ABSTRACT
The urban evidence does suggest a change in social norms around 1500. They become more conscious and tangible and can be expressed in theoretical form while being deliberately applied in conflict situations. The examination of norms, and of the experience which rendered them valid in the context of the functions of social control, raises the question whether there were other institutions in which the norms were ingrained. To this the interaction model endeavours to give a partial answer: the activities of the urban community were continuously related to norms. The model of the urban community based on harmony and consensus – however much the cities of the Holy Roman empire could present themselves in this fashion – covers and obscures tensions and conflicts which were a constitutive element of urban social action, as well as of the development of norms.
