In this article, I critique Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno's post-1940 pessimism regarding the potential for social change in modern society. The basis for this critique is the “history from below” perspective, a perspective which has particular relevance to the discussion since Horkheimer and Adorno's critical theory and history from below share certain core theoretical presuppositions. History from below's re-appropriation of past struggles and relational analysis of domination provide a useful antidote to critical theory's excessive focus on past suffering and its fatalistic interpretation of domination. The history from below perspective helps to demonstrate that Horkheimer and Adorno's pessimism was neither theoretically consistent nor inevitable.
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