Horkheimer in this essay sketches the distinction between critical theory, on the one hand, and, on the other: the "vulgar materialism of bad praxis", by which he more specifically means the "volkish" philosophy and ideology associated with the Nazi movement and its active sympathizers; and, the idea that specialized academic/scientific thinking can be fully separated from value judgments. He opposes critical theory to the type of collectivity that the Nazi movement praised, the community of race and nation, which rejected the constructive aspects of liberal thought while retaining the basic capitalist economic structure that liberalism defends.
Horkheimer explains that critical theory has in common with German Idealism the idea that ideas shape reality, though critical theory understands that the specific context and limitations of present economic relationships also are a fundamental part of the formation of those ideas. Ideas interact with the given social reality in a dynamic relationship. But where German Idealists like Kant and Fichte understood the development of historical reality as ultimately spiritual/intellectual, critical theory understands that it is essentially a materialist process. Critical theory seeks to articulate the possibilities in current realities for "the rational organization of human activity." Critical theory, he writes, shares with Idealism the understanding that humanity has other options than "the accumulation of power and profit."
The goal of critical theory is not abstract or academic (though it’s form certainly can be!) ; its goal is "not the increase of knowledge as such", but rather "the emancipation of humanity from enslaving conditions." He cites the thought of Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and the Epicureans as having this broad orientation, as well.
He claims that conventional economics has "lost its relationship to the fundamental relationships of the [current] epoch." Presumably he is here referring to the shift in economics from the focus on production relationships – which Marxist economics retained – to a focus on exchange, on prices and markets. The same issue of the journal contains an essay by Paul Sering on Alfred Marshall's neoclassical economics, which exemplifies that shift in emphasis. He cites the ultimate classical economist, Adam Smith, as a positive example of an economic analysis that pointed the way forward to a higher form of economic development, e.g., industrial capitalism.
He also separates critical theory from the Communist doctrine of the time that held to a rigid defense of the Soviet model. The criticism here is not so clear, in that he pointedly omits reference to the Soviet Union by name. But in the context of 1937, it's hard to see how it could refer to anything else. He discusses the concept of socialization of production, noting that the key thing about it from the standpoint of critical theory is not the legal form of the ownership but the actual individual and social outcomes it creates:
Das Unterstellen der industriellen Produktion unter die Kontrolle eines Staats ist ein geschichtliches Faktum, dessen Bedeutung im Sinn der kritischen Theorie jeweils erst zu analysieren ist. Ob es sich um Vergesellschaftung in ihrem Sinn handelt, inwiefern also darin ein höheres Prinzip zur Entfaltung kommt, hängt nicht etwa bloss von der Änderung bestimmter Eigentumsverhaltnisse, von der Steigerung der Produktivität in neuen Formen gesellschaftlicher Zusammenarbeit ab, sondern ebensosehr von Wesen und Entfaltung der Gesellschaft, in der sich all dies vollzieht. Es kommt darauf an, wie die neuen Verhältnisse der Produktion genau beschaffen sind. Auch wenn die durch individuelle Begabung und Leistungsfähigkeit bedingten ,,naturlichen Privilegien" zunächst noch fortbestehen, so dürfen jedesfalls keine neuen gesellschaftlichen Privilegien an ihre Stelle treten. In diesem vorläufigen Zustand darf die Ungleichheit nicht fixiert, sie muss vielmehr in steigendem Mass uberwunden werden. Das Problem, was und wie produziert wird, ob relativ feste Gruppen mit speziellen Interessen existieren, soziale Unterschiede festgehalten werden oder sich gar vertiefen, ferner die aktive Beziehung des einzelnen zur Regierung, das Verhältnis aller entscheidenden, die Individuen betreffenden Verwaltungsakte zu ihrem eigenen Wissen und Willen, die Abhängigkeit aller vom Menschen beherrschbaren Zustande von wirkliclier Übereinkunft, kurz, der Entwicklungsgrad der wesentlichen Momente realer Demokraties und Assoziation gehört mit zum Inhalt des Begriffs der Vergesellschaftung.In 1937, not only was the Soviet Union an active opponent of Hitler Germany in international politics. But anti-Communism was a major element of Nazi propaganda, both in Germany and in its international politics. Anyone focused on the menace Germany Nazism represented in the world would be cautious in how they articulated criticism of the USSR, so as not to facilitate having their words being misused.
[The subordination of industrial production under the control of a state is an historical fact whose meaning in the sense of critical theory has yet to be analyzed. The question of whether this is socialization in the sense that it is also a higher principle of development, does not depend solely on the change of particular ownership relations and the increase of productivity under new form of social cooperation. It depends just as much on the essence and development of the society in which all this occurs. It depends upon how the new relations of product are specifically obtained. Even if the “natural privileges” related to individual ability and productivity are continued for the time being, at the minimum in any case no new social privileges should emerge in their place.
In this progressing situation the inequality should not become fixed, it must far more be overcome to an increasing extent. The problem, what is produced and how, whether relatively established groups with special interests exist, social difference held in place or even becoming deeper, further the active relationship of the individual to the government, the conduct of all decision-makers, the relationship of the administrative acts that touch the individual in his own knowledge and will, the dependence of all condition truly under the mastery of humanity on genuine agreements, in short, the level of development of the essential moments of real democracy and association, belong to the content of the concept of socializing society (Vergesellschaftung).]
Horkheimer goes on to address the situation in "totalitarian" states – clearly not including the USSR in the meaning of that description here – in which there was partial nationalization of private businesses. He points out that this form of nationalization does not constitute "socialization" in the sense critical theory understands it.
Tags: critical theory, frankfurt school,, frankfurter schule, kritische theorie, max horkheimer, max horkheimer
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