John Abromeit is an assistant professor in the Department of History and Social Studies Education at the State University of New York, Buffalo. He is the co-editor of Herbert Marcuse: Heideggerian Marxism (2005) and Herbert Marcuse: A Critical Reader (2004), and his articles and book reviews have appeared in Theory and Society; Theory, Culture and Society; Radical Philosophy and Constellations. Professor Abromeit previously held a Harper–Schmidt postdoctoral position in the social sciences in the University of Chicago Society of Fellows.

'Abromeit's book is the most exhaustive study of Horkheimer to date. His critical examination of the secondary literature is unparalleled, and his extremely detailed archival work, citation of sources, and textual exegesis, is exceptional. Indeed, it is hard to imagine anyone in the future adding much more to what he has accomplished here. This book will be the benchmark by which future Horkheimer scholarship will be measured.' David Ingram, Loyola University, Chicago

• Introduction; 1. Coming of age in Wilhelmine Germany; 2. Student years in Frankfurt; 3. A materialist interpretation of the history of modern philosophy; 4. The beginnings of a critical theory of contemporary society; 5. Horkheimer's integration of psychoanalysis into his theory of contemporary society; 6. Horkheimer's concept of materialism in the early 1930s; 7. The anthropology of the bourgeois epoch; 8. Reflections on dialectical logic in the mid 1930s; Excursus I. The theoretical foundations of Horkheimer's split with Erich Fromm in the late 1930s: Fromm's critique of Freud's drive theory; Excursus II. Divergence, estrangement, and gradual rapprochement: the evolution of Horkheimer and Adorno's theoretical relationship in the 1930s; 9. State capitalism - the end of Horkheimer's early critical theory; Epilogue: toward a historicization of Dialectic of Enlightenment and a reconsideration of Horkheimer's early critical theory.

John Abromeit is an assistant professor in the Department of History and Social Studies Education at the State University of New York, Buffalo. He is the co-editor of Herbert Marcuse: Heideggerian Marxism (2005) and Herbert Marcuse: A Critical Reader (2004), and his articles and book reviews have appeared in Theory and Society; Theory, Culture and Society; Radical Philosophy and Constellations. Professor Abromeit previously held a Harper–Schmidt postdoctoral position in the social sciences in the University of Chicago Society of Fellows.

'Abromeit's book is the most exhaustive study of Horkheimer to date. His critical examination of the secondary literature is unparalleled, and his extremely detailed archival work, citation of sources, and textual exegesis, is exceptional. Indeed, it is hard to imagine anyone in the future adding much more to what he has accomplished here. This book will be the benchmark by which future Horkheimer scholarship will be measured.' David Ingram, Loyola University, Chicago

• Introduction; 1. Coming of age in Wilhelmine Germany; 2. Student years in Frankfurt; 3. A materialist interpretation of the history of modern philosophy; 4. The beginnings of a critical theory of contemporary society; 5. Horkheimer's integration of psychoanalysis into his theory of contemporary society; 6. Horkheimer's concept of materialism in the early 1930s; 7. The anthropology of the bourgeois epoch; 8. Reflections on dialectical logic in the mid 1930s; Excursus I. The theoretical foundations of Horkheimer's split with Erich Fromm in the late 1930s: Fromm's critique of Freud's drive theory; Excursus II. Divergence, estrangement, and gradual rapprochement: the evolution of Horkheimer and Adorno's theoretical relationship in the 1930s; 9. State capitalism - the end of Horkheimer's early critical theory; Epilogue: toward a historicization of Dialectic of Enlightenment and a reconsideration of Horkheimer's early critical theory.