Institut für Politik- und Kommunikationswissenschaft

Identity is a key term in the political philosophy of Jürgen Habermas. Creating a »reasonable identity« has in his view maintained to be the central task for a modern society, but the process of shaping collective identities has become more complex. Thereby Habermas distrusts any genuine national or cultural heritage to contribute to a reasonable identity which can only rely on the shared values of enlightenment as a common western project of modernity. This article argues
that Habermas’ theory is suffering from a blind spot: It does not take into account the strong effects of non-rational identifications (for example in the fields of religion or traditions) that remain essential to any political or social
process of identification. Furthermore his disregard for symbols, myths and other forms of complexity reducing media shows a lack of understanding for the multitude of representations. Instead Habermas clings to a rather narrowed,
cognitive concept of representation that needs further explanation to meet the requirements of modern societies.

Political economist Moritz Julius Bonn (1873–1965) was one of the few scholars who supported the new form of state installed with the Weimar Republic. In view of his role as an influential adviser of the German Imperial governments, as a well-known author, and as a political theoretician, it is astonishing to note that Bonn is all but forgotten today. This text revisits the
discussions between this reputed German-Jewish intellectual and Carl Schmitt, whom Bonn mentored, on the crisis of parliamentary democracy, as a starting point for rediscovering an important representative of liberalism in Germany.

Er gilt als musikalische Verkörperung der Revolte der 60er Jahre, als Sprachrohr seiner Generation, als Poet unter den Musikern – Bob Dylan ist längst eine Legende. Anlässlich Dylans 70. Geburtstag am 24. Mai diskutiert der Politikwissenschaftler Jens Hacke dessen ambivalentes Verhältnis zur Politik. Dabei zeigt sich, dass vieles, was man von Dylan zu wissen meint, keineswegs so eindeutig ist, wie es die Mythologie behauptet.