Adorno subordinated belief in progress and rationality to the superstructure from the outset.

Evidence

Adorno gave his thesis quite a surprising Marxist turn in its conclusion. He observed that the theories of the unconscious which he had criticized served as ideologies which partly transfigured the governing economic order and partly distracted attention from it. These social conditions, characterized by economic competition' and imperialist tendencies’, set limits on any process of enlightenment. In brief, without actually naming it as such, he declared his belief in the Marxist theory that consciousness was determined by social existence. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 331 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Above all, Adorno alleges ‘a lack of mediation between pragmatic substance and Marxian theory leading to a “materialistic-historiographical evocation” of socio-historical motifs’. The missing mediation of which Adorno writes is mediation between ‘conspicuous individual features from the realm of the superstructure’ and the ‘corresponding features of the substructure’ – a mediation that can only be achieved theoretically, however, ‘through the total social process’. … This means unpacking ‘the overall social and economic tendencies of the age’ rather than ‘imput[ing] to phenomena precisely the kind of spontaneity, tangibility and density which they have lost under capitalism’. — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 280 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Adorno demanded theoretical mediation between superstructure and substructure in historical materialism. — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 280; Adorno declared belief that social existence determines consciousness. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 331

Broader Connections

• Adorno declared belief that social existence determines consciousness. #corroborates (0.85) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 331
• Adorno demanded theoretical mediation between superstructure and substructure in historical materialism. #expands (0.75) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 280