The Society of Individuals and Figurations

Abstract

Norbert Elias’s book, The Society of Individuals, constantly revisits a problem he characterizes as a difficult to bridge gap in Western thinking which has opened up between the individual and society (Elias 1991b: 3–20). There are two opposing groups of opinion: one claims that “Everything depends on the individual”; the other believes that “Everything depends on society.” The former argue that there are always particular individuals who decide what will and will not be done. The latter argue that what individuals do is always socially conditioned.