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, globalized world in mind. The notions civilization, 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 reflexion 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.

Oliver Kozlarek (Dr. phil., Dr. en Humanidades) teaches Political and Social Philosophy and Social Theory at the Universidad Michoacana de San Nicolás de Hidalgo in Mexico. Jörn Rüsen (Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult.) was Historian at the Universities Berlin (FU), Bochum, Bielefeld and Witten/Herdecke. Lastly he was Visiting Chair Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences, National Taiwan University. Ernst Wolff (Prof. Dr.) teaches philosophy at the University of Pretoria (South Africa) and is Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities at Essen (Germany). His research covers hermeneutics, social and political philosophy and the philosophy of technology.