Excerpt

In interviews he gave during the 1970s and 80s, Michel Foucault acknowledged points of intersection between his work and that of the group of thinkers (the “Critical Theorists”) associated with the German Institute for Social Research, or Frankfurt School.¹ While admittedly broad in nature, the shared concerns that Foucault identifies are nonetheless important; perhaps foremost among them is the extent to which the preoccupation with certainty that characterizes modern Western thought has led to the uncritical acceptance of what is merely prevailing as being necessary. As Nietzsche observes, within the modern West a comprehensible reality, even if it is terrible,…