have you read legitimation crisis? how about the stuff on social movements? how about the historical sociology of the public sphere?
flawed these may be, but he is not only interested in navel gazing, but has been pursuing a line of thought in a rather systematic way over the course of a lifetime.
if there is anything interesting about Habermas at all for me is that it is precisely because he argues that in order to be different from navel gazing pomos then his arguments only matter in the context of a systematic research program and in terms of social practice.
kelley