On systematically distorted communication

'On systematically distorted communication' is the title of a 1970 article by German Philosopher and critical theorist Jurgen Habermas.

Exposition

Gross argues that the concept is useful and needs rescued from obscurity and reconstructed. Habermas, Gross notes, 'virtually' ignored the concept 'in the later stages of his career, a marginalization that may be the reason that scholars have generally neglected its detailed explication.' As Gross says this is is unfortunate, because without it the concept of 'Communicative action', 'must remain inoperative'. This is because communicative action depends on an idealised notion of rational-truthful communication, which systematically distorted communication subverts.

Nick Crossley argues that Bourdieu’s work 'offers an important framework or problematic' in which 'we can realise, both empirically and theoretically, an analysis of ‘systematically distorted communication’, such as was deemed central to critical theory by Habermas in his earlier work.'

In his original article Habermas had used psychoanalysis as an example:

In Knowledge and Human Interests Habermas claims that he wishes to extract the form of psychoanalytic criticism for his critical theory but not its content. He wants to establish a form of social analysis and criticism which can achieve a similar type of critique at the social level, as psychoanalysis, in his opinion, achieves at the psychological level; a process which would involve removing the psycho-biological baggage of psychoanalysis and replacing it with sociological equivalents. His account of systematically distorted communication, however, particularly in the seminal paper of that name, remains tied to the content of psychoanalysis, portraying systematically distorted communication as psychopathology. There is therefore a theoretical gap to be filled before we can implement an analysis of distorted communication.