UTOPIANISM

Our interpretation Adorno's Positive Dialectic reveals five interconnected dimensions to Adorno's Utopianism. First, it shows a Utopian history; note that this is very particular, in three principal ways. Distinct from his German forefathers, Adorno's Utopian history is not one of progress towards an end point. It does not map a trajectory of competing forces which develop towards a ‘Utopian’ conclusion. Adorno's positive view of history does not entail progress, development and is not a prediction. Instead, it is a speculative image of the entire course of Western history.

Adorno's vision of history is positive in one key way. Instead of the negative dialectic between enlightenment and myth – history characterised by an ever regressive element – Adorno offers the possibility of a distinct trajectory wherein Western history can become close to realising its aim. Composed of a dialectic between enlightenment and absorption, history can be positive in the sense that, it can come closer to, attaining enlightenment.

Adorno's positive history is composed, at root, between modes of engagement between the Subject and the Object. The dialectic between enlightenment and myth, was negative because it consisted of the same mode of identification between the Subject and the Object, namely, forms of anthropomorphism. (Enlightenment is the most sophisticated kind of anthropomorphism.) The dialectic of enlightenment and myth, therefore is simply one of enlightenment competing with a regressive counterpart of the same mode of identification between Subject and Object.