The Germanic Review: Literature, Culture, Theory

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Three Concepts of Form in Simmel’s Sociology

Daniel Silver & Milos Brocic

To cite this article: Daniel Silver & Milos Brocic (2019) Three Concepts of Form in
Simmel’s Sociology, The Germanic Review: Literature, Culture, Theory, 94:2, 114-124, DOI:
10.1080/00168890.2019.1585666

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Published online: 01 May 2019.

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The Germanic Review, 94: 114–124, 2019
# 2019 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 0016-8890 print / 1930-6962 online
DOI: 10.1080/00168890.2019.1585666

Three Concepts of Form in

Simmel’s Sociology

Daniel Silver and Milos Brocic

This paper poses a simple question that is hard to answer: what does Simmel mean
by “form” in Sociology? We pursue this question in three major steps: First we
articulate why it is important to understand what Simmel means by form in
Sociology; second we explain why it is difficult to understand Simmel’s notion of
form; and third we develop what might be considered a pragmatist answer: namely,
that there is no single meaning but that depending on his argumentative purposes,
Simmel utilizes at least three different but interrelated notions, which we designate as
“geometric,” “transcendental,” and “vitalist.”

Keywords: Simmel, Sociology, Form, Vitalism

his paper poses a simple question that is hard to answer: what does Simmel mean by
T “form” in Sociology? We pursue this question in three major steps: First we articulate
why it is important to understand what Simmel means by form in Sociology; second we
explain why it is difficult to understand Simmel’s notion of form; and third we develop
what might be considered a pragmatist answer: namely, that there is no single meaning but
that depending on his argumentative purposes, Simmel utilizes at least three different but
interrelated notions, which we designate as “geometric,” “transcendental,” and “vitalist.”

WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO UNDERSTAND SIMMEL’S CONCEPTION OF FORM

The importance of a question depends upon the audience to which it is addressed. We
highlight two interpretative communities for whom the meaning of Simmel’s conception
of form matters: 1) the interdisciplinary, international community of Simmel scholars and

Daniel Silver is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Toronto.

Milos Brocic is a PhD candidate at the Department of Sociology at University of Toronto.

114
 SILVER AND BROCIC ♦ THREE CONCEPTS OF FORM IN SIMMEL'S SOCIOLOGY 115

interpreters; 2) (primarily) American sociological theorists and researchers for whom

Simmel has attained the status of a disciplinary and sub-disciplinary classic.
Consider first the importance of the question for scholars and interpreters of
Simmel. In his Fundamental Problems of Philosophy, Simmel argued that a philosopher is
in the end defined by some basic orientation to the world. Interpretation of their work
amounts to an effort to articulate that orientation and how it permeates the entirety of their
thought. There is a good case to be made that “the problem of form” indicates Simmel’s
basic mode of thought, which pervades not only his sociology but also his discussions of
individual artists and philosophers such Kant, Goethe, Rembrandt, and Rodin, as well as
of artistic styles, culture, morality, and the metaphysics of life. Guy Oakes puts the matter
baldly: “the concept of form is Simmel’s fundamental methodological instrument” (Oakes
1980: p. 8). As Oakes elaborates, if there is a leitmotif that cuts across all of Simmel’s
incredibly diverse outputs, it is form. Even if we periodize Simmel into early positivist,
middle neo-Kantian, and late vitalist episodes, we can see in these an ongoing reflection
on what it means to discover form amidst a world of flux and change. Thus, in the spirit of
Simmel’s own interpretative orientation in Fundamental Problems of Philosophy, it is cer-
tainly important to refine and deepen our understanding of his fundamental problem.
The question is also important to those engaged in sociological theory and research,
construed in more narrow disciplinary terms. Most notably, while Simmel has exerted a
long-standing influence on the field (Levine et al 1976), there has been a major surge of
interest over the past few decades (Brocic and Silver 2018). In this process, Simmel
emerged as a leading reference point for what has come to be known as “formal socio-
logy.” The main driver of this growth has been the expansion of social network analysis –
not of course because Simmel himself did anything resembling contemporary network ana-
lysis, but because concepts such as dyads and triads, tertius gaudens, and intersecting
circles lent themselves so well to it. Simmelian notions of form have especially resonated
with network researchers who seek to elaborate the theoretical significance of their
approach: namely, that we can examine configurations of social relations via their formal
properties (such as distance, connectedness, and position) relatively independent from their
contents. Erikson (2013) crystallized this view in an important recent article, arguing that
sociological “’formalism’ is based on a structural interpretation of the theoretical works of
Georg Simmel.” Given this situation, it is certainly valuable to clarify Simmel’s socio-
logical notion of form in order to better understand the intellectual basis of ‘formal soci-
ology’ and to potentially identify some of its latent assumptions, blind spots, and
alternatives.

WHY IT IS DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND SIMMEL’S CONCEPTION OF FORM

While it is clearly important to unpack Simmel’s conception of form, it is not easy to do
so. Challenges again appear from both interpretative standpoints.
For Simmel scholars, the most basic challenge comes from the fact that Simmel
speaks about form in many different ways, and it is exceedingly difficult to synthesize
these different usages into a single overarching notion. Oakes’ essay is probably the most
brilliant and thoroughgoing synthesis across Simmel’s entire corpus, encompassing many
116 THE GERMANIC REVIEW ♦ VOLUME 94, NUMBER 2 / 2019

different discussions of form. He lists at least nine features of Simmel’s discussion of

form, but at the basis of his account is an epistemological interpretation. Most clearly
articulated in Problems in the Philosophy of History, forms in this interpretation are neo-
Kantian categories that allow an observer to represent the world in a certain way, for
instance as a possible object of historical knowledge.
Oakes identifies a number of challenges that this synthetic project raises. For
instance, he notes, Simmel’s own remarks are “metaphorical and illustrative rather than
analytical … [they are] opaque and elusive, but also essential and axiomatic” (Oakes 1980:
p. 9). Yet Sociology adds additional difficulties, which Oakes does not mention – perhaps
because this text raises problems with the basic view of form as representational categories
that make scientific observation possible. Most notably, Simmel himself stressed that the
famous “three a prioris” in “How is Society Possible?” are different from the more con-
ventional Kantian a prioris: “societal unity is realized only by its own elements … and
needs no spectator” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 41). The objects of social knowledge (other
people) are affected by and react back to their being known – for instance by keeping
secrets. Social knowledge is part and parcel of the social process.
Some commentators have noted and tried to deal with this difference across
Simmel’s corpus. Levine (1989) for example argues that Simmel should have stuck with
the more “spectatorial” version of the Philosophy of History and instead developed socio-
logical a prioris as heuristics by which sociologists could guide their observations. Lash
(2005) instead suggests that what Simmel had in mind was the difference between the con-
ditions of “knowing” nature and “being” society, where the latter is a functional rather
than cognitive matter. It concerns the conditions that allow society to exist, such as reli-
gion or government. While these are intriguing suggestions, they belie the fact that neither
did Simmel himself speak in functionalist terms in “How is Society Possible?” nor did he
see fit to deploy the spectatorial notion from his earlier Problems in the Philosophy of
History. In fact, he might well have considered the later version an advance upon the ear-
lier. Without seeking to settle the matter, these examples are enough to illustrate the diffi-
culty of the question and point us toward a closer look at how Simmel actually utilizes the
notion of form in Sociology.
The problem gets even more challenging, however, when we note that Simmel does
not only write about form in epistemological terms. As Lash notes, form for Simmel is not
only about knowing an object, it is rather also about the process of forming some material
into an object. This notion of form as formation is crucial to Lash’s project of building a
“Lebensociologie,” for which he finds scant help in the purportedly “positivist” or “neo-
Kantian” Sociology. Oakes too discusses Simmel’s more vitalist writings to articulate ideas
about the emergence, consolidation, transcendence, and death of forms. But he (like Lash)
does so more or less exclusively by way of Simmel’s writings about culture, without refer-
ence to such themes in Sociology. And even within Sociology, it is difficult to reconcile
the a priori forms of “How is Society Possible?” with the “forms of association” that popu-
late the work, such as conflict or hierarchy – though some commentators have tried.1

1
Cf. Gerhardt 2011, who argues that the three a prioris govern the structure of the book, and that the
social forms are meant to illustrate how they operate.
 SILVER AND BROCIC ♦ THREE CONCEPTS OF FORM IN SIMMEL'S SOCIOLOGY 117

Parsing what Simmel’s “formalism” means in the context of contemporary socio-

logical research and theory is just as difficult. Erikson (2013) for example contrasts
Simmel’s “formalism” with a more relational and phenomenological variant of interaction-
ism, for which network theory and analysis has also been crucial. She places Simmel
squarely on the structural, formalistic side.
However, Simmel’s notion of form transcends this division. Indeed, as Symbolic
Interactionism grew and consolidated, Simmel became a classic inspiration for this litera-
ture as well. And once again his notion of form was central, though not understood in a
structuralist way. Consider the example of social distance. In symbolic interactionism, this
concept deals with the fragmented and incompleteness of what we reveal about ourselves
in interpersonal relationships (Goffman 1959; Gurevitch 1989). By contrast, in more struc-
tural interpretations (Blau 1977), distance has to do with features such as individuals’
density of ties and their similarity in terms of multiple overlapping variables. To make
matters worse, there is yet another tradition in sociology that has also rapidly grown and
consolidated in recent decades, informed by a different uptake of Simmel’s notion of
form. Often referred to as “processual social theory,” this tradition has been very con-
cerned with the emergence and transformation of (social) forms, self-organization, and
complexity. Cederman (2005) in particular has argued that Simmel could give deeper the-
oretical grounding to this work, but that this appropriation has been hampered in some
degree because interpreters have treated him as more of a thinker of static form (as a
“formalistic” formalist), rather than in terms of the dynamic relation between form
and process.
In sum, there are multiple opposed traditions in contemporary sociology for which
Simmel’s notion of form is central. And yet that notion means very different things to
each, and even can become a wedge between them in debates about the single ultimate
meaning of form. In reading these multiple appropriations, one wonders if they came from
the same author. The thesis of this paper is that yes, they did – but that the author in ques-
tion is difficult to pin down, because he uses similar concepts in multiple ambiguous
ways, and even plays upon and thrives on this multivocality.

A PRAGMATIST PROPOSAL: GEOMETRIC, TRANSCENDENTAL, AND VITALIST

CONCEPTIONS OF FORM IN SOCIOLOGY
How then can we clarify the concept of form in Sociology? We pursue a pragmatic pro-
posal, in the sense CS Peirce developed in his “How to make our ideas clear.” In this
approach, we make our ideas clear by asking what practical difference a different defin-
ition makes, where “practical” has a wide meaning that includes intellectual conduct and
habits. In the case of Simmel, this approach implies that we can clarify his idea of form in
Sociology by observing differences in the kind of arguments he gives for different notions
of form, and then drawing out the import or significance of adopting or accepting these
notions for intellectual conduct. More specifically, we identify three variant ideas of form
in Sociology, which we refer to as the geometric, the transcendental, and the vitalist. For
each we elaborate a cluster of related terms Simmel associates with that conception, the
method by which he argues for it, and the import or significance he attaches to it. In this
118 THE GERMANIC REVIEW ♦ VOLUME 94, NUMBER 2 / 2019

way we highlight differences in these conceptions of form that make an intellec-

tual difference.
Consider first the set of terms Simmel uses when he talks about each notion of
form. They are very different.

 When elaborating geometric variants of form, Simmel uses terms such as shape, con-
figuration, structure, location, position, and figure. He contrasts these to terms like
impulse, matter, substance, purpose, or interest. In this geometric conception, the
form of for instance conflict indicates that conflict has a shape whatever it is about,
whether love or money.
 For transcendental notions of form, Simmel uses terms like a priori, presupposition,
unity, representation, subject, consciousness, framing, knowability, and presumption.
He contrasts these to terms such as empirical, given, diversity, plurality, or discon-
nected. In this transcendental conception, form is the condition of the possibility of
an intelligible social world, and has something to do with the presuppositions under
which social relations could be comprehensible or incomprehensible to participants
as such.
 The vitalistic notion of form has been much less discussed by commentators, which is
understandable given that Simmel does not explicitly differentiate it as such, while he
devoted explicit theoretical-philosophical discussion to the other two in Chapter 1.
Still, any attentive reader of Sociology will find numerous discussions revolving
around terms such as growth, expansion, energy, vitality, renewal, transcending (in
the sense of overcoming or moving beyond rather than presupposing), regeneration,
climax, vigor, and flow. Simmel contrasts these with terms like fixity, objectified,
mechanical, finite, exhausted, and dead. This vitalistic cluster of ideas juxtaposes
form not with content or incomprehensibility but with process. Vitalistic form is less
concerned with what a form like conflict is about (e.g. love or money) and more with
how it emerges creatively from out of the flow of interaction, gives direction and
energy, but also can become exhausted to the point of provoking a search for renewal.

These initial characterizations give a general sense of the ideas Simmel associates
with each conception in practice. More important in our view however are the questions of
how Simmel argues for these and why he thinks it is important to do so. For these ques-
tions point toward what Simmel thought he (and we) could do with these ideas. Let us
again consider each in turn.
Regarding the geometric notion of form, Simmel lays out his general argumentative
procedure in the first chapter, “The Problem of Sociology.” Here he notes that the same
form can be about different contents and that different forms can be vehicles for the same
substantive interests, just as the sun, a snow globe, and a basketball are all spherical. This
procedure distills the shape or configuration of a relation from out of its contents. Simmel
puts this method to work throughout the book. For instance, in “Quantitative Determinants
of Groups,” he demonstrates that across many domains, groups exhibit similar features
depending on their size; in “Super and Subordination” he shows how groups subordinated
under a single ruler exhibit similar traits, whether it is a church, a university, or a govern-
ment; in “Space and the spatial ordering of society,” he discusses similarities among
 SILVER AND BROCIC ♦ THREE CONCEPTS OF FORM IN SIMMEL'S SOCIOLOGY 119

groups characterized by spatial elements like borders, whatever those borders are dividing.
Similar instances can be found in every chapter of the book.
While this type of argument is familiar enough – even canonically “Simmelian” –
why Simmel places such weight on it is less obvious. As a starting point for an interpret-
ation, we can note that in Chapter 1 Simmel suggests that this notion of form can
constitute the basis for a science of sociology (Simmel 2009 [1908]: pp. 23–24). In later
chapters, when he runs through an instance of the “distillation” exercise by which form
and content become purified, he will often speak of a “form-sociological” perspective.
These are signs that for Simmel the geometric idea of form as “form vs. content” is
meant to help create what we might refer to as a “sociological task.” This is, we believe,
the significance of the fact that Simmel introduces this concept of form as a procedure.
The sociological task comes not so much by picking out certain objects for sociologists to
study, but by laying out a method, an exercise that we can perform.2 This is a method in
the older meaning of the word: a practice of self-discipline, a kind of work, such that if we
do it, we will be, we will make ourselves into, a certain type of person, namely, a sociolo-
gist – where a sociologist is that kind of person capable of perceiving social form any-
where it might be. Carrying out this method of “ideational variation” (Backhaus 1998)
requires a huge amount of empirical knowledge, about many diverse cases. But most
importantly, it offers sociologists not objects to look at, but something to do: learn about
many cases, seek to discern their common forms, codify those forms, discover their histor-
ies, connections, and permutations. Perception in turn follows practice. This first notion of
form, in sum, seems to be designed to create new habits of perception and inference that
could constitute the disciplinary basis of sociology. This is its practical meaning.
Turning next to the transcendental notion of form, the logic of Simmel’s argument
is presuppositional. Some X that we think is possible would not be possible but for A, B,
or C. In the case of Simmel’s philosophical argument in “How is society possible?”, it is
notoriously difficult to fill in the blanks of this generic transcendental formula, though the
overall logic is clear enough (see Gerhardt 2011 for a helpful and relatively recent over-
view). Simmel’s thought is that a recognizable social experience is possible only under
certain conditions. We must be able to place individuals into generic social types or roles,
otherwise every new encounter would be so utterly novel that social life would have no
regularity. Additionally, we must presume that those we encounter hold some part of them-
selves in reserve, otherwise social interaction would collapse into pure communion; in this
(unrecognizable) scenario, there would be no possibility of surprise or conflict. Finally, a
society that did not lay out some tasks or callings to its members would be scarcely intelli-
gible; social life would lack that characteristic capacity to provide motivation and direction
to individuals. However we might flesh out these ideas in detail, the logic of these claims

2
“Sociology belongs to that type of science whose special character is not that its object clusters with
others under a broader concept (in the manner of classical and German philology, or optics and
acoustics), but rather places a whole field. of objects under a particular perspective. Not its object but
its way of looking, especially by carrying out its abstraction, distinguishes it from the customary his-
torical-social sciences.” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: pp. 25–26).
120 THE GERMANIC REVIEW ♦ VOLUME 94, NUMBER 2 / 2019

is that if these three conditions did not hold, that experience we recognize as “social”
would not be possible.
While Simmel lays out the transcendental conditions of society in “How is society
possible?”, throughout Sociology he repeatedly makes arguments that utilize variants of
the three a prioris. This usage in the flow of the text helps to elaborate the way Simmel’s
transcendental argument operates in argumentative practice. Generally, he appeals to
“conditions of the possibility” claims to demonstrate how some bit of experience that
might not seem social can be recognized as social, if it exhibits features determined by the
sociological categories of “How is society possible?”
Hence in “The Poor Person,” Simmel begins the chapter by noting that poverty may
initially appear to be a feature of individuals suffering from absolute levels of deprivation.
However, impoverishment can become a social category if “the poor” becomes recognized
as a social role – an example of the first a priori at work. In “Secrecy and the Secret
Society,” though secrecy initially seems like something outside of social interaction,
Simmel shows that by holding something back from one another (by keeping secrets), we
create the conditions of a relationship exhibiting the back and forth of discovery and reve-
lation without which it would not merit the name “interaction.” This is an example of the
2nd a priori in action. Finally, in “Superordination and Subordination,” domination seems
initially to be the dissolution of social life: one tells the other what to do. Not only does
Simmel suggest (famously) that hierarchy is a two-way relationship, later in the chapter he
shows that a hierarchical world lays out a path of self-realization: in such a world, I
increase my freedom by increasing my power as I move up the ranks. This is an example
of the third a priori at work.3 In these examples and more, Simmel appeals to transcenden-
tal arguments in effecting a kind of reversal of perception in the reader, by showing how
when perceived in terms of the right presuppositions, even what might look like a non- or
anti-social experience can in fact be a recognizable component of social life.
Why does Simmel pursue these various iterations of transcendental arguments about
form? This is a difficult topic with no simple answer, but a useful hint may lie in the fact that
Simmel seemed worried about his sociology appearing to be too “formalistic.” For example,
at times he questions the formalism that a schematic of positions imposes upon the “internally
variable essence of the human being [which]never exactly conforming to conceptually static
forms” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 151). The transcendental forms, by contrast, imbue the more
geometric forms of association with what we might call “phenomenological validity.” They
are possible not just as such, but for me, from a first-person point of view. That is, rather than
a free-floating description of the schematic configuration of “the poor person,” we have “poor

3
While some chapters emphasize certain a prioris to greater degrees than others, discussion of all
three suffuse the whole work. The 3rd a priori, for instance, comes up in Simmel’s discussion on
secret societies, where the shared secret implies a commitment to one another, calling forth a series
of shared practices in effort to preserve this bond. “The Poor Person”, moreover, reflects not just the
typification of the first a priori, but the boundaries of the second a priori as well. Like the stranger, it
is a social type that straddles the insider/outsider boundary, standing outside of society by being the
object of society’s charity, and yet, by virtue of this this relationship, becoming constitutive of society
as such.
 SILVER AND BROCIC ♦ THREE CONCEPTS OF FORM IN SIMMEL'S SOCIOLOGY 121

people” integrated into consciousness as a recognizable social role; rather than a purely geo-
metric description of the shape of conflict, we have conflict represented as the consciousness
that my experience of you contains an irreducible otherness. Without these and other argu-
ments about how forms can be part of subjective experience, then the sociological project
could descend into empty formalism. This is a lesson that some of Simmel’s more avid
“formalist” followers could do well to heed.
Consider finally the vitalist variant of form in Sociology. Vitalist arguments about
form generally revolve around the dialectics of life process and life form. Rather than
assume an existing form, they often point toward the emergence of forms from energies
that are initially relatively fluid, immediate, and unfixed. In the logic of a vitalistic argu-
ment, this fluidity becomes relatively (and often provisionally) fixed and ordered through
an active and creative process of formation. In turn, the resultant form exhibits its own cre-
ativity, selecting material suitable to it, while also providing a platform for new experi-
mentation in how to sustain its energies. Vitalist arguments, moreover, point to the
finitude of forms, in that emergent forms may lose their steam, become worn out, dull, and
exhausted, to the point of becoming straightjackets that restrict the very creativity that
brought them into being. Attempts at renewal and resuscitation often follow, as do efforts
to cast off the form and search for a new one. In sum, vitalist arguments about form
revolve around demonstrating their creative emergence, sustenance, and transcendence
rather than their abstract shape or status as a condition for the intelligibility of experience.
While Simmel outlines the general form of this type of logic in other works (espe-
cially the View of Life but also the Conflict in Culture and the Tragedy of Culture),
Sociology contains a number of arguments about the vitalistic character of social forms.
For example, Simmel’s discussion of dyads contains a remarkable comment on the sense
of mortality of two-person relations, an example of the finitude of social forms.4 Eye-to-
eye interaction provides an example of a relatively raw, unformed aspect of social life,5
illustrating the moment of immediacy in a vital process. Simmel also frequently discusses
the process of actively shaping the material of social life into a relatively enduring pattern
(for instance via fidelity6), and the tensions that result as individuals are compelled to

4
“This dependence of the dyad on the pure individuality of the single member lets the idea of its
existence be accompanied by that of its end in a way more nearly and perceptibly than is the case
with other unions, which all members know can survive their individual departures or deaths. Just as
the life of the individual is shaded in some way by the idea of one’s death, so is the life of
associations.” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 83).
5
“The most vital interactivity, however, in which the eye-to-eye look intertwines human beings, does
not crystallize in any kind of objective formation” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 571).
6
“This special sociological importance of fidelity, however, still allows it to play a unifying role in a
wholly fundamental duality affecting the principal form of all social processes. It is this: a relation-
ship that is a fluctuating, continuously developing life process obtains a relatively stable external
form.” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 522).
122 THE GERMANIC REVIEW ♦ VOLUME 94, NUMBER 2 / 2019

shape themselves to fit into forms that now constrain their lives from above.7 Yet he also
frequently discusses the capacity of emergent forms to sustain vitality and creativity, for
instance in how conflict imbues groups with energizing tensions, or how the excitement of
sociability persists by creating opportunities to move among many conversation circles.
Nor does Simmel neglect the atrophy of social forms or the search for new ones: the chap-
ter on conflict ends with a discussion of the exhaustion of conflict and the search for rec-
onciliation; “The preservation of social groups” reflects on the profound challenges in
casting off a particular form of group life,8 and the excursus on fidelity remarks on the ten-
dency of new forms to “rush ahead” of life so much that they do not initially seem to fit
(Simmel’s example is how using the informal “you” with somebody can awkwardly antici-
pate an intimacy that is not yet realized).9
These examples are enough to show that vitalistic arguments about form course
through Sociology, and that Simmel was actively developing a vitalist sociology well
before his more explicit “vitalist” period. But why does he do this? Though he never tells
us, we can speculate. One bit of evidence is that vitalist passages in Sociology tend to be
imbued with the tragic pathos that characterizes Simmel’s writings about culture and meta-
physics more centrally. By indicating that social life is after all a form of life, these pas-
sages suggest that these tragic notes are also inescapable in the social domain of existence.
Additionally, reminding readers about the vitalistic features of social forms is another way
for Simmel to counteract the impression that his notion of social form devolves into a kind
of empty formalism. Vitalistic themes forcefully demonstrate that social forms are not
only forms of perceiving or thinking, or forms of intellectual practice – they involve an
active process of forming, creating, maintaining, being suffocated by, and seeking to move
beyond what results. These vital dynamics are crucial to include in any “formal” sociology
worth its name. In sum, the sociological vitalism adumbrated in Sociology has the import

7
“The fact that humanity fashioned society as its life form placed into its foundation the deep contra-
diction between the objective demands, the supra-personal attitudes and norms that logical legalism
develops purely from the reality of the situation—and the subjectivity of the personalities who must
comply with that and not fit the whole of life, which is by nature vibrant and irrational, into the pre-
scribed firmly constructed mold. (Simmel 2009 [1908]: pp. 461–462).
8
“Every quantitative expansion of a group requires certain qualitative modifications and adaptations
that an outdated structure can no longer undergo without breaking apart … The process of transform-
ing it into a new structure requires the assimilation and working up of new members; it consumes
energy. Structures that have lost their inner meaning no longer possess this energy for the task, but
use all that they still have in order to protect the once existing from against internal and external dan-
gers.” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 515).
9
“When superseded forms are shattered by the life pulsating behind them, it swings, so to speak, to an
opposite extreme and creates forms that rush ahead of that real life and by which it is not yet com-
pletely filled beginning with wholly personal relationships, where for example, the use of German Sie
[formal ‘you’] among those who have been friends for a long time is often found to be an unsuitable
stiffness in the warmth of the relationship, but the Du [informal ‘you’] just as often, at least at first, is a
bit excessive as an anticipation of a total intimacy not yet achieved.” (Simmel 2009 [1908]: p. 522).
 SILVER AND BROCIC ♦ THREE CONCEPTS OF FORM IN SIMMEL'S SOCIOLOGY 123

that no attentive reader of the text can miss: that sociology is not disconnected from the
general dynamics of vital processes, and thus from Simmel’s metaphysics of life.

CONCLUSION
What lessons can we draw from this effort to clarify the concept of form in Simmel’s
Sociology? For scholars of Simmel, it is important to acknowledge that vitalism courses
through his whole oeuvre, even if Simmel did not call attention to it in the opening pages
of this work in particular. This recognition poses an intellectual challenge: if Simmel
would have thematized the vitalism of Sociology explicitly, what would it look like? Since
he never did this for us, it falls on his interpreters to develop the implications of his
unformed thoughts.
For sociologists working with Simmelian concepts of form, a valuable lesson would
be to clarify what sense of form one is adopting. By remaining clear about the different
meanings and implications of geometric, transcendental, or vitalistic notions of form, we
can in turn be clear on which one to use, when and why. Yet we can go beyond this bare
avowal of difference by working though the implications of studying a given topic under
one or the other: how do we study borders or dyads or triads or agency or exchange or
domination under each conception of form?
In both cases, in good Simmelian form, we might do well to give up or at least slow
down the search for a single unifying form of form, accept some plurality and even contra-
diction among multiple conceptions, and seek to learn about when, why, and how we
might want to think with one or the other.

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