EDITH KURZWEIL
829
understood, by their teachers Horkheimer and Adorno, and who
kept reminding each other that neither
mythos
nor
logos
was to gain the
upper hand. This alone would have been heady stuff. But the unques–
tioning and unrelenting use of Marxist categories, of how the state
apparatus dominates subjectivity, how capital determines it, or how
the suspension of alienation into alienation as a given- (here Gunther
Anders was cited)- were clear indications that Marxism has become
more than a worldview, or even a hoped-for salvation. Instead, as a
method of inquiry, it has been turned into a security blanket, pro–
tecting these intelligent and dynamic individuals- against fascism,
anti-Semitism, and the "collective narcissism" the Nazi period alleg–
edly left behind.
In contrast to their parents' generation, and to their cohorts on
the right, German leftists live with Nazi history (except for the few
neo-fascist gangs mythologizing it) in order to avoid its repetition,
and with the philosophical forebears who provide the solid tradition
they affirm
and
reject. Horkheimer's
Dialectic ofEnlightenment,
as both
critique and perpetuation of this tradition, has become their bible.
Whether references to Adorno's and Horkheimer's later works were
missing, because these are less Marxist or do not deal directly with
theoretical questions of subjectivity, was unclear. Still, the partici–
pants at this two-day meeting stuck closely to their theme, covering,
thoroughly and theoretically, such diverse topics as the construction
of subjectivity, how forms of subjectivity develop, the subject in social
movements, the dimension of creativity in such movements, and neo–
fascism. (Psychoanalysts, pedagogians, sociologists, and psycholo–
gists took part; and they were familiar with each others' intellectual
premises.)
Undoubtedly, the conscience of this generation of Germans has
changed; and, as Adorno already found, it is different (better) than
that of Weimar. But, to paraphrase Adorno once more, they again
fear opposing the East, insofar as its dynamic awakens the German
past, not just ideologically, but because "the organic striking power
of totalitarian systems forces something of their own essence onto
their opponents." Or is there another explanation for the scant men–
tion of this danger to the democracy Germans cherish, coupled to an
ever more virulent anti-Americanism? Even the psychoanalysts who
readily interpreted instances of projection by the neo-Nazis and
other youth did not think of this- societal- sort of projection. Nor
was this topic discussed in connection with issues of Marxist "totality"
which seemed more urgent to the sociologists than the therapists.
