Critique and Overcritique in Sociology

Abstract

The concept of ‘overcritique’ is defined as a type of melodramatic, negative, one-sided and total critique of society, which developed in the latter part of the twentieth century out of the Critical Theory strand of Western Marxism. As an aid to understanding the notion the multiple meanings of the much used terms critique and critical in sociology and the humanities generally are clarified and their origins are traced in Kant, Hegel and Marx and the work of the Frankfurt School. The equivocal term ‘critical’ is shown to function in overcritique in particular as a political code word for a generalised commitment to eliminating all forms of unequal power balances between interdependent groups, which relations are prejudged as subjugation, oppression or domination. Over critique is shown to be one-sided, over-abstract, destructive and socially iatrogenic, based on dubious transcendental arguments and overstated to the point of absurdity. These drawbacks are illustrated by reference to some of the recent writings of Zygmunt Bauman.