Hermann Lübbe


Hermann Lübbe is a German philosopher. He is considered a member of the Ritter School.

Biography

Lübbe was born in Aurich. From 1947 to 1951, he studied philosophy, theology and sociology in Göttingen, Münster and Freiburg. Among his academic teachers were Joachim Ritter and Heinrich Scholz. From 1963 to 1969, Lübbe was professor in Bochum. Since 1966, he was also secretary of state in the education ministry of the German state North Rhine-Westphalia. In 1969, Lübbe became professor in Bielefeld and secretary of state with the minister-president of North Rhine-Westphalia. From 1971 to 1991, he was professor of philosophy and political theory in Zurich.
Lübbes philosophical work focuses on a theory of modern civilization and liberal democracy. A prominent opponent of the protests of 1968 in Germany, he analyzed the acceleration of social change and emphasized the relevance of common sense, traditional virtues, stable political institutions and religious orientations in modern, highly dynamic societies. Criticized by Jürgen Habermas as one of the leading representatives of German neoconservatism in the 1970s and 1980s, Lübbe is now widely recognized as one of the most influential German political philosophers in the last decades.

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