Event dynamics: the eventalization of society in the sociology of Georg Simmel

Abstract

Commencing from Georg Simmel's notion of the general tendency of modern thought as the ‘dissolution of substance into functions’, the article analyzes Simmel's own thought as an apotheosis of that dissolution. The focus is on Simmel's conception of society as an ‘event’ (Geschehen), which rejects the reifying conception of society as a substantive entity, but does not reduce the social to action nor actors either- event has primacy both over subject and substance. The article asserts that the Simmelian event has two main aspects: that of reciprocal causation and inner antagonism. Along with clarifying the event dynamics in accordance with these aspects, the key sociological implications of Simmel's philosophy of life (Lebensphilosophie) are also unfolded: it is claimed that event expresses the deep continuity between the vital and the social in Simmel's thought. In the end, the uses of the notion of the event are elaborated by connecting Simmel's reflections to more recent insightful conceptualizations of the social.