Alle Publikationen
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2016
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(2016): A Critical Social Systems View of the Internet. In: Philosophy of the Social Sciences 37 (4), S. 471-500. DOI: 10.1177/0048393107307664
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(2016): A Critical Social Systems View of the Internet. In: Philosophy of the Social Sciences 37 (4), S. 471-500. DOI: 10.1177/0048393107307664
Abstract: The article discusses principles that form part of evolutionary systems thinking in social sciences and humanities. It is argued that introducing the concept of self-organization relates agency and structures in a way that makes it possible to take up certain features of Critical Theory by which it can meet the demands for a critical social science. These principles are applied to the question of whether there is convergence or divergence in and by means of the Internet. It will be clarified that the Internet is basically a social system and that it is a subsystem of the larger and overarching system of the whole society. It will be shown how the Internet can be perceived as a possible trigger for societal developments bringing about fundamental change in the nature of society. Thus the article cuts across philosophical, system theoretical, social theoretical, sociology of technology, and information society theory considerations.
Keywords: agency, critical Theory, Disziplin, dynamic, epistemology, Evolution, Handlungsmacht, information society, Informations- & Kommunikationstechnik, Internet, Kritische Theorie, mechanism, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Philosophie, Realtechnik, revolution, Selbstorganisation, self-organization, social system, social systems, soziales System, Soziologie, STS, Technik 2012
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(2012): Web 2.0 Technologies of the Self. In: Philosophy & Technology 25 (3), S. 399-413. DOI: 10.1007/s13347-011-0032-9
Abstract: Although no scholarly consensus exists on the issue, the claim that a substantive reconfiguration of the Internet has occurred in the beginning of the 2000s has settled firmly in public common sense. The label tentatively chosen for the new turn in the medium’s evolution is Web 2.0. The developments constituting this turn have been contemplated from different perspectives in technical and business publications (O’Reilly 2005), in treatises on “convergence” or “participatory” culture (Jenkins 2006; Jenkins et al. 2009), and could be usefully interrogated by means of political economy concepts such as the “social factory” and “free labor” (Terranova 2004). Marked, or rather symbolically constructed, by these discursive pickets lies a field of practice that the members of the participatory culture, the “produsers” (Bruns 2008) of open journalism, blogs, social networking sites and other characteristic Web 2.0 applications inhabit and animate with their everyday thought, decision making and action. This paper undertakes a theoretical exploration of the user practices emerging and consolidating around the new technological and organizational models making up Web 2.0. It is informed by a qualitative study of bloggers and Facebook users conducted through focus group methodology, although the concrete empirical data are not presented here. Rather, the analysis employs the concept of “technologies of the self” by Foucault (1988) as a heuristic device in order to situate Web 2.0 use, first, in a long history of culturally evolved forms of self-constitution and, second, in a complex matrix of relationships with other types of technologies, namely, those of production, sign systems and power. This conceptual choice, we argue, furnishes a study of Web 2.0 use, which holds in balance its liberatory potential and its susceptibility to new forms of domination, rationalization and commodification.
Keywords: Anerkennung, Art des Kommunikationsmediums, Blogs, critical Theory, Disziplin, Foucault, Im (wissenschaftlichen) Diskurs, Konstruktion des Selbst, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Philosophie, (post)strukturalistische Ansätze, Reflexionen über MTR, Selbst, Social networking sites, Soziale Angemessenheit, Sozialphilosophie, Technologies of the self, Web 2.0, Zeitschrift: Philosophy and Technology 2011
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(2011): Collective Intentionality and the (Re)Production of Social Norms. In: Philosophy of the Social Sciences 42 (3), S. 323-355. DOI: 10.1177/0048393111399100
2009
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(2009): History and the Critique of Social Concepts. In: Philosophy of the Social Sciences 40 (1), S. 3-29. DOI: 10.1177/0048393109350678
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0048393109350678 Abstract: Many theorists have regarded genealogy as an important technique for social criticism. But it has been unclear how genealogy can go beyond the accomplishments of other, more mundane, critical methods. I propose a new approach to understanding the critical potential of history. I argue that theorists have been misled by the assumption that if a claim is deserving of criticism, it is because the claim is false. Turning to the criticism of concepts rather than criticism of claims, I expand on the distinction between “descriptive semantics” and “foundational semantics” to show that genealogy can be uniquely qualified to explore the foundations of concepts, and hence to criticize concepts that are problematic in nonobvious ways.
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