Date: Tue, 24 Feb 1998 13:46:36 -0600 ()
Subject: HAB: Money, power, and ... images?


Brian's post reminds me of something that occurred to me in
reading TCA.  Brian (and Habermas) refer to money and power as
means by which people communicate without having (or being able) 
to confront one another in terms of discursive justification. 
>From that lack we get all the irrational systemic effects we're
all aware of.  This recognition seems to me within or near the
core of Habermas's work, at least as far as my political science
interests are concerned.  I would like to suggest that we should
add "images" to the first two means. 
	I first started thinking about this when I asked the
students in my "Third World and Development" class to
deconstruct images of the third world.  Looking at example after
example of how our (bizarre) understanding of the third world is
shaped, I realized how much this shaping is done through images
that, like money and power, do not present themselves in a
manner claiming (or being readily susceptible to) discursive
justification.  Advertising works along closely similar lines;
the real impact of an ad is almost never presented in any
explicit claim.  It seems to follow that we need to pay as much
attention to those who control our public images as we do to
those with money and power.  Our critical theory needs to be
concerned as much with deconstructing these images as it does
with deconstructing the subterranean paths of money and power.
	I might add that I don't regard deconstruction as the
end of social analysis;  we need to subsequently construct, on
the standard of discursive justification, the forms we can agree
to.  Deconstruction in all three domains is just the
prerequisite for us to be able to make such an agreement without
blinders on. 

Offered for your consideration.


Best to all,

Steve, irresponsibly writing this despite being in the throes of
finals week

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| Stephen Chilton, Associate Professor, Dept of Pol Science |
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