Communicative action and philosophical foundations: Comments on the Apel-Habermas debate

Abstract

Anglo-American and continental philosophy are often con sidered sharply divergent, even hostile, movements of thought. However, there have been several attempts to cross the divide between them, leading some theorists to very interesting and promising new projects. Apel has been one of the first German philosophers whose serious preoccupation with continental themes has not impeded his thorough and responsible investigation of analytic and post-analytic issues. Thus, Apel promotes a linguistic analysis that aspires to unveil the hidden, implicit, but non circumventible linguistic-pragmatic presuppositions of argumentation and to explore its implications for epistemology, ethics and politics.