The Theory of Communicative Action, Volume 1: Reason and the Rationalization of Society

Contents ......Page 4
Translator’s Introduction ......Page 6
I. Introduction: Approaches to the Problem of Rationality ......Page 39
1. “Rationality” – A Preliminary Specification ......Page 50
2. Some Characteristics of the Mythical and the Modern Ways of Understanding the World ......Page 85
3. Relations to the World and Aspects of Rationality in Four Sociological Concepts of Action ......Page 117
4. The Problem of Understanding Meaning in the Social Sciences ......Page 144
II. Max Weber’s Theory of Rationalization ......Page 184
1. Occidental Rationalism ......Page 198
2. The Disenchantment of Religious-Metaphysical Worldviews and the Emergence of Modern Structures of Consciousness ......Page 227
3. Modernization as Societal Rationalization: The Role of the Protestant Ethic ......Page 257
4. The Rationalization of Law. Weber’s Diagnosis of the Times ......Page 284
III. Intermediate Reflections: Social Action, Purposive Activity, and Communication ......Page 313
IV. From Lukacs to Adorno: Rationalization as Reification ......Page 378
1. Max Weber in the Tradition of Western Marxism ......Page 384
2. The Critique of Instrumental Reason ......Page 405
Notes ......Page 439
Index ......Page 495