LUHMANN, Niklas, 2000. Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens. In: LUHMANN, Niklas, Organisation und Entscheidung. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. S. 123–151. ISBN 978-3-322-97094-7. doi 
* Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens I. * Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens II. * Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens III. * Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens IV. * Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens V. * Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens VI. * Die Paradoxie des Entscheidens VII.
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If one limits oneself to the concept of decision, the definition of a decision as a Choice does not lead any further. It remains stuck in a tautology. This definition is then supplemented by the information that the choice must be based on an Alternative. This reduces the complexity of the world to a few possible variants, but does not provide an answer to the initially interesting question of what a choice is, but only shifts the problem to the question of what the alternative nature of the alternative consists of and what it may mean for the future if one believes to find an alternative as a result of the past; and an answer to these questions in turn presupposes the concept of choice (or: decision).
Above all, we are now faced with the question of which possibilities are included in the alternative and which are excluded from it. Is this question, as one might assume, predetermined by the logical or cosmo-Iogical order of the world, or must we presuppose an observer who decides it? And if so, is the exclusion of other possibilities part of the logical structure of the alternative? In other words, must exclusion be included? And looking back historically: was this perhaps the reason why Kant only wanted to speak of freedom on the condition that it was handled rationally?
So we are going round in circles. An alternative exists when one decision option is confronted with one or more others under the condition that only one of them can be realized: The choice of one forces us to forego the others. It therefore requires careful consideration and may be subject to reproach or subsequent remorse. An examination of the use of language reveals that it remains characteristically ambivalent. Sometimes the majority of possibilities are referred to as alternatives, sometimes only one version at a time from the set of possibilities that cannot be realized simultaneously; and it often remains unclear which of these two mutually exclusive meanings is meant. This ambivalence in the use of language seems to be an indicator that we are dealing with a paradox that cannot be admitted, but must be concealed, because at the same time (again: at the same time!) the decision requires careful consideration, if not rationality.
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Above all, however, the relationship between the decision and the alternative needs to be clarified. The alternative does not decide itself. Not even dialectical theories, which were based on "opposites", would have claimed that the opposites cancel themselves out. A further factor was needed – called concept or spirit or revolution. But if a decision (or even a decision-maker capable of acting) is needed in order to choose one of the alternatively connected possibilities: what is this decision, who is this decision-maker?
In order to move forward, we propose an abstracting conceptualization. We replace the concept of action as the ultimate concept with the concept of observation. An observation always exists when a distinction is made in order to designate one (but not the other) side of the distinction.
This version of the term does not originate from psychology, but from cybernetics. However, it can also be interpreted psychologically. For the general term see, for example, Heinz von Foerster, Observing Systems, Seaside Cal. 1981; Niklas Luhmann et a1., Beobachter: Konvergenz der Erkenntnistheorien?, Munich 1990; Niklas Luhmann, Die Wissenschaft der Gesellschaft, Frankfurt 1990, p. 68 ff. Vg1. also Francesco Pardi, L'osservabilita dell'agire sociale, Milano 1985, with reference to the earlier literature.
According to this, every mental experience that has to focus its perception and thinking is an observation. But also every action that wants to achieve something specific (and nothing else), and finally every communication that picks out information in order to communicate it. The concept is more elementary than concepts such as thing, event, symbol, action, decision, all of which always presuppose distinctions, whereas observation denotes the signifying distinction itself, i.e. also includes itself in its own conceptual scope. The concept must be correspondingly abstract in order to be able to cover various forms of materialization of the operation of observation, and this has the advantage that it can concentrate on a specific problem, namely the question: How is it even possible to designate something specific while disregarding everything else? And how does one get from there to a certain distinction, such as is needed when making a decision: this and not that? And: this alternative and no other?
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