The Institute’s flagship study juxtaposed vast empirical material with theory that never engaged it

Evidence

The final result was a work of nearly 1000 pages, the main part consisting of three essays (the projected economics essay was not in the end written). Instead of the appendices which had been planned at first, two further sections had been included. The first of these contained the questionnaire material, and the second the reports on research and literature, and each of them was longer than the theoretical section. The fact that the theoretical drafts did not refer at any point to the questionnaire material or to the reports on research and literature dramatically illustrated the limited extent to which a `fusion of constructive and empirical procedures’ could be spoken of. At the same time, the letters of Horkheimer and Fromm showed that empirical research, and keeping themselves well-informed about the various scientific disciplines, served the Institute’s two chief theoreticians as a kind of protective screen. Behind this screen, a form of theory was being pursued which, on the one hand, was attempting to distinguish itself from pure philosophy, but which was also, on the other hand, sceptical about the various branches of science and about empirical research, and uncertain of its own status. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 605

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Adorno/Horkheimer’s critique of positivism and the broader Frankfurt School ambivalence about empirical methods, which recurs through later Institute work. — connects to: The Institute’s self-proclaimed empirical flexibility never touched its core convictions about historical progress. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 482; The Institute’s theory-empirical synthesis peaked with the Studies on Authority — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 625
• DEEPTHINKING: The claim that a 1000-page empirical study contained theory that never once referenced its own data — and that empiricism served the theoreticians as a ‘protective screen’ for a theory unsure of its own status — captures the deep structural tension of the entire Frankfurt School project.

Broader Connections

• The Institute’s theory-empirical synthesis peaked with the Studies on Authority #qualifies (0.85) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 625