CONTRADICTION, CRITIQUE, AND DIALECTIC IN ADORNO A ...

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CHAPTER 3: <strong>ADORNO</strong>’S SOCIAL ONTOLOGY OF ANTAGONISM The previous chapter explored the relation that obtains, according to Adorno, between the individual and the social subject in modern society. This relation is a field of tension with fully unmediated individuality in one extreme and total social determination on the other. Of course, to describe the relation as a “field of tension” remains very imprecise, so in this chapter I seek to clarify the quality of this relation. Adorno characterizes it as a relation of antagonism. My goal in this chapter is to clarify the meaning of this antagonism. Let me quickly explain how this discussion fits into the overall objective of this study. Ultimately, our goal is to clarify Adorno’s two-fold notion of contradiction. I argued in chapter 2 that in order to clarify this notion, we need first to explore the conception of the subject-object relation that it presupposes. The main elements that constitute this relation, for Adorno, are the individual, society, and nature. The previous chapter has begun to investigate Adorno’s view of the individual’s mediation of and by the social world. This chapter completes that investigation and explains in detail why Adorno takes the individual’s relation to the social order to be specifically ‘antagonistic.’ The discussion I pursue here will also begin to clarify how the third key element, i.e. nature, enters into and alters the subject-object relation. 102
Clarifying Adorno’s notion of antagonism is made difficult by the fact that Adorno nowhere offers an explicit analysis of what he means by ‘antagonism.’ Yet, as anyone familiar with Hegel and with Adorno’s recurrent allusions to the Hegelian philosophy would not fail to notice, Adorno’s claim that society is structured in accordance with an essential “antagonism” is advanced as a direct counter-claim to Hegel’s view that the social order is essentially “reconciled.” On the basis of this observation, the method I employ to clarify what Adorno means by “antagonism” is to reconstruct in detail his disagreement with Hegel’s view of the modern social order. Section 1 briefly explains the key elements of Hegel’s social theory that are relevant to this discussion. Then section 2 offers a systematic reconstruction of Adorno’s disagreement with Hegel. On the basis of this reconstruction, I conclude with a concise statement of Adorno’s conception of “antagonism” as the basic category around which the modern social order is structured. 3.1 Hegel One of Hegel’s principal claims in the Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts 103 [The Philosophy of Right] is that the structure of modern society is the most rational social structure. The statement is meant both in a prescriptive and a descriptive sense. One the one hand, Hegel argues that the structure of modern society is in itself the most rational form of social organization because it is differentiated into three distinct 103 Hegel, G.W.F., Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts, in Werke, Vol. 7 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1986). I will henceforward refer to this work simply as The Philosophy of Right or Die Philosophie des Rechts, as is standard practice. 103
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CONTRADICTION, CRITIQUE, AND DIALEC
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CONTRADICTION, CRITIQUE, AND DIALEC
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For my parents, Luz Marina and John
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4.3 Adorno’s resolution of the di
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FIGURES Figure 4.1: Inner contradic
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost,
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CHAPTER 1: THE PROBLEM OF DETERMINA
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in the present study, and which I t
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inadequate. In my view, O’Connor
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system, and Adorno rejects both the
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and instead examining only the assu
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In Hegel, there are three stages in
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dialectical movement in act. 16 Phi
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According to Hegel, the philosopher
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dialectic is driven forward from on
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observing consciousness has already
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consciousness to perform the operat
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and makes possible the successive a
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corresponds to the self-determining
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And yet, as I hope to have shown in
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claim; namely, that the Hegelian sy
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the system’s inability to express
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Hegel’s idea that history is in e
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irremediably caught in a situation
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defined in its essence by rationali
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zum Entsetzen verifiziert und auf d
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1.2.2 Hegelian dialectics as a form
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objectivity, but rather as an empha
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as thought, is a form of thought th
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conceptual element. It is thus ulti
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It is clear, however, that (2) is n
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Page 81 and 82: 2.2 The subject’s mediation of an
Page 83 and 84: It might be thought, then, that the
Page 85 and 86: the subject as, on the one hand, an
Page 87 and 88: of consciousness that are then said
Page 89 and 90: Note the radical nature of Adorno
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Page 127 and 128: Civil Society Let us now turn to an
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Page 157 and 158: Adorno’s conception of the antago
Page 159 and 160: The question I pursue in this and t
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efusal to acknowledge social factor
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There is therefore a sort of social
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their own autonomously defined ends
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available to thought. By bringing t
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durch ihre einzelnen Momente hindur
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eality by the principle of exchange
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If a critical form of thought expos
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The following diagram illustrates t
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appearance and essence characterist
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Adorno’s famous statement that
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false or delusory. So, the idea tha
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it is also not merely ‘logically
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Hegel’s Science of Logic begins w
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In my view, the sublation [Aufhebun
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contingent historical development,
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further interpretation. This need f
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Marcuse’s builds his conception o
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essence gives way to a more develop
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(2) that there are tendencies alrea
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eality as a whole does not result i
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asking them to choose their prefere
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eality “in itself,” or essentia
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Since the contradiction between app
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appearance to essence. But the empi
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eflection to the study of social re
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nature, which constitutes social re
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objects, for the constitution of ob
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However, we do not yet know how the
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CHAPTER 5: A FREUDIAN INTERPRETATIO
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objects only to the extent that the
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it does not follow the rules of thi
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mechanism, namely paranoid projecti
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civilization and enlightenment has
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Adorno and Horkheimer see the Shoah
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thought has experienced a loss of e
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any objective appreciation and judg
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der Menschheit im Bann der technisc
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imagination exists that ‘reality
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esults in the radical creation of s
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of Adorno’s negative dialectics i
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that human beings on the average ca
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5.4.1 Development of civilization A
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The first stage of distance that Ad
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persuade it or “convince” it to
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much greater control over nature, b
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Threatening, wild nature is pushed
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stronger, and so became the exertio
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advanced capitalist societies is ne
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In his Vorlesung über Negative Dia
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Denken ineinsgesetzt, ohne dessen f
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instrumental reason. Stepping outsi
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een totally “civilized,” of all
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nature from the world; they repeat
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5.5 Conclusion This chapter has dev
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teleologically ordered structure th
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CHAPTER 6: THE DIALECTIC OF ENLIGHT
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6.1 The dialectic of enlightenment
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development of the modern period an
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necessitated by the very mechanism
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The interpretation of Dialektik der
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doing without society provides no a
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conception of historical developmen
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of the system and perhaps also taki
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alone, seemingly for its own sake.
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accordance with which social realit
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(3) Therefore, the result of regres
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from its beginnings in animism to h
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subsection (6.2.2), I briefly expla
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constraints to bring about the emer
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Just like the social-historical lev
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6.2.3 Adorno’s historical method:
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dans sa force et sa faiblesse, la s
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emplacements et de déplacements, d
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individual as ailing from a weak eg
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this point is worth emphasizing bec
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element is a necessary component of
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exchange). Moreover, I said that, f
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within, and constructs the world as
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would be the case if exchange was a
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But the relation of nature to socie
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neither can be understood as more f
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The ‘natural history’ of a phen
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Verschlingungen; darum sind ihr so
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given to the structural order of so
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principle of exchange’s primacy o
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contradiction between appearance an
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introduced in chapter 3: the elemen
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When we consider the relation betwe
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The main goal of this chapter and t
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each of the Concept (beyond the rea
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object leaves room for an idea of c
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context of the object’s origin is
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each element of Kant’s theory on
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precisely through the interpretatio
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problems of the text (or other obje
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Ängste auskennt, das ist auf der e
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The world of empirical experience,
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Adorno interprets Kant’s division
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interpretation as the dissolution o
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demonstrates that the contradiction
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ist—der Begriff des Widerspruchs
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a. The first component corresponds
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historical context. But this way of
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The concern with retrieving the non
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object, which necessarily exceeds i
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the problem seems to be inherent in
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However, this society is pathologic
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sufficiency the “Schein des Ansic
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The category of ‘inner nature’
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fragments and their rhetorical form
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TABLE 7.1 DISCURSIVE-CONCEPTUAL V.
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moreover, a critique that simply ig
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The two philosophical strands, or s
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experience of suffering or damage,
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CHAPTER 8: PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE A
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adicalization of the materialist st
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Adorno’s words, nature is that wh
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One important point in Benjamin’s
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After the fall, “the judging word
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Importantly, however, language afte
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particular object is preserved in o
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that, “Was aber solche Namen als
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Die platonische Anamnesis steht die
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elements in the exemplary particula
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hat Geschichte nur noch als einen G
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Das Echte - jenes Ursprungssiegel i
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It is not my purpose here philosoph
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Adorno takes the idea of constellat
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The notion of onomatopoeia is strai
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Ausdruck kommt, in sehr entrückten
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evelation of this symbolic dimensio
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anders als in der Sprache nicht ged
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an aesthetic (artistic) ability to
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The constellation provides a field,
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constellation succeeds, and in the
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Again in agreement, Benjamin and Ad
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Adorno’s basic disagreement with
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immediately related to the economic
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[B]eide sind die auseinandergerisse
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illumination of the phenomenon that
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Adorno says that “Die Formel daß
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echen: Ihre eigene, die rücksichts
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which nature mediates social realit
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concept,” and chapter 8 gave a fi
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eality—that is, the structure of
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conceptual tensions in the object a
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conceptual oppositions that arise f
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object,” as well as in the “con
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element and in terms of its interpr
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The logical structure of paranoid p
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I do want to conclude with some ref
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If Adorno is right, this abstract l
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that they repress the non-conceptua
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BIBLIOGRAPHY Works by Adorno in the
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---. Negative Dialectics. Translate
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---. “On Some Motifs in Baudelair
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---. “Neurosis and psychosis.”
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---. Capital, Vol. I. Translated by
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