Space: With reference to previous research on the still ongoing "spatial turn", society in lockdown leads to an expansion and re-perspectivisation of the widely shared assumption of socially constructed space. In recent years, a reconquest of the public, increasingly strongly privatised space could be observed in favour of the establishment of new political spaces (see above, for example on the Arab Spring, Fridays for Future, etc.), which can also be understood as appropriation. With the help of initially locally perceptible communication, often organised at group level, places become legible as specific spaces. Currently, familiar procedures of betexting are observable (notices, semiotic barriers, etc.) in order to reorganise help, solidarity and social conventions (e.g. of physical distance). At the same time, this takes place under conditions of non-locally divisible spaces, as applicable contact restrictions prevent these social spaces from being jointly generated: What becomes interesting is how which spaces are currently generated locally, with the help of which forms of communication? Are old social spaces becoming newly legible?
Under the conditions of a society in lockdown, can we nevertheless and paradoxically speak of a revitalisation of public space, although physical co-presence must be prevented?
What is the relationship between digitally and analogue generated "spaces" of sociality? Due to increasing convergence phenomena (integration of virtual and digital spaces into analogue everyday life), do dichotomies still in use (e.g. analogue vs. digital) have to be replaced, expanded or do they confirm their relevance?
How can this be captured and described analytically?
Freedom: In the course of the fight against Corona, not only fundamental rights have been restricted or are to be further restricted through the application of the Infection Protection Act: Freedoms of economic development, freedoms of movement and assembly, etc. At the same time, the idea of a quasi borderless, mobile, global world has been torn down in a very short period of time: instead, borders are being closed, citizens are being recalled, non-citizens are no longer allowed to enter the country, and so on. These developments have so far taken place without any significant questioning and in the name of reason and the protection of the population (and this despite the fact that the images of the future of less market and more state that are now being called up come very close to the idea of renationalisation - of basic services, for example - which was fiercely fought against until recently; see also Social Differentiation).
How is the tension between freedom and security negotiated? Can the idea of reasonable vs. unreasonable people, between new normality and deviation, hold? What dynamics of the negotiation of freedom and security can be observed?