Modal Media

In addition to media of understanding, dissemination, success, and Heider media, a fifth, new type of media can be developed with systems theory. This refers to modal media, which were proposed by Peter Fuchs as a theory building block (Fuchs/Fuchs n.d.: 11), but had not yet been elaborated (Reiter 2014).

Here, "'mode' or 'modality' is no longer understood Kantianly as a form of cognizing consciousness, but as a form in which something reacts to its problem becoming problematic" (Luhmann 1984: 436f.). The development of modal media is therefore oriented towards the questions, which problem of a system becomes problematic and in which way it reacts to it.

Modal media can also be called a second-order media form, since they always refer to something that is already observed as the form of another medium. However, their differentiation performance then does not consist in observing this form in turn as another one, but in a different way, by providing the reference form with an additional shaping. Therefore, it can also be assumed that this type of media does not refer to a primary improbability problem of communication, but to the problems of already available media, which thereby move into the position of first-order media.

The emergence and rapid increase of modalizations and modal media can be assigned temporally to the change from the stratification of the Middle Ages to the functionally differentiated society. The transition "from the idea of a multiplicity of possible worlds, from which God unerringly selected the best, to the idea of a single real world" (Luhmann 1995a: 93ff.) led to internal differentiations (to modalizing determinations) of this one world, in which the world then always remains both the indeterminate and the unity of determinate and indeterminate. General reference problems for modality would thus be problems of observability of world and society, which become problematic with the breaking up of God-givenness and natural boundedness, since doubts about the observability of observations arise.

Modalization provides the uniformity of a form with an additional shaping, so that contingency is added to it through a change in the manner of observation, i.e. through internal differentiation of observation. Only in this way can deviations, which on the one hand increase abruptly in the transition to a functionally differentiated society and on the other hand are also needed, be differentiated into artistic, criminal, individual or pathological and provided with suitable connection options.

In relation to communication media or social systems, modal media thus provide a potential of possibilities that can be accessed communicatively as soon as problems (and problem solutions) of these media or systems themselves become problematic.

If, for example, an organization's communication raises doubts about whether the decidability of decisions is still guaranteed due to deviation amplifications, decisions and decision processes can be observed differently by assigning them one of the additional forms pathological/non-pathological, criminal/non-criminal or illegal/legal. And once such modalization is established, an organization can adjust how it will decide in the future when there is doubt about the decidability of decisions. For only when additional decidability is provided can special conditions of connectivity take effect without delay.

Modality thus makes possible internal differentiations of observation when problems become problematic and the resulting conspicuousness of the uniformity of forms. It is thus not bound to certain systems or media, but (like morals or values) freely floating, available society-wide and in everyday mass use.

However, a special feature always arises when modalization refers not to the uniformity of a form but to the uniformity of a shaping process, for then the emergence of new media becomes observable.

The basic question of shaping is dealt with in the context of systems theory with the theory piece of the Heider media and the distinction form/medium. According to this, forms are created by the loosely coupled, homogeneous elements of a medium being firmly (but only eventfully) coupled into forms. Medium and form are alike in that both are conceived as consisting of homogeneous elements, and they are unlike in terms of the mode of coupling: the mode of loosely coupling the elements denotes the medium, and the mode of fixed coupling denotes the form. Accordingly, forms are ephemeral but perceptible and the medium is permanent but imperceptible - and therefore must be inferred from its forms. Forms and media do not occur independently of each other, so forms are always forms in a medium, which in turn is always only medium in relation to its forms. If, for example, one takes payments as perceptible and firmly coupled (but ephemeral) forms of the economy, loosely coupled prices and quantities of money can be inferred as its elements, and thus also the imperceptible but permanent medium of success, money. Different success media such as money, truth, power or love then make different elements and forms distinguishable.

⇒ Loose Coupling

Modal media are different: they do not refer to the fundamental question of the Malleability of the world, like Heider media, and not to the differences of forms, media and their probabilities of acceptance, like success media. Rather, they observe already developed elements and forms with regard to possibilities of their internal differentiation and in relation to the process of shaping.

In the case of Heider media or success media, that is, when something is observed as something else, the focus is on changing what is observed while maintaining the respective mode of observation. The relation 'observing something as something else' enables the introduction of inequality through external differentiation.

In the case of modal media, on the other hand, this something is observed in a different way, that is, what is observed is kept the same and only the mode of observation is changed. This second relational form 'observing something in a different way' allows for the introduction of inequality through internal differentiation. Seen in this way, modal media are contingency suppliers with which "found structures can be brought into the light of other possibilities of themselves" (Fuchs 1999: 102).

Since every sense-like observation is only possible as observation of a form, elements can also only be observed as forms – but at the same time differ from them. Paradoxically formulated: Elements can only function as forms if they cannot function as forms.

It is important to note that forms cannot unconditionally move into the observation status 'element', but only if they are dependent on coupling. And 'dependent on coupling' should mean that these forms are not self-sufficient, i.e. they cannot determine themselves and cannot "in-form themselves" (Luhmann 1995b: 167), but only become perceptible and observable as a form through fixed coupling.

Examples would be the tones in the music or the calculation units of the money: Prices and money quantities make in each case for itself, no sense. They are self-informative only if they are coupled to forms, i.e. to paid prices (payments). Thus, forms can observationally move into the status of elements only if they are not self-informative and therefore depend on coupling.

Accordingly, elements would be un-forms and that means here: forms which can be grasped conceptually exclusively by negation. The mode of observation 'element' can gain its negativity from a temporal difference, in that it spans a difference between what it no longer is (a past form) and what it is not yet (a future form). 'Element' would then, seen in this way, be the designation of the unity of a form produced by two negations, namely that of not-more-form and not-yet-form.

Modal media provide a way for systems to respond to the problematization of their problems through internal differentiations of the shaping process.

The modal medium of economic depression, for example, observes payments in terms of the frequency and amount of their shaping – as opposed to values expected to be normal. The medium generates a temporal, qualitative and quantitative modalization of the payment event through this additional shaping, so that a persistent undershooting of the threshold values can then be metaphorically described as a depression (or an economic depression). A counterpart to the mode of economic depression would then be, for example, the mode of economic overheating. The metaphor used of deceleration or trough would be indicative of a form catastrophe (Fuchs 2004: 26), namely an expression of uncertainty that the observation of economic activity is not changing, so that it is no longer (or not yet) possible to distinguish whether things are getting worse or whether they are no longer getting worse and can therefore only get better.

Whether such an episode has been a depression or not can therefore always be determined only when it is possible to distinguish between the beginning and the end of the episode and thus to make comparisons with other episodes (Schumpeter 1961: 160, note 17). And this in turn is only possible if the mode of observation has already changed again. Only then does one know it came worse, and therefore the preceding episode cannot be called a depression, but must be called a recession. Or it didn't get any worse, and that's the only reason why, as soon as things get better again, the episode can be called a depression in retrospect.

Each additional shaping of a form leads to the fact that the forms produced thereby on the one hand still point to their 'origin' (to their previous coding) and at the same time point away from it. On the one hand, they forfeit their previous self-informativity as forms of a medium and, on the other hand, they gain the potential and the possibility to appear simultaneously as elements of another medium, namely of the respective modal medium. This coding ambivalence would then be an unavoidable product of modalmedial communication.

Moreover, each modal medium modalizes differently, so that modalizations of the other aspects of Heider's shaping can also occur. If modalization starts, for example, with the uniformity of medial elements, then, with respect to a potential medium 'technology', homogeneous elements can be distinguished from heterogeneous elements, according to Niklas Luhmann: "Technology can, in other words, form functioning networks from quite heterogeneous elements, provided only that strict coupling succeeds" (Luhmann 2000: 370). This additional shaping (homogeneous/heterogeneous) would then also be a strong argument for conceptualizing technology as a modal medium (technization, technisability).

A second mode of modalization of elements is called individuality and the corresponding change of form is called individualization. This modal medium enables reactions when the dissimilarity of dissimilarities increases to such an extent that there is doubt about the distinctness of the dissimilar, since distinctness is only possible when aspects of sameness are available. In the case of individualization, inequality is introduced with the help of sameness and this paradox is unfolded through diversity: "The medium of individuality (of individualizabilities) offers only one sameness - that of Diversity" (Fuchs/Fuchs n.d.: 11).

The modalization of form formation in the case of criminality can be seen in the fact that it tries to prevent form formation and media development through development disturbances, and in this way creates un-events. These consist in the fact that events cannot be assigned and oscillate between not-yet-form and not-more-form. That is, in the case of crime, it cannot be plausibly inferred which forms of which medium might be involved – and this is precisely where these elements are alike.

Modalization appears attractive and can motivate, since its risk seems low at first: It is not what is observed (e.g., deviations) that is changed by being observed as something else, but only a changed view of something that otherwise remains the same. As soon as a modalization takes place, however, it becomes apparent that what is observed differently in this way is still the same on the one hand, but at the same time becomes something else. The change in the mode of observation has also changed the form of what is observed, but without changing it – it has remained both uniform and, through the modal, additional shaping, has been enriched with the potential of a non-uniformity that irritates the process of observation.

In any case, this can lead to the triggering of form catastrophes, which in the case of modalization are based on the fact that an observation is no longer appropriate (because it is uniform) and therefore it can lead to the opening up of new modes of observation and possibly a new modal medium.

And this in turn refers us back to the question posed at the beginning: perhaps modalization offers a solution to the problem of uniformity related to law and power, and then illegality would be an attractive candidate for the modal medium to be tapped.

⇒ Illegality