System’s Sole Constituent, the Operation:

Clarifying a Central Concept of Luhmannian

Theory

Jean Clam
CNRS. Paris, France

ABSTRACT
The autopoietic turn in Luhmann’s later theory is not thinkable without the refocusing
of systems theory around a new concept of operativity. The article shows the lines of
development from the earlier theory towards the final prevailing of a purely operativist
conception of the system. The movement is one of deconstructing all intuitive
representations of a border-defined, thing-like system. The radical version that emerges
leaves the operation as the sole and unique systemic constituent. The article shows that
such a strain of thought contracting an extensive transitive structure into a purely
operative core has major philosophical antecedents: Aristotle’s conception of the
actuation of life or intellection in a composite being, Fichte’s self-position of the
transcendental I. Heidegger’s subject and authorless ’Ereignis’ constitute very similar
figures of ’operativization’. This sheds light on the most problematic aspect of
Luhmannian theory, namely its reliance on a ’protologic’ that does not elaborate, like
similar philosophical endeavours before it, on the fundaments of its own evidence.

Jean Clam, 1796 Av. de Grasse. F-83300 Draguignan, France

© Scandinavian Sociological Association 2000

Niklas Luhmann’s systemist sociology is, in its
own project, often misunderstood. The option
for a description of society within a systems
theoretical framework is very often reduced to
an all-commanding assertion of the structuring
function of systems in today’s societies. Luh-
mannian systemism is conceived frequently as
an attempt to apply a general systems approach
to social phenomena. The benefits of such an
approach would then have to be assessed in
terms of a greater accuracy of the sociological
description as well as a greater explanatory
potency. Not taking consideration the
into
complete transformation of the original frame-
work through Luhmann’s fresh modelling of its
central concepts, such an assessment is doomed
to misapprehension.
I will show in the following how and why
Luhmann goes far beyond the current systems
model, and in what direction his theory heads. I
shall have to show the intricacy of the
constructions necessitated by the categorial
radicalization it undertakes. I begin with an
introductory presentation of the systems prob-
lematics in Luhmann’s sociology in order to
come to the core concept of the whole theory:
that of a ’non-real’, purely ’actual’ system,
containing nothing and made of nothing but
operations.
1. The transformation of systemism
Luhmann’s interest in the systems model is
particularly ambiguous. To have a clearer idea
of the status and function of the model within
the theory, I will set Luhmann’s fundamental
options and intuitions into the broader context
of his sociological work. My thesis, which
stresses a statement obvious Cor any person
64
acquainted with the work, is that the specific
conatus of Luhmann’s enterprise is to conceive
complex objects by means of an adequate,
equally complex theory capable of accounting
for the emergence of complexity as a specific
mode of reality or givenness of the real.
Luhmann had a very firm intuition of an
inescapable and profound break in the repre-
sentation of reality, making impossible or
illusory the continuation of heretofore familiar
self-descriptions of thinking, feeling and theoriz-
ing. He held the conviction that the objects to be
modelled in sociology (personal interaction,
institutions, groups, organizations, functional
subsystems, society...) could not be con-
structed in the terms of classical sociology.
Unlike Parsons, Luhmann had a vision of the
historiality of categorial settings. His knowledge
of Heidegger enabled his perspective on the
transformations of all-sustaining matrices of
thought as ’ontohistorial’ (scinsgesc11ic11tlic11)
ones. The ’epoqual’ comprehensions of being
precede and determine the modes of action and
experience realizable in a historical social
setting. Luhmann’s concerns reflected the
problems of theory-building in the historial
terms of philosophical hermeneutics. He was
profoundly conscious of the rupture of the
ontological tradition. From the beginning his
project is very clearly one of a post-metaphysical
theory of society.
The reformulation of systems theory initi-
ally seeks to critique and thereby overcome the
sociological concept of action, a concept that
seems to Luhmann both undefendable and
doomed to atrophy. This took place at a time
when no convincing model was available that
could compete with it or prevail over it in
descriptive or heuristic terms. Long before a new
version of systems theory was developed.
Luhmann saw the categorical nature of action
as making too many massive assumptions of
self-identity, internal consistency and ontologi-
cal firmness of the acting subject. The predomi-
nance of the action model was for him
intimately associated with the concept of a
privileged, dignified actor. Luhmann’s constant
and very early rejection of any axiological
assumption is reminiscent of Heidegger’s own
repulsion with all value thinking. The function-
alism of the early Luhmann could thus be seen
as the expression of his definite disqualification
of all ontologically impregnated ways of think-
ing. His increasingly complex interdisciplinary
arrangements integrating a number of hetero-
geneous ’theory pieces’ (Tlieoriestdcke) and his
constantborrowings of incongruous theoretical
perspectivesare required and given order by
their distance from inadequate modes of
thought. Luhmann is the sociologist of our
century with the most acute sense of the post-
ontological (non) structure of communication
constituting a world where things (res) have no
consistency and where only differences are
events.’ He has, as a theoretician, an acute
consciousness of the need for non-metaphysical
frameworks for the description and comprehen-
sion of ’what is’.
Thus, functionalist systems theory was. for
Luhmann, a convenient departure point for a
much more comprehensive theory designed to
grasp the non-identity, the paradoxical and
unsummarizable character of reality. The sys-
tems theory of Parsons and the first-order
cybernetics had to be enlarged and transformed
to integrate a variety of systemic and non-
systemic approaches capable of enhancing its
complexity and reflexivity, viz. Second-order
cybernetics (von Foerster), paradoxalist differ-
ence theories (Spencer Brown, Derrida), emer-
gence medium-form theory (Fritz Heider),
horizontalist meaning theory (Husserl), differ-
entialist linguistic (Saussure) and communica-
tion (Bateson) theories. There thus remains
nothing of the representation of a previously
available general theory that could be applied to
a special field of research. What should be most
insistently noted is that the system cntectory is
o1lly apparently wider than that of society as its
eventual application field. Luhmann’s special
intuition, the one which gives his theory its
specific profile and bestows on it a real
autonomy with regard to all other philosophies
and theories that contribute to its construc-
tions, is the following: society is a self-contained
field of social communication and the site of all
self-descriptions of human communication;’ it
is the place where all meaning is born and can
be equated with a constituting intersubjectivity
stripped of its transcendental nature. Since all
partial or global world representations are
communicatively elaborated, society (i.e. social
communication) is the self-engendering reality
-
like Hegels Geist, once more denuded from
metaphysical assumptions. The condensations
of social communication (in meanings, institu-
tions, routines, systems... ) are purely circular
and have no anchoring in any reality outside.
They are paradoxical because they include a
structural reference to an indefinite further
connection and to an unattainable internal
consistency. Society is the paradigm of a system

;~~<,
or an entity that escapes all objectivation and
engulfs the observation itself that posits it as its
objective correlate.
Luhmann’s vision of sociology as a science
of society transforms it into a sort of vagrant
’supertheorie’ with a special reference to the
basic category of ’system’. The radical remodel-
ling of the system category enables it to remain a
unifying pattern of the theory. Nevertheless, a
reformulation of the theory in terms of differ-
entiation and mediation as an alternative to
systemist ones is thinkable throughout. What is
fundamental, then, is a type of category capable
of expressing the measure of reflexivity, circu-
larity and paradox inherent to society as it is
thought by Luhmann. The specific performance
of his sociology is, thus, the identification and
manifestation of social communication as the
last convex, the untranscendable envelope, of all
meaning and all reality.~Society - that is, the
’SillllSYStCI1l KOl1l11l11llikati011’ - constitutes the
unfolding of indefinitely self-referential and
inconcludable differences as a multi-dimension-
ally articulated system of meaning, overarching
consciousness. There is no access to the world of
meaning without a socialization of individual
consciousness in the field and flux of an
unending and ungroundable communication.
Communication is, thus, a self-engulfing struc-
ture, being the context of itself.
Society and system are interdependent
concepts insofar as the motive for the revision
of systems theory was the conception of society
as a circular, self-contextual structure of a very
specific type; on the other side, the systems
theoretical framework offered a departure point
for developing a post-ontological theory which
will very soon exceed it. Moreover, the intuition
of the unbounded status and scope of sociology
is not a late product of the theory itself, but is
there from the beginning: when Luhmann
comes to sociology after many years in admin-
istrative office, he is attracted by the generality
of its perspective, the possibility to advance in
any theoretical direction, free from disciplinary
limitation. Sociology, in his perception, is a field
where ’one can do everything’!pursuing any
interest in knowledge. The range of themes is
almost unlimited, and the sociologist can direct
his choice towards any mundane object: per-
sons, nature, the state, music, intimacy, etc ...
There is a sociology of everything, everything
being communicatively constituted through
social media and systemic processes.
Luhmann’s path from the presentiment of
the omnicompetence and thematic vagrancy of
65
sociology to the most sophisticated theoretical
expressions of the self-reference of communica-
tion is an interesting one. It shows us how an
interest in the universal theme of sociology
takes body in the project of a general theory of
society and how the generality of this theory
leads toradical reformulation of the concept of
a
society well as of the concept of system, the
as
latter being designed to be the main category
reflective of the former. Thus, the project of a
general theory of an enlarged and profoundly
reflexive concept of society induces the radical
recasting of the systemic categories.’To retrace
Luhmann’s progression towards a de-ontologi-
zation of the system category is thus worth-
while.
The initial research in Luhmann’s early
work is concentrated on organization theory.
Systemist and affinitive approaches were
already developed in this domain, and they
have been considerably amplified since.&dquo; Luh-
mann’s main questioning in this seminal phase
centred on the conception of an ’other’ ration-
ality. Actually, administrative science and orga-
nization theory were soaring in an impressive
effort to renewtheir fundaments: the heretofore
unitary conception of the formal organization as
a human institution designed for the realization
of definite goals instrumented through complex
informational and procedural means was foun-
dering. The sociology of organization was
discovering how almost all formal organiza-
tional schemes, tokens and routines were
doubled through informal ones. Therewith.
the system constituted by the organization
revealed itself as much more complex than its
instituted, unifying, mostly hierarchical design.
Particularly. the category of goal and goal
attainment was withering away: the difficult
identifiability of final representations, the con-
fusing interdependence and co-variation of
apparent, strategic and objective goals, the
constant but irregular re-import in the organi-
ization system of informal secondary and unin-
tended positive ends ... made necessary such a
complexification of the notion that it became7
eventually soundless to work with it further.’
New light was also shed on the relations of the
organization with its environments, thereby
showing an incomparably more nuanced
image than that of an internally functional
system unit subjected to environmental con-
straints and producing correlative responses.
The conclusion that Luhmann as an
organization theorist drew from these premises
66
resulted in a research programme focussed on
the concept of complex, or as he termed it,
’systernic ratiollality’. The programme was to be
implemented in two stages: (1 a critique of the
supposition of an immanent instrumental
rationality of organization presenting the orga-
nizational mode of’ action as a unique tool,
defined and unified by its goals and ends, and
whose rationality is univocally inscribed in its
transitive hierarchical architecture: and (2) a
descriptive and conceptual work on a great
number of phenomena constituting complex
rationality in a variety of complex figures. The
programme went through a series of recon-
structions of the complex intelligence sedimen-
ted in organizations as well as in every com-
municational phenomenon. Actually, every such
phenomenon combines a series of mutually
conditioned devices to a relatively functional
and operative whole that can take various
forms, ranging from quasi-instant social sys-
tems of fugitive face-to-face interaction to the
heaviest and most enduring formal institutional
ventures. This combination is far from being a
product of pro-projecting design and, above all,
from being grasped in its consequences. Thus,
the descriptive work converges towards the
problem of order. of its origin and evolution.
Within the framework of a theory of complex
rationality, order appears as emergent. open to
variation and self-sensitive,‘’ requiring non-
linear, intransitive and original theoretical
concepts. At its origin, the research identifies
self-destabilizing paradoxical settings. An
instance of such settings is the double con-
tingency scheme, which Luhmann takes over
from Parsons and Shils and develops into a
generative figure of all order&dquo;’ in collective
1
meaning systems - that is, social systems. 1
Systemic rationality is thus a title for the
central intuition of the improbability. fluency
and circularity of order. Order is improbable not
because it calls for human - or divine - design.
but because it has to be accounted for as the
non-natural, non-spontaneous - although self-
organizing 1 2 _ realization of forms of being that
no design could have predicted and no self-
directed process could have produced. The
system-order emerging from non-reproducible
conjunctions of factors and circumstances is
fluent, nurtured through fluency 13 It is never
structured only from within. Order is ’differen-
tial’ in the sense that it is the unceasing
negotiation of a difference between non-order
and order. The maintenance of the system-order
is an explicit and continuous performance. As
such it is not self-evident. Most fallacious is thus
the spatial representation of the order-unity as a
closed entity containing in itself its order
components and internally quiescent as long
as its environment does not exercise any
pressure on its boundaries. Order is rather an
actual difference, order/non-order, which is
reflected in its first term (order) and whose
maintenance takes the deceptive, metaphorical
form of a (spatial) boundary. In fact, the
boundary is a complex actuol relation, an
effectuation or an actuation - I try to translate
the German word: I>I>11=iig - of an asymmetrical
difference and its retlection in one Ot~ its terms.
Very soon the problematic oi~ complex order
concentrates on the de-realization or de-onto-
logization of the spaces, the fluxes and func-
tional activities related to the system. To think
systems as pure differences becomes the de-
ontologizing programme Ot LLlllfIlaI111’s systems
theory. All its lines of argument converge in this
direction.
To sum up, I could say that the new de-
ontologized concepts arch an alternative to the
metaphysically grounded theoretical frame-
works of action theory. This does not mean
that those frameworks are altogether invalid:
they are just outclassed by a new theoretical
design called for by deep transformations in the
projections (Elll BB’lï/fe) H of the meaning and
structure of the objects of the relevant sciences.
To use an analogy I will discuss more thor-
oughly at the end of the article, the projection of
the unconscious as the primary psychic object
and the proper theme of the science of the
psyche is an alternative to the previous intro-
spectivist and cognitivist projection of such an
object within the psychology of consciousness.
The old designs, which are thus superseded, do
not lose their whole relevance. They must
nevertheless be brought up to the new level.
restructured so as to fit into the new categorial
projections. Coming back to the problematics
within sociology at the emergence of the post-
actionalist systemist model. I can read it as
follows: Action theory is intrinsically ontologi-
cal in its categorial design; it is co-extensive with
the triadic, extensive, transitive o~t’r~for-~’r~-
tio-opertitlitiz structure, which objectifies its
terms as real, self-identical terms: it lives from
the equally ontological assumptions made on
the nature of the subject-actor as self-conscious
bearer of intentions and will, promoter of his
action through its more or less rational
instrumentation. The invention (in the double
sense of founding and figuring) of a de-
 67

ontologizing level of intcllection’’is equivalent is a convenient one and yet, importantly, not the
to the breakthrough in the direction of ncw only one possible. Luhmann’s early - and a
categories framing the comprehension of the fortior-i later - work is not restricted to this
social. These categories enable and demand an theme and contains already a series of more
abandonment of the assumption that there is an general as well as different perspectives. Never-
actor or an action behind social communica- theless, where law or politics, power or values
tion. They allow the positing of a specific, are at stake, the systems theoretical approach
autonomous, anonymic, non-aggregative objec- transforms the traditional problem positions
tivity. Such objectivity is no more ontologically through discovering the underlying paradoxical
projectible. It requires the framework of a structures. Thus. the juridical code (lawful/
transformed systemism. centred on the inher- unlawful) can itself be neither lawful nor
ently circular, self-differentia) entity which unlawful: the medium of politics, power, lives
Luhmann continues to call a system,. The new communication ally from its non-use: values are
subject-object of sociology - the social - is a sort of complexity ’stoppers’, instrumented to
communication as a system. Communication is cover the self-reference of all orders of meaning.
the last constituent of the social, behind which Throughout these examples, the fundamental
there are neither actors nor things, but only theoretical difficulty is that systems are inher-
operations. These are the sole. variously specifi- ently incotnplete and made unstable through
able constituents of all communicative systems. their differential structures.
I should, however, insist on the passage
’
from ( 11 the classical representation of a system
2. Figures of thought as a unity with an immanent order facing an
environment which acts on it. thus promoting
Differential self-actuation or inhibiting the unfolding of its order structure:
I have followed Luhmann on his way from the to (2) a differential representation where the
reception of systems organization theory to his order unit is that of an asymmetrically retlected
elaboration of systemic rationality. I saw that difference order/non-order. The contrast brings
what was to be thought could not be conceived out the features of the end term. Actually, the
along the classical ontological schemes of involved relational and theoretical structure in
objectivation. The kinds of objects that came this term is not unprecedented. It is part of a
to the fore were paradoxical in the sense that stock of very special, rarely used figures I
they could not be thought of as identities or encounter in the philosophical tradition from
unities, bearing extrinsic relations to their Aristotle to Heidegger. Where such figures
environments, but as system-environment du- appear, they are regularly associated with a
alities with an asymmetrical anchoring of the daring and violent effort to think at a challen-
self-position of the duality in the system. This ging level of originarity and against habits of
was the abstract frame of systemic rationality. intuitive thought. I will discuss two such figures
which had to enable us thinking organizational in unequal detail. The first. which I call the
devices, active or sedimented intelligence as ’originary self-positing self-identity’, is the one
ambiguous contributions to the system’s stabi- at stake here: the second is the one I call the
lity as well as instability. When boundaries are ’Ntit--17c)llzlig’ structure, meaning a structure
de-spatialized to become the expression of the whose terms are contracted in a sole self-
self-difference of the system (as system-envir- contained act or effectuation (this figure engulfs
onment) in the system (as building a self- the first one and will be explained in more
identity), the system enshrines in itself its own detail l.
negation. It becomes a circular dynamic chose My main purpose in this article is to show
potentialities flow from the internalization of its how Luhmann’s most central theses can be read
environment (non-self) in itself. That is how instructively by means of such a structural
order is built from noise: that is why the main commentary of the engaged tigures of thought.
resources for stability and adaptation are The objects of my attention are then those
inherent instability and variety and why tived figures of thought - I could say lociisrnoi - that
optimality is suboptimal and diverse suboptim- make possible a radical transformation of the
ality a major asset for evolution. problem vision. My ’logismological’ approach
This access to the problematic of asymme- focuses on the constitution and performance of
trical self-identity of system from Luhmann’s such figures and in this sense, it has certain
initial preoccupation with organization theory at1inities with I~1111t11~ttltl~s theory-building as a
68
type of highly reflexive venture. Luhmann pays
a lot of attention to the theorization choices and
their figures themselvcs. The actually unfolding
theory becomes thus an object for itself’ and the
result of a series of construction decisions made
consciously by the theoretician. This leads to a
very high level of reflexive abstraction in
thought and argument. I,L111r11ar1I1’S theory of
theory did not. however, thematize the under-
lying figures of its most crucial categorial
contractions. While it is ultimately enlightening
to the problematics of complex theorizing,1 it
still lacks a genuine analysis of most decisive
figures. These figures have, in my eyes, analo-
gues in the specific theory-building of first
(pi-6td philosophicr or prima philo-
philosophy
sophin) ’
7
on the ground of the originary
emergence of the first lineaments of being.
Our thesis is. in particular, that the self-
difference paradox can be compared with such a
figure of prime philosophy and thus be clarified
through the reminiscence of some of the
transcendental deductions that give expression
to it. I chose Fichte’s ’jNissenschaJtsloi~ro’ whose
line of progress is most elaborated. I&dquo;’ In Fichte’s
deduction, at the beginning is a ’Tlzatllluzdlll11g’
(self-performing act ).’which is the self-position
of the I (the transcendental subject ).2( ) Before
this self-position, there is nothing worldly*’ and
the emergence of the I is that of being, i.e. of a
world. However, the self-position of the Ursub-
jokt is not global-spherical: the I is not a closed
Izf1l kai pan, self- and all-containing in the sense
of having no other. Fichte’s argument is
precisely that the advent of the I in its originary
act is the advent of a difference, of a same and
non-same, of I and not-I (lei nnd Nioht-Ichl. The
subject is a subject of something which is not
itself. Fichte’s vision differs, thus, from the
conceptions of the Parmenidian metaphysics
or that of scholastic theological speculation on
the state of being ante iiiiiizdi creati011em. The
difference I/Not-I is. further, what is retlected in
the I itself and constitutes the most genuine act
of the I as I. The I is not a closed and total
sphere. It is embedded in a split (or a scratch,
Rit~). The I is the split whose name is world and
whose act is the reflection of this same splitting
difference.
The scheme of thought here calls for a
distancing from intuitive modes of comprehen-
sion, wherc unities or identities are posited as
separate and closed wholes. I and Not-I cannot
be thought of as two distinct entities standing in
an extrinsic relation to each other, whose
product is, a third and distinct new term. Not
only are all terms here a sole differential
structure and a sole self-actuating Voll:ug
(effectuation), but also an asuml1lctrical one.
The Not-I can never attain to the determinative
density of the I, because precisely the I is the site
of the retlection of the uneven difference I/Not-I.
This asymmetrical moment is best stressed in
the protologic of G. Spencer Brown, who
conceives the unmarked state within the
inaugural distinction as a sort of residual
term. correlative to the marked state of the
distinction. Here also the duality of the self-
difference (I/Not-I, marked state/unmarked
state) is reflected in the active density of. so to
speak, the ’positive’ term of the distinction - the
indication, in Spencer Brown’s terminology.
Distinction is thus, in a specific, paradoxical
sense, self-continent. insofar as it needs nothing
more to exist than its moments united in one
sole act: effectuation.
As a matter of fact, Luhmann’s reliance on
Brownian protologic for the presentation and
development of his own theory gradually
escalated to reach a quasi-dominant position
in his later work. As I shall stress later on, this
dependence makes the question about the
theoretical status of Luhmannian assumptions
and proto-sociological theorems most acute. At
what level is the body of the most general and
abstract sentences of Luhmann’s theory of
society to be situated? Is it transcendental a
pr-ior-i or is it simply a generalization of a set of
crossed evidences stemming from various
domains of observation? My thesis is that
Luhmann’s major assertions rely on a sort of a
priori ground with no transcendental reference,
which is that of the Brownian protologic. Thus,
I think that the logical calculus of George
Spencer Brown, published under the title taws
oj Form,1:! is most accurately qualified as a
’protologic’. Classical logics included (1) an
encompassing theory of enunciation (sentence
and discourse) and inference (deduction of
sentences from sentences), like the inaugural
logic of Aristotle; (2) an apriorical deduction or
description of the constituting acts of a pure
consciousness performing the cognitive opera-
tions of judgement and reckoning, like the
transcendental logics of Kant and Husserl; (3)
a formal or mathematical body of theorems - an
algebra - syntactically inferred from a small set
of axioms and symbol definitions, like the logic
of the Principia 11l11t/lCIIllltica of Russel and
Whitehead. In contrast to these logics, particu-
larly the last one, Spencer Brown’s programme
is an inquiry into the pre-discursive laws

emerging with the most elementary position of
’something’. These laws must be situated at a
level preceding the level of expression grasped
by classical logic. Protologic denotes, thus, in
our context, the logic implied in the most
general act of appearance or position of a
something (a form). It reveals ’our internal
knowledge of the structure of the world’ ( lays of
Form 1969:xiiil. The form, as it is understood by
Spencer Brown, is prior to anything logic can
thematize at its own levels of generality. It is to
be thought of as lying at such a depth of
originarity and generality as to be ’beyond the
point of simplicity where language ceases to act
normally’ (ibid. :xx). It, then, ’resists expression’
(il)id.), whereas logic is something discursive
about which I can talk and which I can
objectivize. 233
To be sure, and this is a point I have already
noted, Brownian protologic is not the only
approach Luhmann draws upon in order to
think systems as differences and not as res.
Luhmann’s own method commanded a diversi-
fication of the contributions integrated into the
theory, in order to raise its incongruity and curb
the tendency towards massively unifying and
potentially re-ontologizing concepts. Neverthe-
less, Spencer Brown becomes gradually the
dominant reference of the late theory, which
develops into an ’observation theory’ based on
the Brownian concept of difference as a bilateral
concept (~n~ei-Seiten-Forml. This evolution is not
altogether advantageous. Brown’s logic is still a
very poorly elucidated theory waiting for a
genuinely appropriating reception. Yet, Luh-
mann works with it as if it were not only
common knowledge, but as if one had fully
grasped the transformation of the deep ontolo-
gical structure it induces. In his texts, the same
concise, schematic hint at Spencer Brown’s
Laws of Form suffices to justify the most abstract
concepts and the shorthand-like exposed argu-
ments. This is the reason why I think that I
should try to build an analogical space as much
around Spencer Brown’s protologic as Luh-
mann’s use of it. For this purpose, I turn to the
philosophical tradition as a reservoir of most
instructive figures of thought. The advantage of
the philosophical references is that they bring
with them the necessary diachronic and histor-
ical depth severely needed for the clarification of
categorial revisions.
Fichte’s deduction of the asymmetrical self-
difference structure and of its reflexive entan-
glements is instructive because it reminds us
that the main difficulties of theorizing on an
69
originary-structural level are twofold: (1) to
think from theoretical site lying before
a
experience in a transcendental world without
time and without objective firmness; and (2) to
think in a world of pure actuality without time
and without objective products of activity.
Despite the fact that Luhmann’s theory does
not develop on any transcendental ground, its
figures of thought still have many essential
features in common with the apriorical tradi-
tion. The theoretical constructs shaped in this
tradition as groundwork of all subsequent
empirical acting and experiencing have a sort
of homological counterpart in an enlarged
systems theory. This is even more the case as
systems theory integrates protological compo-
nents and is shaped in such a manner as to
become a sort of universal theory of objects .24 It
is actually inescapable that at a certain level of
originarity - which we could call protological,
and where we would situate most apriorical
theories - heterogeneous schemes share in a
series of figures. The instance of Fichte’s
deduction shows how a thought taking place
at the emerging point of things, at an observa-
tion site revealing their most universal features.
is forced into unintuitive, highly reflexive.
contracted paths. One should see that Luh-
nmnn’s theory is not just a sociological theory of
a particularly high generality. It should be seen
that such a theory incorporates a very central
protological dimension. Taken seriously, this fact
changes the basis of the theory reception. It is
thus hopeless to try to make sense of the theory
of self-referential social systems, above all when
they are conceived of as nothing but operations.
while occulting the protological problematic.
Circular actuality (Nur-Vollzug)
Let us nowexamine more accurately some
important moments of the figure of thought
elaborating on the self-difference structure. In
the course of my commentary on Fichte’s
deduction, I said that the main pressure bending
thought into counter-intuitive, highly com-
pacted patterns originates from the twofold
necessity of abstracting time and the necessity
to reabsorb all intuitively - i.e. extensively
posited - terms into one or a few (’verbal’)1
actual aspects of a circular process. I now show
that this figure of contraction of extensive terms
in actual effectuation < 14>11=ii g ) is not specific to
the transcendental tradition, but is also required
in other philosophical approaches confronted
with problems of the composite constitution of
specific beings. Concerning Luhmann, the pre-
70
sent stage of my discussion will offer an
instructive specification of his general concep-
tion of system as a differential non-entity. It will
take the form of a commentary on its most
fundamental, most pregnant statement: ’nur
Kommunikation kann kommunizieren’ (only
communication can communicates
I begin with a presentation of the figure as
it is elaborated by Aristotle, in crucial develop-
ments of his psychological theory. 21 It is the
central figure of the act theory of the soul,
which solves the major problems of the preced-
ing doctrines. The theory reacts to the quasi-
mythological treatment of psychology by Plato.
for whom the soul is a composite being extended
over several heterogeneous domains and whose
unity seemed ever since problematic. It is
topologically dispersed and its heterogeneous
parts are thought of as co-existing and often
interacting with each other in a global space.
The question for Plato was that of the uniting
domination (11e’gemondn) of one part over the
other or all others within this plurality.Z’7
Aristotle simplifies the stratificatory scheme of
the soul into three main parts: a vegetative
(growth and decay without motion), an animal
(autonomous motion and sense) and an intel-
lectual (knowledge) part. He then resolves the
problem of the unity of the strata in superior
living beings like animals or men in an
audacious and straightforward manner. He
rejects the idea of cumulative stratificatory
endowments and brings to the fore an actual-
effectual or ’verbal’ concept of form, which
transforms the problem: the soul (psyche) is the
form (eidos) of the living body in the sense that it
is the act (the realized dynamis, the energeia) of
living, which is its perfection (entelecl1eia). In the
soul of a human being there are not three
partial souls or three psychic floors interrelated
through the material being they animate. There
is only one act, through which the living human
being lives and realizes his being ( tois z6isi to zên
einai, esse viventibus vivere, De anima 415b:14).
Each time this act is specified as vegetative
(when man sleeps), animal (when he perceives)
or intellectual (when he thinks). The life of such
a being is ’effectuated’ (actually realized) in one
sole act of being, which is here life in its
vegetative, animal or intellectual form. There is
no need to multiply the involved beings.
The act theory dispels all forms of being
which are not actual-effectual (Vollzug), i.e. all
forms of already given res-like beings. The
theory transforms the comprehension of being
as presence of objects (frozen products of once
enacted being) in their multiplicity, factual
diversity and dispersion into that of an originary
actus esseridi. There is
a transformation of the
thick-setting of extensive, transitive multi-
an
moment structure into a circular intransitive,
internally effective, unique-moment structure.
The logico-grammatical triadic structure of
operator-operatio-operatwn be counter-
must
intuitively compacted monadic
into a structure
with one last irreducible component, the
operatio. A step must be made to cut behind
the current logical and linguistic settings of
triadic ontic evidence and to attain to the
protological founding dimension of the ’sole-
operation’ structure. The act theory invokes the
originary ontological ground, out of which a
reality emerges, whose obscured perception
breaks its primal ’collection’ (Sanztnlting) and
scatters its vivid core into cooled disjected
members.
The problem created by such an analogy
between Aristotle’s act theory in its modern
interpretation and Luhmann’s operation the-
ory is that of the limits beyond which both
theories are no more comparable. Massive
misinterpretations lurk, should the analogy be
loaded with more than it bears. Aristotle’s form
actuality is metaphysical in the sense that it is
not a historically or a self-organizationally
emerging operation, but is the actuating of a
primarily actual essence. It is not an arbitrary
distinction, a contingent split the world’s
on
surface. The Aristotelian actuality is essential.
It is also strictly unitary and self-sufficient. Its
circularity is not differential or paradoxical; it is
spherical and global. No form-act refers to
another form-act or to an environing non-act,
the difference to whom is reflected in the form-
act itself. However, if these are the restrictions
to be made on my analogy, the analogy itself
remains pertinent as an elucidation of the
actual-effectual figure which is decisive in
Luhmann’s categorial revision of sociology.
While the Fichtean deduction could help us to
understand the asymmetrical three-step pro-
cess (position of system as concomitant with
the position of difference to an unmarked
environment and reflection of the difference
as core operation of the system) as a proto-
logical untemporal unique circularity: the
Aristotelian figure gives us a key for under-
standing more than the actual-effectual aspects
of the resorption of extensive terms into one
operative structure, already partially enlight-
ened by the comparison with Fichte. It is
mainly interesting for the invaluable contribu-
 71

tion it offers to the understanding of the
couplings between different operation types,
that is, different systems.
The relatedness and dependency of the
brain autopoiesis’8 to the autopoiesis of con-
sciousness, as well as the relatedness of the
latter to the autopoiesis of communication, can
be explained in terms very much analogous to
Aristotle’s act theory. Only communication can
communicate, meaning that consciousness - as
well as the brain - cannot: this refers to an
actual contraction necessary to think the form
as act. There is no place for whatever multi-
plicity in the Aristotelian scheme because the
entities at stake are not objective (res-like), but
actual-effectual ( Uollzug). Multiplicity is the co-
existence of many different items at a time, in a
space. Prime actuality - or protological pro-
cesses - arenon-spatial and are untemporal in
the sense that they are not in time as in a pre-
existing space. They are, on the contrary.
themselves time-generative. There is thus no
place, on the originary ground, for a multiplicity
of acts. The actiis essencdi of a living being is life
and that of a thinking living being is thinking
(noein). There is no stratification, ordering the
acts of being, life, vegetation, perception and
intellection as a multiplicity in space or time,
arranging their cumulation at the higher levels.
In the action theoretical framework, the most
specific act is always and alone the actual one.
through the structural connectibility of its parts
All others, ’underlying’ ones, are there, in it.
- each operation demanding the connection of a
They are superseded by its actual specificity so
that their actuation ’is’ its own. new one of the same actuality. The lower
ence reflection that constitutes the communica-
tion acts. The conscious actuality entering the
communicative actuality does not operate like a
material component entering a material synth-
esis. Consciousness is already fully and genu-
inely present in communication. When
communication is actuated, consciousness and
cerebral life are as well. Aristotle had already
stressed this presupposition relationship of the
lower actuality by the higher one.31 In Luh-
mannian terms: whereas only communication
communicates, there is no communication
without consciousness and no consciousness
without cerebral life.
The difference between the two visions lies
in Luhmann’s conception of the absorption of
the subordinate actuality in the effectuation of
the more specific one in terms of contribution
and stimulation. Since the lower actuality does
not imply the realization of the higher one, since
e.g. consciousness is not already communica-
tion, the coming to pass of communication must
be specifically conditioned. Communication
being autopoietic, the continuous connection
of its operations from one instant to the next,
building more or less coherent sequences, is
purely communicative in nature. That means
that each level of actuality is completely
autonomous in its sequence-building and
time-consuming operation. The system endures
on the basis of self-motion and self-continuation

actuality systems do not condition the operative

Coupling of operative levels continuity of the higher ones - these would
Aristotle proposed a detailed theory of the otherwise not be autopoietic; rather they supply
couplings involved in the actual absorption of them with the type of actuality they need,
lower act dimensions within higher ones, in which is in turn transformed by them, through
particular the famous abstraction theory coup- a specific reticulation into the higher type
ling perception and intellection through the actuality. The ’material’ out of which commu-
processing of sense data into intellectual nication is made is conscious ’Erlebnisse’, sense

forms.29 It is not possible to expose it here, but
what is sure is that the analogical setting of both
theories, Aristotle’s and Luhmann’s, persists
around their central logismic figures. Thus,
Luhmann approaches the problematics of coup-
ling as one of a contribution of the autopoiesis of
the lower systems to the autopoiesis of the
higher ones. This contribution takes the form of
an entry of lower difference reflections in higher
ones without breaking the unity of the specific
actual effectuation. When conscious material
30
(thoughts - Gedanken) enters communication,
it does so in the form of that material which
syntheses of the specific kind that I call
consciousness. These syntheses build the basic
’material’ of communication by entering into
the higher syntheses specific to this higher type
of sense system.
Not all conscious syntheses enter, however,
into the higher communicative ones, as the
transformation of conscious experience
(thought, in Luhmann’s terminology) into
intersubjective communication is not itself
automatic. Moreover, not all conscious synth-
eses are equally appropriate to enter into
communication - some being structurally

structurally stimulates the asymmetrical differ- excluded, like incommunicable, ineffable con-
72
scious experiences. The choice of the terms
’contributions’ and ’stimulations’ to describe
the relations between a pair of asymmetrically
conditioned levels of actuality reflects this
unequal and selective structure of systemic
coupling. Some conscious operations are more
stimulated than others to engage in commu-
nication. Once communication is actual, the
theory considers that the conscious material
has ceased to operate and has acceded to the
higher operative synthesis of communication.
The problem of a conscious experience of
communication itself during its own operation
is not that of a confusion of the two levels of
operation, but that of a simultaneity or double-
stage effectuation <~~2N~) of the two syntheses.
The problem is prevented through the multi-
dimensional structure of communication itself
in Luhmannian theory. Through its conception
of communication as a threefold operation
consisting of information, impartation (Mit-
teilutig )32 and comprehension (Verstelzen), the
theory accounts explicitly for the phenomenon
of the continuous ’£]lll7nt a soi’ underwriting
communication. Thus, the unquestionable phe-
nomenon of a current being-for-myself, feeling
and judging in myself of the contents of
communication, while engaged in communica-
tion, is not occulted in the theory. The conscious
sequences accompanying continuously actual
communication and forming, so to speak, its
background, are respectively among the con-
stituting acts of communication. The unim-
peachable autonomy and self-referentiality of
the communicative sequences guarantee the
autopoietic character of the communication
system and inhibit any attempt to resolve
communication into consciousness.
A possible interpretation of Aristotle’s act
theory points towards a new logismic horizon
that I will have to explore. It has been
suggested to conceive of the Aristotelian
actuation of a specific and individual being as
a continuous realization of a form in its
adequate matter. The actuation of vegetative
life in a rose is thus an actuation of being-a-
rose in adequate matter, throughout each
moment of its existence; that of a cell, the
continuous actuation and thereby mainte-
nance of the being or form cell in adequate
matter throughout all its metabolic processes.
The metaphor that bears the whole interpreta-
tion is that of a whirlpool maintaining the
stability of the form through the flow of matter.
This conception of ’transtemporal stability’,
within which specific and individual form
actuating is a ’sempiternal wrap or bend
informing the local matter’.33 goes beyond the
heretofore explored theoretical space. With
such a view of the temporal-operative event
continuum we enter the domain of the
concrete realization of the prime originary
actuality. We leave the protological level,
reaching what we could call a strictly opera-
tional one. Whereas the former described the
state of things at their untemporal, time-
inaugural emergence, the latter corresponds
to a consideration of the concrete actual-
effectual (Nur-Vollzug) event. In real time, the
compactness of the Nur- Vollzug structure is
reflected in a very specific form. One would
expect that, in the protological event of a self-
reflecting difference, the bundling or knotting
of all extensive terms into one circular actual
effectuation must embody in a contraction of
the operator and the operntum into a time-
consuming self-centred operatio. The empirical
world is, however, when compared to its
originating matrix, a world of cooled out
derivatives. It constitutes a level of constructed
reality opposite to the protological one and
structurally unable to host its circular arche-
types. These must, when the departure is taken
from the empirical level, always be reinvented
in a stark effort of theoretical thought.
The whirlpool metaphor is thus the best
suited one to conceive of the sole-being and the
circularity of the operation, as well as the
derivative, transitory status of its cooled forma-
tions. It has, moreover, a not uninteresting,
most concrete basis in biological phenomena.
Actually, the material components of living
tissues are continuously renewed and replaced
within relatively constant periods, while the
biological form is altogether maintained. Thus,
the metaphor is in a way inescapable or ceases
almost to be one. It offers a convenient
transition towards metaphysically unsaddled
representations of operative processes. Presup-
positions on the status, ideal identity or
supratemporal sameness of the act forms need
not to be made within it. The conception of a
transtemporally stable oper-atum through the
unceasing, continuous action of a specific,
contingent operatio (eventually consuming
time and matter) fits quite well as a de-
ontologization of Aristotelian act theory. It
establishes the problematic on an empirical
operative ground and draws on the contingence
and (evolutionary) variability of the form as
opposed to its supposed incorruptible ideal
sameness. On the whole, this conception

seems to be very close to Luhmann’s view of the
operation as a prime constituent of the system
with no guarantee of ontological identity and
stability.
Through the flow of time, theconcretions
of life, consciousness and communication are
cooled forms of current continuous operations.
These maintain transtemporally identifiable,
functionally in fine advantageous operata. The
stability of the operata (a cell, a thought, a
specific communication such as a friendly
interaction, a work conflict, a legal procedure)
is nothing but the permanence, from instant to
instant, of the actual effectuation of the
corresponding operation. The operata have no
subsistence and no substance outside the
operation. But what then probabilizes coherent.
enduring, system-building operations rather
than anarchic, non-self-confirming, non-con-
densing, instantly vanishing ones? Within
Aristotle’s act theory, such a question is
irrelevant. The act form is an ontologically
firm eidos, ever since, and self-identical under all
conditions. Within de-ontologized frameworks
like systems theory, the tendency to condensa-
tion must be especially accounted for. Luh-
mann’s proposal elaborates on the ground of
the self-organization theory in a protological
differentialist formulation. Thus, each difference
that scratches the surface of the world tends,
from its prime event on, to iterate in a way that
builds a nucleus for redundancy as well as for
variation. Redundancy is the basic, variation-
enabling process, while variation is the mar-
ginal one. Both are the substance, the content of
the operative life pulsing in the constituted form
through the time-matter flow. Each operation,
from moment to moment, either confirms and
condenses further the form, or inflects its
wrapping movement and prepares the possible
(not necessary)emergence of new forms. The
double trajectory of confirmation and variation
is an unpredictable one. Predictions of evolution
have some pertinence after bifurcation has
occurred, in phases of necessary condensation
through strong redundancy, the post-bifurcative
phase being similar to theoretically initial ones.
The nearer to the inaugural distinction, the
more redundant operating is likely to prevail.
The more virginal the ground where the
distinction is drawn, or the more originary the
level of emergence, the more hasty and intense
are the processes of iteration. This is clear from
protological, form-theoretical premises: the
reflection of the difference system-environment
within the system is stronger, and enhances the
73
building of self-identity, when the environment
is not already so differentiated as to impose
internal complexification of the system through
the differentiation of diverse roles and functions
within the latter. These processes are namely
factors of variation that inflect the actuated
form in a number of directions. The systemic
structure is maintained as long as variation
does not provoke a switch to a changed form,
whose confirmation would require anew a high
measure of shape- or structure-building redun-
dancy. A major feature of Luhmann’s systems
operativity theory is finally its inversion of the
status of structure (in all functionalist and
systemic theories) from one of a superordinated
commanding magnitude, whose stability
enhancing is the finality of the functional
processes, to one of a flowing process with no
real anchoring in things. Structure reflects just
the temporary redundancy tendencies of opera-
tions, with ’enslaving’ effects upon certain
operative sequences. 34
To sum up: a system would be a sort of
transtemporally stable whirlpool, a form main-
tained in actuality through a constant bend of
its individual operative components into a
global structure. The complex mechanisms
that link together or mutually indent the
successive operations are not deterministic.
They are inherently unstable because they are
grounded on paradoxes. These paradoxes are
the main source of systemic dis-equilibrium as
well as the main resources for complexity-
building and actuality-furthering variation.
Pure event
The last instantiation of the logismic figure of
Nur-Vollzug I would like to present before
closing this commentary on Luhmann’s sys-
temic operation could help us understand its
’evential’ aspect. Operation ’happens’ as the
asymmetrical reflection of a difference in a
form act. The ’products’ of this happening are
living beings, conscious contents and social
interchanges. Luhmann’s theory tends to
deconstruct these cooled objectivities into
their constituting operations. But as soon as
we leave the real-objective level for the
operative one, we face the problem of the
representability of protological complexes. One
of the problematic aspects of thinkability of
originary operativity is the ’happening’ of pure
operations. What does it mean that an opera-
tion happens or comes to pass? Once more the
evocation of a philosophical figure is most
instructive. It is Heidegger’s doctrine of
74
5
’Ereignis’ (event ).3 The idea of ’Ereignis’
represents the climax of the fundamental effort
of Heidegger to think ’be’ (Sein) in its difference
to the ’being’ (Seiendes). This effort leads to
complete ’verbalization’ of thought structures
with concentration on building ways of
a of current operations in systems. Thus, the pure
access to the non-objective, purely actual
universe of prime reality. The main statements
have the form: Welt weltet, Nichts nichtet,
Ereignis ereignet, ist istet 36 reminiscent of
...
that fundamental structure of pure actuality
where operator operatum and operatio are
contracted in a sole intransitive, internally
actual. circular act. Heidegger’s novelty is
that pure actuality is thought as ab-solute
finite, with no anchoring in any transcendent
nor transcendental nor worldly reality. Being is
the pure event of itself, the gift of time and
being, winding in itself like an out-less finite
ring. The pure event is a circular event, a
coming into its own being (Er-eignen). Once
again, the circular structure is a complex one
with a dual movement of giving time and being
to the reciprocal duality of themselves.
Luhmann’s protological conception of a
self-sustaining operativity is certainly nearer to
the asymmetrical three-moment movement of
the Fichtean deduction than to Heidegger’s
dual, quasi-mystical movement of a self-giving
being. The interest of the Heideggerian figure is,
however, its insistence on the event character of
circular actuality. Its shaping of the event
motive is one whose central stakes are the
’saying’ of the gratuity of the givenness of the
given. ’Ereignis’ is irrelative and causeless. There
is no transcendent nor any other actor who
does. makes or motivates the event. There is no
internal necessity eliciting it and unfolding its
movement. Sole-actuality is ’eventual’ for Hei-
degger in the sense that its effectuation ( Uollzug)
has no motive outside of itself. When it comes to
pass and endures through time and being, it is
still inaugurally motiveless, with no relation to
anything outside its pure event. This radicality
of the Heideggerian figure has no correspondent
in Luhmann’s theory.
Thus, my last analogical presentation
designed to enrich my commentary on Luh-
mann’s operational conception has to be much
more contrastive than the preceding ones.
Operations, the sole systemic constituents,
’happen’, occur, in an already existing stream
of specifically identical operations. Metabolic
processes, thoughts and communications come
to pass through insertion in such a stream,
connecting themselves to respectively adequate
and specific operations which are at that
moment effective. This idea is developed by
Luhmann along with a well-known theoretical
a topic, that of the connection or connectability
(Anschluss, Anschlussfå11igkeit. Anschliessbarkeit)
operativity of systems, though circular, is not
prime-eventual. Its protological description can
show it in status llascendi as emerging and
inaugural, and elucidate its structure, moments
and movement. It does not make any assump-
tion on its prime Operative systems - in
event.
Luhmann’s sense - appear then
as structurally
or immanently unstable: they can never stop
operating, being, as I would say, tilted ahead
and ever searching adequate connection to
operate. They are literally ’pro-clivious’, bent
forward in a relentless concatenation with
similar entities. This ever-current connecting
is nothing else than the effectuation of the
asymmetrical reflection of the difference
between the system and its environment within
the system. This difference can never attain the
status of an in itself quiescent unity. As an
actual difference, it is continuously, unceasingly
in effectuation (in Vollzug). Thus, systems
consisting in actual operations presuppose
themselves. Their operations can never begin
out of nothing, but always lack connection to
other operations of the same autopoiesis in
order to happen. Each singular operation is
structurally referential of other operations
immediately connected to it through a puzzle-
like key mesh. The operations sequence is
concatenated through a sort of structural
intrusion of the ’end’ of one operation into the
’beginning’ of the next.
To be sure, the expression of this state of
things in terms of a beginning and end of
operations is not very appropriate, though it
reflects the fact that the circular process of the
singular operation refers constantly backwards
from its (protological) end moment to its
beginning one. In a way each operation has a
part of itself pre-posited in an undetermined
next operation, specified through the key fit
characteristic of the relevant autopoiesis. An
operation of social communication cannot be
connected with an operation of life or of
consciousness, as none of the moments of the
autopoiesis of life nor of consciousness are able
to fit between the circularly organized moments
of the communication operation, i.e. informa-
tion, impartation and comprehension. Each
operation of a specific autopoiesis hosts in itself
the reference to a homopoietical operation

under the form of an entangling intrusion of
their different moments in the circular process
of their effectuation. 37
3. The world problem
Although contrasting with such an embedded-
ness of the advent of the like in the stream of
ever-actuated like, the Heideggerian event con-
cept still has illuminating aspects. It actually
shows the thought of Nur-Vollzug in a state of
full completion. Unfolding its immanent motives
and making explicit its internal horizons, pure
operativity would tend to these extremes of pure
eventuality. Acutely elaborating on the proto-
logical structures, Luhmann’s approach is, for
its part, not blind to the problem of pure
eventuality. In its terms, the problem of the
event of circular actuality would be a world
problem, outreaching the scope of a theory of
society - however radical the theory may be in
its categorial casting of pure, internal-intransi-
tive, circular operativity. The achieving piece of
Nur-Vollzug thought is the reflection of an aspect
of reality which hints towards a horizon that
out-ranges, and in a way engulfs the horizon of
all- and self-engulfing communication.
The world problem of world event is,
however, like everything having sense, a poten-
tial object of social communication. It can be
indicated, discussed, referred to. Any emergence
of it is socially constructed. In contrast to all
other constructions of communication, it is.
however, something that directly hits upon the
paradoxical, self-eluding, circular limitations of
social communication itself. It unites all the
paradoxity of the latter in one enigma and gives
it the name of the sole horizon of all its horizons,
that is, the world. Social communication being
the ultimate envelope of itself cannot cross
beyond itself. However, it does not reflect this
self-limitation as a problem of communication
itself, i.e. as a social problem. Communication
reflects its paradoxical character as a whole in
the form of a (non-social) world problem. It
3s
shows, then, in its most paradox forms like art
or religion, that there still is a problem that is
not its own. A problem that is neither a part of it
nor coextensive with it, but definitely larger
than it. It is the problem of a sphere that
transcends communication and should not be
confused with any sphere of the incommunic-
able within communication. We have seen that
conscious experience, especially when very inti-
mate and intense, is not easily communicable.
75
Other spheres of meaning do not motivate
communication adequately. Besides, there is a
whole shadow domain of communication which
is structurally incommunicable: a communica-
tion can never impart, in its own act, the
impartation quality of this same act.39A whole
stream of non communication is thus co-
current to that of communication, building
the non attainability of the whole of commu-
nication to itself.40 These are the paradoxes of
pure operativity as structurally pro-clivious and
unending. Besides these specific paradoxes,
communication hosts, very centrally, another
type of communication that does not reflect
problems of its self-reference, but the fact that
although all-engulfing and self-contextual,
communication is not the ’largest’ horizon of
being. Communication, thus, contains the most
paradoxical hint towards a ’world’, larger than
it is. The extreme of paradox is thus reached in a
communication - which could be, like silence, a
renunciation of communication - that shows
beyond itself. World problems are problems of
the pure eventuality of ever-streaming pure
operativity. They are not those of self-reference
of communication, but those of the self-refer-
1
ence of the givenness of a world for it.41
4. Social communication: a concept for
refounding sociology
Our exploration of Luhmann’s version of
systems theory showed it as a radical transfor-
mation of the initial model through a new
shaping of its central categories. The main line
of thought commanding this categorial revision
could be characterized as a programme of
universal de-ontologization viewed as historial
necessity. My endeavour was to shed some light
on the ways and motives that led to the final
centring of the whole theory upon the concept
of operation. I have proceeded by establishing
some conjunctions of Luhmann’s approach
with philosophical theories, all of which docu-
mented efforts to conceive the emergence of
fundamental structures of meaning at proto-
logical levels. The convergence of these theories
towards a de-realization (Ent-dinglicirung - or de-
substantivization) of current ontological cate-
gories was in itself instructive. Thus, most
efforts went in the direction of a counter-
intuitive thinking of internal-intransitive, cir-
cular, effectual actuality. I brought them under
the logismic title of Nllr- Vollwg. Whereas
Luhmann’s theory stands somewhat alone in
76
contemporary sociology and seems therefore
erratic and incomprehensible, my procedure
allowed me to situate it in a line of philosophical
thought. The trajectory of the reviewed figures
of sole-operation could lead us, in an altogether
ordered way, from the first shapings of the
system-operation motive within the complexity
problematics to the last of its reflections in the
world problem.
Let us venture a last remark on the
sociological interest of such a theory of social
communication. Its primary level reveals itself.
once more, as very remote from the traditional
settings of social theory - and not only its
empirical ones. It would thus further the
scepticism of those who feel that its ’entry
rights’ are prohibitively high. Moreover, while
showing the strong stimulation such a general
theory receives and exerts on the specifically a
priori theorizing of neighbouring philosophy, my
interpretation could have enhanced the opinion
of its marginal sociological fertility. My thesis
would here be that a sound approach to
Luhrnann’s design cannot do mithout a miniifium
of philosophicnl analysis of its theoretical pre-
mises. Such an analysis should deliver a
characterization of the nature and level of the
involved concepts. We should avoid self-delusion
and recognize the basic evidence that the ground
on which Llljlnl(inrl’S theory stands - and falls - is
protological. Protologicity. as practised by Luh-
mann, is a very new and peculiar setting for
forging primary categories, conceptual archi-
tectures and descriptive frameworks. Whereas
classical sociology could lean on philosophical
groundwork (Simmel and Weber on neo-
Kantianism, Scheler and Schutz on phenomenol-
ogy, etc.), Luhmann inaugurates a new type of
relation between a theory of society and the
foundational or categorial work of philosophy.
He rejects any reliance on a global philosophical
position. Instead, he combines a multiplicity of
theoretical pieces to a conception of high
abstraction and logical priority. The protological
status of the whole synthesis is not always clear.
Yet, my conviction is that the central pieces of
the theory are protological, and hence require a
philosophical elucidation. Actually, protologic is
a sort of unidentified transcendental logic which
is poorly established and whose contours are
still very ambiguous. I can see no way to
dispense with a philosophical elucidation of its
statements.
Admittedly, all this being done, the ques-
tion remains as to the concrete returns of a
theory so costly in terms of conceptual elabora-
tion and so remotefrom the fields of its
acknowledged objects. My thesis is that the
main and most potent acquisition of Luhmann’s
theory is the concept of ’social communication’.
To make clear what I suggest, I would compare,
in strictly epistemological terms, Freud’s ’inven-
tion’ of the Unconscious with Luhmann’s
construction of ’social communication’. 42 The
basic epistemological feature they share is that
both concepts embody a sort of coming to
themselves of their respective disciplines.
Actually, both social communication and the
unconscious are primary object concepts, cir-
cumscribing the proper theme of a specific
science. As the phenomenological thorough
theorizing of these matters has shown, such
projections of specific objectivities are nothing
less than inductive. They represent fundamental
’Etitik,ti’t-fe’ (castings) of primary objects, impul-
sing a decisive differentiation of the scientific
discipline at stake and establishing it on a new
basis. They open unsuspected horizons for
theory-building, allowing a much farther-
reaching inspection of their objective domains,
as well as a much more rigorous formulation of
their accounts. They are prior to any set of
observations or cognitions, and have something
of a founding performance.
Our suggestion is to consider the Luhman-
nian concept of ’social communication’ as an
inaugurative performance endowing sociology
with its proper object: the social. In the same
manner, Freud’s Unconscious represented a
new foundation of psychology on the basis of a
recasting of the psychic. The analogy holds in a
very pertinent manner. The problem of psychol-
ogy at the beginning of the 20th century was,
from a psychoanalytical point of view, the
dominance of I-centred, introspective and cog-
nitive thematizations of the psychic. The psychic
as an objectivity was featured in a massively
ontological manner, supposing a firm, self-
identical and individual mental entity. The
concept of the Unconscious anonymized the
psychic entity, transforming it in a bundle of
processes governed by a complex affectual
economy. We can observe in Luhmann’s theory
a similar aversion from individualistic ontology
and a striking analogy with the anonymizing
effects of the position of an anthropologically de-
centred - or de-anthropologized - third person,
non-mechanical processual object. The limits of
these similarities between both castings of de-
individualized, centre- and nameless primary
objects, is that the Freudian Unconscious has
been often thought of as an objective entity

existing somewhere - of Atlantis dis-
a sort
covered by
good-hearted
a who, after a
man
long search, came across it. From a Luhman-
nian point of view, Freud’s casting of the psychic
was not thoroughly de-ontologizing. For this
purpose, the Unconscious should have been
3 Luhmann’s early work. A stimulating discussion of Luhmann’s
thought as a difference and not as an identity.43
However, on the whole, we can maintain the
analogy and insist on the autonomizing and
fertilizing effects of the switch, in both psychol-
ogy and sociology, to anonymous and auton-
omous primary objects who allow the
observation of a level of reality in its own
right. Psychic life is no more an aggregate of
conscious or cognitive mental states than social
interchange is an aggregate of individual
actions. The contribution of Niklas Luhmann
to a refoundation of sociology on the basis of a
proper primary objectivity not only delivers the
concept of such a specific object, but also a
highly reflexive, epistemological and protologi-
cal theory thematizing all central processes of
any de-ontologization project. My purpose here
was to show how the idea of a circular,
actual operation constitutes the core
internally
of such a theory.
First version received
July 1999
Final version accepted September 1999
Notes
1
Luhmann’s first articles bear testimony to this conscious-
ness, where the ’Uberholtsein der uberlieferten metaphysischen
Bestimmung der Wahrheit von ontologischen Pramissen her’
(Luhmann 1962-1, 63) is stated as the basis for a profound
transformation in the dogmatic structure of social beliefs.
2 A political project, a juridical dogmatics, the perception of
or the acting in a market, a scientific theory, a game. a conflict
... all are conceived as self-descriptions of social communica-
tion, constituting modes of representing the world within
communication as well as modes of experiencing or acting
related to it.
3
The text (Derrida), consciousness (Husserl), language or
logic (Saussure. Spencer Brown) are other figures of the same
protological paradigm.
4 20
A formulation Luhmann uses in biographical interviews:
weil... man als Soziologe alles machen kann, ohne auf einen
bestimmten Themenbereich festgelegt zu sein’ (1987-141)
5
Parsons’ systemism was in many respects too narrow. too
essentialist for that purpose, lacking the main characteristics of
the required theory, namely high reflexivity. For a reconstruc-
tion and critique of Parsons’ essentialism, see Clam (1999:142-
150).
6
The relevant literature is immense. The theoretical
sophistication has been ever-increasing. Organization theory
and its literature remained a constant source of inspiration for
the later Luhmann - until recently, where the evolutionary
problematic in the chapter ’Evolution’ of Die Gesellschaft der
77
Gesellschaft (Luhmann 1997) was developed partially on the
basis of such literature
7
The major reference in Luhmann’s work is definitely
Zweckbegriff und Systemrationalit&auml;t (1973). Yet Legitimation durch
Verfahren (1969). where the rationality of subordinate, micro-
final devices like procedures is theorized, is also interesting.
8
See Clam (1997), the first part of which is dedicated to
administration and organization theory is Dammann et al.
(1994).
9 That is, reacting to its own variation.
10 As checked disorder
11 It should be noted that the double contingency scheme is
the paradigm of what I would call the ’indefinite generativity of
paradox’ It is the genus, so to speak, of all other reflexive
paradoxes like, for instance, that of the circular making of law
through legal procedures. See on this latter circularity the
enlightening work of G. Teubner (1989).
12
Imake a terminological distinction between sponta-
neous and self-organizing order.I understand spontaneous
processes as reproducible, whereas self-organizing order is
emergent, coming but once to pass and self-encaging.
13
We could call it the principle of das Feste wird . auf
das Flie&szlig;ende gegrundet’ (’found the solid upon the flowing’.
Luhmann 1962 190).
14
Using the terms of the phenomenological eptstemology
of Husserl and Heidegger.
15
One should always insist on the fact that Luhmann’s
invention does not proceed like an abstract, apriorical deduc-
tion. It is nurtured through the evidence coming from
constructivistically reconceived sciences (like attribution theory
in psycho-sociology) and is developed along the lines of a
theoretical sociology - and not those of an aprioric philosophy.
16
Like those of the sequencing ) Sequenzierung of notions
(
and arguments in circular or reticular topics, or those of the
sense and scope of abstraction in general theory (cf. Luhmann
1979:170-177).
17
Succeeding Plato’s distinction of different levels of
philosophizing, the top of which is the Platonic dialectic.
Aristotle’s pr&ouml;t&eacute; philosiphia is a research on how being reveals
itself as being; a research upon the most fundamental. i.e.
categorial. ground of our world comprehension.
18
The Grundlage der gesamten Wissenschaftslehre of 1794 is
the most detailed exposition of the system However, the
Grundriss des Eigenthumlichen der Wissenschaftslehre of 1795
contains, at its beginning, a very brief and clear presentation of
the figure I am discussing. We quote from the first edition of the
Werke (1834-35. 1845-16).
19
The I is understood by Fichte as a ’pure activity’ (reine
) (Grundlage &sect;1, 6), where the actor (
Th&auml;tigkeit das Handelnde
)
and its product ( ) ’sind eins und dasselbe’ (’are one and
die That
the same thing’: &sect;1. 6). The same passage implicitly identifies
das Handelnde (the actor) and die Handlung (the action). This is a
very clear token of the underlying ’ Nur-Vollzug structure that I
discuss later.
No need to say that our presentation of Fichtean
deduction is a most cursory one. The exegesis of the extremely
dense principles ) Grunds&auml;tze of the deduction fills an extended
(
literature. I concentrate, in our interpretation, on the central
and consensually acknowledged figure of thought ) logismos A
(
.
few hints at the literature may suffice: P Rohs (1991). brings an
interesting image to illustrate the activity-based conception of
the I like a photon which is nothing when stripped of its
movement, the I is nothing besides its actual activity (p. 53,
Thathandlung being the identity of Tat (activity) and Handlung
(product of the activity): Hans-Jurgen Muller (1980:120ff.)
stresses the problems of the sequenciation of circular activity
under the title of ’symbolic narrative’ (the Thalhandlung being
78
explained in the deduction ’symbolisch erz&auml;hlend’) as well as the
fact that the Thathandlung of the I is the paradigm of every
setzen Dieter Henrich (1982) brings into discussion
position );
( challenging violence done to language in the German of the
the later (1801) Fichtean formula ’an activity whom an eye has
been implanted’ (p. 75ff.) which would fit very well into our
interpretation -however, he proposes a divergent assessment of
it; Reinhard Lauth (1984:19ff.) analyses very accurately the
doubling of self-reflection/determination and hetero-determina-
tion in one unique act Vollzug or Selbstvollzug
( ).
21
The transcendental philosophy of consciousness is no
longer modelled on the perfect and divine intellectus originarius,
of whom the human intellect represents a derivative form
intellectus derivativus). Thus far, the statement that worldliness
( It cannot convey or ’communicate’ its own intention-
begins with a finite subjectivity does not prejudge the givenness
or not givenness of a pre-worldly consciousness.
22
First edition: London (1969); second edition: New York
(1972) containing some significant complements.
23
A recent discussion of Spencer Brown’s logic with a clear
link to Luhmann’s revival of its central stakes is to be found in
the two volumes edited by Dirk Baecker (1993a, b).
24
The ’allgemeine Gegenstandstheorie’ in the manner of
the pure Logistik of the beginning does not reach such deep
originary levels as Spencer Brown’s protologic It doesn’t really
propose a theory of purely actual, paradoxical and circular
objects
25
The context of the statement is the following: ’Aber
Menschen konnen nicht kommunizieren, nicht einmal ihre
Gehirne konnen kommunizieren, nicht einmal das Bewusstsein
kann kommunizieren. Nur die Kommunikation kann kommu-
nizieren’ (in the chapter entitled ’Wie ist Bewusstsein an
Kommunikation beteiligt?’ Luhmann 1995b:37).
26
The main text is De anima (especially Book II:412a-b,
414a). Our interpretation draws on Inciarte (1970), Frede &
Patzig (1988) and Liske (1985).
27
Plato, Republic 436a, 544e, 580d-e, 588c-e: Timaeus
69c-e.
28
Autopoiesis means, in our context, self-producing
circular actuality and activity.
29
Cf Hamelin (1953). I suppose that Anstotle, with his
theory of the totalizing unity of the most specific form act,
resolved the problem of the coupling between the principle of
intellectual knowledge and that of animation of the body. For a
detailed study of the long groping search for that solution, see
Nuyens (1948)
30
I would like to add, in the wide sense of all conscious
Erlebnisse However, Luhmann’s texts on con-
experience ).
(
sciousness occult the affective domain of conscious expenence.
31
With the exception that pure intellects are not only
conceivable, but really exist with no anchoring in animal or
vegetative life.
32
To avoid confusion I translate the second moment of the
communication Kommunikation operation, namely Mitteilung,
(
)
as ’impartation’ - rendered otherwise most naturally into
English ’communication’. ’Impartation’ has the advantage of
replicating with relative fidelity the etymological composition of
the German word - an advantage the word ’utterance’ (the
adopted rendering in English translations of Luhmann) does not
have.
33
Furth (1978, quoted in Liske 1985:256).
34
These effects have drawn the attention of the self-
organization theorists. On this point, cf. Schweitzer (1997).
Most impressive examples of redundancy in initial phases of self-
organizing processes are paths (or tracks: Wege
).
35
The basic text is Zur Sache des Denkens (1969). As for
Fichte and Aristotle, a thorough penetration of the philosophical
notion requires a much greater textual basis, extending to the
entire corpus.
36
One can easily figure how embarrassing the translation
of such nominal-verbal doublets is. World worlds, nothing
nothings, event events, is ises reflect quite accurately the
...
original text
37
Empirically, all systems are described as being always in
a state of operative ’ongoing’.
38I mean the figure of art which Luhmann calls ’world art’
in distinction from all other art configurations. ’World art’ is the
form of art characteristic of our differentiated societies, where
art has no reference outside itself. concentrating its self-creating
mission and paradoxity on the closure of the work of art itself on
itself. See Luhmann (1990, 1995a).
39
ality (communication quality), because the intentionality of the
intentionality communicating act would, while this latter is in
effectuation. itself be still veiled - awaiting a higher act of
explicitation, whose intentionality again would have to be
unveiled...
40
Erreichbarkeit (attainability) of social communication
forms a consistent topic in Luhmann’s theory (1997, ch. 5).It
has been explicitly thematized by Fuchs (1992)
41
Luhmann does not make a clear distinction between
communicational paradoxes and world problem. World, as the
all-engulfing unity of difference ( Einheit der Differenz
), is what is
’concomited’ ) mitgefuhrt in the paradoxes of communication. I
(
opted for a formal distinction as a means of giving a higher
profile to a world problem that is not just silently concomitant
with current communication, but takes form as such and for
itself A basic Luhmannian text dealing with the world
problematic is ’Reden und Schweigen’ (1989).
42
What is at stake is not on any account an assessment of
the scientific or cultural repercussions of both. That would be
obviously mistaken, the weight of the Luhmannian theory
being, in this respect, rather modest when compared to that of
Freudian psychoanalysis.
43
Moreover, the energetic economy of psychic life by Freud
is still too mechanistic, that is, not complex enough to enable the
emergence of a difference theoretical theorizing.
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