Habermas question

[Lauren Gifford]

Hi everyone, 

I keep coming back to this one point in the reading. I feel like there's something there I'd like to work with, but I need some help working through it. On page 28 Habermas writes, "The claim to power presented in rational-critical public debate, which eo ipso renounced the form of a claim to rule, would entail, if it were to prevail, more than just an exchange of the basis of legitimation while domination was maintained in principle." 

It seems to be like this helps explain the ideological push for the production of the Bourgeois Public Sphere, but I can't quite figure it out. 

Any thoughts? Ideas? Anyone else thinking of the production of space of the Bourgeois Public Sphere?

Thanks.

-lauren

[galenbmurton]

Other than reading through Section 7 (which is referenced parenthetically at the end of this quote) to get a better handle on it, my understanding of the meaning of this quote is actually captured in the previous sentence: "The principle of control that the bourgeois public opposed to the latter - namely, publicity - was intended to change domination as such" (28). Isn't he saying that the publicity of criticism (and rational thought/reason), which the public sphere produced, is what challenged the "domination" of state power and gave civil society its teeth, and thereby "undercut the principle on which existing rule was based" (28)? Does that make any sense, or am I answering something different and/or more obvious. Of course, I could be totally off, but that's my take for now. 

[Lauren Gifford]

That's good. Thanks Galen.