(american university studies - volume 62) leon bailey-critical theory and the sociology of...

7/25/2019 (American University Studies - Volume 62) Leon Bailey-Critical Theory and the Sociology of Knowledge_ a Compar

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Leon Bailey

Critical Theoryand the

Sociology of Knowledge

A Comparative Study

in the Theory of Ideology

PETER LAN G

New York Washington, D.C./Baltimore San Francisco

Bern Frankfurt am Main Berlin Vienna Paris


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Libra ry of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication D ata

Bailey, Leon.

Critical theory and the sociology of knowledge: a comparative study in thetheory of ideology/ Leon Bailey,

p. cm. (American University Studies. Series XI,

Anthropology and sociology; vol. 62)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Know ledge, Soc iolo gy of. 2. Critical theory. 3. Ideology.

I. Title . II. Series.

BD175.B34 140dc20 93-6953

ISBN 0-8204-1988-5

ISBN 0-8204-3654-2 (pbk)

ISSN 0740-0489

Die Deutsche Bibliothek-CIP-Einheitsaufnahme

Bailey, Leon.

Critical theory and the sociology of knowledge: a comparative study in the

theory of ideology/ Leon Bailey. - New York; Washington, D.C./ Baltimore;

Bern; Frankfurt am Main; Berlin; Vienna; Paris: Lang.

(American Un iversity Studies. Series X I, A nthropology and

sociology; vol. 62)

ISBN 0-8204-1988-5ISBN 0-8204-3654-2 (pbk)

NE: American University Studies/11

The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability

of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity

of the Council of Library Resources.

1994, 1996 Peter Lang Publishing, Inc., New York

All rights reserved.Reprint or reproduction, even partially, in all forms such as microfilm,

xerography, microfiche, microcard, and offset strictly prohibited.

Printed in the United States of America.


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For

Margarita, Zachary, Dylan and Kari


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Like i ts existent ia l ist counterparts, [ the sociology

of know l edge] cal ls ev ery t hi ng i nt o quest i on and

crit icizes nothing.

Theodor W. Adorno


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Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments xi

Introduction 1

Chapter One: The Origins and Development of the 5

Frankfurt Schools Critical Theory of Society

Chapter Two: The Origins and Development of 41

Karl Mannheim's Sociology of Knowledge

Chapter Three: The Frankfurt School's Critique of 63

Mannheim's Sociology of Knowledge

Chapter Four: Central Problems in the Theory of Ideology: 81

A Comparison of Critical Theory and

the Sociology of Knowledge

Chapter Five: Conclusion: The Relevance of the 105

Comparison for Contemporary Debates inSocial Theory

Notes 123

Bibliography 185

Index 209


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Preface andAcknowledgments

This book developed from a doctoral dissertation submitted to the

Department of Sociology at Purdue University in 1987. In revisingand expanding the manuscript for publication, I have retained most

of the original text. The detailed background expositions in

Chapters 1, 2 and 3 should be useful to readers unfamiliar with the

intellectual history related to Lukacs, the Frankfurt School and

Mannheim.

Changes in the text have been designed primarily to expand

the arguments related to the contemporary relevance of the contrast

between critical theory and the sociology of knowledge. The Intro-duction has been revised to strengthen intimations of the contempo-

rary relevance of the contrast in the context of newly rising spectres

of totalizing critique, and substantial additions have been made to

the closing discussion of Habermas in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 has been

thoroughly revised. Most of the material in this chapter is new, par-

ticularly the final section which seeks to demonstrate that the central

issues posed in the Frankfurt School's critique of Mannheim's sociol-

ogy of knowledge recur within current debates in the theory of ideol-ogy. The arguments of Chapters 4 and 5 are probably contentious

enough to interest more specialized readers. References to the most

recent literature in the relevant areas of inquiry have been incorpo-

rated throughout.

I would like to express my gratitude to the original examining

committee for the dissertation: Dean Knudsen (Chair), Robert

Perrucci, Walter Hirsch, and Richard Hogan. I also would like to

acknowledge the generous support and encouragement I receivedfrom Fred Dallmayr during the early phases of the original project.


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xii Preface and Acknowledgments

As the dissertation evolved into the present book, I have re-

ceived helpful comments on the manuscript from Richard Walker,Douglas Kellner, Frank Verges, and David Ingram. Any flaws that

remain are my responsibility.

Thanks are also due to Elise Wilson for her care in typing the

manuscript and to Richard Walker for his superb technical assistance

in the preparation of the final version of the text.

The book is dedicated to my wife, Margarita Barbosa, and our

children, Zachary, Dylan, and Kari.


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The appearance of Karl Mannheim's Ideology and Utopia in 1929

presented an important challenge to the Marxian theory of ideology.

In Mannheim's account of the origins of the sociology of knowledge,

Marxism was credited with the development of a "total" concept ofideology that called the entire world view of its opponents into ques-

tion. By linking the ideological distortion of thought to social posi-

tion, Marxism had raised doubts about the very possibility of its op-

ponents ever attaining an adequate knowledge of social reality. But

in one respect Mannheim charged that Marxism had not gone far

enough. Specifically, it had failed to call its own position into ques-

tion and therefore subject all forms of social thought, including itself,to ideological analysis. This final, radical step, transforming the the-

ory of ideology into a general theory of the social determination of

all knowledge of history and society, had been taken only with the de-

velopment of the sociology of knowledge. Marxism itself was now

to be unmasked as merely one particular standpoint, as one ideology

among all the others. Thus the ironic result of Mannheim's view

was that the genuine contribution of the Marxian theory of ideology

could be preserved only by revoking its substantive claims to truth.

Among those who opposed Mannheim's transformation of the

theory of ideology into a general sociology of knowledge were the

three central theorists of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research

(commonly known as the "Frankfurt School"): Max Horkheimer,

Theodor W. Adorno, and Herbert Marcuse. In their view, Mann-

heim's extension of the concept of ideology to encompass all forms of

social thought had deprived it of all critical content by severing it from any definite relation to a concrete historical conception of truth.

As a result, they believed Mannheim's sociology of knowledge, de-

spite all wishful assurances to the contrary, to be indistinguishable


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2Critical Theory and the Sociology of Knowledge

from epistemological relativism. Given this central line of criticism,

the Frankfurt School continually returned to Mannheim's work, sub-jecting it to close scrutiny and attempting to distinguish it from their

own critical theory of society.

The present work seeks to examine the central problems posed

by the contrast between the critical theory of the Frankfurt School

and Karl Mannheim's sociology of knowledge. It is widely recog-

nized that the Frankfurt School's critique of Mannheim constitutes

one of the most important contributions to what has become known

as the "Sociology of Knowledge Dispute."1 Passing references to the

Frankfurt School's critique of Mannheim are commonplace in the

specialized literature on the Frankfurt School, as well as in the liter-

ature on Karl Mannheim.2 There have also been a variety of more

extended reviews of the Frankfurt School's critique of Mannheim,

many concluding with either partisan affirmations or denials of its

ultimate success.3 Yet despite the fact that the contrast between criti-

cal theory and the sociology of knowledge has often been noted inthe literature, it has never been fully analyzed at sufficient length. As

a result, the exact terms of the contrast and the issues at stake have

remained somewhat obscure. Nowhere does one find an elaboration

of the relevant issues within a more comprehensive comparative

perspective. Such a comparative reconstruction of these two con-

flicting approaches to the theory of ideology is, however, essential

for a clearer view of precisely what is at issue.

It is also essential for an understanding of the contemporary

relevance of the contrast. Recent years have witnessed a renewed

interest in the theory of ideology and an increased awareness that

the interpretation and critique of ideology involve issues that are

central to general social theory.4 Far from simply occupying the po-

sition of a specialty field within sociology or political science, the the-

ory of ideology inevitably involves considerations related to the logic

and method of the social sciences, substantive theories of contempo-rary societies, and problems of rationality, justification and truth.

Since these issues lie at the heart of the contrast between critical


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In t roduct ion 3

theory and the sociology of knowledge, a comparative reconstruc-

tion of the contrast may hope to be of some relevance to more con-temporary debate on these issues.

Recent years have also witnessed renewed debates concerning

the current status and the continued viability of the theory of ideol-

ogy. Particularly strong challenges to the project of ideology critique

have been issued from within poststructuralist and postmodernist

currents of thought. Some authors from within these traditions have

rejected the critical conception of ideology as "false consciousness"

because of its association with allegedly problematic notions of truth,

subjectivity and totality.5 Others retain the concept of ideology but

vigorously extend its application to the point where it seems to en-

gulf all thought, language and discourse.6 In a manner directly remi-

niscent of Mannheim, albeit from within a different idiom, these

thinkers, too, identify the concept of ideology with the "perspectivis

tic" qualities inherent in all language, knowledge and belief. In ei-

ther case, whether continued use of the concept of ideology is for-mally retained or rejected, there has developed within poststruc-

turalist and postmodernist circles a persistent tendency to imply that

all thought is "ideological" to the extent that it is necessarily limited,

perspectivistic and contextbound.7 As a result, within contemporary

debates about the status of the theory of ideology we are once again

confronted with the contrast between a "totalized" conception of

ideology that is applied to all thought and a "determinate" concep-

tion of ideology that carries the specific meaning of "false conscious-

ness." Because the contrast between these two formulations of the

concept of ideology is central to the general contrast between critical

theory and the sociology of knowledge, we find additional grounds

for the hope that a comparative reconstruction of these two conflict-

ing approaches may be of more than merely historical interest. In

working through the differences between critical theory and the soci-

ology of knowledge, important systematic questions in the theory ofideology must be confrontedquestions that have reappeared in

new forms within more contemporary debates.


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4 Critical Theory and the Sociology of Knowledge

Our reconstruction of the contrast between critical theory and

the sociology of knowledge will therefore combine the consideration

of certain issues in intellectual history with an analysis of the system

atics of the theory of ideology. Chapters 1 and 2 seek to provide the

historical and intellectual background necessary for an adequate

comprehension of the contrast by offering overviews of the origins

and development of critical theory and the sociology of knowledge

respectively. In these chapters, considerable attention is devoted to

the decisive impact of Georg Lukacs' History and Class Conscious-

ness (1923) on the intellectual development of both the FrankfurtSchool and Karl Mannheim. These rather extended discussions are

necessary because it is only against the background of the common

formative influence of Lukacs' seminal work that it becomes possible

to reveal both the underlying points of agreement, as well as the de-

cisive differences between critical theory and the sociology of knowl-

edge. Chapter 3 presents a chronological review of the Frankfurt

School's critique of Mannheim's sociology of knowledge designed to

sketch out its essential themes and begin to bring the central points of

contention into clearer relief. These key issues then receive more ex-

tended consideration in Chapter 4 which develops the comparative

reconstruction of the two approaches and offers an evaluation of

their relative merits. This reconstruction and evaluation revolves

around four analytical problems central to the theory of ideology: 1)

the concept of totality, 2) the relation between consciousness and so-

cial existence, 3) the concept of ideology, and 4) the problem of truth. By way of conclusion, Chapter 5 examines the contemporary rele-

vance of the contrast by drawing a number of parallels to ongoing

debates in social theory today. The continued importance of the cen-

tral analytical problems highlighted by the contrast between critical

theory and the sociology of knowledge will be examined. The con-

temporary significance of the contrast between "totalized" as op-

posed to "determinate" conceptions of ideology also will be assessed.


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Chapter One

The Origins and Developmentof the Frankfurt School'sCritical Theory of Society

In his 1931 inaugural address as Director of the Institute for Social

Research, Max Horkheimer outlined the distinguishing features of

the research programme that would guide the Institute's work under

his leadership.1 Horkheimer announced that the Institute would seek

to bring the methods of empirical social research to bear on the great questions of classical social philosophy. It was hoped that such a

strategy might yield results of mutual benefit to these traditionally

separate endeavors. Problems of social philosophy could be posed in

more precise terms and, at the same time, specialized inquiries would

be invested with greater philosophical significance.

Inevitably, Horkheimer noted, this programme would require a

broad interdisciplinary effort in which concrete investigations by

philosophers, sociologists, political economists, historians and psy-

chologists were organized within a common theoretical problematic.

Particularly important to the articulation of this common problem-

atic, in his view, was the task of clarifying "the interconnection be-

tween the economic life of society, the psychic development of indi-

viduals and transformations in the realm of culture."2 By tracing the

mediated relationships between these various aspects of the social

totality, he hoped the Institute might concretely reformulate the clas-sical concerns of social philosophy and develop a comprehensive the-

oretical framework for the critical analysis of modem society.


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The elaboration of this ambitious programme provided the im-

petus for some of the most creative contributions to twentieth cen-

tury philosophy and social theory.3 Even a cursory examination of

the Institute's journals, from the early Z ei t schr i f t f i i r Sozia l fo r

schung and Studies in Philosophy and Social Science to the later

Frankfur ter Bei t rage zur Sozio logie, reveals an impressive array of

contributors and an astonishingly broad range of investigations.

Although the contemporary reputation of the "Frankfurt School"

rests primarily on the more theoretical works of its central figures,

the scope of the empirical work done under the Institute's auspices

should not be forgotten. While never uncritical in their acceptance of

empirical techniques and always inclined to assert the primacy of

theory, Horkheimer and his colleagues actually pioneered the intro-

duction of empirical methods in German sociology. The empirical

projects of the Institute, including such largescale collective efforts

as St udien i iher Aut or i t at und Fami l ie and St udi es i n Prejud i ce,rep-

resent important facets of the interdisciplinary research programme

first outlined in Horkheimer's inaugural address.The task of elaborating the general theoretical programme of

the Frankfurt School was assumed primarily by Horkheimer,

Herbert Marcuse and Theodor W. Adorno. Even when dealing with

these central theorists, however, talk of a unitary "Frankfurt

School" may be misleading. For the notion of a distinct "school"

may be taken to mean a level of doctrinal consensus which in this

case obscures significant differences of interest and emphasis.4 What

the key figures of the Frankfurt School shared was a common theo-

retical problematic drawn largely from the legacies of Hegel, Marx,

and Freud. This shared problematic served to distinguish their criti-

cal theory of society from all forms of "traditional" theory, but within

its general parameters, diverse responses could and did develop.

In what follows primary emphasis will be given to the develop-

ment of what may be taken as the common programme shared by

Horkheimer, Adorno and Marcuse, although where necessary a dis-cussion of significant variations among these three theorists will be


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The Frankfurt School's Critical Theory o f Society 7

introduced. A full discussion of such variations would require a

major work in itself, and in any event, it is an overview of the com-

mon programme of the Frankfurt School that is most relevant for

the contrast with Karl Mannheim's sociology of knowledge to be de-

veloped in later chapters.

The Frankfurt School's theoretical programme developed from

within an intellectual tradition variously referred to as "Western

Marxism," "Hegelian Marxism" or "Critical Marxism."5 As a dis-

tinct current within Marxist thought, Western Marxism is character-

ized by the insistence that Marxism has the status of a dialectical cri-tique rather than a positive science. Typically this claim is defended

by way of a reconstruction of the philosophical origins of Marxism in

the Hegelian dialectic. By placing the dialectics of subject and object,

consciousness and reality, at the center of their interpretation of

Marxism, Western Marxists have developed a focus on questions of

subjectivity, consciousness and culture largely ignored in more objec

tivist and determinist readings of Marx. Whereas the latter see such

problems within the context of a mechanical relation between eco-

nomic base and ideological superstructure, Western Marxists have

insisted that consciousness and culture cannot be reduced to mere

epiphenomena of economic development. Consciousness is seen as

fundamentally constitutive of social reality, not as something merely

chimerical in relation to the objective economic dynamics of society.

In Germany two seminal works published in 1923 were espe-

cially important in the origins of Western Marxism: Georg Lukacs'History and Class Consciousness and Karl Korsch's M arxi sm and

Phi losophy.6 Both books were written as contributions to the wide-

spread European debates about "the crisis of Marxism" in the early

twenties. In the aftermath of World War I, the European socialist

movements entered a period of ferment and critical reflection. The

experiences of the preceding decade, which had included the capitu-

lation of the German Social Democratic Party to the war effort, theBolshevik success in Russia and failed revolutionary attempts in

Germany, Austria, Hungary and Italy, all seemed to demand a


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thorough rethinking of the prevailing forms of theory and practice.

Lukacs and Korsch had been active participants in the

Communist parties of Hungary and Germany respectively and both

were concerned to draw the essential lessons from those experi-

ences. This led them to challenge the mechanical, "scientific"

Marxism of the Second (Social Democratic) International, as well as

similar tendencies that had begun to appear in the new Third

(Communist) International. They were particularly concerned to ex-

plain why revolutionary movements had failed in situations where

all the objective preconditions for revolution seemed to be present.According to both Lukacs and Korsch, one of the chief sources of

error was to be found in mechanical Marxism's belief in the in-

evitability of socialism and its consequent neglect of the problem of

revolutionary subjectivity. They argued that all the objective precon-

ditions for the transition to socialism might well be present, but

without the active intervention of a fully developed, class conscious

proletariat, the revolution would be doomed to failure. Whereas the

determinism of the mechanical Marxists had led them to conceive of

revolution as an almost automatic result of the objective laws of po-

litical economy, Lukacs and Korsch stressed the vital importance of

conscious insight and activity as subjective preconditions for socialist

revolution.

To put it mildly, neither H i sto ry and Class Consciousness nor

M arx i sm and Phi losophy were well received within official Party

circles. Although both Lukacs and Korsch had regarded their works

as contributing to the recovery of a genuinely revolutionary

Marxism for the developing Communist movement, their philo-

sophical interpretations of the nature of Marxian theory were clear-

ly too far at variance with the emerging orthodoxy of the Third

International. At the Fifth World Congress of the Third Interna-

tional held in Moscow in 1924, Lukacs and Korsch were both singled

out for official denunciation. Lukacs was forced to make various ac-

commodations and selfcriticisms in order to remain in the Party.Korsch, for his part, refused to make such accommodations and, as a


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result, was eventually expelled from the German Communist Party

in 1926. Thus in varying ways, both Lukacs and Korsch fell victim to

the "Bolshevization" of the European Communist parties in the af-

termath of the Russian Revolution.7

The critical reinterpretations of Marxism offered by Lukacs

and Korsch did, however, exert a broadranging impact on

independent leftist intellectuals outside the established Party appa-

ratuses. Lukacs' History and Class Consciousnesswas especially in-

fluential in these circles because of the great philosophical sophisti-

cation with which its themes were developed.8 For independent

Marxist intellectuals, H i st ory and Cl ass Consci ousness represented

a brilliant, even if at points very problematic, attempt to demon-

strate the intellectual superiority of Marxism over all bourgeois

philosophical efforts.

Although Lukacs himself soon abandoned His tory and Class

Consciousness, the further elaboration of Western Marxist thought

was taken up by othersmost notably, by the central figures of the Frankfurt School. Because of the decisive impact of His to ry and

Class Consciousness on the development of the Frankfurt School's

critical theory of society, several of its central themes and the way

these themes became incorporated into the common theoretical pro-

gramme of the Frankfurt School must be examined at greater length.

An elaboration of these central themes also will help prepare the

basis for the discussion of Mannheim's reception of His to ry and

Class Consciousnessthat will follow in Chapter 2.

Throughout History and Class Consciousness, Lukacs' over-

riding philosophical concern was to recover the precise meaning and

significance of the Marxian dialectic. For Lukacs, the central focus

of Marx's original method had been "the dialectical relation between

subject and object in the historical process."9 Through a materialist

transformation of Hegel's idealist dialectic, Marx had developed the

fundamental premise that the realm of sociohistorical reality is con-stituted through a dialectic of subjective and objective forces. Based

on this premise, the fundamental task of Marxian theory became the


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The Frankfurt School's Critical Theory of Society 11

Lukacs demonstrated that these features of Marx's analysis

cannot easily be reduced to fit the framework of a positive science ofthe "iron laws" of economic development; rather they show the dis-

tinctive status of Marx's theory as a c r i t i q ueof political economy.

The essence of Marxism as critique, according to Lukacs, is found

precisely in its aim to retranslate fetishized appearances back into

the essential processes of human social activity which have produced

them. Marxian theory thereby came to be understood as a method

for bringing to consciousness a critical understanding of the way in

which the objective social world is produced and reproduced throughhuman activity. For Lukacs, such awareness was seen as a prepara-

tory step toward, although certainly no substitute for, revolutionary

praxis designed to bring the system of objects and object relations

constituted through human activity under conscious regulation and

control. Under socialism the blind determination of the historical

process "behind the back" of humanity by objective forces of its own

creation was to be replaced by conscious mastery and rational plan-ning in accordance with the general interests of all.

Lukacs charged that the prevailing interpretations of Marxism

had failed to give an adequate account of Marx's dialectical method.

Social Democrats and Communists alike had tended to tailor their

interpretations of Marxism to fit the methodological framework of

the natural sciences. Social Democrats such as Eduard Bernstein

had completely rejected the dialectic as an alleged metaphysical

residue incompatible with Marx's otherwise scientific outlook.

Meanwhile, although Leninism was not without its voluntarist ele-

ments, the emergent orthodoxy of the Third International was em-

bracing Engels' conception of dialectical materialism as a science of

the universal laws of nature and society. The result in either case had

been the same: the dialectical relation between subject and object in

the historical process had not been given the prominence it

deserved.13Moreover, Lukacs argued, the reduction of Marx's method to

fit the framework of the positive sciences had also had serious, nega-


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tive consequences for revolutionary political practice. For implicit

within these interpretations was a tendency to regress back into the

"contemplative materialism" which Marx had superseded in his cri-

tique of Ludwig Feuerbach. Once again consciousness was placed in

a contemplative relation to an objective world governed by inex-

orable laws. By lapsing back into a contemplative stance and rein-

troducing dualisms of subject and object, consciousness and being,

such interpretations had destroyed the possibility of any proper un-

derstanding of the dialectical unity of theory and praxis.14

Lukacs did more than recover the dialectical character of

Marx's original method. He also broadened Marx's concept of com-

modity fetishism into the more generalized concept of "reification."

Lukacs' original German term for reification Verd ing l i chung

literally translates as "thingification." Lukacs used the term to de-

note the general tendency for objectifications of human activity to

become estranged from the subjects who produced them, thereby as-

suming a "natural" appearance which serves to mask their social

genesis. Within this condition of estrangement, human subjects fallprey to blind determination by objective forces of their own creation

and dead "things" appear to be the really active agents.

As a reflection of an objective condition of alienation, reifica-

tion simultaneously entails both cognitive and practical conse-

quences. Cognitively, it entails a failure to comprehend the total

process of the social production of reality and a fetishized adherence

to immediate appearances. Practically, it entails a loss of any sense

of active participation in the making of objective reality and a conse-

quent lapse into a contemplative stance toward the given reality as

something fixed and wholly external to the activity of human sub-

jects.

Lukacs' theory of reification, developed primarily in his pivotal

essay on "Reification and the Consciousness of the Proletariat,"

sought to show that the progressive spread of reification throughout

all spheres of life is intrinsic to the logic of capitalist development. In

this way, he was able to extend the concept of reification far beyond


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its origins in the critique of political economy to show its utility for a

critique of virtually all spheres of capitalist society and culture, in-cluding science and philosophy.15

The integration of Max Weber's analysis of formal rationaliza-

tion and bureaucracy into the Marxian critique of capitalism was one

of the most innovative elements of Lukacs' theory of reification.16

Pointing to commonalities in Marx's analysis of commodity ex-

change and Weber's analysis of formal, bureaucratic rationality,

Lukacs noted that both analyses had uncovered similar processes of

abstraction, formal standardization, quantification and specializa-

tion at work in capitalist society. Both Marx and Weber had shown

how in the course of capitalist development, the concrete, material

and qualitative aspects of things become devalued in relation to the

abstract, the formal and the quantitative. Both Marx and Weber had

shown how the development of a detailed division of labor in capi-

talist society had progressively fragmented both manual and mental

labor. Since these processes tend to veil the concrete, qualitative as-pects of reality and destroy the ability of individuals to readily com-

prehend the social whole, Lukacs related them to the progressive

spread of reification.

By synthesizing these elements of Marx's and Weber's earlier

analyses, Lukacs was able to link the spread of bureaucracy to the in-

creasing universality of commodity exchange and the partial ration-

alization of society and the state in accordance with the requirements

of capitalist reproduction.17 As the interlocking processes of com-

modity exchange and formal rationalization come to embrace almost

all areas of life, the material foundations of society are obscured, and

reification sinks all the more deeply into human consciousness.18

According to Lukacs' argument, reification under capitalism

threatens to become total. Capitalism subjects the world to more in-

clusive forms of socially organized control than all previous types of

society. The objective world confronting the individual is more thanever before the product of organized social activity. Yet despite this

progressive "socialization" of the world, humanity is increasingly re-


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distorted selfunderstanding, Marx had aimed to promote a

transformation of consciousness that would carry over into practice.To be sure, as Marx had made clear in his critique of the Young

Hegelians, more than a mere change in consciousness was necessary.

But by exposing the objective conditions under which ideological

consciousness was formed, Marxian theory had prepared the way

for a practical transcendence of those conditions through conscious,

selfdetermining praxis.24

Lukacs stressed that ideology must be conceived as "socially

necessary illusion."25 Ideology is objectively necessary because it is

systematically produced by the existing organization of society. Yet

ideology is also a form of false or illusory consciousness because it

fails to grasp essential aspects of the concrete, sociohistorical total-

ity. Unaware of its own social presuppositions, ideological con-

sciousness necessarily displays internal contradictions and failures in

its aspirations toward truth. Precisely in and through these failures,

ideology serves the social function of legitimating the status quo by veiling the true character of the established society. Therefore, ac-

cording to Lukeics' conception, ideology is a form of consciousness

which "fails subject ive ly to reach its selfappointed goals, while fur-

thering and realizing the ob jec t iveaims of society of which it is igno-

rant and which it did not choose."26

Ideological consciousness is not, however, wholly false or illu-

sory. Since it grasps some aspects of reality, its claims also embody

elements of truth that must be recovered by the critique of ideology.

As interpreted by Lukacs, the task of the critique of ideology involves

more than simply denouncing a set of ideas from the outside.27

Ideology is not to be dismissed out of hand solely by reference to the

social interests and functions that it serves. To properly accomplish

its aims, the critique of ideology also must explain the process by

which ideologies are formed and develop a substantive evaluation of

their truth content. Therefore, the stance of ideology critique towardthe objects of its critical scrutiny is best described in terms of the

Hegelian notion of Aufhebung. Ideologies are subjected to a form of


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criticism in which their contents are simultaneously negated,

preserved and transcended. Ideology critique aims to negate the

falsehoods and preserve the relative truths of ideology and, at the

same time, articulate a more comprehensive view.

Luk&cs' famous section on "The Antimonies of Bourgeois

Thought" provided a most striking example of this type of dialectical

ideology critique in action.28 Immersing himself in the philosophical

difficulties of classical German idealism, Lukacs found the occasion

for a demonstration of how social contradictions are manifested in

the realm of thought. For Lukacs, as for Marx, the greatness of clas-sical idealism was to be found in its genuine attempts to consistently

think its problems through to the end. Its tragedy was that it re-

mained mired in unresolved contradictions to which only mythologi-

cal solutions could be offered.

Initially focusing on the work of Kant, Lukacs argued that the

unresolved problems of Kantian philosophy could ultimately be

traced to its bourgeois individualist premises. The abstract individu-

alistic presuppositions of Kantian epistemology and ethics simply

mirrored the individualism of the bourgeois economic subject. The

opaque relation between the Kantian epistemological subject and the

unknowable "thinginitself" mirrored the estranged relation be-

tween the individual and the fetishized world of commodities. The

unbridgeable chasm between subject and object and all the other un-

resolved antimonies of Kantian philosophy were thus to be seen as

various reflections of the historical problematic of reification. It wasno wonder then, by Lukacs' account, that from Kant onward,

through the works of Fichte and Hegel, German idealism had vainly

searched for solutions to the problem of the thinginitself and unre-

solved antimonies between subject and object, freedom and necessity,

appearance and essence, facts and values, form and content.

Idealism was simply incapable of resolving in thought alone, contra-

dictions that were actually expressions of a real sociohistorical

process.

These aspects of H i stor y and Class Consciousness exerted a


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anisms of capital reproduction, and its active subjectivity is denied.

But because of its key position in the capitalist labor process, it re-

mains the central subject of that process. Ultimately the fetishized

world of commodities can be reproduced only through the living

labor of the proletariat. Thus Lukacs was led to the claim that objec-

tive knowledge of the total social process coincides with the self

knowledge and selfinterests (class consciousness and class interests)

of the proletariat. In gaining knowledge of the total process of capi-

talist production, the proletariat wins authentic knowledge of its

own historical mission.

In Lukacs' view, the proletariat is the only class capable of

transcending reification and grasping the totality. Only from the

class standpoint of the proletariat can the process of the social pro-

duction of reality become visible. Of the various classes and strata of

capitalist society, only the bourgeoisie and the proletariat can

achieve class consciousness in any welldeveloped form. All other

strata are simply buffeted about by social forces they neither control

nor comprehend. The class consciousness of the bourgeoisie, how-ever, has its own limits which are determined by its objective position

within the sociohistorical totality and the class interests associated

with this position. Because of such limitations, Lukacs argued, the

bourgeoisie remains incapable of fully comprehending the systemic

origins of the periodic crises of capitalist society or the necessity for

seeing beyond the deepening crisis tendencies of the system to grasp

the potential for a higher form of social organization. Only the pro-

letariat can recognize in thought and realize in practice the objectivehistorical possibilities lying beyond the confines of capitalism.32

For Lukacs, then, capitalism simultaneously produces the

threat of total reification and the class capable of transcending reifi-

cation. The sociohistorical process of humanity coming to con-

sciousness of itself as the author of its own history reaches fruition in

the class consciousness of the proletariat.33 The objective economic

dynamic produced by the laws of capitalist development leads to the

point of crisis and possible collapse, but it does not in itself lead be-



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identical subjectobject of history and his acceptance of the Leninist

conception of the vanguard party. By the end of the 1920s, when crit-ical theory first began to take shape, historical circumstances had

changed significantly. The prospects for successful proletarian revo-

lution were much less optimistic and would become even less so after

the triumph of fascism and the continuing degeneration of Soviet so-

cialism. Writing from the vantage point of their exile in New York

during the 1930s, Horkheimer and Marcuse continued to express

hopes regarding the possibility of proletarian revolution, but such

hopes became increasingly muted over time.39 Hopes regarding the

potential unity of theory and practice came to be replaced by re-

minders that their difference was not to be forgotten.40

Under historical circumstances in which hopes of revolutionary

social transformation had been defeated, the Frankfurt School be-

lieved that theory might still preserve a sphere of critical insight.

Critical social theory could continue to speak the truth about the es-

tablished state of affairs, even in the absence of clear links to prac-tice. And unlike Lukacs, the Frankfurt School consistently refused to

subordinate their theoretical work to the pragmatic dictates of any

particular political party or grouping. Suspicious of both the existing

Social Democratic and Communist parties, they insisted instead on

the need to maintain a position of strict intellectual independence.

Lukacs' conception of the proletariat as the identical subject

object of history also was rejected on more strictly philosophicalgrounds. It was evident to the Frankfurt School that Lukacs' reinter-

pretation of Marxism had not fully freed itself from the ontological

framework of Hegel's absolute idealism. Hegel had conceived his-

tory as the dialectical process of the absolute subject coming to con-

sciousness of itself in the world. The dialectic could take on a closed

form and the final outcome of the historical process could be assured

because the ultimate identity of subject and object had been presumed

from the outset. Lukacs' conception of history displayed essentially

the same teleological structure with one important change: the

Hegelian World Spirit was replaced by the Marxian proletariat. By


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forms of knowledge useful for the control of nature and for the re-

production and extension of existing forms of social life.53The status and intentions of critical theory were portrayed by

Horkheimer in a quite different light. He stressed that the basic tasks

of critical social theory go far beyond the description and explana-

tion of facts to include the development of a comprehensive critique

of the existing society in light of its suppressed potentialities for

greater human freedom and selfdetermination. Therefore, in con-

trast to the narrow technical interest guiding traditional theory, crit-

ical theory is motivated by an "interest in freedom." Rather thansimply accepting "the facts" as given, a critical theory of society is

charged with the comprehension of the total social process through

which those facts were produced. Rather than simply taking the

existing organization of society for granted, critical theory con-

sciously seeks to further the struggle for a more rational organiza-

tion of society.54

Calling for a reconsideration of traditional epistemology,

Horkheimer argued that all facts presented to the senses are socially

mediated in a double sense: "through the historical character of the

object perceived and through the historical character of the perceiv-

ing organ."55 The object of perception has been preformed by the so-

cial activity of human subjects, while the knowing subject has been

preformed by the objective dynamics of the social process. Because

both subject and object are historically shaped by organized social

activity, Horkheimer concluded that neither could be accepted assimply "given" or "natural." Nor could the spheres of "objectivity"

and "subjectivity" ("facts" and "values") be neatly segregated.

Whereas traditional theory had enshrined a static dualism of subject

and object, consciousness and being, critical theory was premised on

developing an awareness of their dialectical interrelation.56

In a manner that clearly harkened back to Lukacs' critique of

the contemplative character of bourgeois science and philosophy,

Horkheimer charged that traditional theory had failed to acknowl-edge the extent to which the objective world confronting the individ-

25 Critical Theory and the Sociology of Knozi'iedge


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The Frankfurt School's Critical Theory of Society TI

ual is a product of the activity of society as a whole.57 Traditional

theory reflects the passive stance of the individual before the reified

totality. But because critical theory recognizes that the reality con-

fronting the individual is a product of social activity, it can transcend

the passive, contemplative stance of traditional theory. Because so-

ciety is ultimately produced and reproduced through human activity,

it is, in Horkheimer's words, "a possible object of planful decision

and rational determination of goals."58

Horkheimer insisted that the goal of a rational society should

not be seen as an arbitrary, abstract utopia. He contended that thepossibility of a rational organization of society is actually "immanent

in human work" and that the will to freedom is "really innate in

everyone."59 For Horkheimer, it was no idle speculation to hope that

human actors might potentially understand and control that which

they have themselves produced. Moreover, Horkheimer empha-

sized, the indictment of the established society offered by critical

theory is based upon a concrete historical analysis of the objectivepossibilities for a more rational organization of society. By exposing

the historical contradictions between the expanding potentialities for

the realization of human freedom and the limitations imposed by ex-

isting social relations, critical theory seeks to demonstrate that a ra-

tional reorganization of society to more adequately fulfill and de-

velop human needs is already present as a real possibility.60

Horkheimer went on to draw several contrasts between the

logical structures of traditional and critical theory.61 Since critical

theory is guided by a concern for the future, it must move beyond the

classificatory procedures of empirical science. Within critical theory,

the relation of concepts to facts is not simply a relation of classes to

instances. Nor does critical theory take the form of a deductive sys-

tem. Critical theory does use inductive and deductive arguments,

but such formal logical operations do not exhaust its aims. Rather,

critical theory is "in its totality, the unfolding of a single existentialjudgment."62

By use of the term "existential judgment," Horkheimer was re-


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30 Critical Theorv and the Scdcijv.

, _- i . i n ; . ' 'terpretations of Marxis m. Severn1, reasons io:

opment of critical theory may he cited.

The first set of considerations were related to the grew;.-.-,

recognition that there had been important modifications in the struc-

ture and dynamics of capitalist society. As we have seen

Horkheimer's "Traditional and Critical Theory" already included an

awareness of such changes. But by the early 1940s,, serious doubts

had developed about the continued applicability of the classical for-

mulations of Marxian political economy, particularly the theory of

economic crises, to the new situation. In the internal debates withinthe Institute regarding the character of fascism and the significance

of developments within other Western capitalist societies, Friedrich

Pollack had suggested that growing state intervention in the man-

agement of economic affairs had nullified many of the economic cri-

sis mechanisms originally outlined by Marx.69 Pollack thus raised

the possibility that "state capitalism" might well be capable of con-

taining its economic contradictions. Although other economists

within the Institute continued to argue that capitalism was in-evitably doomed to collapse, Pollack's account had a major influence

in producing the later formulation of critical theory.

Several essays from the early 1940s written by Horkheimer and

Marcuse reveal the shift of analytical attention away from the crisis

tendencies of organized capitalism to its technicaladministrative

apparatus.70 Sensing that economic questions were becoming essen-

tially technical questions, Horkheimer and Marcuse began a detailed

examination of the social implications of technological rationality.

In effect, the Frankfurt School was returning to the MarxWeber

synthesis forged earlier by Lukacs. But the increasing pessimism of

the conclusions drawn from their analyses was actually bringing

them much closer to Weber than to Marx or Lukacs. Capitalism was

still regarded as a fundamentally irrational system of domination

and exploitation, but in their view, the true character of the system

was increasingly obscured by a "technological veil."71

A second set of general considerations responsible for the turn


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in critical theory was related to growing doubts regarding all as-

sumptions about historical progress. Certainly these doubts were

provoked by the triumph of fascism and the experience of forced

exile. Many of the Frankfurt School's early discussions of fascism

had pointed to fatal flaws in traditional liberal conceptions of reason

and progress which had helped prepare the way for fascism.72 By the

early 1940s, the Frankfurt School was also ready to reject all Marxist

assumptions about the necessity of historical progress. Walter

Benjamin's posthumously published "Theses on the Philosophy of

History" (1940) had pointed out the extent to which Marxism itselfhad suffered from its progressivist assumptions.73 Benjamin argued

that nothing had so damaged the workers' movements as the oft

proclaimed belief that history was on their side. According to

Benjamin, the traditional Marxian view of the necessary march of

historical progress produced by conflicts between the developing

forces of production and the existing relations of production had to-

tally failed to notice the connection between "the technical mastery of nature" and "the retrogression of society."74

The consequences of the turn to the critique of technical reason

achieved fullest elaboration in The D ial ect ic of Enl i ghtenment(1947),

written jointly by Horkheimer and Adorno.75 The result of a thor-

ough reconsideration of the Marxist philosophy of history, Dia lec t i c

of Enl i ghtenment presented a series of "philosophical fragments"

outlining most of the major themes of the later social philosophy of

the Frankfurt School.

In The Di al ect ic of Enl i ghtenment Horkheimer and Adorno set

out to expose the regressive underside of the Enlightenment project

of the domination of nature. Enlightenment thought had promised

that the efficient utilization of human reason would insure social

progress. Yet as Horkheimer and Adorno noted, "the fully enlight-

ened earth radiates disaster triumphant."76 The Enlightenment had

promised that as the powers of reason expanded, nature would beincreasingly subjected to human purposes and the hold of ancient

myths and prejudices would be destroyed. Reason would thus liber-


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32Critical Theory and the Sociology of Knowledge

ate humanity from theblind constraints ofboth nature and tradition.

Horkheimer and Adorno argued, however, that the events of mod

ern historydepression, fascism, and warhad revealed the recidi

vist elements latent within the Enlightenment conception of reason.

Over the course of its modem development the concept of reason

had gradually been stripped of all aims transcending the domination

of nature. The Enlightenment conception of rationality had been

progressively reduced to technical rationalityreason as an instru-

ment of control. But for Horkheimer and Adorno, the methodical in-

sanity of the modern era, reaching its summit in the murderous effi-ciency of fascist barbarism, had proved conclusively that social

progress could not simply be equated with technical progress.

The central thesis of Di alect i c of Enl i ght enment was that the

domination of nature is inextricably linked to the development of

forms of human domination. According to Horkheimer and Adorno,

progress in the domination of nature becomes entwined with the in-

creasingly efficient, albeit increasingly irrational, domination of hu-

manity by its own productive apparatus and the privileged groups

which control that apparatus. In the struggle for selfpreservation,

the violence directed against external nature is also directed against

inner, human nature. Thus through a fateful dialectical reversal, the

project of the domination of nature recoils back upon humanity itself

and the history of civilization comes to reveal a cruel paradox: as

the objective material preconditions for human freedom are estab-

lished, its subjective preconditions are destroyed. As technical

progress creates the objective possibility of a free and abundant life

for everyone, realization of that possibility becomes all the more re-

mote because human subjectivity has become thoroughly integrated

into an allembracing system of domination. The individual is re-

duced to a cog within the apparatus of administered society.

Opposition to the apparatus is either crushed, marginalized or ab-

sorbed. The fears and desires of the masses are mobilized and ma-

nipulated to serve the interests of domination. Within the context ofthe senseless perpetuation of enforced scarcity, renunciation and sac-


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rifice, technical rationality reverts to a new form of mythology, an

ideology legitimating new and more inclusive forms of human

domination.

The gloomy prognosis of Dialect ic of Enl ightenment sets the

basic framework for most of the later works of the Frankfurt School.

Many of its central themes are taken up, refined and elaborated

throughout their later writings. These continuing themes in the later

work of the Frankfurt School center mainly around their accounts of

the decline of the individual, the culture industry, and fascism.

The theme of the decline of the individual is one of the more constant themes of the Frankfurt School, found in both their earlier

and later writings. After D ia l ect i c of Enl i gh tenm ent , however, the

analysis of the decline of bourgeois subjectivity became a central pre-

occupation. According to the Frankfurt School, the transition from

liberal to organized capitalism had produced significant changes in

family structure and consequently, changes in the process of person-

ality formation.77 Under liberal capitalism the family had greater

autonomy, and the demands of competitive market activity had re-

quired that some individual capacities for independent judgment and

initiative be instilled through the socialization process. But with the

coming of organized capitalism, the social foundations of bourgeois

individuality, always precarious and classbound to begin with, had

gradually dissolved. Smaller forms of familybased enterprise were

eclipsed by giant corporations. The tentacles of the state were ex-

tended into more and more spheres of social life. Invaded from theoutside by these powers, the family had been reshaped to fit the new

configurations of state and economy. The individual now came to be

directly preformed by the demands of administered society from the

earliest age. As the exercise of individual reason and judgment was

replaced by more or less automatic mechanisms of adjustment, the

limited forms of individuation characteristic of the earlier bourgeois

era had declined. Individuality in any meaningful sense had ceased

to exist.78

The Frankfurt School's analysis of the culture industry is one of


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their most important contributions to the analysis of the new forms

of domination in advanced capitalist societies. According to the later

Frankfurt School, the expansion of the culture industry in the manip-

ulated capitalist democracies had signaled the invasion of the realm

of leisure by the same forces that had long ago taken over the realm

of work. Promoting notions of individuality defined solely in terms

of the possession and consumption of commodities, the culture in-

dustry offers a variety of substitute satisfactions which compensate

for the lack of substantive freedom. As the scope of individual deci-

sionmaking and judgment is narrowed to making choices betweenthe preestablished options served up by the system, individuality is

reduced to pseudoindividuality; individual choice, to pseudochoice.

Genuine artistic style and the critical potentials of aesthetic experi-

ence are destroyed as the whole of mass culture becomes commodi-

fied and permeated by a totally standardized, repetitive "advertising

aesthetic."79

The later Frankfurt School analyses of fascism are also devel-

oped within the context of the key thesis of the dialectic of enlighten-

ment. Under fascism the process of mass manipulation sheds its

pseudodemocratic character and assumes openly terroristic forms.

In this case, the "revolt of nature" against domination is harnessed

for the most barbaric purposes of continued domination. The re-

pressed fury of the masses against the senseless renunciation im-

posed upon them is mobilized by the fascist powers and channeled

against despised groups outside the fascist collectivity. The calcu-lated perfection of a technical rationality of means serves ends that

are totally destructive and irrational.80

These aspects of the later work of the Frankfurt School are far

removed from the presuppositions of classical Marxism. As a true

heir of the Enlightenment, Marx had built many assumptions about

historical progress into the basic framework of historical material-

ism. For Marx, the capitalist mode of production is characterized by

certain fundamental contradictions. These contradictions systemati-

cally generate crises and lead to the development of a revolutionary


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Adorno once said of Schoenberg's music could equally well be said of

his own essays: they demand "not mere contemplationbut praxis." K

They are designed to break apart conventional categories of thought

and thereby prod the reader to further reflection.

As the title of his masterwork indicates, however, Adorno

eventually purged all positive, affirmative elements from his concep-

tion of dialectics. Critical theory, in his view, could no longer confi-

dently outline a positive alternative to the organized insanity of the

administered world. Under such circumstances, Adorno believed

that hope for the future could best be preserved by relentlessly ex-posing the contradictions of the present state of affairs. Although it

could make no pretense of resolving those contradictions, critical

theory might thus indicate, in purely negative fashion, what would

notbe characteristic of a better future. The concept of reconciliation

did play a major role in Adorno's later writings, but its content was

never elaborated in positive terms. As the ideal of a nonrepressive,

mutual mediation of subject and object, the concept of reconciliationacquired its significance exactly by virtue of its absence in reality.

In the end, for Adorno the primary task of negative dialectics

became the denunciation of the prevailing illusions of administered

society while taking care to avoid establishing new illusions in their

place. Secularizing the Judaic ban on pronouncing the name of God,

Adorno steadfastly refused to give a positive outline for a liberated

future.91 Fearful of the instrumentalization of critical theory itself,

he obsessively avoided any hint of "false positivity" in his writings.

Given the ability of administered society to absorb and coopt oppo-

sition, Adorno was convinced that critical theory would have to

maintain a purely negative stance if it was to escape the same fate.

The later works of Horkheimer display many similar features.

There are, however, some important variations. Later in his life,

Horkheimer returned to his early philosophical interest in

Schopenhauer. Not surprisingly, after D ial ect ic of Enl i ght enmenthecame to see the negativity of Schopenhauer's philosophical pes-

simism as consonant with the basic impulses of his own critical the-



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ory of society.92 Horkheimer also developed a deep interest in reli

. n For the later Horkheimer, authentic religious experience cameto represent one of the few remaining "visions of the totally other" in

the administered world of advanced capitalist society.93 Politically,

he retreated into more liberal, at times even conservative, positions

seemingly far removed from the radicalism of his early works.94

Although Marcuse did not choose to return to Germany when

Horkheimer and Adorno reopened the Institute in Frankfurt in 1950,

his work continued to be strongly influenced by the writings of his

former colleagues. The deeply pessimistic themes of Dia lect ic of

Enl ightenmentwere echoed in many of Marcuse's writings from the

1950s and 1960s, particularly in the widely read O neD im ensi ona l

M an(1964).95

Alongside the critical negativity of his later works, however,

Marcuse also developed a positive, constructive dimension that was

completely absent from the later writings of Horkheimer and

Adorno. In Eros and Civi l izat ion (1955), for example, Marcuse de-veloped the outlines of a positive philosophical anthropology

through a brilliantly novel, though highly controversial, reinterpre-

tation of Freudian metapsychology. Through an internal critique of

Freud's account of the necessary discontents of civilization, Marcuse

was able to derive affirmative images of a liberated society in which

"socially necessary repression" could be reduced to a minimum.96

While Horkheimer and Adorno strongly distanced themselves

from the New Left of the 1960s, Marcuse became an ardent, though

hardly uncritical, supporter. In A n Essay on Li berat i on (1969), he ar-

gued that a "new sensibility" had emerged within the student move-

ment and the counterculture which represented the revolt of Eros

against the lifedeadening routines of advanced capitalist society.97

In "Failure of the New Left?" (1975), he continued to defend the

movements of the 1960s for their contribution to the recovery of a

radically libertarian vision of socialism.98 In one of his last publishedwritings, a critical evaluation of Rudolf Bahro's The A l t e rna t i ve,

Marcuse continued to probe the crisis tendencies of advanced


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capitalist (and bureaucratic socialist) societies searching for strate-

gies of radical political action." Unlike Horkheimer and Adorno, hehad returned to the call for the unity of theory and praxis that had

characterized the early formulations of critical theory in the 1930s.


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42 Cr i t i c a l i h e c r y and t he Soc i o l ogy o r knczo i f j j e

the German originals (1929 and 1935 respectivelyin both cases,

much new, supplementary material had been added. But particularly

in the English translation of Ideology and Utopia, there were also

significant shifts in language and meaning.3 Relatively idiosyncratic

German was replaced by relatively standardized English. The idio

matic resonances of historicism and Lebensphi losophie were sup

planted by those of pragmatism and empiricism. Indeed after close

and careful comparisons of the English and German editions o i Ide-

ology and Utopia, David Kettler claims to have found no less than

four hundred instances of such shifts in meaning.4 In addition tothese problems, several of Mannheim's most important early texts

which remained unpublished during his lifetime have only recently

become available. These key essays from the mid1920s do much to

clarify the nature of Mannheim's project and his path from problems

of aesthetic analysis and epistemology to the sociology of knowl-

edge.5

Still another problem of interpretation is posed by the unclear

relation between Mannheim's work in the sociology of knowledge

and his later work on social reconstruction and planning. After his

emigration to England in 1933, there was a dramatic turn in the focus

of Mannheim's writings. The sociology of knowledge disappeared

into the background, replaced by analyses of the crisis of liberal capi-

talism and advocacy for social planning. Although the influence of

good English common sense as an antidote to the murky musings of

continental philosophy is often proffered in explanation, that aloneis clearly insufficient to account for the break in Mannheim's work.

The AngloAmerican reception of Mannheim's sociology of

knowledge has tended to fall into two typical forms.6 The first form

of reception is characterized by outright dismissal. Mannheim is

more or less automatically found guilty of a whole range of funda-

mental logical errors and inconsistencies. Chief among these is the

cardinal sin of confusing considerations related to the genesis ofknowledge with judgments of the validity of knowledge. In these in-

terpretations, Mannheim is also usually charged with having fallen


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Karl Mannheim's Sociology of Knowledge 43

into the relativist paradox (or paradox of selfreference) wherein he

must claim that all thought is relative except his own.7The second typical form of reception has been slightly more

appreciative. Mannheim is praised for pioneering investigations of

the relation between knowledge and social structure. These authors

also find fundamental logical flaws and inconsistencies in Mann-

heim's sociology of knowledge, but they willingly acknowledge the

importance of his work when "shorn of [its] epistemological

impedimenta."8

Neither form of reception really does justice to the fundamen-

tal aspirations of Mannheim's work in the sociology of knowledge.

The first form fails to note that Mannheim was well aware of the

problem of relativism and the logical distinction between genesis and

validity. Nonetheless he chose to press on with his inquiries even in

the face of unresolved difficulties in these areas. In the end, Mann-

heim may not have adequately mastered his problems with rela-

tivism, but he was hardly unaware of them.The second form of reception fails to note that Mannheim did

not conceive the sociology of knowledge simply as another special-

ized field of inquiry within sociology. To be sure, he did speak of

1"value free" inquiry into the connections between knowledge and so-

ciety as one aspect of the sociology of knowledge, but these "non

evaluative" studies were to be only one phase of a much more ambi-

tious project. In Ideology and Ut opia, Mannheim explicitly speaks of

the potential of the sociology of knowledge for providing a new

"foundation for the social sciences" and an organon for "a science of

politics."9

Both traditional forms of the reception of Mannheim's sociol-

ogy of knowledge have essentially been premised on the confident

selfassurance of empiricist models of the social sciences. In the first

iorm, Mannheim's work is rejected because it obviously fails to meet

the standards of these models. In the second form, Mannheim'sWork is domesticated so that it may be incorporated into the main-

stream of positivist social science. In both cases, Mannheim's


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had lapsed into "an antimetaphysical metaphysic" and proven itself

incapable of grasping the nonreducible specificity of problems of in-

terpretation in the social sciences.18

Just before beginning his studies at the University of Budapest,

Mannheim made the acquaintance of Georg Lukacs. At that time,

Lukdcs had not yet made his conversion to Marxism, but he had al-

ready established a substantial reputation as the author of several

important works in philosophy, aesthetics and literary criticism.

Lukacs was the guiding figure of a small group of intellectuals

known as the Szel lemkek or "sprites" by virtue of their preoccupa-tion with problems of the "spirit" (szel lem). From 1915 to 1918

Mannheim was an active member of the Lukacs Sunday Circle

group, and it was here that many of his early views on cultural ques-

tions were formed.19 The outlook of the group was marked chiefly by

a strong sense of cultural malaise and decline, coexisting with rather

vaguely defined hopes for cultural renewal.

During his student years, Mannheim also became involvedwith the Budapest Social Scientific Society headed by Oscar Jaszi.20

Philosophically, the Social Scientific Society was more positivistic in

outlook than the Lukdcs group and much more oriented toward

questions of political reform than toward problems of culture. Due

to these differences in orientation, there were some tensions between

the two groups, but Mannheim was one of several people who man-

aged to participate in both groups. The liberal social democratic re-

formism of Jaszi had a lasting impact on the development of Mann-

heim's political views.21 To a large degree, Mannheim's later ap-

proach to questions of social reconstruction and planning represents

a return to perspectives much like those commonly held within the

Social Scientific Society. The internal critique of classical liberalism

and the attempt to revise the liberal tradition to fit new historical cir-

cumstances became one of the central political dimensions of Mann-

heim's work, much as it had been in the work of Jaszi.In 1917, the Lukacs group organized a series of public lectures

and seminars under the heading of the "Free School for Studies of


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"expost ontology."24 In his view, the ontological underpinnings of

all possible epistemologies could not be immediately postulated;

rather the basic ontological axioms could only be derived by working

through the various systematizations to uncover the indispensable

ontological presuppositions common to them all.

Mannheim's handling of the problem of the relation between

the origin and the validity of knowledge is also of interest, especially

in light of the standard criticisms of his work. He insisted that judg-

ments regarding the validity of meanings should be strictly separated

from consideration of the empirical conditions under which thosemeanings occur. In a series of comments directed against histori

cism, he acknowledged the importance of developing a sense of the

flux and change of everything in history, but warned that this sense

should not be carried over into the realm of meaning and validity. To

do so would be to confuse the logical distinction between origin and

validity; the inevitable result, relativism. Mannheim even asserted

the relativist paradox against historicism. The sphere of meaning

and validity could not be dissolved into the flux of history lest "we

should unwittingly controvert our own assertions."25

Mannheim continued to display a similar attitude toward the

problem of the relation between origin and validity in the first of his

unpublished booklength essays on the sociology of culture, "The

Distinctive Character of CulturalSociological Knowledge" (1922).26

In this essay, Mannheim was as much concerned with limiting the

claims of the sociology of culture as he was with clarifying its poten-tial contribution. At this point in his career, Mannheim saw the pri-

mary contribution of the sociology of culture in its ability to interpret

cultural productions as functions of more global processes. But he

emphatically denied that sociological interpretation had any rele-

vance to judgments regarding the value of any cultural creation.

Instead these judgments were still reserved for philosophy and

aesthetics.

By the time he wrote his second major unpublished essay on the

sociology of culture, however, Mannheim had changed his mind. In


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"A Sociological Theory of Culture and Its Knowability" (1924),

Mannheim assigned a considerably expanded scope and relevance to

the sociological interpretation of culture.27 The sociology of culture

was now directly linked to the possibility of developing a comprehen-

sive philosophy of history. Mannheim argued that the exact outlines

of this philosophy of history could not be specified in advance, but he

had come to believe that disciplined sociological inquiries into the

various cultural fields might eventually reveal the ultimate meta-

physical ground for all judgments of validity.

Sometime between 1922 and 1924 Mannheim clearly changedhis mind on the question of the relation between origin and validity.

If in his earlier writings he had consistently upheld a categorical dis-

tinction between origin and validity, by 1924 he was prepared to as-

sert that in some sense the social origins of knowledge and culture

were relevant to judgments of validity. With this turn in the develop-

ment of his thought, Mannheim set off down the path to the sociol-

ogy of knowledge.

Mannheim now believed it possible to relate the social origins

of knowledge to questions of validity without necessarily falling into

relativism. The turn in his thinking is most clearly documented in

"Historicism" (1924), an essay published shortly before the comple-

tion of his second long manuscript on the sociology of culture, and in

his first explicit statement on the sociology of knowledge, "The

Problem of a Sociology of Knowledge" (1925).28 In these essays,

Mannheim sketched the outlines of a "dynamic historical philosophyof life" which he hoped would eventually provide the ontological

foundation for all judgments of validity.29

Mannheim opened the essay on historicism with the declara-

tion that "we today are under a moral obligation to seek a solution to

the problem of historicism."30 As an intellectual movement, histori-

cism had always been animated by the conviction that no feature of

human thought or culture could be understood in an abstract, "time-less" fashion, but only as it had developed within a unique historical

constellation. Thus, according to Mannheim, historicism furnishes

Karl Mannheim's Sociology o f Knowledge 49


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the only standpoint appropriate for an era when experience of the

world has become thoroughly "dynamic" and permeated by an

awareness of historical change. From the beginning, however, his

toricism had been plagued by the problem of relativism. For how

could one derive valid values and standards of interpretation when

confronted with the continual change and flux of all such values and

standards in history?

Although Mannheim had earlier criticized the relativist impli-

cations of historicism, he now argued that the best strategy for re-

solving the relativist problematic was to press the implications ofhistoricism through to the end.31 In "The Problem of a Sociology of

Knowledge," Mannheim strongly rejected attempts by Max Scheler

and others to secure a realm of absolute values beyond the historical

flux.32 As opposed to these "transcendent" solutions, Mannheim in-

sisted that a correct solution to the relativist problematic must be

"immanent" to history. In his view, the transience of all knowledge

and culture in history had to be acknowledged; yet amid the ceaseless

process of historical change, it should be possible to discern certain

latent ordering principles and structures.

The category of totality provided the key element in Mann-

heim's strategy for pursuing an "immanent" solution to the relativist

problematic.33 In his usage, the concept is associated with the meta-

physical assumption of a meaningful historical process that gradu-

ally reveals itself through its particular manifestations. Mannheim

assumes that the meaning of the overall historical process is notgiven in directly perceptible form; rather it is only revealed indirectly

through the diverse tendencies present within the various spheres of

life and culture. Therefore, the task of theory becomes one of deci-

phering the underlying unity of the historical process as it is revealed

through these diverse tendencies of development. In this way,

Mannheim hoped to remain faithful to the change and flux of his-

tory, yet transcend relativism by positioning all particular tendencies

within a comprehensive developing whole. Change and diversity

would then no longer appear anarchic; they would become



59/226

Karl Mannheim's Sociology o f Knowledge 51

intelligible in terms of the overall meaningful unity of the historical

process.34Within the sociohistorical totality, different social groups and

strata may be seen as bearers of distinctive "styles of thought."35

Mannheim emphasized, however, that the views of any particular

social group can only represent a part of the total process.

(american university studies - volume 62) leon bailey-critical theory and the sociology of...

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