the ideal model of
the nation-state, within state and nation there developed strong
tensions between the state with its emphasis on territoriality and
the seeming potentially universalistic notions of citizenship, on the
one hand; and nationwith its more closed denitions of membership with strong primordial components, on the other hand.
Thus paradoxically, a central aspect of the constitution of modern
collective identities, closely related to the tension between citizenship and membership of a primordial community, between state
and nation, was also the construction of a growing tendency to a
sharper delineation of the boundaries, of dierent ethnic, regional
and even religious communities, transforming the relative porousness
of former semi-ethnic territorial, linguistic or kin boundaries into
more formalized ones and with strong political orientations. Although
in principle such dierent primordial communities were to be brought

23
Meyer and Jepperson, 2000; Meyer, Boli and Thomas 1987, pp. 1238; Meyer,
Boli, Thomas and Ramirez 1997.

648

shmuel n. eisenstadt

together under the overall canopy of the nation state, in fact there
developed a potential for the continual development of a multiplicity
of such distinct collectivities with strong potential political orientations,
which needless to say varied greatly between dierent societies.
VII. In many ways, the model of the nation-state, closely related to
some of the basic ontological premises of the cultural program of
modernity, has become hegemonic in the modern international systems and frameworks that developed in conjunction with the crystallization of modern order.24 But despite its hegemonic standing, the
model of the nation-state was never as homogeneous, internally within
any single society or across dierent societies. Even in Europe, a
great variety of nation-states developed.
One of the most important aspects of that variety was the relative importance in them of the dierent codes or themes of collective identity, i.e. of the primordial and civil and sacral (religious or
secular ones) and the dierent combinations thereof. The second
aspect of that variety was the extent to which there developed totalistic
as against multifaceted visions of those basic collective identities
i.e. the extent to which the basic codes and the ways in which primordial-national, civil and universalistic orientations were interwoven
in them, and especially the extent to whichin the historical experience of those societiesnone of these dimensions is totally absolutized or set up by their respective carriers against the other dimensions
or, contrariwise, the extent to which rather multifaceted patterns of
collective identity developed instead.
Such dierent modes of construction of modern collective identities were promulgated in modern societies by many political activists
and intellectuals, and particularly the major social movements. It was
indeed one of the most distinct characteristics of the modern scene
that the construction of collective boundaries and consciousness could
also become a focus of distinct social movementsthe national or
nationalistic ones. In many modern societies, such as the UK, France,
and Sweden, the crystallization of new national collectivities and
identities of dierent types of nation-states took place. Without the
national movements playing an important role, the potentiality of

24
Meyer and Jepperson, 2000; Meyer, Boli and Thomas, 1987, pp. 1238; Meyer,
Boli, Thomas and Ramirez 1997.

collective identity and modernity

649

such movements existed in all modern societies. In somein Central

and Eastern Europe, some Asian and African, and to some extent
Latin-American societiesthey played a crucial role in the development
of nation-states.
VIII. It was within the framework of the basic characteristics of the
constitution of modern collectivities and the political realm and, above
all, the tensions between the pluralistic multifaceted and absolutizing
totalizing visions that there crystallized the specic modes of the
destructive potentialities inherent in the modern cultural program.
These destructive potentialities became most fully manifest in the
ideologization and sanctication of violence, terror and wars which
became rst apparent in the French Revolution and later in the
Romantic movement and in the combination of such ideologization
with the construction and institutionalization of the nation-states; with
the fact that the nation-states became the most important agent
and arenaof constitution of citizenship and of collective identity;
with the crystallization of the modern European state system and of
European expansion beyond Europe especially under the aegis of
imperialism and of colonialism, which were very often legitimized in
terms of some of the components of the cultural programs of modernityall of which became reinforced by technologies of war and
communication.
These destructive forces, the traumas of modernity which undermined the great promises thereof, emerged clearly during and after
the First World War in the Armenian genocide, became even more
visible in the Second World War, above all in the Holocaust, all of
them shaking the naive belief in the inevitability of progress and of
the conation of modernity with progress. Lately they have reemerged
in a most frightening way on the contemporary scene, in the new
ethnic conicts in many of the former republics of Soviet Russia,
in Sri Lanka, in Kosovo, and in a most terrible way in Cambodia
and in African countries, such as Rwanda.25
IX. The extent to which such destructive tendencies developed in
modern societies was greatly inuenced by the mode of constitution
of modern collective identities to which we have referred above

25

Eisenstadt, 1996a.

650

shmuel n. eisenstadt

above all to the mode in which the dierent themes of collective

identitythe primordial, civic and sacredwere interwoven.
In all modern European societies there developed a continual tension or confrontation between the primordial components of such
identity, reconstructed in such modern terms as nationalism and ethnicity, and the modern, as well as more traditional religious, universalistic and civil components, as well as among the latter ones.
The mode of interweaving of these dierent components of collective identity which varied greatly among dierent European societies
greatly inuenced the tension between pluralistic and totalistic tendencies of the cultural and political program of modernity and the
extent to which the destructive potentialities developed in these
societies.
It was insofar as the primordial components were relatively peacefully interwoven in the construction of their respective collective identities with the civil and universalistic ones in multifaceted ways
that the kernels of modern barbarism and the exclusivist tendencies
inherent in them were minimized. In England, Holland, Switzerland
and in the Scandinavian countries, the crystallization of modern collective identity was characterized by a relatively close interweaving
even if never bereft of tensionsof the primordial and religious
components with the civil and universalistic ones, without the former being denied, allowing a relatively wide scope for pluralistic
arrangements. Concomitantly, in these countries there developed also
relatively weak confrontations between the secular orientations of the
Enlightenmentwhich often contained strong deistic orientations
and the strong religious orientations of various Protestant sects.
As against situations in these societies, in those societies (as was
the case in Central Europe, above all in Germany and in most countries of Southern and Central Europe) in which the construction of
the collective identities of the modern nation-state was connected
with continual confrontations between the primordial and the civil
and universalistic, and as well as between traditional religious and
modern universalistic components, there developed a stronger tendency
to crisis and the breakdown of the dierent types of constitutional
arrangement. In the more authoritarian regimes, such primordial
components were promulgated in traditional authoritarian terms
in the more totalitarian fascist or national-socialist movements, in
strong racist oneswhile the absolutized universalistic orientations
were promulgated by various leftist Jacobin movements.

collective identity and modernity

651

Franceespecially modern Republican France from the Third

Republic on, but with strong roots in the preceding periodsconstitutes a very important, arguably the most important, illustration of
the problems arising out of continual confrontations between Jacobin
and traditional components in the legitimation of modern regimes
even within the framework of relatively continuous polity and collective
identity and boundaries. The case of France illustrates that under
such conditions, pluralistic tendencies and arrangements do not develop
easily, giving rise to the turbulence resulting from the institutionalization of a continual constitutional democratic regime.26
The construction of dierent modes of collective identity has been
connected in Europeand beyond Europewith specic institutional
conditions; among them the most important have been the exibility
of the centers, the mutual openness of elites, and their relations to
broader social strata. There developed in Europe, and later in other
societies, a close elective anity between the absolutizing types of
collective identity and various types of absolutist regimes and rigid
centers, and between the multifaceted pattern of collective identity
in which the primordial, civil, and sacred components were continually
interwoven with the development of relatively open and exible
centers and of mutual openings between various strata. It was the
concomitant development of relatively strong but exible and open
centers, multifaceted modes of collective identity, and autonomous
access of major strata to the center that was of crucial importance
in the development of a distinct type of civil societya society that
was to a large extent autonomous from the state but at the same
time autonomous in the state, had autonomous access to the state
and participated in formulating the rules of the political game; and
it was such conditions that made possible the minimization of the
tendencies to barbarism and exclusion.
X. It was insofar as such multifaceted modes of construction of
collective identities and of strong but exible centers faltered that
the two major forms of absolutizing tendencies, bearing within themselves the kernels of barbarism, of destruction, of drastic exclusion,
demonization and annihilation of othersthe Communist and the

26

Eisenstadt, 1999a.

652

shmuel n. eisenstadt

extreme fascist, especially the National Socialist movements and

regimestriumphed.
Within each of these movements and the regimes instituted by
them there developed strong tendencies to exclusivism and barbarism.
But contrary to the claim for a total equivalence of the barbaric tendencies of these two types of regimes, and despite many similarities
between them, there was a crucial dierence between them. This
dierence, as Leszek Kolakowski and Martin Mallia have shown in
their comments on Besanon,27 was rooted in the attitudes of those
respective movements and regimes to the universalistic and the concomitant potentiallyeven if only potentiallyinclusivist components
of the modern cultural and political program.
The socialist and communist movements were fully set within
the framework of the cultural program of modernity, above all of
the Enlightenment and of the Revolutions, and their criticism of the
modern capitalist bourgeois society was made in terms of noncompleteness of the modern programentailing the potentiality of
continual inclusioneven if these potentialities were strongly counteracted by the barbaric exclusivist practices of these regimes rooted in
their absolutizing tendencies. Hence within the Communist movements and regimes with all their destructive annihilating forces there
could develop tendencies of resistance with least the potential to challenge those regimes barbaric and exclusivist practices.
The extreme fascist or national-socialist regimes, aimed above all
at the reconstruction of the boundaries of modern collectivities,
negated the universalistic components of the cultural program of
modernity and promulgated ideologies and praxis of total exclusion,
total barbarization without possibilities of challenge from within
to the total demonization of the excluded. It is indeed when these
two absolutizing tendencies come togetheras in Cambodiathat
they give rise to some of the most gruesome aspects of modern
barbarism.28
In the modern program, all these destructive potentialities and
forces are inherent potentialities, most fully manifest in the ideologization of violence, terror and wars; and the total ideological exclusivity and demonization of the excluded are not outbursts of an old

27
28

L. Kolakowski, 1990.
Ben Kiernan, 1999, 17:93128.

collective identity and modernity

653

traditional forcebut outcomes of modern reconstruction, of seemingly traditional forces in a modern way. Thus, to paraphrase
Leszek Kolakowskis (1990) felicitous and sanguine expression, modernity is indeed on endless trial.29

29

L. Kolakowski, 1990.

APPENDIX

THE TRAIL OF A SCHOLAR

A succint curriculum vitae
Shmuel Noah Eisenstadt was born in September 10, 1923, Warsaw,
Poland. He immigrated at a young age to Palestine/Israel, married
Shulamit and has three children. He started his higher education in
1940, in the Departments of History, Jewish History and Sociology
of Culture, at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He got his Master
degree in 1944 and his PhD in 1947, under the tuition of Martin
Buber. He was on post-doctoral studies at the London School of
Economics during 194748. He started teaching at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem in 1944, in 1959, was appointed Rose Isaacs
Professor of Sociology. He was the Chairperson of the Department
of Sociology from 1951 to 1969, serving as well as the Dean of the
Faculty of Social Sciences from 1966 to 1968. Since 1983, he is
Professor Emeritus.
The list of S.N. Eisenstadts appointments as visiting professor
shows his international renown. He was invitedfor diverse periods)
in the London School of Economics (1958), the Universities of Oslo
(1958), Chicago (1960), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (19623),
Chicago (1966, 1971, 19891995), Harvard (19689; 197581),
Michigan (1970), Zurich (1975), Australian National University (1977),
Manchester (1978), Vienna (1980), Bern (1980, 1985), Stanford (1984,
198690), of Washington (Seattle, 1986, 1996, 1998), Alberta
(Edmonton, 1989), Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes en Sciences
Sociales (Paris, 1989), Justus Liebig (Giesen, 1990), Montesquieux
(Bordeaux, 1996), Heidelberg (1997), Erfurt (1998, 1999, 2000),
Konstanz (1999), Hong Kong (2000). He was also a Fullbright
Professor (1986), a guest of the Russell Sage Foundation, New York
(1988), a guest scholar of the Wilson Center for International Exchange
(Washington, 1996, 1998), and a visiting researcher at the US Institute
of Peace (Washington DC, 2002). In addition, he also was a Fellow
at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences,
Stanford (195556), the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study,
Wassenaar (1973) and the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Studies
in Social Sciences, Uppsala (199396).

658

appendix

From 1960 to 1964, he was Chairperson of the Chairman, Israel

Council of Community Relations, from 1969 to 1971, of the Israeli
Sociological Association, and from 1995 to 1999, of the Academic
Advisory Council, Ben Zvi Institute.
S.N. Eisenstadt received honoris causa doctorates from the Universities of Helsinki, Harvard, Hebrew Union College, Tel-Aviv, Duke,
Budapest (Central European University), and was made Honorary
Fellow of the London School of Economics, the Open University of
Tel-Aviv and the Israeli Sociological Society. Moreover, S.N. Eisenstadt
is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, a
Honorary Foreign Member, American Academy of Arts & Sciences,
a Foreign Member, American Philosophical Society, Foreign Associate,
National Academy of Sciences (USA), a Honorary Research Fellow,
Institute of Sociology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
S.N. Eisenstadt also received a list of distinguished awards and
prizes: the McIver Award of the American Sociological Association
(1964), the Kaplun Prize in Social Sciences (1969), the Rothshild
Prize in Social Sciences (1970), the Israel Prize in Social Sciences
(1973), the International Balzan Prize (1988), the Max Planck Research
Award (1994), the 21st Century Award for Achievement from the
International Biographical Center, Cambridge (2000), the European
Amal Prize for Sociology and Social Sciences (2001), the Humboldt
Research Award (2002), and the Ambassador of Cultural Dialogue
Award of the Polish Asia Pacic Council in Warsaw. 1988 was
declared by the Chinese Sociological Society, the Eisenstadt Year,
and in 2003 he was declared Living legend by the Worldwide
Honours List of the International Biographical Centre, Cambridge;
in 2003.
S.N. Eisenstadts list of books includes:
The Absorption of Immigrants, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul and Glencoe, Il:
Free Press, 1954.
From Generation to Generation, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul and Glencoe, Il:
Free Press, 1956. With new introduction 1970 (also German, Italian and
Portuguese translations). Third edition: Transaction, New Brunswick, 2003.
Essays on Sociological Aspects of Political and Economic Development. The Hague: Mouton
Press, 1961.
The Political Systems of Empires. New York: Free Press, 1963, 1969. Also Spanish and
Chinese translations. New edition with new introduction, New Brunswick:
Transaction Publishers, 1993.
Essays on Comparative Institutions. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1965.
Modernization, Protest and Change. Englewood Clis, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1966 (Also
Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean and Chinese translations).

appendix

659

Israeli Society. New York: Basic Books, 1967 (Also Hebrew, German and Portuguese
translations).
The Sociology of Modernization ( Japanese). Tokyo: Mizuzu Shobo, 1967.
Modernizacao e Mudanca Social. Introduction and translation by Jose Clovis Machada,
Belo Horizonte, 1968.
Ensayos sobre el cambio y la Modernizacion. Madrid, 1970.
Social Dierentiation and Stratication. Glenview: Scott, Foresman & Co., 1971 (Also
Hebrew and Japanese translations).
Tradition, Change and Modernity. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1976. (Also German
and Italian translations).
Revolution and the Transformation of Societies. New York: Free Press, 1978. (Also Hebrew,
Portuguese, Russian and German translations).
The Transformation of Israeli Society An Essay in Interpretation. London: Weidenfeld &
Nicolson, and Boulder, Colorado: Westview, 1985.
[a] Hebrew: 1989. The Transformation of Israeli Society. Jerusalem: Magnes.
[b] German: 1987. Suhrkamp Verlag, 1992: German paperback with new
Introduction.
Comparative Sociology of Civilizations (in Japanese). Tokyo: Mariaisha. Translated by
Junichi Umezu and others, 1991.
A Dinamica das Civilizacoes. Tradicao e Modernidada. Lisbon: Edicoes Cosmos 1991.
De Transformatie van de Israelische Maatschappij. The Willem Drees Lecture, The Hague:
Sdu Uitgeverij Koninginnergracht, 1994.
European Civilization in a Comparative Perspective. Oslo: Norwegian University Press, 1987
(Also Japanese and French translations).
with A. Shachar Society, Culture and Urbanization. Beverly Hills and London: Sage
Publications, 1987.
Jewish Civilization. The Jewish Historical Experience in a Comparative Perspective. New York:
State University of New York Press, 1992 (Also Italian and enlarged Hebrew
translations).
Power, Trust and Meaning: Essays on Sociological Theory and Analysis. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 1995.
Japanese CivilizationA Comparative View. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996
(also Italian translation). (Forthcoming Japanese and Chinese translations).
Fundamentalismo e Modernidade. Portugal: Celta Editore (Portuguese), 1997.
Les Antinomies de la Moderniteles Composantes jacobines de la Modernite et du Fondamentalisme.
Paris: LArche (French), 1997.
[a] Die Antinomien der Moderne: Die Jakobinischen Grundzuge der Moderne und des
Fundamentalismus. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag (German), 1997.
Modernita, Modernizzazione e Oltre. Rome: Armando Editore (Italian), 1997.
Os Regimes Democraticos: Fragilidade, Continuidade e Transformabilidade. Oeiras: Celta Editore
(Portuguese), 1998.
Paradoxes of Democracy, Fragility, Continuity and Change. Washington: The Woodrow
Wilson Press and Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1999 (Also Italian and
Arabic translations).
[a] 2002. Paradossi Della Democrazia Versus Democrazie Illiberali, Bologna: Societa
Editrice il Mulino (Italian).
[b] 2003. Paradoxes of Democracy: Fragility, Continuity, and Change. Cairo, Egypt: El
Ahram Press (Arabic).
[c] 2004. Hebrew translation to be published by the Israel Democracy Institute.
Die Vielfalt der Moderne. Velbruck Wissenschaft, 2000.
Fundamentalism, Sectarianism and Revolutions. Cambridge University Press, 2000. (Hebrew
translation to be published in 2004.)
Democracy and Its Tortuosity: Paradoxes in Modern Democracy. Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense
Publications (Hebrew), 2002.

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appendix

Le Retour des Juifs dans lHistoire. Paris and Brussels: Editions Complexe (French).
Fundamentalism and Modernity, Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense Publications (Hebrew),
2002.
Jewish Civilization: The Jewish Historical Experience in a Comparative Perspective and Its
Manifestations in Israeli Society. The Ben-Gurion Heritage Center: Ben-Gurion
University of the Negev (Hebrew), 2003.
S.N. Eisenstadt, Comparative Civilizations & Multiple Modernities2 volumes collection
of essays. Brill: Leiden-Boston, 2003.
Explorations in Jewish Historical Experience: The Civilizational Dimension. Brill: Leiden/Boston.
Changes in Israeli Society. Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense Publications (Hebrew), 2004.
Modernity and Modernization: Collection of Essays. (in Italian), Rubettino, Italy, 2004.
Modernity and Modernization. (in Chinese), SDX Joint Publishing Company, China,
2004.
Political Theory in the Search of the Political. Soveria Mannelli, Italy (Italian).

S.N. Eisenstadt has also edited the following:

The Protestant Ethic and Modernization. New York: Basic Books, 1968. (The introduction translated also into Hebrew, Spanish, Italian, German, Portuguese and
Japanese.)
Political Sociology. New York: Basic Books, 1971.
with S.R. Graubard Intellectuals and Tradition. New York: Humanities Press, 1973.
Post-Traditional Societies. New York, 1974.
with Y. Azmon Socialism and Tradition. New York: Humanities Press, 1975 (Also
German translation).
with R. Lemerchand Political Clientelism, Patronage and Development. Beverly Hills: Sage
Publications, 1981.
Origins and Diversity of Axial Age Civilizations. New York: State University of New York
Press, 1986.
Patterns of Modernity Volumes I and II. London: Frances Pinter, 1987.
Kulturen der Achsenzeit Griechenland, Israel, Mesopotamien, Teil l. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp
Verlag, 1987.
Kulturen der Achsenzeit Teil 2. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1987.
Kulturen der Achsenzeit Buddhismus, Islam, Altagypten, Westliche Kultur Teil 3. Frankfurt:
Suhrkamp Verlag, 1992.
with L. Roniger and A. Seligman Centre-FormationProtest Movements and Class Structure
in Europe and the U.S. London: Frances Pinter, 1987.
with M. Abitbol and N. Chazan The Early State in African Perspective: Culture, Power
and Division of Labor. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988.
with I. Silber Knowledge and Society: Studies in the Sociology of Culture, Past and Present.
Greenwich, Ct.: JAI Press Inc., 1988.
with E. Ben-Ari Japanese Models of Conict Resolution. London: Kegan Paul International,
1990.
Martin Buber on Intersubjectivity and Cultural Creativity. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1992.
Democracy and Modernity, E.J. Brill, Leiden, 1992.
With S. Hidehiro (eds.) Japan in a Comparative Perspective. International Symposium
l2. Kyoto, Japan: International Research Center for Japanese Studies, 1998.
with Wolfgang Schluchter and Bjorn Wittrock, Public Spheres and Collective Identities.
New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2001.
Multiple Modernities. New Brunswick (U.S.A.) and London (U.K.): Transaction Publishers,
2002
S.N. Eisenstadt, M. Hoexter M. and N. Levtzion (eds.). The Public Sphere in Muslim
Societies. Albany: State University of New York, 2002.

appendix

661

With D. Sachsenmaier, J. Riedel (eds.) Reections on Multiple ModernitiesEuropean,

Chinese and Other Interpretations. Brill: Leiden/Boston.
Introduction: The Context of Multiple Modernities Paradigm.

The list of monographs includes:

Absorption of immigrants in Israel (with special reference to Oriental Jews). Multilit, Jerusalem
the Jewish Agency for Palestine, Department of Oriental Jews an the Hebrew
University, 1951.
Bureaucracy and bureaucratization. Current Sociology, 1958.
Consideraciones de un sociologo sobre Cambio y Transformacion para el Desarrollo. Venezuela,
1967.
(with D. Weintraub and N. Toren) Analysis of processes of role change. Jerusalem, 1967.
Traditional patrimonialism and modern neo-patrimonialism. Sage Publications, 1977.

A SCHOLARLY PORTRAIT
MULTIPLE OPENINGS FOR
SOCIOLOGICAL DISCOURSE
Donald N. Levine
Over the past decade or so, critics have raised questions about the
central unit of analysis in the discipline of sociology. They have done
so by questioning the viability of using the notion of society, in particular the nationally-circumscribed society, as such a foundational
unit. Some have even concluded that the age of sociology is over:
since its essential heuristic unit, the national society, is now obsolete, it is now time to discard the discipline of sociology altogether.
Thus, in his widely discussed ISA presidential letter no. 5 (1997),
Immanuel Wallerstein decried the persistence of sociological investigation of national societies on grounds that only an interdisciplinary
and evolutionary framework made sense for the social sciences. Nico
Stehr has emphatically rejected the continuing identication of
modern society with the nation-state as an obsolescent ideological
and epistemological residue of the 19th-century origins of social
science discourse (2001, 911). Martin Albrow (1997) urges us to
abandon terms like modernity altogether, arguing that while it was
appropriate to use the term Modern to designate the epoch of the
past few centuries, that epoch has now ended and we have entered
a new one, which he calls The Global Age.
Alain Touraine has for two decades been promoting the idea of
a sociology without society, by which he refers largely to the
national society. At meetings of the World Congress of Sociology in
July 2002, one of the hot ideas in circulation concerned the obsolescence of the nation-state as a central unit for sociological analysis,
and the theme of sociology without society was being taken up as
a banner behind which to secure a putative emancipation from all
previous sociology.
Long before the rise of these objections to using the trope of
society qua nation as an authoritative notion for sociological inquiry,
however, the sociological tradition included four strands of work that
transcend this analytic focus. These include the Simmelian notion of

appendix

663

interaction among parties at any level; the Weberian idea of society

as merely an object of orientation constructed by actors; the Parsonian
conception of the system of modern societies; and the multidisciplinary perspective of civilizational analysis. What makes this reminder
particularly salient for the present volume is that each of the four
strands in question bears an important relation to a signicant phase
of the career of the scholar and colleague whom we honor here.
Supranational perspectives in sociology
Simmels peculiar notion of society
Among those who provided the intellectual capital that launched the
enterprise of modern sociology, Georg Simmel stood out in many
ways. For present purposes, we should consider his insistence that
the term society should not refer to a phenomenal entity. He used
the term, rather, in the same way that he used comparable cultural
categoriesto designate a universe of forms of a certain sort. In this
case, the forms in question consisted of forms of social interaction,
things that themselves connote no phenomenal entity but are abstractions from concrete phenomena in which, like tetrahedral pyramids
and spherical basketballs, form and content are essentially conjoined.
For Simmel, then, societal forms referred to the patterns embodied
in types of interaction: conict as found within and among schools,
churches, and labor unions; or domination as found in schools,
churches, and labor unions. In this view, society designated the
universe of all such forms of social interaction.
Now, not only was Simmels sociological attention not restricted
to national societies, but the elements of his interactional forms could
be individuals or any kind of collectivity. Thus, his essay on conict
represented diverse properties of conictual interaction by making
reference to conict between business rms, religious groups, athletic
teams, and national armies, just as readily as between friends or individual family members.
As in so many other respects then, Simmel was here doubly ahead
of his time. He not only avoided the pitfall of conning all sociological analyses to the domain of a nationally bounded society, but
oered a ready way of identifying and analyzing international and
supranational forms. Thus, one sociologist has analyzed the protests

664

appendix

against the World Trade Organization in Seattle, Melbourne, and

Prague as themselves constitutive of new forms of global association,
in a mode quite resonant with a basic theme of Simmels argument.
Webers constructivist view
Although Max Weber frequently referred to nations and was himself a passionate German nationalist, he never considered the nation
or society as a central unit for analysis. If anything, one could
argue that the category of social stratum (Stand ) was far more salient
for him. Such awesome cultural transformations as ascendance of
world religions, the rationalization of legal codes, and the utilization
of new military technologies would not have been possible, whatever
the intensity of the needs that they satised, had it not been for the
availability of duly qualied and interested social strata.
Beyond that, even when Weber used the term society (Gesellschaft),
he considered it shorthand for an aggregation of individual actions.
The reality of social life was that it was constituted by individual
actors oriented meaningfully to one another. Webers primary disciplinary commitments, to jurisprudence and economics, focused on
the liability of individuals, on the one hand, and on the performance
of actions designed to satisfy personal wants, on the other. These commitments had brought him into conict with holistic notions from
the social sciences that were becoming increasingly popular in his
time.1
The concept of society as an organism constituted the focal point
of Webers objections to such notions. This metaphor, he wrote, can
be highly dangerous . . . if its cognitive value is overestimated and
its concepts illegitimately reied (1968, 15). Supraindividual concepts generally amount to a cloak for confusion of thought and
action; sometimes subserve specious and fraudulent procedures, and
always obstruct the proper formulation of problems (1949, 110).
1
Inuenced by Herders and Hegels notions of Volksgeist and Zeitgeist, a number of academic enterprises were striving to overcome individualistic perspectives
and, instead of individual action, were making social forces and collective movements
the truly decisive and eective factors in human life. These included collective
psychology (Vlkerpsychologie), positivistic sociology, cultural history, milieu theory,
moral statistics, historical political economy, ethnology, animal sociology, comparative
legal studies, and sociologydisciplines that since the 1860s had emerged as
sciences of the supraindividual, as collectivist social theories (Dahme 1993, 40; Levine
2004).

appendix

665

On the other hand, Weber did signal a disposition to use the term
society in certain circumscribed ways. It could serve as a rough
generalization of certain kinds of conduct. When reference is made
in a sociological context to a state, a nation, . . . or to similar collectivities, what is meant is, on the contrary, only a certain kind of
development of actual or possible social actions of individual persons. What is more, he argued, these concepts of collective entities . . . have a meaning in the minds of individual persons, such that they
orient their action to them (1968, 14, emph. mine). The persons
in question include not only professionals such as judges and bureaucrats but ordinary, private individuals as well. Webers position on
this issue could thus be glossed as providing a foundation for what
has come to be thought of as a constructivist view of concepts like
the nation.
Parsons and the supranational social system
Where Simmel transcended the national society perspective by identifying forms of social interaction that could be manifested at any
level, from microscopic through international, and Weber did so by
repudiating the assumption that society referred to any sort of concrete phenomenonother than a symbolic construct in the minds of
actors, Parsons did so by subordinating the notion of society to a
more encompassing idea, that of the social system.
Initially, Parsons dened the social system as a plurality of individuals interacting in an environmentally contextualized situation, motivated to optimize gratications and related through a system of shared
symbols; he viewed society. then, as a type of social system that
meets all the essentials of long term persistence from within its own
resources (1951, 56, 19). As he developed the concept, he came to
use it with increasing exibility, to refer to systemic phenomena at
all levels, from microscopic to macroscopic. And although some of
his analyses of societies were directed at national entities like Germany
or the United States (1993; in press), in his innovative work of
the 1960s on the comparative analysis of societies, he concluded by
subordinating nations as units under what he called an overarching
system of modern societies. As early as 1971, then, Parsons had
illuminated the way to analyzing the global community in the terms
of his far-reaching systems theory.

666

appendix

Civilizational analysis as a supranational perspective

Throughout the 20th century, nally, a small number of sociologists
(and anthropologists) joined the eorts of world historians like
Burckhardt and Spengler to represent social and cultural formations
of enormous scope. These included Emile Durkheim, Alfred Weber,
Pitirim Sorokin, Alfred Kroeber, and Robert Redeld. Such scholars
often worked as lone giants, mastering huge bodies of material and
producing formulations of stunning sweep and depth.
Although he did not employ the notion of civilization as such,
Max Weber, in his Comparative Studies of the World Religions, pursued
a comparable program. Combining both research programs, Benjamin
Nelson called for a depth-historical sociology in which civilizational
analysis stood at the core. In this vein Nelson revitalized the International Society for the Comparative Study of Civilizations, founded in
1961 by Arnold Toynbee, Rushton Coulborn, and Sorokin, by bringing
it to the United States a decade later and promoting its agenda
vigorously. Although the ISCSC functioned as a necessarily interdisciplinary enterprise of broad scope, scholars like anthropologist
Roger Wescott and sociologists Vytautas Kavolis and Matthew Melko
were core gures alongside Nelson.
Eisenstadt and the supranational perspectives
Although the work of S. N. Eisenstadt has certainly dealt with national
societies at many points, from his earliest work on the adjustment
of immigrants in Israel to some of his later modernization studies,
it may be of interest to observe that his intellectual biography connects
in nontrivial ways to each of the four supranational perspectives just
described. In the course of his career, Eisenstadt displayed strong
anities with perspectives deriving from Simmel, Weber, Parsons,
and proponents of civilizational studies.
The Simmelian moment in Eisenstadts work
Although Eisenstadt rarely made reference to Simmel or Simmelian
perspectives as such, his sociological career was launched by early
studies with Martin Buber, one of Simmels most distinguished students. Indeed, it was from Simmel that Buber derived his notion of
human interaction as the core characteristic of sociality. Prior to

appendix

667

studying with Simmel, Buber had been a proponent of Nietzschean

individualism. Inuenced by Simmel to change toward an interactional perspective, he broadened the latter to constitute the framework of his paradigm of human dialogue (Mendes-Flohr 1989). It
was this central notion in Simmel-Buber of intellectual interaction
as reecting degrees of openness to other positions that formed a
guiding principle in Eisenstadts approach to perspectival dierences,
a principle that animates his important work (with M. Curelaru) on
The Form of Sociology Paradigms and Crises (1976).
Eisenstadt as a follower of Weber
Following his work with Buber and others at Hebrew University,
Eisenstadt went to the London School of Economics, where his
encounter with Weber implanted a lifelong devotion. This expressed
itself in publications on Weber himself and in a rich harvest of publications in the Weberian spirit. To some extent these manifested
the constructivist side of Webers approach, in that Eisenstadt never
lost sight of the importance of subjective dispositions in action. One
fruitful extension of the notion of society as a symbolic construct was
his later work, with Bernhard Giesen, on the varieties of symbolism
with which national communities dene themselves.
In addition, Eisenstadt took up Webers project of a sustained
exploration of comparative macrosocial phenomena in a multidimensional mode. In this eort, subjective dispositions were conjoined
with questions of resource allocation and social position to produce
explanatory accounts of enormous depth. His many contributions
here include a Weberian kind of formulation in the treatment of
social transformations. He broke new ground by pointing to the double contingency of factors making for social change, one of which
had to do with whether or not a qualied Stand was available to
innovate in ways that a situation indicated.
Parsons and the study of evolution and modernization
Early on, Eisenstadt had shown himself a revealed himself as one of
the few sociologists who was able to make fruitful use of the theoretical constructs of Talcott Parsons in empirical research. Thus, in
From Generation to Generation (1956) Eisenstadt employed the Parsonian
variable of particularism and universalism to make the rst plausible explanation of why some societies have age-homogeneous groups

668

appendix

and others do not. Following that, in his rst magisterial synthesis,

The Political Systems of Empires (1963), he drew broadly on structuralfunctional elements of Parsonian theory.
In the early 1960s, Eisenstadt spent time at Harvard, where he
took part with Parsons, Robert Bellah, and others in a famous seminar that brought a more rened version of evolutionism back into
social science discourse. This work led not only to the important
paper Social Change, Dierentiation, and Evolution (1964) but
also to an intensied engagement with problems of modernization
(1973).
Civilization as an alternative unit of scholarly analysis
As Parsons broadened his perspective into conceptualizing a global
system of modern societies, Eisenstadts development took another,
more Weberian form, by deepening his investigations in the comparative study of civilizations. This agenda has occupied virtually all
his attention since the early 1980s. Like the earlier giants of civilizational studies, he proceeded largely as a lone scholar drawing
mainly on his own fresh engagement with substantive materials.
Weber gures as virtually the only predecessor or colleague worthy
of sustained attention. The yield of this exceptionally productive
period includes dozens of originative essays, recently published in two
volumes (2003), Jewish Civilization, and one of the most extraordinary
achievements of twentieth-century scholarship, Japanese Civilization
(1996).
The theme of multiple modernities
Sensitized by his depth-historical forays into the universe of what he
came to call Axial Civilizations and their contemporary manifestations in Europe, India, China, and Japan, Eisenstadt has in the past
dozen years returned to the problematic of modernization theory
with a renewed revisionist impulse. This impulse has expressed itself
most robustly under the rubric of multiple modernities (2003).
The alternate perspective Eisenstadt proposes has much to recommend it. It opens up a productive way of looking at the contemporary
world distinct from the convergent modernization perspective, however modied. Eisenstadts perspective embodies both a new interpretation of modernity which emphasizes deliberate intervention
toward actualizing some transcendent ideal in the world, and a studied

appendix

669

sensitivity to the dierences among cultural ideals that inform the

global modernization process.
It would be in keeping with Eisenstadts more general approach
to theoretical work, however, to refrain from rejecting the convergent modernization perspective out of hand and instead to consider
it as a plausible alternative point of view. This mode of response
expresses his longstanding commitment to what he has called theoretical openness, and which stems ultimately from his Buberian
emphasis on dialogue. Just as presenting alternatives to the nationstate perspective need not result in an outright rejection of sociological work that adheres to it, so the classic modernization perspective
can be retained in the expectation that it may illuminate signicant
phenomena that the Multiple Modernities framework fails to embrace.
For there is a serious danger that in rejecting the modernization
perspective, one joins the stampede against Parsons that has beset
Western sociology since the 1970s. The Parsonian perspective does
highlight phenomena not given due attention in the Multiple Modernities perspective. For one thing, insofar as the latter considers generic
modernity, it may place undue emphasis on collective agency. For
another, it fails to deal systematically with the increasingly salient
processes that connect peoples of the world into common global networks. Above all, its critique of classical modernization theory tout
court neglects those multiple dimensions of modernization in favor of the
streamlined notion of modernity formulated by development economists of the 1950s. It thereby discourages ongoing investigation of
the extensive array of institutions and processes that have come to
be associated with worldwide modernization, processes that are themselves associated with cultural ideals of worldwide signicance.
It would be hard to gainsay, as essential markers of the modern
world, the association of international commerce based on currency
and credit (Adam Smith); the inexorable erosion of aristocratic privileges (Tocqueville); the growth of new inequalities based on capitalist systems of production (Tocqueville, Marx); and the extension
of the principle of functional specialization into all sectors of society
(Spencer, Durkheim). It would be equally hard to gainsay the importance of scientic revolutions (Comte) and the extension of paradigms of scientic reasoning into the public sphere (Dewey); or the
increasing distance between objectied culture and the cultivation of
human subjects (Simmel) and the gap between the rationalization of
routine activities and the cultivation of the powers of rational minds
(Mannheim). The worldwide advance of bureaucratic regulation

670

appendix

appears unstoppable (Weber). The need for increased discipline of

impulsivity to accommodate modern forms of complex organization
seems unmistakable (Freud, Weber, Elias). And there seems to be
scant refutation of the progressive adoption and implementation of
safeguards for the rights of groups and individuals, however halting
and tortuous this progress be (Durkheim).
What is more, each of these structural changes has its counterpart in some inspiring cultural ideal. These include the ideals of
diminished hunger and poverty, generalized trust, social equality,
mobility, rational inquiry, professionalism, impersonal norms, selfdiscipline, and human rights. Together, these and related ideals can
be taken to constitute what could well be called the civilization of
modernity.
Accordingly, like it or not, the world is faced with a plethora of
phenomena plausibly associated with a universal pattern of modernization. In Eisenstadts hands, this generic pattern seems to be construed in terms of the repercussions of a single dimensionthat which
honors the creative drive to impose a transcending vision of the
world onto mundane realities. That notion gives us new insights into
what ideologists of Jacobinism, Marxism, fascism, and religious fundamentalism have been about. And yet it ignores a vast number of
phenomena that can be just as plausibly construed as essential to
our common-sense understanding of the term modernity.
Finally, it leaves little room for integrating what Eisenstadt himself acknowledges to be an essential constituent of the modern world:
the many kinds of protests and revolts against these phenomena that
can only be construed as anti-modern or, in a term that Mannheim
espoused, traditionalist. The Multiple Modernities perspective would
consider every serious eort to mobilize resources on behalf of reconstructing the world in accord with a transcendent ideal to be quintessentially modern, however much it might y in the face of the
ideals enumerated above. And, in implying that each civilization projects a unic vision for world transformation, it downplays what
Eisenstadt himself has been in the forefront of identifying the
immense internal pluralization that takes places willy-nilly in every
society of the modern world.
In sum: standing on Eisenstadts shoulders, we can glimpse the
value of keeping the perspectives of both multiple modernities and
convergent modernities in play. For this, among many other gifts
too numerous to mention, we remain profoundly in his debt.

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INDEX OF PERSONS
Abilea, Joseph 511
Abu-Lughod, J.L. 292296
Adamski, W. 494
Adrian (patriarch of Moscow) 355
Adriansee 594595
Advani, L.K. 548
Agursky, M. 359 n40
Albrow, Martin 662
Alcntara Senz, Manuel 567, 572
Alexander, Jerey C. 10
Alexei Mikhailovich (tsar of Russia)
354
Alfonsn, Ral 570 n5
Allardt, Erik 21
Alli, Lord Waheed 226
Apparao, Gurujada 19, 396397,
400411
Aquinas, Thomas 297 n13, 316,
320324
Aristides, Aelius 128
Aristotle 16, 224, 297 n13, 312,
320324, 503, 612, 614, 625
Arjomand, Sad 16, 296, 297 n13
Arnason, Johann P. 7, 85, 105108,
110, 312, 491, 494
Aron, Raymond 358 n37
Asad, Talal 448
Assisi, Francis of 302
Assmann, Jan 77, 79, 114, 445
Atatrk, Kemal 258
Augustus, Octavianus (Roman
emperor) 130, 136137
Aurelius, Marcus 126127, 503
Avitzer, Leonardo 577
Bacon, Francis 531
Bacon, Roger 290
Baker, Keith 8586
Balsham, Hugh of 314
Batailles, R. 178
Bauman, Zygmunt 232, 492, 560
Beard, M. 136
Beck, Ulrich 492, 560
Bellah, Robert 668
Bellamy, R.P. 633
Ben-Gurion, David 420
Ben-Rafael, Eliezer xiiixiv, 17
Bendix, Reinhard 97 n7

Benhabib, Selya 446

Benjamin, Walter 445446
Bentley, Jerry 101
Berkemer, Georg 399
al-Beruni 546
Besanon 652
Bhabha, Homi 446, 448
Bhindranwale, Jarnail Singh 549
Bismarck, Otto Edward Leopold von
517, 519
Bloch, Marc 97
Blondel, Jean 496497
Bodin, Jean 629
Bonhoeer, Dietrich 507, 512
Boris Godunov (tsar of Russia) 352
Borkenau, Franz 97, 99
Boudon, Raymond 2425, 626, 630
Boukovski 216 n3
Bousetta, Hassan 196
Bowersock, G.W. 298
Brague, Rmi 456457
Brandt, Willy 256, 258
Brass, Paul 546
Braudel, Fernand 3, 293, 295, 456
Brecht, Bertold 532
Brubaker, Roger 201
Buber, Martin xiii, xvixvii, 501, 512,
657, 666667
Buccanna, Burra 398
Buckland, W.W. 133134
Budick, S. 445
Burckhardt, J. 58 n3, 666
Bussy, Charles de 401
Cacciari, M. 597
Caillois, R. 178
Calhoun, C. 477
Carens, J.H. 202
Castoriadis, Cornelius 31, 6465
Catherine II (the Great, empress of
Russia) 362 n45
Cato, Marcus Porcius, the Younger
127
Chvez, Hugo 570571
Cicero 126127, 132133, 135
Clastres, Pierre 66, 68
Cliord, James 447, 477
Cohn, Norman 291292, 305

708

index of persons

Colley, L. 365
Collor de Mello, Fernando 570
Comte, Auguste 613, 615, 669
Conno, Michael 17
Conni, Michael 570
Constantine (Roman emperor) 140,
341
Cook, M. 311
Cooley, Charles H. 487, 531
Coulborn, Rushton 666
Crates 135
Crmieux, Adolphe 523
Crozier, M. 557
Dahl, Robert 557, 566, 577
Dahrendorf, Ralf 13, 540, 559, 566
DAndrea, ? 597598
Darmsteter, James 523
Darwin, Charles 275
Das, Venkata Rama 401
Davies, Norman 531532
Delanty, Gerard 20
Delgado, Adriana 577
Denkha Shah 399
Derenbourg, Joseph 518
Descartes, Ren 41, 223, 239
Deutsch, Karl 52
Dewey, John 172 n1, 575, 669
Dhu Nuwaas 509
Diogenes of Sinope (the Cynic) 503
Dittakavi, Narayanakavi 398 n10
Douglas, Mary 178
Dreyfus, Alfred 369 n1
Dumont, Louis 8586, 210211
Durkheim, Emile 23, 10, 25,
6567, 126, 157, 171172 n1,
178, 232, 487, 518, 527, 540,
605610, 611615, 618619, 621,
626627, 630631, 633, 639, 666,
669670
Dworkin, R. 307308
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N. ix, xixxiii, 3,
6, 25, 63, 71, 83, 103, 120, 122,
125, 132, 141, 174175, 184,
191192, 200, 205, 223224,
227228, 245, 252, 258, 287288,
292, 295297, 309312, 332, 334,
338, 344, 409, 411, 415, 443,
461462, 472473, 476, 481,
483488, 490, 498, 505, 509, 555,
557578, 606610, 616, 631,
657661, 666670
Eliade, Mircea 66

Elias, Norbert 2, 27, 41, 639, 670

Eliot, T.S. 183, 600
Engelstein, Laura 348
Engineer, Ashgar Ali 546
Entzinger, Han 12
Epictetus 503
Erasmus, Desiderius 41, 223
Eusebius 361
Faubion, James D. 32
Fedor I (tsar of Russia) 352
Ferguson, James 146, 478
Filaret (patriarch of Moscow) 355 n27
Fini, Gianfranco 573
Finley, M.I. 129
Florovsky, Georges 340
Fontana, J. 599
Fortuyn, Pim 197
Fotopoulous, T. 213
Foucault, Michel 41, 646
Fowler, Warde 137
Franck, Adolphe 518
Frank, Andre Gunder 464
Frankel, Zacharias 521
Freeze, Gregory 357, 358
Frentzel-Zagorska, Janina 495
Freud, Anna 178
Freud, Sigmund 2, 670
Fromm, Erich 10, 176
Fronto 127
Fujimori, Alberto 570
Fukuyama, Francis 306, 415
Fuller, Steve 446
Gaborieau, Marc 546
Gadamer, Hans-Georg 80, 445,
447448, 450
Gajapati, Ananda (king of
Vizianagaram) 401, 403, 410411
Gandhi, Mohandas (Mahatma)
504506, 511
Gans, Edouard 520
Gans, Herbert 201
Gaon, Saadia 367
Garca, Alan 570
Gauchet, Marcel 6476, 78, 80, 86
Gaudiosi, Monica 314
Gay, Robert 569
Gellius, Aulus 127
Gellner, Ernest 224, 311, 365, 487,
489490
George I (king of Greece) 343 n5
Germani, Gino 573
al-Ghazali, Abu Hamid 508

index of persons
Gibb, H.A.R. 315, 321
Giddens, A. 175 n14, 498
Giesen, Bernhard 13, 667
Gijsbert, M. 496
Glazer, Nathan 200201
Goetschell, Rolland 22
Gouldner, Alvin 475
Goyard-Fabre, S. 621
Graham, Richard 568
Gramsci, Antonio 143144, 467
Greeley, A. 205
Gregory I (the Great, pope) 345346
Gregory VII (pope) 346
Grgoire, Henri 515
Gundelach, Peter 492493
Guzman, Dominic 302
Habermas, Jrgen 202, 228, 448,
537, 575
Hall, Stuart 446
Handelman, Don 400 n16
Hannerz, Ulf 20, 473474
Hardenberg, Karl August von 516
Harris, W.V. 130
Hartz, L. 44
Havel, Vaclav 532
Hayek, F. von 606, 632
Heesterman, Jan 80, 410
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 96,
102 n13, 108, 143, 275, 618, 664 n1
Heidegger, Martin 93, 97
Heilbron, Johan 8586, 446
Held, David 542
Herder, Johann Gottfried von 487,
664 n1
Hervieu-Lger, Danile 16, 383
Herzl, Theodor 420
Hill, Christopher 292
Himmelstrand, Ulf 488490
Hintze, Otto 96
Hirsch, Samson Raphal 521522
Hirschman, Albert 562
Hobsbawm, E. 365
Hodgson, Marshall 6061, 101,
311313
Homans, George 290291
Hoppenhayn, Martin 563564
Horowitz, D. 417
Hu, T.E. 313, 323 n5
Hughes, E.C. 197
Hleg (Mongol Emperor) 323
Hume, David 142, 228, 624
Huntington, Samuel 2627, 150, 185,
415, 534, 557, 613

709

Ibn Khaldun 311

Ibn Moshkuya 322
Ibn Taymiyya 321, 323325, 508 n5
Ignatie, Michael 481
Inglehart, R. 625626
Inkeles, Alex 33
Innocent III (Pope) 302
Iser, W. 445
Isral, Grard 299
Jabotinsky, Vladimir (Zeev) 420
James, William 187
Jaspers, Karl 7, 7172, 97, 102103,
105106, 108, 110, 112, 120, 122,
296, 586, 596
Jepperson, Ron 646
Jinnah, Muhammed Ali 504, 546
Joas, Hans 85
John Paul II (Pope) 507, 597
Julian (Roman emperor) 140
Justinian (Roman emperor) 132,
341344
Kakar, Sudhir 546547
Kano, Jigoro 506
Kant, Immanuel 96, 142, 175, 228,
588, 614615, 624625, 629
Karpovich, Michael 342 n4, 352353,
354 n25, 355 n28
Katz, E. 383
Kavolis, Vytautas 666
Kazhdan, Alexander 345
Keane, John 146
Kelsky, K. 478
Kennedy, John F. 301n 18
Khan, Badshah (Khan Abd al Ghaar)
511
Kivisto, Peter 498
Kliuchevskii, Vasilii O. 354 n25,
355 n28
Kluckhohn, Clyde 1
Knapp, Peter 566
Kocka, Jrgen 9
Kolakowski, Leszek 652653
Konrad, George 475
Koselleck, Reinhart 8485, 87, 122
Kries, von ? 276
Kroeber, Alfred 666
Krsna-kavi, Kakaraparti 412
Lane, George 313
Lang, R.D. 175 n14
Lasker, Edouard 517518, 522
Lavn, Joaqun 570, 573

710

index of persons

Le Roy Ladurie, E. 290 n6, 299 n15

Lea, H.C. 307
Lefort, Claude 34, 6465
Leibowicz, J. 379
Lerner, Dan 33
Lvi-Strauss, Claude 66, 366
Levine, Donald N. 21
Levy, S. 383
Lvy-Bruhl, Lucien 606, 615
Lichtenstein, Aaron 511
Liebman, C.S. 383
Lijphart, A. 200
Linder, D.M. 137
Lipset, S.M. 491
Lissak, M. 417
Livy 127, 133, 137
Longinus, Gaius Cassius 133
Louis XVI (king of France) 515
Louis XVIII (king of France) 515
Louis Philippe (king of France) 516
Luhmann, Niklas 454
Lukacs, G. 172
Lukes, Steven 487
Luther, Martin 288, 291, 614

Mikhail Romanov (tsar of Russia)

354, 355 n27
Miles, Robert 198
Mill, John Stuart 228, 273 n28
Miller, Perry 177 n20, n21
Milosevic, S. 628
Mirabeau, Honor Gabriel Riqueti,
Comte de 149
Mitzman, A. 176 n17
Mohammad II (Khwrazm Sh) 317
Momigliano, A. 135
Mommsen, Wilhelm 1
Montaigne, Michel Eyquem de 41,
223
Montesquieu, Charles-Louis de 458,
612, 621, 629
Moore, G.E. 624
Morris, Ivan 505
Moue, Chantall 577
Moynihan, Daniel 200201
Munck, Salomon 518
Mntzer, Thomas 291
Murad, Abdal-Hakim 511
Musil, Robert 404

Machonin, P. 494
Macintyre, Alisdair 445
Mackenzie, Colonel ? 398
McNeill, William 101
Magidor, Menachem xi
Maimonides, Moses 299
Mair, Peter 497
Makdisi, George 314315
Mallia, Martin 652
Manent, Pierre 8586
Mannheim, Karl 669670
Marcus Aurelius 126127
Marr, Wilhelm 524
Marshall, T.H. 627
Martinelli, Alberto 24
Marx, Karl 12, 143, 157, 171172,
288, 669
Maurer, Georg von 361 n42
Mauss, Marcel 3, 67
Meerson, Michael A. 350351
Meinecke, Friedrich 96
Melko, Matthew 666
Melucci, Alberto 492493
Mendelssohn, Moses 142
Menem, Carlos 570
Merton, Robert K. 474 n11
Merton, Walter de 314
Meyendor, John 351
Meyer, John 646

Nadeau, R. 632
Nagorski, Andrew 536
Nandy, Ashis 480
Napoleon Bonaparte 515, 526
Narayana Rao, Velcheru 396, 402,
404
Nash, Kate 493
al-Nsir li-Din Allh 316319
Nava, M. 478
Nelli, R. 299 n16
Nelson, Benjamin 297 n13, 666
Nicholas XI (tsar of Russia) 363
Niemoeller, Martin 507, 512
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm 171,
176, 630
Nieuwbeerts, P. 496
Nikon (patriarch of Moscow) 354,
358, 362
Nino, Carlos 565
North, J. 136
Oberoi, Harjot 549
ODonnell, G. 572
Oenbach, Rachel and Jacques 518
Oommen, T.K. 910
Oron, A. 383
Oszlak, Oscar 565
Otto I (king of Greece) 343 n5,
361 n42

index of persons
Pagden, Anthony 531
Panaetius 135
Pandey, Gyanendra 545
Papadakis, Aristeides 25, 354, 361
n42
Parekh, B. 202
Pareto, Vilfredo 605
Parsons, Talcott 84, 91, 97, 104, 171,
232, 483, 665, 667669
Pascal, Blaise 622
Pascal, Pierre 354 n26, 358, 614
Paul (Apostle) 283284, 506
Peda Vijaya Rama Raja (king of
Vizianagaram) 399
Peter I (the Great, tsar of Russia)
349, 355, 358361
Pharr, Susan 557
Pinochet, U.A. 628
Piot, Charles 478
Pipes, Richard 341 n3, 347
Plato 133, 322, 503
Plutarch 127
Polanyi, Karl 86
Polybius 130
Popkin, S. 162, 610611
Popper, Karl 224, 605, 618, 624
Posidonius 136
Price, S. 136
Prokopovich, Feofan 355356
Przeworski, Adam 557, 566
Putman, Robert 557
Quigley, Carroll 3
Qutb, Sayyid 508
Radbruch, Gustav 276
Rajasekhara 403
Ram, U. 440 n21
Ramet, Pedro 340
Randeria, Shalini xivxxiii
Ranger, T. 365
Rani, Riva 402
Ranke, Leopold von 96
Ratosh, Y. 387
Rawls, John 175
Redeld, Robert 666
Rickert, Heinrich 276
Ricoeur, Paul 449
Rie, Philip 175 n14
Robinson, Francis 324
Rokkan, Stein 491, 585
Roniger, Luis 23
Rudolph, E. 591
Runciman, W.G. 8

711

Sa'di of Shiraz 314

Sahlins, P. 365
Said, Edward 474, 534
Saint-Simon, Claude Henri de
Rouvroy, Comte de 288 n2, 290
Santarama 397
Santos, Boaventura de 577
Sarney, Jos 570 n5
Sartre, J.P. 176 n17, 336, 637
Saussure, Ferdinand de 178
Scheid, J. 137
Schlesinger, Arthur 225
Schluchter Wolfgang 15, 103
Schmitt, Carl 187
Schnapper, Dominique 12, 386
Schneider, D.M. 638
Schwartz, Benjamin 80, 103, 106
Seidman, S. 174 n8
Sen, Amartya 612
Seneca, Lucius Annaeus 135
Shafer, B.C. 365
Shapiro, Y. 439
Shils, Edward xvi, 462464, 472
Shulman, David 19, 400 n16
Siebeck, Paul 266267
Silvan, E. 330
Simmel, Georg 156157, 162, 611,
618, 663667, 669
Simon, Janos 496
Smelser, Neil 467
Smith, Adam 142, 612, 669
Smith, Anthony 366
Smooha, Sammy 19
Sofer, Hatam (Moses) 521
SohravardiShaykh 'Omar 318
Sombart, W. 44
Sorokin, Pitirim 290, 483, 666
Souvarine, Boris 359 n40
Spencer, Herbert 669
Spengler, Oswald 97, 483, 666
Spohn, Willfried 287 n1
Stalin, Iosif 358
Stammler, Rudolf 270
Stehr, Nico 662
Stein, Karl von 516
Sternberger, Dolf 228
Sternhell, Z. 439 n20
Stoecker, Adolf 524
Strauss, Genevive Halevi 523
Strauss, Leo 617
Studt 524
Subramanyam, Sanjay 101
Sudarsky, John 565
Sukale, M. 619

712

index of persons

Summer, William Graham 501

Suranna, Pingali 403
Syme, R. 130
Szeftel, Marc 353, 362
Sztompka, Piotr xiixiii, 23
Tacitus 130, 133
Tadmor, Hayim xixii
Tambiah, Stanley J. 23, 549
Tarrow, Sydney 574575
Taylor, Charles 490
Taylor, P. 4
Tekish (Khwrazm Sh) 317
Tenbruck, Friedrich H. 275
Thackeray, Bal 549550
Therborn, Goran 492, 597
Theroux, Paul 474
Thomas, William Isaac 540
Tikhon (patriarch of Moscow) 357
Tiryakian, Edward A. 15, 39, 177
n20
Tocqueville, Alexis de 86, 143, 216,
227, 527, 575, 669
Todorov, T. 210
Togril III (Seljuk Sultan) 317
Tnnies, Ferdinand 487
Torricelli, Evangelista 622, 625
Toulmin, Stephen 41
Touraine, Alain 13, 492493, 662
Toynbee, Arnold 3, 97, 99, 345,
360361, 483, 666
Treitschke, Heinrich von 524
Troeltsh, Ernst 330
Turner, Victor 472
Tusi, Nasir al-Din 313, 316,
319323
Tyler, Anne 474
Ueshiba, Morihei 506, 508, 512
Ulmann, Salomon 522
Varma, Madhava 398
Varshney, Ashutosh 546547
Vernant, Jean-Pierre 79
Vivekananda, Swami 406

Voegelin, Eric 103

Voltaire 96, 288
Wagner, Peter 41, 85
Wahhab Najdi, Mohammed Ibn Abdul
508 n5
Waisman, Carlos 572
Waldo, Peter 301
Wallerstein, Immanuel 293, 464, 662
Walsh, James 289290
Walzer, M. 175
Wardle, Huon 477
Watanuki, J. 557
Weber, Alfred 103, 122, 483, 666
Weber, Max xvixvii, 10, 15, 25,
3132, 35, 41, 43, 45, 65, 76, 97,
122, 132, 134135, 157, 171,
176178, 206, 232, 261285,
287288, 293, 295, 304, 309310,
486, 490491, 498, 540, 594,
605606, 612, 615621, 623626,
631633, 640, 664668, 670
Wehler, Hans-Ulrich 86
Weil, Eric 209
Weingrod, A. 381
Weiss, Johannes 584
Werblowsky, Zvi 11
Wescott, Roger 666
Wilkomirski, Benjamin 254
Wilson, J. 614615
Wittgenstein, Ludwig Josef Johann
446
Wittrock, Bjrn 8, 295296, 297 n13,
305, 312313
Wokler, Robert 88, 96 n4
Wolf, Emmanuel 519520
Wortman, Richard 363
Yavorksy, Stefan 355
Yossef, Ovadia 381382
Yusuf, Hamza 511
Zapf, W. 494
Zhivov, Viktor 362 n44
Zunz, Lopold 520

INDEX OF SUBJECTS
Abbasid Caliphate 117316
absence, of limits 586588, 594, 599
absenteeism, electoral 567
absolute relativism 605
absolutizing tendencies, in modern
collective identities 650652
The Absorption of Immigrants (Eisenstadt)
200
abstractions, of modernity 171
accountability 69
public, in Latin America 567
acculturation 5
Achaemenid Empire (Iran) 111,
116117
activists
inuential 641, 644645
political 36
armative action 226
Africa, nation states in 159
agency
concept of 492
societal 528
agentiality 120
Agrarian Conditions in Antiquity (Weber)
261
agriculture, basis of civilizations
149150
Agudat Israel 376377
aid, Western, received by Israel
419420
Akhlq-e Nseri (Tusi) 322323
Albigensian Crusade 302303
Albigensians see Catharism
Algeria, citizenship in 209
alienation 12, 172
Alliance Israelite Universale 523524
alternative modernities 93, 173174,
589
alternatives
to multiculturalism 201204
to Westernization 442
ambivalence
in social life 467
to social order 642
Americas
modernity in 4445
see also Canada; Latin America;
United States

Anabaptists 291
Ancient Judaism (Weber) 262
animals, rights of 213
anthropology
ethnocentrism in 611612
methods, used in sociology xvi,
xviiixix, 290, 461, 471
theories of pollution and taboo
178
anti-Americanism 534
anti-globalization movements 144
in Latin America 554555
anti-Hellenism, in Bulgaria 348 n15
anti-Judaism 283 n54
anti-modernism 173, 242, 670
of Roman Catholic church 594
anti-Semitism
in Bulgaria 348 n15
in France 524525
in Germany 524525
modern 368369
Western 418
in Christianity 506507
anti-Westernism 324325, 440
in Communist Eastern Europe 536
antinomies, of modernity 40
antiquity
capitalism of 261 n1
Webers analysis of 283
anxieties
of autonomy and self-control 178
existential 637
ontological 175n 14
apartheid 194 n1
Arab-Israeli conict 385, 388,
439440, 510511
Arabs, in Israel 385386, 424425
archetypal gures 1314, 250, 258
Archiv fr Sozialwissenschaft und
Sozialpolitik 263264, 268, 269 n17
Argentina
neo-liberalism in 563 n4
privatizations in 565566
Aristotilianism, political 320321
Armenians, Turkish genocide of 258
asceticism
in Middle Ages 301
in modernity 175176, 179

714

index of subjects

Asia
culture of, Webers analysis of
274275
South
Buddhism in 122
Islam in 551
modernity in 157158
assimilation 5
civic 12, 202
Assyria 70
astronomy 313
asymmetries, in center-periphery
relationships 471
atomism 608
Attic Nights (Aulus Gellius) 127
authenticity, search for 217, 221
authoritarian regimes see totalitarian
regimes
autocephaly, in Eastern Orthodox
Church 350
autocratic regimes, political processes
in 36
autonomy 6465, 615, 633
of elites 310311
human behavior reecting 615
of man 33, 4041
problems generated by 68
and self-control, anxieties of 178
of universities in Europe 320
axial age 68, 80, 102103, 174
chronology of 5859
civilizations 11, 292 n8, 484, 668
Chinese 81, 115, 118, 121122
Jewish 509
non-axial 113, 121122
research into 63, 102104
concept of 105107, 111112,
484
cultural crystallization in 104,
107
debates on 5758
extensions of 296
Gauchets analysis of 66, 7076
and history
global 119123, 312
origins of 107109
legacies of 11, 6162, 75, 173
political order in 118
imperial 104, 110112, 116119
reexivity in 106, 112, 118119
religion in 104, 109110, 640
self-denitions in 62
state formation in 80
theories of 175

transcendental and mundane order

in 106, 112, 116, 174175
transformations in 5960, 7172,
75, 78, 80, 103107, 112119,
125
continuities with pre-axial
civilizations 108110
imperial political orders 104,
110112, 116119
monotheistic innovations 61, 73,
81
political 104, 296 n11
axiological ideas, selection of 623
Ayodhya dispute (India) 547549
Bacchanalian Conspiracy (Rome,
186 BCE) 127
Balkan states, church and state in 343
barbarians, dichotomy with Greeks
503
barbarism, and modernity 11, 55,
92, 172, 179, 652
behavior see human behavior
Being and Nothingness (Sartre) 336
Belgium
democracy in 432
pillarization in 194
beliefs
collective 632
and human behavior 540
Berlin Wall 537
Beyond the Melting Pot (Glazer &
Moynihan) 200201
Bilhaniyam (Apparao) 402
binary thinking, in modernity
176179
BJP political party (India) 548
Blood and Belonging (Ignatie ) 481
Bolivia, neo-populism in 573574
borders
European 532
between East and Central
537538
between East and West 537
of states 416417
boundaries
of collectivities 37, 529, 635, 641,
644645
construction of 530, 635, 640
crossing of 639
in social reality 249250
societal, in Israel 417
bourgeois societies 87
bourgeoisie revolution 161

index of subjects
Brahmins
absence of, in Vizianagaram 400
compared to Levites 279
purity of 504
Brazil, democracy in 558, 573,
576577
Brhadaranyaka Upanisad 406407
brides, sold in marriage, in India
402403
Brides for Sale see Kanyasulkam (Brides for
Sale, Apparao)
bronze age, crisis of 7879
Buddhism
in Japan 185186
Mahayana 109, 121122
in South Asia 122
Buddhist nationalism, in Sri Lanka
551
Bulgaria
anti-Hellenism and anti-Semitism
in 348 n15
Eastern Orthodox Church in
348 n13
bureaucratic organizations 357
Byzantine Empire 117, 340345
Byzantine heritage, of Russia 360
caesaropapism 344345
caliphates
Abbasid 117, 316
and monarchy 316317
theories of 315, 318, 321
Calvinism 175, 288
Canaanites 387388
Canada, attitudes towards immigration
197
capitalism 587
of antiquity 261 n1
criticism of, role of civil society
144145
development of 293
in Europe 540, 591592
rationality of 153
transition from Communism to
494497
caste model, of Jewish religious identity
367368, 370371, 389
caste system, in India 15, 278,
504
Catharism 1516, 299 n16,
300301, 304
and Protestantism 304305
Catholicism 291
in France 336

715

heterodox challenges to 301303

repression of heresy 302304
use of Latin in 351
see also Roman Catholic Church
cause, notion of 610
Center and Periphery (Shils) 463
centers
and periphery relationships 20, 35,
462467, 472
in anthropology 471
and cosmopolitanism 479480
in Europe 590
of societies
charismatization of 35
toleration of pluralism by 46
themes of protest incorporated in
3536
Central European University (Budapest)
xviixviii
certainty, recreation of 571
Chandogya Upanisad 406407
change
political 8687, 230
of regime, post-socialist 494
social 667
structural 669670
in value-systems 540541
see also transformations
charismatic activities 637638
charismatic innovators 511512
charismatization, of centers of societies
35
Chile
neo-liberalism in 563 n4
neo-populism in 573
Chinese civilization
axial 81, 115, 118, 121122
contacts with Eurasia 60
contacts with Islamic civilization
313
cultural dominance over Japan
185186
Han Empire 111
pre-axial 7980, 110
Western views of 160
Chosen People
Jewish people as 368, 509510
Christianity 109, 122
and Communism 618
communitarianism in 594
early 283284
in Europe 331, 333, 335, 593595
fundamentalism in 291 n7
individualism in 618

716

index of subjects

and resignation and humility

doctrines 347
in Roman Empire 125126,
139140
universal love ideal in 506
Webers analysis of 15
Western 74
anti-Semitism in 506507
and Western civilization 3, 61,
6566
see also Anabaptists; Calvinism;
Catholicism; Eastern Orthodox
Church; Protestantism; Roman
Catholic Church
chronology
of axial age 5859
of books of the Old Testament
279280
church and state see religions and
politics
cities
in India, Hindu-Muslim riots in
547
in Latin America, security problems
in 560
in Middle Ages 294
modern life in 156
Western 295
world 465, 472
citizens
equality of 90, 207, 210211,
215217, 225, 244, 431432,
588589, 616
in Israel 431432
sovereignty of 208
citizenship 616617, 633, 646
classic 206207, 218, 220
cosmopolitan 542
in democracies 207208, 210
and equal rights 209210, 217
in France 207208, 212, 218,
386
multiple 601
and nationality 162, 197198,
209, 212213, 219, 542543
and rationality 210211
societies based on 219
transnational 543
universality of 212, 237
utopian dimensions of 12, 211212
violations of 95
city states 77
civic assimilation 12, 202
civic religion, in United States 227

civil society
concept of 9, 141, 145147, 235
modern 141143
normative dimensions of 142,
146
and criticism
anti-dictatorial 143144
of capitalism 144145
emergence of 651
in France, Jews in 518
in Germany
Jews in 518520
Weimar Republic 147
in Japan 46
and market 146, 152
relationships with polity and society
88
and self-organization 142, 144
semantic revival of 143144
and the state 142143
and voluntary associations 142,
574575
civility theme, in collective identities
640
civilizational integration, of Near East
61
civilizations 3, 149151, 158,
483484, 501
axial 11, 292 n8, 484, 668
research into 63, 102104
Chinese 60, 7981, 110111,
115, 118, 121122, 160, 185186,
313
clashes between 150, 166, 186,
502, 510, 512, 534, 551552
comparative analysis of ix, xv, 13,
287 n1, 292 n8, 294, 296297,
309, 310, 666, 668
historical 5763, 121122, 312
and cultures 12
European 9, 290292, 456457,
486, 502, 532, 584
exclusionary versus inclusionary
concepts in 502512
Indian 62, 7980, 108, 115116,
118
Iranian 62, 111, 116118, 313314,
316
Islamic 117, 311313, 315321,
324325, 453
Jewish 509
of modernity 6, 31, 287289,
297298, 305306, 670
and modes of production 149150

index of subjects
non-axial 113, 121122
non-Western 186
pluralism of 35
post-axial 118, 296
pre-axial 58, 7879, 108110
regional basis of 150
and religions 3, 149
Roman 89, 456, 502
Western 3, 61, 6566, 150, 290,
314, 415
see also intercivilizational relations
civilized man, images of 3839, 646
civilizing mission
of colonialism 159, 533
of globalization 163
civilizing process 2, 27, 142
clan ties 295
classes
conicts between 154155, 492
politics of 156
clietelism, neo, in Latin America
568569, 578
co-evolution 139
codes
of collective identities 639641,
645, 648
cultural 257258, 336337
cognitive rationality 620621
Cold War 161162
collective beliefs 632
collective guilt 256, 257258
collective identities 245246, 366367,
527, 528531
codes of 639641, 645, 648
construction of 22, 2526,
248249, 631, 636, 638643,
650651
and cultural translations 447
in modernity 2526, 3738, 88,
542, 635, 644653
reconstruction of 14, 559, 571,
643
symbolic representations of 14,
247258
collective memories 253254, 647
collective trauma 256
collectivism
modern 154155
in Western Europe 540
collectivities 635636
boundaries of 37, 529, 636, 641,
644645
membership of 639
national 645646

717

Colombia, democracy in 558,

567568
colonial revolution 161
colonialism
civilizing mission of 159, 533
and globalization 10, 159161
in New World 160
source of modernity 157
values and institutions produced by
160161
The Colors of Violence (Kakar) 546547
The Comet (Apparao) 408
common good
idea of 322323
multiple interpretations of 34, 223
communality 245246
communication 21, 235, 448, 541
Communism 651652
and Christianity 618
in Eastern Europe 535536
transition to capitalism and
democracy 494497
and modernity 152153, 161162,
491, 652
peoples democracies in 623
Communism and Modernity (Arnason) 494
communitarianism 167, 594
communities 1213, 157, 167, 199
comparative analysis
of civilizations ix, xv, 13, 60, 62,
121, 287 n1, 292 n8, 294,
296297, 309310, 666, 668
of cultures 258
of institutions xvi
of societies 665
comparative sociology 126, 138
of religions 272273
Comparative Studies of World Religions
(Weber) see Gesammelte Aufstze zur
Religionssoziologie (Weber)
comparisons 273
compensation theories, of ethnic and
religious revival in modernity 206,
217
complex societies, studies of xvi, xviii
concepts
construction of 271, 273
exclusionary versus inclusionary, in
civilizations 502512
spatial, civilizations as 158
supraindividual 664
conicts 1112
between Arabs and Israelis 385,
388, 439440, 510511

718

index of subjects

between civilizations 150, 166, 186,

502, 510, 512, 534, 551552
between classes 154155, 492
between communities 167
ethnic 56, 187, 649
ethno-nationalist 546552
between Hindus and Muslims 23,
545552
between Hindus and Sikhs 549
international 55
in Israeli society 391392
and pluralism 13, 225
political 493
religious 11, 187
between Sinhalese and Tamils in
Sri Lanka 550551
Confucianism 108, 115
conquest 6970, 129130
consensus, in social life 463
conservatism, of Roman elite 131
consociational democracy 432
Constantinople, Patriarchate of 352
The Constitution of Communalism in colonial
North India (Pandey) 545
constitutional patriotism 228, 531
constitutional theory 322
in Islamic civilization 317318, 321
constitutions
European 532533, 582
Greek 361 n42
in Israel 375, 387 n15, 431
constructivist views 665
consumer protection 564
contestations, role in development 114
conversion
of Constantine to Christianity 140,
341
of Jews to other faiths 390 n16
to Islam, in India 552
to Judaism 390 n17, n18
converts 334
cores see centers
coronation rituals, in Russia 363
cosmocentric views, of the universe 151
cosmologies 106107, 118119
cosmopolitan citizenship 542
cosmopolitanism 462, 473481
humanitarian 503
Cosmopolitans and Locals in World Culture
(Hannerz) 473474
counter-culture 292
counterows, from peripheries to
centers 471472
courtesans, in India 407

covenants with God 177

notion in Judaism 509511
creativity xxiii, 67
in metropolis 20, 463464
creolization 462, 467473
Crete, Minoan, divine kingship in 78
criminal policies, and social control
626627
critical sociology 39
criticism
of America 177 n21
anti-dictatorial, in Eastern Europe
143144
of capitalism 144145
of modernity 173
see also anti-modernism
of modernization theories 669
of multiple modernities notion 669
of structural analysis 92, 95
Critique and Crisis (Koselleck) 87
Critique of Pure Reason (Kant) 624
crusades 302303
cultural codes
of Judeo-Christian tradition
257258
of religion, in Europe 336337
cultural crystallization
in axial age 104, 107
in Middle Ages 296
and modernity 83
periods of 93, 113, 119, 121123
cultural dialogue 458
cultural homogenization 338, 450,
469, 630
see also global culture
cultural ideals 670
cultural identities 493
cultural imperialism 469
cultural orientations 59
cultural pluralism 186, 337
cultural plurality 186187
cultural policies 214
cultural programs of modernity 21,
3134, 295, 644
tensions in 3943, 49
cultural reality 268269
cultural relativism 166, 309 n1
cultural rights 220, 238239
demands for 240242
cultural roots, of European identity
586595
cultural translations
and collective identities 447
and intercultural dierences 449

index of subjects
and modernity 20, 444, 447,
450455
in Europe 444445, 455460
theories of 444450
cultural trauma 9495, 540
cultures 449, 527
and civilizations 12
comparative analysis of 258
counter 292
of critical discourse 475
European 480
global 20, 338, 444, 450452,
472473
and religion 336337
Roman 127129
and society 59, 463
third 449
customs, norms derived from 629
Daedalus ( journal) 103, 106
Daoism 115, 122
de-civilizing processes 27
de-historicisation 243
de-modernization, and de-secularization
329
de-ontologization, of the political 411
de-politization, of economics 563564
de-socialization 233234
de-Westernization 228, 460
death 253
debates
on axial age 5758
Fischer-Rachfahl 261
on headscarfs in France 241242
Declaration of the Rights of Man and
Citizen (France, 1789) 207,
237238
defense mechanisms, theories of 178
denitions 484
self, in axial age 62
delegative democracy 572
democracies xxiii, 191, 578
citizenship in 207208, 210
consociational 432
delegative 572
disenchantment with 556557, 567
Durkheim on 65
and equality of citizens 211, 213
ethnicity in 12, 206, 208, 217221,
432, 435
in Europe 488489, 494498,
593
foundation myths of 251
fragility of 557558, 562

719

inherent tensions of 12, 208,

216219, 221
irreversibility of idea of 623
in Islamic world 16
in Israel 430433
in Latin America 2324, 553558,
567568, 574, 576579
liberal 172, 432
and participation 567, 575577
and particularism 4, 207, 217221
and pluralism 13, 220221, 223
political legitimacy in 207
and political parties 496497
refusal of limits in 212217
and representation 566568, 593
in socialist states 162
theories of 576577
utopian dimensions of 216217
Weber on 176177
Democratic Revolution 91
demography, of Israel 422425
Denmark, attitudes towards
immigration 197
destruction
of social order 13
of social spheres 233234
destructive potentialities
of construction of collective
identities 2526, 642643,
650651
of construction of realm of sacred
637
of modernity 5556, 635, 649653
development 413414
of capitalism 293
economic
of Eastern Europe 534
of Israel 426428
paths of 113119
social 2
Webers concept of 275276
dialogue 21, 501
cultural 458
human, paradigm of 667
intercivilizational 312
diarchy, in Russia 353355, 361
Diaspora
Jewish
in the West 419
and Zionism 373374, 386387
Polish, in the West 538539
dichotomies
between Greeks and barbarians 503
between Jews and goyyim 509

720

index of subjects

between modernity and tradition

151, 157, 166
between Orient and Occident
156160, 458, 534
in Western sociological theories
486487
dictatus papae (Gregory VII) 346
dierentiation
social 152
structural 5254, 152154
diuse rationalization 625627
diusion, of world religions 109110
dignity
of criminals 627
of man 619, 628629, 633
violations of 9495
sense of 609
discourses
cultures of critical 475
of modernity 47, 56, 90
transformations in 8485, 88
public 91
of social sciences 8788, 9697
discrepant cosmopolitanisms 477
disenchantment 274275, 277278
with democratic system 556557,
567
processes of 43, 633
displacement syndromes 164
diversity
in Europe 532, 585
of nation-states 648
unity achieved through 600
in world society 169
see also pluralism
divine kingship 7679, 251
in Vizianagaram 410412
The Division of Labor in Society
(Durkheim) 171 n1
Division of Social Labor (Durkheim)
606607
divisions
in Europe 533, 537538
social 171
doctrines
of Eastern Orthodox Church
347349
of humanitarian cosmopolitanism
503
of world state 503
Dominicans 302, 319
Dreyfus aair 369, 524
dual sovereignty, in Islamic civilization
316317

dualist transcendental visions 299301

dualistic-agential path of development
116118
duality
in Latin American societies
575576
of reality 154
Duhem-Quine thesis 625
East see Orient
Eastern Europe
civil society in 143144
Communism in 535536
transition to capitalism and
democracy 494497
early syndrome 535536
identities in 527528, 534543
origins of Zionism in 439
relations
with United States 538
with Western Europe 23, 534,
536537, 539541
religion and politics in 17, 339363
satellite mentality in 536
Eastern Orthodox Church 17
Greek Orthodox Church 347348,
361 n42
internal organization of 349351
Russian Orthodox Church 352363
ecclesiastical reform, by Peter I
355356, 358361
economic analysis, of cultural reality
268269
economic development
of Eastern Europe 534
of Israel 426428
economic ethics, of world religions
272273
economic history 270, 293
economic integration, of European
Union 601
economic reasoning, shifts in 89
economic systems, disappearance of
234235
economics
de-politization of 563564
political 464465
Economy and Society (Grundri der
Sozialkonomik, Weber) 262267,
270, 272, 277
Ecuador, neo-populism in 573574
Ecumenical Councils, in Eastern
Orthodox Church 349
ecumenical renaissance 296, 313

index of subjects
education, in Israel 425426
Egypt, ancient 7677
elections, in Latin America 567
The Elementary Forms of Religious Life
(Durkheim) 6667
elites
autonomy of 310311
in Colombia 558
in Eastern Europe 535536
in Islamic civilization 324
in Israel 373375, 381, 422, 433
in Japan 51
in Latin America 553554
in modern societies 5152
as religious forces 391
in Roman Empire 126128, 131,
137
in South Asia 157
and transcendent ideals 502
elitist theories, of democracy 576577
emancipation
of Jews
in France 515516, 525526
in Germany 516518, 525526
of man 3233
emigration
from Latin America 561562
from Poland 538539
of Jews from Russia 384
emotion
and rationality 40
see also romanticism
emperors, in Byzantine empire 341,
343
empires, political systems of
see imperial political orders
empirical observations 247
Encyclopdistes 142
England see United Kingdom
Enlightenment
historiography 267, 288 n2
Jewish 371 n3
and otherness 457458
Epic of Gilgamesh 70
equality
of citizens 90, 207, 209211,
215217, 225, 244, 588589, 616
in Israel 431432
in democracies 211, 213
and freedom 589
esotericism, in Kalinga region
397398
Essays on the Physical, Moral, and Political
Regeneration of the Jews (Grgoire) 515

721

Essays in the Sociology of Religion (Weber)

263, 265267, 272, 616
Estonia, Western modernity in 442
ethics
Confucian 108
economic 272273
Greek 503
of law 279
modern 177178
rationality in 40, 620, 626
religious 274, 279 n45, 281, 310
Ethics (Aristotle) 322
Ethics (Tusi) 321
ethnic conicts 56, 187, 649
ethnic identities see ethnicity
ethnic nationalism
conicts of 546552
in Estonia 442
in India 546
in Israel 435436, 439440
ethnic revival, theories of 205206,
211, 217
ethnicity
administrators 214
in democracies 12, 206, 208,
217219, 432, 435
and geography 188
in Israel 380
in modern societies 205206, 208,
214215, 218
ethnicization, of public policy 1213
ethno-religions 328
ethno-transcendence 117
ethnocentrism 21, 501502
in social sciences 611612
ethnography, of cosmopolitanism
477478
Eurasia, contacts of Chinese civilization
with 60
Eurocentrism
in comparative civilizational analysis
63
in global history 9697, 293
ideology of 533
in philosophy of history 102 n13
Europe
borders of 532, 537538
capitalism in 540, 591592
citizenship in 543
democracy in 488489, 494498,
593
diversity 532, 585
divisions in 533, 537538
hegemony of 293294

722

index of subjects

heterodoxy versus orthodoxy in

297298, 302, 304
history of 457, 532, 585586, 597
individualism in 586, 588590
modernity in xx, 21, 85, 87,
9093, 157, 158, 443, 485486,
498499, 597
confrontation with other
civilizations 5051
and cultural translations
444445, 455460
and European identity 581, 583,
586588, 590595
multiple 487488, 490
rationalism versus romanticism
486491
religious 332, 334338
movements of protest in 292, 336
multiculturalism in 196
nation-state in 592593
non-Western origins of 456
and the Orient 159, 458
political philosophy in 141, 320
politics in 491
post-modernity in 21, 491494
post-Westerness of 459460
rationalism in 586588
religions in 1617, 594
Christianity 331, 333, 335,
593595
Islam 17, 337338
revolutions 85, 537
science and technology in 591
secularization in 331
self-understanding in 142
social structure of 590
universities 314315, 320, 591
see also Eastern Europe; Western
Europe
European civilization 9, 290292,
456, 584
ethnocentrism in 502
internal contradictions of 486
origins of 456, 532
Roman heritage of 456457
European Constitution 532533, 582
European culture 480
European identities xxi, 459460,
527528, 531534, 581602
collective 23, 256, 449
core elements of 586597
Eastern 534543
and European modernity 581, 583,
586588, 590595

formation of 24, 228

political 599601
and Western identities 597598
European Union 582583, 596597
divisions in 538
economic integration of 601
enlargement of 459460, 527, 537
Israeli (associate) membership of 422
legitimation of 532
political integration of 599602
European values 532533, 583596
dierences between East and West
539540
Europeanization, of the world
597599
evolution
of ideas 624
irreversibility of 606
of law 621
selection processes in 632
social 605, 616, 631633, 668
theories of 139, 275, 605606, 616,
631633
exclusion
concepts of, versus inclusionary
concepts, in civilizations 502512
of outsiders 248249
rituals 278, 282
exclusivism 652
exile, in Judaism 370
existential anxiety 637
existential self-examination 175
existentialism 14 n175, 252
expansion, of modernity 4851
expectations, horizons of 87
experiments 273 n28
external institutionalization 193194
extremism
in Israel 379
political 489
failing heroism 252
failures, of cultural translations 449
falsication, of theories 247, 624625
families
and civil society 146
in Israeli society 423
in modern societies 167168
fascism 651652
feminism, radical 231
First World 161162
Fischer-Rachfahl debate 261
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act
(United States) 307

index of subjects
The Form of Sociology Paradigms and
Crises (Eisenstadt) 667
foundation myths 250251
fragmentation, of societies 1213, 240
France
anti-Semitism in 524525
attitudes towards immigration
192193, 196197, 214215
citizenship in 207208, 212, 218,
386
collective guilt in 256
headscarf debates in 241242
Jews in 22, 207209, 369, 515,
518
emancipation of 515516,
525526
and modernization 522524, 526
Occitan-speaking Southern 15,
298299
pluralistic versus totalitarian
tendencies in 651
religion in 335336
and nationalism 385386
separation of powers in 629
Franciscans 15, 302, 319
Frankfurt, Grand Duchy of 516
Frankfurt School 2, 39
freedom
and equality 589
escapes from 176177
as European value 586
limits of xxiii, 226227
and security 215217
French revolution 8485, 92, 210,
515
From Generation to Generation (Eisenstadt)
667
fundamentalism 93, 166, 224, 228,
306
Christian 291 n7
Islamic 508
Jewish 510511
market 563
Futuwwa orders 317319
gender bias, in cosmopolitanism 478
gendered symbols, of nation-states 647
genocide 635
geography, and ethnicity 188
Germany
anti-Semitism in 524525
attitudes towards immigration 197,
240
East, Communist regime in 495

723

Jews in 22, 515, 518520

emancipation of 516518,
525526
and modernization 519522,
526
Law of return in 424 n11
post-war 255256
Reformation in 335
separation of powers in 629
Weimar, civil society in 147
Gesammelte Aufstze zur Religionssoziologie
(Comparative Studies of World
Religions, Weber) 262263,
265267, 271273, 276277, 666
ghetto existence, of Jews 15
Gilgamesh epic 70
global age 662
global culture 20, 338, 444, 450452,
472473
global history 100102, 305, 312
axial age in 119123
critical 98
Eurocentrism in 9697, 293
multi-regional framework of 6061
globality 158
globalization xxi, 10, 162163, 332,
452, 476
and colonialism 10, 159161
and communitarianism 167
history of 159, 163
and homogenization 163164,
168169, 185, 338, 441442
and hybridization 167169
and modernity 20, 156, 162,
453454
and modernization 161
and pluralization 164165, 169,
184, 188
studies of, in social sciences
99100
and traditionalization 165167
God, covenants with 177, 509511
Gold (Apparao) 408
governance, in Latin America 567
goyyim, dichotomy with Jews 509
grassroots movements 492493,
495496
Great Ape Project 213
Great Revolutions 34
Great Traditions, clashes between
166167
Greece, religion and politics in 343 n5
Greek civilization
axial 117118

724

index of subjects

philosophical-political path of
development 114, 118
contacts with other civilizations
312, 314
dichotomy between Greeks and
barbarians 503
ethnocentrism in 502
legacy of 62
Greek Orthodox Church 347348,
361 n42
Greek philosophy 74, 111, 502, 600
inuences on Islamic political
thought 316, 320324
Grundri der Sozialkonomik (Economy
and Society, Weber) 262267,
270, 272, 277
Guatemala, democracy in 558
guilt, collective 256, 257258
Han Empire 111
Harijan (children of God) 504
Hassidism 376 n8
headscarf debates (France) 241242
Heaven, Mandate of 47, 7980, 115
Hebrew language 371372, 373 n6,
377
hegemonic traditions 166
hegemonization, of nationalities
155156
hegemony, European 293294
heresy 1516
repression of 302308
heritages
Byzantine 360
Roman 456457
hermeneutical tradition, in philosophy
445
heroism 1314
failing 252
self-sacricing 257
triumphant 250251, 257
heterodoxy 291, 310, 318319
in South India 398
versus orthodoxy
in Islamic civilization 311312
in medieval Europe 297298,
302, 304
heterogeneity 224225, 504
hierarchical order, in early states 69
Hindu nationalism 546, 548, 552
Hindu-Muslim conicts, in India 23,
545552
Hindu-Sikh conicts, in India 549
Hinduism 122, 504505

historical sociology 6364, 8485,

605
historicism 605, 609, 613614
historiography 267, 288 n2
history
American 177 n20
and axial age 107109, 119123,
312
and civilizational analysis 5763,
121122, 312
economic 270, 293
of Europe 457, 532, 585586, 597
global 100102, 305, 312
critical 98
Eurocentrism in 9697, 293
multi-regional framework of
6061
of globalization 159, 163
Marxist 154155
of modernity 611, 5763
origins of 67, 89, 106, 107109, 120
philosophy of 64, 102 n13
of political thought 121
and reexivity 102, 120, 596597
religious 261262, 267, 271274,
276277
scholarly discipline of 87, 89, 96,
99, 100101
of science 617618, 622623
Hittite Empire, divine kingship in
7778
Holocaust 55
Holy Synod (Russian Orthodox)
355357, 360
Homo Sovieticus syndrome 536,
538539, 541
homocentric views, of the universe 151
homogeneity
desirability of 183184, 646
versus pluralism 1, 46, 11, 14, 17,
2627, 289
in nation-states 187, 191192,
224, 646648
homogenization
cultural 450, 469, 630
and globalization 163164,
168169, 185, 338, 441442
and modernity 166167
horizons of expectations 87
human action, consciousness about 106
human behavior
and beliefs 540
indeterminacies in 636637
interpretations of 88, 610, 615

index of subjects
human beings see man
human civilization 150
human condition, refusal of limits to
215216
human interaction 663, 666667
indeterminacies of 636637
rationality in 208
human nature 503, 614615
human rights 90, 160, 207, 209, 237,
543, 588589
appeals to 238, 242
in Communist Eastern Europe 495
in Israel 431
and security demands 560
violations of 308
humanitarian cosmopolitanism 503
humility ideals, in Eastern Orthodox
Church 347
Hungary
Communist regime in 495
neo-orthodox Judaism in 521522
hybridization 470
and cultural translations 448
and globalization 167169
hypermodernity 244
Iberoamerica see Latin America
ideals
cultural 670
of humility 347
of poverty 301302
samurai 505506
of submission 507
of transcendence 502
of universal love 506
ideas
of common good 322323
new, irreversibility of 622625
of purity 503505
of social contract 191
identities 245247
American 2627, 531, 597
collective
codes of 639641, 645, 648
concept of 245246, 366367,
527531
construction of 22, 2526,
248249, 631, 636, 638643,
650651
and cultural translations 447
in modernity 2526, 3738, 88,
542, 635, 644653
reconstruction of 14, 559, 571,
643

725

symbolic representations of 14,

247258
cultural 493
ethnic see ethnicity
European xxi, 459460, 527528,
531534, 581602
collective 23, 256, 449
core elements of 586597
Eastern 534543
and European modernity 581,
583, 586587, 590595
formation of 24, 228
political 599601
and Western identities 597598
and immigration 192, 200201
individual 528
and languages 187
mass 528
multiple 542543, 600
national
and immigration 192
Jewish 367, 370376
politics of 4, 156
re-codication of 448
reactive 338
and religion 187
religious 217
Jewish 367369, 376384
in Roman Empire 136
ideologies
of Eurocentrism 533
of pluralism 11, 183, 225226
secular, in Roman Empire 127
studies of 224
of violence 55
imagined worlds 468, 479
imams, in Muslim immigrant
communities 199
immigrant communities
identication with country of origin
199
self-determination of 195
immigration
attitudes of nation-states towards
12, 192204, 214215, 240
and identities 192, 200201
in Israel 373374, 384, 423424,
431
imperial political orders xvi, xviiixix
in axial age 104, 110112,
116119
modern 119
post-axial 118, 296
imperialism, cultural 469

726

index of subjects

indeterminacies, of human interaction

636637
India
Ayodhya dispute in 547549
caste system in 15, 278, 504
civilization of 62, 7980, 108,
115116, 118
heterodoxy in 398
heterogeneity in 504
Hindu-Muslim conicts in 23,
545552
Hindu-Sikh conicts in 549
intellectuals in 463
Maurya Empire 111
modernity in 19, 49, 396398, 400,
409412
Muslims in 504, 546, 548
nationalism in 545
partition of 504505
political philosophy in 315
purity idea in 503505
reform movements in 403, 407408
relations with Near East 60
Western views of 160
individual identities 528
individual rights see human rights
individualism 25, 86, 238, 614
beginning of 72, 606609,
613614, 633
and citizenship 616617
in European history 586, 588590
irreversibility of 611
in Israeli society 436
methodological 632
in modernity 154, 157, 217, 598,
612613, 619
individualization 59
of religion 203, 327328, 332,
334335, 383
industrial revolution 591592
innovations 606
Inquisition 303305, 307
institutional fragility, of democracies
557558, 562
institutional orders, modern 54
institutionalization
of boundaries of collectivities 641
of immigrant and minority cultures
193194, 196200
of modernity 43, 5253
of pluralism 12
institutions
of colonialism 160161
comparative analysis of xvi

European 591596
evaluation of 614
imported from one civilization into
another 314315
and individualism 612, 619
of modernity 31, 9095
performance of 562, 566
religious 330
reversibility of 613
in societies, role of 230
transformations of, in axial age 104
of Western civilization 415
instrumental rationality 620, 624
integration
civilizational, of Near East 61
of Israel in Middle East 418419
and pluralism 225
policies 240
political and economic, in European
Union 599602
intellectuals 59, 475
inter-ethnic relations 208
intercivilizational relations 5051, 60,
297 n13, 312314, 323, 415, 458,
460
intercultural dierences 257, 448449
interests, self 86, 231, 609610
internal institutionalization 193
international conicts 55
International Institute of Sociology
(IIS) xiv
International Society for the
Comparative Study of Civilizations
(ISCS) 666
International Sociological Association
(ISA) xii
international systems, emergence of
4850
intolerance 530
invented traditions 16, 325
Iranian civilization 313314
Achaemenid Empire 111, 117
axial, dualistic-agential path of
development 116, 118
political order in 316
Sassanian Empire 116117
and Zoroastrian religion 62
Ireland 416 n4
irrationality, in modern societies
153154, 162, 206, 210, 216217
irreversibility
of breaches of promissory notes 94
of evolution 606
of individualism 611

index of subjects
of new ideas 622625
of separation of powers principle 622
see also reversibility
Islam 109
conversion to 552
in Europe 17, 337338
in India 23
jihad in 507511
medieval 296, 297 n13, 311
and modernity 242
non-violence in 511
political 324325
religion and politics in 131
in South Asia 551
submission ideal in 507
Islamic civilization
contacts with other civilizations
312313
modernity in 453
orthodoxy versus heterodoxy in
311312
political order in 16, 117, 316320,
321, 324325
state and society in 315
Islamic law 311
Islamic movement 233
Islamic royalism 316, 319320
Islamicate civilization see Islamic
civilization
Israel
ancient 79, 114, 117118
Arabs in 385386, 424425
borders of state of 416417
citizenship in 219
conicts in 391392
with Palestinians 385, 388,
439440, 510511
constitution in 375, 387 n15, 431
democracy in 430433
demography of 422425
economy 426428
education in 425426
elites in 373375, 381, 422, 433
ethnic nationalism in 435436,
439440
ethnicity in 380
extremist groups in 379
families in 423
heterogeneity of 225
human rights in 431
immigration in 373374, 384,
423424, 431
integration into Middle East
418419

727

Jews in 436, 440

Mizrahim 380382
secular 377378, 382383, 435
ultra-orthodox 377378, 424
Land of, in Jewish identities 369,
379
law in 431, 432433
Law of Return 370 n2, 431
middle-classes in 375
military in 428429, 431
nation-building in 234, 374
national-religious identity in
378380
non-Western population in
424425, 438439
occupation of West-Bank and Gaza
433
relations with United States 420
religion in
and nationalism 375376,
382386, 388392
and politics 18, 432, 434435
research and development in 425
societal boundaries in 417
sociology in xiiixiv
Western modernity of 1920, 413,
416442
Jacobin tendencies, of modernity
305306
Jamaica, cosmopolitanism in 477
Japan
collective guilt in 258
elites in 51
makoto (sincerity) ideal in 505506
modernity in 4547, 54, 185186,
472473
Japanese Civilization (Eisenstadt) 668
Jesus movement, in ancient Judaism
282284
Jewish civilization 509
Jewish Civilization (Eisenstadt) 668
Jewish Diaspora 373374, 386387,
419
Jewish Enlightenment 371 n3
Jewish fundamentalism 510511
Jewish monotheism 81
Jewish national identities 367, 370380
Jewish nationalism 18, 366, 370,
375, 388391, 435436
Jewish religious identities 367369,
376384
Jews
as Chosen People 368, 509510

728

index of subjects

conversion to other faiths 390 n16

in France 22, 207209, 304, 515,
518
emancipation of 515516,
525526
and modernization 522524, 526
in Germany 22, 515, 518519
emancipation of 516518,
525526
and modernization 519522,
526
in Israel 436, 440
Mizrahim 380382
secular 377378, 382383, 435
self-isolation of 278, 281, 283284
Sephardic 382
in United States 420
Yemenite 380381
jihad 507511
Journal of Development (Ketab-e tawsa"eh,
Iran) 309
Judaism 367368
ancient, Webers analysis of 15,
261264, 277284
conversion to 390 n17, n18
covenant (brit) notion in 509511
liberal 383384, 390 n18
modernization in 376377,
519524, 526
in Occitan France 299
orthodoxy in 376378, 383384,
390, 424, 434, 521522
and post-Zionism 388
territorialization of 370
and Zionism 366, 383384,
390391
Judeo-Christian tradition, cultural codes
of 257258
juridical positivism 621
jurists, Roman 134135
Kabre (Togo), cosmopolitanism of
478
Kalinga region (India) 397, 409
Kanyasulkam (Brides for sale, Apparao)
19, 396398, 401411
Kashmir dispute, Hindu-Muslim divide
in 23
kingship
divine 7679, 251
in Vizianagaram (Andhra Pradesh,
India) 410412
see also monarchy

knowledge
institutions for diusion of, in
Europe 591
quest for 587
languages
Hebrew 371372, 373 n6, 377
and identity 187
interest in 8788
local, use in Eastern Orthodox
Church 351
Occitan 298 n14
Telugu 402
Latin, use in Catholic Church 351
Latin America
authoritarianism in 555556
de-politization of economics
563564
democracy in 2324, 553558,
567568, 574, 576579
dualization of societies in 575576
elections in 567
elites in 553554
emigration from 561562
neo-clietelism in 568569, 578
neo-liberalism in 554, 562563
neo-populism in 569574, 578
new social movements 569
politics in 554555, 563564
privatization in 565566
public spheres in 564
security issues in 555561
states in, perceptions of 563564
violence in 558560
law
ethics of 279
Islamic 311
Israeli 431433
in modern societies 210, 627629
natural 238, 321
philosophy of 630631
rationality in 620622
Roman 127, 132133
and Roman religion 133140
Law of Return
in Germany 424 n11
in Israel 370 n2, 431
Laws (Plato) 133
legal order, universal application of 91
legal pluralism 194195
legitimacy
political
citizenship as source of 207, 218

index of subjects
in Roman Empire 129130
requirements of law 621
Letter to the Galatians (Paul) 616
Leveling Crowds (Tambiah) 549
Levites 279281
liberal democracy 172, 432
pluralism as a condition of 13, 223
liberal Judaism 383384, 390 n18
liberal market economy 90
liberal sociology 175, 615
liberalism 633
and modernity 171172, 175
neo, in Latin America 554,
562563
libido sciendi 613
life
social 463, 467, 664
rationalization of 231, 486, 489,
491, 498
styles 156, 164
liminality 249250
limits
absence of, in modernity 586,
587588, 594, 599
of freedom xxiii, 226227
of pluralism 226228
of political body 212213
of rationality 210, 231, 588
refusal of, in democracy 212217
linguistic analysis, interest in 8788
Little Traditions 166167
liturgy
reform of, in Russian Orthodox
Church 354 n26
vernacular, in Eastern Orthodox
Church 351
local languages, use in Eastern
Orthodox Church 351
localism, resurrection of 167
localization, of the global 450, 454
locals 474 n11
Location of Culture (Bhabha) 446
London, as heterogeneous liberal
community 225
love, universal, ideal in Christianity
506
madrasas 320
Maharajas College (Vizianagaram)
401
Mahayana Buddhism 109, 121122
makoto (sincerity) ideal, in Japan
505506

729

man
autonomy of 33, 4041
civilized, image of 3839, 646
control of nature 41, 150151,
216, 239
dignity of 619, 628629, 633
violations of 9495
emancipation of 3233
rational pursuit of self-interest 231
reexivity of 120
Mandate of Heaven 47, 7980, 115
Mann ohne Eigenschaften (Musil) 404
market economy, liberal 90
market fundamentalism 563
marketing, political 578
markets
and civil society 146, 152
for symbolic goods 330
marriages
in India, girls sold in 402403
in Israel, religious inuences on 434
martial arts training, in Japan 506
Marxism 610
and history 154155
as a secular religion 358 n37
and sociology 231
views of modernity 154155, 173
mass communication 235
mass identity 528
mass mobilization
and elitist theories of democracy
576577
and neo-populism 574
Maurya Empire 111
Meiji Restoration ( Japan) 45, 506
memories, collective 253254, 647
Merton College 314
Mesopotamia 76, 77
meta-narratives of modernity 39
methodological individualism 632
methodologies of social sciences
276277
anthropological xvi, xviiixix, 290,
461, 471
metropolis, as center of creative vitality
20, 463464
Metropolis and Province in Intellectual Life
(Shils) 463
metropolitans, of Russian Orthodox
Church 352
Middle Ages 288292
asceticism in 301
formation of modernity in 295297

730

index of subjects

Islam in 296, 297 n13, 311

multiple modernities in 294
transcendental visions in 298300
Middle East
Israels integration into 418419
see also Near East
middle-classes, in Israel 375
military organisation
institutionalized in axial age 104
in Israel 428429, 431
minorities
cultures of, institutionalization of
193194, 196200
rights of 239240, 432
Mithraism 128
Mizrahim 380382
Mleccha (outsiders) 504
mobility, and cosmopolitanism 474,
479480
modern societies
diuse rationalization in 626
elites in 5152
equality of citizens in 90, 207,
209211, 215217, 225, 244,
588589, 616
ethnicity and religion in 205206,
208, 214215, 218
families in 167168
irrationality in 153154, 162, 206,
210, 216217
and nation-states 662, 665
politics in 3536, 38
and racism 211
rights in 627629
totalitarianism versus pluralism
in 31
modernity 6, 171
absence of limits in 586588, 594,
599
alternative 93, 173174, 589
antimonies of 40
asceticism in 175176, 179
and barbarism 11, 55, 92, 172,
179, 652
binary thinking in 176179
civilization of 6, 31, 287289,
297298, 305306, 670
collective identities in 2526,
3738, 88, 542, 635, 644653
and Communism 152153,
161162, 491, 652
concept of 67, 157158, 395, 413,
444, 485, 498
Webers 32, 43, 288, 293, 498

cultural program of 25, 3134,

295, 644
tensions in 3943, 49
and cultural translations 20, 444,
447, 450455
destructive potentialities of 5556,
635, 649653
discourses of 47, 56, 90
transformations in 8485, 88
end of 662
see also post-modernity
ethics in 177178
expansion of 4851
formation of 8390, 95, 104105
in Middle Ages 295297
and globalization 20, 156, 162,
453454
history of 611, 5763
and homogenization 166167
individualism in 154, 157, 217,
612613, 619
inherent tensions of 14, 26, 39,
157, 172174
institutionalization of 43, 5253
institutions of 31, 9095
and Islam 242, 453
Jacobin tendencies of 305306
life-styles of 156
non-Western 453
origins of 7, 32, 157158, 485
and pluralism 1114, 26, 223224,
227, 670
political order in 3437, 65, 119,
230, 309
in post-socialist states 494498
and rationality 153154, 162,
172 n1, 173174 n8, 491
reexivity in 3233, 485, 492
and religions 1416, 18, 208, 295,
328334
salvation in 177, 179
and secularization 331332
structural analysis of 92, 95
taboos in 627
and tradition dichotomy 151, 157,
166
universalism of 171
values of 21, 309
views of
liberal 171172, 175
Marxist 154155, 173
violence in 94
see also European modernity; multiple
modernities; Western modernity

index of subjects
modernization 910, 33, 151, 413
and globalization 161
in Judaism 376377, 519524, 526
and structural dierentiation 5254,
152154
theories 52, 98, 99100, 468,
668669
universal patterns of 670
and Westernization 184185, 439,
441
modes of production, and civilizations
149150
monarchy
and caliphate 316317
and prophecy 321
see also kingship
monastic retreatism 252
money, social importance of 156
Mongol Empire 313
monistic conceptualizations, of
modernity 157
monotheism 188
in axial age 61, 73, 81
Jewish 81
rejection of 300
moral philosophy 85, 115
moral reasoning, in social sciences 89
morality, and rationality 40, 620, 626
Morocco, Islamic law in 195
Moscow, Patriarchate of 352353,
355, 357358
mother-tongue teaching, in
institutionalized multiculturalism
198
movements
anti-globalization 144
grassroots 492493, 495496
heterodox 291
Islamic 233
national 38, 240, 648649
New Age 179
orthodox 291 n7
of protest 44
in Europe 292, 336
in Japan 46
in Latin America 554555
reform
in India 403, 407408
in Judaism 519524
religious, new 206, 218, 329
social 34, 3738, 645, 648
new 155, 492494, 569
womens 493
working class 155

731

multiculturalism 4, 214, 219220, 571

alternatives to 201204
and fragmentation of societies 13,
240
institutionalized 193200
in Israel 384
limits of 196201
and secularization 448
multiple citizenship 601
multiple globality 158
multiple identities 542543, 600
multiple modernities ix, 18, 26, 485,
581, 668669
clash of 555
and communication 21
emergence of 4344, 4748, 5051
in Europe 487488, 490
in Middle Ages 294
and nationalism 365
notion of xx, 6, 11, 151, 157, 185,
443, 451, 487, 533, 670
religious 332333, 338
role of translations in 20
mundane order
and transcendental order 10, 34, 93
in axial age 106, 112, 116, 125,
174175
in Roman Empire 125126, 129
Muscovy 361
religion and politics in 342343,
352353
Muslims, in India 504, 546, 548
mutation syndromes 167
mysticism 216
myths
foundation 250251
of Vizianagaram 399400
of revolutionary birth of the people
251
Narbonne, Jewish community in 299
narratives of modernity 39
nation-building
in Israel 234, 374
by Palestinians 234
nation-states 90, 191
in Africa 159
decline of 239
diversity of 648
in Europe 592593
homogeneity versus pluralism in
187, 191192, 224, 646648
and immigration, attitudes towards
12, 192204, 214215, 240

732

index of subjects

and modern societies 662, 665

in modernity 162, 228, 365,
645647
particularism of 209210, 219
national collectivities 645646
national identities
and immigration 192
Jewish 367, 370380
national movements 38, 240,
648649
national religions 386, 389
National Socialism 93, 224, 507
nationalism 224, 365, 367
Buddhist 551
ethnic 435436, 439440, 442, 546
conicts of 546552
Hindu 546, 548, 552
Indian 545
Jewish 18, 366, 370, 375, 388391,
435436
and religion 18, 365366
in Arab world 385
in France 385386
in Israel 375376, 382386,
388392
in United Kingdom 386
and Zionism 370
nationalities
and citizenship 162, 197198, 209,
212213, 219, 542543
and Eastern Orthodox Church 350
hegemonization of 155156
values associated with 228
natural law 238, 321
nature
in Greco-Roman civilization
502503
human control of 41, 150151,
216, 239
Roman interpretations of 127
On the Nature of the Gods (De Natura
Deorum, Cicero) 126, 135
Nazism see National Socialism
Near East 6061, 70, 79, 114, 160
see also Middle East
neo-clientelism, in Latin America
568569, 578
neo-evolutionary theory 139
neo-liberalism, in Latin America 554,
562563
neo-orthodox Judaism 521522
neo-populism, in Latin America
570574, 578
neo-Zionism 440 n21

Netherlands
attitudes towards immigration 197
emergence as nation-state 365366
institutionalized multiculturalism in
196, 198
pillarization in 194, 199200
networks 100
neuroscience, social 501 n1
neutral attitudes, towards immigration
192193, 196
New Age movements 179
new social movements
in Latin America 569
theory 492494
New World, colonialism in 160
Nigeria, city life in 468
noble savage theme 2
nominal denitions 484
non-axial civilizations 113, 121122
non-social principles 239240
non-violence
in Islam 511
promoted by Gandhi 505
non-Western civilizations 186
non-Western modernity 453
non-Western origins, of Europe 456
non-Western population, in Israel
424425, 438439
norms, derived from customs 629
Northern Europe, multiculturalism in
196
Norway, collective guilt in 256
Occitan language 298 n14
Occitan pluralism 1516, 299305
de Ociis (Cicero) 127
Old Testament, creations of 262, 274,
278281
ontological anxiety 175 n14
ontological conceptions, multiplicity of
3233
Open Society (Popper) 224
openness, of politics in modern
societies 36
organizations, bureaucratic 357
Orient, Occident dichotomy 159160,
458, 534
The Origin and Goal of History
(Vom Ursprung und Ziel der Geschichte,
Jaspers) 102, 105
origins
of European civilization 456, 532
of historical thinking 67, 87, 89,
106109, 120

index of subjects
of individualism 72, 606609,
613614, 633
of modernity 7, 32, 157158, 485
of the people in democracies 251
questions of 250
of Zionism 439
The Origins and Diversity of Axial Age
Civilizations (Eisenstadt) 292 n8
Origins of the West (Eisenstadt) 287288
orthodoxy 291 n7
Jewish 376378, 383384, 390,
424, 434
in Germany 521522
versus heterodoxy
in Europe 297298, 302, 304
in Islamic civilization 311312
otherness 530, 639
acceptance of 501
encounters with 474
in Enlightenment 457458
surrender to 475
translations of 449450
Ottoman Empire, legal pluralism in
194195
outsiders, exclusion of 248249
Over-procurator (Russian Orthodox)
356
Oz ve-Shalom 511
Pakistan 504
ethno-nationalist conicts in
549550
Palestinians
conict with Israel 385, 388,
439440, 510511
nation-building by 234
papacy
lack of, in Eastern Orthodox Church
350351
and secular power 346
paradigm
of human dialogue 667
structural-functional, in sociology
xviii
Paradoxes of Democracy (Eisenstadt) 191
parameters 610
parfaits (Catharism) 300301
pariahs 15, 278, 282, 504
parody, modern 407409
participation
and democracy 567, 575577
equal rights to 90, 207, 209
quest for 36
voluntary 574575

733

particularism
and cosmopolitanism 476
and democracy 4, 207, 217221
of nation-states 209210, 219
transcendence of 207, 217218
versus universalism 443, 453454
past, translations of 450
Patriarchate
of Constantinople 352
of Moscow 352353, 355, 357358
Patriot Act (United States) 307
patriotism, constitutional 228, 531
Pauline mission 283
pauperism, voluntary 301302
peoples democracies 623
performative dimension, of
representations of identity 248
peripheries 2021
and center relationships 20, 35,
462467, 472
in anthropology 471
and cosmopolitanism 479480
in Europe 590
transnational 465
perpetrators 14, 253, 255257
Persia see Iranian civilization
Persian Letters (Montesquieu) 458
personal identities 528
phenomenology, historical 83,
121122
philosophical-political path of
development 114, 118
philosophy
Greek 74, 111, 502, 600
inuences on Islamic political
thought 316, 320324
in Han Empire 111
of history 64, 102 n13
of law 630631
moral 85, 115
political 93, 121, 617618
cosmopolitanism in 480
European 320322, 324
Indian 315
Islamic 315, 320324
and religion 74
translation theories in 445446
pilgrims 334
pillarization, of societies 194,
199200, 226227
pioneer-generation, in Israel 373374
pluralism 184
of civilizations 35
conicts resulting from 13, 225

734

index of subjects

cultural 186, 337

and democracy 13, 220221, 223
and globalization 164165, 169,
184, 188
ideology of 11, 183, 225226
institutionalization of 12
and integration 225
legal 194195
limits of 226228
and modernity 1114, 26,
223224, 229, 670
Occitan 1516, 299305
participatory 575
and religions 188189, 337
toleration of 46
versus homogeneity 1, 46, 11, 14,
17, 2627, 289
in nation-states 187, 191192,
224, 646648
versus totalitarianism ix, 31, 4142,
223, 635, 650651
pluralistic societies, dominant values in
227228
pluralistic-semantic path of
development 116, 118
plurality 183, 189
cultural 186187
in nation states 225
of tradition 166
pluriform societies 192
poets, Telugu 411412
Poland
collective guilt in 256
communist regime in 495496
emigration to the West 538539
policies
criminal 626627
cultural 214
integration 240
multicultural 196197, 214215
public, ethnicization of 1213
Sharia-based 321, 325
polis, concept of 141
political activists, in modern societies
36
political aliations, of sociologists
232
political attitudes 489, 496
political body, limits of 212213
political change 8687, 230
political conicts 493
political economy, and center-periphery
theories 464465
political identities, European 599601

political integration, of European

Union 599602
political legitimacy
citizenship as source of 207, 218
in Roman Empire 129130
political marketing 578
political order
in axial age 118
imperial 104, 110112, 116119
conceptions of 90
imperial xvi, xviiixix
in Iranian civilization 316
Islamic 16, 117, 316321,
324325
in modernity 3437, 65, 91,
119, 230, 309
post-axial, imperial 118, 296
in pre-axial civilizations 110
political parties
and democracy 496497
in India 548
political philosophy 93, 121, 617618
cosmopolitanism in 480
European 320322, 324
Greek, inuences on Islamic political
thought 316, 320324
Indian 315
Islamic 315, 320324
political rights 212213
political systems
of empires xvi, xviiixix
separation of powers principle in
621623, 629
Political Systems of Empires (Eisenstadt)
xviiixix, 668
political values, and rationality 626
political visions, of society 238,
243244
politics
class 156
of cosmopolitanism 476, 480481
in Europe 491
of identity 4, 156
in Japan 46
in Latin America 554555,
563564
in modern societies 3536, 38
and religion 114, 116117
in Europe
Eastern 17, 339363
Western 345346
in Islamic civilization 16, 117,
131, 316321, 324325
in Israel 18, 432, 434435

index of subjects
in Roman Empire 126, 131, 137
in Russia 348349, 352363
and religions, in early states 6870,
71, 76
in South India 411
theories of, rationality in 620622
of translation 446
Politics (Aristotle) 16, 297 n13, 322,
324
polity, relationships with civil society
and society 88
pollution, anthropological theories of
178
pontices, role of 133134
populism, neo, in Latin America
569573, 578
positivism, juridical 621
post-axial civilizations, imperial
political orders in 118, 296
post-Marxism 231
post-modern sociology 492, 605606
post-modernity 243244, 329, 571
in Europe 21, 491494
and pluralism 226
Western 414
post-social principles 239240
post-social societies 234236, 242
transformations in 243244
post-socialist states
modernity in 494498
regimes of 538539
post-Westerness, of Europe 459460
post-Zionism 387388
poverty, ideal of 301302
power
and cultural translations 448
royal and priestly 76, 7980
separation principle of 621623,
629
transfer of, in Roman Empire
130131
pre-axial civilizations 58, 7879,
108110
pre-modern images 224
pre-modern societies 154
prevention, of crime 627
primitive religions 6668
primordiality themes, in collective
identities 639640, 643, 650
private spheres
in post-social societies 236237, 239
and public spheres 202203
privatization
in Latin America 565566

735

of religion 203, 327328, 332,

334335, 383
production modes, and civilizations
149150
profane
abstention of 252
and sacred 252, 639
programmatist theories 25
of evolution 631633
programs 631
cultural, of modernity 21, 3134,
3943, 49, 295, 644
progress
post-modern notions of 605606
and rationality 627
proletarian revolution 161
promissory notes, breaches of 9495
prophecy
and monarchy 321
role in Judaism 280
prophetic books, of the Old Testament
279
protest
and modernity 670
movements 44
in Europe 292, 336
in Japan 46
in Latin America 554555
themes of, incorporated in centers
3536
The Protestant Ethic (Weber) 261262 n1
Protestant states, model for Peter Is
ecclesiastical reform 360361
Protestantism
and Catharism 304305
and individualism 607
Webers analysis of 272274
Prussia, Jews in 516
psychotherapy 175 n14
public discourses 91
public goods 560, 564
public policy, ethnicization of 1213
public spheres 9091
extension of 235
formation of, and democracy 577
in Islamic civilization 311
in Latin America 564
and private spheres 202203
unitary 646
public trust, in Latin America
555557, 564565
Puritan settlers, in America 177
Puritanism 274 n30, 293
purity 368

736

index of subjects

in Indian civilization 503505

Pusapati dynasty 398399
racism, theories of 211
Rational Peasant (Popkin) 610
rationality
appeals to 239, 242
and citizenship 210211
cognitive 620621
Communist understanding of 491
diuse 625627
in ethics 40, 620, 626
religious 274, 281, 310
in European history 586588
and evolution of ideas 624
in Greek philosophy 74
in human relations 208
instrumental 620, 624
limits of 210, 231, 588
and modernity 153154, 162,
172 n1, 173174 n8, 491
and progress 627
and religion 281, 284285, 621,
626, 630
Christianity 594
ethics 274, 281, 310
in selection processes 628629, 631
in social life 231, 486, 489, 491,
498
sovereignty of 4142
totalizing visions of 4142,
223224, 237
and utopian visions 628
and values 626
versus romanticism 40, 486491,
499
versus subjectivity/individualism
589
Webers analysis of 2, 41, 206,
491, 619623, 625
see also irrationality
reactive identities 338
real denitions 484
realism, modern 409
reality
cultural 268269
duality of 154
social 249250
reason see rationality
redemption, in Judaism 370371,
378, 389390
reexivity
in axial age 106, 112, 118119
and history 102, 120, 596597

of man 120
in modernity 3233, 485, 492
self 120
reform 166
ecclesiastical, by Peter I 355356,
358361
of Judaism
in France 522524
in Germany 519522
movements, in India 403, 407408
Reformation 346, 614
in Germany 335
medieval background of 288, 291
regimes
changes in, post-socialist 494
Communist 495496
totalitarian 36, 143144, 155,
161162, 292, 345, 555556
regions, basis of civilizations 150
reication 172
rejections
of modernity 176177
of monotheism 300
The Relations between Sociological Theory
and Anthropological Research (Eisenstadt)
xviii
relativism
absolute 605
cultural 166, 309 n1
religions
in axial age 104, 109110, 640
and civilizations 3, 149
and culture 336337
ethno 328
in Europe 1617, 594
Christianity 331, 333, 335,
593595
Islam 17, 337338
fundamentalists use of 224
Gauchets analysis of 6569, 74
history of 261262, 267, 271274,
276277
and identities 187
individualization of 203, 327328,
332, 334335, 383
and modernity 1416, 18, 208,
295, 328334
monotheistic 188
in axial age 61, 73, 81
rejection of 300
national 386, 389
and nationalism 18, 365366
in Arab world 385
in France 385386

index of subjects
in Israel 375376, 382386,
388392
in United Kingdom 386
peaceful coexistence of 630
and philosophy 74
and pluralism 188189, 337
and politics 114, 116117
in early states 6871, 76
in Eastern Europe 17, 339363
in Islamic civilization 16, 117,
131, 316321, 324325
in Israel 18, 432, 434435
in Roman Empire 126, 131,
137
in Russia 348349, 352363
in Western Europe 345346
primitive 6668
and rationality 281, 284285, 594,
621, 626, 630
in Christianity 594
ethics 274, 281, 310
in Roman Empire 126129, 632
Christianity 125126, 139140
and Roman law 133140
secular 358 n37
and society, in axial age 7273, 80
sociology of 261, 263285,
327328, 331333
Webers analysis of 261262,
263285, 295, 310
world 104, 109110, 262
economic ethics of 272273
jamborees of 186, 188
religiosity, new 383
religious conicts 11, 187
religious ethics 279 n45
rationality in 274, 281, 310
religious identities 217
Jewish 367369, 376384
religious institutions 330
religious movements, new 206, 218,
329
Religious Rejections of the World and their
Directions (Weber) 176
religious revival
in democracies 218219
theories of 205206, 211
Replies to Critics (Weber) 261
representations
and democracy 566568, 593
of liminality 250
symbolic, of collective identities 14,
247258
Republic (Plato) 133, 322

737

research
and development, in Israel 425
into axial age civilizations 63,
102104
into global history 101102
into inter-ethnic relations 208
into pre-axial age civilizations 58
residence-based citizenship 212213
resignation doctrine, in Eastern
Orthodox Church 347349
retreatism, monastic 252
retrospective individualization 59
reversibility
of institutions 613
see also irreversibility
revival
ethnic and religious 205206, 211,
217, 218219
semantic, of civil society 143144
revolutionary birth of the people,
myths of 251
revolutions 8687
bourgeoisie 161
colonial 161
Democratic 91
European 85
Eastern (1989) 537
French 8485, 92, 210, 515
Great 34
industrial 591592
of modernity 105
proletarian 161
righteousness 177, 179
rights
of animals 213
cultural 220, 238239
demands for 240242
human 90, 160, 207, 209, 237,
543, 588589
appeals to 238, 242
in Communist Eastern Europe
495
in Israel 431
and security demands 560
violations of 308
of minorities 239240, 432
in modern societies 627629
political 212213
social 213214, 238
rituals
coronation, in Russia 363
of exclusion 278, 282
of expelling perpetrators 255256
of failing heroism 252

738

index of subjects

in Roman Empire 137138

sacricial 643
of triumphant heroism 251, 257
Roman Catholic church 291, 593
anti-modernism of 594
and state power in Western Europe
345346
see also Catholicism
Roman civilization 89, 456, 502
Roman Empire 111, 117
and conquest 129130
culture in 127129
dissent in 127128, 137138
identities in 136
religion in 126129, 632
Christianity 125126, 139140
and Roman law 133140
secular ideology in 127
transfer of power in 130131
see also Byzantine Empire
Roman law 127, 132133
and Roman religion 133140
The Roman Revolution (Syme) 130
romanticism 173174 n8, 179, 252
versus rationalism 40, 486491,
499
royalism, Islamic 316, 319320
rulers
autonomy of elites from 310311
sacred 69, 7677, 7980, 363
secular
in Eastern Europe 342343
in Western Europe 346
Russia
Byzantine heritage of 360
Jews in, emigration to Israel 384
religion and politics in 348349,
352363
see also Muscovy
Russias Byzantine Heritage (Toynbee) 360
sacred
codes of collective identities 640
power
and states 76
see also politics and religion
and profane 252, 639
realm of, construction of 637638
rulership 69, 7680, 363
sphere of 630
sacredness see transcendence
sacrice
rituals of 643
self 257

sacrilege 638
salvation 277278
in modernity 177, 179
personal 128
samurai ideals, in Japan 505506
SAP see Structural Adjustment
Programme (SAP)
Sassanian Empire (Iran) 116117
satellite mentality, in Eastern Europe
536
satellites, and metropolis 464
satyagraha (truth) 505
Scandinavia, political parties in 497
Scenarios of power (Wortman) 363
science
cognitive rationality in 620621
in Europe 591
history of 617618, 622623
see also social sciences
Science as Vocation (conference, Weber)
617
Second World, modernity of 161
sects
heterodox 304
in Islam 311
secular ideology, in Roman Empire
127
secular Jews, in Israel 377378,
382383, 435
secular religion 358 n37
secular rulers, in Europe 342343, 346
secularization 327329
in Europe 331
and multiculturalism 448
in Russia 362
theories of 331332
security
and freedom 215217
issues in Latin America 558561
security forces, impunity of 561
segregation, spatial, in Latin America
559
selection processes
of axiological ideas 623
in evolution 632
rational 628629, 631
self-control, and autonomy, anxieties of
178
self-denitions, in axial age 62
self-determination, for immigrant
communities 195
self-examination, existential 175
self-interest 86, 609610
rational pursuit of 231

index of subjects
self-isolation, of Jews 278, 281,
283284
self-organization, and civil society
142, 144
self-projections, in civilizational analysis
57, 60
self-reexivity 120
self-sacricing hero 257
self-understanding, European 142
Seljuk Sultans 317
semiotics 178
separation of powers principle
621623, 629
Sephardic Jews 382
September 11 events, United States
reaction to 306308
The Seven Laws of Noah (Lichtenstein)
511
Shang kingdom (China) 79
Sharia-based policies 321, 325
Shas party 381382
Shiv Shena 549
Silk Route 104
Sinhalese-Tamil conicts, in Sri Lanka
550551
slavery, views of 612613
social action, civil society as a type of
145
social activism 311
social change 667
Social Change, Dierentiation and Evolution
(Eisenstadt) 668
social closure 10
theory of 178
social contract, idea of 191
social control, decrease of 626627
social development 2
social dierentiation 152
social divisions 171
social evolution 605, 616, 631633,
668
social life 664
ambivalence in 467
consensus in 463
rationalization of 231, 486, 489,
491, 498
social movements 34, 3738, 645, 648
new 155, 492494, 569
social neuroscience 501 n1
social order
ambivalence towards 642
destruction of 13
dimensions of 639
and work 142

739

social reality, boundaries in 249250

social rights 213214, 238
social sciences 85, 285, 664
ahistorical form of 98
discourses of 8788, 9697
ethnocentrism in 611612
historicism in 605, 609, 613614
and history 89
methodologies of 276277
anthropological xvi, xviiixix,
290, 461, 471
moral reasoning in 89
notion of human nature in
614615
studies of globalization 99100
translation theories in 446
see also sociology
social spheres
civil society as a type of 145146
destruction of 233234
social strata 664
social structures, of Europe 590
social systems 665
social transformation 14, 164
social visions, of societies 230,
237238, 243244
socialism see Communism
socialization 230
disappearance of 233234
societal agency 528
societies
based on citizenship 219
boundaries of, in Israel 417
bourgeois 87
centers of
charismatization of 35
toleration of pluralism by 46
civil society and polity in 88
comparative analysis of 665
complex, studies of xvi, xviii
concept of 8586, 88, 663665
in sociology 230233, 662663
and culture 59, 463
fragmentation of 1213, 240
institutions in, role of 230
pillarization of 194, 199200,
226227
pluralistic 227228
pluriform 192
post-modern 243
post-social 234236, 242
transformations in 243244
pre-modern 154
and religion, in axial age 7273, 80

740

index of subjects

and states
conation of 45
in Islamic civilization 315
totalitarian 224
visions of
political 238, 243244
social 230, 237238, 243244
see also modern societies
socio-cultural order 6768
socio-economic analysis, of cultural
reality 268269
sociologists 232
sociology 243, 669670
and anthropology xvi, xviiixix,
290, 461, 471
civilizational analysis in 666
comparative 126, 138
concept of society in 230233,
662663
critical 39
historical 6364, 8485, 605
and historiography 267
Israeli xiiixiv
liberal 175, 615
Marxist 231
post-modern 492, 605606
real denitions in 484
of religion 261, 263285, 327328,
331333
structural-functional paradigm in
xviii
supranational perspectives in
662668
systems theory in 665
of translation 446
Weber on 267268, 270271
Western 486487
World Congress of 662
solidarity 611
sources of 227228
Solidarity movement (Poland)
495496
South Africa, apartheid in 194 n1
South Asia
Buddhism in 122
Islam in 551
modernity in 157158
Souvenirs (de Tocqueville) 86
sovereignty
of citizens 208
crisis of, in Near East 79
dual, in Islamic civilization
316317
of rationality 4142

spatial concepts, civilizations as 158

spatial segregation, in Latin America
559
sports welfare state 214
Sri Lanka, Sinhalese-Tamil conicts in
550551
state bureaucracies 357
state intervention, in welfare states
214215
states
borders of 416417
and church see religions and politics
city 77
and civil society 142143
and conquest 6970
developed 413414
early 6871, 7577
formation of 80
perceptions of, in Latin America
563564
post-socialist, modernity in 494498
Protestant, model for Peter Is
ecclesiastical reform 360361
and religion see politics and religion
and sacred power 76
socialist see Communism
and society
conation of 45
in Islamic civilization 315
territorial 77
transformation in axial age 7172
see also nation-states; welfare states
stereotypes 530531, 535
Stoicism 135136, 252, 503
Structural Adjustment Programme
(SAP) 163
structural analysis 92, 95, 610
structural change 669670
Structural Change and Modernization in
Post-socialist Countries (Adamski,
Machonin and Zapf ) 494
structural decits, of welfare states 215
structural dierentiation, and
modernization 5254, 152154
structural transformation 389
structural-functional paradigm, in
sociology xviii
structures, social, of Europe 590
subjectivity 589
submission ideal, in Islam 507
superiority, of civilizations 150
supraindividual concepts 664
supranational perspectives, in sociology
662668

index of subjects
survival theories, of ethnic and
religious revival in modernity
205206, 217
Sweden, dominant values in 227
Switzerland, heterogeneity of 225
symbolic goods, market for 330
symbolic representations
of collective identities 14, 247258
of liminality 250
symbols
gendered, of nation-states 647
of Jewish tradition 372, 382383,
390
symphonia, principle of 341, 344
systems
political
of empires xvi, xviiixix
separation of powers principle in
621623, 629
theories of 464, 665
of values 540541
taboos
anthropological theories of 178
in modernity 627
Tantric Yoga 397
The Task of the Translator (Benjamin)
445446
technology
and dierentiation 152
in Europe 591
teleology, in axial age concept
112113
television 235
Telugu civilization
literature in 402
modernity in 396
Telugu poets 411412
territorial states 77
territorialization, of Judaism 370
terrorism 242, 306308
Theft of an Idol (Brass) 546
theories
anthropological, of pollution and
taboo 178
of axial age 175
of caliphate 315, 318, 321
constitutional 317318, 321322
of cultural translations 444450
of defense mechanisms 178
of democracy 576577
of dependency 464
of ethnic and religious revival
205206, 211, 217

741

of European modernity 443

of evolution 139, 275, 605606,
616, 631633
falsication of 247, 624625
of modernization 52, 98100, 468,
668669
of new social movements 492494
of politics, rationality in 620622
programmatist 25, 631633
of racism 211
of secularization 331332
of social closure 178
of systems 464, 665
truth of 624625
Theories of Society (Parsons) 483
third cultures 449
Third World 161
The Thirteenth Greatest of Centuries (Walsh)
289290
Thomism 320321
three clocks hypothesis 540
threshold of modernity 32
see also origins of modernity
Time of Troubles (Russia, 15981613)
354
tolerance 226, 530
totalitarian regimes
of Byzantium 345
in Eastern Europe, criticism of
143144
in Latin America 555556
in Middle Ages 292
political processes in 36
in socialist states 155, 161162
totalitarian societies 224
totalitarianism, versus pluralism ix,
31, 4142, 223, 635, 650651
totalizing visions, of rationality 4142,
223224, 237
tourism 474
Towards a General Democracy: Direct,
Economic, Ecological, and Social
Democracy (Fotopoulous) 213
trade routes
in axial age 104
in Middle Ages 294296
Tradition and Translation (Macintyre) 445
traditions
and globalization 165167
Great, clashes between 166167
hegemonic 166
invented 16, 325
Jewish, symbols of 372, 382383,
390

742

index of subjects

Judeo-Christian, cultural code of

257258
Little 166167
versus modernity dichotomy 151,
157, 166
transcendence 7273
in Axial age 80
conceptions of 279
ethno 117
ights from 177178
ideals of 502
of particularism, in democratic
societies 207, 217218
theme in collective identities 640
and utopia, in democratic societies
216
transcendental interpretative
development path 114, 118
transcendental order
and mundane order 10, 34, 93
in axial age 106, 112, 116, 125,
174175
in Roman Empire 125126, 129
transcendental visions
dualist 299301
in Middle Ages 298300
multiplicity of 3233
transformations
in axial age 5960, 7172, 75, 78,
80, 103107, 112119, 125
continuities with pre-axial
civilizations 108110
imperial political orders 104,
110112, 116119
monotheistic innovations 61, 73,
81
political 104, 296 n11
in modernity
discursive 8485, 88
political 230
in post-social societies 243244
social 14, 164
structural 389
world-historical 312
see also change
translations
cultural 20, 444460
role in multiple modernities 20,
447
theories of 445448
transnational citizenship 543
transnational diasporas 4
transnational peripheries 465
transnationalism 200

trauma
collective 256
cultural 9495, 540
of modernity 649
travel, and cosmopolitanism 474,
477480
triumphant heroism 250251, 257
trust
generated through constructing
collective identities 642
public, in Latin America 555557,
564565
truth
search for, in Hinduism 505
theories of 624625
Truth and Method (Gadamer) 445
tsars, of Russia 353, 356, 361363
Turkey, collective guilt in 258
unanimity rule, in village societies
610611
unifying orientations, versus pluralistic
orientations towards newcomers in
societies 56
United Kingdom
attitudes towards immigration in
198
dominant values in 227
Jews in 368369
nationalism and religion in 386
separation of powers in 629
United States
attitudes towards immigration 193
civic religion in 227
criticism of 177 n21
democracy in 432
heterogeneity of 224225
history of 177 n20
identities in 2627, 531, 597
inter-ethnic relations in 208
modern society in 233
Peace Corps 301 n18
Puritan settlers in 177
relations
with Eastern Europe 538
with Israel 420
social sciences in 98
war on terrorism 306308
unity, achieved through diversity 600
universal human nature 503
universal love, ideal in Christianity
506
universal patterns, of modernization
670

index of subjects
universal translatability, modernity as
condition of 444, 451452
universal values 630
universal-inclusive path of development
115, 118
universalism
of modernity 171
versus particularism 443, 453454
universality 70
of citizenship 212, 237
of social development 2
universe, views of 151
universities, European 314315, 320,
591
untouchables see pariahs
Upanisads 406407
urbanization
in Middle Ages 294295
source of modernity 158
Vom Ursprung und Ziel der Geschichte
(The Origin and Goal of History,
Jaspers) 102, 105
utopian dimensions
of citizenship 12, 211212, 216
of civil society concept 146
of democracy 216217
utopian visions 3536, 371, 628
values 630
colonialisms introduction of
160161
dominant, in pluralistic societies
227228
European 532533, 583596
dierences between East and West
539540
in Israeli society 437
of modernity 21, 309
and rationality 626
systems of, change in 540541
tolerance 226
universal 630
world, surveys of 625626
Zionisms appropriation of 372
Vedic religion 115116, 122
Venezuela, democracy in 568,
571572
verzuiling see pillarization
victims 14, 253254, 257
Viddha-salabhanjika (Rajasekhara) 403
Vienna, Congress of (1815) 516517,
526
village societies, unanimity rule in
610611

743

violations, of human dignity 9495

violence 177 n20
ideologies of 55
in Latin America 558560
in modernity 94
see also barbarism
in post-social societies 235
ruled out by Gandhi 505
Vishwa Hindu Parishad 548
visions
of conquest 6970
of societies
political 238, 243244
social 230, 237238, 243244
totalizing, of rationality 4142,
223224, 237
transcendental
dualist 299301
in Middle Ages 298300
multiplicity of 3233
utopian 3536, 371, 628
Vizianagaram (Andhra Pradesh, India)
395401
cultural output in 409, 411412
kingship in 410412
voluntary associations, and civil society
142, 574575
voluntary pauperism 301302
Waldensians 15, 301302, 304
War of Independence (Israel, 1948)
431
warfare, institutionalized in axial age
104
We are all Multiculturalists now (Glazer)
201
Weimar Germany, civil society in 147
welfare states
multicultural policies in 196197,
214215
social rights in 213214
structural decit of 215
in Western Europe 540
Wergeld practices (Germany), abolition
of 611, 620
West
diasporas in 419, 538539
dichotomy with East (Orient)
159160, 458, 534
West-Bank and Gaza, Israeli
occupation of 433
Western Christianity 74
anti-Semitism in 506507
and Western civilization 3, 61, 6566

744

index of subjects

Western cities 295

Western civilization
and Christianity 3, 61, 6566
contacts with other civilizations 314
medieval 290
superiority of 150
uniqueness of 415
Western Europe
democracy in 497498
relations with Eastern Europe 23,
534, 536537, 539541
religion and politics in 345346
Western modernity xxxxi, 25,
4445, 158, 414416, 440441
confrontations with 555
in Estonia 442
and European modernity 597598
heterodox versus orthodox
orientations in 298
inuences on other modernities 54,
97100, 485, 597599
inherent tensions of 174175
of Israel 1920, 413, 416442
see also European modernity
Western post-modernity 414
Western sociology 486487
Westernization
alternatives to 442
in Israel 438441
and modernization 184185, 439,
441
What is to be done? (Buber) 512
Who are We? (Huntington) 2627
Wissenschaft of Judentum 519520
women
cosmopolitanism of 478
discrimination of, in Israeli society
434
headscarfs worn by 241242

womens movement 493

work, and social order 142
working class movements 155
world, Europeanization of 597599
world cities 465, 472
World Congress of Sociology 662
world history see global history
world religions
in axial age 104, 109110
economic ethics of 272273
jamborees of 186, 188
Webers analysis of 262, 310
world society 169, 454
world state, doctrine of 503
world values, surveys of 625626
world-system analysis 293295, 464
worlds, imagined 468, 479
Yemenite Jews 380381
Yiddish 372, 377
Yoga, Tantric 397
Zambia, cosmopolitanism in 478
Zhou dynasty (China) 7980, 110,
115
Zionism 369376, 389390, 418,
439440
and Diaspora Jewry 373374,
386387
East European origins of 439
and Judaism 366, 383384,
390391
national-religious wing of 378
and nationalism 370
neo 440 n21
post 387388
Zoroastrianism 5859
and Iranian civilization 62