Precarious Recognition. The "Third Sex" from the perspective of Christian Social Ethics

我们项目的起点是2017年10月德国宪法法院（1 BvR 2019/16）关于引入“第三性”的决定，该决定要求对公民身份法进行修改。该项目从基督教社会伦理和哲学的角度，关注这些法律变化的社会影响。它在两个主要问题下分析了正在进行的政治和社会辩论：哪些新的社会冲突是由承认产生的，神学伦理如何有助于有效地参与这些冲突？作为一个批判性反思的论坛，社会伦理将特别关注天主教会，因为教会是一个社会行动者，参与了围绕“第三性”的认可斗争。立法程序于2018年12月产生了第一批结果，它不是（成功或失败）承认的终点，而是对正在进行的和新引发的社会进程进行必要反思的起点。强制性的（到目前为止，法律上有效的）变化是更大发展的一部分，包括为同性伴侣创造民事伴侣关系，同性伴侣的婚姻平等，宪法法院对变性人法（TSG）的决定，以及2013年第一次犹豫不决的民事地位法改革。一般来说，这一发展涉及对性/性别、身份、性行为、伙伴关系和家庭等类别的法律处理的灵活性和自由化。上述法律变化提出了新的问题，这些问题无法从法律制度内部得到回答，这些问题也涉及天主教会作为社会行动者的自我概念。在这种背景下，我们想问天主教会如何在其自身的道德和形而上学传统框架内参与这些变化，这是基于对性/性别的二元和互补理解，以及它如何为正在进行的社会认可过程提供建设性的贡献。一个特别的焦点将放在如何在教会内部进行这些承认冲突的问题上。这些冲突是在巴特勒承认理论的基础上进行分析的，他的理论使我们能够将承认概念化为一个开放式的过程，没有成功承认的固定目标。关于性和社会性别概念的世界观的潜在差异将通过Ludwik Fleck的思维方式分析来检验。

The starting point of our project was the October 2017 decision of the German Constitutional Court (1 BvR 2019/16) regarding the introduction of a “third sex”, which mandated changes to the civil status law. From the perspective of Christian social ethics and philosophy, the project focuses on the social effects of these legal changes. It analyzes the ongoing political and social debate under two leading questions: Which new social conflicts are produced by recognition, and how can theological ethics contribute to a productive engagement with these conflicts? As a forum of critical reflection, social ethics will focus in particular on the Catholic Church, insofar as the church is a social actor involved in the struggles for recognition surrounding the “third sex”. The legislative process, which produced first results in December 2018, does not mark not the end point of (successful or failed) recognition, but the starting point for necessary reflection on ongoing and newly triggered social processes.The mandated (and by now, legally valid) changes are part of a larger development, which includes the creation of civil partnerships for same-sex couples, marriage equality for same-sex couples, the Constitutional Court’s decisions on the Law on Transsexuals (TSG) and the first, hesitant reform of civil status law in 2013. This development concerns, generally speaking, a flexibilization and liberalization of the legal treatment of categories liked sex/gender, identity, sexuality, partnership, and family.The aforementioned legal changes raise new questions, which cannot be answered from within the legal system – and these also concern the self-conception of the Catholic Church as a social actor. In this context, we want to ask how the Catholic Church can engage with these changes from within the framework of its own ethical and metaphysical tradition, which is grounded in a binary and complementary understanding of sex/gender, and how it might offer constructive contributions to the ongoing process of social recognition. A particular focus will be on the question how these conflicts of recognition are carried out within the church. These conflicts are analyzed on the basis of Judith Butler’s work on theories of recognition, which allows us to conceptualize recognition as an open-ended process without a fixed telos of successful recognition. The underlying differences in world-views concerning the concepts of sex and gender will be examined with Ludwik Fleck’s thought-style analysis.