Equality and the Meaning Structure of the Social World

Abstract

The subject of the present paper is the theoretical analysis of various aspects of the notion of equality in the common-sense thinking of concrete social groups. The general idea of equality in the philosophical or religious sense is not within the scope of our investigation, and therefore is intentionally omitted. It is sufficient for our purpose to acknowledge that all common-sense aspects of equality are merely secularizations of more or less clearly conceived ethical or religious principles which are just taken for granted beyond question. Consequently, no attempt has been made at referring the common-sense notion of equality to the idea of the dignity of man, to the relation of the soul to God, or to the Right of Nature.