Critical Theory and the Decolonial Turn: Toward a Post-Western Emancipatory Project

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the differences and convergences between critical theory, especially the work of Habermas, and decolonial thinking as paradigms that seek to construct an emancipatory political project based on their ontological, epistemological and methodological assumptions, as well as nature of the political proposals that both currents of thought have sustained and sustain. From this review, the convergences between the most recent generation of critical theory and the decolonial turn and the possibility of constructing a dialogue in symmetrical conditions are pointed out, recognizing the importance of valuing other knowledge of the decolonial turn, but also of the institutional pillars that sustain the existence of a critical social science.