Habermas

Stefan Müller-Doohm, born in 1942, studied in Frankfurt under Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer and is now Professor Emeritus of Sociology and Director of the Research Centre for the Sociology of Intellectuals at the University of Oldenburg. His other works include Adorno: A Biography.

"This [book] makes for fascinating reading"The Guardian"Habermas is a biography of an accomplished living intellectual whose audience is extended much beyond the academic world. Stefan Müller-Doohm is a perfect storyteller and he tells the story of Habermas in such a way that you will not be able to put it down before you finish it. Nobody knows the art of biography better than Müller-Doohm."The Washington Book Review"Few would contest the verdict that Habermas has achieved—in both his philosophical work and in his role as a public intellectual—a place of enduring significance that surpasses that of any other thinker in our time. The definitive new biography by Stefan Müller-Doohm… lays out the evidence for this conclusion with great care and enormous sympathy for its protagonist."The Nation"Heidegger’s lapidary biographical summation, “The man was born, he worked, and then died,” may have been appropriate for Aristotle, but is woefully inadequate for the philosopher who is arguably our era’s version of the great Greek polymath, Jürgen Habermas. For not only is he still very much alive and producing new work at a vigorous pace, but it is also the case that his voluminous contributions to philosophy, sociology, political theory, and cultural criticism demand to be read in the context of his remarkable career as a committed public intellectual. As his masterful biography of Adorno already demonstrated, Stefan Müller-Doohm shows himself to be fully up to the task of discerning figures in the intricately woven carpet of a major thinker’s life and work."Martin Jay, University of California Berkeley"Habermas was and is an exemplary intellectual… he was a Berliner, soberly mindful of the weight of the old world, hopeful for the prospects of the new. This book is a monument to this challenge, and to his commitment."The Australian

• Table of ContentsAcknowledgementsPrefacePrologue: The Other among his PeersPart I: Catastrophe and EmancipationChapter 1: Disaster Years as Normality. Childhood and Youth in GummersbachBorn in 1929Turning point: 1945Chapter 2: At University in Göttingen, Zurich and BonnDoctorate on the philosophy of SchellingSpeaking out as a freelance journalistThe beginnings of a career as a public intellectualPart II: Politics and CritiqueChapter 3: Education intellectuelle in Café MarxMutual trust between Habermas and the AdornosHorkheimer’s animosities towards the ‘dialectical Mr H.’The ‘most promising intellectual’Chapter 4: Under the Aegis of Conflicting Personalities: Abendroth and GadamerA man of the democratic leftPositions in the dispute over the right form of critique and good politicsChapter 5: Back in Frankfurt. Torn between Academic Work and Political PracticeIn search of an epistemological foundation for critiqueThinking with the protest movement against the protest movementIn the line of fire from his own sideA new track in philosophical thoughtChapter 6: In the Ivory Tower of Social Scientific ResearchBetween Academic Management and ResearchA theory about the impossibility of not learningThe minefield of political interpretations in the ‘German Autumn’ResignationPart III: Science and CommitmentChapter 7: Genius Loci: In Frankfurt for the Third TimeThe major workThe theory of actionSystem and lifeworldEveryday life in FrankfurtChapter 8: New ProjectsUnder the spell of the philosophy of lawMorality and lawChapter 9: Battles over the Politics of IdeasOpinion leader of the new left?The historians’ debateHabermas as a sceptic towards reunificationChapter 10: Against Germanomania and NationalismHabermas’s ambiguous attitude towards military interventionsThe Asylum DebateA memorial to the murdered JewsPart IV: Cosmopolitan Society and JusticeChapter 11: Critique as a Vocation. The Transition into the Third MillenniumA plea for freedom of the will and the inviolability of the personThe philosopher as globetrotterMany honours and an affairChapter 12: The Taming of Capitalism and the Democratization of EuropeDemocratic politics Ð a counterbalance to capitalism?European integrationOn the way to a democratically constituted world orderChapter 13: Philosophy in the Age of Postmetaphysical ModernityWhat can I know? - Linguistic pragmatics as a form of naturalism and realismWhat should I do? From the demand of virtue to the assumption of rationalityWhat may I hope? Religion in a post-secular societyWhat is Man? Language and IntersubjectivityChapter 14: Books at an ExhibitionConsciousness-Raising and Rescuing CritiqueEpilogue: The Inner CompassNotesAppendixGenealogyChronologyList of Habermas’s lectures and seminarsBibliographyList of archivesIllustration creditsIndex