In this volume Axel Honneth deepens and develops his highlyinfluential theory of recognition, showing how it enables us bothto rethink the concept of justice and to offer a compelling accountof the relationship between social reproduction and individualidentity formation.Drawing on his reassessment of Hegel’s practical philosophy,Honneth argues that our conception of social justice should beredirected from a preoccupation with the principles of distributinggoods to a focus on the measures for creating symmetrical relationsof recognition. This theoretical reorientation has far-reachingimplications for the theory of justice, as it obliges this theoryto engage directly with problems concerning the organization ofwork and with the ideologies that stabilize relations ofdomination.In the final part of this volume Honneth shows how the theory ofrecognition provides a fruitful and illuminating way of exploringthe relation between social reproduction and identity formation.Rather than seeing groups as regressive social forms that threatenthe autonomy of the individual, Honneth argues that the‘I’ is dependent on forms of social recognitionembodied in groups, since neither self-respect nor self-esteem canbe maintained without the supportive experience of practisingshared values in the group.This important new book by one of the leading social philosophersof our time will be of great interest to students and scholars inphilosophy, sociology, politics and the humanities and socialsciences generally.

Book by

Product Description: Das Buch leistet einen grundlegenden Beitrag zur Globalisierungsdebatte, indem es dem Autor gelingt, eine theoretische Alternative zu den vorherrschenden Paradigmen der Modernisierungstheorie herauszuarbeiten.

Product Description: La entera tradición de la crítica social y de la filosofía política contemporáneas resulta incomprensible cuando se soslaya un concepto dominante en la filosofía de la primera mitad del siglo XX: el concepto de 'reificación', categoría que con posterioridad a la Segunda Guerra Mundial perdió su posición central como diagnóstico de la época...read more

Product Description: In einem Brief nennt Adorno die "Negative Dialektik" kurz nach ihrem Erscheinen unter seinen Schriften "das philosophische Hauptwerk, wenn ich so sagen darf." Dieser herausgehobenen Bedeutung, die das Werk für Adorno hatte, entspricht nicht nur die lange Zeit, die er mit der Abfassung des Buchs beschäftigt war, sondern auch die lange Geschichte, die ihre zentralen Motive in seinem Denken haben...read more

(view table of contents)

The essays in this book weave together insights and arguments from such diverse traditions as German critical theory, French philosophy and social theory, and recent Anglo-American moral and political theory, offering a unique approach to the political and theoretical consequences of the modernism/postmodernism discussion. Through an analysis of central themes in classical Marxism and early critical theory, the author shows how recent work in a variety of traditions converges on the need to question familiar distinctions between material production and culture, the public and the private, and the political and the social, and to reconsider the conceptions of agency and power that have informed them.

Axel Honneth's Critique of Power is a rich interpretation of the history of critical theory, which clarifies its central problems and emphasizes the "social" factors that should provide that theory with a normative and practical orientation. Honneth focuses on the dialog between French and German social theory that was beginning at the time of Michel Foucault's death. It traces the common roots of the work of Foucault and Jürgen Habermas to a basic text of the last generation of critical theorists—Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment—and draws from this connection the outline of a program that might unite and surpass their seemingly irreconcilable methods of critiquing power structures. In doing so, Honneth provides a constructive and nonpolemical framework for comparisons between the two theorists. And he presents a novel interpretation of Foucault's analysis of social systems. Honneth traces the internal contradictions in critical theory through an analysis of Horkheimer's early programmatic writings, the Dialectic of Enlightenment, and Adorno's later social-theoretical writings. He shows how Habermas and Foucault in their distinctive ways reinserted the social world into critical theory but argues that neither operation has been wholly successful. His cogent analysis redirects critical social theory in ways that can draw on the strengths and avoid the weaknesses of the two approaches.

(view table of contents)

Product Description: These critical essays on Jürgen Habermas's major contribution to sociological theory, The Theory of Communicative Action, provide an indispensable guide for anyone trying to grasp that large, difficult, and important work. The editors' introduction traces the history of the reception of the work and identifies the main themes on which discussion has focused: a concept of communicative rationality; a theory of action based on distinguishing communicative from instrumental reason; a two-level concept of society that integrates lifeworld and system paradigms; and a critical theory of modernity meant to diagnose the sociopathologies of contemporary society...read more