The End of the Era of Rational Discourse

Americans have a long history of being led into wars under legal pretenses. In 1898, although naval experts cited an accidental explosion on a ship as the cause, the yellow press blamed Spain for the sinking of the USS Maine, fueling a war fervor. Similarly, the George W. Bush administration sought to justify the invasion of Iraq by linking Saddam Hussein to the 9/11 attacks and alleging weapons of mass destruction—claims later proven false.

In the case of war involving Iran, Donald Trump set a new precedent. He became the first president to start a war without bothering to deceive the American people, as their opinion held no value for him. There was no consultation regarding an attack on Iran—neither with Congressional leaders nor with intellectual circles or civil society.

As Trump stated to The New York Times in January, his power as commander-in-chief “is determined by my own morality and my conscience.” He added, “The only thing that can stop me is myself.”

Jürgen Habermas, a profound analyst of discourse civilization, was unable to comment on the Iran war. He passed away on March 14 at age 96, two weeks after the attacks by the US and Israel began. Nonetheless, the conflict expressed his deep concerns about the future of liberal democracy, which he spent his lifetime studying and defending. Habermas believed democracy’s essence is in “discourse”—continuous deliberation on ideas and values.

He introduced the concept of the “public sphere,” a space where citizens gather to make decisions. Communicative action transforms language into a collaborative power. He wrote, “All political power derives from citizens’ communicative power. In an ideal democracy, all questions and contributions arise through debate and dialogue before conclusions are drawn.”

The end of Habermas’s long and fruitful life cannot be called a tragedy, but tributes published after his death highlighted the lamentable state of democracy. In November, in Munich, he had lamented how the expansion of Trump’s authoritarian executive power had caused disintegration within American democracy.

If you hold opposing views, your social media feed is filled with like-minded contrarians who only affirm your beliefs and never challenge them, making democratic debate impossible.

The authoritarian turn America has taken darkened the end of Habermas’s life, which he described as politically fortunate in his speeches. That life began from such a low point that the only option was to rise.

Born in Germany in 1929, Habermas grew up during the Nazi era. He was a member of the Hitler Youth, and his father served as an officer in the German army during World War II. He witnessed the firm roots of democracy in West Germany and the restructuring of an independent Europe.

This hopeful conclusion was not inevitable, but as a theorist and eloquent speaker, Habermas made significant contributions. He began his career in the 1950s in West Germany, when academia was still dominated by former Nazis.

Despite this, he opposed the influence of Martin Heidegger and found guidance in Theodor Adorno, founder of the Frankfurt School and a social critic exiled from the Nazi era. Habermas led the second generation and spent his career at Frankfurt University.

While Adorno lost hope for modern civilization after the Holocaust, Habermas sought the sources of freedom within the Western intellectual tradition. This search began with his 1962 publication, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere, his most renowned work.

Habermas traced the modern concept of public opinion to 18th-century Europe’s coffee houses, salons, and journals, which gave the public a chance to debate and comment on rulers’ decisions.

The French Revolution was founded on this environment, which politically inspired him. The public sphere means ending repression so ideas can be influenced uniquely by compelling public insight, not by other bases.

However, Habermas acknowledged that the liberal democratic ideal has never been fully realized—neither in the openly public spheres restricted to elite men in the 18th century, nor in the 20th century when public opinion became passive and manipulated by propaganda. He wrote, “The world created by mass media is merely an illusory public sphere.”

He was not alone; leftist thinkers dismissed liberalism as merely a capitalist facade. Yet he believed in liberalism’s utopian potential.

Though conscious democracy never fully emerged, any good society must be based on its principles. In his 1992 book Between Facts and Norms, he wrote, “The legitimacy of law ultimately depends on communicative order.”

Citizens must engage in rational debate, freely express their ideas, and seek mutually understood problem-solving.

Calling Trump authoritarian was accurate, but social media made him a “strongman” — ignorant, uncertain in behavior, indifferent, and unaware of what to do next.

Habermas’s dynamic study of discourse took him far beyond political philosophy. His intellectual discussions engaged sociology, linguistics, psychology, and cultural studies. His German philosophical writing style was deep and complex; yet he described his work as a living example of “discourse ethics,” involving honest and sustained intellectual exchange.

He believed language compels people to commit to democratic argumentation. In 1981’s The Theory of Communicative Action, he explained language as a crucial medium not just for expressing truth or falsehood, but for dialogue.

Habermas argued that speech acts succeed when acknowledged by the hearer. This recognition always rests on possible grounds or reasons. We require clear and precise reasons from any speaker, which must be presented when necessary.

His conclusion was that “persuasion” is the fundamental basis of language use; the ultimate goal of human communication is establishing mutual understanding.

We use language not only for rational persuasion but also for commands or threats. According to Habermas, agreement based on reward or punishment is submission, not genuine consent.

Public debate is genuine only when no participant is excluded, no ideas are prohibited, and no one is coerced. These conditions are rare in today’s politics, although we may always move closer or further from this ideal.

In the mid-20th century, when writing Structural Transformation, the main obstacles to public debate were technical. Radio, television, and large newspapers controlled communication, denying the public chances to express their views, creating one-sided discourse edited to powerful interests.

But later in life, technological advances brought the opposite problem. The Internet and social media opened the marketplace of ideas, yet a single streamer could become official for millions, while news networks and magazines struggle to survive.

When cruelty and insensitivity become political combinations, it becomes clear the era of rational debate—Jürgen Habermas’s era—has fully ended.

The Internet was initially hoped to be a blessing, with many believing it would strengthen democracy. So why does the abundance of ideas now threaten it?

In his 2023 book A New Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere and Deliberative Politics, Habermas searched for answers. He wrote, “Printing made everyone a reader; today, digitalization makes everyone an author.”

Due to a lack of seriousness in debate, public discourse becomes impossible. Genuine debate requires truth-telling and listening to others’ viewpoints.

The Internet cannot create such an environment. The problem is not only lies and misinformation but a public sphere fragmented into divisions that ignore one another.

If you hold opposing views, your social media is filled with those who share those views, merely confirming you without challenge, making democratic debate impossible.

Habermas wrote, “The main goal of reflective politics is to improve our beliefs and guide us toward genuine problem-solving.” This requires challenge and explanation—without which dialogue is impossible.

The challenge of social media was initially underestimated by Habermas. It is not just division, but the void and superficiality of online existence that promotes nihilism. Platforms like TikTok and Twitter foster trolling, where the identity of the speaker matters more than what is said.

Habermas’s judgment of Trump as authoritarian remains accurate, but social media has shown him as unstable and trivial, unaware of or indifferent to his actions. He causes harm to people and institutions by not taking matters seriously.

Thus, Trump remains a mystery for political theory but a star of social media. To borrow from Karl Marx, “Whatever is solid melts into air.”

When cruelty and irresponsibility form effective political combinations, the age of rational debate—that is, Jürgen Habermas’s era—has definitively ended.

(This article is a translated adaptation of Adam Kirsch’s analysis published in The Atlantic. Adam Kirsch is a poet, critic, and editor who regularly contributes to The Atlantic and The New Yorker, and has authored ten books including the poetry collections The People and the Books and The Discarded Life.)