Hegel in Adorno’s post-Hegelianism

Abstract

Abstract According to a widely accepted interpretation, the dialectics of Adorno and Hegel pursue opposite goals despite their similar terminology. Adorno employs immanent critique and determinate negation within a negativistic model of social criticism, diagnosing the irrationality of Western capitalist societies without offering remedies. Hegel uses the same method to support a social quietism grounded in optimistic views about the rationality of modern societies. While I shall not dispute the thesis of a deep incompatibility between Adorno and Hegel, I argue that it overlooks a deeper issue. Adorno presents his negative dialectic as an alternative to Hegel’s, in so far as he claims to identify and criticize the latter’s identitarian character—its tendency to rationalize phenomena. I contend that Adorno’s critique misfires on several counts, most notably in its account of the source of Hegel’s identitarian problem. The crux of the matter, however, is neither Adorno’s Hegelianism nor his anti-Hegelianism, but the viability of his distinctive model of post-Hegelian philosophy.