The Fourth
Witten Conference on Institutional Change was organized
at Witten/Herdecke University in Germany during 1–2 February 2018. I got an
invitation to contribute on contemporary recognition theory from Professor Matthias Kettner, who was also mainly
responsible for organizing the event. From a recognition-theoretical perspective,
the theme of institutional pathologies is indeed highly relevant, and the
discussions during the conference were very interesting, useful, and intellectually
stimulating. They also fit perfectly with the idea of recognition theory as “an
interdisciplinary social theory with emancipatory intent” as Christopher F. Zurn has put it in his
2015 book on Honneth.
 |
| Professor Matthias Kettner |
The turn of the month was thus a very busy and highly rewarding
experience. Before the main program started, there was a pre-conference
get-together at the restaurant Ratskeller
on the 31st of January. This was already a great opportunity to meet
and talk with many of the participants. Next morning, the conference kicked off
with a plenary panel “On the Very Idea of a Socio-Cultural Pathology” chaired
by Professor Dirk Sauerland.
Matthias Kettner and Kerrin Jacobs
opened the session with their talks, after which Nadia von Jacobi, Rasmus
Johnsen and myself joined the panel with our own comments and discussion.
After the panel and a coffee break, I got to chair one of the parallel
sessions. Its topic was “Disorders of Moral Responsibility and Awareness”, and
the contributors were Uta Müller, Mica Valdivia, and Jacob Dahl Rendtorff. These speakers gave considered talks on the
complex issues of institutional responsibility and moral blindness. In the
evening, I presented my invited lecture on “Social Recognition and
Institutional Pathologies: The Case of Religious Identities”, and continued
with questions and comments. To conclude the day, the participants then gathered
for the conference dinner at Restaurant Mondo.
On Friday, I had the opportunity to concentrate on listening to talks by
others and participating in discussions. The day was opened by Hartmut Rosa’s invited lecture
“Pathological Potentials of Dynamic Societal Stabilization”. The programme
continued with parallel sessions, and I attended a round table session on
“Institutional Transfers and Social Pathologies”. The discussion by Joachim Zweynert (Chair), Elsje Fourie, Robbert Maseland, and Valentin
Seidler resonated strongly with the Honnethian theme of a formal conception of the good life,
which tries to abstract from any substantive cultural values. During the lunch
break, a meeting chaired by Professor Kettner was held on forming a research
network of interested people around the themes of the conference. The third
invited lecture of the conference was then given by Rasmus Johnsen, whose topic was “Chronopathic Feelings: Time
Pressure and the Pathologies of Contemporary Work-Life”. After the talk,
Kettner and Sauerland presented a recapitulation and farewell for the
conference.
 |
| Registration at the conference |
On Saturday, I then proceeded to give an intensive four-hour seminar on
contemporary recognition theory. In addition to Professors Kettner and Dirk Tänzler, the audience consisted
mainly of students of Witten/Herdecke University’s Master Programme on
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE). It was truly a pleasure to lecture
on my favourite topic, and to have such enlightening discussions with both
faculty and students. On Sunday, it was time to return home with fond memories
of the conference as well as of all the persons encountered in
Witten.
