Culture and Power: Possibilities and Responsibilities for the World-Society

From Znaniecki’s point of view, and alluding to present-day conclusions about the so-called reflexivity of modernity, one would have to say that it is a problematic reflexivity, as long as knowledge about the principles of cultural becoming will be minimal. Znaniecki did not deny the justification of sociological studies that start out from naturalist premises. However, he rightly believed that the dependence of cultural order on natural order is not only shrinking, but the reverse is in fact happening-there is an increasing influence of cultural order on natural order, and the rising complexity of cultural phenomena renders the naturalist approach scientifically less productive. The development of sociology as a cultural science led, according to Znaniecki, to displaying the possibility of a world-society as a society founded on culture, while the development of cultural sciences would be an expression of global responsibility for the world-culture society.