Morality, Law and Politics

[00:00:00] INTRODUCER:
This is a continuation of the Howison Lecture by Professor Jürgen Habermas, for which we’re indebted to the Howison Fund for providing support for these lectures. He spoke last night at International House, and this is a continuation of that lecture. As he’s going to point out, I’ll point it out, too, it presupposes what he was talking about there.

Uh, he’ll talk for approximately an hour.

[00:00:29] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Is that right?

[00:00:30] INTRODUCER:
And then there will be a discussion which could be the– a follow-up discussion on both of the lectures. The title of the lecture this afternoon is Morality, Law, and Politics.

[00:00:45] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Yeah.

(applause)

Yeah. Thank you, Bert. Uh, I’m quite surprised that this is called a seminar in the United States, I mean.

But, uh, uh– uh, I will adapt to this situation and, uh, give just another lecture. Um, please, there is an alternative to this acoustic arrangement, namely to turn it off. So I will ask you in five minutes whether we will be better off to do it without.

Um, I will present a rather, a rather condensed version of, uh, something of, uh, 100 pages. To make it even worse, what I dare to present is, uh, only reflecting a work in progress, uh, no finished product. As I have yesterday taken up basic issues of the tradition of moral philosophy with a straight systematic intent.

Today, I will proceed in a similar way with the tradition of contractarian theories in modern, uh, natural law. I will address the same issues which we know from this context, uh, but using different premises and a different conceptual frame. I will just start instead of defining the natural states, um, with, uh, two basic problems that any collective will formation in any society has to face, and, uh, then go on to analyze what we find as strategies to solve these problems, so to say, in a crazy empiri-empirical way.

And then in the same vein as these contractualian theories, I will continue with a thought experiment, namely just asking how could one transfer these more or less natural, uh, strategies of problem solving into something more natural? The result of this thought experiment is then that, then, uh, uh, nothing will be achieved except that we would, uh, rely on law and politics as a medium through which one could implement, uh, rational collective will-formation. Now, this leads me then to, uh, this whole complex of, uh, law and politics that I very briefly introduced in terms of a conceptual genesis, if you like.

Um, then, uh, returning to the question whether it is possible to implement rational collective world formation through these media without distorting, already on that abstract level, just in terms of structural constraints, without cons– without distorting the rationality of a supposedly, um, working, um, collective will formation. Now, this leads me then to the idea of, uh, an entwinement or interpenetration, interpenetration of two types of procedures, legal and argumentative, that can be illustrated in terms of legal or in the cases of legal discourse. And, uh, finally then, I will use this whole, uh, discourse theoretic approach to, uh, propose a reconstruction of the normative content of, uh, the, uh, democratic constitutional, uh, state.

I will give an somewhat unusual reading to principles of, uh, people’s sovereignty or to human rights as guidelines for the institutionalization of those communicative practices which are supposed to frame rational collective will formation. Of course, uh, you will immediately ask me why Fall back to, uh, contractarian theories of that highly constructive and idealizing kind after we have gone through the historical way of thinking since the nineteenth century. I will leave that issue for the discussion.

Uh, now that I have explained to you what will happen, please don’t take it as a rhetorical, uh, device if I, uh, invite all of you who came with an understandably different expectations rather than to leave the room. I mean, I, uh, would not only not mind, but would be, uh, glad to see that, uh, uh, my chance to disappoint you, uh, uh, uh, diminished, I mean, so. Now, please, I… Uh, let me first focus on what, uh, was, uh, at that time, seventeenth century, eighteenth century, called a natural state as against society.

Following Parsons, I presume that social interactions occur under conditions of double contingency. That simply means the actors expect of one another that each can decide both in one way and the other. As a consequence, every social order which, with relatively stable behavioral patterns has to rely on some mechanisms for action coordination, basically on influence, and that’s a purely empirical, uh, item either on influence or on processes of reaching understanding.

I won’t go into this. If such coordination is not forthcoming, more or less anomic sequences of action arises, and what is more important, the participants themselves then experience such uncertainties as a problem. Problems of this sort exist basically in two typical versions.

They have to do either with the regulation of a conflict brought about by contradictory, by contradictory individual action orientations or with the selection and cooperative realization of collective goals. Let’s simply talk about the regulation on interpersonal conflicts versus the pursuit of collective goals and programs. In the simplest case, several actors argue over one and the same piece of property and wish to solve this conflict by reaching some sort of agreement.

Or, it’s the other type, several actors all come up against a challenge in the same situation and wish to overcome it cooperatively. Agreement and cooperation are just the premises. In the former case, so if I take the- the participants face the question according to which rules should we live together, and in the latter case, the question is that of which goals do we want to reach and how do we want to achieve them.

In short, collective will formation refers to the stabilization of behavioral expectations in the case of conflict or through the specification and effective realization of collective goals. Parsons, of course, speaks of pattern maintenance and goal attainment. Now, let, let us further assume that, uh, simple interactions spread over a continuum bounded on the one side by value-oriented and then on, in the other side by in- interest-oriented or interest-based action.

I mean, values can be shared, and interests by defin- by definition are, uh, uh, my influence. Depending on the relevance and the thematization of either the one or the other aspect, the actors themselves, again, have to adopt different attitudes in these two types of actions, namely either the performative attitude of an actor oriented to reaching understanding or the objectivating attitude of an actor who, in light of his own preferences, orients himself towards the consequences of, uh, actions and events. Problems of action coordination are perceived and processed in different ways depending on the actor’s perspective and the type of action involved.

The practice of reaching understanding distinguishes itself from, uh, that of the bargaining process in terms of the objectives entailed. The agreement aimed for is understood in the first case as consensus, in the second case as some sort of a balancing of, uh, interests. Now, may I ask you, do you, do you have this, uh, handout?

I mean… Okay. Now, for the continuation of problems and how is it with, uh, the micro?

I mean, it works or no? Okay. From, uh, the continuation or from the combination, excuse me.

From the combination, now look at this sheet here. From the combination of problems on the one hand, two types of problems, and of actors’ perspectives, either in value-oriented or in, uh, interest-oriented actions. So kind– uh, uh, you get then the kind of criteria for a rough classification of, uh, basic problem-solving strategies.

The two conflict regulations, the two, two conflict regulating strategies in the next column up can be described under the headings of consensus and arbitration. Given conditions of value-oriented action, there is a prospect that a conflict can be resolved by the parties on the basis of shared values. Given conditions of interest-oriented action, there is a prospect that a conflict can be resolved by a balance of interests on the basis of factual power, uh, positions, normally in terms of a compensation for damages.

The two strategies for goal setting can be brought under the heading of authority and, uh, compromise. Let us see second, uh, column. Either individual persons or families enjoy sufficient prestige to give an authoritative interpretation of shared values and beliefs, or the parties to the quarrel arrive at a tolerable compromise, again, depending on their actual power.

Now, one could, and we can come back to that in the discussion. One could illustrate these four strategies by anthropological, uh, evidence for, uh, institutions, for, uh, different types of, uh, yeah, problem-solving of that interactional kind. However, none of these problem-solving strategies so far neutralized power relations.

All of them rather lead to results which, either directly or in a less visible way, depend on the contingent power positions involved, including, of course, such power constellations as are expressed in prestige differentials or even lie concealed behind value, shared value beliefs. If we now follow the frame of contractarian thought, Mm. They switch over to, um, rational collective, uh, will formation, will mean, not surprising.

I mean, the, the whole setup of those contractarian theories had been idealizing constructions. Now, we can’t— we cannot do it, uh, in the same way today, but we can just, uh, uh, uh, mmm, uh, declare this switch as a thought experiment. I mean, this is something preliminary.

Now, such a switchover now to rational collective, uh, will-formation would imply that these problem-solving strategies which we find, so to say, in the natural, uh, state, in fact, in kinship-based societies. Um, that these strategies can be freed from their enchainment to such power-ridden contexts. A thought experiment that I cannot carry out here in detail would allow us to point a clean– to paint a clear picture of rational collective will formation.

You can look, uh, at the line, uh, at the bottom line. On the one hand, moral discourses of justification and application would permit an impartial regulation of interpersonal conflicts that is free from ideologies and factual power impositions. And on the other side, pragmatic discourses, along with compromises and with the ethical clarification of collective identities would yield to a discursive form of goal setting, no longer prejudiced and disturbed by constellations of prestige and power.

If I now use, uh, terms like moral and ethical and pragmatic, just associate what you got from yesterday evening. And yet, in a certain sense, such a thought experiment would remain fruitless. Even granted the counterfactual assumption that both the practices of consensus formation and of bargaining were raised to the level of rational standards, the rational problem-solving strategies would leave the coordination problem unresolved in a non-trivial sense.

These are in your, uh, chart, uh, the unresolved, uh, problems in the bottom line.

(click)

Um, With respect to conflict regulation, the problems of imputation arises, and with respect to the pursuit of collective goals and programs, the problem of empowerment occurs. Let me briefly explain this. In modern discourses, the validity of a norm is always tested under the premise of its being universally adhered to.

Kantian idea. Norms which have stood this test can therefore only be imputed to someone who can be certain that everybody else orients their action, his or her action to it as does he himself. A post-conventional, a post-tradition-traditional morality of the Kantian type, of the deontological type, cannot provide such a certainty.

Of course not. In order to ground certainty, morally valid norms would have beforehand to be transformed into legally binding norms. On the other hand, rationally motivated agreements on goals and programs remain ineffective until the corresponding resolutions empower and simultaneously bind the executive bodies involved.

But rational collective will formation is not as such a process that generates, that generates power. I mean, Hannah Arendt thought one, one could make an argument for that, but I don’t think that this works. Only even if it were to be linked, I mean, this process of collective will formation.

Only if it were linked to political power would it be possible to confirm competencies, uh, on executive bodies and to supervise the implementation of the inputs. Thus, the functional requirements, if nothing else, the functional requirements of law and politics can themselves be explained in terms of the conditions necessary for a rational collective will-formation that involves imputable end-effect. Contractarian theories face the problem of the transition from a natural state to society.

An equivalent of this would be, in my design, the question as to how rational collective will formation can, without distortion, proceed within the medium of law and political power. Now, uh, I come to the second, uh, um, part, uh, the law and power complex. Maybe you find that a bit, uh, difficult.

Now, uh, contractarian theories, I mean, I knew it just in a different way than contractarian theories did it, and, and that seems to be, uh, for me, it seems, uh, to be important. Contractarian theories traditionally operate with two basic concepts. Just think of Hobbes.

Just think of the Leviathan. Namely, they have the concept of, uh, the sovereign’s factual power to issue commands at will, and on the other hand, the concept of the rule structure of legal norms. Norms that are conceptualized in a modern sense that assign equal liberties for private actors.

Now, political authority in these theories is then conceived as a sovereign will resuming and exercising legislative functions. The will of the sovereign then expresses itself in the form of laws, but his power is still conceived as that will that can override every other will. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be the will of the sovereign.

But no. Power channeled into laws still remains at its core substantive force. As a consequence, reason, in terms of which political authority gains legitimacy, and that was a problem for them, too, has to be imposed on the sovereign as a constraint from without.

One could, uh, uh, show that even for Rousseau. In contrast, this, uh, in contrast to this conceptual strategy now, I have provided a, uh, different starting point. We can already count on mechanisms and institutions which already process the risks of double contingency at a level below the evolutionary threshold of law and politics.

Thus, we can from the outset understand social power to be an intersubjectively recognized source of influence. For instance, in prestige systems, and also conceived of norms of action as somehow sacredly based on religious beliefs and morally binding. Proceeding from these assumptions, the concepts of law and politics can be then introduced in a two-step process.

Uh, the upper half of the right, uh, side. Uh, in the first step, normative authority can, on the one hand, arise by dint of social power claiming to be based on previously recognized only morally binding norms. Sacred law, for instance, provides a resource for justice from which power can draw its legitimation.

On the other hand, as soon as an adjudication that is initially binding only in a moral sense is linked with factual power, moral law becomes transformed into socially binding law. Social power functions in this context as a resource for force from whence administration draws its sanctioning power. So the authorization of power by law and on the other hand, the sanctioning of law by power must both occur uno actu.

The fact that those moments are of simultaneous origin can… I mean, they demand each other conceptually. Um, uh, the fact that those m-m-moments in this sense are of simultaneous origin can in a further step explain the functions that legitimate power or political authority and sanctioned law or binding law fulfill for one another

(coughs)

down there on the right side. It is only on the second level that power and law both mutually constitute themselves as codes, each of which takes on a function of its own, a societal function of its own. Law serves once it lends political domination a legal form to constitute a binary code of power.

That simply means whoever disposes of our power can issue commands to others. Whoever submits to such power has to obey. To this extent, law functions as an organizational means displayed by state authority.

Conversely, power serves to the degree that it provides executive reinforcement for judicial decisions, to constitute a binary legal code. Courts decide what is legal and what is not. To this extent, power provides law with a means of sanction.

Now, it is these code-specific functions of, uh, providing collectively binding decisions or a certain stabilization of behavioral expectations that explain why our thought experiment on rational collective will formation suggests that recourse be made to law and politics. The problem posed as to whether someone can be reasonably expected to abide by morally justified norm can be solved with the aid of the legal code. And on the other hand, the problem of empowerment and how executed bodies can be placed under control can be solved with the power code.

Of course, this does not yet answer the question of why such a conceptual experiment should be undertaken in the first place at all. Let us take a brief historical look back to the period when the, uh, state system in, uh, uh, in the modern state system in, uh, uh, uh, uh, early Europe, uh, uh, took, uh, shape. In modernity, early modernity, with the decline of religious worldviews and the decline of the meta-social guarantees which these religious worldviews provided, law and politics combined to form, so to say, a circular process.

Seen from a purely functionalist perspective, law then is entirely absorbed, and both by the contribution it makes to the power code to constitute it, and on the other hand, by fulfilling the code function of its own. Pattern magnets. Viewed in this manner, the circular, uh, process involving positive law and secularized power should be somehow able to rely on its own operations to stabilize itself.

Now, in fact, empirically, this is not the case. Rather, the validity of positive law becomes paradoxical and a gap in legitimation opens up if we only describe this whole, uh, complex of law and politics as an infrastructure of modern political systems and legal systems in functionalist terms. How can, which are the following: how can law that has since become positive law and can arbitrarily change, meet with normative recognition on the side of its addressees, and serve even more so as a legitimizing basis for political power despite its random changeability?

That’s one question. So, it’s a paradoxical validity base of positive law. Legal positivism again and again failed to explain this problematic condition, or rather denied its existence.

I think that the problematic situation can be explained. Explained by the— explain why is the fact that the constitutive conditions for the complex of law and politics are or would be violated as soon as the law placed at the arbitrary disposition of some political legislator ceases or would cease to serve simultaneously as a source for justice. You see?

I, I have, uh, explained, so to say, this conceptual genetic story about it. And you see that some type of law has to go into the constitution, into the constitution of binding law. And, uh, if, uh, uh, the positivization of law, uh, succeeds to such an extent that this resource is, so to say, blocked, uh, only then, uh, the, uh, uh, paradox of validity, uh, uh, comes up, shows up.

Now, just as political power must rely on the concentration of coercive means as a latent resource of force, so too law must remain in evidence also as a resource for justice. It is for this reason that a gap in legitimation opens up in that circular process which moves back and forth between instrumental power and instrumentalized law. And in this gap that contractarian theories had helped to close with their taking recourse to practical reason.

I mean, that was just the historical condition under which, uh, this type of theory, uh, uh, could make sense. And I think, I think that the conditions which are of interest for us didn’t change since. So the problem remains, only the solutions are outmoded.

Kant drew a plausible conclusion from the fact that the complex of law and politics, robbed of its sacred foundation, had been shaken. So he assumed that questions of justice underwent differentiation into moral and legal questions, and that law and politics always remain somehow intertwined with morality, uh, all the same. So this is an anti-positivist position, of course.

But Kant gave moral law the form of a rigid set of rules and principles superordinated to positive law. So even if it were be po– to be possible to ground such principles of natural law in terms of practical reason, they would either be too selective or not informative enough to meet the growing regulatory requirements of an increasingly complex and highly mobile, mobile society. I mean, natural, uh, uh, law, uh, concepts, even if they are justified on a post-conventional, uh, level, uh, with the deontological means, uh, are just too– are just undercomplex If even under these mo-modern conditions, still the connection of practical reason to law and politics is not to be cut off at all, we must now view mor- morality to be something that, uh, uh, uh, we, we must not view morality to be something that is somehow, uh, above the law.

Above? No. Instead, we must assume that morality withdraws into procedures that themselves interpenetrate with positive law.

In the following, I refer, uh, to my paper that I gave yesterday. This discourse ethics deprives practical reason of all specific, substantive, normative contents and sublimates them into the form of a procedure for justifying possible normative contents. Furthermore, practical reason does not guide moral judgments only.

It might well take its purest shape in procedural morality, but is by no means exhausted therein. In the first place, these discourses of justification, the equivalent to the Kantian categorical imperative, has to rely on their supplementation by discourses of application because the idea of impartiality is only fully realized in the assessment of concrete cases. Moreover, both types of discourse, justification and application, are interwoven with pragmatic discourses as well as with bargaining processes and ethical-political discourses.

I can’t speak to them. Now, the legal institutionalization of this whole web of overlapping forms of communication means that legal processes and argumentative procedures interpenetrate and, and this is important, mutually control each other. That’s a basic idea which I’m going to illustrate.

The main-track process constrains the dynamics of negotiations and argumentations and distributes, for instance, the burden of proof, but it may not intervie-intervene in the argumentational infrastructure. That is, in the in-interior of a dispersive will formation which obeys an influencing logic of its own. Just as practical reason, so to say, outwits its weaknesses by encoding the results of moral reasoning in legal terms, so too established law conversely outwits itself by means of the non-anticipated results of a logic of argumentation that has been legally licensed and enforced.

Now let me, in the third step here, talk a bit about that inter-interpenetration. Legal procedures regulate, for example, the access to and their own allocation in courts or in parliaments. They shape the type and course of negotiation and argumentation by, let’s say, defining objectives, selecting issues and configurations, channeling decisions, and so on and so on.

The means of positive law are used in a recursive manner in order to institutionalize discourses and negotiations that both produce and apply law. In so doing, two types of procedures and two types of procedural rationality intertwine. The results of legally institutionalized practices of negotiation and argumentation count as valid or as rational, precisely if they came about in conformity with the prescribed procedures.

In this context, however, the conditions of pure procedural rationality, of course, cannot be fulfilled. Third, theoretical as well as argumentative procedures presumably promote correct results, but they cannot guarantee that this is the case for obvious reasons. The idealized pragmatic presuppositions of argumentation in general can, in any case, only approximately be fulfilled and still allow for the possibility that justified beliefs accepted as valid for the time being be revised in the light of better argument tomorrow.

And this fallibility holds true even more so for juridical procedures which place modes of argumentation under the local, the social, and the temporal constraint of decision-making processes. Furthermore, in the case of argumentative procedures, there is no criterion for rule conformity that is not itself dependent on argumentation. Whether the demanding, the demanding communicative presuppositions have been sufficiently met in a given case can only be judged from within the perspective of participants.

Juridical, uh, procedures, however, can compensate for this very weakness by guaranteeing functional, unambiguous, and binding results. In this case, whether or not legal procedural norms have been conformed to, in fact, can be checked from the viewpoint of an observer. so, the socially binding character borrowed from the legal code of a result that has been achieved, achieved conforming to the prescribed procedures of argumentation substitutes the guarantee of pure procedural rationality.

In general, to sum up, this is a bit complicated. The legal institutionalization of rational collective will formation functions, if it functions at all, in such a manner that the discourses and their incomplete procedural rationality have, as Rawls puts it, a quasi-pure procedural justice grafted onto them. The logic of argumentation is thus not immobilized, but rather, let me say, disciplined

(coughing)

and employed, so as to

(coughing)

produce reasonable and at the same time legally valid decisions and resolutions. Juridical discourses are a good example of, uh, the intertwining of, uh, these two, uh, procedural times. I will not go into this here.

I mean, everybody who has, uh, read, for instance, Dworkin, but there are other equally convincing, uh, um, uh,

(coughing)

reports and articles on this issue, uh, Alexy, Aarnio, Günther, uh, to take only, uh, a few will, uh, realize that in hard cases, if you refer to legal discourses, in hard cases, uh, in spite of the finding of the whole procedure to the established law, to the laws, and then, Uh, this, uh, law does not, uh, define a closed, uh, universe of discourse. But in hard cases, uh, you, uh, uh, can get onto, uh, uh, an argumentational knot, so to say, where, uh, you are rationally motivated to include, uh, moral and policy, uh, arguments. So you, uh, see here beautifully, uh, uh, which consequences, uh, this intertwinement of legal procedures and notions of discourse, let me say, uh, here.

However, a rational practice of education, That would be the first, uh, example to analyze this whole, uh, idea a bit more. However, a rational practice, a would-be rational practice of adjudication, uh, represents,

(clears throat)

even under idealized conditions, only the first stage in the procedural self-legitimation of law. The question whether statutes are themselves also valid in a normative sense beyond the positivistic sense of, uh, factual validity, must to a great extent be left unanswered within the legal system. This has rather to be proved at the further stage of legislation.

The same intertwining of legal and argumentational procedures, as we have seen to exist in the legal discourse, first, must also establish itself in the domain of political information, which is not governed by experts. So here it is much more difficult to imagine how it should work at all. Whether the laws presumed to be valid in the legal discourse are also valid in the more demanding terms of practical reason demands on the rational– uh, depends, excuse me, on the rationality of the legislative praxis.

Statutes can lay claim to exhibiting such rationality only to the extent that they emanate and emerge from a democratic legislative procedure which would guarantee rational political will-formation. I wish now, in the last part of my, uh, paper, ten more minutes.

(paper rustling)

Sorry. Uh, yeah. So I wish to conceive of the democratic procedure as a legal institutionalization of those forms of communication necessary for rational political will formation.

As we have seen, court procedure– no, I didn’t go into it, but court procedure focuses on the preconditions of impartiality necessary for an appropriate and context-sensitive application of norms. Unlike now, this administration of justice, both policy formation and legislation unfolds, however, in a complex matrix of practices of bargaining and argumentation in the strict sense. I’m, I’m not yet speaking empirically.

I’m still moving completely in the realm of straight normative, uh, uh, uh, reasoning. A democratic procedure thus has to ensure simultaneously that several conditions for different forms of communication are met. Namely, the participatory conditions for negotiating fair compromises, followed by, let me just call it so, the sovereignty conditions for an authentic ascertainment of collective self-understanding.

I have referred to that yesterday evening, uh, uh, in the case of individual will formation. Now I am talking about collective will formation. Uh, and finally, what has to be granted is the autonomy as the autonomy conditions for moral discourses.

I shall here disregard conditions for adequate information, uh, processing and restrict myself to those aspects of bargaining, of ethical validity of self-understanding, and of moral justification. You’ve seen the same categories from yesterday that are relevant for the national character of dili-deliberation on policies and laws. If we proceed beyond the question of what we can do with regard to the feasibility of programs, then rational political will formation must clarify three questions.

First, the pragmatic question of how we can harmonize competing preferences. Secondly, the ethical-political question of who we are and seriously want to be, as well as finally, the moral-practical question of how we should, uh, we should act, we are allowed to act. An aggregated will can result from fair bargaining processes in which different interests are weighed up against each other.

An authentic common will can evolve from hermeneutic discourses of self-understanding. Think of Peller and other approaches. And an autonomous general will can be formed in moral discourses of justification and application.

Now, as far as they are not taken care for in the legal system, arguments take on different roles in such negotiations and discourses, and there are corresponding forms of communication in which the different types of discourse unfold. All of these forms of communication interpenetrate within the domain of what I call, uh, rational collective, uh, will formation with regard to policies and laws, I mean legislation. The evidence, uh, my knowledge of all these forms of communication evidence similar, namely, egalitarian surface structures.

However, only a differentiated examination allows us to perceive that what seems to be similar forms of communication actually have to satisfy quite different conditions. Let me go through these three types of communication which are interwoven in political will formation. First, as a form of communication, rational bargaining has to satisfy the procedural conditions that allow fair compromises can come about.

Participation and the representation of those entitled to participate, and additionally, the conduct of the bargaining process, the role of invo– the, the, the, the rota involved and the length of the process, the specification of admissible topics, the sorts of contributions and arguments that are admissible, sanctions allowed, and so on, and so on. All this requires regulation. Such regulation must take equal account of all pertinent interests, must equip all the parties with equal power, and honest and frank discussions, given a sufficient flow of information through the pragmatic that is the most rational but morally indifferent pursuit of each party’s own respective interest.

Secondly, ethical political discourse. I’m talking about the communicative pragmatic preconditi-preconditions for those settings in which ideally rational will formation of these three types become possible. I mean, that’s at stake.

Secondly, ethical political, uh, political discourse. Discourses are unlike bargaining processes, also geared somehow to cognitive pur-purposes. They are dependent on the form of communication that satisfy the conditions under which members of a collective gains the unrestrainedness as well as a self-confidence free of fear

(coughing)

that are necessary if they are to be able to recognize and affirm who they are and who they wish to be, what life form they would prefer to share in common. Finally, moral discourses are tailored exclusively to cognitive purposes. They require a form of communication that allows only the rationally motivated force of the better argument to, uh, persist.

Participants are supposed to judge norms and policies solely from a viewpoint that gives equal consideration to the interests of all concerned and to accept justified proposals as binding, as I maintain, that resolutions are, as a consequence, only reached autonomously if they are motivated by

(cough)

insights into what, uh, one should do, and not just one party should do. This particular artificial form of communication meets universal discourse, which substantiv- which substantially fulfills cognitive functions, is of course the most sensitive to all interests and dependencies that intervene in the internal workings of argumentation. Now, in the light of the forms of communication of these three types, it is now possible, and with this I will finish, it is now possible to undertake, uh, a, uh, maybe a somehow strange interpretation of the people’s– of the principle of people’s sovereignty and the human rights.

Then it’s also the normative substance of the democratic constitutional state, whereby these two components can be understood as now. Now the demand that those exacting forms of communication be legally institutionalized. I mean, I understand the well-known principles of our constitutional stage as saying you should, under given condition, as much as possible, legally institutionalize those demanding, uh, pragmatic presuppositions for a communication, uh, process which enables these communication processes to emerge as fair bargaining processes, uh, enlightening, uh, processes of authentic self-understanding and moral discourse.

Now, first, free, equal, and secret elections are geared to the participatory conditions ensuring fair voting. Finally, The equal participation of all requires that the selection of, uh, representatives be indeed as representative as possible, a selection that is intended then, I mean, ideally of course, to guarantee that all interests and value orientations are brought to bear with equal stress. It’s a power relation in the decision-making process.

Secondly, the principle of people’s sovereignty can, is however, I think, not exhausted by such an arrangement. By such an arrangement which allows the citizens to express themselves through the voice of their representatives in view of their own interests. This is an, important and maybe the most important, at least the most visible fact of it, but not the whole of it.

With Rousseau, this principle of people’s sovereignty can also be understood as a principle that the necessary communicative conditions be created for an hermeneutic process of collective self-understanding. Only under conditions of the direct, equal, and spontaneous participation of everybody in the public can that extent of ease, self-certainty, and the fear-free disposition to learn arise as much as it must exist if a dispute on strong evaluations is to develop into a conscious decision. Given that in complex societies like ours, it is not possible to fulfill the demand for immediate participation, strict restri-strict restrictions follow from the principle of people’s sovereignty with regard to the selection, the composition, the business procedures, and most important, through the context of and in which the representative bodies operate.

A discourse by representatives satisfies conditions for the equal participation at least indirectly to the extent that it remains open and sensitive and permeable to a public opinion arising from the grass roots of a more or less informed, pluralist, and spontaneous, uh, public, uh, sphere which is pluralistically organized. Thirdly, the communicative conditions for moral-practical discourses give rise to yet a different set of consequences. In this instance, the form of communication must satisfy conditions of autonomy, let me call it that way, under which each participant can expand his or her own perspective by drawing on the interpretive perspectives of all the other parties involved.

Participation and communication rights, the political part of our human rights, can be understood as the principle to have such discourses of justification legally institutionalized. This class of traditional human rights demands that those commun-communicative conditions which we necessarily presuppose to be fulfilled in practical discourses must be rendered operational and realized as far as possible. In effect, such conditions largely match the, uh, I mean, in effect, such conditions largely match the demands that derived from the principle of people’s sovereignty.

They have, however, a different meaning, namely that of providing the opportunities for discourses in which the participants can judge policies and norms from the moral point of view, and that is something different from the ethical point of view. Unlike in ethical political discourses, the set of potential participants here in moral discourses is not limited to one’s own collective. In other words, the members, uh, to the members of a particular community.

It is humanity which formulates the reference for human rights. Now, what is left as a negative civil rights. I come to a close.

The negative civil rights that originate from the liberal tradition have a different status. Viewed historically, they form, of course, the core of human rights, whereas political rights of participation and communication, as does the principle of people’s sovereignty, go towards constituting the practices of bargaining and argumentation. Negative civil rights, by contrast, promote the self-limitation of such a practice.

You see, it’s an unliberal way to define liberal rights. As has been shown with reference to ethical and moral discourses, rational political reformation would destroy its own communicative precondition if it were not to remain open to permeation by the informal cycle of political communication surrounding it in its environment. The public sphere can just as little be pressed into the pattern of a formal organization as can political culture in general.

So legally constituted political will formation points beyond itself. Only formally organized bodies, of course, can decide, but they must remain open and sensitive to those communicative flows of autonomous public spheres that are spontaneous in origin and elude any legal institutionalization. It is on such a plane that a political culture moves, which has become both reflexive in character and, let me say, communicatively fluent.

Institutionalized political will information– will formation would destroy the basis for its own rational functioning if it were to pluck the sources of spontaneity inherent in an antecedent public sphere. Viewed in terms of discourse theory, negative civil rights compel the practice of rational political will formation to limit itself and prevent itself from puffing itself up as a seeming totality, a deluding totality, and as the perfecting center of society. So I’m sorry, it took more time the first time that I used this paper, and you see it’s still in progress.

and I know it was a heavy load. Uh, maybe we, uh, talk a bit just about, uh, about the meaning of the whole approach, approach. If you don’t, if you shouldn’t have more particular questions.

(applause)

[01:07:16] INTRODUCER:
Okay. Professor Post, can you– Okay, try to see if he– Yeah.

(shuffling papers)

[01:07:22] PROFESSOR POST:
In the second volume of The Theory of Communicative Action, Actually, you speak about the law as colonizing the lifeworld from a certain kind of academic perspective. If I understood what you were saying today, and I’m sure I didn’t fully grasp it. You seem to sketch a more complex role for law.

It seems not only to map, but also to, on the one hand, express and facilitate the formation of community ethics as a protection of certain ethical norms, and also to create the conditions of certain moral discourses which transcend particular community ethics seem to– the law seems to be performing all three functions simultaneously. Is that a fair understanding?

[01:08:06] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Which, which three? Which three?

[01:08:09] PROFESSOR POST:
One is, uh, coordinating actions in the service of certain pragmatic interests. Two, facilitating the discovery and implementing the consensus regarding community ethics. And three, um,

(throat clears)

transcending community ethics to create a space in which, uh, moral discourse can

(throat clears)

occur that is independent of the particular perspective of any specific community

[01:08:35] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Uh, yes. Uh, I mean, you, you have, uh, nicely, uh, put, uh, what I, uh, intended to say. Although I, I wouldn’t like to have it in such an immediately, in such an immediate way applied to, uh, uh, what I, uh, on a more sociological, uh, plane, um, as discussed, in the, at the end of the second volume.

I mean, uh, let me just, uh, place what I, uh, locate what I, uh, have been trying today. I mean, it is far off so far from any empirical analysis. And, and so, uh, an, an immediate application would be, um, perhaps misleading.

I, I don’t know whether you implied that, but, uh, I, I, I… Let me just say, um, that, uh, this is plain normative reasoning with certain, let me say, empirical, empirical informations, uh, put in through the side door. Um, that means what this kind of reasoning can lead to in its strategic goal is to make in the first step plausible in which sense, uh, for political will formation and, and, and legal decisions anyway could be claiming to meet more or less rational standards. Um, So far, I didn’t even touch the level of institutionalization, uh, the level of institutionalization.

I came just to the point where I interpreted the well-known principles of our constitutions as normative guidelines for a possible institutionalization. So that now any institutionalization, Um, uh, which has to, uh, I mean, uh,

(clears throat)

uh, uh, yield to, uh, empirical constraints and functional requirements, um, can take on, uh, very, uh, different forms. And that means there are, uh, many possible, um, uh, institutional implementations of these, uh, principles. And I would maintain that the traditional liberal idea of implementation in terms of a separation of powers is misleading because uh, there you have…

I mean, th-this argument stems from the contractarian theory. So they, they somehow reasoned in a similar way, and then they had their principles, and then they thought, uh, there is a one-to-one relationship between, when we, for instance, discourses of application and discourses of justification, ethical self-understanding as far as it came into it and all can be, uh, uh, institutionalized, uh, just by, by one power, so that they had, uh, parliaments for legislation, courts for, uh, adjudication, um, administration for the, uh, uh, unification. I’m sure that the whole, um, uh, uh, process, historical process, legal and political process of, uh, uh, our political systems during the nineteenth century, at least since the last third of the nin-nineteenth century, when it turns to corporate capitalism and to social welfare state, on the other hand, um, made it clear that this idea of a one-to-one relation between normative principles and their institutional realizations is false.

You can easily see that your Supreme Court too, uh, thus, uh, maintains legislative functions, which it is not allowed to, Uh, and that, uh, uh, parliaments nowadays partly, uh, maintain, uh, administrative functions, uh, while, uh, administrations and then as the core of the story do maintain and presume all functions tellingly enough. So, uh, I’m only pointing now to the fact that this is a first step. But if that repertoire could be sufficiently developed, you could use it now empirically for a critical reconstruction of actual processes, historical as well as, uh, uh, present.

So this was just to, uh, uh, let’s say, um, insist that there shouldn’t be a too quick, uh, switchover from these normative, uh, uh, uh, considerations to whatever. Uh, yeah.

[01:14:34] PROFESSOR POST:
Can I just follow up for a second?

[01:14:35] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Yeah, yeah.

[01:14:35] PROFESSOR POST:
Without taking it to the additional step to institutionalization, uh, and staying on the theoretical level of your presentation, uh, do you have any thoughts on whether a theoretical answer can be given as to which of these three functions of the legislature take precedence in what conditions, since they can and will conflict at various times? Namely, the conditions for pragmatic action coordination will be inconsistent with facilitating, for example, the discourse of morality. Um, and, and under those conditions of conflict on the theoretical level, have you any thoughts about, uh, how, how we should resolve this conflict?

[01:15:20] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Yeah, and it’s also on the theoretical level, not, not speaking of any historical evidences. I mean, uh, already a, a difficult, um, mm, question. Um, I, I touched it yesterday evening, uh, on the parallel plane of individual will formation.

Um, I mean, there are cases to illustrate your question where questions are treated as pragmatic ones to be settled as full negotiations, fair or not, not in fact uh, no, uh, not pragmatic questions, but, uh, either moral or, uh, ethical, uh, ones. I mean, uh, many, uh, ecological, uh, issues are of this, uh, kind. Uh, um, all, uh, civil rights issues, of course, are of that kind And they, of course, of course, the compromises are nevertheless usually made by, uh, via, uh, the power play of, uh, less and more fair compromises.

Um, so not speaking on that, uh, what is empirically happening, theoretically, I think… Yes, that there is not just this multiplicity of, uh, pragmatic, ethical and moral questions, but that it is, after all, the same forceless force of reason which we bring to the problems in order to solve them. So it is by no means accidental that arguments always enter the scene, even in very different roles and even in negotiations.

It’s very interesting to see, uh, to analyze which role arguments should play in such a power-defined game. And nevertheless, I don’t think that it is true that they only play the role of, uh, post hoc justifications. They do that most of the time, uh, but they are not meant to be so, uh, to do that.

And because, uh, it has the same kind of reason, practical reasons that we bring to bear on our practical problems in all these fields, I do think that to the extent that we want to succeed to implement practical reason in a highly differentiated way into, uh, our institutional, uh, uh, uh, workings of, uh, collective will formation, that to this extent, it would turn out where to locate the selection mechanisms which so to say, uh, order types of questions as to their proper place, so that it is no longer up to individuals who debate about this, which is which problem. Uh, this is an intuition. I mean, I, I, I have to give an-another lecture in order to explain this idea, but the intuition should be clear that, uh, I, I do think that this, uh, communicative approach is somehow designed to, to place, uh, reasonable operations out there in the sphere of the objective mind, to speak with Hegel.

That means, uh, out there onto the institutional level, and to put, uh, questions which we face to be just questions to be solved in our minds singularly. Uh, to place them on to a, uh, cooperative level. Yeah, this is not a very satisfying answer, I know.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Next, yeah. Okay.

First and then second there. Please.

[01:20:26] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
You’ve said a tremendous amount about reason and its practical employment. And Kant also subsumed reason and its theoretical employment to a large degree under reason and its practical employment when it comes to dealing with the world. I wonder if you share Kant’s view that reason and its practical employment, in a way, uh, coordinates reason and its theoretical employment when it comes to human action.

In other words, is reason and its theoretical employment for gaining knowledge subsumed to a large measure within reason and its practical employment as used by Kant?

[01:21:04] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
I mean, you, uh, started from a certain reading of Kant, uh, as you well know, which is quite debated. I mean, this reading is inspired by Fichte and others who, uh, make the arguments that, uh, theoretical reason is somehow part of the practical. And that was then the main line, at least leading to Marx, if not to Hegel.

Uh, the question is what, uh, stand I do, uh, take on this. I, I, I think that the question, it doesn’t pose itself in the same way if you leave, uh, the whole design of a philosophy of the subject. I mean, there you have faculties: theoretical, practical, aesthetic, and then you ask for coordination.

Uh, once you transpose these faculties to the very communicative enabling conditions for discourses which are designed to, uh, have participants solve their problems, then, uh, I mean, you have the competition between types of discourses and no longer, I mean, This focused, uh, uh, question of who, uh, uh, uh, dominates who, and I wouldn’t, uh, think that, uh, we have to leave, uh, much, uh, space for contingencies. And I do think that it depends on, uh, situations and problems, if not even cultural particularities, when which type of discourse will justifiably, not just in fact, go to lead the others. So I, uh, have no answer to that a fortiori.

[01:23:18] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
Yeah. You’ve indicated in much of your other work, um, concern for the prac-kind of practices or the power relationships which corrupt and, you know, result in domination and, uh, a departure from some better pattern of, uh, longstanding life in the community. I’m just curious, in this constitution of yours or this framework of yours, what, what you think are the areas where, uh, corruption is the most likely to show itself?

Uh, and, um, what would be the measures you might take to, uh, try to anticipate in, uh,

[01:23:57] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
avoiding that? I mean, corruption in the narrow sense, and this might not be implied in your, uh, vote. Corrup-corruption in the narrow, in the narrow sense is not very important and sometimes, uh, serves, uh, good functions.

Because, uh, corruption in the narrow sense, uh, is more tied up to, uh, personality failures and, and, uh, such things. But corruption in, uh, a more objective or structural sense now, um, uh, is in my analysis… But please, I mean, this is just one proposal, and it competes with many other proposals.

Structural corruptions, um, are most important when in societies like ours, certain, um, large-scale, necessary, non-substitutable functions are fulfilled with means which are not, uh, designed for, uh, fulfilling just these functions. Now, this is an abstract formulation. Uh, I’m, I think that, uh, uh, well, bureaucratization is legalization, is commercialization of processes that are designed to raise children, socialization, to educate people, transmission of traditions, or to integrate people or groups socially, that they have a disrupting, a structurally disruptive, uh, effect, I mean.

Um, Now, uh, uh, a second, um, in my view, I mean, I, I have written something on, on bureaucratization and commodification and legalization. I mean, that is, so to say, on the colonization of spheres of life, which, uh, should be communicatively, uh, organized and, uh, somehow integrated via intentional actions and not so much via, uh, mechanisms like money and power, I mean, so this is one, um, uh, part of my answer. Now, the other part of my answer would be, and is more related to what I said, uh, this afternoon, is that, uh,

Yeah. The public sphere, that’s an old topic of mine, of course. That the pu-public sphere is deformed.

I mean, not just by dumb people, I mean, that we can stand, I mean, if functions are more or less, I mean, uh, uh, working, uh, we can, uh, carry, uh, even, uh, in a lot of, uh, I mean, more or less, uh, incapable, incapable persons. But, um, what I am here, uh, hinting at is more the structural deformation of the public sphere. Now, there is one point which I would like to stress once more.

No. Uh, No. Conventional political theory, also the normative one, uh, looks only to how institutions should be organized. Now, one of my consequences is that, for instance, the democratic procedure, procedure of political will formation in, in a normatively demanding way, uh, can only be institutionalized in deliberating bodies, let’s say parliaments, whatever bodies on whatever level, if they remain responsive.

Now, that had to be explained, of course. If they remain responsive to, uh, the flows of communication, and the communication processes in their environment, which cannot be institutionalized. Now, what can they be?

They are organized in a way, of course. I mean, we have medias, we have, uh, um, uh, papers, we have, uh, publishing houses, we have, uh, uh, yeah, parties, uh, in one of their minor functions, I mean, are part of, uh, uh, uh, organizations in the public sphere. But the problem is that, uh, the public spheres, we should, uh, use the plural of it, the, the public spheres, um, are not designed for decision-making, but only for opinion formation.

So they are relieved from, uh, those functions for which you need bodies, for which you need institutions. So they can develop into networks of informally organized flows of communications, which are even much more, I mean, uh,

(clears throat)

uh, uh, grassroots, um, supported than any institutionalized, although more balanced form of, uh, opinion, uh, formation. So– And if you think from a normative point of view, uh, of this condition, then it is, of course, detrimentous.

One, is this fundamental or is it not, uh, yeah, uh, destructive? Uh, uh, when you see, uh, how, uh, what is really happening in, in the public space, uh, and, uh, if you see the degree of organization and even institutionalization in the formal sense of, uh, of, uh, what should be left, uh, on a low level of organization and of, uh, uh, not being institutionalized. So these are two spheres where I don’t see, uh, uh, dangers, Yes, uh, not only but, uh, yeah, um, counter tendencies from what, uh, through those tendencies which, which one might detect in support of, uh, what I have here normatively, uh, explained.

Yeah? Yeah.

[01:32:00] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
Can you say something about what it is that plays the role of the public sphere once you make this move that you suggested today, uh, the love of mankind, presumably the public?

[01:32:16] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Yeah, yeah. It’s a legitimation function. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, we have these, uh, nice, uh, campaign studies in political science and sociology. We have, uh, electoral sociological studies, and, uh, there are, uh, the issues, uh, more clearly defined, uh, which are at stake. We have media research, um, and since Lazarsfeld, I mean, it’s, uh, developed a bit into mass communication, not so much as one would like.

Anyhow, uh, these are, uh, all, uh, areas in which, uh, there is an established research with, uh, many empirical datas. And I want to think that, uh, uh, a, uh, theoretical perspective like mine could be useful in somehow reorganizing these data and, uh, reconstructing a bit, uh, what is going on in, uh, these spheres. Now, um, uh, that means that one has to get down from these normative heights to, um, uh, uh, empirical analysis of, uh, uh, social processes.

For instance, I would say that from a normative point of view, it would be already as a necessary con-condition for the way of functioning of parliamentary bodies that are institutionalized. It would be necessary to, um, feel, uh, first to have and let spring and then to field, uh, what one might call, uh, autonomous, uh, public spheres. Autonomous public spheres, I call those spheres in which you have a certain degree of organization.

Namely, a degree of organization below the level of a systematized organization which can be defined by the fact that the functions of the organization are different from the intentions of their members. Now, exactly these conditions for large-scale organization is, so to say, normativ- normatively speaking, not allowed for organizations which would fulfill, uh, the function of, uh, fielding, um, more or less non-reflexive communication processes within the public sphere. So, I mean, starting from these points– I mean, I– there are, there are many points, which one is just an example.

Starting from those points, one could then, so to say, interpret the empirical material in, uh, describing, so to say, uh, which, uh, the tendency is to, um, and advance, what one could postulate as the implementation of practical reason in, uh, the public sphere. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah?

[01:36:16] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
I-i’m a little bit concerned by the ease with which you move from the question of individual will formation to the question of collective will formation. It seems as if there’s no centrally different, different phenomenology about the collectivity, uh, that would differentiate from that of the individual. And I wonder how this program of normative reasoning, how or whether this program of normative reasoning could take into account certain claims that have been made about the nature of groups and collectivities by psychologists, sociologists going back to, uh, Freud, for instance, or Durkheim, or Ortega on minorities and masses.

Uh, and whether or not it, it would be possible, uh, to take those into account and still preserve the goal of– goals of legitimation, uh, within the general framework of normative reasoning.

[01:37:17] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
I mean, two things. Uh, first, uh, already on the normative level, I, uh, I didn’t explain this sufficiently today. I lay, uh, stress, if that is an English word, I mean, uh, on, uh leaving behind the conceptual machinery of what I call the philosophy of the subject.

That means it would be exactly the mistake I want at least an attempt to avoid if I want to project structures of individual real formation just on the large scale. I mean, this is what they have in here and in Marx and in minds, and in many others, of course, where Volksgeist, uh, is the instance, and classes are just, uh, macro subjects. And that leads analytically into a cul-de-sac.

Now instead, I, uh, uh, propose to, um, make the transition from, uh, individual will formation to collective will formation in such a way that I already interpret individual will formation as Vygotsky, Mead, and so on, uh, an internalized form or mirror of, uh, a, uh, an intersubjective practice of, uh, be it bargaining or reasoning. Uh, and then the danger is at least less great. Uh, you can conceive from the very beginning, um, Collective will formation, not as something attributed to an entity, but as something that is described in, uh, structural terms, referring in the first place to, uh, linguistic, uh, features that are, or pragmatic presuppositions or whatever, which are from the very beginning shared or supposed to be shared by participants.

So that, I mean, state, the state. I mean, in Germany we have this powerful, I mean, uh, Da weiß man noch, was der Staat ist. I mean, it’s interesting that in the English-speaking world, world, you don’t have this nice concept.

I mean, the state. The state was always supposed, uh, to be the Leviathan or some substitute of it or some variation of it. You cannot longer, no longer think of it as a, as a subject.

Maybe we do think of it as a system, but then what I’m talking about here on the level of the legitimation process, uh, it is higher order intersubjectivity of which we talk and not macro subjects. Now, secondly, uh, uh, this, uh, channel, so to say, is a conceptual rule, uh, on which one can employ empirical knowledge such as so on a social, psychological, Freudian, Piagetian, or, uh, otherwise kind.

[01:41:13] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
Yeah? I didn’t take that as– I, I didn’t mean to introduce an empirical, uh, objection there or claim that that was a– that those, uh, those names were, uh, meant to indicate a series of empiric– possible empirical objections, but rather, uh, claims for a different type of logic at work when we speak of groups.

[01:41:31] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
Yeah. Yeah. No, that, that, uh, should be…

Oh, you mean now the group dynamics, sort of studies, and, and, and, just, I mean, maybe related things. I, I, I’m not sure what you are particularly thinking of. I think that, uh, uh, this type of empirical research, um, could and should be linked to, uh, a more linguistically oriented analysis of communication processes.

But I mean, that now is a different discussion, I think. But I see the problem. I, I, I totally agree that this should be attempted, Yeah, yeah.

[01:42:17] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
Conflict and discourse with other societies, other cultures, other collectives not play any role in, in the theoretical practice of collective movement?

[01:42:26] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
You mean Außenpolitik, foreign policy, to put it, uh, as an example,

[01:42:31] AUDIENCE MEMBER:
on the collective side, does now mean—

[01:42:34] JÜRGEN HABERMAS:
on a, uh, you mean, uh, without the, uh— Does that mean—without the

(unintelligible)

at, at stake? I mean, be it a nation or be it, just a, a neighborhood. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting question because that was the original question of Hobbes, wasn’t it?

(coughs)

Um, uh, Yeah, I mean, it is a question of, uh, uh… you see, I’m slightly evading, uh, uh, of anthropological pessimists, just to put it in history of ideas, yeah? I mean, um, uh, you see, uh, Uh, if you are an anthropological pessimist, you, know, describes the boundary conditions.

That means in the old con-con-constructions, uh, natural estate, in those terms that, uh, contingencies, uh, and dangers are on a high level. That means risk producing mechanisms are visited. I mean, uh, homo homini lupus.

While, uh, Bloch, I mean, and others also– No, not also, I mean. Uh, uh, uh, playing that down. Now, uh, and, and if you stress foreign relations, you are on the side of, uh, the pessimists, and if you start, You, you have the same game in history, those who speak of supremacy of interior policy versus supremacy of external policy.

See, it’s the same name. Anyhow, um, uh, let me put it, uh, now, uh, in, in a serious way. I mean, uh, I mean, on my side in a serious way.

Um, one could object to that whole approach, even if one grants the meaning of normative reasoning, which I only introduced because I am almost sick of, uh, functionalist and contextualist analysis of how courts work and how, uh, parliaments work, and so on and so on. And I do think that this whole approach is just less than half of the story. That’s just for the empirical motivation.

Anyhow, uh, even if I’m indifferent to the meaning of, uh, this normative approach, one can easily object, and I accept it, that of course, action coordination is provided in fact more by, uh, non-intentional than by intentional mechanisms. That means this, all of this concentrates on the question, How could participants intentionally solve these types of problems? and it’s necessary, of course, if you want to implement practical or see, uh, practical reason implemented.

Anyhow, now, uh, there you have this objection. How is it with, uh, systems mechanism like the market? I mean, the, the first, uh, candidate, uh, power codes, uh, uh, any institution has organizational devices that work unintentionally.

And, um, uh, first, I would accept that. It is of course clear that, uh, that set of problems is coped with, let me say, on both planes. Now, for foreign relationships, it is so that, um, in case of conflicts of this type, um, you need even– this is an empirical argument.

You need even more than for internal conflicts, systematic, systematic non-intentional coordination mechanisms in spite of the appearance of diplomacy and, and all that, I mean. Now, uh, so I want in the first step answer you, this is taken care for by other types of mechanisms. Now, then you can in the second step object and say, “But if that is so, why start with that, uh, type of business at all?”

And then I have to answer, uh, or can answer if I want to, to defend myself, uh, with an empirical argument. I do think that the laws in complexity in modern societies work in, works in those dimensions. It is at the same time that systems mechanisms like money and power, in fact, do absorb more and more of the variety, uh, or the risks or however you want to describe it.

But at the same time To the same extent even, I would at least intuitively suggest, the level of reflexivity also raises. That means because of the, um, the dedifferentiation of institutions of an older type like church and army, uh, you have at the same time a growth in problems that are just brought upon the minds of those experts and the people. So, uh, that, uh, I mean, I do see a certain division of labor, sociologically speaking, between the intentional and the non-intentional, uh, procedures of coping with worse coordination problems.

But, uh, uh, the empiricist then I, I would argue for, I mean, with empirical indicators at least, shows us that, uh, both is equally, uh, demanded. And so, uh, uh, the, uh, pointing to external things and so on, uh, would fit somehow or what would be taken into consideration within this enlarged picture. Yeah, you see–

[01:50:29] INTRODUCER:
We have– It’s, uh, four o’clock, and, uh, we’ve had to ask, uh, Professor Habermas a lot of questions, and I want to thank him very much for his talk and for his answers.

(applause)