Losing financial independence forced the Frankfurt Institute to accept research contracts
Evidence
The Institute was re-established without Horkheimer having realized that an Institute that was no longer financially independent would sooner or later have to take on research contracts. Nor did he see that it would be difficult for Critical Theorists, in a period of restoration, not to fall into moral dilemmas. No further money was to be expected from Felix Weil. His business had long since ceased to flourish, and, in addition, he had stayed behind in America. What alternative was there to the strategy pursued by Lazarsfeld, who was so despised by the Critical Theorists, of using research contracts, even unwelcome ones, to give the Institute an opportunity to carry out its own projects? — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1858
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to the broader arc of what financial independence bought the Institute under Grünberg’s endowment (Weil’s money) and how its loss forced market-facing compromises — an institutional-lifecycle pattern echoed in the described mission drift. — connects to: The Frankfurt Institute subsidized Lazarsfeld’s Newark research group via contract work — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 682; Private wealth alone allowed the Frankfurt Institute to exist independently of the university — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 66; Industry funding pulled the Frankfurt Institute toward pragmatic applied research against Adorno’s wishes. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 2107 (+1 more)
- QUESTION: Worth chasing: what exactly were the moral dilemmas Critical Theorists faced in the restoration period, and how did Horkheimer’s careerist turn at this juncture play into Adorno’s later denunciations of instrumental reason?
Broader Connections
- Industry funding pulled the Frankfurt Institute toward pragmatic applied research against Adorno’s wishes.
#corroborates(0.95) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2107