Reason, Tradition, and the Good: MacIntyre's Tradition-Constituted Reason and Frankfurt School Critical Theory

Chapter 3: MacIntyre’s Tradition-Constituted Reason

83 3 MacIntyre’s Tradition-Constituted Reason Modernity suffers from a crisis of reason. The Enlightenment project failed because of the dominance of subjective rationality in modernity . Horkheimer and company outlined a program for emancipatory reason, but Habermas showed the Frankfurt School’s conception of rationality to be inadequate because of its reliance on a philosophy of consciousness. Yet Habermas’s attempt at rescuing modernity founders on the same shoals as did those of other Enlightenment and modern thinkers—the subjectivization of reason—for he proposes a formal rationality that cannot evaluate ends. Must the pessimism so evident throughout Horkheimer and Adorno ’s Dialectic of Enlightenment be accepted? or can some other way out of the problem of reason be found? Must one acknowledge Nietzsche’s will to power, revitalized by Michel Foucault and other contemporary postmodern philosophers, according to which morality and reason are divergent and morality names only the dictates and practices of the stronger group? or can we rethink the project of modernity? Critical theorists need not wallow in pessimism. Rather, a conception of reason can be found in philosophy that will support critical theory in the spirit of the Frankfurt School to pursue emancipation. Reason, however, must be understood not as a universal, ahistorical, or Archimedean phenomenon, but as constituted by and constitutive of tradition. Critical theory à la Horkheimer seeks a reason capable of judging ends. only with a tradition-constitutive and traditionconstituted reason can ends be critiqued. The basis for this conception R E A S o N , T R A D I T Io N , A N D T H E G o o D 84 lies in Alasdair MacIntyre’s account of moral philosophy and traditions of enquiry. For MacIntyre, standards of reason are constituted by tradition. What is reasonable for one tradition may not be reasonable for another. Moreover, argues MacIntyre, a claim of justice can be defended only with the conception of reason inherent in that tradition of justice within which the claim is raised. MacIntyre’s tradition-constituted reason1 provides a starting point for a substantive conception of reason. MacIntyre discloses the fundamental historicity of reason, but he stops short of a conception of reason useful for a critical theory of society. For it to be useful in that way, a conception of reason must recognize that reason is fundamentally, and essentially, tied to the good and must explain the nature of that tie. Although MacIntyre suggests that an essential tie exists between reason and the good, he does not elucidate that relationship. Because this very relationship between reason and the good secures for reason the ability to judge ends, a critical theory of society must spell out that relationship in order to realize a conception of reason useful for purposes of emancipation. I begin with a discussion of the need for moving from a communicative rationality to a tradition-constituted reason. This motivation stems from both Horkheimer’s diagnosis of reason and the need for unrooting the historical contingencies of reason. I also point out the similarities between Horkheimer and MacIntyre. Both, for instance, reject major parts of modernity because of its failure to provide a means for evaluating ends. Showing the connection between Horkheimer and MacIntyre allows me, then, to examine and expand upon MacIntyre’s notion of tradition and his defense of tradition-constituted reason. According to MacIntyre, traditions of enquiry are historically and socially embedded arguments about fundamental agreements; these arguments are shaped both by those who share and by those who do not share those agreements. on MacIntyre’s account, reason consists in a set of beliefs and standards found within those arguments. Finally, I address three question for MacIntyre’s account: (1) Can a tradition-constituted reason judge ends? (2) Is there a stronger connection between reason and the good than MacIntyre envisions? (3) Are there traditions other than traditions of enquiry, and if so, what is the significance of that fact MacIntyre’s Tradition-Constituted Reason 85 for a critical theory of society? Question one will be answered in this chapter; questions two and three in the next. The interpretation of MacIntyre I offer here preferences his treatment of tradition over his treatment of practices. This take differs from that of, for instance, Kelvin Knight in “Revolutionary Aristotelianism” and Aristotelian Philosophy: Ethics and Politics from Aristotle to MacIntyre . one cannot understand reason and virtue in MacIntyre’s work or, more importantly...