The “Great Refusal” and Social Theory, 1961–1981 111
stood in an old Prussian tradition that dated back to Bismarck,
aimed to secure the interests of West German monopoly capitalism,
and were “... comparable to the ‘concerted action’ of Economics
Minister Schiller.”^99
Although Habermas contrasted “technocracy” with “democ-
racy” as the students did, their common language did not blind
him to the weaknesses of the student case for democratization. The
fact that Habermas put “democratization” in quotes and referred
to the “so-called progressives” is evidence that he was not entirely
convinced by the demands for the democratization of the univer-
sity. In an article cowritten with philosopher Albrecht Wellmer in
1968, Habermas argued that the problem of democratization of the
university required a more subtle approach to the question of the
politicization of science than the SDS advocated. While the SDS
argued that the university become a site for the schooling of social-
ist revolutionaries, Habermas and Wellmer argued that democra-
tization would come from prior recognition of the relationship of
the sciences to politics.^100 An abstract model of democracy could
not be carried over to the university, they asserted; rather, democ-
ratization would come from a reorganization of the conduct of
science (Wissenschaftsbetrieb) in conformity with the intention to
spread “critical rationality.” Democratization meant that the deci-
sions of the university must be submitted to a rational test of their
“leg it i mac y.”^101
HABERMAS AND THE STUDENT MOVEMENT,
PHASE TWO: THE CRITIQUE OF “ACTIONISM”
From June 1967 to February 1969, Habermas’s critique of student
“actionism” unfolded in different contexts, but the underlying
argument remained the same. Habermas’s most substantial cri-
tiques of the students were written in the immediate wake of the
dramatic takeover and renaming of the University of Frankfurt as
99 Ibid.
(^100) Albrecht Wellmer, “Unpolitische Universität und Politisierung der
Wissenschaft,” Versuch einer Politischen Universität in Frankfurt [ June
1968], PuH, 249; orig. in Universität und Widerstand, eds. D. Clausen and
R. Vermitzel (Frankfurt/Main: Europäische Verlagsanstat, 1968).
(^101) Ibid., 258.