Habermas’s Theory of Social Evolution

Abstract

Jürgen Habermas has developed his ideas on the foundation of a theory of evolution in various works and has repeatedly emphasised its programmatic character.¹ The theory is presented along several different lines of thought, but these, when looked at more closely, do not always form a coherent whole. The claims of a theory developed under such circumstances can only be judged in an equally limited way. In particular, the restricted scope of this essay prevents me from describing adequately the numerous connections with other theoretical and philosophical parts of Habermas’s oeuvre. I shall also disregard the way that Habermas’s evolutionary theory grew out of his debate with Niklas Luhmann’s theory of society. Similarly, I should like to suspend judgement on the question of whether the illustrations of the theory are historically sound. I see my task, therefore, as twofold: first, to sketch out the content of the theory of evolution and, if possible, to systematise it; second, to examine some of the central concepts of the theory, an examination which should lead to an evaluation of it.