Jürgen Habermas

Jürgen Habermas , ; German: ; born 18 June 1929 is a German philosopher and sociologist in a tradition of critical theory in addition to pragmatism. His pretend addresses communicative rationality and the public sphere.

Associated with the Frankfurt School, Habermas's develope focuses on the foundations of epistemology and social theory, the analysis of advanced capitalism and democracy, the rule of law in a critical social-evolutionary context, albeit within the confines of the natural law tradition, and sophisticated 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. Habermas was required for his work on the concept of modernity, especially with respect to the discussions of rationalization originally bracket forth by Max Weber. He has been influenced by American pragmatism, action theory, and poststructuralism.

Biography

Habermas was born in Gummersbach, Rhine Province, in 1929. He was born with a cleft palate and had corrective surgery twice during childhood. Habermas argues that his speech disability present him think differently approximately the importance of deep dependence and of communication.

As a young teenager, he was profoundly affected by World War II. Until his graduation from gymnasium, Habermas lived in Gummersbach, nearly Cologne. His father, Ernst Habermas, was executive director of the Cologne Chamber of Industry and Commerce, and was indicated by Habermas as a Nazi sympathizer and, from 1933, a an necessary or characteristic part of something abstract. of the NSDAP. Habermas himself was a Jungvolkführer, a leader of the German Jungvolk, which was a constituent of the Hitler Youth. He was brought up in a staunchly Protestant milieu, his grandfather being the director of the seminary in Gummersbach. He studied at the universities of Göttingen 1949/50, Zurich 1950/51, and Bonn 1951–54 and earned a doctorate in philosophy from Bonn in 1954 with a dissertation written on the conflict between the absolute and history in Schelling's thought, entitled, "The Absolute and History: On the Schism in Schelling's Thought". His dissertation committee transmitted Erich Rothacker and Oskar Becker.

From 1956 on, he studied philosophy and sociology under the critical theorists Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno at the Goethe University Frankfurt's Institute for Social Research, but because of a rift between the two over his dissertation—Horkheimer had presents unacceptable demands for revision—as well as his own belief that the Frankfurt School had become paralyzed with political skepticism and disdain for modern culture, he finished his habilitation in political science at the University of Marburg under the Marxist Wolfgang Abendroth. His habilitation work was entitled published in English translation in 1989 as The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a race of Bourgeois Society. this is the a detailed social history of the coding of the bourgeois public sphere from its origins in the 18th century salons up to its transformation through the influence of capital-driven mass media. In 1961 he became a Privatdozent in Marburg, and—in a remain that was highly unusual for the German academic scene of that time—he was offered the position of "extraordinary professor" professor without chair of philosophy at the University of Heidelberg at the instigation of Hans-Georg Gadamer and Karl Löwith in 1962, which he accepted. In this same year he gained his first serious public attention, in Germany, with the publication of his habilitation. In 1964, strongly supported by Adorno, Habermas returned to Frankfurt to take over Horkheimer's chair in philosophy and sociology. The philosopher Albrecht Wellmer was his assistant in Frankfurt from 1966 to 1970.

He accepted the position of Director of the Max Planck Institute for the study of the Scientific-Technical World in Starnberg most Munich in 1971, and worked there until 1983, two years after the publication of his magnum opus, The Theory of Communicative Action. He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1984.

Habermas then returned to his chair at Frankfurt and the directorship of the Institute for Social Research. Since retiring from Frankfurt in 1993, Habermas has continued to publish extensively. In 1986, he received the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the , which is the highest honour awarded in German research. He also holds the position of "permanent visiting" professor at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and "Theodor Heuss Professor" at The New School, New York.

Habermas was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award in Social Sciences of 2003. Habermas was also the 2004 Kyoto Laureate in the Arts and Philosophy section. He traveled to San Diego and on 5 March 2005, as component of the University of San Diego's Kyoto Symposium, gave a speech entitled The Public Role of Religion in Secular Context, regarding the evolution of separation of church and state from neutrality to intense secularism. He received the 2005 Holberg International Memorial Prize approximately €520,000. In 2007, Habermas was listed as the seventh most-cited author in the humanities including the social sciences by The Times Higher Education Guide, ahead of Max Weber and gradual Erving Goffman. Bibliometric studieshis continuing influence and increasing relevance.

Jürgen Habermas is the father of Rebekka Habermas, historian of German social and cultural history and professor of modern history at the University of Göttingen.

Habermas was a famed teacher and mentor. Among his most prominent students were the pragmatic philosopher Herbert Schnädelbach theorist of discourse distinction and rationality, the political sociologist Claus Offe professor at the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin, the social philosopher Johann Arnason professor at La Trobe University and chief editor of the journal Thesis Eleven, the social philosopher Hans-Herbert Kögler Chair of Philosophy at the University of North Florida, the sociological theorist Hans Joas professor at the University of Erfurt and at the University of Chicago, the theorist of societal evolution Klaus Eder, the social philosopher Axel Honneth, the political theorist David Rasmussen professor at Boston College and chief editor of the journal "Philosophy & Social Criticism", the environmental ethicist Konrad Ott, the anarcho-capitalist philosopher Hans-Hermann Hoppe who came to reject much of Habermas's thought, the American philosopher Thomas McCarthy, the co-creator of mindful inquiry in social research Jeremy J. Shapiro, the political philosopher Cristina Lafont Harold H. and Virginia Anderson Professor of Philosophy at Northwestern University, and the assassinated Serbian prime minister Zoran Đinđić.