Richard Rorty’s neopragmatism × Jürgen Habermas’ theory of communicative action

Abstract

This paper aims to present two of the most relevant forms of pragmatism that emerged in the twentieth century and that have the pretension to articulate a new paradigm for philosophy. Firstly the neopragmatism of Richard Rorty, which avoids any kind of ultimate grounding of knowledge and considers philosophy a critical and constructive knowledge that is at the service of small claims every day. And secondly the theory of communicative action of Jürgen Habermas, which search a meaning to the unconditioned lived worlds and thereby presents a philosophy with pretensions to universality. Thus, this article aims to show the differences between the pragmatic positions of these two philosophers about the role of justification of the concrete contexts of action.