Volume 50, Number 1 · January 16, 2003
The Power of Positive Thinking
By Alan Ryan
A Berlin Republic: Writings on Germany
by Jürgen Habermas, translated from the German by Steven Rendall, with an introduction by Peter Hohendahl
University of Nebraska Press,187 pp., $50.00; $14.95 (paper)
The Past as Future
by Jürgen Habermas, interviewed by Michael Haller, translated from the German and edited by Max Pensky, with an introduction by Peter Hohendahl
University of Nebraska Press,185 pp., $15.00 (paper)
The Inclusion of the Other
by Jürgen Habermas, edited by Ciaran Cronin and Pablo De Greiff
MIT Press, 300 pp., $47.50; $19.00 (paper)
Knowledge and Human Interests
by Jürgen Habermas
Beacon, 356 pp., $26.00 (paper)
Religion and Rationality
by Jürgen Habermas, edited and with an introduction by Eduardo Mendieta
MIT Press, 176 pp., $45.00; $19.95 (paper)
Jürgen Habermas: A Philosophical-Political Profile
by Martin Beck Matustík
Rowman and Littlefield, 339 pp., $29.95 (paper)
Another Country: German Intellectuals, Unification and National Identity
by Jan-Werner Müller
Yale University Press,310 pp., $27.50
Jürgen Habermas is often thought of not only as Germany's leading philosopher but as quintessentially German. In the sense that few figures in American public life refer as often to the philosophy of Immanuel Kant or the principles of the Enlightenment, that is no doubt true. In fact, the figure he most resembles, both in his conception of what philosophy can do for public life and in his ideas about the role of intellectuals in a democracy, is an American—John Dewey. In 1947, Henry Steele Commager observed, 'Until Professor Dewey speaks, America does not know what she thinks.' He exaggerated, but it is easy to see what he meant. Dewey spent a long life thinking for his country, not so much trying to capture his countrymen's first thoughts as the thoughts they would have once they had thought things through. For four decades Jürgen Habermas has played just that role in Germany.
Review, 5360 words
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