Shaping a humane world : civilizations - axial times - modernities - humanisms / Oliver Kozlarek, Jörn Rüsen, Ernst Wolff (eds.)

The generation of meaning is the primary precondition for acting and thinking. The essays in this volume contribute to a discourse on this matter with a decentred, globalised world in mind. The notions civilisation, humanism and modernity -- far from being exclusively Western ideas -- may facilitate joint efforts of reflecting on the universality of current human conditions, particularly since such reflection is possible from particular cultural perspectives. Modernity presents us with a second Axial Time in which the quest for a plural, but shared, humane world is the challenge.