KFG Lecture Series with Benjamin Ziemann (Sheffield)

Historicum Room K401, Schellingstr. 12, Munich

Lecture Series “Europe's History of the Present: Universalism and Particularism”

The KFG Lecture Series continues in cooperation with the colloquium of the Chair of Modern History with its next session on Wednesday, June 25th, 2025, with a presentation by guest lecturer Benjamin Ziemann on "Social Transformations since the 1970s from the Vantage Point of Functional Differentiation".

His presentation endeavours to reconsider the theme of the LMU research group – the relationship between universalism and particularism in recent contemporary history – from a specific conceptual vantage point: the theory of functional differentiation. Functional sub-systems of society – the mass media, religion, the economy, sports, politics, science, and the legal system – are both universalistic and particularistic. They are particularistic insofar as their operations are related to a specific reference problem (religious communication does not claim to uncover scientific truths), yet within these limitations, they tend to claim universal relevance (religious observers would be hard pressed to accept the claims of zealous football fans that competitive sport offers a meaningful form of transcendence). The paper asks whether disappointment with the limited success of a liberal normative order in the post-1989 era underestimates the strength of “liberal”, functionally differentiated social structures, and it challenges the notion that the economic downturn since the 1970s has marked a major societal caesura.

You can join the lecture via zoom: https://lmu-munich.zoom-x.de/j/69669963412?pwd=Xljacm9awDEz1872VrPJ1N6PbHJ92h.1 (Meeting-ID: 696 6996 3412, Code: 669894)

Benjamin Ziemann is Professor of Modern German History at the University of Sheffield. He has worked extensively on twentieth-Century German history, and one peace movements in post-1945 Europe. He is the author of seven books and many edited collections, including, with Nadine Rossol (co-eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the Weimar Republic (2021). His latest book is: Gesellschaft ohne Zentrum. Deutschland in der differenzierten Moderne (2024). Benjamin Ziemann has held visiting fellowships at the University of York, Kyoritsu Women’s University Tokyo, the University of Jena, Humboldt University Berlin and the university of Oslo.

 

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