Date: Tue, 07 Nov 1995 11:22:29 -0600
From: JENNIFER HOLTZ <jholtz-AT-kumc.edu>
Subject:  HAB: habermas/medicine/death -Reply to N.G. Crossley


>>jholtz-AT-kumc.edu

Please excuse the tardy reply to your message.  This is my second
semester of doctoral studies, and my time management skills have
proven not up to the task. 

I received Habermas' Moral Consciousness simultaneously with your
message and have had a difficult time making sense of it.  A physician
with whom I discussed this issue cited my application-oriented mind set
as a possible reason.  As a critical theorist, however, Habermas surely
meant his work to be applicable, don't you think?  Have you had any
thoughts on the matter, subsequent to your message?

>>> N.G.Crossley <N.G.Crossley-AT-sheffield.ac.uk> 10/25/95 03:10am
>>>
In reply to Jennifer Holtz's intro

   Hi Jennifer. I was interested in the fact that you are applying 
Habermas' work to a medical area. I work in a department of  psychiatry
(as a sociologist/philosopher) and I am currently thinking  about how we
might conceptualise the psychiatry/mental health area  from a
Habermasian perspective (there are one or two very good  attempts
already written but they were written some time ago).  Perhaps you
could say a bit more about what you intend to do in your  work. 
  I'm not too sure, from a strictly ethical point of view, how we  might
consider the question of the right to die from a Habermasian 
perspective. I trust that you are aware of H's most recent works in 
ethical theory (Justification and Application etc.). From a more 
sociological angle, however, the question of medical authority over 
questions of death could be looked at fruitfully from the point of  view of
"cultural impoverishment" and "the colonisation of the  lifeworld" as
discussed in The Theory of Communicative Action Vol 2.  I recently
discussed (very briefly) the application of these concepts  to medicine in
general in a paper I presented at the recent Theory, Culture and  Society
conference in Berlin and I will glady send you a copy of that  if you think
it may be useful. I think that I mentioned rights over  death very briefly
(one sentence) but there is clearly much that  could be done from this
position. If you decided to take this line  there are quite a few interesting
studies (on the rationalisation of  death etc.) that you might look at.

Hope this is of some help.

Nick Crossley
Centre For Psychoatherapeutic Studies
Department of Psychiatry
University of Sheffield
England