ABSTRACT
Modern social thought was born based on a specific reflection as to the antithesis between freedom (lib) and social order (lab), as polarities irreducible to one another within which social life unfolds. The transition from modern to aftermodern society is driven by the need to overcome the dilemma freedom/control distinction to go towards a post-lib and post-lab society. We must seek a sociological approach which may allow us to see the new, historically unique aspects of social formations that are taking place before us more clearly. The dance where lib and lab shake hands is still the prevailing arrangement in many countries. In the meantime, however, its limits have become apparent. We are gradually realising that it prevents the observer from seeing beyond the horizon where other possibilities have their place. Indeed, many possibilities are not at all thematised or discussed, and many of those that are considered probable in the end prove more virtual than real. In brief, today one realises that the lib/lab approach does not see the morphogenesis of the dialectic between freedom and control that escape modern logic.
