As director of the Frankfurt School's Institute for Social Research, Horkheimer distinguished "traditional theory," which treats knowledge as a detached, positivist description of facts, from "critical theory," which is self-consciously oriented toward human emancipation from unnecessary domination. With Adorno, in "Dialectic of Enlightenment" (1944) he argued that Enlightenment reason, meant to free humanity from myth and the domination of nature, dialectically reverted into a new form of domination through instrumental reason and the standardizing "culture industry."
Intellectual setting
Horkheimer led the Institute for Social Research through exile from Nazi Germany, shaping its interdisciplinary program combining philosophy, sociology, and psychoanalysis, and wrote "Dialectic of Enlightenment" with Adorno while in wartime exile in the United States, reflecting on fascism's emergence from within a supposedly rational, enlightened civilization.
Key ideas
Critical theory versus traditional theory
Horkheimer argued that traditional theory falsely presents knowledge as a neutral, value-free description of an independent reality, while critical theory openly orients its account of society toward exposing and overcoming unnecessary forms of domination.
The dialectic of Enlightenment
With Adorno, Horkheimer argued that Enlightenment reason, intended to liberate humanity from myth and subjugation to nature, dialectically produced new forms of domination through instrumental rationality and a standardizing "culture industry" that manufactures passive mass consent.
Legacy
Horkheimer's distinction between traditional and critical theory defined the Frankfurt School's self-understanding, and "Dialectic of Enlightenment" remains a foundational text of critical theory and cultural criticism, shaping later Frankfurt School work by Habermas and subsequent cultural studies.