Communicative Spaces and Political Development: The Macro-Spatial Formation of the Public Sphere

• In Event: 330 - Section on Comparative-Historical Sociology Paper Session. Comparative-Historical Perspectives on Nationalism and Ideology

Abstract

This paper aims at building a comparative historical framework for the study of the public sphere and its role in political development. It argues that the prevailing concept of the public sphere as adopted since the 1990s is not just counterintuitive and shifting in its scope, but also analytically misleading. It neither designates a durable connected spatial phenomenon, as the term suggests, nor does it reliably trace the degree to which the ideal-typical standard of democratic culture is realized. As an alternative, the paper proposes a pragmatist approach to the public sphere that can grasp the macro-spatial phenomenon itself and its historical and comparative distinctiveness, beyond a priori assumptions of spatial formations or using the concept merely as a comparatively and historically empty signifier. Achieving this task requires the combination of analytical instruments and insights from previously unconnected fields of research. In comparative and historical perspective, the macro-spatial formation of the public sphere generates a systemic shift in political development by institutionalizing uncertainty about the outcome of cultural and political conflicts, the paper argues. This shift provides the mechanism which subsequent claims for increased participatory inclusiveness and deliberative quality activate.

Author

• Andreas Koller, New York University