TOTALITY, INTERPRETATION AND DIALECTIC: ON THE NORMATIVE FOUNDATIONS OF CRITICAL MARXIST SOCIAL THEORY

This study undertakes to demonstrate the theoretical unity of Critical Marxist social theory as it develops from Lukacs through the Frankfurt School. It does so through an analysis of the use made by Georg Lukacs, Theodor Adorno, and Jurgen Habermas of the category of totality. This category is analyzed in its function at three levels of the theories in question. First, it is examined in its application to the whole-part logic of social inquiry. This dialectical usage of totality is contrasted with hermeneutical methodologies, especially Dilthey's. Second, the category of totality is examined in its role as the normative ground of dialectical social theory, which views all thought as historical and yet makes claims to a non-relativistic truth. Again, the contrast with hermeneutics is pursued. Third, analysis is made of the use of totality as a means of relating practical questions to truth, i.e., of uniting theory with a socially determinant ethical and political practice. Problems in the theories investigated are brought to light through an analysis of the relationship between their epistemological and methodological presuppositions and their practical political outcomes.;The analysis of these functions of the category of totality reveals a common structure of argumentation in the works of the writers in question. Although the elements within this structure vary, they do so in a systematic fashion, and the structure of argumentation itself is shown to be the unifying feature of the theoretical tradition under examination.