ABSTRACT
Horkheimer regards the socio-historical preformation of subject and object as the consequence of social labour: the synthesizing, cooperative activity of all labouring subjects. Critical theory makes the reflective self-understanding of the theorist a central moment in theory; considering critical theory a contested tradition of social thought underwrites and furthers this continuously reflective dimension of its activity. Causal reasoning itself is blind to its own conditioning, and as a consequence all the more subjective, lacking as it does a reflective self-comprehension. Horkheimer's distinguishing of traditional and critical theory is as much inspired by and beholden to Kant's 'critical' separation of understanding from reason as it is by the 'critique' of political economy. The Lukacsian formation of theory would remain, only now with a new content. The measure of Habermas's achievement is that he has fully taken on this complex and multifaceted project without losing sight of the demands it imposes.
