Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Abstract
In this article we are reformulating the theory of reflexive modernization as an
empirical research programme and summarize some of the most recent findings
which have been produced by a research consortium in Munich (integrating four
universities, funded by the German Research Society (DFG)). On this basis we
reject the idea that Western societies at the beginning of the twenty-first century
move from the modern to the post-modern. We argue that there has been no clear
break with the basic principles of modernity but rather a transformation of basic
institutions of modernity such as the nation-state and the nuclear family. We would
suggest, therefore, that what we are witnessing is a second modernity. Finally,
we reform the theory of reflexive modernization in reaction to three uttered
objections.
Keywords: Reflexive modernization, postmodernity, individualization, globaliza-
tion, boundary transcendence, decision-making
All around the world, society is undergoing radical change – radical in the
sense that it poses a challenge to Enlightenment-based modernity and opens
up a space in which people choose new and unexpected forms of the social
and the political. Sociological debates since the 1990s have sought to grasp
and conceptualize this reconfiguration. Some authors, who lay great stress on
the openness of the human project amid new contingencies, complexities and
uncertainties, operate with the term ‘post-modernity’ (Bauman, Lyotard,
Harvey, Haraway). However, we reject the idea that so far this is a move from
the modern to the postmodern. On theoretical as well as on empirical grounds
our conclusion is that all Western societies are still ‘modern’ societies: there
Beck (Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich) and Lau (Department of Philosophy and Social Sciences, University of
Augsburg (Corresponding author email: u.beck@uni-muenchen.de)
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005 ISSN 0007-1315 print/1468-4446 online.
Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden,
MA 02148, USA on behalf of the LSE. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-4446.2005.00082.x
526 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
has been no movement beyond the realm of the modern to its opposite,
because there has been no clear break with the basic principles of modernity
but rather a transformation of basic institutions of modernity (for example,
the nation-state and the nuclear family). We would suggest, therefore, that
what we are witnessing is a second modernity.
We use the term ‘first modernity’ to describe the modernity based on nation-
state societies, where social relations, networks and communities are essen-
tially understood in a territorial sense. The collective patterns of life, progress
and controllability, full employment and exploitation of nature that were
typical of this first modernity have now been undermined by certain inter-
linked processes: globalization, individualization, the gender revolution,
underemployment and global risks (such as the ecological crisis, the crash of
global financial markets and the threat of transnational terrorist attacks). The
real theoretical and political challenge of second modernity is the fact that
society must respond to all these challenges simultaneously.
When these processes are considered more carefully, the thing they all have
in common emerges more clearly: they are all unforeseen consequences, not
of the crisis but of the victory of the first, simple, linear, industrial moderniza-
tion based on the nation-state (the focus of classical sociology). This is what
we mean when we speak of ‘reflexive modernization’: radicalized moderniza-
tion consumes the foundations of first modernity and transforms its institu-
tions and its frame of reference, often in a way that is neither desired nor
anticipated. Or, in terms of systems theory: the unforeseen consequences of
functional differentiation can no longer be controlled by further functional
differentiation. In fact, the very idea of controllability, certainty or security –
so fundamental to first modernity – collapses.
The aim of this article is to elaborate some of the major basic assumptions
and empirical implications of this theory of the self-transforming modern
society and to scrutinize them from an empirical standpoint. This will be done
in six sections. In the first section we shall offer a more precise account of the
basic theoretical assumptions of the theory before outlining our programme
of empirical research in the second. In the third section we shall demonstrate
some of the distinctions between first and second modernity. Having recon-
structed the main features of first modernity in the fourth section, we shall
then elaborate the manifestations of the new, second modernity, in order, in
the sixth and final section, to reform the theory of reflexive modernization
accordingly.
These basic assumptions include, first, the claim that there is a break between
first and second, or reflexive, modernity. The term ‘first modernity’, far from
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 527
How do these structural changes come about? The second basic assumption
in the theory of reflexive modernization is that it is the process of modern-
ization itself that calls the institutional order of first modernity into question,
steals its clarity and forces it to make decisions. In other words, the crises of
second modernity are triggered by processes of enforced modernization,
which then take hold of modernization’s own foundations. The ‘protective
zones’ generated by first modernity to shield it against the dynamic of mod-
ernization are currently losing their unquestioned taken-for-grantedness. They
are experienced as being contingent and open to influence, and are increas-
ingly being forced to provide rationales for their existence. This also applies
to the very legitimatory sources of modernity themselves – and to science in
particular. The latter may be producing more and more knowledge, but it is
also producing an ever greater lack of knowledge, uncertainty and insufficient
clarity. The rationalization process ultimately encompasses the model of hege-
monic scientific rationality as well, which in many spheres is only of limited
use for the task of making solid, unambiguous decisions.
At a recent conference, Jürgen Habermas addressed himself in detail to the
theory and empirical investigation of reflexive modernization, in the process
outlining a proposal for how they may be lent greater precision and developed
further. He distinguished between two variants, namely that of a radical and
that of an internal discontinuity between first and second modernity. Social
change can only be considered radical ‘when the application of modern prin-
ciples undermines these principles themselves’ (Habermas 2005).1 In contrast
to this, Habermas – like us – argues for the recognition of a certain internal
discontinuity, which makes it perfectly possible to describe the new empirical
situation of reflexive modernization by (using the distinction offered by Beck
himself) as a transformation of basic institutions in which the basic principles
of modernity continue to operate successfully’. Habermas concludes from this
that these principles should now be formulated in turn at a sufficiently abstract
level within sociology and social theory. He makes the following proposal:
‘Modern societies are characterized by the accelerated mobilization of social
change that is moving not only towards exhausting all quasi-natural reserves
of an unreflected, lived ethos and of customary practices, but also towards
internalizing all natural resources – in other words, the ecological environment
and the organic substrate of socialized individuals (including the generative
mechanism whereby parental sets of chromosomes randomly combine); that
is to say, it is incorporating such resources completely into the cycle of the self-
reproduction of society. This dynamic of change has been placed on a self-
regulating, permanent footing in the first place by the interlinking of the
capitalist economy with institutionalized science and the development of pro-
ductive forces. From a sociological point of view, the distinctive feature of
modern societies is the way in which the cumulative intermeshing of the
rationalization of the life world with the functional differentiation of social
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 529
The meta-change of modern societies, which has only been roughly outlined
here, occurs in different ways in nearly every social sphere. The theory of
reflexive modernization, translated into a programme of empirical research,
makes it possible to compare different phenomena of the structural tran-
scending of boundaries and to investigate whether they reveal any similar pat-
terns or trends. This empirical investigation has been carried out since 1999 in
a research consortium funded by the German Research Society (DFG),2
involving four universities located in the Munich/Augsburg area. About
sixteen empirical research projects are distributed across three fields of
inquiry: a) knowledge, science and technology, b) individuals, life
situations/lifestyles, work, and c) economics, politics and history. The results of
these different endeavours have revealed remarkably consistent patterns of
meta-change across very heterogeneous spheres of action and systems. For
example, in the sphere of science and technology it has become clear that the
elimination of boundaries from institutionalized nature–society distinctions
and the elimination of the difference between scientific and non-scientific
knowledge is leading to situations marked by crisis. Science is itself develop-
ing into a source of uncertainty, lack of knowledge and categorical ambiguity
(Böschen and Wehling 2004). This means that those institutions that are still
under obligation to make decisions have necessarily to make them in a prag-
matic way, using political procedures and normative criteria (Böschen and
Schulz-Schaeffer 2003).
The projects located within this field of inquiry address such different issues
as the recognition of experiential knowledge and tacit knowledge in profes-
sional and technological contexts (Böhle, Pfeiffer and Sevsay-Tegethoff 2004),
the problems that attend science assessment (Böschen and Wehling 2004), the
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
530 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
None the less, the transition from first to second modernity by no means sig-
nifies a complete break in the process of modernization. Unlike postmoder-
nity, second modernity maintains that there is an overlapping of continuity and
discontinuity that needs to be defined both theoretically and empirically. In
order to do this, it is helpful to interpret and refine the distinction between
first and second modernity by using the distinction between basic principles
and basic institutions. Second modernity shares certain basic principles or
lasting imperatives with first modernity (such as the principle according to
which decisions can and must be backed up by rational reasons), which, when
fulfilled to the optimum extent, constitute the dynamic element of modern-
ization. By basic institutions we mean the institutional responses to the fun-
damental imperatives of these basic principles in particular historical contexts,
each response being associated with a particular phase of modernity. Thus, for
example, a distinction needs to be made between the basic principle of state-
hood and the basic institution of the nation-state, which is subject to change.
While institutional responses, once found, possess a considerable degree of
inertia, they are none the less rendered null and void by the ongoing impera-
tives of modernization, which remove the foundations of their rationales
and decision-making. It can therefore be expected that the continuity of
modernity will be guaranteed by the basic principles, while the transition to
reflexive modernity will be brought about by the discontinuous transforma-
tion of basic institutions.
An example may serve to illustrate this link between continuity and dis-
continuity. One necessary prerequisite for institutional action in both eras is
the distinction that can be drawn in principle between the domain of natural
causes and phenomena – where issues of responsibility are absent – and the
domain of societal decision-making and responsibility. Whereas in first
modernity it was clearly the task of science to provide a rationale for this
nature–society difference, this same boundary turns into plural boundaries in
second modernity, and the rationale for it likewise. Thus, basic principles are
cognitive–normative problems and minimum requirements of the ‘project of
modernity’, which represent its ‘driving force’ and thereby keep its develop-
mental dynamic going. Some of these principles have already been mentioned,
such as the capacity to provide a rationale for statements, structures and deci-
sions and the principle of statehood. Others include the principle of individ-
ual reproduction through gainful employment, the principle of egalitarianism,
the principle of functional inclusion and the demarcation of nature from
society.
These basic principles of modernity do not lose any of their normative valid-
ity; on the contrary, their claim to validity becomes greater in the course of
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 533
example, of danger, the market, the private sphere. Perhaps the most impor-
tant distinction of this kind is the nature–society difference, which in its
many different sub-forms (healthy/sick, life/death, genetically modified/non-
modified, anthropogenic/non-anthropogenic) exempts actors from every kind
of responsibility and from having to give reasons for their actions. Only
through the demarcation of each different sphere of responsibility and by
bracketing off any ‘residue’ of reality for which no rationale can be given can
modernity’s potential for rationalization fully unfold. It is obvious that if these
boundaries become blurred or are even dismantled, the outcome will be insti-
tutional crises regarding responsibility and decision-making, as we are cur-
rently observing in the debate over stem cells, for example, and in the debate
over how far international law still provides a basis for decisions about war
and peace.
Another important function of institutional boundary-drawing in first
modernity, referred to especially by Foucault and Bauman, is its impact on
standardization and normalization. According to this ordering logic, certain
forms of social life (nuclear family), knowledge (scientific knowledge), work
(paid work, regular work), statehood (nation-state, welfare state), subjectivity
(criminal responsibility) are marked out as standard forms ahead of all other
forms and are recognized both in law and in society. Standardization and nor-
malization rely on clear distinctions between the standard form and forms that
deviate from the standard. The dissolution or pluralization of these bound-
aries is hard to reconcile with the institutional logic of first modernity, as the
latter relies on clear criteria (e.g. criminally responsible/not criminally respon-
sible) in order to reach decisions.
However, anyone taking a closer look at this simple, stylized picture of first
modernity will be almost bound to raise the standard objection that, even
before, the world was never ordered as unambiguously as is claimed. And
indeed we did come across a number of cases in the course of our research –
not least because we were keeping a sharper lookout for phenomena display-
ing plurality and ambiguity – where there were deviations from the ‘either/or
structures’ of first modernity outlined here. By exploring the plurality of insti-
tutional solutions in the present, it is possible to gain a more differentiated
view of the past, one that avoids the over-stylizations and simplifications of
conventional theories of modernization and of textbook accounts.
An important development in our basic assumptions about first modernity
emerges out of this. Alongside the dominant standard and normal forms, there
are always other forms of the organization of work, knowledge and modes of
social co-existence. Even in first modernity, it was not always possible to make
clear, categorical distinctions or to maintain boundary divisions. However,
unlike the phenomena of meta-change that we have examined, such ambigu-
ities and deviations from the normal model were not recognized. This is exactly
why social recognition of plurality and ambiguity seems to us to be essential
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
536 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
Marginalization
The strategy of marginalization does not involve denying that phenomena
which deviate from the norm exist empirically. But they are ultimately inter-
preted as residual and remainder forms, which sooner or later have to give
way to their corresponding normality types. For example, in spite of the con-
tinued existence and partial expansion of the trades, the model of the large
industrial factory and the ‘system of industrial relations’ was established as the
normal model for regulating labour. Similarly, the regulatory models of the
nation-state (and of international relations), class conflict (labour and capital),
normal forms of work, the nuclear family and the normal biography influenced
all those political formations of community and conflict and the ways of life
and modes of activity that deviated from them. By virtue of being institu-
tionally sidelined and defined as ‘out-dated’ and ‘deviant’, as ‘belonging to a
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
538 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
Temporal deferment
Possibly at least as important as the strategy of marginalization of the deviant
is the strategy of deferral of certainty to a future time. Even if it is not yet
possible to achieve clear boundary definitions in the present, such as those
between life and death, or to establish complete and consensual scientific jus-
tifications for certain practices, such as the work of a doctor, these are none
the less possible in principle – so the assumption goes – and will follow at some
point in the future, thanks to scientific progress. Asserting that a problem will
be solved in the future provides a legitimate basis for provisionally accepting
the existence of contradictory categorical definitions and boundary demarca-
tions in the present. The strategy of temporal deferment is bound up with the
notion that the natural sciences are capable in principle of fathoming the
world’s mysteries, although they have so far done so only inadequately,
and that this makes all non-scientific experiential sources (tacit knowledge,
intuitive and experience-based knowledge, local contextual knowledge)
obsolete and enables the best possible solutions to be found to existing
problems.
What is also ‘postponed’ in this approach is action to remedy the distortions
of the scientistic worldview caused by regularly recurring scientific disputes
and disagreement among experts. Lack of unanimity among scientists –
regarding, say, the human or natural causes of disasters and environmental
degradation – is regarded as something that can be overcome by applying
better methods and measuring procedures, rather than being put down to the
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 539
Ontologization
Another strategy aimed at establishing an unquestionable rationalization for
basic institutions and categories consists in grounding them in natural facts
and anthropological truisms. If social distinctions and ways of forming human
communities are derived from natural distinctions and necessities, they are
exempted from any further obligation to provide grounds for their existence
and are considered as non-contingent anthropological inevitabilities. Thus,
repeated attempts have been made to naturalize family forms, the sexual divi-
sion of labour, educational differences, racial distinctions and demands for
ethnic homogenization and thereby put them beyond all doubt.
Since such ontologizations of basic structures and foundational categories
contravenes a basic principle of modernity – namely that all structural deci-
sions should be open to critique and subject to rationalization – they have
never really been successful over the long term, only for certain periods of
time. However, the absolute monopoly on truth enjoyed by the (natural) sci-
ences during first modernity regularly provides both the incentive and oppor-
tunity to derive normative statements from ‘human nature’ and thus to lend
them special validity. In a certain sense, the distinction between nature and
society – and therefore also between facts and values and science and politics
– itself constitutes a differentiation that has been grounded ontologically
(Latour 1995). While such differentiation may meet the constitutive necessi-
ties of every society, it certainly need not be institutionalized to this degree of
clarity and precision (cf. Lau and Keller 2001).
Monopolization
A further opportunity to counteract the pluralization of structures and the
blurring of boundary demarcations exists in the domain of state activity. Both
the state’s monopoly on violence and legal regulation make it possible to
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
540 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
arise if different criteria were applied to the same situation in which a deci-
sion had to be made.
At first sight this solution appears to follow the well-known principle of
(functional) differentiation, the classic principle of first modernity in which the
different aspects of a problem are allocated to different spheres of action and
are each dealt with according to different criteria (values, codes, logics of
action). Our case studies, however, deviate from this principle, in as much as
they involve fundamental boundary definitions that up until now have been
backed up by the claim of scientific objectivity. If, by appeal to practical, func-
tional necessities and situational constraints, they are replaced with a multi-
plicity of boundary definitions that are simultaneously valid, then these
boundary definitions lose their fundamental ‘naturalistic’ character. What is
implicitly acknowledged in this is that the definition of specific boundaries
within a boundary space that remains diffuse occurs relatively arbitrarily, that
is, no longer by recourse to unambiguous scientific results, but according to
practical necessities. In principle, then, boundary definitions can be altered
again at any time and remain the object of not only scientific but also politi-
cal dispute.
The example of different definitions of the precise time of death (brain
death, heart failure) illustrates clearly that this is not simply a matter of the
differentiation of various fields of practice within medicine (transplantation),
but one of questioning the right to determine the boundary between life and
death (nature/society) unambiguously and uniformly for the entire medical
field. While there is indeed evidence that conflict has existed within science in
the past as well over the definition of the precise time of death, these were
conducted against the background of a generally accepted assumption that it
was possible in principle to set a clear boundary and that this was to be done
by scientific means.
Plural compromise
This strategy is about combining different principles that fundamentally con-
tradict one another into a single formula based on compromise. Let us take
the example of the ruling on abortion in Germany. This came about as a com-
promise between different positions based on different values and ideological
and political interests. Abortion is generally forbidden, save in exceptional cir-
cumstances. The issue of whether or not these specific circumstances apply is
determined not by experts alone but is also addressed at a practical level by
considering the situation of the mother. Since this involves a conflict between
different values, the solution lies not in a distributive compromise based on
quantitative factors, but in the linking of opposing values in a both/and
formula. There is no doubt that this kind of double standard, having once
gained acceptance, has some degree of stability, since any change would
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 543
immediately give rise to new conflicts. Still, the negotiation and interpretation
of what constitutes exceptional circumstances may be subject to considerable
change, thereby opening up the entire system to debate once again.
These sorts of compromises have been a familiar feature for some time now.
In a certain way all forms of double standards that are put into practice follow
this logic, albeit up until now they have generally been considered to be ille-
gitimate. Legal compromises such as the one outlined above have also been
regarded rather as less-than-ideal solutions. As they and their implied plural-
ism come to be recognized as a legitimate, desirable way of resolving
problems based on conflicting values, they acquire a different functional sig-
nificance and become intentional both/and forms.
Instead, the crucial point is that science is no longer seen as being solely
responsible for generating valid and useful knowledge.
Hierarchically ordered pluralism can also be observed in the area of forms
of social co-existence. For example, the ‘normal family’ still enjoys the special
protection of German basic law, but family forms that deviate from this norm,
including same-sex partnerships, are also recognized in legal terms as a ‘func-
tional equivalent’. A comparable pattern can be observed with regard to
groupings that are increasingly complemented by post-traditional bonds.
Finally, hierarchically organized pluralizations are also manifested in the orga-
nization of work, as well as in the strategies of mobility and security adopted
by individuals. For example, actual biographies are often reconstructed and
perceived as (positively or negatively valued) deviations from what are
implied as being normal biographies: the latter are still seen as being a nor-
mative point of reference, even if this benchmark is subject to frequent chal-
lenge and in some respects contradicts lived realities.
Once plurality is acknowledged in this way, however, a number of problems
arise as a result. For example, which biographical patterns are considered to
be socially unacceptable once the normal biography no longer exists as such?
And where, for example, do the boundaries of recognized non-scientific
knowledge in medicine lie, once it is recognized as being a useful and even
necessary addition to scientific knowledge? Can esoteric knowledge be
included here as well as intuitive and experiential knowledge? What criteria
are available (or can be developed) for assessing the different options? How
does the normative ideal impact on such post-norm issues? For all these
reasons, then, it is likely that ‘hierarchically organized plurality’, as a type, will
bring about a certain degree of instability, as it may establish a variety of strate-
gic, inter-professional competitiveness that could lead to change.
Unstructured plurality
The problems alluded to above become more serious once the alternative ver-
sions are genuinely given equal status. This type of both/and solution fits with
postmodern ideas about the fundamental equality of heterogeneous patterns
of organization, forms of social co-existence and norm systems (‘anything
goes’). Selection is ultimately made on the basis of idiosyncratic or ethnocen-
tric criteria.
In the areas we studied we were unable to discover a pure form of this type,
which is usually described in terms of ‘anomie’ in the sociology of first moder-
nity.5 The following may be seen as the main reasons for this. Firstly, in the
context of a completely unstructured plurality of options, it is no longer
possible to make decisions based on a rationale. It is not only institutional
decision-makers who are faced with almost intractable problems because
of this: individuals too are overwhelmed as they ponder a multitude of
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 545
possibilities, without any criteria by which to judge them. At least with hier-
archically structured heterogeneity, described above, there is a ‘first port of
call’ (which makes this solution much more practicable), a norm which, even
if it has broken down, still provides some orientation for decision-making. Sec-
ondly, and linked to this, the problem of demarcation towards the outside
emerges here in an exaggerated form. The dualisms of nature/society,
work/non-work, knowledge/non-knowledge, market/hierarchy, family/non-
family, national/international, us/them, which structured the different fields of
first modernity, have now imploded, as it were, and have left behind a disor-
dered multitude of different forms. This diversity without criteria not only pre-
vents unambiguous decisions from being made, it also makes it hard to define
‘what doesn’t belong’. For example, with the levelling off of the difference
between paid work and other activities and the establishment of an ‘extended
concept of work’, all manner of forms of activity can be captured by the
concept of work (grief work, reproductive work, relationship work etc.); and
once the concept of first modernity’s ‘normal family’ has been watered down,
it becomes possible to introduce an astonishingly wide range of different kinds
of relationship into the debate within the category of ‘family’.
previously been separated strictly from one another. For example, some
company operations display a range of different combinations between hier-
archical control and market-based elements. Or again, certain elements of the
old nation-state are just as much integrated into the new transnational polit-
ical regimes as are new actors from civil society and new political arenas. In
this instance, too, the old basic institutions such as nation-states can no longer
be the same if they are combined with other institutional forms to create new
institutional arrangements. Just how complex the structure of these inter-
meshing forms can be is apparent in this example. The integration of two dif-
ferent institutional patterns cannot be achieved all at once, but must instead
be seen as a longer term process in which many different mutual adaptations
need to take place and where failure is always a possibility.
Sequentialization
This refers to a pendulum-style shifting of boundaries. First one and then
another boundary definition is given preference over successive periods of
time. In explanations of human intelligence, for example, biological factors will
be given priority in some phases, while in others the circumstances of social-
ization will be given more credence as an explanation. Such shifts that occur
on the basis of ‘fashion’ cannot strictly be characterized as reflexive-modern
– except, that is, when they are consciously chosen as such, as in different
phases of a person’s biography. Thus, in contrast to notions of ‘maturation’
which dominated first modernity, we observe normal biographical phases (with
their corresponding orientation towards security) being repeatedly inter-
rupted by phases dedicated to quite a different way of living, considered to be
no less legitimate.
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
548 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
Reflexive decisionism
One way of dealing with ambiguity, lack of clarity and eroding boundaries is
to maintain the old boundary demarcation in the full knowledge that it can
no longer be rationalized using scientific arguments and maintain the same
claim to non-ambiguity as before. This re-establishment of taboos around
boundary change can be presented as a normative move, by drawing attention
to the resulting unforeseeable and untenable consequences of boundaries
shifts or dissolutions (the ‘slippery slope’ argument). Some suggest, for
example, that the existing boundary which defines the point at which life
begins should be upheld, despite disagreement amongst experts, because the
next, more liberal boundary definition is much more difficult to maintain. Such
positions can be referred to as being reflexively decisionistic – unlike ideo-
logical or religious grounds – when there can be no more recourse to the
naturalness or factuality of the distinction, only to the functional properties
of the boundaries per se.
The desire to hold on to the nation-state, the family, class or a normal biog-
raphy may also spring from such a motivation. One need only recall the
debates taking place over the future of the nation-state, to name just one
example. Even in Europe, people are still holding on to the fiction of a nation-
state that continues to exist unchanged or one that will possibly be reactivated
in the future, despite the absence of a national currency and despite the
nation’s reduced legal and economic powers. The reason given is that only the
nation-state can guarantee basic rights, democracy and social security.
Whether the insistance on particular ‘boundary taboos’ will succeed in the long
term is hard to predict, as it depends on the interests that would be adversely
or positively affected by a boundary shift, and on their potential to assert
themselves strategically.
The varieties of ‘both/and’ outlined here are generalizations arrived at
inductively from empirical studies. They indicate the full range of destabiliz-
ing impacts affecting what were once clear rules of classification in national
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 549
societies based on the industrialized welfare state, while some also represent
a response to this destabilization. However, the great complexity of these insti-
tutional responses needs – and indeed ought – to be explored further in the
future. The struggles and debates over new boundaries, new reflexive rules of
categorization and new forms of social co-existence need to be understood as
a field involving strategies whose results are uncertain – global political strate-
gies, interest-based strategies, scientific/academic strategies and, in some
instances, individual strategies. In order to make an overall assessment of the
meta-transformation of modernity, it will be particularly important to look
into the problems that result from the erosion of basic institutions and rules
of categorization, and their impact on those spheres not directly affected. What
are the impacts of a politics of boundary construction on forms of post-
national memory and forgiveness? To what extent does economic globaliza-
tion work its way through to new structures of inequality and new polarized
interests within and between national societies? How will these be dealt with
politically? Can we really assume – as talk of a ‘world risk society’ suggests –
that global risks will inevitably bring about a shared global situation? If not,
how might their unequal distribution, the way they are perceived in society
and their dynamic for political conflict be differentiated?
For example, what effects does the pluralization of natural demarcations in
the sphere of medicine have on the family, individual subject constitution and
the legal system? Or again, what effect does the pluralization of forms of work
have on individual career patterns and the system of industrial relations? And
what does this, along with the transition towards communities of choice, mean
for forms of social co-existence and for people’s strategies in terms of personal
security?
Questions such as these can be formulated in relation to every sphere,
although it can be assumed – and this is hinted at in the results themselves –
that problems of attribution and ambiguity in an institutional field will lead to
destabilization in other fields which had so far been dependent on the ‘supply’
of standard forms of the social and clear categorical distinctions. These kinds
of interlinked uncertainties over boundaries (side-effects of side-effects) are
also present within those institutional fields in which several previously
compatible basic differences had been established. If this global, overarching
context of ambiguity between different domains could be proven empirically,
then reflexive modernization would no longer merely be the sum total of
many individual developments, but would indeed represent a coherent trans-
formation, in the social theoretical sense, of the very nature of modern
society.
(1) What is currently being passed off as new under the rubric of ‘meta-
change’ is already the key topic of classic sociological thought. The found-
ing figures of sociology always addressed the ambiguities associated with
the development of modern society as a central theme. Every classical soci-
ologist, in his own way, analyses at least one key principle of modernization
that drives the latter forwards and creates cohesion; at the same time,
however, there is another principle closely linked to this one, which threat-
ens the social order, or breaks it up, or calls it into question. Alexis de
Toqueville, for example, recognizes and underlines the liberating power of
the idea of equality, but simultaneously warns that it may dilute and dissolve
the intermediary institutions that facilitate equality and freedom. Emile
Durkheim, the theoretician and empiricist who early on uncovered the con-
nection between functional differentiation and individualization, sees in this
same connection the source of ‘anomies’ that threaten the process of
modernization to its very foundations. Max Weber famously described the
victory of modernization as a triumph of bureaucratic organization, yet also
saw this as the greatest threat to freedom and individuality. Georg Simmel,
perhaps the most ‘second modern’ classical sociologist, pointed to the way
in which social circles are at once individualized and globalized by the
expansion of market relations; and when this happens – according to Simmel
– the elements of expansion and the element of threat to individuality
become intermeshed. Finally, it was Michel Foucault who demonstrated how
discourses and institutions of emancipation complete and perfect power.
Thus the key concepts used by the theory of reflexive modernization to
explain itself – ambiguity, side-effect, crisis etc. – are put to very diverse and
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 551
fruitful use at every turn: nothing new there, then, in the world of sociologi-
cal thought!
(2) But even if one were to concede that certain ideas of classical sociology
become radicalized in the theory of reflexive modernization, the issue of
‘fluid structures’ has been developed and thought through in terms of social
theory in the various strands of postmodernism, becoming an extensive
topic of empirical social research internationally. In this respect, the dis-
tinction between postmodernity and second modernity amounts to a seman-
tic sleight of hand, based not so much on any serious pursuit of knowledge
but rather on a neurotic desire to make one’s mark.
(3) The proposed distinction between first and second modernity is ulti-
mately based on a two-fold error, in which differences are over-emphasized
and commonalities underestimated. In order to disguise this fact, a simpli-
fied image of first modernity is created in order to serve as a contrast to
second modernity. The absence of ambiguity, crisis and side-effects, which
are said to characterize second modernity, is alleged to be characteristic of
this image. And yet this clearly contradicts historical reality and research.
The above mentioned three objections may sound plausible at first sight, yet
they are partly based on misunderstandings and can easily be responded to by
reformulating the theory of reflexive modernization:
(1) The culture-critical fears imagined by the classical sociologists have
become today’s reality. After 100 years of radical modernization, the different
dimensions of risk have not only come to pass, they are changing and threat-
ening the very foundations of modernization as we know it – or, to be more
precise, the basic institutions of first modernity: the core ideas of the nation-
state, the nuclear family, class conflict, international relations, the welfare state,
nation-state democracy and scientific knowledge. The way the theory of reflex-
ive modernization describes the present and prospective future of social
reality differs quite clearly from the descriptions offered by the classical soci-
ologists. While the latter see breakdowns, crises and ambiguities as occasional
instances of intensification, the theory of reflexive modernization attributes
these basic difficulties to the functioning of the system. Whereas the sociolo-
gies and sociologists of the first modernity see potential complications of the
modernization process as exceptions and relegate them to the periphery, the
‘crisis’ addressed by the theory of reflexive modernization has systemic origins;
it is a ‘crisis’ in perpetuity, and as such is no longer a crisis, because it invali-
dates the very concept of crisis: after all, it is the triumphs of first modernity
that bring about ‘meta-change’.
This change in change, this transformation of the frame of reference of
social change, also changes the meaning of the different theoretical com-
ponents of reflexive modernization – risk society, forced individualization,
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
552 Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau
(3) It is indeed the case that the conceptual scheme, or conceptual metaphor,
of the ‘new era’ brings with it a temptation to over-exaggerate the degree of
internal coherence present within each era, as well as the contrast between
eras. This is a tendency we have now corrected. The both/and metaphor is the
vehicle for this, as it enables us – following the lessons of historical research –
to understand historical change more precisely. For example, it makes no sense
and leads to an endless series of misunderstandings to construct a false oppo-
sition between the national and the transnational. The transnational must
indeed be understood as integral to the redefinition of the national, although
even this entails an ‘epistemological break’ in sociological terms and in
research practice. Transnational studies need to overcome the reified stand-
point of ‘methodological nationalism’, according to which social relations that
extend beyond the formal legal borders of nation-states are somehow ‘extra-
social’ or sociologically ‘irrelevant’. Transnational studies that remove the dis-
tinction between national and international and simultaneously conceptualize
and research the national and the transnational on the basis of the both/and
principle, have to break with the basic assumption that the nation-state society
actually forms a totality and that relations between different nation-states and
national societies are ruled out analytically when it comes to researching
what is ‘actually real’ – the class structure and political dynamics of national
societies.
In this sense, transnationality also stands in contradiction to Wallerstein’s
world systems theory and to the global sociology of John W. Meyer and his
research group. Transnational research should neither be confused with a
variety of global theory and research that retains the national-international
antinomy and projects it onto the global level (Wallerstein 1990), nor with a
theory of distribution of global norms (Meyer 2000) that ultimately univer-
salize the ‘one best American way’. To elucidate this point, let us take the
emergence of transnational ways of life mediated through the mass media as
an example (Robins and Aksoy 2001, 2003). These new forms make it per-
fectly clear that the national context has not been eliminated. However, the
foundations and boundary demarcations of mass media industries and cultures
have simultaneously undergone dramatic change, giving rise to all kinds of
transnational connections, transformations and confrontations. As a conse-
quence, cultural ties, loyalties and identities come to transcend national bound-
aries and to circumvent nation-state control. Individuals and groups who
choose transnational TV channels and consume transnational programmes
live both here and there. How, though, can sociologists conceptualize Turkish
and German speaking transmigrants who, while they may live in Berlin, are
living out their expectations, ambitions and cultural disruptions elsewhere as
well, namely in transnational networks? In methodological nationalism,
German-Turkish both/and ways of life and identities are located and analysed
within one or the other national frame of reference and thereby robbed of
© London School of Economics and Political Science 2005
Second modernity as a research agenda 555
Notes
Bibliography
Bauman, Zygmunt 1991 Die Gesellschaft der der Zweiten Moderne’ in Ulrich Beck and
Gesellschaft (Two Volumes), Frankfurt/M.: Christoph Lau Entgrenzung und Entschei-
Suhrkamp. dung. Was ist neu an der Theorie reflexiver
Beck, Ulrich 1992 Risk Society – Towards a Modernisierung, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp.
New Modernity, London: Sage. Böhle, Fritz, Pfeiffer, Sabine and Sevsay-
Beck, Ulrich 1996 The Reinvention of Tegethoff, Nese (eds) 2004 Die Bewältigung
Politics, Cambridge: Polity Press. des Unplanbaren, Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag.
Beck, Ulrich 1999 World Risk Society, Bonß, Wolfgang, Kesselring, Sven and
Cambridge: Polity Press. Vogl, Gerlinde 2005 Mobilitätspioniere
Beck, Ulrich 2000 (in conversation with (forthcoming).
J. Willms) Freiheit oder Kapitalismus. Böschen, Stefan and Schulz-Schaeffer, Ingo
Gesellschaft neu denken, Frankfurt/M./ (eds) 2003 Wissenschaft in der Wissensge-
Conversations with Ulrich Beck, Cambridge: sellschaft, Wiesbaden: Westdeutscher
Polity Press (2003). Verlag.
Beck, Ulrich 2004 Der kosmopolitische Böschen, Stefan and Wehling, Peter 2004
Blick oder: Krieg ist Frieden, Frankfurt/M.: Wissenschaft zwischen Folgenverantwortung
Suhrkamp/The Cosmopolitan Vision, und Nicht-Wissen, Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag.
Cambridge: Polity Press 2005. Grande, Edgar and Kriesi, Hanspeter 2004
Beck, Ulrich 2005 Power in The Global Age, ‘Nationaler politischer Wandel in entgren-
Cambridge: Polity Press. zten Räumen’ in Ulrich Beck and Christoph
Beck, Ulrich and Beck-Gernsheim, Lau (eds) Entgrenzung und Entscheidung.
Elisabeth 2001 Individualization, London: Was ist neu an der Theorie reflexiver Mod-
Sage. ernisierung, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp.
Beck, Ulrich and Beck-Gernsheim, Gray, John 2003 Al-Quaida and What it
Elisabeth 2003 ‘Families in a Runaway Means to Be Modern, London: W. W. Norton
World’ in J. Scott, J. Treas and M. Richards & Company.
(eds) The Blackwell Companion to Socio- Habermas, Jürgen 2005 ‘Kommentar zu
logy of the Family, Cambridge: Polity Press. Ulrich Beck, Modernität und der
Beck, Ulrich, Bonß, Wolfgang and Lau, gesellschaftliche Umgang mit Andersheit’
Christoph 2001 ‘Theorie reflexiver Mod- in Ulrich Beck and Martin Mulsow
ernisierung – Fragestellungen, Hypothesen, (eds) Diskontinuität und Kontinuität
Forschungsprogramm’ in Ulrich Beck and (forthcoming).
Wolfgang Bonß (eds) Die Modernisierung Heidling, Eckhard, Deiß, Manfred, Meil,
der Moderne, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Pamela and Schmierl, Klaus 2004 ‘Restruk-
Beck, Ulrich, Giddens, Anthony and Lash, turierung nationaler Interessenvertretung’
Scott 1994 Reflexive Modernisation. Politics, in Ulrich Beck and Christoph Lau (eds) Ent-
Tradition, and Aesthetics in the Modern grenzung und Entscheidung, Frankfurt/M.:
Social Order, Cambridge: Polity Press. Suhrkamp.
Beck, Ulrich and Grande, Edgar 2004 Keller, Jan 2003 ‘Beck’s Critical Theory of
Das kosmopolitische Europa. Gesellschaft Reflexive Modernization’ in Czech transla-
und Politik in der Zweiten Moderne, tion of Ulrich Beck Risk Society, Praha.
Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Keupp, Reiner, Ahbe, Thomas and Gmür,
Beck, Ulrich and Lau, Christoph (eds) 2004 Wolfgang 2002 Identitätskonstruktionen,
‘Entgrenzung und Entscheidung. Was ist neu Reinbek: Rowohlt.
an der Theorie reflexiver Modernisierung, Kratzer, Nick, Boes, Andreas, Döhl, Volker,
Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Marrs, Kira and Sauer, Dieter 2004 ‘Ent-
Beck, Ulrich, Levy, Daniel and Sznaider, grenzung von Unternehmen und Arbeit –
Natan 2004 ‘Erinnerung und Vergebung in Grenzen der Entgrenzung’ in Ulrich Beck
and Christoph Lau (eds) Entgrenzung und Parsons, Talcott 1980 ‘Health, Uncertainty
Entscheidung – Was ist neu an der Theorie and the Action Structure’ in Seymour Fiddle
reflexiver Modernisierung?, Frankfurt/Main: (ed.) Uncertainty. Behavioural and Social
Suhrkamp. Dimensions, New York: Praeger.
Kriesi, Hanspeter and Grande, Edgar 2004 Robins, Kevin and Aksoy, Asu 2001 ‘From
‘Nationaler politischer Wandel in entgren- Spaces of Identity to Mental Spaces’,
zten Räumen’ in Ulrich Beck and Christoph Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies
Lau (eds) Entgrenzung und Entscheidung, 27(4): 685–711.
Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Robins, Kevin and Aksoy, Asu 2003 Enlarge-
Kratzer, Nick 2003 Arbeitskraft in Entgren- ment of Meaning, paper, Goldsmith College,
zung, Berlin: edition sigma. University of London.
Latour, Bruno 1995 We Have Never Been Schimank, Uwe 1996 Theorien gesellschaft-
Modern, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard Univer- licher Differenzierung, Opladen: West-
sity Press. deutscher Verlag.
Latour, Bruno 2003 ‘Is Remodernisation Schmitt, Carl 1963 Der Begriff des Politis-
Occurring – And If So, How to Prove it?’, chen, Berlin: Duncker & Humboldt.
Theory, Culture & Society 20(2): 35–48. Sellmaier, Stephan 2005 Ethik der Konflikte,
Lau, Christoph and Keller, Reiner 2001 ‘Zur Univ. Diss., München.
Politisierung gesellschaftlicher Naturab- Therborn, Göran 1995 ‘Routes to/through
grenzungen’ in Ulrich Beck and Wolfgang Modernity’ in Mike Featherstone, Scott
Bonß (eds) Die Modernisierung der Lash and Roland Robertson (eds) Global
Moderne, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Modernities, London: Sage.
Levy, Daniel and Sznaider, Natan 2002 Erin- Urry, John 2003 ‘Thinking Society Anew.
nerung im globalen Zeitalter. Der Holocaust, Conversations’ in Ulrich Beck and Johannes
Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Willms (eds) Conversations with Ulrich
Luhmann, Niklas 1997 Die Gesellschaft der Beck, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Gesellschaft, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Wallerstein, Immanuel 1990 ‘Societal
May, Stefan 2005 Institutionelle Entgrenzung Development or Development of the
durch Nichtwissen, Frankfurt/M.: Campus. World-System?’ in Martin Albrow and
Mayntz, Renate 1992 ‘Modernisierung und Elizabeth King (eds) Globalisation, Know-
die Logik interorganisationaler Netzwerke’, ledge and Society, London: Sage.
Journal für Sozialforschung 32(1): 19–32. Walwei, Ulrich and Hoffmann, Edeltraud
Meyer, John W. 2000 ‘Globalisation. Sources 1998 ‘Normalarbeitsverhältnis: ein Auslauf-
and Effects on National Societies and modell? überlegungen zu einem Erk-
States’, International Sociology 15: 233–48. lärungsmodell für den Wandel der
Münch, Richard 2002 ‘Die “Zweite Beschäftigungsformen’, Mitteilungen aus der
Moderne”: Realität oder Fiktion? Kritische Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung 3:
Fragen an die Theorie der “reflexiven” 409–25.
Modernisierung’, Kölner Zeitschrift für Wimbauer, Christine 2003 Geld und Liebe.
Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie 54(3): Zur symbolischen Bedeutung von Geld in
417–43. Paarbeziehungen, Frankfurt/M.: Campus.