Love, Actually? Theodor Adorno, Erich Fromm, and the Possibility of Love in Capitalist Modernity

Bibliographic Data

ID4071500
AuthorsRobbie Spiers (corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume51
Issue3
Pages45-68
Publication date2024-11-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueNew German Critique (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0094-033X • E-ISSN: 1558-1462
PublisherDuke University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1215/0094033x-11309184
OpenAlexW4404749890
LanguageEN
References cited29

Love is not regularly associated with the Frankfurt School. Theodor Adorno and Erich Fromm are not regularly associated with each other. Yet, when we bring these Critical Theorists' works together, a rich discussion of love emerges. Love is viewed by both as a dialectical force, bringing two subjects into union while also allowing them to cultivate their individual selves. Fromm and Adorno operate within the same Marxist philosophical tradition, meaning that they share concerns about the increasing commodification of love and the disappearance of genuine, spontaneous relationships between people. The similarities are not endless, however, and important differences between them remain: Fromm, with his optimism and his concern for existential issues, maintains a belief in revolutionary political change and high spiritual ideals that the materialist pessimist Adorno resists as comfortable illusions. Through this philosophical encounter, two faces of Critical Theory emerge, one oriented toward an analysis of the present and the other turned toward hopes for the future

Epistemology · Modernity · Psychoanalysis · Critical Theory and Philosophy · Philosophy · Political Economy and Marxism · Psychoanalysis, Philosophy, and Politics · Psychology

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