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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MONEY AND INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY 227 ore ion of ter- se. atic 1Ce, in- 5b- de- ion ‘fic de- Jsl- 5 1t sto ex- ing \CO- t of ~ific SOT. imi- lom also hit and a SO our :nd- 29ANS of our possessions. They mean an extension of the ego, an enlargement of the sphere of the individuality. An external object would be without significance if it could not obtain value, and the ego would be a point without extension if it could not express itself in external objects. One may say that the acquisition of property means the growth of the individuality beyond the individual. If lib- erty means a state in which the will can realize itself un- hampered, an increase in possession will mean an increase in liberty. But this liberty is restricted by the character- istics and the properties of the objects possessed. Our will is usually sufficiently adapted to life’s conditions not to demand from objects what they cannot perform and not to consider that limitation as a positive restraint, but it would be possible, none the less, to arrange objects in a series according to the amount of obstruction which they place in the way of the expression of our will. The last item of that series would again be money. It lacks all structure of its own and adapts itself immediately to any demand or purpose. The objects which stand behind it may exert limi- tations; money itself adapts itself immediately to our will. But because of its lack of structure it is also the most unadapted object. Because we possess it so completely, we cannot obtain any more from it than possession. Only in so far as an object is something in itself can it be some- thing for us; only in limiting our freedom can it allow an expression of our freedom. This logical opposition reaches a maximum tension in money. It is more for us than any other object because it belongs to us without reservation, and it is less for us than any other object because it lacks any content which can be actually possessed apart from the mere form of possession as such. We possess it more completely than any other object, but we possess in it less than in any other object.

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