ABSTRACT
The question of the historically changing relation of individual selves, social identities and societal configurations accompanied the preceding account of the history of organized modernity-its emergence, temporary consolidation and crisis. This question may now be faced in somewhat more explicit-though hardly conclusive-terms than was possible throughout the analysis. The two major approaches to this question during organized modernity itself have been, first, the mainstream sociological debate on social roles and, second, the view of the fate of the individual in theories of mass society.
