Abstract
This article discusses the origins, ideas, and lasting influence of the Frankfurt School,
a group of thinkers linked to the Institute for Social Research, founded in Frankfurt in 1923.

The Frankfurt School appeared between the two world wars, during a time of
capitalism, fascism, and communism. Its main thinkers: Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse,
Fromm, Habermas, and others, developed a critical way of thinking to question the
problems of their time. Inspired by Marx, Hegel, Weber, and Freud, they created what
is called Critical Theory, which seeks not only to understand society but also to change
it by revealing the systems of control and manipulation.

A key work of this school is Dialectic of Enlightenment (Adorno & Horkheimer,
1944), which shows how reason and progress turned into tools of domination through
what they called the “culture industry.” The article also looks at how Critical Theory
influenced the New Left movement, Habermas’s idea of the Public Sphere, and later
feminist approaches that studied power, gender, and communication.

Overall, the article shows that the Frankfurt School’s ideas are still important today to
understand modern society, where technological progress exists alongside inequality,
and where true human freedom is still a goal to be achieved.

Keywords: Frankfurt School, Critical theory, Dialectic of Enlightenment, New Left
and Feminism Critique

https://www.josooor.com/pdfs/thirtythree_one/25.pdf