Habermas replaced subject-centered philosophy with communicative action theory

Evidence

The shift in paradigmsfrom the philosophy of the subject and the utopia of a reconciliation between mind and nature, to the theory of communicative action and the utopia of exhausting the normative content of action that was based on consensuspromised a new perspective on society and history, one that would for the first time make possible a systematic perception of progress in the approach to the creation of a human race that could achieve consensus about its essential goals without fear of dominationif such a human race was possible. … Some of the significance Adorno attributed to art later found its way into Habermas’s assumption that a rationalization of the life-world was taking place as a result of the potential of science and philosophy for interpreting both the world and themselves, as a result of the potential for enlightenment provided by strictly universalist concepts of law and morality, and as a result of the radical experiences of modernism in aesthetics. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 688

Categorization

• DEFINE: The paradigm shift is the central conceptual hinge of late Critical Theory: philosophy of the subject and mind-nature reconciliation give way to communicative action and the exhaustion of consensus-based normative content.
• XREF: Connects to the reader’s earlier Frankfurt School notes on Adorno’s mimesis/non-identical and Horkheimer’s critique of instrumental reason.