Habermas: An Intellectual Biography

✍ Scribed by Matthew G. Specter

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2010
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 279
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book follows postwar Germany's leading philosopher and social thinker, Jürgen Habermas, through four decades of political and constitutional struggle over the shape of liberal democracy in Germany. Habermas's most influential theories - of the public sphere, communicative action, and modernity - were decisively shaped by major West German political events: the failure to de-Nazify the judiciary, the rise of a powerful Constitutional Court, student rebellions in the late 1960s, the changing fortunes of the Social Democratic Party, NATO's decision to station nuclear weapons, and the unexpected collapse of East Germany. In turn, Habermas's writings on state, law, and constitution played a critical role in reorienting German political thought and culture to a progressive liberal-democratic model. Matthew Specter uniquely illuminates the interrelationship between the thinker and his culture.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover......Page 1
Half-title......Page 3
Title......Page 5
Copyright......Page 6
Dedication......Page 7
Contents......Page 9
Acknowledgments......Page 11
Introduction......Page 17
ANTINOMY I: STATE AND CIVIL SOCIETY......Page 29
ANTINOMY II: LEGALITY AND LEGITIMACY......Page 30
ANTINOMY III: LIBERAL CONSTITUTIONALISM AND DEMOCRACY......Page 33
1 The Making of a ‘58er: Habermas’s Search for a Method......Page 43
THE POLITICAL THEORY DEFICIT IN WEST GERMANY IN THE 1950s......Page 45
THE POLITICAL CONTEXTS OF A ‘58ER......Page 50
DEBATING THE CONSTITUTIONALITY OF SOCIAL RIGHTS: ABENDROTH VERSUS FORSTHOFF......Page 56
THE MEMORY OF THE THIRD REICH IN WEST GERMAN CONSTITUTIONAL THEORY......Page 60
2 Habermas as Synthesizer of German Constitutional Theory, 1958–1963......Page 75
THE PLEBISCITARY DISTORTION OF DEMOCRACY......Page 77
THREE DIMENSIONS OF THE RULE OF LAW: SEPARATION OF POWERS, GENERALITY OF THE LEGAL NORM, AND FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS......Page 81
THE SEPARATION OF POWERS AND LEGAL NORMS......Page 85
FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS......Page 88
3 1961–1981: From the “Great Refusal” to the Theory of Communicative Action......Page 103
FROM DECISIONISM TO TECHNOCRACY: 1961–4......Page 108
HABERMAS AND THE STUDENT MOVEMENT, PHASE ONE: AGAINST TECHNOCRACY......Page 117
HABERMAS AND THE STUDENT MOVEMENT, PHASE TWO: THE CRITIQUE OF “ACTIONISM”......Page 127
TECHNOCRACY, TECHNOLOGICAL UTOPIANISM, AND THE IDENTIFICATION OF UNIVERSAL HUMAN INTERESTS......Page 132
LANGUAGE, LEGALITY, AND LEGITIMACY IN THE THEORY OF COMMUNICATIVE ACTION......Page 139
4 Civil Disobedience, Constitutional Patriotism, and Modernity: Rethinking Germany’s link to “the West” (Westbindung), 1978–1987......Page 149
THE EUROMISSILE DEBATE AND THE PARTY-POLITICAL REALIGNMENT OF 1982 AS CONTEXT FOR THE DEFENSE OF “MODERNITY”......Page 151
HABERMAS AND DIE WENDE: “MODERNITY” AND VARIETIES OF CONSERVATIVE CHALLENGE......Page 153
“CONSTITUTIONAL PATRIOTISM” AS REBUKE TO BOTH THE NEOCONSERVATIVE RIGHT AND THE NEUTRALIST LEFT......Page 163
DYNAMICS OF THE DEBATE ON THE RIGHT OF RESISTANCE: A CHANCE AND TWO DANGERS......Page 167
THE “NONIDENTICAL” RECHTSSTAAT AS SYNTHESIS......Page 181
5 Learning from the Bonn Republic: Recasting Democratic Theory, 1984–1996......Page 187
NEITHER LIBERALISM NOR REPUBLICANISM: THE PROCEDURAL THEORY OF LAW AND DEMOCRACY......Page 190
REENCHANTING THE RECHTSSTAAT: HABERMAS ON THE OFFENSIVE, 1984–8......Page 195
A MISSED OPPORTUNITY TO REFOUND THE REPUBLIC: HABERMAS ON THE DEFENSIVE......Page 199
STATISM AND ITS CRITICS: THE WEST GERMAN EXPERIMENT WITH LAW AND DEMOCRACY......Page 207
Conclusion......Page 219
Bibliography......Page 229
Index......Page 265