The Frankfurt School revised its theories in response to the changing postwar social reality
Evidence
As noted in the previous chapter, the Studies in Prejudice, even those parts most heavily influenced by members of the Institut, often departed from the tenets of Critical Theory as they had been articulated in the Zeitschrii . Most obviously, the analysis of anti-Semitism in The Authoritarian Personality differed significantly from its counterpart in Dialectic of the Enlightenment. Although attributable in part to the role of non-Institut scholars in the Berkeley project, the discrepancies were also a reflection of more fundamental develop ments in the theory itself. … As the concrete social reality changed, so too, Horkheimer and his colleagues argued, must the theoretical constructions generated to make sense of it. Accordingly, with the end of the war and the defeat of fascism, a new social reality had emerged, which required a new theoretical response. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 765
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Postwar New Leftists rediscovered the Frankfurt School through pirated and reissued pre-1950 writings — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 76; The Frankfurt School neglected autonomous political theory until Pollack’s state capitalism — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 395; Historical change forces theorists to invent new, more concrete concepts (+5 more)