Kracauer’s early critical orientation defined itself against Simmel, Weber, Scheler, and Lukács.
Evidence
The philosophical positions around which Kracauer orientated himself critically in the post-war years and the first half of the 1920s were, on the one hand, Simmel’s relativism and his metaphysically shallow `philosophy of life’, together with the sharp distinction made by Max Weber between value-relativism and the ideal of scientific objectivity; and, on the other, Max Scheler’s approbation of Catholicism, or rather of a religiously inclined phenomenology, along with Georg Lukács’s approbation of Dostoevsky’s work and of the Russian soul as a fulfilment of the longing for a world filled with meaning. He shared with all of them their analysis of the time as involving a demystification of the world and of the relations between human beings together with the inability of the sciences to point to a way out of the crisis. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 267
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Kracauer saw Lukács’s Marxism as exhausted idealism rather than genuine innovation — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 302; Weber found Simmel’s methodology and results fundamentally flawed — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 114; Weber’s methodology and theory of rationalization drew directly from Simmel — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 112 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Kracauer saw Lukács’s Marxism as exhausted idealism rather than genuine innovation
#corroborates(0.90) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 302 - Weber found Simmel’s methodology and results fundamentally flawed
#contradicts(0.82) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 114 - Weber’s methodology and theory of rationalization drew directly from Simmel
#contradicts(0.78) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 112 - Park’s students kept Simmel’s social relations while dropping his social process focus.
#expands(0.75) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 136