From some years now, the social sciences have been highlighting the existence of a type of goods that are neither material things, nor ideas, nor functional performances but consist, instead, of social relations and, for this reason, are called relational goods. This contribution proposes to clarify this concept from the viewpoint of relational sociology, which avoids both methodological individualism and holism. Subsequently, it argues that such goods can be produced only by specific social subjects, which the author calls «relational subjects». Relying upon many theoretical and empirical researches, the paper explains in which sense and in which way relational subjects, and the goods they generate, can contribute to making civil society more robust: that is, no longer the typically capitalist society of the market, but an «as-sociational» society able to sustain a mature democracy.Keywords: relational goods, relational sociology, relational subjects, civil society, civil democracy.
ResumenDesde hace algunos años, las ciencias sociales han resaltado la existencia de un tipo de bienes que no son ni cosas materiales, ni ideas, ni prestaciones funcionales pero que consisten, en cambio, en relaciones sociales. Por esta razón se les llama bienes relacionales. Este texto propone aclarar este concepto desde el punto de vista de la sociología relacional, evitando tanto el individualismo como el holismo metodológico. Posteriormente, se argumenta que tales bienes pueden ser producidos únicamente por sujetos sociales específicos, que el autor denomina como «sujetos relacionales». Apoyándose en numerosas investigaciones teó-ricas y empíricas, el texto explica en qué sentido y de qué manera los sujetos relacionales, y los bienes que generan, pueden contribuir a que la sociedad civil sea más robusta. Entendién-dola no como la sociedad típicamente capitalista de mercado, sino como una sociedad «aso-ciativa» capaz de sostener una democracia madura. 20 recerca, reviSta De PenSaMent i anÀliSi, nÚM. 14. 2014. iSSn: 1130 Palabras clave: bienes relacionales, sociología relacional, sujetos relacionales, sociedad civil, democracia civil
In SEARCH OF 'OTHER GOODS' THAT COnFER SOLIDITy On A RObuST DEmOCRATIC CIvIL SOCIETyFor some years now the social sciences have been highlighting the existence of a type of goods that are neither material things, nor ideas, nor functional performances but consist, instead, of social relations and, for this reason, are called relational goods.This contribution proposes, first of all, to clarify this concept and, subsequently, to show that such goods can be produced only by specific social subjects, which I call «relational subjects». We shall then see in which sense and in which way relational subjects, and the goods they generate, can contribute to making civil society more robust: that is, no longer the typically modern civil society -the bourgeois society of the market-but an «associa-tional» society able to sustain a mature democracy as a welfare society's form of governance.It is important...
