GPT

Habermas integrates George Herbert Mead’s work, particularly his theory of symbolic interactionism, into his broader theory of communicative action and social development. Mead's ideas play a crucial role in Habermas’s conceptualization of intersubjectivity, the development of selfhood, and the social nature of rationality. Here’s how:

1. Communicative Action and the Social Self

• Habermas draws on Mead’s idea that the self emerges through social interaction, particularly through role-taking and symbolic communication.
• Mead's distinction between the "I" (spontaneous, creative self) and the "Me" (socially structured self) helps Habermas argue that individual identity is formed through dialogical engagement with others—a key idea in communicative rationality.
• Habermas extends this to say that rationality itself is intersubjectively constituted through communication rather than being an individual, internal property.

2. Discourse Ethics and Moral Development

• Mead’s work on moral development, where individuals move from egocentric perspectives to generalized perspectives (the "generalized other"), aligns with Habermas’s theory of universal pragmatics.
• Habermas applies this idea to discourse ethics, arguing that moral norms should be justified through rational deliberation among all affected parties—mirroring Mead’s emphasis on taking the perspective of the other.

3. Lifeworld and Socialization

• Habermas incorporates Mead into his concept of the lifeworld, the shared horizon of meanings that individuals participate in.
• He sees Mead’s account of symbolic interaction as foundational to understanding how the lifeworld is reproduced through communicative action.
• Mead’s developmental model (play stage → game stage → generalized other) helps Habermas theorize how social integration occurs through learning processes embedded in communication.

4. Against Solipsistic or Strategic Models of Action

• Habermas critiques models of rationality that are purely individualistic or instrumental, instead favoring Mead’s intersubjective, dialogue-based model.
• He contrasts Mead’s socialized intelligence with the strategic rationality found in economic and bureaucratic systems, arguing that genuine understanding arises through cooperative dialogue, not manipulation.

Conclusion

Mead provides Habermas with a non-foundational, intersubjective account of self and society that supports his theory of communicative rationality. Mead’s emphasis on symbolic interaction and the social origins of meaning-making helps Habermas argue for a model of rationality that is rooted in dialogue rather than in isolated cognition. In this way, Habermas bridges American pragmatism with critical theory.

The Lifeworld and System: In The Theory of Communicative Action, he differentiates between the lifeworld (a background of shared meanings and cultural reproduction) and the system (governed by instrumental rationality, such as the market and bureaucracy). These operate somewhat like Bourdieu’s fields but are based on different logics.

Discourse Domains: Habermas discusses different domains of discourse, such as moral, scientific, and aesthetic reasoning, each with their own validity claims. These could be seen as loosely analogous to Bourdieu’s fields in that they have internal logics.

Public Sphere: In The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere, he conceptualizes the public sphere as a social space for rational-critical debate, which, while not a "field" in Bourdieu’s sense, does function as a structured communicative domain.