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Re-interrogating normativity – philosophical sociology and emancipatory critique

Daniel Chernilo opens his timely and impressive Debating Humanity by asking us to ‘step back and interrogate again the status of our conceptions of the human’. (Chernilo 2017, 11) The act of interrogation that is called for here – one which Chernilo rightly suggests is marked by a conspicuous absence in most forms of sociological inquiry – forms the lynchpin of his wider project of philosophical sociology, which is set with the task of helping to rectify this issue. What Chernilo has achieved in Debating Humanity, and also in other works that have helped frame this project (Chernilo 2014), is not only considerable progression in terms of his interrogatory task (though it is that), but also in terms of setting of the ground for further and wider engagements in this direction that may interrogate alongside, across, or at variance to his own interrogation. What I would like to pursue here then, in this spirit, is precisely an interrogation that works alongside, but also across, and, to a certain limited extent, against his interrogation. In particular, I want to pick up some threads from Chernilo’s analysis: namely, the issue of universalism and how this relates to the particular, but also the sense in which our conceptions of the human can be said to be integral to emancipatory projects. In doing so, I will look at the issue of normativity and critique, and the ways in which our ideas of what it is to be human are instrumental to critique. As part of this discussion, I will turn to Karl Marx and Erich Fromm as figures who can help progress this analysis, and my account, as erected out of their writings, will be defended against rival accounts such as that of Michel Foucault. As part of this, I will deal with what seem to me to be some aporias and tensions in Chernilo’s own project. My hope is that I will be able to add something of importance to Chernilo’s project, which is one that I have great regard for.