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Vergangenheit als Zukunft
Jürgen Habermas is one of the best-known and most influential philosophers in Europe today. Heir to the Frankfurt school, his reputation rests on more than thirty years of groundbreaking works on society knowledge, history, technology; ethics, and many other subjects. He is also a familiar figure in his native Germany where he has often played a prominent role in public de-bates. In recent years, he has spoken out ever more directly on the extraordinary changes taking place in Germany, Europe, and the world.
This volume of interviews reveals Habermas's passionate engagement with contemporary issues. Wide-ranging and informal, the interviews focus on matters of decisive importance to Germany and the rest of the world in the 1990s: German unification; recent explosive debates about interpretations of German history, Germany's asylum policies, and the Nazi era; efforts to create a cooperative, peaceful Europe; and the significance of the Persian Gulf War. A final interview focuses on the relation between theory and practice—between philosophy and the so-called real world. In an afterword to the volume, Habermas addresses a broad spectrum of issues facing Germany and other nations in this final decade of the century.
Ably translated and annotated by Max Pensky, professor of philosophy at the State University of New York-Binghamton, The Past as Future provides a striking portrait of an intellectual who is equally at home in the world of academic philosophy and in mainstream debate—and who can make valuable connections between the two.
- GenresHistory
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First published January 1, 1993
About the author
Jürgen Habermas
383 books734 followersJürgen Habermas was a German sociologist and philosopher in the tradition of critical theory and American pragmatism. He is perhaps best known for his work on the concept of the public sphere, the topic of his first book entitled The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. His work focuses on the foundations of social theory and epistemology, the analysis of advanced capitalistic societies and democracy, the rule of law in a critical social-evolutionary context, and contemporary politics—particularly German politics. Habermas's theoretical system is devoted to revealing the possibility of reason, emancipation, and rational-critical communication latent in modern institutions and in the human capacity to deliberate and pursue rational interests.
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October 17, 2024
A WRITTEN “INTERVIEW” WITH THE FAMED GERMAN SOCIAL PHILOSOPHER
Jürgen Habermas (born 1929) is a German philosopher and sociologist who is one of the leading figures of the Frankfurt School.
The Foreword by Peter Hohendahl states, “Among the numerous interviews Jürgen Habermas has given during the last decade or so, ‘The Past as Future’ stands out … It is not only his most extensive dialogue to date but also his most carefully prepared exchange of questions and answers. Michael Haller, the interviewer, submitted his questions in writing, thereby giving Habermas time to go beyond an immediate response and to reflect on the broader ramifications of the subject.”
Michael Haller’s own Preface says, “my interview with Jürgen Habermas was ultimately conducted by correspondence… The written form of the interview will not, of course, permit the kind of spontaneity and conversational give-and-take that one expects from spoken interviews. But it compensates the reader with the clarity of its construction and the succinctness of its form.”
Habermas quotes some economic statistics, then comments, “It means an even more sharply segmented society: while the rich get richer, the poor not only get poorer, but more and more of the poor will be pushed out of the system and into the underclasses, where they will have no access to veto power and won’t be able to improve their situation through their own efforts. In a word: the social climate is going to get a lot colder.” (Pg. 56)
He states, “I never left any doubt about my own refusal of Stalinism and my assessment of Soviet Marxism… In this sense there can be no talk of ‘ambivalence.’ Given the political socialization of my generation in the late 1940s and early 1950s, this is no great achievement. I didn’t stand on the barricades as a Maoist in 1968 either, as did many of the new philosophers who thought at that time to order … farewell to the ‘master thinkers.’ Life histories are different. There are no representative individuals.” (Pg. 74)
He continues, “I saw then, and still see now, nothing that refutes in advance the possibility of a democratic potential within a self-revolutionizing state socialism. With the opening of the Wall, however, all the dams have burst. I say this with no regrets.” (Pg. 76)
He argues, “One can speak of the failure of the experiment of grass-roots democracy only if one regards it to concretistically, as some Greens do themselves. The New Social Movements indeed no longer belong to the type of mass movement that occupied the streets… The demonstrations in which the outrage at social poverty in the GDR speaks out belongs rather to the traditional type … Nevertheless, the belief in the subject in large format, like the belief in direct access to the great system, is, thank God, washed up.” (Pg. 92)
He explains, “I never say that people WANT to act communicatively, but that they HAVE to… Furthermore, we can’t equate communicative action with argumentation. Communicative action normally takes place in a common language and in a linguistically developed, preinterpreted world, in shared cultural forms of life, normative contexts, handed-down traditions, customs, routines, and so forth---in lifeworlds that are porous to one another. This communicative action is not the same thing as argumentation. Arguments are improbable: they are heavily presuppositioned forms of communication, islands in the sea of praxis.” (Pg. 111-112)
He states, “I’ve always said that ‘socialism’ is useful only if it serves as the idea of the epitome of the necessary conditions for emancipated forms of life, about which the participants themselves would have to reach understanding.” (Pg. 113)
He recalls his feelings upon learning of the death camps: As the shock of those images and reports reached me, I was sixteen years old. I knew that, despite everything, we would live on in the anxiety of regression, that we would have to carry on in that anxiety.” (Pg. 119)
This is a very useful book for understanding Habermas’s ideas and opinions.
Jürgen Habermas (born 1929) is a German philosopher and sociologist who is one of the leading figures of the Frankfurt School.
The Foreword by Peter Hohendahl states, “Among the numerous interviews Jürgen Habermas has given during the last decade or so, ‘The Past as Future’ stands out … It is not only his most extensive dialogue to date but also his most carefully prepared exchange of questions and answers. Michael Haller, the interviewer, submitted his questions in writing, thereby giving Habermas time to go beyond an immediate response and to reflect on the broader ramifications of the subject.”
Michael Haller’s own Preface says, “my interview with Jürgen Habermas was ultimately conducted by correspondence… The written form of the interview will not, of course, permit the kind of spontaneity and conversational give-and-take that one expects from spoken interviews. But it compensates the reader with the clarity of its construction and the succinctness of its form.”
Habermas quotes some economic statistics, then comments, “It means an even more sharply segmented society: while the rich get richer, the poor not only get poorer, but more and more of the poor will be pushed out of the system and into the underclasses, where they will have no access to veto power and won’t be able to improve their situation through their own efforts. In a word: the social climate is going to get a lot colder.” (Pg. 56)
He states, “I never left any doubt about my own refusal of Stalinism and my assessment of Soviet Marxism… In this sense there can be no talk of ‘ambivalence.’ Given the political socialization of my generation in the late 1940s and early 1950s, this is no great achievement. I didn’t stand on the barricades as a Maoist in 1968 either, as did many of the new philosophers who thought at that time to order … farewell to the ‘master thinkers.’ Life histories are different. There are no representative individuals.” (Pg. 74)
He continues, “I saw then, and still see now, nothing that refutes in advance the possibility of a democratic potential within a self-revolutionizing state socialism. With the opening of the Wall, however, all the dams have burst. I say this with no regrets.” (Pg. 76)
He argues, “One can speak of the failure of the experiment of grass-roots democracy only if one regards it to concretistically, as some Greens do themselves. The New Social Movements indeed no longer belong to the type of mass movement that occupied the streets… The demonstrations in which the outrage at social poverty in the GDR speaks out belongs rather to the traditional type … Nevertheless, the belief in the subject in large format, like the belief in direct access to the great system, is, thank God, washed up.” (Pg. 92)
He explains, “I never say that people WANT to act communicatively, but that they HAVE to… Furthermore, we can’t equate communicative action with argumentation. Communicative action normally takes place in a common language and in a linguistically developed, preinterpreted world, in shared cultural forms of life, normative contexts, handed-down traditions, customs, routines, and so forth---in lifeworlds that are porous to one another. This communicative action is not the same thing as argumentation. Arguments are improbable: they are heavily presuppositioned forms of communication, islands in the sea of praxis.” (Pg. 111-112)
He states, “I’ve always said that ‘socialism’ is useful only if it serves as the idea of the epitome of the necessary conditions for emancipated forms of life, about which the participants themselves would have to reach understanding.” (Pg. 113)
He recalls his feelings upon learning of the death camps: As the shock of those images and reports reached me, I was sixteen years old. I knew that, despite everything, we would live on in the anxiety of regression, that we would have to carry on in that anxiety.” (Pg. 119)
This is a very useful book for understanding Habermas’s ideas and opinions.
December 30, 2015
I haven't read Habermas's main works, but this presents a nice application of his views. While he is often portrayed as a (naive) neo-Kantian, Habermas shows some awareness of his own approach and shows us at least, how he characterizes the nature of Europe post-Gulf War I. Here, he sums of the problems inherent within the German unification post-Cold War and talks about trends that are all the more relevant today. The title is a bit cryptic but his careful observations of ideological rational analysis of various problems still holds today. I don't know much about the details how of how the reunification happened (Germany as a whole has been an ideological heteronomy since its initial unification through the Prussian Hegemony in the late 1800s)... but perhaps these problems are now magnified through the formation of the Euro as a cobbled economic and political entity.
This work is a pretty good introduction to some applications of his thoughts, although he is correct, philosophy today is far too stuck navel gazing at its own immanent problems.
This work is a pretty good introduction to some applications of his thoughts, although he is correct, philosophy today is far too stuck navel gazing at its own immanent problems.
to-keep-reference
October 18, 2016Discutido en Imperio Pág.16
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews