Institutional Agonism: Axel Honneth's Radical Democracy*. Issue 1 (2nd January 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Lysaker, Odin
• Is Part Of: Critical horizons. Volume 18:Issue 1(2017)
• Page Start: 33
• Page End: 51
• Publication Date: 2017-01-02
• Subjects: Axel Honneth -- recognition theory -- radical democracy -- institutional agonism; Critical theory -- Periodicals; 142.05
• DOI: 10.1080/14409917.2017.1275168
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1440-9917

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Axel Honneth may be criticised for reducing political philosophy to moral psychology. In what follows, I argue that if his theory of recognition is reframed as one of democracy, quite another picture will appear. To do this, I systematically reconstruct Honneth's stance as a multidimensional version of radical democracy. The question I discuss is the manner in which this framework combines the three dimensions of democratic deliberation, culture, and conflict. I then discuss Honneth's picture from both a deliberative and agonistic viewpoint. How one understands the way in which he combines the abovementioned dimensions is dependent upon which one of these two approaches one may choose. I claim that when taken together, these three dimensions form the grounding of a radical-democratic understanding of a struggle for recognition, which I term institutional agonism.