Kozelek’s History of Concepts helps us gain a deeper understanding of contemporary political and social phenomena by analyzing how concepts like ‘freedom’, ‘democracy’, and ‘peace’ transform and are used across different eras and contexts, through an examination of past and present conceptual understandings.
When people use concepts like ‘freedom’, ‘democracy’, and ‘peace’, these concepts do not necessarily carry the same meaning. For instance, ‘freedom’ can be used as a concept emphasizing ‘a state of being unconstrained’, or it can be used as a concept emphasizing ‘voluntariness’ or ‘active participation’. These differences in definition and interpretation have consistently led to debates and controversies surrounding concepts. It is precisely this phenomenon that prompted the emergence of Koselleck’s ‘conceptual history’.
German historian Koselleck, who developed conceptual history as a branch of historiography, stated that ‘concepts are both indicators and elements of reality’. This statement serves as a crucial guideline for untangling the complex relationship between concepts and socio-political reality, as well as between concepts and historical reality. According to him, concepts are mirrors reflecting realities such as political events or social changes. Simultaneously, concepts are actual elements of socio-political events and changes. For example, through the concept of ‘modernization,’ we can interpret social change in a specific direction. Simultaneously, the concept of ‘modernization’ functions as a driving force that motivates people to transform society according to the goals of this specific social change.
Kozelek’s conceptual history focuses on exploring the interaction between historical reality and concepts. Concepts go beyond mere word meanings; they reveal how they transform and are used within the political, social, and cultural contexts of their time. For example, the concept of ‘revolution’ does not simply signify radical change; it has been employed for diverse political and social purposes across specific eras and situations, with its meaning expanding and evolving. Understanding this process of change plays a crucial role in gaining deeper insight into the concepts we use today.
Concepts are used by various agents who are directly involved in political events and social changes, or who record and interpret them. The concepts employed by these subjects—the ‘historical actors’—form layers where multiple meanings overlap. Conceptual history explores how these concepts have been used in relation to socio-historical realities, examining how their meanings have shifted during this process, what implications were projected onto them, and how they functioned.
Moreover, conceptual history focuses less on ‘what is being said’ and more on ‘what concepts are being used to say it’. It illuminates the difference between the concepts past historical actors employed to describe their experienced ‘present’ and the concepts used today to understand historical narratives of the ‘past’. It then follows a procedure to clarify how the two can converge while translating past history into present history.
As seen above, conceptual history contrasts concepts with reality and past concepts with present ones to explore whether a concept accurately reveals the reality it corresponds to, or whether it hinders understanding of reality and even distorts it. Through this, Koselleck critiques the modern historical method that claims a ‘single correct description’ of the past, aiming to meaningfully communicate the historical reality constructed by past historical actors with the historical reality created by present historians.
Koselleck’s conceptual history can be applied across various fields. In disciplines such as literature, political science, and sociology, the methodology of conceptual history can be used to understand the social and political contexts of an era and to reexamine contemporary meanings through the evolution of concepts. This goes beyond merely recording historical facts, contributing to the analysis and understanding of how historical concepts influence modern society. Therefore, conceptual history is not merely a tool for understanding the past; it can be an important key to understanding the present and the future.
