ABSTRACT
The sociological observer, who shares the social universe by standing behind the counter of an institution, comes face to face with an extremely differentiated population. The model was drawn up by a group of psychologists, psychoanalysts, educationalists and social workers, mandated by the government of the Land of Baden-Wurttemberg, and it claimed to offer systematic and scientifically-based care for the forms of vulnerability. The social heterogeneousness of the population ran counter to the ‘figure of misery’ stereotype that the promoters of this ‘programme’ had in mind. Even though the issue of domination in the social relationship to vulnerability has been raised many times in theoretical approaches and historical analyses of social politics, it has rarely been the object of systematic empirical analyses. The little input that has taken place has mostly been inspired by interactionism or phenomenology, and the notion itself of domination too often remains locked into the idea of methodological individualism.
