“Europe is at a turning point. It is plain to see that the monetary union cannot be sustained and expanded without a genuine political union. The problem is that we are now experiencing the full hardship of a complex economic situation in which Europe plays a leading role. That does not make the necessary strengthening of the European idea any less complicated.”
These words, spoken by Jürgen Habermas in a 2013 interview at KU Leuven, when the economic crisis was testing the European project, remain strikingly relevant today and capture the magnitude of the loss of the German philosopher, whose contribution to the concepts of the public sphere and deliberative democracy was decisive. As a theorist of the second generation of Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School, through his sharp yet constructive presence he continuously laid the intellectual foundations for claiming a Europe of its peoples.
My first encounter with his work, through the course “Theories of Justice: Rawls, Habermas, Luhmann, Derrida” during my undergraduate studies in the Department of Political Science and History at Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences, was decisive. His works The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere and The Theory of Communicative Action (Vol. 1: Reason and the Rationalization of Society) became foundational texts for the intellectual development of thousands of political scientists.
His contribution to the debate on a constitution for Europe taught us that the universal challenges of our time require collective responses, which can only be achieved through a politically united Europe. A Europe that does not remain confined to technocratic management, but advances toward a “supranational democracy”. In simple terms, through his work he laid the foundations for a Europe of the peoples -an idea that may be more relevant, critical, and necessary today than ever before.
Selected Works of Jürgen Habermas
Habermas, J. (1991). The structural transformation of the public sphere: An inquiry into a category of bourgeois society. MIT press.
Habermas, J. (1985). The theory of communicative action: Volume 1: Reason and the rationalization of society (Vol. 1). Beacon press.
Habermas, J. (1992). Citizenship and national identity: some reflections on the future of Europe. Citizenship: Critical Concepts, 2, 341-358.
Habermas, J. (2012). The crisis of the European Union: A response. Polity.
Habermas, J. (2017). Why Europe needs a constitution. In Constitutionalism and Democracy (pp. 507-528). Routledge.
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