ABSTRACT
Contemporary sociological theory, like contemporary politics, is marked by the somewhat paradoxical conviction that progressivism is out of date. Social change cannot be denied as a reality, but its coherent, cumulative, developmental character is frequently called into doubt. No cause, moreover, can plausibly justify itself today simply by claiming to be “in the line of social development.” The paradox involved in social or political analyses which conclude, in effect, that it is no longer progressive to be progressive points to a needless confusion. First, then, it is perfectly possible and often valuable to retain an analytical concept of social progress in order to maintain critical contact with the sophisticated tradition of social theory that emphasizes the importance of irreversible experiential learning in the development of vital congeries of social relations over time (Luhmann 1981, 1984). This conception need not assume that all social phenomena can be referred to as social progress or that disruptions and radical discontinuities cannot occur, because it need not imply that social progress is the only subject matter for social theory. And it certainly does not commit the analyst to a normative progressivism, the second context in which progress is a key term. The abandonment of progress as a criterion for evaluating social achievements and projects does not, however, imply the rejection of everything done earlier and justified in the name of progress, but only their reanalysis and reassessment. Because political life does not necessarily benefit from nominalist clean sweeps, it may even be justifiable to continue referring to such achievements and projects as “progressive,” so long as it is made unmistakably clear that the progress here intended is a project, political in the broad sense, and not a process in the sense of the analytical concept. 1
