Does emancipation devour its children? Beyond a stalled dialectic of emancipation. (February 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Haderer, Margaret
• Other Names: Blühdorn Ingolfur guest-editor.; Butzlaff Felix guest-editor.; Haderer Margaret guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: European journal of social theory. Volume 25:Number 1(2022)
• Page Start: 172
• Page End: 188
• Publication Date: 2022-02
• Subjects: Critical social theory -- emancipation -- Foucault -- judgement -- late modernity; Social sciences -- Philosophy -- Periodicals; 301.01
• DOI: 10.1177/13684310211028382
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1368-4310

Abstract

Emancipation serves not only as a midwife for progressive agendas such as greater equality and sustainability but also as their gravedigger. This diagnosis underpins Ingolfur Blühdorn's 'dialectic of emancipation', which depicts a dilemma but offers no perspective on how to deal with it. By drawing on Foucault, this article suggests conceiving of emancipation as a task moderns are confronted with even if a given emancipatory project has come to devour its children. Claiming autonomy from given social constellations is key to this task; key also is judging between legitimate and illegitimate claims to autonomy. In late modernity, the criteria for such judgement are no longer universally given. Instead of regarding the latter as entry into mere subjectivism (Blühdorn), this article presents judgement as a key political, 'world building'-activity (Arendt), a critical social theory may join in, by not only observing the world but by also taking sides in it.