Communicative Action's Democratic Deficit: A Critique of Habermas's Contribution to Democratic Theory
Year: 2009
Type: article
Abstract: In this paper, I develop a critique of Habermas’ concept of communicative action. My critique is based on the concept’s inability to grasp the complexities of democratic politics and democratic political action. I first show that the central seed of this inability is to be found in his early masterpiece, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. This genealogical beginning is followed by a more conceptual critique of communicative action’s dichotomist foundations, its moralization of speech act’s theory, and its incorporation of the dyad’s dialogue as the elementary form of human communication. During this conceptual critique, I present a different notion of how the strategic and communicative dimensions of action intertwine in political action proper.
Author: Martín Plot
Institution: California Institute of the Arts
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W2101550766