Suchergebnisse

Argues that Hannah Arendt's understanding of politics, action, & plurality is a profound response to Martin Heidegger's failure to understand the meaning of public life. According to Arendt, the human condition is characterized by a capacity to act & speak, which, in turn, represent opportunities to bring into being something wholly new & unique. Thus, the human condition is, by definition, plural, with individuals acting, speaking, & creating new things. For Arendt, the most important danger of modern bureaucratic social life was the extinction of this plurality in speech & action. It is shown that Arendt comes to this conclusion not simply by borrowing Heidegger's concepts, but by appropriating & inverting them into a new meaning. It is concluded that, while, in a sense, Arendt was faithful to Heidegger in employing his concepts, she was unfaithful by engaging in independent thinking & thinking against him; she used his provocation to provide an acute critique of his work. D. M. Smith

An exploration of the role of Leszek Kolakowski's defense of utopianism ("The Concept of the Left" in Toward a Marxist Humanism, New York: Grove Press, 1968) in the development of the thought of Agnes Heller. Heller envisions utopianism as one of the characteristics of genuine philosophy. She goes on from this general conception to the more specific conception of a radical philosophy, which addresses the need to transcend a society based on subordination & superordination. Her utopia has three basic ideals: free communication, unconditional recognition of the needs of others, & the duty of self-perfection. Regrettably, her conception seems founded on too facile a dismissal of "positivist pseudophilosophies" & an assertion of the existence of genuine philosophies opposed to them. The theory has also not been sufficiently translated into terms suited to guiding present action. W. H. Stoddard

The relevance of Anthony Giddens's theory of structuration (The Constitution of Society, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1984 [see IRPS No. 26/85c00433]) for an understanding of the critical functions of social science is explored. Giddens's deconstruction of sociological theories, particularly his criticisms of functionalism, are reviewed. Structuration theory attempts to illuminate how social structure both constrains & enables social action; human agents are viewed as possessing practical knowledge of their actions but not full awareness of them. However, Giddens had dodged some of the important issues in critical social theory by leaving open the question of the basis of critical judgments & the ends for which social knowledge should be used. 8 References. K. Carande