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The Potentialities for Globality in the Tradition of Critical Theory

By Johan Bolding Rasmussen

Critical Theory in Global Intellectual History

The field of intellectual history is concerned with the development of ideas, particularly focusing on philosophical concepts, as well as their relationships with research fields such as cultural studies and social theory. Global intellectual history is then the emergence of a promising and strong research field that combines intellectual history with the recent increase in attentiveness towards the global, that has conveyed several publications on, among other things the global histories of capitalism, climate change, or colonialism.[1] Political theorist Malte Frøslee Ibsen’s (1983-) monograph A Critical Theory of Global Justice – The Frankfurt School and World Society from 2023 aims to integrate Critical Theory into the field of intellectual history and connect it to the discussions on the “scale of global concerns”.[2] However, this essay argues that in attempting to conflate intellectual history with a scale of global concerns Ibsen’s monograph falls short of providing a compelling and comprehensive argument that resonates with global intellectual history.

The cradle of Critical Theory was the Institut für Sozialforschung (IfS) at the Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt am Main that was established in 1923, which later became known as “The Frankfurt School”. In short, Critical Theory originated in the philosophical realms of philosophy, psychology, and sociology aiming to disclose the inherent coercion and power dynamics of modern capitalist society, through a Marxist-Socialist lens. Recent years have seen a significant number of research monographs and collective biographies that have contributed to both the mythologisation of the institute and its theories, as well as the reassessment of its tradition, thereby outlining its intellectual history.[3]

Institut für Sozialforschung an der Senckenberganlage 26, Frankfurt am Main, Deutschland. Photography taken by Frank C. Müller. Shared under a Creative Commons Licence. Wikimedia Commons

The ongoing academic interest in the history of the Frankfurt School, its prominent theorists and interpretations of the theory’s relevance for contemporary problems, is exemplified by two monographs from 2024: Philipp Lenhard’s Café Marx – Das Institut für Sozialforschung von den Anfängen bis zur Frankfurter Schule and Jörg Später’s Adornos Erben – Eine Geschichte aus der Bundesrepublik, both providing detailed accounts of Critical Theory and the institute’s history. Despite apparent similarities, Lenhard’s focus is on the IfS as an institution deeply influenced by Marxism, exploring its established and associated staff, and academic environment. More importantly, Lenhard’s book covers the entire history of the institute, from its founding in Weimar in 1923 to the present day, thereby tracing the institutional foundations of Critical Theory’s intellectual history.[4] In contrast, Später’s monograph delves into the legacies of first generation Frankfurt School theorist Theodor Adorno (1903-1969). Beginning its examination of the different variations of Critical Theory in 1949 with Adorno’s return to the German Federal Republic. It shows how his students dispersed across Germany and carried on the tradition of thought in such diverse arenas as the sociological and philosophical faculties of universities, different democratic institutions and movie productions.[5]

Ibsen’s monograph then invigorates yet another attempt at continuing this tradition, but in an allegedly different direction. The monograph grapples with the potentialities for global justice, mostly in the canonised parts of the Frankfurt School, and thus assists the established history of the institute. As a result, it can be seen as a contribution to the larger field of intellectual history and the smaller field of Frankfurt School history, but only in some respects does it contribute to the field of global history. In the introduction Ibsen reveals that the framework for a Critical Theory of global justice serves the purpose of a both personal and professional concern with global economic inequality, the rise of far-right politicians, and to an even greater extent the global ecological and environmental catastrophe. This disassociates the monograph from Lenhard and Später’s work because Ibsen’s explicitly aims to deploy Critical Theory in an urgent present context.

Conversely, Ibsen also continues the excavation for the relevance and topicality of the history of the institute and the theory just as Lenhard and Später did. Ibsen further clarifies that two of the theorists examined in the book, Axel Honneth (1949-) and Rainer Forst (1964-), served as his Ph.D.-supervisors.[6] This means that he is implicated with the tradition of Critical Theory in more than one way – which does not, however, prevent him from taking a critical stance. The following will briefly show how the ideas of the six theorists included in Ibsen’s account of Critical Theory represented six different “paradigms,” and how these paradigms relate to a global setting. The paradigms emphasise the existence of one tradition of thought as well as to what extent that tradition contributes to the conversation on global history. The paradigms, however, should not be mistaken with the generations of Critical Theory, but should be seen as independent constituents of a common thread of thinking, that both criticise and elaborate on the preceding components.[7]

Concerns for the Global and Critical Theory’s Foundational Paradigms

To a large extent, Critical Theory subscribes to a theoretical framework that cannot escape the tendency of establishing universal claims regarding the “totality” of the concept of society. A concept that is neither adequately emphasising national and cultural differences, nor emphasising the importance of both the temporal and spatial movements of concepts and ideas.[8] Given that Ibsen’s primary area of investigation is the history of the Frankfurt School and the possibilities of global justice inherent in that tradition, A Critical Theory of Global Justice makes a more compelling case in contributing to intellectual history than to the field of global intellectual history. Ibsen does not pretend to venture into assembling a Critical Theory of global justice with the six different paradigms of Critical Theory, but his project is nevertheless highly historical. He describes his aspiration in the concluding remark, which is to “(…) uncover the normative and methodological perspectives that would allow a historical and sociological critique of the present global order, and the most important tasks that such a critique must take upon itself”.[9]

Many a theorists still engage with the tradition and its fields of research, but they have dispersed and are not solely located at the IfS anymore, let alone in the German-speaking sphere of academia. The Frankfurt School continues to exist and, although to a very limited extent, has actually been globalized to encompass more than just an intimate group of rich male Jewish-German university scholars.[10] Ibsen thus argues against the judgements of posterity that Critical Theory has lost relevance in a global world, and that it has not taken contexts outside of the post-industrial capitalist societies in the West into account. He does so by claiming a potential concern for the global scale of problems in the six paradigms, something that would make the tradition relevant today in “our bourgeoning world society”.[11]

Ibsen’s interpretation and arranging of the theory in paradigms underscores a coherent tradition with internal critiques. It additionally makes it evident that, although all paradigms subscribe to the same tradition of thought, they are occupied with different fields and simultaneously build upon and criticise the preceding terms and concepts. Ibsen’s examination clarifies that the presence of a concern for the global in the first generation of Max Horkheimer’s (1895-1973) “original paradigm” and Adorno’s “negativist paradigm” is not conductive, but needs to be extrapolated and can seem farfetched. Their shared concern with not only the rise of fascism, but also the exploitation of nature through technological advancements, is analysed as a consequence of the Second World War, and is all the more dominant in their later and exiled writings. This is most concisely exemplified by Horkheimer’s remark in 1947: “The more devices we invent for dominating nature, the more must we serve them if we are to survive”.[12] In the notoriously pessimistic Dialektik der Aufklärung from 1944, their shared concern becomes a more apparent consequence of the atrocities committed with human-made technology during the Second World War. This shifted their attention from potentialities for Marxist revolution in capitalist society to examining the inherent hostility and rational subjugation of humans and nature, as it expressed itself in the late-modern capitalist society of the West. In focusing on that, Ibsen additionally makes a relatively uncontroversial point; that the concern for the global practices of fascism and exploitation of nature are connected with Horkheimer and Adorno’s global mobility. The distance enabled by the move from war-ridden Germany to exile in California shows the physical and intellectual movement of the Frankfurt School, when the two theorists from afar concluded that the enlightenment and social rationalization had pivoted into its own contradiction, embodied in the atrocities of the war.

Photograph taken in Heidelberg, April 1964, by Jeremy J. Shapiro at the Max Weber-Soziologentag. Max Horkheimer, Adorno, Jürgen Habermas, Siegfried Landshut. Shared under a Creative Commons license.

The most dominant claim in Ibsen’s work is that there is a potential concern for the global that is not fully delivered in the existing framework of Critical Theory. The argument of a potential, but restrained, globality is less relevant to global history than it is to intellectual history. But it nevertheless shows significance to the conversation of claims with global validity, because Ibsen locates dawning global connections and concerns in all six paradigms. The first generation entails the two paradigms of Horkheimer and Adorno, where the former’s foundational paradigm unfortunately is too theoretically constrained by historical materialism and a universal “stagist” idea of societal development that it falters in the global context. Conversely, by equating Adorno’s negativist paradigm’s concept of the  “non-identical” with the postcolonial “Other”, Ibsen shows that Adorno’s theories complements the postcolonial conceptualisation of the likes of Edward Said (1935-2003) and Gayatri Spivak (1942-).[13] In addition to this latent global concern, the ideas of totalitarian enlightenment in the so-called “administered society” connects with Michel Foucault’s (1926-1984) idea of “subjection” and “governmentality”.[14] However, this does not amount to a question of global validity per se, but discloses to what extent the conceptualisation of power resonates and moves across borders.

Jürgen Habermas’ (1929-) “communicative paradigm” is the embodiment of the second generation, where the conceptualisation of the development of modernity and the “rationalisation of the life-world” introduce a more clearer global context. The presupposed distinction between “life-worlds” and “life-systems” that refines Max Weber’s (1864-1920) concept of the “social rationalisation” of life in modern society as living in a “stahlhartes Gehäuse”(steel-hard housing), in many respects underlines the contribution to intellectual history.[15] The global connection is displayed in the way that the “rationalisation” is tied to capitalism as a “global system” and something (but not solely) that yields societal changes due to the “indissoluble tension” there is between capitalism and democracy that profoundly changes the circumstances under which communication can take place.[16]

The third generation is embodied by Honneth and his “recognition paradigm” that links social freedom with recognition. Honneth distinguishes between different spheres of freedom, but the sphere of the economic market is the most prominent in relation to a global argument, where the possibilities of freedom, and thus recognition, are yet again disturbed by capitalism.[17] Both Habermas and Honneth’s analyses comprehend the “misdevelopments in the ‘reality of freedom’ of modern capitalist democracies” as a global phenomenon. But it is on the basis of a universal idea of recognition which does not take any global mobility or differentiation in the conceptualisation of recognition into account.[18]

The fourth generation presents two radically different continuations and reinvigorations of the four preceding paradigms. From a feminist and postcolonial perspective Amy Allen’s (1970-) “contextualist paradigm” is highly critical of the tradition and makes visible its inherent blind spots and assumptions.[19] Her contextualist paradigm is in some respects the overarching self-critique of a theory, that in many ways pretends universality, but does not really take globality into account. Allen emphasises that the tradition “need[s] both to posit context-transcending ideals and to continually unmask their status as illusions rooted in interest and power-laden contexts”.[20] Thus, the critique conveys a reinvigoration of the tradition of the Frankfurt School in extrapolating the arguments of her predecessors in order to test the global validity of their claims. Allen thereby shows the global blind spots of the tradition that the critique pays tribute to.

Contrarily, Forst’s ambition of the “justification paradigm” is to generalise justice into having “transnational” validity and it takes the philosophical literature of “global justice” as its sounding board.[21] His paradigm’s relation to global history is in his emphasis on international, transnational, or global justices and on how to ground justification, with the ambition of being universal, in these international, transnational, or global frameworks.[22] However, it is uncertain to what extent something actually gets grounded at least globally when there are no examples of relational justification provided in Ibsen’s account. No exemplification of the differing ideas on justice, neither through time nor space is made. This inexhaustive analysis of what justification then means discloses an embeddedness in a societal tradition of thought that can still be coined “Western”. Ibsen’s account of Forst’s paradigm does not make any attempt at showing how an understanding of justice could be different elsewhere and thus shows how globality in the Frankfurt School does not exceed the universal pretension. Despite phrasing it “global justices” no emphasis is put on how globality expresses differences and exchanges, which would then have undermined any proclamation of universal justice.

Omissions and Misconceptions

The six different paradigms are all connected to the tradition of Critical Theory in how they bring forth contributions to the analysis of societal coercion and the possibilities of emancipation. Their shared project might be most explicit in Ibsen’s emphasis on the persistent claim made by several of the theorists included in the framework; that any scholar putting forward a theory is embedded in a societal context and is to be perceived as a product of the historical development leading up to that society in question. Phrased in another way; almost all theorists seem concerned with positionality.[23] However, due to the alleged universal validity of most of the theories, the specific societal context, of which historical progress they should be products of, is approached as something to be transcended with the help of the universal theories in question.

Ibsen’s interchangeable use of the concepts “global”, “world”, and “universal” shows a slight misconception in his account of the global aspect of a Critical Theory of justice. In many ways “global” presupposes interaction, exchange, movement, or something that puts emphasis on differences and relations. This is not the case for most of the theories presented, which to a large extent both intellectually and physically speaking are confined to either the Western European or later the North American context. Although Ibsen actually emphasises this early on: “In effect, ‘the world’ is silently collapsed into Europe”, he does not turn this into a substantial critique of Critical Theory.[24] Despite the fact that Ibsen reads a bourgeoning concern for the global in each of the six paradigms, there is practically no global claims, but mainly universal pretensions.

In its attempt to sketch out a Critical Theory of justice, the book falls short of defending its omissions. This is evident when the philosopher and sociologist Herbert Marcuse (1898-1979) is not included as an example of global involvement. The defence of Marcuse’s omission being due to “the degree of overlap between Marcuse’s work and the first two paradigms [Horkheimer and Adorno’s]” is in no way compelling.[25] Marcuse would have been an excellent example of somebody inside the theoretical and institutional framework of Critical Theory that thinks beyond the Western intellectual hemisphere. Best exemplified with regard to both his activist and theoretical engagement with the protests against the American war in Vietnam – something Adorno only mentions in passing, together with apartheid in South Africa – and the Cold War tensions between the USA and the Soviet Union.[26] His work splendidly illustrates how global connections can be contained within the framework of Critical Theory, without necessarily being confined to the society of origin or claiming any universal validity. Marcuse additionally bridges the first and the second generation, as well as the European and American spheres, given that he was one of the few exceptions of exiled critical theorists who did not return to Germany after the end of the Second World War.

Furthermore, the glaring absence of the women of both the early and the mature generations of the Frankfurt School in some way contradicts the monograph’s very own premise of a restoring research of a Critical Theory of global justice. Most distinctly is how the American philosopher Nancy Fraser (1947-), prominent critic of Western neoliberalism and capitalism and representative of the third generation, is only mentioned as the intellectual interlocutor of Honneth. Fraser’s joint work on capitalism with Rahel Jaeggi (1966-) of the fourth generation, and the former’s critique of Habermas’ theory of the public spheres acutely grapples with global aspects.[27] In addition, and just as examples, the sociologist and former scientific assistant of Habermas, Gertrud Nunner-Winkler (1941-), the sociologist, philosopher and president of the “Berliner Institut für kritische Theorie“ Frigga Haug (1937-), or the sociologist and former guest professor at the Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt am Main, Karin Stögner (1974-), are completely left out. Their works on morality, a feminist justly society, nationalism and post-national socialist societies, respectively, could have contributed to Ibsen’s framework of a Critical Theory of global justice.[28] All of them may very well belong to the second or third generation of the Frankfurt School, either due to their commitment to the Marxist-Socialist interpretation of societal coercion or their professional relation to either the IfS itself or the staff members.

The Frankfurt School in Global History

Through its philosophical reconstructions A Critical Theory of Global Justice is more an intellectual history of the tradition of the Frankfurt School than an intellectual history of the scale of global concerns. The restoration of the theoretical framework of Critical Theory and the ability to put forward a theory of global justice is worthwhile and sound. Still, as a contribution to global intellectual history it falters in profoundly defending the global aspect, as either global impact, inspiration, or mobility. The global history of the Frankfurt School is, to a large degree, reduced to the pretension of a universal theory of justice and potential global aspects. The tradition of theory, as presented in the framework of the theorists included, seems less occupied with making global claims or including global mobility or practices, and more inclined to pose arguments and theories that postulate a universal validity. In that way, it might be stretching the concept of global to define the account of Ibsen’s monograph as intellectual history examining the scale of global concerns, given that most of its concerns lie with the intellectual history of the tradition. Ibsen tries to make the Critical Theory worthwhile and relevant in this “bourgeoning world society” by pointing towards the inherent global potentialities.[29] However, if there should be a global frame of reference for such a Critical Theory, and in order to confirm Ibsen in the notion that the potential for a theory of global justice is acute and does have some kind of ground in Critical Theory, then either “contemporary global capitalist modernity” or the environmental catastrophe would be something that has only intensified and worsened since the foundational days of the Frankfurt School.[30] This means that the experiences of the “contemporary global capitalist modernity” is to be understood as a shared, yet still very particular experience, that discloses the societal differences, both locally and globally.

As a philosophical tradition Critical Theory is not just a top-down blue-print for emancipation, but, as phrased by Habermas, “a process of enlightenment [where] there are only participants”. Its aim to disclose societal domination then commands reflection on how individuals or groups autonomously can pursue freedom.[31] If a Critical Theory of global justice is to pay tribute to its tradition, it must overcome social rationalisation and take numerous circumstantial differences into consideration. One of the dangers of global intellectual history is exactly presuming the existence of eternal ideas or a universal context. The extension of the analysis in space and including different contexts, or exchanges between contexts, should not result in limiting the analysis in time, let alone a total abandonment of any temporal or spatial contextualisation in the pursuit of theorisation.[32] This would result in a mere theoretical interpretation of philosophies that only pretend a move in international or universal directions, without taking the cultural or national circumstances into account. This means that by including rather than excluding participants from different contexts in formulating a theory of global justice, such a Critical Theory would need to avoid pretended universalist claims, that presuppose arguments and concepts that are not grounding in any context. Critical Theory has to stay critical of itself for it to live up to its claim of being critical, particularly as a global claim.


Bibliography

Adorno, Theodor. Metaphysics: Concept and Problems. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001.

———. Negative Dialektik. Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1966.

Allen, Amy. The End of Progress – Decolonizing the Normative Foundation of Critical Theory. New York City, New York: Columbia University Press, 2017.

———. The Politics of Ourselves – Power, Autonomy, and Gender in Contemporary Critical Theory. New York City, New York: Columbia University Press, 2007.

Bauer, Ullrich, Uwe H. Bittlingmayer, Carsten Keller, and Franz Schultheis, eds. Bourdieu Und Die Frankfurt Schule – Kritische Gesellschaftstheorie Im Zeitalter Des Neoliberalismus. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2014.

Chakrabarty, Dipesh. The Climate of History in a Planetary Age. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2021.

Colligs, Alexandra, and Karin Stögner. Kritische Theorie Und Feminismus. Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2022.

Cooper, Frederick. ‘How Global Do We Want Our Intellectual History To Be?’ In Global Intellectual History, 283–94. New York: Columbia University Press, 2013.

Edelstein, Wolfgang, Gertrud Nunner-Winkler, and Gil Noam, eds. Moral Und Person – Beiträge Zur Sociogenese Der Handlungsfähigkeit. Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1993.

Erxleben, Poul. Kritische Theorie Aktualisieren – Adorno Und Foucault in Kraftfeldern von Subjekt, Macht Und Ideologie. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2024.

Forst, Rainer. ‘Transnational Justice and Democracy’. In Political Equality in Transnational Democracy, edited by Eva Erman and Sofia Nässström, 41–59. New York: Palgrave MacMillian, 2013.

Foucault, Michel. Security, Territory, Population. Lectures at the Collége de France 1977-1978. New York: Picador, 2007.

———. ‘The Subject and Power’. Critical Inquiry 8, no. 4 (1982): 777–95.

Fraser, and Rahel Jaeggi. Capitalism: A Conversation in Critical Theory. London / New York: Verso, 2018.

Fraser, Nancy. Cannibal Capitalism: How Our System Is Devouring Democracy, Care, and the Planet – and What We Can Do About It. London: Verso, 2022.

———. ‘Transnationalizing the Public Sphere. On the Legitimacy and Efficacy of Public Opinion in a Post-Westphalian World’. Theory, Culture & Society 24, no. 4 (July 2007): 7–30.

Habermas, Jürgen. The Theory of Communicative Action. Vol. II: The Critique of Functionalist Reason. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1987.

———. Theory and Practice. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1988.

Haug, Frigga. Die Vier-in-Einem Perspektive – Politik von Frauen Für Eine Neue Linke. Hamburg: Argument Verlag, 2009.

Honneth, Axel. The Critique of Power: Reflective Stages in a Critical Social Theory. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1991.

———. The Struggle for Recognition: The Moral Grammar of Social Conflicts. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995.

Horkheimer, Max. Eclipse of Reason. New York City, New York: Oxford University Press, 1947.

Hufgard, Henriette, and Kristina Steimer. Ausgeklammert – Die Philosophinnen Der Frankfurter Schule – Eine Unerhörte Geschichte. Munich: Goldmann, 2023.

Ibsen, Malte Frøslee. A Critical Theory of Global Justice – The Frankfurt School and World Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2023.

Jeffries, Stuart. Grand Hotel Abyss: The Lives of The Frankfurt School. London: Verso, 2017.

Lenhard, Philipp. Café Marx – Das Institut Für Sozialforschung von Den Anfängen Bis Zur Frankfurter Schule. Berlin: C.H.Beck, 2024.

Manjapra, Kris. Colonialism in Global Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020.

Marcuse, Herbert. Towards a Critical Theory of Society. Edited by Douglas Kellner. 1st ed. Vol. 2. Collected Papers of Herbert Marcuse. New York: Routledge, 2001.

Moyn, Samuel, and Andrew Sartori. Global Intellectual History. Columbia Studies in International and Global History. New York: Columbia University Press, 2013.

Müller, Frank. ‘Die Rezeption Der Frankfurter Schule in Frankreich’. Zeitschrift Für Politische Theorie 8, no. 2 (2017): 235–46.

Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York City, New York: Penguin Random House, 2019.

Slobodian, Quinn. Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World Without Democracy. London: Allen Lange, 2023.

Später, Jörg. Adornos Erben – Eine Geschichte Aus Der Bundesrepublik. Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2024.

Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’ In Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, edited by Cary & Grossberg Nelson. London: Macmillan, 1988.

Stögner, Karin, and Johannes Höpoltseder. ‘Nationalism and Antisemitism in the Postnational Constellation: Thoughts on Horkheimer, Adorno, and Habermas’. In Global Antisemitism: A Crisis of Modernity, edited by Charles Asher Small, 119–31. Brill | Nijhoff, 2013.

Voller, Christian. In Der Dämmerung – Studien Zur Vor- Und Frühgeschichte Der Kritischen Theorie. Berlin: Matthes & Seitz, 2022.

Weber, Max. Die Protestantische Ethik Und Der Geist Des Kapitalismus. Weinheim: Belz Athenäum, 1996.


Notes

[1] Global intellectual history is most prominently invigorated with the anthology Moyn and Sartori, Global Intellectual History from 2013 as well as the publication of the journal Global Intellectual History since 2016. Examples of the three latter fields respectively being Slobodian, Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World Without Democracy; Chakrabarty, The Climate of History in a Planetary Age; Manjapra, Colonialism in Global Perspectives.

[2] Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, 4.

[3] Most prominent example of a recent collective biography might be Jeffries, Grand Hotel Abyss: The Lives of The Frankfurt School; More critically engaging academic books include Colligs and Stögner, Kritische Theorie Und Feminismus; Voller, In Der Dämmerung – Studien Zur Vor- Und Frühgeschichte Der Kritischen Theorie; and Hufgard and Steimer, Ausgeklammert – Die Philosophinnen Der Frankfurter Schule – Eine Unerhörte Geschichte.

[4] Lenhard, Café Marx – Das Institut Für Sozialforschung von Den Anfängen Bis Zur Frankfurter Schule.

[5] Später, Adornos Erben – Eine Geschichte Aus Der Bundesrepublik.

[6] Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, vii.

[7] For the start of Ibsen’s respective analyses of the six paradigms see: Ibsen, 27 for Horkheimer, 85 for Adorno, 149 for Habermas, 228 for Honneth, 299 for Allen and 313 for Forst.

[8] Ibsen, 4.

[9] Ibsen, 349.

[10] Ibsen, 2–6.

[11] Ibsen, 17.

[12] Horkheimer, Eclipse of Reason, 93.

[13] Said, Orientalism; Spivak, ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’

[14] Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, 135–37; Adorno, Negative Dialektik, 17, 38; Foucault, Security, Territory, Population. Lectures at the Collége de France 1977-1978, Lecture 1; Foucault, ‘The Subject and Power’; The ‘French connection’, however, is not a novel claim, as evident by the following: Bauer et al., Bourdieu Und Die Frankfurt Schule – Kritische Gesellschaftstheorie Im Zeitalter Des Neoliberalismus; Erxleben, Kritische Theorie Aktualisieren – Adorno Und Foucault in Kraftfeldern von Subjekt, Macht Und Ideologie; Müller, ‘Die Rezeption Der Frankfurter Schule in Frankreich’.

[15] Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action. Vol. II: The Critique of Functionalist Reason, 153; Weber, Die Protestantische Ethik Und Der Geist Des Kapitalismus.

[16] Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action. Vol. II: The Critique of Functionalist Reason, 345.

[17] Honneth, The Critique of Power: Reflective Stages in a Critical Social Theory, 28–29; Honneth, The Struggle for Recognition: The Moral Grammar of Social Conflicts., 42; Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, 234–38.

[18] Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, 261.

[19] Allen, The End of Progress – Decolonizing the Normative Foundation of Critical Theory, 100–101.

[20] Allen, The Politics of Ourselves – Power, Autonomy, and Gender in Contemporary Critical Theory, 148.

[21] Ibsen, an account of the different ‘camps’ of global justice theory on 337-338.

[22] Ibsen, 337–40; Forst, ‘Transnational Justice and Democracy’, 51–54.

[23] As respectively expressed, see Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, 72 for Horkheimer, 91 for Adorno, 151 for Habermas, 245 for Honneth, 308 for Allen.

[24] Ibsen, 130.

[25] Ibsen, 22.

[26] Most dominantly expressed in: Marcuse, Towards a Critical Theory of Society; Adorno, Metaphysics: Concept and Problems, 101.

[27] As exemplified in Fraser and Jaeggi, Capitalism: A Conversation in Critical Theory; Fraser, ‘Transnationalizing the Public Sphere. On the Legitimacy and Efficacy of Public Opinion in a Post-Westphalian World’ or; Fraser, Cannibal Capitalism: How Our System Is Devouring Democracy, Care, and the Planet – and What We Can Do About It.

[28] Respectively: Edelstein, Nunner-Winkler, and Noam, Moral Und Person – Beiträge Zur Sociogenese Der Handlungsfähigkeit; Haug, Die Vier-in-Einem Perspektive – Politik von Frauen Für Eine Neue Linke; Stögner and Höpoltseder, ‘Nationalism and Antisemitism in the Postnational Constellation’.

[29] Ibsen, A Critical Theory of Global Justice, 17.

[30] Ibsen, 348.

[31] Habermas, Theory and Practice, 40.

[32] Cooper, ‘How Global Do We Want Our Intellectual History To Be?’, 288.

 


About the Author

Johan Bolding Rasmussen is currently enrolled in the joint M.A. program in Global History between Freie Universität Berlin and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. He holds a B.A in History of Ideas and German Studies from Aarhus University in Denmark. Through the combination of a stronger theoretical perspective and the area specialisation he hopes that Global History can help in developing a greater understanding of the past, present and future in a global context, and of the African and European relations and entanglements. His current research interests include the history of philosophy, including that of Critical Theory, the African and European intellectual histories, literature and philosophy of the 20th century and (post)colonialism.


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Citation: Johan Bolding Rasmussen, The Potentialities for Globality in the Tradition of Critical Theory, in: TRAFO – Blog for Transregional Research, 04.03.2025, https://trafo.hypotheses.org/55680


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