Critical Theory and Antisemitism: Interrogating the Historical Specificity of the Enlightenment

Abstract

This paper attempts to revisit the “Elements of Anti-Semitism” in Dialectic of Enlightenment, regarding the later development of Critical Theory. As Habermas or Wellmer have pointed out, the mentioned text may lead to a pessimistic philosophy of universal history, undermining any potential of rationality and therefore paradoxically sustaining de domination of totality (and its consequences, as anti-semitism). In order to avoid this pessimistic turn, I propose a reading of Dialectic of Enlightenment under the prism of the approach developed by Postone, which links the dynamic of totality with the historical specificity of capitalism