"Reflection as a Social System" (1976) - Resolving the Habermas-Luhmann Controversy
This text is a preview of History of the Reception of Hegel, volume II, to be published in 2026 by Reflexivity Press.
The Problem: Action or System?
In the early 1970s, German social philosophy faced a seemingly insurmountable opposition. On one side, action theory, which took as its starting point the individual subject and its communicative rationality—prominently represented by Jürgen Habermas. On the other side, systems theory, which described society as a functional system whose operations become detached from individual intentions—developed by Niklas Luhmann.
The famous controversy between the two, documented in the volume “Theorie der Gesellschaft oder Sozialtechnologie” (Theory of Society or Social Technology, 1971), seemed to pit two incompatible paradigms against each other. Habermas argued: society is essentially communication between subjects. Sociology must proceed from action—from meaningfully oriented actors who reach understanding, dispute, cooperate. Systems theory misses the essential point: the normative dimension, the question of legitimacy, the participant’s perspective.
Luhmann countered: society is a system—a self-referential order that reproduces itself. The participant’s perspective is only one among many; the observer sees more. Action is a mode of attribution, not a basic category. Normativity is a system function, not a metaphysical distinction.
The debate ended without a victor. Habermas could show that Luhmann’s systems theory underexposes the normative dimension. Luhmann could show that Habermas’ action theory underestimates the complexity of modern societies. Both were right—and both were one-sided.
The Solution That Already Existed
Here lies the historical irony announced in the framing above: five years before Habermas published his major work, Heinrichs had already solved the problem.
Heinrichs recognized that the opposition between Habermas and Luhmann rested on a shared error: an inadequate determination of the concept of reflection. Neither Habermas nor Luhmann had systematically thought through the constitutive role of reflection for social systems. Habermas remained stuck in a subject-philosophical concept of reflection—the subject reflects, society is the result. Luhmann eliminated the subject in favor of a “subject-free” systems theory—the system operates, the subject is merely environment.
The central thesis of “Reflection as a Social System” (1976) overcomes this false alternative: personal and social systems are equally original and mutually imply one another through reflection. There is no priority of the individual over society (methodological individualism) and no priority of society over the individual (sociological holism). Both arise through the same reflexive process.[1]
What does this mean concretely? A subject constitutes itself as an I by distinguishing itself from others. But these others are themselves subjects who in turn possess I-consciousness. The constitution of the individual I is thus always already socially mediated. Conversely, a social system can only exist if its participants mutually recognize one another as subjects.
While Habermas externalized the system as the “enemy” of the lifeworld (the famous “colonization thesis”) and Luhmann banished the subject from the system (“subject-free communication”), Heinrichs integrates both: systems are institutionalized reflection, actions are enactments of reflection—both sides mutually imply one another through the same reflection-logical process. This was precisely the “mediated transformation” that Hegel had conceived, but which neither Habermas nor Luhmann managed to think through.
This equal originality is not a formula of compromise but the reflection-logical structure of the matter itself. Individual and society are two moments of a single process—the reflexive constitution of community and meaning.
The Fourfold Structure of Society
From the four stages of reflection in social action, Heinrichs develops a systematic fourfold structuring of society that goes far beyond Parsons’ unfounded AGIL scheme:
First level: Goods-related action (economy). The other appears primarily as my object—as someone with whom I produce, exchange, consume goods. This level corresponds to the first stage of reflection: object-related action under social conditions.
Second level: Strategic action (politics). The other appears as an autonomous agent of action—as someone with his own interests, who exercises power, and whom I must encounter strategically. This level corresponds to the second stage of reflection: the interplay of acting subjects.
Third level: Communicative action (culture). The other appears as a communicative partner—as someone with whom I reach understanding, share values, enact cultural practices. This level corresponds to the third stage of reflection: double reciprocity, mutual recognition.
Fourth level: Metacommunication (basic values/law). We thematize the conditions of our communication itself—the fundamental norms, rights, principles of legitimation that regulate all the other levels. This level corresponds to the fourth stage of reflection: reflection on reflection.
This fourfold structure is not arbitrarily posited (as in Parsons) but is derived through the logic of reflection. Each level presupposes the previous one and adds a new reflexive quality. The fourth level closes the circle by reflecting on the conditions of possibility of all the other levels.
The Practical Consequence: The Fourfold Structure of Democracy
Perhaps the most significant practical consequence of Heinrichs’ theory is his proposal for a “fourfold structuring of democracy.” Contemporary parliamentary democracy mixes all four levels of society together in a single institution (parliament). The result is systematic confusion: economic interests dominate political decisions, cultural questions are decided by calculations of power, conflicts over basic values are treated as mere conflicts of interest.
Heinrichs’ alternative: four specialized parliaments for the four levels of society—an economic parliament, a political parliament, a cultural parliament, and a parliament of basic values. Each parliament has its own rationality, its own basis of legitimation, its own composition. Integration occurs through systematic coordination, not through mixture.
This proposal may seem utopian—but it follows consistently from the analysis based on the logic of reflection. If society is in fact structured fourfold, then its democratic self-governance must also be structured fourfold. The crisis of contemporary democracy—lobbying, political disaffection, erosion of basic values—results precisely from the fact that this structural differentiation has not been institutionalized.[2]
The thesis of the equal originality of personal and social systems is the core thesis of “Reflection as a Social System.” It stands in deliberate opposition both to Habermas’ subject-philosophical approach and to Luhmann’s “subject-free” systems theory. ↩︎
The basic outlines of the fourfold structuring of democracy are already laid out in “Reflection as a Social System” (1976). The detailed presentation in “Revolution der Demokratie. Eine Realutopie” (Revolution of Democracy: A Real Utopia, 2003) belongs to Heinrichs’ later work (-> Volume III). ↩︎