Herbert Marcuse’s Concept of One-
Dimensional Man
• In conformity with the dialectical critique of modernity and
liberal ideology, Marcuse, a prominent scholar of the Frankfurt
School, underlined the subjective, critical and humanist
dimension of Marxism.
• Marcuse dwelled on the theme of alienation in contemporary
Western society and gave a penetrating critique of capitalism
as regards its impact on human freedom.
• According to him capitalism exercises monopolistic control not
only on production and distribution, it also creates the desire
and demand for commodities through a clever manipulation
of the mass media. The result is the widespread craze for
consumer goods which develops into a distorted second
nature of an
Herbert Marcuse…(contd.)
• Consumer capitalism renders the oppressed sections
insensitive to their original discontent, by stimulating
their trivial, material desires which can be easily satisfied.
Under the spell of gratification of these trivial desires, the
genuine urge for freedom disappears.
• Thus, the alienated human beings become unaware of
their alienation. Under the circumstances, they should
first be awakened to realize their condition of alienation
in order to arouse their urge for freedom.
• It will be a democratic community where work will
become play, and necessary labour will be organized in
harmony with liberated, and authentic, individual needs.
J. Habermas on Human Capacity for
Communication
• Jurgen Habermas was as emphatic as earlier theorists in his
critique of instrumental rationality of liberalism. He maintains
that it is possible to find non-instrumental rationality but rational
criteria in reference to which a social critique may be formulated.
• The significance of such criteria lies in the fact that they provide
the basis for a critical assessment of our shared beliefs and
values and of institutions they find an embodiment, such as our
legal and political arrangements.
• These values and institutions form what Habermas refers to as
our ‘lifeworld’ that always carries the possibility of coming under
the influence of a system which is heavily in favour of dominant
sections.
• In such an eventuality, we may turn towards rational scrutiny of
the ‘life world’ and highlight its distortion.
Human Capacity for Communication: The
Basis of Rational Critique
• According to Habermas, the basis of rational critique lies in
the human capacity for communication for language use.
Habermas hints at the universal value of the standard of
language and communication and thus its importance.
• Such standards are appealing because they are genuinely
universal and are derived from the logic of language use
itself. They transcend the particular, and potentially
flawed, beliefs and values that we have established in our
actual social communication.
• Habermas argues that whenever we use language, we
implicitly commit ourselves to certain key criteria. These
consist of truth, sincerity, moral appropriateness and
intelligibility.
Ideal Speech Situation
• Habermas draws the contours of such a communication in the form
of the ‘ideal speech situation’. This makes the possibility of
communication free from distortions, hidden agenda, biases or
arbitrary closure.
• Such discussions are not only rational but are also guided by the
force of better argument alone ensuring all participants an equal
chance to speak, to make an argument or express a point of view.
• This is how such kind of communication helps to arrive at a rational
consensus. Even if distortions creep into the communication of a
kind, there is a need to raise the level of such communication from
a particular to the general level of social conversation in order to
identify the distortion and to eliminate them.
• Such an eliminating process emerges out of Habermas’ critique of
modern liberal capitalist societies.
