Habermas: After a diagnosis, a universal principle: the communicative reason

Abstract

In the first part of this paper, a "Habermas-way" diagnosis is made: uncertainty as the climate of an interconnected world without a common basis, the crisis of successful “Enlightened Reason”, including its techno-scientific expression, and critical reason. In the second part, it discusses the paradoxical outcome of modernity and its unfulfilled promises, as well as the crisis of modern reason which, despite the postmodern reaction, addresses the search for the foundation of discourse ethics and the problem of presuppositions, demonstrably valid norms, the importance of language, communicative action and parliamentarism. The third section presents three final reflections, including the need to continue the struggle for emancipation, the complexity of putting this diagnosis into practice, and the criticism that Habermas has received for ignoring cultural differences and reducing communication to a linguistic exchange.