Axel Honneth

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Axel Honneth is the Jack C. Weinstein Professor for the Humanities in the Department of Philosophy at Columbia University; Director of the Institute for Social Research, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main (since 2001); and C4-Professor of Social Philosophy, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main (since 1996).

From 1992 to 1996, Professor Honneth was C4-Professor of Political Philosophy at Freie Universität Berlin; from 1991 to 1992 he was C3-Professor of Philosophy, University of Konstanz.  From 1983 to 1989 he was „Hochschulassistent“ (scientific assistant) to Prof. Dr. Jürgen Habermas, Dept. of Philosophy, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt/M.; from 1982 to 1983 he had a Research Grant with Prof. Dr. Jürgen Habermas, Max-Planck-Institute for Social Sciences, Starnberg.   From 1977 to 1982 he was Wissenschaftlicher Assistent (scientific assistant), Institute of Sociology, Freie Universität Berlin.

Professor Honneth studied Philosophy, Sociology, and German Literature at Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn and Ruhr-Universität Bochum from 1969-1974, earning his M.A. in Philosophy in 1974.   His postgraduate studes were at Freie Universität Berlin from 1974-1976.    His Dissertation (thesis), at Freie Universität Berlin in 1982 was entitled „Kritik der Macht. Foucault und die Kritische Theorie“.  Professor Honneth’s Habilitation (postdoctoral thesis and postdoctoral lecturing qualification) was in 1990 at the Department of Philosophy, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main, entitled „Kampf um Anerkennung“.

Professor Honneth received the Ernst Bloch-Preis from the City of Ludwigshafen (Germany) in 2015, the Bruno-Kreisky Prize from the Karl-Renner Stiftung in Vienna in April 2016, and the Ulysses Medal, University College Dublin’s highest honour, for his lifetime contribution to social philosophy and critical theory.

His areas of specialization include Social and Political Philosophy, Ethics, and Social Theory. His publications include The Idea of Socialism, 2016, Freedom’s Right: The Social Foundations of Democratic Life, 2014, The I in the We, Polity Press, 2012, Das Recht der Freiheit, Suhrkamp Verlag, 2011, The Pathologies of Individual Freedom: Hegel`s Social Theory, Princeton University Press, 2010, Pathologies of Reason: On the Legacy of Critical Theory, Columbia University Press, 2009, Reification: A New Look at an Old Idea, Oxford University Press, 2008, Disrespect: The Normative Foundations of Critical Theory, Polity Press, 2007, Redistribution or Recognition?:  A Political– Philosophical Exchange, co-authored with Nancy Fraser, Verso Press, 2003, The Struggle for Recognition: The Moral Grammar of Social Conflicts, MIT Press 1996, The Fragmented World of the Social: Essays in Social and Political Philosophy, State University of New York Press 1995, The Critique of Power: Reflective Stages in a Critical Social Theory, MIT Press 1991, and Social Action and Human Nature, co-authored with Hans Joas, Cambridge University Press, 1988.