Date: Tue, 9 May 1995 13:27:10 +0000
From: N.R.Romm-AT-msd.hull.ac.uk (Norma Romm)
Subject: Re: HAB: Communicative Action and Strategic Action


Dear David

Yes, I too am pleased that the list has survived - not that I "use" it that
often  - but an occasional look at people's thinking in this field is fine
with me. I think your two questions are very pertinent. I will be
interested to see what replies you get. My feeling on question 1 is that
there is no discontunuity in Habermas's work on this. His suggestion has
always been that we must recognise the interested character of
knowledge-construction, and hence, just because of this, we should be
prepared to open our constructions to communicative validity checking. For
me, this is the point of his speaking about an emancipatory interest -
where validity checking of claims is based on discourse rather than
authority (some authoritative way of doing science) or tradition. Habermas
himself says ( 1993 - in his book on justification and application - that
he jhas been working on the same proejct since the 1970's.

As for question 2, I think Habermas would want to valorise coomuncative
action   more than strategic action; I think that he would want to  say
that communicative action (a communicative attitude in our relations with
others) allows us to re-look at our "strategies" in the light of concerns
for other people and not just in the light of our own goals. Even the
demands of effiency need to be re-looked at in the light of some form of
communicative practice.

Well, let us see what other repsonses you get to these questions

Norma Romm