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Critical Theory and the Traditions of Historical Others

Aliosha BielenbergLeave a comment

I developed these ideas further in a related paper called “The Politics of Recognition and the Frankfurt School.”

Introduction

This paper takes up the theme of the relation between those articulating critique (theorists/scholars) and those suffering injustice (common agents). What should this relationship look like when both parties share common interests in the critique of society and in establishing the conditions for action? This paper is motivated by my discontent with how critical theory in particular deals with the “traditions of historical others.” This concern has been addressed by significant recent works in critical theory in the wake of movements for decolonization.1 Yet the overarching question remains: to what extent can critical theory construct a productive relationship with asymmetrically empowered moral and intellectual traditions?

To relate this approach to critical theory, I draw on the work of David Scott. I begin this essay by spelling out his critique and its relationship with critical theory — here understood as the tradition inaugurated by Max Horkheimer in his essay “Traditional and Critical Theory.” I indicate the ways in which Horkheimer’s construction of critical theory is susceptible to Scott’s line of critique. I then introduce other theorists who build on Horkheimer while providing us with additional resources to address Scott’s critique. I use the initial framing provided by the juxtaposition of Horkheimer and Scott to assess in turn the works of Adolfo Sánchez Vázquez, Pierre Bourdieu, and Nancy Fraser. I conclude by gesturing towards what these thinkers might offer us in response to Scott’s critique.

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Abu Bakr al-Razi on The Philosopher’s Way of Life

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In the text The Philosopher’s Way of Life, Al-Razi articulates his view of the philosophical life as a way of moderation between the two extremes of hedonism and asceticism. In this essay, I briefly describe some of the key characteristics of this philosophical life, mention some aspects that are not part of this way of life, and outline the reasons Al-Razi gives in defense of his conception. I conclude by briefly assessing Al-Razi’s argument.

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Hannah Arendt on Ideology and Terror

Aliosha Bielenberg1 Comment

Hannah Arendt develops her theory of ideology from her analysis of historically existing totalitarian regimes, namely those of Hitler and Stalin, in The Origins of Totalitarianism (1951). These regimes, Arendt says, are characterized by ideology and terror. These principles take the place of genuine political action, which is the key characteristic of any well-functioning polity. To understand just how ideology substitutes for action, we must understand how totalitarianism emerges historically as a novel form of government. Towards this end, I begin by outlining how totalitarianism differs from tyranny, according to Arendt. I go on to clarify how ideology relates to terror and finally compare ideology to the concept of action as developed in The Human Condition (1958).

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The Relationship Between Civil Society and the State Between Hegel and Marx

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In his book Hegel’s Theory of the Modern State, Shlomo Avineri writes that Hegel’s political theory “is perhaps best expressed by Hegel’s ambiguous attitude to civil society: on one hand, it is the major achievement of the modern world; on the other, woe to that society of men that allows the forces of civil society to rule unimpeded.”2 This duality in Hegel’s attitude towards civil society reflects what Warren Breckman calls the “dual meaning of the German term bürgerliche Gesellschaft,” which Hegel exploited to “describe civil society as both the ‘bourgeois’ sphere of market relations and the ‘civic’ sphere of institutionalized individual and communal rights.”3 The bourgeois sphere of market relations must be checked by the state; otherwise, unregulated capitalism unleashes a “spectacle of extravagance and misery,” as Hegel already perceived in the Philosophy of Right (§185).4 On the other hand, the creativity and freedom of the civic sphere flourish under conditions of autonomy from the state.

Between these two extremes, what should the relationship between civil society and the state look like? Hegel’s account is still one of the richest explorations of this problematic. In this essay, I articulate Hegel’s account of the relationship between civil society and the state with reference to Marx’s subsequent critique thereof. I argue that Hegel outlines a logically coherent account of how the state emerges necessarily and organically from civil society. Marx proceeds to misrepresent Hegel’s account on at least two counts: its method and its politics. However, I argue that Marx is ultimately correct to criticize Hegel for his anti-democratic tendencies, which I think blind Hegel to the political import of his analysis.

To support this argument, I structure this paper in three sections. In the first section, I examine Hegel’s account of the relationship between the state and civil society in the Philosophy of Right. I focus on how the institutions and practices of civil society form from the “system of needs” around which civil society revolves. In the second section, I turn to Marx’s criticism of Hegel’s account, as found in Marx’s Critique of Hegel’s Doctrine of the State. I consider and reject Marx’s objections to Hegel’s method and politics. In the third section, I turn to Marx’s critique that Hegel is essentially anti-democratic. I return to Hegel’s account of how the political state forms to explain in what sense this objection holds.

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Spinoza, conatus, and ethics in a world of absolute necessity

Aliosha BielenbergLeave a comment

Conatus is the linchpin of Spinoza’s ethical system. This concept bridges Spinoza’s metaphysics of substance, his definitions of the affects, and his ethics proper. In this paper, I argue that conatus addresses a core problem in the Ethics: how to have ethics in a world of absolute necessity. I begin this paper by explaining conatus as it relates to metaphysics. In the second section, I focus on conatus and the affects. In the third section, I turn to Spinoza’s ethics proper and specifically his conception of good and evil. In the fourth section, I focus on the principle of moderation. In the fifth and final section, I conclude by showing how conatus relates to Spinoza’s doctrine of necessity.

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Nightingales

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This poem complements an essay I published in Taxis called “Who Remembers Paliomylos? From the Troodos Mountains of Cyprus.”

"T'aidonia de s'afinoune na koimetheis stis Platres."
                                                                                                — Giorgos Seferis, "Helen".

         Past the near meadows, over the still stream,
                Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep
                        In the next valley-glades:
         Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
                                                                                               — John Keats, "Ode to a Nightingale".
What do nightingales think
of symbolism?

Silver light fills the valley
The fresh evening air resounding
With the nightingale's song.

My heart opens, my mind fills
With memories of light:

The fireplace, the Christmas tree
The morning sun, the evening moon
The comet, the stars, the milky cloud
Etched like frosted glass
On a clear summer's night.

In the morning, the hammers pound.
The voices of neighbors float
From orchards to verandas.

The birds bide their time
Until winter rains
and residents retreat.

Life after life.

Habermas and Civil Society

Aliosha BielenbergLeave a comment

In this essay, I focus on the concept of “civil society” in Habermas. I trace its development through the four phases of juridification Habermas outlines in The Theory of Communicative Action. To substantiate this development, I look backwards to Habermas’ foundation in the Hegelian and Marxist conceptions of civil society. I then turn to Habermas’ later text Between Facts and Norms, which argues for a strong relationship between the law and civil society. On the one hand, I deeply appreciate how Habermas elevates civil society, making its characteristic intersubjectivity the foundation of law. On the other hand, I worry about where this leaves civil society. In particular, I think the process presented positively in Between Facts and Norms contradicts Habermas’ own analysis of juridification in The Theory of Communicative Action. I think Habermas looks to civil society as a model because it is a space of spontaneous free interaction between autonomous subjects. But when the law assumes the functions of civil society, this space of freedom and autonomy risks disappearing. Before elaborating on this argument about Habermas, I will provide some motivation for why I see this as a risk.

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Objectivity in Kant, Hegel, and Marx

Aliosha Bielenberg1 Comment

In this essay, I briefly sketch the trajectory of the “objective” or “objectivity” in three canonical German philosophers: Kant, Hegel, and Marx. My motivation for pursuing this essay is looking backwards from the place of “objectivity” today, especially as the word has been variously contested in the last forty years or so in the emerging field of science and technology studies (e.g., by Donna Haraway). Too often, in these debates objectivity is deployed as a strawman, a crude caricature of logical positivism to be hacked away at by (often equally crude) postmodern critiques. A more sophisticated account of objectivity is given by Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison in their seminal 2008 book, Objectivity, which traces the rise of successive “epistemic virtues” through a close study of scientific atlases from around 1750 to 1950. There have also been recent attempts to recuperate objectivity as part of the broad coalition of movements grouped under the “ontological turn.” I think a move of this sort was anticipated by Hannah Arendt in her late Lectures on Kant’s Political Philosophy. I think all these discussions would be enriched by a more nuanced understanding of the history of this word.

But enough of this talk. This paper is more proximately driven by a fundamental foreignness I perceived when reading the German philosophers of the early nineteenth century, for whom “objectivity” seems to mean something else quite different. For the purposes of this essay, I want to reconstruct as faithfully as I can the various meanings of objectivity and objects in the work of Kant, Hegel, and Marx. I bracket both my motivations and the later development of the term to focus on an immanent account of each of these thinkers in turn. One more preliminary note: part of the foreignness can be attributed (as so often it is) to difficulties of translation. In particular, “subject” is also a Latinate term in German (Subject or Subjekt). By contrast, “object” can be either Object/Objekt (the Latinate term) or the Germanic Gegenstand, whence also Gegenständlich (“objective”) and Gegenständlichkeit (“objectivity”). Gegenstand has the distinction that it literally “stands against” something. Kant talked mostly of Objecte — but not really, since he divided the world into the realm of appearances (phenomena) and things-in-themselves. The Subjekt has a double meaning, of course: it is both subject-matter (“what is the subject of this book?”) in which case it can be rather synonymous with “object”; and it is the ethical or epistemological subject, the self that knows or acts. So much for a bird’s-eye view of the development. Let us now dive in and get our hands dirty.

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An Articulation of Hegel’s Preface to the Phenomenology of Spirit

Aliosha BielenbergLeave a comment

For Hegel, philosophy requires systematic exposition. It should not be a matter of feeling or intuiting. Nor should philosophy undertake the task of “edification,” a kind of “fog” of “inflamed inspiration.” Rather, philosophy has as its aim material completion that opposes “utterly vacuous naiveté in cognition.” This kind of systematic, complete, ultimate truth is not in substance but in subject, namely the universal individual, the world spirit. Science consists not in an end, but rather in the reflection: the process is of absolute importance.

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