Habermas, Honneth and Education: the Significance of Jürgen Habermas's and Axel Honneth's Critical Theories to Education

Rauno Huttunen writes on the importance of Jürgen Habermas's and Axel Honneth's critical theories to educational research and critical pedagogy. He examines significance to the theory of indoctrination and action research. In the course Huttunen introduce his theory of communicative teaching. While Habermas is concentrating on cognitive elements of individual and socio-historical learning processes, Honneth in his theory of Struggle for recognition is putting emphasis the the notions of care, love and respect. Huttunen applies Honneth's theory of recognition to educational narrative research and critical adult education. "Rauno Huttunen shows that he knows the research tradition, and has a very solid theoretical background... The over all project is clear, the contribution important, and findings help to advance the tradition of Critical Theory... Huttunen has mastered the craft of research at all level, from the design to the scientific proof, from the theory and method to the bibliographical critical analysis of the material." Dr. Carlos Alberto Torres Professor of Social Sciences and Comparative Education University of California, Los Angeles