The Institute’s directorship was institutionalized as a philosophy chair funded by the Society.

Evidence

On Grünberg’s retirement as Professor Emeritus, the Society for Social Research and the Faculty of Economics and Social Science had not been able to agree on a successor to his professorial chair who would be acceptable to both sides. The successor also had to be acceptable to the Society for Social Research as Grünberg’s replacement as director of the Institute. The following compromise was reached: the Society for Social Research would continue to finance Grünberg’s chair in the Faculty of Economics and Social Science, if filled by a candidate acceptable to the faculty, until one of the other professorial posts became free. A new chair, which was to incorporate the directorship of the Institute, was established in the Faculty of Philosophy, and Horkheimer was appointed to this post at the end of July 1930. It was mainly thanks to Tillich, who was, like Adolph Löwe (the immediate successor to Grünberg’s chair), a religious socialist, and to pressure from the Ministry of Culture, that Horkheimer received the unusual appointment to a professorship at the university at which he had taken his Habilitation. But the Faculty of Philosophy had insisted that the chair be established not as one in philosophy and sociology, but merely as one in social philosophy. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 141

Categorization

• XREF: The struggle over whether Horkheimer’s chair would be philosophy-and-sociology or merely social philosophy foreshadows the enduring tension between critical theory’s philosophical and empirical-sociological strands. — connects to: The Institute’s benefactor required ideological alignment with its director — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 73; The Institute was founded through financial patronage and a shared critical stance toward society. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 67

Broader Connections

• The Institute was founded through financial patronage and a shared critical stance toward society. #expands (0.82) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 67