Is there a “defensive reflex” against the new middle class in German sociology? The Berlin cultural sociologist Andreas Reckwitz has now made this accusation in an article in the magazine "Leviathan", which is devoting its current issue to the topic of the "divided society". Reckwitz, for his part, replied to Nils Kumkar and Uwe Schimank's accusation that his diagnosis of a “late modernity” with a society divided into three classes was wrong. More precisely: that Reckwitz's theses do not stand up to empirical testing because the social structure of German society is much more complex than Reckwitz claims.
The attacked reacts in the usual way: Much praise for the statements of the critics, but in essence he has been misunderstood. Reckwitz closes his contribution with the ironic remark that one is used to this from German sociology: that one encounters resistance there if one asserts the existence of a new and culturally dominant middle class. Resistance that had “not just objective reasons”. Reckwitz explicitly excludes his two opponents here, but he assumes that "quite a few others in the guild" would rather be clueless than seriously discuss the existence of a new middle class. But it is not easy to take this defense off, so Reckwitz. The matter is too serious, after all, nothing less is at stake than the ability of sociology to“To understand contemporary society”. And indeed "without blinkers as to how one would like it to be". What Reckwitz actually means here, however, are probably the blinkers in front of it, as one does not want society to be.
Is “Prenzlauer Berg Sociology” indecent?
Reckwitz generally assumes that German sociology lets its empirical interests be guided by its socially critical motives. “In essence, social structure means inequality analysis.” One prefers to look “into the lower levels of society” in order to then complain about this inequality according to one's own standards of social justice. Instead, like him, Reckwitz, to deal with the new middle class of modernization winners and their “supposed self-realization problems” would appear “downright frivolous”. Is “Prenzlauer Berg Sociology” (Reckwitz's ironic self-labeling) indecent as long as migrant children still get poorer grades in German schools? But you have to deal with the winners (anyway), so Reckwitz defiantly,because otherwise one would no longer understand today's society.
But Reckwitz goes even further: the analytical fear of contact with the new middle class is due to a “subliminal political unease” towards these “politically insecure cantonists”. Her relatives no longer conformed to the usual "left-right distinction". In addition, the new middle class is socially influential up to almost "hegemony". You don't really know whether this is a “good or bad hegemony”, so it actually seems obvious to ignore this class for the time being. However, his diagnosis forced sociology to “uncomfortable self-observation”. Because if one does not participate “in one's private life” as a privileged academic “subliminally in those tendencies towards social closure”,which characterized the new middle class? So did Reckwitz catch the German sociologists in their research denouncing the disadvantages of immigrant children in school, but preferring to send their own offspring to the Waldorf school? That is of course "embarrassing", so Reckwitz, which is why it seems to apply to some colleagues: "The new middle class is always the others."
One would rather avoid the question of the cultural dominance of a class to which one belongs, says Reckwitz. Admitting to one of the “globalization winners”, although as a sociologist one prefers to show solidarity with the losers, could lead to “self-embarrassment”.
One could read Reckwitz's cutting criticism of German sociology almost as an invitation to shame others: Society likes to provoke them, but catching themselves enjoying the beautiful and good life in the winners' class quarters leads to secret betrayal of their own scientific principles of neutrality and Value freedom. One thing is clear: the phenomenon of the new middle class is a "controversial field, a mined, politicized area in which much more than just scientific curiosity and the search for truth" are being negotiated.