Adorno’s Politics Revisited

Ever since the West German student movement came into conflict with T. W. Adorno in the 1960s, the question of whether his theory and praxis were in some sort of problematic relationship has not gone away. In this chapter, the author partially defends Adorno’s views on theory and (political) praxis, focusing particularly on the 1960s. It is a defense because the author will suggest that, in significant respects, Adorno’s theory and practice were not in contradiction with each other but cohered well. Moreover, the author will suggest that we can learn from his stance how to think about and engage in politics—specifically from his contextualism and his emphasis on immersion in a local context. It is, however, merely a partial defense. The author identifies some tensions between Adorno’s theory and practical stance that have gone unnoticed so far, contrasting his stance to that of Marcuse, notably in relation to paying sufficient attention to interrelations between local contexts and the lack of an account of a global subject of change.