Communicative Rationality - Post-metaphysical Philosophy

Post-metaphysical Philosophy

There are a number of specific trends that Habermas identifies as important to twentieth century philosophy, and to which he thinks his conception of communicative rationality contributes. To look at these trends is to give a clear outline of Habermas's understanding of communicative rationality. He labels all these trends as being post-metaphysical. (Cooke, 1994) These post-metaphysical philosophical movements have, among other things:

1. called into question the substantive conceptions of rationality (e.g. “a rational person thinks this”) and put forward procedural or formal conceptions instead (e.g. “a rational person thinks like this”);
2. replaced foundationalism with fallibilism with regard to valid knowledge and how it may be achieved;
3. cast doubt on the idea that reason should be conceived abstractly beyond history and the complexities of social life, and have contextualized or situated reason in actual historical practices;
4. replaced a focus on individual structures of consciousness with a concern for pragmatic structures of language and action as part of the contextualization of reason; and
5. given up philosophy's traditional fixation on theoretical truth and the representational functions of language, to the extent that they also recognize the moral and expressive functions of language as part of the contextualization of reason.