Reading across the whole range of Habermas' work, this book traces the development of the theory of communicative reason from its inception to its defence against postmodernism. Bernstein's analyses are always problem centred and thematic rather than textual, making this a major contribution to the critical literature on Habermas.

The theory of recognition is now a well-established and mature research paradigm in philosophy, and it is both influential in and influenced by developments in other fields of the humanities and social sciences. From debates in moral philosophy about the fundamental roots of obligation, to debates in political philosophy about the character of multicultural societies, to debates in legal theory about the structure and justification of rights, to debates in social theory about the prospects...

The Critical Theory of Axel Honneth provides a comprehensive study of the work of Axel Honneth, tracing the theoretical trajectory from his earliest writings on philosophical anthropology to the development of a theory of recognition. The book argues that Honneth’s early work provides important insights for the reconstruction of the normative project of critical theory and the articulation of a conceptual framework for analyzing social relations of power and domination. Danielle Petherbrid...

Revolutionary theories from Marx onward have often struggled to unite the psychological commitments of individuals— understood as ideological— with the larger ethical or political goals of a social movement. As a psychiatrist, social theorist, and revolutionary, Frantz Fanon attempted to connect the ideological and the political. Fanon’s work gives both a psychological explanation of the origins of ideology and seeks to restore the individual to autonomy and political agency.This b...

Contemporary critical theory’s methodology is currently taking shape under the impact both of transformative internal develops within the discipline, and of external pressures and incentives arising from a series of international debates.In this book, Piet Strydom presents a groundbreaking treatment of critical theory’s methodology, using as a base the reconstruction of the left-Hegelian tradition, the relation between critical theory and pragmatism, and the associated metatheoreti...

An anthology of readings and extracts providing a comprehensive introduction to the main schools and positions of critical theory. The book is divided into five sections; structuralism and poststructuralism, psychoanalytical theory, Marxism, feminism, and post-foundational ethics and politics. It includes a general introduction covering the field of critical theory and identifies founding theorists and movements with a bibliography and notes.

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com.Over the past 15 years, Rainer Forst has developed a fundamental research programme within the tradition of Frankfurt School Critical Theory. The core of this programme is a moral account of the basic right of justification that humans owe to one another as rational beings. This account is put to work by Forst in articulating - both historically and p...

Critical theory was one of the most vigorous and insightful intellectual traditions of the twentieth-century. At its core was a critique of culture and consciousness tied to instrumental rationality and capitalist economic life. Yet, Michael J. Thompson argues in this highly original book that this once critical tradition has been domesticated - it no longer offers a philosophically convincing nor politically viable form of social critique.Thompson demonstrates that critical theory...

A watershed event in the field of sociology, this text introduced "a major breakthrough in the sociology of knowledge and sociological theory generally" (George Simpson, American Sociological Review ).In this seminal book, Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann examine how knowledge forms and how it is preserved and altered within a society. Unlike earlier theorists and philosophers, Berger and Luckmann go beyond intellectual history and focu...

On What Matters is a major work in moral philosophy. It is the long-awaited follow-up to Derek Parfit's 1984 book Reasons and Persons, one of the landmarks of twentieth-century philosophy. Parfit now presents a powerful new treatment of reasons, rationality, and normativity, and a critical examination of three systematic moral theories - Kant's ethics, contractualism, and consequentialism - leading to his own ground-breaking synthetic conclusion. Along the way he discusse...

Originally published in 1964, One-Dimensional Man quickly became one of the most important texts in the ensuing decade of radical political change. This second edition, newly introduced by Marcuse scholar Douglas Kellner, presents Marcuse's best-selling work to another generation of readers in the context of contemporary events.

This is a book about what many teachers know but are increasingly being prevented from talking about: that real education always involves a risk. The risk is there because, as W. B. Yeats has put it, education is not about filling a bucket but about lighting a fire. It is there because students are not to be seen as objects to be moulded and disciplined, but as subjects of action and responsibility. The Beautiful Risk of Education is organised around a critical discussion of seven key educ...