Critical Pragmatism

Dewey’s social philosophy revisited

Bibliographic Data

ID2397946
AuthorsTorjus Midtgarden (University of Bergen, corresponding author)
Year2012
Volume15
Issue4
Pages505-521
Publication date2012-11-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Journal of Social Theory (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1368-4310 • E-ISSN: 1461-7137
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1368431011432373
OpenAlexW2054213429
LanguageEN
Citations received15
References cited19

Scholars like Alison Kadlec, Melvin Rogers and R.W. Hildreth have recently confronted the claim that Dewey's pragmatism lacks resources to approach issues of power, but they have not given a unified account of what theoretical framework Dewey's pragmatism provides to grapple with such issues and to articulate standards for social criticism. In this article, I explore one such framework: Dewey's outline of a social philosophy developed in his Lectures in China. Here, Dewey derives immanent standards for social criticism through sociological and historical perspectives. Such standards are articulated in terms of social relationships of mutuality and recognition in and between groups; on such standards, social institutions and practices are to be criticized in so far as they embody relationships of domination disabling individual development and social and political participation. Dewey's critical project extends to cultural sources of normative authority, and I further explore his social philosophy in terms of an 'immanent cultural criticism

Critical theory · Criticism · Epistemology · Normative · Political science · Politics · Pragmatism · Social criticism · Social philosophy · Social relation · Social science · Sociology · Critical Theory and Philosophy · Law · Philosophy · Political theory and Gramsci · Pragmatism in Philosophy and Education

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