The main purpose of this paper is to examine the concept of critique in Habermasian thought. Given that the concept of critique is a central theoretical category in the work of the Frankfurt School, it comes as a surprise that little in the way of a systematic account which sheds light on the multifaceted meanings of the concept of critique in Habermas's oeuvre can be found in the literature. This paper aims to fill this gap by exploring the various meanings (...) that Habermas attributes to the concept of critique in 10 key thematic areas of his writings: (1) the public sphere, (2) knowledge, (3) language, (4) morality, (5) ethics, (6) evolution, (7) legitimation, (8) democracy, (9) religion, and (10) modernity. On the basis of a detailed analysis of Habermas's multifaceted concerns with the nature and function of critique, the study seeks to demonstrate that the concept of critique can be considered not only as a constitutive element but also as a normative cornerstone of Habermasian thought. The paper draws to a close by reflecting on some of the limitations of Habermas's conception of critique, arguing that in order to be truly critical in the Habermasian sense we need to turn the subject of critique into an object of critique. (shrink)

Traditional Africans' belief in and veneration of ancestors is an almost ubiquitous, long-held and widely known, for it is deeply entrenched in the African metaphysical worldview itself. This belief in and veneration of ancestors is characterised by strong moral undertone. This moral undertone involves an implicit indication that individual members of communities must live exemplary lives in accordance with the ethos of the community. Living according to the ethos is among the conditions for attaining the prestige of being elevated to (...) an ancestor after one's death. The aim of this paper is to gain an understanding of the metaphysical and moral demands connected to ancestor veneration. With this understanding, the paper suggests values that can promote a better way for humans to coexist, and indicates a moral sense of the responsibility people should hold towards each other. The paper's focal aim is to expose what it considers to be the moral undertones or features associated with a belief in and veneration of ancestors, mainly from traditional Akan perspectives. The paper also considers how principles and values of Akan communitarianism can be espoused to promote human well-being. It is the position of the paper that the metaphysical and, especially, the moral underpinning of ancestor veneration in the traditional Akan society, can provide values that can serve as catalysts for the furtherance of human well-being. (shrink)

This article discusses how to deal with the relations between different cultural perspectives in classrooms, based on a proposal for considering understanding and knowledge as goals of science education, inspired by Dewey’s naturalistic humanism. It thus combines educational and philosophical interests. In educational terms, our concerns relate to how science teachers position themselves in multicultural classrooms. In philosophical terms, we are interested in discussing the relations between belief, understanding, and knowledge under the light of Dewey’s philosophy. We present a synthesis (...) of Dewey’s theory of inquiry through his naturalistic humanism and discuss its implications for the concepts of belief, understanding, and knowledge, as well as for the goals of science teaching. In particular, we highlight problems arising in the context of possible conflicts between scientific and religious claims in the school environment that result from totalitarian positions. We characterize an individual’s position as totalitarian if he or she takes some way of thinking as the only one capable of expressing the truth about all that exists in the world, lacks open-mindedness to understand different interpretative perspectives, and attempts to impose her or his interpretation about the facts to others by violent means or not. From this stance, any other perspective is taken to be false a priori and, accordingly, as a putative target to be suppressed or adapted to the privileged way of thinking. We argue, instead, for a more fallibilist evaluation of our own beliefs and a more respectful appraisal of the diversity of students’ beliefs by both students and teachers. (shrink)

In this essay I argue that the notion of religious transcendence was a latecomer in human evolution. It did not appear before the Axial Age, and in its extreme form as a realm of ultimate meanings beyond human reach it had only a locally and temporally bounded existence. Once it appeared, however, the idea of religious transcendence set an evolutionary dynamic in motion, which soon led to various forms of “immanent transcendence,” starting from the “Papal Revolution” and continuing with the (...) Reformation, the Enlightenment, the Kantian notion of the transcendental and its Hegelian and Habermasian modifications. In my conclusion I briefly discuss two alternative versions of modern immanent transcendence—cognitive and exemplary—and their consequences for political philosophy. (shrink)

What role does religious transcendence play in liberal democracies? In Jürgen Habermas’s early political theory of the bourgeois public sphere, religion was downplayed if not dismissed completely. In the past several years however, he has developed a greater interest in religion. Habermas seems to like the positive solidarity-forming effects religion can have on communities that mediate in a public sphere between private individuals and state authority. However, in light of continuing terrorist activity, he is deeply critical of any sort of (...) other worldly transcendence that is too open to violent cooption. Nonetheless, Habermas relates his renewal of a critically engaged public sphere of debate to universalized rational procedures which he discusses in light of a philosophical notion of “detranscendentalization.” However, if it is the case that the solidarity of communities is being eroded by the influences of mass media and free market globalization as Habermas claims, then a further reflection on the way religious communities form around shared transcendent beliefs is required. Are his detranscendentalized rational procedures of critical debate adequate in inspiring the critical power communities need to solidify themselves against state authority? It is in light of this questions that I will develop the thought of Karl Barth. (shrink)

An in-depth look at the theory of solidarity of German philosopher Jürgen Habermas, serving also as a comprehensive introduction to his work.

This article addresses the debate between Jürgen Habermas and Charles Taylor on the implications of state secularism for the public use of reason. Recent commentators have traced this debate either to Habermas’s and Taylor’s divergent views about the status of Western modernity or to their disagreement about the relation between the good and the right. I argue that these readings rest on misinterpretations of Habermas’s theory of social evolution and understanding of impartial justification. I show that the debate rests on (...) diverging interpretations of what it means for citizens to embed the principles of liberal democracy in their respective conceptions of the good. This difference in turn leads Habermas and Taylor to espouse different criteria of democratic legitimacy. I conclude by suggesting that we have prima facie reasons to prefer Habermas’s conception of legitimacy to Taylor’s, and to that extent, to favor his model of the public use of reason. (shrink)

The article considers the role of translation in encounters between religious citizens and secular citizens. It follows Habermas in holding that translations rearticulate religious contents in a way that facilitates learning. Since he underplays the complexities of translation, it takes some steps beyond Habermas towards developing a more adequate account. Its main thesis is that the required account of translation must keep sight of the question of truth. Focusing on inspirational stories of exemplary figures and acts, it contends that a (...) successful translation makes truth appear anew; further, that it is the central role of truth in translation that enables the prospect of learning from the inspirational messages of religion. By highlighting truth as the point of continuity between intercultural learning and learning from religion, it provides support for the thesis that encounters between religious and secular citizens are a subset of intercultural encounters and, as such, contexts of possible mutual learning. (shrink)

As a political thinker nurtured in early 20th-century German, Hannah Arendt is most often identified with the Greek philosophical tradition. This article argues that the crisis in reality that threw her into politics also, though unacknowledgedly, threw her into ‘Jewish modes of thinking’ as an alternative source where she found the Greek tradition lacking. This claim is controversial, given Arendt’s vehement criticisms of any recourse to the absolute, or metaphysical truths in the realm of politics. Nevertheless, and consistent with a (...) number of early 20th-century Jewish thinkers (Rosenzweig, Levinas, Buber, Shestov) who explicitly identified the Hebrew God not as the metaphysical but as the condition of possibility for authentic freedom under conditions of finitude, one finds in Arendt a move towards an understanding of the seat of human freedom that sits far more comfortably in the Jerusalem than in the Athens tradition. Specifically, in her emphasis on natality and genuine futurity, one senses a strong resonance with the notion of pure creation in the Hebrew Bible, as one does, notably, in her insistence that forgiveness and promises (covenants) form the two pillars for human sociality. Throughout the history of Jewish thought, one consistently finds precisely this Arendtian struggle to represent a model of law that holds the tension between binding fidelity to promises, memory and the past, and an openness to futurity, to the infinity of interpretation that gives meaning to those promises. Closely resembling the midrashic tradition, Arendt’s political community of speech is one in which meaning is open ended and plural, allowing for the binding together that sustains a polity, while also opening up to the radically new of each new birth. (shrink)

In our postmodern times, the question 'where is truth' and surely 'truth with regard to religion' appears to be answered especially with the reply 'in particular traditions'. The combination 'truth, particular tradition and salvation', however, still leaves a number of avenues open. In the first part, we go over the ideas of Herman De Dijn, Richard Rorty, Peter Koslowski and Jürgen Habermas respectively with regard to truth and particularity. The first two desire to respect fully the particular and contingent character (...) of traditions that accord meaning. The other two authors also take this starting point but nonetheless deem it necessary to ensure the truth content of traditions in that which rises above that particularity and contingency. Koslowski chooses the metaphysical anchoring of the truth - an anchoring which only becomes public with the philosophical re-reading of the Christian tradition. Habermas appeals to the criterion of intersubjectivity and immediately links this to a universal validity; the procedures make it precisely possible - surely in the ideal case of 'unimpaired intersubjectivity' - to relativize the particular as such. For Rorty, on the contrary, the intersubjective recognition of insights and attitudes does not neutralize its contingent particularity; he does not dub generally diveded insights and attitudes as universal, even if they would indeed fit into a world that is becoming all the more small within a cosmopolitan evolution - they cannot lay claim to anything more than being cosmopolitan. De Dijn, on his part, distinguishes the truth of the cognitive-scientific domain of knowledge, characterized by demonstrable universality, and the 'truth to live by' that cannot be explicitated and is always incarnated in concrete praxis. This 'truth to live by' is proper to the domain of meaning-giving, and is necessarily particular and contingent. A different demarcation line distinguishes Rorty and Habermas from De Dijn and Koslowski: in contrast to the modern Habermas and to Rorty who seems to take a leap forward, De Dijn and Koslowski choose to return, in a 'post'-modern way, to the wisdom content of the Christian tradition as a normative foundation for life and society. It seems that only De Dijn has somewhat done justice to the combination 'religious truth, particular tradition and salvation', but he has done so at such a high price, especially for the theologian. This is the reason why we opt to approach the combination 'religious truth, particular tradition and salvation' from the standpoint of the question raised by our current situation of plurality with regard to the question of truth, more specifically from the standpoint of the confrontation with the truth of the other. The narrative of the other does not so much as make me give up the truth claim of my own narrative, but point to the deficiency in my truth, a deficiency that cannot be supplemented considering the inevitably particular and contingent character of my narrative. It is owing to this that the truth is finally no longer a matter of authentic content, but rather of coming to relate to the deficiency so much so that it precisely opens up the order of truth. Such a concept of truth offers perspectives to the theologian in order to qualify the truth content of the Christian tradition. The truth deficiency of the Christian tradition and the awareness of its particular and contingent character, are not - theologically speaking - counter indications of its truth, but rather constitutive of it insofar as the Christian truth concerns itself with that which ultimately withdraws itself from every truth expression, which, in theological discourse, is called God. Any talk about truth in a condition marked with ineradicable plurality immediately requires, however, a talk about justice. Plurality necessarily brings along conflict. A Christian narrative that develops sensibility for the deficiency in one's own and in the others' truth narratives will criticize, out of this sensitivity, hegemonic narratives that fail to see their own deficiencies and thereby oppress other narratives. Postmodern talk about truth likewise enables the theologian to articulate in a contextually meaningful way the evangelical option for the poor, the outcast, and the 'sinner', and to point out and indict the injustice committed against those who do not fit into the ruling discourse. (shrink)

Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA, and London, UK: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007), ISBN-13:978-0674- 02676-6; 874pp. This review essay concentrates on Charles Taylor's image of modernity.

It is hard to overstate the growing impact of the works of Andreas Reckwitz and Hartmut Rosa on contemporary social theory. Given the quality and originality of their intellectual contributions, it is no accident that they can be regarded as two towering figures of contemporary German social theory. The far-reaching significance of their respective approaches is reflected not only in their numerous publications but also in the fast-evolving secondary literature engaging with their writings. All of this should be reason enough (...) to take note of their collaborative work, which, most recently, has culminated in the publication of their co-authored book Spätmoderne in der Krise: Was leistet die Gesellschaftstheorie? (Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2021). The main purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that the latest exchange between Reckwitz and Rosa contains valuable insights into recent and ongoing trends in society in general and social theory in particular. The first part comprises an outline of the central matters at stake in, and the core lessons learnt from, the constructive dialogue between Reckwitz’s critical analytics and Rosa’s critical theory, before moving, in the second part, to an assessment of the most significant limitations of their respective views and propositions. (shrink)

Can critical research on religion offer both an ideology critique and a critical retrieval of religious import? This article suggests that it can, offering a programmatic sketch for a full-fledged critique of religion—a critique both aimed at religion and inspired by religion in a self-critical fashion. The sketch weds elements of a robustly normative critique of Western society with insights derived from the Frankfurt School. First the article maps three societal macrostructures that organize much of contemporary social life—civil society, proprietary (...) economy, and administrative state. Then it discusses solidarity, resourcefulness, and justice as societal principles that can sustain a critique of societal macrostructures. Next it identifies normative deficiencies within and between these macrostructures. On the basis of this architectonic critique, the article then provides an account of religion in its critical and utopian roles. It concludes by envisioning a normative and emancipatory transformation of society as a whole. (shrink)

_An in-depth look at the theory of solidarity of German philosopher Jürgen Habermas, serving also as a comprehensive introduction to his work._.