Dialectic of Enlightenment: Philosophical Fragments (Cultural Memory in the Present) - Hardcover

Horkheimer, Max; Adorno, Theodor W.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0804736324 ISBN 13: 9780804736329

Publisher: Stanford University Press, 2002

Synopsis

This is a new, improved translation of the most influential publication of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory. Adorno and Horkheimer aimed "to explain why humanity, instead of entering a truly human state, is sinking into a new kind of barbarism."

About this title

About the Author

Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno were two influential members of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory.

From the Back Cover

Dialectic of Enlightenment is undoubtedly the most influential publication of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory. Written during the Second World War and circulated privately, it appeared in a printed edition in Amsterdam in 1947. "What we had set out to do," the authors write in the Preface, "was nothing less than to explain why humanity, instead of entering a truly human state, is sinking into a new kind of barbarism."
Yet the work goes far beyond a mere critique of contemporary events. Historically remote developments, indeed, the birth of Western history and of subjectivity itself out of the struggle against natural forces, as represented in myths, are connected in a wide arch to the most threatening experiences of the present.
The book consists in five chapters, at first glance unconnected, together with a number of shorter notes. The various analyses concern such phenomena as the detachment of science from practical life, formalized morality, the manipulative nature of entertainment culture, and a paranoid behavioral structure, expressed in aggressive anti-Semitism, that marks the limits of enlightenment. The authors perceive a common element in these phenomena, the tendency toward self-destruction of the guiding criteria inherent in enlightenment thought from the beginning. Using historical analyses to elucidate the present, they show, against the background of a prehistory of subjectivity, why the National Socialist terror was not an aberration of modern history but was rooted deeply in the fundamental characteristics of Western civilization.
Adorno and Horkheimer see the self-destruction of Western reason as grounded in a historical and fateful dialectic between the domination of external nature and society. They trace enlightenment, which split these spheres apart, back to its mythical roots. Enlightenment and myth, therefore, are not irreconcilable opposites, but dialectically mediated qualities of both real and intellectual life. "Myth is already enlightenment, and enlightenment reverts to mythology." This paradox is the fundamental thesis of the book.
This new translation, based on the text in the complete edition of the works of Max Horkheimer, contains textual variants, commentary upon them, and an editorial discussion of the position of this work in the development of Critical Theory.

From the Inside Flap

Dialectic of Enlightenment is undoubtedly the most influential publication of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory. Written during the Second World War and circulated privately, it appeared in a printed edition in Amsterdam in 1947. "What we had set out to do," the authors write in the Preface, "was nothing less than to explain why humanity, instead of entering a truly human state, is sinking into a new kind of barbarism."
Yet the work goes far beyond a mere critique of contemporary events. Historically remote developments, indeed, the birth of Western history and of subjectivity itself out of the struggle against natural forces, as represented in myths, are connected in a wide arch to the most threatening experiences of the present.
The book consists in five chapters, at first glance unconnected, together with a number of shorter notes. The various analyses concern such phenomena as the detachment of science from practical life, formalized morality, the manipulative nature of entertainment culture, and a paranoid behavioral structure, expressed in aggressive anti-Semitism, that marks the limits of enlightenment. The authors perceive a common element in these phenomena, the tendency toward self-destruction of the guiding criteria inherent in enlightenment thought from the beginning. Using historical analyses to elucidate the present, they show, against the background of a prehistory of subjectivity, why the National Socialist terror was not an aberration of modern history but was rooted deeply in the fundamental characteristics of Western civilization.
Adorno and Horkheimer see the self-destruction of Western reason as grounded in a historical and fateful dialectic between the domination of external nature and society. They trace enlightenment, which split these spheres apart, back to its mythical roots. Enlightenment and myth, therefore, are not irreconcilable opposites, but dialectically mediated qualities of both real and intellectual life. "Myth is already enlightenment, and enlightenment reverts to mythology." This paradox is the fundamental thesis of the book.
This new translation, based on the text in the complete edition of the works of Max Horkheimer, contains textual variants, commentary upon them, and an editorial discussion of the position of this work in the development of Critical Theory.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

ASIAN AND LATINO IMMIGRANTS IN A RESTRUCTURING ECONOMY

The Metamorphosis of Southern California

STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

Copyright © 2001 Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8047-3632-9

Contents

List of Illustrations.....................................................................................................................................................................................xiList of Tables............................................................................................................................................................................................xiiiAcknowledgments...........................................................................................................................................................................................xv1. Introduction Marta Lpez-Garza and David R. Diaz.....................................................................................................................................................1PART I: WOMEN IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY.......................................................................................................................................................................192. Exploitation and Abuse in the Garment Industry: The Case of the Thai Slave-Labor Compound in El Monte Julie A. Su and Chanchanit Martorell...........................................................213. Through Economic Restructuring, Recession, and Rebound: The Continuing Importance of Latina Immigrant Labor in the Los Angeles Economy Kristine M. Zentgraf..........................................46PART II: MACROECONOMICS...................................................................................................................................................................................754. The Promises and Dilemmas of Immigrant Ethnic Economies Tarry Hum....................................................................................................................................775. Economics and Ethnicity: Poverty, Race, and Immigration in Los Angeles County Manuel Pastor, Jr......................................................................................................102PART III: THE INFORMAL ECONOMY IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA.....................................................................................................................................................1396. A Study of the Informal Economy and Latina/o Immigrants in Greater Los Angeles Marta Lpez-Garza.....................................................................................................1417. Labor behind the Front Door: Domestic Workers in Urban and Suburban Households Grace A. Rosales......................................................................................................1698. Doing Business: Central American Enterprises in Los Angeles Norma Stoltz Chinchilla and Nora Hamilton................................................................................................188PART IV: CHANGING POLITICAL AND SOCIAL TERRAIN............................................................................................................................................................2159. Latino Street Vendors in Los Angeles: Heterogeneous Alliances, Community-Based Activism, and the State Clair M. Weber................................................................................21710. The Politics of Social Services for a "Model Minority": The Union of Pan Asian Communities Linda Trinh V............................................................................................24111. Community Divided: Korean American Politics in Post-Civil Unrest Los Angeles Edward J. W. Park.......................................................................................................27312. Constructing "Indianness" in Southern California: The Role of Hindu and Muslim Indian Immigrants Prema Kurien.........................................................................................28913. A New and Dynamic Community: The Case of Monterey Park, California Timothy P. Fong...................................................................................................................31314. The Politics of Adaptation and the "Good Immigrant": Japanese Americans and the New Chinese Immigrants Leland T. Saito...............................................................................332PART V: ETHNICITY, RACE, AND RACISM.......................................................................................................................................................................35115. Variation in Attitudes toward Immigrants Measured among Latino, African American, Asian, and Euro-American Students Grace A. Rosales, Mona Devich Navarro, and Desdemona Cardosa.....................35316. Racialized Metropolis: Theorizing Asian American and Latino Identities and Ethnicities in Southern California ChorSwang Ngin and Rodolfo D. Torres...................................................368PART VI: SOCIAL POLICY....................................................................................................................................................................................39117. Salvadoran Immigrants and Refugees: Demographic and Socioeconomic Profiles Claudia Dorrington........................................................................................................39318. Environmental Logic and Minority Communities David R. Diaz...........................................................................................................................................425Appendix to Chapter 15....................................................................................................................................................................................449List of Contributors......................................................................................................................................................................................451Index.....................................................................................................................................................................................................457

Chapter One

Introduction

Marta Lpez-Garza and David R. Diaz

Introduction

Those of us who have lived most of our lives in this region have witnessed the transformation in the demographics of Southern California from predominantly European American, most of whom were migrants from various other states (with sizable but geographically contained Mexican/Chicano, Chinese, and Japanese neighborhoods and a scattering of small communities of other ethnic backgrounds), to a majority minority population of Latinos, Asians, and African Americans. Thus, Southern California now lurches forward in a milieu of sights and sounds reminiscent of seemingly faraway places. Indeed, such changes are not unlike those in other major metropolises, just more acute.

The metamorphosis of Southern California attendant to the large immigrant presence has followed the conventional demographics transition linking population patterns to a society's level of technological development accompanied, unfortunately, with its corrupt side of mass exploitation. This metamorphosis has occurred neither in a vacuum nor overnight; rather, it has developed over decades, with its pace quickening since the 1980s. This influx of humanity did not suddenly surge across international borders on a mere whim. The major catalytic pull has been a restructured economy with the resurgence of high-tech industries spurred by corpulent foreign and domestic investments, with an attendant and significant increase in informal establishments owned or staffed mainly by immigrants.

The resultant significant bigender Latino and Asian presence in Southern California fuels the Los Angeles region's economic machinery with low-wage skilled and unskilled labor, which tends the children of working parents, provides inexpensive day labor, and keeps restaurant and hotel industries solvent. Contrary to "conventional wisdom," immigrants do pay taxes (without representation) and draw minimally (particularly undocumented immigrants) from social services.

Within the framework of the workday, immigrants constantly confront the prospect of running into the racial, political, police, and INS (Immigration and Naturalization Service) gauntlets. Immigrant bashing from skinheads to "common folk" underscores the ongoing conflicting relationship that is tolerated by most when rendering a service while abhorred by the majority as a potential neighbor or recipient of public services.

It is against a background of economic imperatives, phobias, and concerns that this volume presents the harvest of its collective research. The demographic analysis, integration of previous research, and volunteered interviews with the affected populace delineate the transformation surrounding the immigrant presence, its moral legitimacy, and its dignity.

The contributions to the volume by scholars and community activists with social science, urban planning, and legal backgrounds are organized under various umbrellas of interests, which are discussed in the following sections.

Part I: Women in the Global Economy

Raising the gender dimension of immigration is imperative and is an increasingly noted phenomenon among scholars in the field. Researchers can no longer accurately address the topic of migration without including women. Su and Martorell (chapter 2), along with Zentgraf (chapter 3), make gender a pivotal subject.

Chapters 2 and 3 undertake the global economy and women's participation in the international division of labor. They explore the causes for the influx of immigrants from "underdeveloped" countries to the United States. While they relate specifically to the conditions in Thailand and Mexico, respectively, such conditions can be generalized to other developing countries. Economic development, through modernization programs in the southern hemispheric countries of the world, exposes women in these countries to highly exploitative work environments. Incorporation of women into such national development and multinational enterprises is often a prelude to the process of immigration.

In both chapters the authors describe historical and contemporary conditions in the immigrants' countries of origins and examine the economic and political "push" motives for migration. Certainly, the push-pull theory remains a valid basis for analysis, if construed-as these contributors do-within global economic dynamics.

A shady world of human cargo feeds the exploitative industries with a vast workforce subjected to low-wage injustice on a semipermanent basis. Such an economic expediency is the rationale for the existence of snakeheads or "horses" from Shanghai, Bangkok, and Hong Kong to compete with their counter parts-"coyotes" from Tijuana, San Salvador, and Guatemala City-in catering to the demand by industries for cheap and docile labor in Southern California. The irony of this trumpeted city of high-end world culture is the devious nature of how these workers are recruited. They are actively enticed from severely impoverished farming, small rural townships and urban centers with promises of permanent and good-paying jobs. The labor contractors often ensure these workers that transportation, immigrant work permits, and housing will be "taken care of" as part of a normative recruitment practice. A vast majority of these workers, who have little or no savings, borrow money from family members or accept "loans" from the labor contractors to finance their escape from a life of terminal poverty. What they have done in reality is sold their future for a pittance on arrival.

The vicious underside of this reality was "uncovered" in a small suburban community, El Monte (approximately fifteen miles east of central Los Angeles), in August 1995. A task force of local, state, and federal authorities raided a nondescript condo development that had been converted into a garment manufacturing concentration camp for Thai women (see chapter 2). Some of the seventy-two women freed had been enslaved for over seven years, working under horrendous conditions reflective of the past practice of lifelong servitude. Totally cut off from communication with the world outside the compound, forced to buy basic household and food products from their labor masters, verbally and physically harassed, these women were trapped in a hopeless situation. The main beneficiaries of this situation were the labor contractors, garment companies, and a wide range of multinational retail corporations, including B.U.M., Miller's Outpost, Target, and Nordstrom, to name just a few, not to mention the consumers. While this Dickensesque story both shocks and saddens the public, it is not too different from conditions under which countless other desperate immigrants work. Their meager wages are often used to pay off impossible debts while they strive to provide for their families (locally and abroad). In addition to these workplace indignities, they suffer from constant threats by government authorities demanding legal justification for their exploited presence in this economy.

An important historical lesson from this ugly incident in El Monte is a reminder of Latina workers who have experienced similar fates throughout the history of this region. The only difference is that, in an earlier era, no one cared. Women, particularly poor immigrant women, had no rights or legal aid organizations to defend them. If they complained of abuse, torture, sexual harassment, and/or wage discrimination, they were simply deported, which resolved the problems expeditiously. In addition, their plight was invisible to major newspapers. No district attorney would dare prosecute a case involving male labor contractors, business owners, or retail companies on the behalf of immigrant women of color. The tragic incident in El Monte involving Thai women is "recent news" within a workplace framework that has historically negated women's rights or interests in relation to the economic and political power in the region. Within an era of revisionist politics, in which anti-women, anti-ethnic, and anti-affirmative action and immigrant bashing have again become mainstream discourse, the role and rights of immigrant women have reemerged as central issues in the debate over the social, economic, and cultural composition of the region.

In chapter 2, Su and Martorell consider why these Thai workers came to the United States and examine the forces in Thailand that gave impetus to their migration. The chapter delineates the legal and political mobilization that took place on their behalf as well as the process by which workers united and filed suit against manufacturer and retailer in order to rebuild their lives.

This important documentation of the plight of the Thai workers reverberated globally. In this country, Richard Reich, ex-secretary of labor, attempted to initiate "damage control" regulations. Yet "discovery" of the slave labor garment operation in the San Gabriel Valley in Los Angeles County was nothing out of the ordinary in the relationships between garment labor contractors and major fashion retailers. What was shocking was that enslaved workers were coerced into the condo prison. That Asian women were the victims of this scheme underscores the strident critiques of the "Myth of the Model Minority" by leading Asian American academics and calls for changes in conventional perspectives regarding the social stratification within various Asian ethnic groups.

While this case contains numerous sordid scenarios, the overt greed in pursuit of personal wealth and the bungling of the State Labor Commission, the U.S. Department of Labor, Cal OSHA, and the Employment Development Department is appalling. This case also discloses the inhumane yet standard procedures whereby the INS reimprisoned these immigrant women immediately after "rescuing" them, thereby propagating incomprehensible conditions. What is most striking, in terms of truly understanding the breadth of multiethnic Los Angeles, is that Asian immigrant poverty closely parallels that experienced by immigrant Latinas/os.

The El Monte sweatshop scandal crystallized the overt abuse of workers by production managers in responding to the demands from both major local and international clothing retailers and name-brand fashion designers. Unfortunately, the reality being that other similar slavelike labor condos in the region continue to operate.

In chapter 3, Zentgraf reviews the processes of migration and details the complexities of the international division of labor. She describes the migration pattern, beginning with migration within the country of origin (Mexico) and extending to emigration across international borders. Within the context of what she calls "the changing character of the new immigration," Zentgraf offers a macroperspective-the global view.

Zentgraf develops a framework, incorporating demographic and economic data to support the essential role assumed by Mexican immigrant women in California's economy.

Yet, immigrant women are locked into a duality of injustice in relation to the demands of household and unfair workplace conditions. They are creating a new social terrain in terms of personal independence and responsibility while also encountering the brunt of a revival of gender- and race-based hatred directed at their mere presence in this society.

Regardless of the acute personal and economic problems immigrant women encounter, they remain the most important component of the low-wage workforce. Zentgraf argues that neither their importance nor their personal needs are being adequately addressed within the context of a rapidly changing multicultural society. The fact that their influence in the regional economy is undervalued is indicative of conventional analysis of the relationship between gender and work. Zentgraf provides an important and critical new avenue in developing both an appreciation of the role of immigrant women and a theoretical exploration of how macroeconomic changes are predicated on the availability of female immigrants within the regional workforce. Los Angeles County and Southern California in general, as Zentgraf implies, will continue to be structurally linked to a legal and undocumented immigrant women workforce for the foreseeable future.

Part II: Macroeconomics

Working from analysis of the census and other large database sources, Hum (chapter 4) and Pastor (chapter 5) present the economic contributions and financial peril of Asian and Latino immigrants.

Chapter 4 focuses on Chinese, Korean, Mexican, and Central American ethnic enclave economies and the ethnic-specific patterns in industrial and occupational segmentation, employment outcomes, and quality of work. Hum addresses dilemmas posed by immigrant ethnic communities for urban policy and community-based economic development and further questions the viability of "dominant models of labor market" when applied to these immigrant groups' heterogeneity. The author offers new approaches in explaining the present labor market's social networks, occupational niches, and the formation of enclave economies. This chapter overlaps with chapter 8, by Chinchilla and Hamilton, which documents the Central American business community during the 1980s and 1990s.

The enclave economy is a fundamental point of entry into the workforce for a significant percentage of immigrants. This sector of the economy remains the arena wherein acculturation and survival in a new society initially evolve. However, as Hum points out, the wage scale and types of positions are at the lower rung of both the local and national economies. While the wage structure is extremely low, ethnic enclaves do provide an entry point-a sheltered, culturally based environment through which new workers become integrated into this society. There are a few distinct differences among Asian and Latino enclave economies. In particular, Hum analyzes how Koreans have developed small businesses and technical skills at a significantly higher rate than other ethnic communities.

The major impact of the enclave economy is in responding to consumer demand in specific neighborhoods and, thereby, revitalizing their declining economies. In fact, Hum argues that ethnic enclave economies evolve as a direct response to having been ignored by the conventional business networks of regional and global enterprises. This sector of the marketplace follows the movement and expansion of communities throughout the United States.

Chapter 5 focuses on Latino immigrants inasmuch as they compose a significant portion of this region's population, thereby constituting the bulk of the working poor. Within the conventional logic that the regional labor force consists of a significant percentage of Latinos (both immigrant and native born) in the bottom echelon of the wage structure, it must be recognized that lower-income neighborhoods are not the stagnant centers commonly associated with these areas.

Pastor asks, "Who are the poor?" then proceeds to explore the connection between undocumented immigrants, work, and poverty. This analysis of the nature of poverty reveals the troubling phenomenon of the working poor in Los Angeles that stems largely from Southern California's economic restructuring, a forty-hour workweek at below the poverty level.

As Pastor indicates, the reindustrialization of the region is highly dependent on the low-wage Latino workforce. In fact, the resurgence of the region's economy is closely linked to the availability of immigrant labor. An important factor is the proximity of Latino immigrant and minority neighborhoods in general to major employment centers. However, the main problem is that Latinos are often impacted by an "income mismatch" in which jobs available to Latino immigrants do not pay a livable wage.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from ASIAN AND LATINO IMMIGRANTS IN A RESTRUCTURING ECONOMY Copyright © 2001 by Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. Excerpted by permission.
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Edition details

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Publication date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804736324
• ISBN 13: 9780804736329
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 304
• Editor: Noeri Gunzelin Schmid