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The paper explores the relevance of critical theories of modernity in the research of memory transmission and political socialization. Firstly, the relevant concepts of Habermas, Giddens and Bourdieu are overviewed. Secondly, the notion of political culture and memory transmission are reinterpreted from the perspective of these theories, revealing different sources and forms of radicalism. Finally, divergent constellations of modernization are reintroduced as the broadest context of the processes of political formation.

This article aims at grounding critical theories with the help of psy discourses. Even if the relationship between the two disciplines has always been a controversial one, the article argues that therapeutic knowledge that accesses empirical forms of social suffering may offer important insights for critical theory. This general argument is demonstrated by complementing the theories of Bourdieu and Habermas with a clinical description of depression. First, the limitations of the capabilities of these influential theories in terms of how they can be used to conceptualize the variety of social suffering are introduced. Second, the psy discourses on depression are reviewed to identify and highlight latent references to the social. Third, by combining models of depressive suffering and various distortions of integration, an extended normative basis is elaborated. Instead of solely criticizing inequalities or distortions of communication, those social constellations are criticized that trap actors by producing a homogenous pattern of suffering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Communicative action is the coordination mechanism of social actions. However, being a social action itself, it needs coordination in case of obstruction. Such obstruction is especially frequent in late modern constellation burdened with the "individualization of life forms" (Beck) and the "dissolution of a mutual ground" (Lash). I call the mechanism capable of overcoming such obstruction the "coordination of action coordination." In the following essay, this notion is elaborated. Firstly, on the level of formal pragmatics, situations that implicate action coordination are specified. Secondly, the coordinating mechanism of action coordination is elaborated in the frames of the Habermasian theory as the harmonization of different concepts of justice underlying action coordination. Thirdly, a paradoxical aspect of this solution is introduced, which originates from the strict linguistic-intentional character of Habermas's theory. Fourthly, based on Levinas's pre-intentional ethical phenomenology, an alternative description of the coordination of action coordination is elaborated. Finally, the broader theoretical consequences of the new solution are detailed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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