Current philosophy is determined by various methodological and content-ontologically preformed oppositions. For example, there are analytical approaches that are committed to the implications of the natural sciences and hermeneutic-pragmatic projects, directions arguing evolutionist-systems-theory encounter post-Marxist-inspired power / knowledge analyzes, and discussions arise time and again based on the distinction between "discourse theory" and "deconstruction" . This book makes the tension between these two understandable from their original moments. Using the protagonists Jacques Derrida and Jürgen Habermas, the author reconstructs their contrast from the respective center, exposes the points for deviating theories and makes further comparisons. In doing so, he confronts them with central problems of today's Enlightenment practice and contemporary criticism of reason - and enables a new look at those fundamental dialectics that have always moved Western philosophy.