Critique and its foundations: on critical realism and the Frankfurt School

ABSTRACT

In this paper, I assess some recent critical realist constructive criticisms of Theodor Adorno, one of the leading thinkers of the Frankfurt School tradition of critical theory. I argue that while there are similarities between Adorno’s treatment of causality and the critical realist notion of powers, these connections should not be taken to imply that Adorno’s conception of critique requires a critical realist powers ontology. I show that Bhaskar’s transcendental realism is at odds with the basic commitments of Adorno’s historical materialism. I go on to clarify such materialism and show that to Adorno, capital is the historical compulsion characteristic of modernity.

KEYWORDS:

• Adorno
• Bhaskar
• freedom
• causality
• critical theory
• capitalism

Acknowledgments

I am indebted to Craig Reeves and Fabian Freyenhagen for many discussions on the topics covered in this paper as well as two JCR reviewers for their comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 Although it needs to be stressed that a richer psychosocial sense of metacritique animates much of Reeves’ work elsewhere, see chiefly ‘What Punishment Expresses’ (2019).

2 The Marxian interpretation offered here is also distinct from the readings of Adorno which emphasize the resurrection of sensuous, somatic content, or ‘material inferences’ as an antidote to reason understood as identity thinking (chiefly, Bernstein 2001). For the sake of maintaining a focus on critical realism, pursuing a critique of this line of inquiry is not possible at this occasion.

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Jaakko Nevasto

Jaakko Nevasto teaches management at Essex Business School. His interests involve critical theory, business ethics and the philosophy of economics.