The social Theory of Georg Simmel

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1024612627

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-166627

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Spykman, Nicholas J. http://d-nb.info/gnd/124229867

Title:: The social Theory of Georg Simmel

Place of publication:: Chicago

Publisher:: Univ. of Chicago Press.

Year of publication:: 1925

Scope:: XXIX, 297 S

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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204 THE SOCIAL THEORY OF GEORG SIMMEL family group appears to give a definite support to the in- dividualization. The single individual is apparently unable to face the large community alone. Only by giving up a part of his absolute ego to a few others and by uniting with these others in a small circle can he guard and maintain his individual uniqueness. He has to devote himself and his interests to a few others in order to be able to face the whole community on a broader front. In this way mem- bership in the smallest circle within the widest group can support and protect the differentiation, although it usually serves this purpose only during the period of preparation and transition. The modern family fulfils this function in an ideal way. As a collective unity it offers its members on the one hand the opportunity for a preliminary differentiation which prepares them for later, fuller differentiations. On the other hand it offers them a certain protection under which the individual differentiations can develop until they are capable of asserting themselves in the social totality. Mod- ern civilization gives definite rights both to the individual- ity and to the widest possible circle. In such a social struc- ture the family takes an intermediate position and partakes of the characteristics both of the small group and of the large group. It appears as an extension of the individu- ality, as a unity acting as one, distinct and separate from all other social units. But it also appears as a complex plurality within which the individual is differentiated from all others and develops his self-realization and self-suffi- ciency. This double function leads to a sociological ambiguity. The family appears sometimes as an individual unit in the larger circles, sometimes as an intermediate circle between the individual and the larger circle. Both these functions may be found in the different phases of the evolution of

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