Dados is one of the most widely-read social sciences journals in Latin America. Created in 1966, it publishes innovative works, originating from academic research, by Brazilian and foreign authors. Edited by IESP-UERJ, it aims to reconcile scientific rigor and academic excellence with an emphasis on public debate based on the analysis of substantive issues of society and politics.
Dados vol. 60 n. 2 Rio de Janeiro abr./jun. 2017
Abstract
ABSTRACT The following article argues that the intersubjectivity claimed by the theory of communicative action is undermined by the monological solipsism intrinsic to the very premises upon which it is based. In terms of structure, the central thread of the article is the reflexivity of the language (section 1). The problem with the intersubjectivity emerges as the article shifts from analyzing the public sphere in the eighteenth century to the procedural paradigm of deliberative democracy (section II). It is between these institutional extremities that Habermas locates his anti-institutional theory of language, supported on the “ideal speech situation” (section III). In the aim of ensuring engagement in the search for linguistic understanding, the participants in a discussion must act according to a rule of sincerity (section IV), which presumes a prior moral commitment (that is therefore monological) to the search for a consensus (section V). Such issues undermine the deliberative model of democracy because they convert the ideal of discursive symmetry into the empirical founding of democratic deliberation (section VI).
Keywords: Jürgen Habermas, intersubjectivity, theory of communicative action, deliberative democracy, public sphere
Intersubjectivity or Solipsism? Problems with Jürgen Habermas’ Theory of Communicative Action
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