> Hey there,
> So far I have been little more than a lurker in part due to
> my total ignorance concerning most of the issues raised
> here. I'd like to catch up and I'd be most grateful for
> recommendations for introductionary literature on Adorno,
> Habermas, Horkheimer, Fromm, Reich, Keynes etc.
> Thanks in advance.
Introductions or first hand material?
Adorno - I'd start with either Minima Moralia or Negative Dialectics or, if you can find it, his early essay, "The Actuality of Philosophy" - I think it's in a back issue of Telos. Secondary material - Gillian Rose, The Melancholy Science / Martin Jay, Adorno / Simon Jarvis, Adorno (excellent introduction) / Susan Buck-Morss, The Origin of Negative Dialectics.
Habermas - it's good to start with Autonomy and Solidarity. It's a collection of interviews and it reads pretty well... then I'd shift to Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (if you're interested in ethics) or Knowledge and Human Interests (early Habermas, more in line with the frankfurt school) or The Theory of Communicative Action (if you want to hurt yourself first time out). Good secondary material - Seyla Benhabib, Critique, Norm, and Utopia (probably the clearest and best) / Albrecht Wellmer, Critical Theory of Society (with nice sections on the switch from the FS to Habermas) / Axel Honneth, The Critique of Power (again, lots of good stuff on the transition from the FS to Habermas - with Foucault thrown in for good measure), Thomas McCarthy, The Critical Theory of Jurgen Habermas (simply... the authority on Habermas till about 1978) / William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity (general intro and critique) / the anthology Habermas and Modernity (excellent) edited by Richard Bernstein / the anthology Communicative Action edited by Honneth and Joas (good too) and the well known Habermas: Debates edited by Thompson and Held.
Horkheimer - the key text _Critical Theory: selected essay_. There is also some good commentary on Horkheimer's work in the anthology On Max Horkheimer (benhabib is one of the editors).
that's a start.
ken's notes