Simon Susen’s trilogy offers a systematic account of Jürgen Habermas’s Also a History of Philosophy. It provides a comprehensive overview of the central issues at stake in this magnum opus and, crucially, assesses its most significant limitations and shortcomings.
Susen shows how Habermas’s approach to the history of philosophy seeks to reconstruct the genealogy of postmetaphysical thinking by tracing the tension-laden relationship between faith and knowledge back to the major developments brought about during the Axial Age. The trilogy examines how Habermas’s latest project invites us to reconsider not only classical antinomies – such as faith vs. knowledge, the sacred vs. the profane, religion vs. science – but also the role of philosophy in the twenty-first century, particularly with regard to its capacity to overcome the tension between ‘ideologization’ [Verweltanschaulichung] and ‘scientization’ [Verwissenschaftlichung]. This endeavour, Susen argues, sheds light on the extent to which the emancipatory potential of rational freedom, far from being reducible to a mere product of the Enlightenment, has been present throughout human history – most notably in the processes of ‘the linguistification of the sacred’ in advanced civilizations during the first millennium BCE. Informed by a meticulous analysis of the Epilogue to the original German-language edition – which contains valuable insights into Habermas’s retrospective reflections on his main arguments and engages with the reception of his ambitious theoretical enterprise – this definitive trilogy serves as an essential guide to one of Habermas’s seminal works.
The first volume, The Foundations of Postmetaphysical Thinking, comprises a detailed outline of the core assumptions underlying Habermas’s Auch eine Geschichte der Philosophie.
This trilogy is for all those in the social sciences and humanities studying and researching classical and contemporary social theory, the sociology of knowledge, the sociology of religion, political sociology, cultural sociology, social and political philosophy, epistemology, the philosophy of religion, the philosophy of history, the philosophy of language, and the history of social and political thought.
Table of Contents:
Setting the Postmetaphysical Scene I. Towards a Genealogy of Postmetaphysical Thinking a. Religion and Theology b. Practical Reason c. The Human and Social Sciences d. The Historical Standpoint 1. Crisis and Decline in Twentieth-Century Thought 2. Religion and Society a. The Missionary Expansion of the Major World Religions b. The Fundamentalist Radicalization of World Religion c. Postmodern Forms of Religiosity d. The Political Instrumentalization of Potentials for Violence Further Reflections on Religion 3. The Unfolding of Postmetaphysical Thinking From ‘the Particular’ to ‘the Universal’ (and back again) 4. Social Theory and Postmetaphysical Thinking Human Development as a Learning Process a. Co-Existence through Social Integration and Social Evolution b. The Transformation of World Pictures and its Consequences c. From World Pictures to the Lifeworld Towards a Pragmatics of Language II. Unearthing the Sacred Roots of the Axial Traditions 1. Cognitive Breakthrough and Preservation of the Sacred Core a. Cognitive Achievements of the Axial Age b. The Distinctiveness of Religion c. Towards a Critical Theory of Religion 2. The Origins of Language and the Socio-Cultural Form of Life III. Remarks on World Pictures in the Axial Age Habermas’s First Intermediate Reflection: Conceptual Directions of the Axial Age a. The Emergence, Development, and Transformation of World Pictures b. The Socio-Ontological Centrality of the Lifeworld i. The Lifeworld and the Preponderance of the Performative ii. Illocutionary and Perlocutionary Acts iii. Between Lifeworld, Objective World, and Everyday World c. The ‘Big Picture’ of World Pictures d. The (Pre)Cosmopolitan Spirit of the Axial Age IV. The Symbiosis of Faith and Knowledge in Christian Platonism and the Emergence of the Roman Catholic Church V. The Progressive Differentiation of Sacerdotium and Regnum in Christian Europe VI. The Path towards Modernity Scientific, Religious, and Socio-Political Dimensions VII. Towards the Separation of Faith and Knowledge The Rise of Protestantism and Philosophy of the Subject
About the Author :
Simon Susen is Professor of Sociology at City St George’s, University of London. He is Associate Member of the Bauman Institute and, together with Bryan S. Turner, Editor of the Journal of Classical Sociology.
Review :
‘At an age when many devote themselves to writing their memoirs, Jürgen Habermas undertook the formidable task of retracing the history of Western philosophy. He did so not as a detached scholar but, rather, as a way of engaging with the vast intellectual edifice he himself had built and of situating it within that broader history. For us, as sociologists, there remained an urgent need for the rigorous and authoritative work that Simon Susen now provides – one that repositions this history of philosophy not only within the Habermasian corpus but also within the landscape of the contemporary social sciences. Only Simon Susen’s intellectual boldness and wide-ranging expertise could meet this challenge, bridging the widening gulf within our disciplines between philosophy, social theory, and empirical research.’
Luc Boltanski, Directeur d’études, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris, France
‘Simon Susen’s comprehensive and deeply thoughtful engagement with Jürgen Habermas’s magnum opus, Also a History of Philosophy, is far more than a commentary on an important work of contemporary critical thought. In unpacking Habermas’s project, Susen offers an engrossing and incisive reflection on the intellectual legacies we inherit – and on the ways in which they shape our self-understanding as moderns.’
Simone Chambers, Professor of Political Science, University of California, Irvine, USA
‘A welcome and important book. Simon Susen offers the clearest account available in English of Habermas’s views – not only on the history of philosophy but also on modernity, the relationship between faith and knowledge, and the future of freedom and the Enlightenment project. Perhaps the pre-eminent thinker of our era, Habermas has engaged with both public affairs and the most profound intellectual questions for more than 70 years. Most scholars who believe they understand his perspective have dipped only into one earlier phase of his work; Susen sheds light on the whole.’
Craig Calhoun, University Professor of Social Sciences, Arizona State University, USA
‘This superb book combines a meticulous and very readable summary of Habermas's Auch eine Geschichte der Philosophie with a comprehensive presentation of constructive critical comments. The summary part draws a number of connections which are not explicit in Habermas's text or are lost in the details of his argument, while the critical comments should shape subsequent discussions on the relationship between faith and knowledge.’
William Outhwaite, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, Newcastle University, UK
