Page 124 - Communication and the Evolution of Society

Iox The Development of Normative Structures

ment is so intimate that we cannot meaningfully speak of a de-
marcation of subjectivity in the strict sense.
b. In the next segment of life, which corresponds with Piaget’s
sensory-motor and preoperative phases of development, the child
succeeds in differentiating between self and environment. It
learns to perceive permanent objects in its environment, but with-
out yet clearly differentiating the environment into physical and
social domains. Moreover, the demarcation [of the self} in rela-
tion to the environment is not yet objective. This can be seen
in manifestations of cognitive and moral egocentrism. The child
cannot perceive, understand, and judge situations independently
of its own standpoint—it thinks and acts from a body-bound
perspective.
c. With the onset of the stage of concrete operations the child
takes the decisive step toward constructing a system of demarca-
tions; it now differentiates between perceptible and manipulable
things and events, on the one hand, and understandable action-
subjects and their utterances, on the other; and it no longer
confuses linguistic signs with the reference and meaning of
symbols. In becoming aware of the perspectival character of its
own standpoint, it learns to demarcate its subjectivity in relation
to external nature and society. With the seventh year, more or
less, pseudo-lying ceases—an indication that distinctions are made
between fantasies and perceptions, impulses and obligations. At
the close of this phase, cognitive development has led to an ob-
jectivation of external nature, linguistic-communicative develop-
ment to the mastery of a system of speech acts, and interactive
development to the complementary connection of generalized
expectations of behavior.
d. Only with adolescence can the youth succeed in progres-
sively freeing himself from the dogmatism of the preceding phase
of development. With the ability to think hypothetically and to
conduct discourses, the system of ego-demarcations becomes te-
flective. Until then the epistemic ego, bound to concrete opera-
tions, confronted an objectivated nature; and the practical ego,
immersed in group perspectives, was dissolved in quasi-natural
systems of norms. But when the youth no longer naively accepts
the validity claims contained in assertions and norms, he can