Richard Rorty, Jürgen Habermas, and the Nature of Philosophical Dialogue

Preview: /Review: Marcin Kilanowski, The Rorty-Habermas Debate: Toward Freedom as Responsibility, (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2021), 304 pages./ The American philosopher Richard Rorty (1931 – 2007) and the German philosopher Jürgen Habermas (b. 1929) engaged in a lengthy discussion over the years on a range of issues, particularly as these issues involved the nature of liberal, democratic society following the horrors of Auschwitz. The two thinkers came from different philosophical traditions with Rorty associated with analytical philosophy and pragmatism and Habermas with Continental philosophy, the Frankfurt School, and critical theory. Both philosophers saw themselves as “postmetaphysical,” rejecting traditional philosophical questions about the nature of reality and knowledge. Marcin Kilanowski, Professor of Law at Nicholas Copernicus University in Poland, offers a detailed discussion of the Rorty-Habermas debate. His book is intended for a broad audience beyond academic philosophers. He presents an exposition of both Rorty’s and Habermas’ thought, together with a comparison with those of John Dewey, who influenced them both. Kilanowski then compares and contrasts the thought of Rorty and Habermas with the goal of showing large areas of agreement, even though they philosophized in seemingly different ways. Kilanowski also suggests lessons that may be learned from the Rorty-Habermas debate about the nature of politics and democracy. He does so through the concept of freedom and through the development of a view he calls “freedom as responsibility.” The review examines Kilanowski’s study of the Rorty-Habermas debate and concludes that Kilanowski succeeds in his aim of showing the convergence between the two thinkers. The review also suggests that Kilanowski’s work may have a broader application in that it suggests how dialogue between different philosophical traditions may be developed and understood. As in Kilanowski’s book, the review also questions the “postmetaphysical” stance adopted by both Rorty and Habermas

Epistemology · Sociology · Philosophy · Pragmatism in Philosophy and Education