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- Title
Zum Verhältnis von Interaktion, Organisation und Gesellschaft in der Therwiler Handschlag-Affäre. Eine systemtheoretische Analyse.
- Authors
Walthert, Rafael; Frank, Katharina; Stauffacher, Daniela; Weber, Urs
- Abstract
This paper attempts to explain the trajectory of the so-called "handshake affair" of Therwil (Switzerland) with a special focus on the role of religion, drawing on the work of the sociologist Niklas Luhmann. With his distinction between three types of social systems, Luhmann offers a tool for the analysis of the case in question: The first type of systems, interactions, like the encounters in which the refusal of the handshake took place, consists of communications between people that are co-present. The second type, organizations, are characterized by specified purposes, decision-making processes and formal membership. The third type, society, is the all-encompassing system which is structured by functional subsystems like politics, law or religion. The case in question shows, that once these societal subsystems became involved, organizations and especially interactions lost influence on the way the issue was handled. Further, the analysis shows that religion, although a subsystem of society, had only a minor influence on the debate. Factors explaining these results are the amount of time needed by the different systems and the degree they rely on face-to-face interaction.
- Subjects
LUHMANN, Niklas, 1927-1998; SYSTEMS theory; RELIGIONS; ORGANIZATION
- Publication
Zeitschrift für Religionswissenschaft, 2021, Vol 29, Issue 1, p16
- ISSN
0943-8610
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1515/zfr-2019-0020