The Two Nightmares of Jürgen Habermas
In remembrance of Germany's acclaimed philosopher.
One of the peculiarities of English-language academic publishing is that, unlike the French and the Germans, and regardless how esoteric the subject, English university presses like to have an illustration on the front cover of their books. This is presumably just a convention, and not a business decision, sin...
Jürgen Habermas’ intellectual project was a direct response to the horrors of the 20th century, particularly the Nazi regime and the Holocaust. His work sought to reclaim rationality as a force for human emancipation, even as postmodern thought dismissed it as a tool of oppression. The strongest version of his argument is that language itself embeds a commitment to justification—a "transcendental" structure that makes total ideological control impossible. This is a powerful counter to Orwellian ...