/pol/ seems to think that because they invented critical theory, then they're responsible for it being adopted by feminists, cultural theorists, post-colonial studies, etc.
Critical theory for the Frankfurt School was three things:
1 - The critique of political economy which shows the 'transformation of the concepts which dominate the economy into their opposites'. I.e. they drew attention to the following aspect of Marx's procedure: beginning with the accepted definitions of the categories used by political economy, Marx shows how these turn into their opposites. Marx does not juxtapose his own standards to those used by political economy, but through and internal exposition and deepening of the available results of political economy, he shows that these concept are self-contradictory.
2 – Critique is not identical with its object. The critique of political economy does not reify the economy. It defends 'the materialist concept of the free, self-determining society, while retaining from idealism the conviction that men have other possibilities than to lose themselves to the status quo or to accumulate power and profit'. This defetishizing critique is to show that the social reality of capitalism necessarily presents itself to individuals in a mystified form. Spontaneous, everyday consciousness, no less than the discourse of classical political economy, proceeds from the assumption that social reality is an objective, law-governed, nature-like sphere. Neither the social relations nor the human activities which give rise to this appearance of a nature-like objectivity are taken into account.
3 – The critique of political economy regards the tendencies of society as a whole and portrays 'the historical movement of the period which is approaching its end''.
But then -- In view of the realities of WWII -- the entire Marxian paradigm of the critique of political economy is thrown into question. The paradigm shift from 'critical theory' to the 'critique of instrumental reason' occurs when this increasing cleavage between theory and practice, between the subjects and potential addressees of the theory, leads to a fundamental questioning of the critique of political economy itself.
/pol/ are morons, basically.
