Luhmann (3) Structure and Time

Abstract

The previous two chapters discussed Luhmann’s concepts of meaning, subject, communication, system, and environment. This chapter describes how he explains the growth of structures through the process of expectation-driven reproduction.

The question of how social structures can change over time involves two parts: how can part of the structures change while the structures themselves remain stable? The classical answer to this question held that structures were “things” that had both essential and peripheral “qualities” and that the essential qualities were stable while the peripheral ones were transitory. The theory of autopoietic systems rejects this kind of explanation.

Autopoietic systems reproduce themselves constantly. Their existence beyond the span of a momentary event depends upon their processes of reproduction. For them, the question is not, “How do they change?” The crucial question is, “How do they remain the same?”

Social systems endure in time because of their structure of self-reproduction. They constantly reproduce themselves in a manner that embodies constraint and openness. For this purpose, they use a strategy of expectations that includes anticipating expectations, mutual anticipation, ambiguity, generality, and several symbolic abbreviations such as: person, role, program, value, norm, and cognition.