Society's Educational System

In the spring of 2002, probably the last large manuscript of Niklas Luhmann, the German sociologist, who died in 1998 at the age of 70, was published. The manuscript is an almost completely developed analysis of the educational system of contemporary society. The book is entitled Das Erziehungssystem der Gesellschaft. Despite the fact that the work is one of many analyses of the differentiated functional systems of contemporary society, it is not only one book in a series, but is also based on Luhmann’s lifelong interest in educational questions, which, among others, is expressed in a series of books published in 1982, 1986, 1990, 1992 and 1996, which he edited together with Karl Eberhard Schorr: Zwischen Technologie und Selbstreferenz, Zwischen Intransparenz und Verstehen, Zwischen Anfang und Ende, Zwischen Absicht und Person and Zwischen System und Umwelt. In addition, in 1997, he published a book with Dieter Lenzen entitled Bildung und Weiterbildung im Erziehungssystem. In this article, Das Erziehungssystem der Gesellschaft is introduced; it is put into the context of Luhmann’s total oeuvre; and it is related to the situation and function of education in our modern, “hypercomplex“ society.