ABSTRACT
The theoretical legitimacy and practical applicability of social criticism have remained major unsolved problems of critical theory. To be immune from moralistic idealism and ideological biases, critical theory intended to be what Horkheimer, in his early writings, called ‘the intellectual side of the historical process of emancipation’. In other words, the sociologist’s critical approach would be justified only if it could uncover within the social reality forces, movements, practices embodying the theoretician’s critical point of view. Theory had to reflect scientifically emancipatory actions in whose ‘pre-scientific’ reality its truth would be grounded.
