A contest over titles: The canonisation of the Frankfurt School as ‘permanent exiles’

Prevailing images of the Frankfurt School have long relied upon an idea of their origins that is far from self-evident. Premised upon the curious allure associated with such notions as ‘transcendental homelessness’ and ‘extraterritoriality’, and enhanced more recently by a vogue for all things ‘exilic’, this canonised image of critical theory has identified members’ life […]

Back from the future

Reivew of Keti Chukhrov, Practicing the Good
Keti Chukhrov, Practicing the Good: Desire and Boredom in Soviet Socialism (Minneapolis: eflux/University of Minnesota Press, 2020). 336pp., £22.99 pb., 978 1 51790 955 0 Spinoza’s dictum that we ought to understand first – not ridicule, not cry, nor detest – is ignored surprisingly often, even in philosophical scholarship, when it comes to revising and […]
Neighbourhood mozaic hidden behind long grass showing woman in white holding child, doctor, soldier, student.

Between context and transcendence

Reivew of Martin Jay, Genesis and Validity
Martin Jay, Genesis and Validity: The Theory and Practice of Intellectual History (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2022). 280pp., £26.99 hb., 978 0 81225 340 5 Can ideas transcend the context of their appearance? Can concepts depose the particularity of their origin to achieve validity? In the opening pages to a new collection of essays […]
Spines of books on shelves with titles 'A Critical History of Western Philosophy', 'THe Oxford History of Western Philosophy', 'History of Philosophy Eastern and Western'

Wounds of Democracy: Adorno’s Aspects of the New Right-Wing Extremism and the German antisemitism debate

Scholars of European history and critical theory observing American politics in recent years have often found themselves experiencing déjà vu. History, the truism goes, does not repeat itself, but last summer, with calls for ‘law and order’ and armed right-wing militias clashing with anti-racist protestors across America, many asked, what more are you waiting for? […]
Outside of a UKIP MEP's office in the European Parliament, with flags of Israel, Tenessee and Gadsden tacked onto the wall.

The Logic of Critical Theory

Reivew of Robert Pippin, Hegel’s Realm of Shadows
Robert B. Pippin, Hegel’s Realm of Shadows: Logic as Metaphysics in The Science of Logic (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2019). 322pp., £34.00 hb., £24.00 pb., 978 0 22658 870 4 hb., 978 0 22670 341 1 pb. In one of Lenin’s most famous lines, he notes that ‘it is impossible to understand Marx’s Capital […]

Critical theory and lived experience: Interview with Detlev Claussen

Detlev Claussen (b. 1948) is Professor Emeritus of Social Theory, Culture and Sociology at Leibniz Universität Hannover. In the mid-sixties he moved to Frankfurt to study with Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer, where he was actively involved in the protest movements associated with the political upheavals of 1968. In the seventies, Claussen worked as […]

73 Reviews

REVIEWS Marxism without Marxism Jacques Derrida, Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning, and the New International, translated by Peggy Kamuf, New York and London, Routledge, 1994. xx + 198 pp., £11.99 pb., 0415910455. There is no doubt that Derridean deconstruction was a political project from the outset, or that […]

‘The world spirit on the fins of a rocket’: Adorno's critique of progress

‘The world spirit on the fins of a rocket’ Adorno’s critique of progress Michael Lowy and Eleni Varikas The ideology of progress, born (in its modern guise) during the Enlightenment, finds its culminating philosophical expression in Hegel’s conception of history. Here, everything that happens marks a further step in mankind’s march towards freedom: watching Napoleon […]

Incomplete Modernity: Ulrich Beck's Risk Society

Incomplete Modernity: Ulrich Beck’s Risk Society Michae/ Rustin There has been good reason to fear that ‘post-modem’ and ‘post-industrial’ currents of thought have been sweeping away the foundations of radical critiques without offering to put anything very substantial in their place. It is all very well criticising the limitations of social democracy, the welfare state, […]

The Spirit of Postmodernism (Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, 27 February); Rethinking Critical Theory (University of Essex, 27 February 1993); Maurice Blanchot (London, 6-8 January 1993)

For Godd’s Sake The Spirit of Postmodernism Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, 27 February 1993 It seemed that Marx had forgotten to add that not only worldhistorical events but also academic conferences occur twice, the second time as farce. This conference was timed to coincide with the publication of the papers collected from an earlier […]

56 Reviews

Geoffrey Scarre, ed., Children, Parents and Politics Carolyn Steedman, Childhood, Culture and Class in Britain: Margaret McMillan, 1860-1931 David Archard Alison Assiter, Pornography, Feminism and the lndividual Jean Grimshaw Otto Pöggeler, Martin Heidegger’s Path of Thinking Jonathan Rée David Gooding, Trevor Pinch, Simon Schaffer, eds., The Uses of Experiment Jonathan Powers Morwenna Griffiths and Margaret […]

The Politics of Fulfilment and Transfiguration

The Politics of Fulfilment and Transfiguration J. M. Bernstein- SeylaBenhabib’ s Critique, Norm, and Utopia* is, without doubt, the most philosophically acute and learned history of the critical theory of society yet to be written. Because the intentions of Benhabib’s work are systematic rather than historical, her history is equally a major contribution to critical […]

Why Habermas?

WBY BA.BERMAS ? LINDA J. NICHOLSON’ There exist two ways to deny an idea. One is to label it false. The other is to call it non-important, more effectively achieved by not discussing it all. Mainstream philosophy in both England and the United states has skilfully employed the art of nondiscussion to deny ideas antithetical […]