From: <kenneth.mackendrick-AT-utoronto.ca>
Subject: HAB: Re: Habermas on Freud
Date: Tue, 19 Dec 2000 18:54:52 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time)



On Tue, 19 Dec 2000 12:39:56 -0800 (PST) Gary D <gedavis1-AT-yahoo.com> wrote:

> > ....the idea, developed in Habermas's reinterpretation of Freud,
> that language "is the only thing whose nature we can know," made in
> his Frankfurt inaugural address in 1965, "holds just as true for
> Habermas today as it ever has" (Whitebook 1995: 167; Habermas 1971:
> 314). 

> But the implication of this is that psychoanalysis, read after the 
> theory of formal pragmatics and cognitive development theory, IS a
> very different "thing". Whitebook's point supports my stance, rather
> than clarifying your disagreement.

Exactly... Whitebook goes on to point out in his work why this is a problem, 
because their is something about the unconscious, trauma for instance, which 
fundamentally resists being drawn up into langauge. Language can only encrypt 
itself over the trauma, concealing it in the form of a symptom. "Dissolving" 
this symptom only produces another symptom - since the trauma is not 
eliminated, simply kept out of sight (it has to be kept out of sight otherwise 
subjectivty cannot emerge). In psychosis, the trauma is 'laid bare' and 
manifests itself directly. In short, I'm arguing that the ego - individuation - 
*is a symptom* - itself a defensive mechanism against being overwhelmed... And 
yet, language is all that we can know. The point being: trauma has an affective 
dimension. And it is precisely this affective dimension, which is expressed in 
language, that is non-communicative. In Habermas, the unconscious is solely 
derived from language. This is profoundly antiFreudian, which is fine for 
Habermas but not for a psychoanalytically informed critical theory (which is my 
intention). Habermas simply reject any viewpoint opposed to his thesis here as 
empirically invalid. The problem is that not everything has to be empirically 
valid (qualitative / quantitative) in order to be 'true.' It is not possible to 
measure or 'test' trauma. This doesn't mean it does not exist - we can only get 
partial results, mostly unscientific. And yet it would be profoundly 
antihumanist to say that the re-narrativization of our experience - of which 
critical theory plays a crucial role (as I argue when I discuss Jay Bernstein's 
work), so that we might better understand and comprehend the world around us. 
Now, if I can maintain this - then it is possible to defend critical theory 
against the charge of being a critical hermeneutics (since it isn't reducible 
to interpretive inquiry) and defend critical theory against the charge of being 
scientistic (since its 'critical' capacity exceeds what science can 
accomplish). In a way, Lacanian analysis helps us to see that critical theory 
has a hermeneutic dimension which exceeds a philosophical hermeneutics, and, 
has a scientific dimension which exceeds positivistic science. Habermas has 
made both of these claims for his critical social theory - but I've argued 
elsewhere (in my thesis at least) that Habermas's defense of formal pragmatics 
begs the question - he gets caught in a circular argument, assuming 
precisely that which he needs to justify.

> > ....Habermas writes: "As can be shown through the example of
> > psychoanalysis, as interpreted in terms of communication theory,
> > the two procedures of reconstruction and of self-critique can still
> be brought together within the framework of one and the same theory"
> (Habermas 1987:300).

> Yet, this "one and the same" is the theory of communicative action,
> not a basically psychoanalytic reading of the communicative potential
> for learning and emancipation from distortions.

I read this to mean that a theory of communicative action clarifies what is at 
stake in psychoanalysis such that two dimensions of psychoanalysis, which Freud 
failed to distinguish in what Habermas calls Freud's scientistic 
misunderstanding, can be read together: the reconstructive (whereby the 
analyst draws on the unconscious rule systems of a given methodology) and the 
self-critical (the actual procedure of dialogue). Maybe I've misunderstood the 
sentence.

> > Although the conceptual geography of Habermas's argument has shifted, .... 
the key tenets of his communicative theory.... still very much lean on,  to 
some degree, the validity of his reinterpretation of Freud (Habermas 1971:
226-228, 238). 

> This is an untenable claim (whatever you mean by "very much...to some 
degree").

I agree it might be a stretch. Perhaps Habermas's foray into Freud is much ado 
about nothing. I would argue, however, that Habermas needs psychoanalysis or at 
least psychoanalytic concepts to vindicate his claim that the unconscious is 
solely derived from language (we should also note that Habermas's reading of 
Freud is likely one that lead to his insight about systematically distorted 
communication, at least it is in his reinterpretation of Freud that he makes 
the most sustained argument about this). In any event, it would be bad faith on 
Habermas's part to use a psychoanalytic-inspired analysis as a critique of 
Foucault that isn't at all related to or dependent upon any of 
the concepts of psychoanalysis. In effect, the fact that he is using his 
reinterpretation of Freud against contemporary social-theoretical frameworks is 
enough evidence for me that it is "very much... to some degree" part of 
Habermas's critical social theory... But I'll think about your point. Does 
Habermas need Freud in 1978? Probably not. Does Habermas need Freud in 1968? 
Absolutely. By and large my intervention here is an intervention in his earlier 
work. His late work generates its own problems which I think I'll deal with 
separately (pointing out that... 'if only Freud had been read differently... 
the follies of Piaget could have been avoided...'). That's a joke.

> > In his earlier work, Habermas argues that Freud and Marx stand
> > together; the critique of ideology and psychoanalysis represent independent
> > disciplines which uncover' systematically distorted forms of communication. 
Despite Habermas's more recent turn to reconstructive science to defend this 
claim...

> JH doesn't turn to reconstructive science to defend this claim. He turns to 
reconstructive science to development the theory of communicative action 
methodologically. Critical theory is reformulated as a part of the general 
interests of reconstructive science to contribute to the development of 
communicatively productive (if not evolutionary) social life, from which a 
revised view of the relationship between a discursive critique of ideology and 
immanent emancipatory (educative-therapeutic) practice would follow.

Ok, I'm trying to work my head around my misformulation.

However, this introduces another problem: critical theory is reformulated as a 
part of the general interests of reconstructive science to contribute to the 
development of communicatively productive (if not evolutionary) social life..." 
If critical theory is an attempt to contribute to a communicatively productive 
social life, doesn't critical theory have to know what a communicatively 
productive social life is or looks like? And if that is the case, how did 
critical theory acquire knowledge about this life? As far as I can see, simply 
because enlightenment posits a telos: autonomy, solidarity and so on, doesn't 
mean it would be a 'good thing' to achieve it. The 'dream' of the enlightenment 
is autonomy and happiness... but this dream is a dream - a wish-fulfillment. 
Fundamentally, it is unrealizeable. Habermas, in KHI calls for an 'exact 
fantasy' - this is precisely what we need to talk more about. One of the chief 
characteristics of fantasy is that we do everything in our power to avoid its 
fulfillment - that's what makes it a fantasy: the idea that we can't have it. 
And whenever we have reached it, we've ended up with a high degree of violence 
and destruction. There is a fantastic new book out by Susan Buck-Morss which 
discusses this very point: Dreamworld and Catastrophe - the closer we come to 
our fantasy, the more psychotic we are.

Gary, thanks for your instructive thoughts. They are warmly appreciated.

*****

> It looks like one should be having a dialogue with Whitebook and Zizek, as 
you seem to depend on those readings, rather than anticipating your own.

Incidentally, there is an article by Zizek and a rejoinder by Whitebook in 
Constellations (I forget which year, 1995 maybe). Whitebook doesn't much like 
Zizek, which is odd since he lumps Lacan and Habermas together in Perversion 
and Utopia as liquidating the unconscious via langauge. I agree that Habermas 
does this, but I disagree that Lacan does. Anyway... a side side note.

> > ... Habermas's reinvention is such that it no longer "fits" any consistent 
understanding of Freudian psychoanalysis at all.

> This would be because JH is not a Freudian!

Yep. One of the problems with cutting and pasting is that you loose the flow of 
something... so... the statement is in the context of situating Habermas with 
the FS... who are Freudian... You are, of course, correct - and I'll make sure 
to note that Habermas doesn't consider himself so.

> > Habermas's appropriation of psychoanalysis ceases to be Freudian 
> > psychoanalysis. This point has not gone unnoticed. 

> Not.

A case can be made: seduction, hysteria, sexuality, the unconscious, fantasy... 
these are all discarded elements of the Freudian corpus - esp. sexuality. For 
Freud, sexuality is something that can never be reconciled with, in language or 
out. It is a 'fixed' problem, an irreconcilable antagonism constitutive of our 
subjectivity - we can read Augustine to see evidence of this. Habermas has 
never written about it, as far as I know.

thanks again for reading through that and making comments,
ken



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