著者

酒巻 秀明

出版者

東京女子大学現代教養学部国際社会学科社会学専攻紀要編集委員会

雑誌

東京女子大学社会学年報 = Tokyo Women's Christian University annals of sociology (ISSN:21876401)

巻号頁・発行日

no.2, pp.1-16, 2014

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ウルリッヒ・ベックによれば,近年の政治の停滞は別に驚くべきことではなく,再帰的近代化の進行の結果ということになる.ベックの考える再帰的近代化とは,近代化の後の近代化のことで,近代化でもたらされた変化によって,再び社会の近代化が進むことを意味している.そのため,再帰的とも言われる.そこで本稿では,ベックが再帰的近代化後の政治をどのように捉えているのかが検討される.ベックによれば,一般的に近代社会と考えられている産業社会は,半分モダンな社会でしかなかった.しかし,国民の権利拡大の要求や,経済や科学の潜在力が無視できないほど拡大したことにより,今までの公式的な政治の外側で社会を変化させる動きが強まっている.ベックはこのような動きをサブ政治と呼び,このような事象を理解するためには,政治的なものの再発見が必要と考えている.消費の問題を例にすると,これまでの研究では,一般的に政治に訴えることでの解決が考えられていた.しかし,ベックは経済の中に民主主義的なシステムを持ち込むことで,サブ政治の次元で問題解決が図れるとしている.ベックによると,既存の政治システムですべてをコントロールするのは,もはや無理だと考えられる.そこで,ベックは,これから求められるのは,様々な集団や分野の議論による相互コントロールの仕組みだとしている.This paper will show why Ulrich Beck thinks that the political needs to be reinvented. According to Beck, recent political instability has been caused by reflexive modernization, which he thinks of as the modernization of modernization. It is reflexive becausechanges brought about by modernization lead to further modernization.In his opinion, democracy in modern industrial societies was half modern in two respects. First, other than by voting, citizens had no opportunity to participate in the political decision-making process. Second, there was no need to control the economy and scientific advance democratically, as these activities were still in the early stages and not a threat to society. Nowadays, however, we see people trying to change society directly by using their own powers, not via parliament. In addition, the economy and scientific advances bring new products that could change society entirely. We are facing a new situation, not presupposed by official political undertakings. Beck summarized these "political" activities outside the existing political institutions as subpolitics. What we need now, he thinks, is the reinvention of the political.As an example of his new political theory, his analysis of the consumer movement is compared with traditional theory. While the traditional theory holds that problems of consumption must be solved in the realms of politics, Beck thinks that they must be solved through the democratization of the economy. A democratic mechanism should be installed in the economic system, making the economy a sub-public arena.According to Beck, there is no one simple answer in the era of reflexive modernization and we should leave the ideal of the political center behind. Instead, he proposes a new form of politics, one that facilitates democracy in every social sphere and enables mutual control.