|
This concept imples a group of social developments and experiences characterized, above all, by two meanings.... On the one hand, individualization means the disintegration of previously existing social forms -- for example, the increasing fragility of such categories as class and social status, gender roles, family, neighborhood etc.... Wherever such tendencies towards disintegration show themselves the question also arises: which new modes of life are coming into being where the one ones, ordained by religion, tradition or the state, are breaking down? The answer points to the second aspect of individualization. It is, simply, that in modern societies new demands, controls and constraints are being imposed on individuals. Through the job market, the welfare state and institutions, people are tied into a network of regulations, conditions, provisos.... The decisive feature of these modern regulations or guidelines is that, far more than earlier, individuals must, in part, supply them for themselves, import them into their biographies through their own actions.... The normal biography thus becomes the "elective biography," the "reflexive biography," the "do-it-yourself biography." This does not necessarily happen by choice, neither does it necessarily succeed. The do-it-yourself biography is always a "risk biography," indeeed a "tightrope biography," a state of permanent (partly overt, partly concealed) endangerment. |
|
Ulrich Beck
& |