Class 15 - Methodological Debates + start of Part IV PDF

CLASS 15 / Part III: Methodological Debates: Positivism, Interpretivism and Critique Ø SUMMARY: Ø Critique: Ø Frankfurt School as immanent critique Ø Generational dynamics Ø General characteristics + tenets of critical theory Ø Methodological foundations and / or limits of critical theory Ø Start of...

CLASS 15 / Part III: Methodological Debates: Positivism, Interpretivism and Critique Ø SUMMARY: Ø Critique: Ø Frankfurt School as immanent critique Ø Generational dynamics Ø General characteristics + tenets of critical theory Ø Methodological foundations and / or limits of critical theory Ø Start of Part IV: Ø Analyzing culture and social change Ø Durkheim and structuralism CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School - generational dynamics: Ø 1st generation, starting with the 1930s: Max Horkheimer (1895-1973), Theodor Adorno (1903-1969), Herbert Marcuse (1898-1979), Eric Fromm (1900-1980) 2° generation, starting with the 1970s: Jürgen Habermas + Richard Bernstein = New School for Social Research in New York Ø 3d generation, contemporary: students of Habermas + scholars influenced by Habermas: Klaus Offe, Josef Früchtl, Hauke Brunkhorst, Axel Honneth etc. Ø CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School – critical theory – general characteristics: Ø Hugely influential immanent form of critique influenced by / rooted in the philosophies of Marx, Hegel and Kant Ø Follows in spirit the ethos and the goals of the Enlightenment regarding the notion of progress and human emancipation Ø Built up a school of thought linked to what is largely known as “critical theory” CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School – critical theory – general characteristics: Ø Studies of anti-Semitism and fascism Ø critiques of capitalism and any system of “oppressive” power relations Ø New type of psychoanalysis: combination of Marxism with Freud CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School – critical theory - general tenets: Ø Follows the Marxist maxim: the task of the philosopher is not to understand the world, but to change it Ø critical theory sees as its task the transformation of the world by clearing it from “false consciousness” Ø Ideology critique: this can be achieved by exposing the socio-economic-political determinants explaining the limits of specific philosophical views Ø Denies the separation between theory and praxis CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School – critical theory - general tenets: Ø Knowledge is historically embedded: it is not objective because the object of knowledge is part of the historical and social process Ø There is no fact – value distinction in knowledge: critical theory emphasizes “reflexivity” in the sense of its normative prescriptions (human emancipation + progress) Ø This means that knowledge should be functional to “ideology critique” and social emancipation Ø Knowledge should ultimately be social criticism ideology critique - which translates into social action + transformation CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School – critical theory - general tenets: Ø 2 types of rationality: Ø (I)Rationality expressing dominant forms of power; deprived of true normative value; Ø “emancipatory” or “true” rationality providing the liberating force for a (better) yet to come reality CLASS 15: Critique Ø Frankfurt School – critical theory - general tenets: Ø Modern processes of bureaucratic administration favour formal over substantive values – this leads to the domination of instrumental rationality – works as premise for the rise of totalitarianism Ø Capitalism + technological (and scientific) knowledge lead to the technological (and scientific) domination of human action Ø Non-critical forms of knowledge in combination with technology /science are seen as means for the exploitation of labour forces - this betrays the purposes of the Enlightenment CLASS 15: Critique Ø Methodological foundations and / or limitations of critical theory: Ø Reflexivity reduced to “critical thinking” – critique is foundational of knowledge Ø Absolutisation of ideals of “emancipation” and “justice” in the sense of progress, individual liberation, social emancipation – risk: “ideology critique” is itself highly ideological Ø Negative view on power: tendency to equate power with oppression CLASS 15: Critique Ø Methodological foundations and / or limitations of critical theory: Ø The outsider position: Ø epistemologically, when upholding universal standards of justice and procedural reason Ø Socially, when “criticizing” existing social conditions by positioning oneself over, above and against them CLASS 15: Critique Ø Methodological foundations and / or limitations of critical theory: Ø the contradiction between the historical and social construction of knowledge on the one hand, and the universal progressive standards of justice on the other Ø Critical theory functionally presupposes critical reasoning (rationality) as anthropological constant – equally available to anyone, everywhere, at all times CLASS 15: Critique Ø Methodological foundations and / or limitations of critical theory: Ø Consequence: limited capacity to think with social and human crises characterised by precisely weak reasoning power Ø Critique as never-ending process of thought – implication is that the concrete is and must always be given up, abandoned, or “purified” out of reality - nihilism? Relativism? CLASS 15: Critique Ø Methodological foundations and / or limitations of critical theory: Ø Reflection point 1: Ø How can one think of the limits / downfalls of the narrative of progress, human emancipation and individual liberation within the ethos of critique? Ø Reflection point 2: Ø The paradox of critique: how can one be “critical” of “critique”? CLASS 15 – start of Part IV Ø Reminder: Ø Part IV: Analyzing culture and social change / Analyzing historical formations of modernity Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912): Ø Formulates a theory of culture rooted in the analyses of religious beliefs and rituals of Australian aborigines and Amer-Indian societies Ø the beginning of structuralism / structuralist analyses of culture Ø The beginning of functionalism / functionalist analyses of culture Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Durkheim and the birth of structuralism in analyses of culture: Ø focus not on the content / meanings of culture Ø focus on the practices by which meanings are produced, on the relations between the components that make up a practice (these relations provide the structure) Ø Looks at the arrangement or the symbolic structure of an event (example: wedding feast in “kinship societies”) in order to discover its cultural meaning Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Durkheim and the birth of structuralism in analyses of culture: Ø Cultural symbols are central to all sociology and social anthropology: Ø they provide the broad frameworks within which social life, language, and symbolic representations of human groups are organized Ø For Durkheim and structuralism, the structure of a culture is given by the classifying schemes and the collective representations of the social group Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912): Ø 1. collective representations: Ø the cultural beliefs, moral values, symbols and ideas shared by any human groups Ø Such representations are neither true nor false in the sense of representing objects in the outside world Ø They are produced, reproduced, transmitted and transformed collectively Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912): Ø 1. collective representations: Ø Even the most basic categories of thought – ideas of time, space, causation etc. – are collective representations Ø Reason is a collective representation: a socially shared standard of what counts as good, well-reasoned argument Ø It is within such socially shared frameworks that individual experience is classified Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912): Ø 2. primitive classification: Ø “primitive” societies operated complex systems of classifying animals, plants, people etc. Ø Within this classificatory schemes, particular plants, animals, objects were “totems”, being associated with or representing particular groups, clans or tribes Ø Totemic systems provided a classificatory map of society – hence, understanding classification systems is key to cultural analysis Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912) Ø 2. primitive classification: Ø One such “primitive classification” / one basic classification of all culture is the division of things between the sacred and the profane: Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912) Ø 2. primitive classification: Ø The sacred: Ø everything and every activity that is set apart from routine objects and activities; Ø the beliefs which define what is classified as sacred in a culture and the rituals which actively set apart particular elements, times, people or places Ø The profane: routine objects and practices / activities Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912): Ø Religions are made up of beliefs and rites (the sacred): Ø Durkheim claimed that religious rites can be defined by the belief expressed in the rite. This belief is the “totem” Ø The totem is nothing other than society itself, a collective representation through which society actualizes itself Class 15: Analyzing culture and social change Ø Emil Durkheim: The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912): Ø Religions are made up of beliefs and rites (the sacred): Ø Durkheim conceptually limited the transformative effects of rites, as he stressed the way in which rituals served to tie together individuals in mechanical social solidarity. Ø The structure (and meaning) of religion and its cultural symbols is explained through the primitive classification between the sacred and the profane, and its underlying collective representation (totem). CLASS 15 – Analyzing culture and social change Ø Bibliography: Ø “Chapter 5” Ø Modernity: An Introduction to Modern Societies; Wiley- Blackwell (1996),by Stuart Hall, David Held, Don Hubert, Kenneth Thompson (eds.)