The Communicative Ethics Controversy

by Seyla Benhabib (Editor)

This timely reader in moral philosophy addresses a controversy that strongly affected recent European reflections on the relevance of ethics for theories of democratic institutions and democratic legitimacy. The debate centers around the idea of a communicative ethics as articulated by Jürgen Habermas and Karl-Otto Apel, and it is representative both of recent attempts to bridge the gap between Continental and Anglo-American philosophy and of the turn to language that has characterized much of recent philosophy. The Communicative Ethics Controversy illustrates philosophical dialogue in action, moving from theses to counterarguments to rejoinders. Theoretical statements by Habermas, Apel, and two of their leading students, Dietrich Böhler and Robert Alexy, are followed by a series of five arguments by their leading critics, who represent viewpoints ranging from Kantian idealism to Wittgensteinian ordinary-language theory. Fred Dallmayr's introduction and Seyla Benhabib's incisive conclusion place the debate in perspective, bringing it up to date and relating it to the Anglo-American context.Seyla Benhabib is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Women's Studies at the State University of New York, Stony Brook. Fred Dallmayr is Packey Dee Professor of Government at the University of Notre Dame. Robert Alexy. Karl-Otto Apel. Seyla Benhabib. Dietrich Bohler. Jurgen Habermas. Otfried Hoffe. KarlHeinz Ilting. Hermann Lubbe. Herbert Schnadelbach. Albrecht Wellmer.

390 pages, Paperback

First published October 22, 1990

About the author

Seyla Benhabib is a Turkish Jewish professor of political science and philosophy at Yale, and director of the program in Ethics, Politics, and Economics, and a well-known contemporary philosopher. She previously taught in the departments of philosophy at Boston University, SUNY Stony Brook, the New School for Social Research, and the Department of Government at Harvard University.

She is the author of several books, most notably about the philosophers Hannah Arendt and Jürgen Habermas. She has also worked with many important philosophers and scholars, including Herbert Marcuse. Benhabib is well known for combining critical theory with feminist theory.