critical theory It is a doctrine of thought that is based on the criticism of Marxism and that proposes, from there, a new theoretical body known as neo-Marxism.
As a current of thought, critical theory was opposed to traditional theorybased on the postulates of the natural sciences and positivism (so in vogue at the time), which he accused of reducing knowledge to a conceptual reproduction of the data that reality provided.
Critical theory, in this sense, proposes that knowledge is mediated by the subject’s experienceas well as by its historical, political, economic and social context, and maintains that both theoretical and non-theoretical interests influence the way in which knowledge is organized, formed and constituted.
In fact, the adjective “criticism” comes to indicate his questioning position on previous knowledge.
Critical theory was developed in Frankfurt School by a group of thinkers and intellectuals among whom we include Walter Benjamin, Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse, Jürgen Habermas and Erich From, among others.
There is no, for critical theory, a pure theory, divorced from the individual, his experience and his historical context. Knowledge is only possible if it is considered in its relationship with social life, since all aspects of reality have a theoretical value that determine to a certain extent the way in which scientific knowledge is produced.
Hence, then, its purpose of carrying out a theoretical update of Marxism, since theoretical criticism recognizes that both the economic, political and social situation in which that theoretical body was created have been changing since then, to the point of no longer being applicable.
See also what Criticism is.