The idea of progress under attack - On Amy Allen’s attempt to “decolonize“ Critical Theory

This article evaluates Amy Allen’s claim that Frankfurt School critical theory is structurally Eurocentric because it relies on historical progress and univer­salist ethics. Re-examining Marx’s shifting views on colonialism (from early modernizationist theses to positions anticipating dependency theory) and Polanyi’s account of “primitive accumulation,” I argue that “progress” can be judged contextually as event-bound advances rather than as a teleology. Engaging Thomas McCarthy’s call to deconstruct and reconstruct the idea of development, the paper defends discourse ethics as a genuinely universalist—yet non-foundational—project aimed at inclusive participation by all affected. I contrast Allen’s metanormative contextualism with Enrique Dussel’s “trans­modernity,” which exposes modernity’s colonial underside while articulating a global emancipatory horizon. The conclusion maintains that, though ideolo­gically abused, progress should be retained as historically situated judgments concerning expansions of human freedom and communicative inclusion.