Rahel Jaeggi, Center Director, Berlinhttps://hscif.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/068A0363bea_cut_web2048pxl-1024x716.png1024716domondadomondahttps://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/c721361ef69235ca03d3a1fa144e0a59?s=96&d=mm&r=g
Critical Theory, according to Max Horkheimer’s statement in 1937, forms the intellectual side of emancipation. To keep it alive, we have to relentlessly analyze the crises which shape our present and inform our emancipatory hopes.
Robin Celikates , Center Deputy Director, Berlinhttps://hscif.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/068A0086bea_cutout_web2048pxl-1024x683.png1024683Susann SchmeisserSusann Schmeisserhttps://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/f0e7200cc21fefd51a4d524c4f4492b5?s=96&d=mm&r=g
The crises and struggles of our present have to be the starting point of Critical Theory. Our task, then, is to probe their emancipatory potential, their limitations, convergences and tensions. That is why in thinking about migration and solidarity today we have to take migrants and their practices of critique and resistance seriously.
Consciously to effectuate social change is the modern ambition. But after nearly 250 years, we still need to understand better what possibilities and perils are involved in transmuting fundamental institutions.
Jonathan David Klein, Fellowhttps://hscif.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/RCKP6049bea_cutout_web2048-1024x683.png1024683Susann SchmeisserSusann Schmeisserhttps://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/f0e7200cc21fefd51a4d524c4f4492b5?s=96&d=mm&r=g
What appears in modern society as atomisation is at the same time the creation of all-sided dependency. Social theory is indispensable for shedding light on this contradictory social constitution.
The founders of critical theory taught that the domination of nature implies the domination of people and vice versa. Understanding how this works concretely, in the past and the present, should be the task of a massive research effort.
Historical change in line with a hegelian-marxian tradition comes about and runs through contradictory processes and crises. Given that currently emancipatory transformation is in a crisis, we need to uncover the inconsistencies, debris and hardenings that block its proceeding.
What we need today is to take a closer look at the bigger picture. The humanities provide the lense for recalibrating our perspective on the crises we currently face.
Charles Taylor, Benjamin Chair 2019https://hscif.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/068A0416bea_cutout_max-1024x683.png1024683Susann SchmeisserSusann Schmeisserhttps://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/f0e7200cc21fefd51a4d524c4f4492b5?s=96&d=mm&r=g