The Critical Theory of Modernization attempts to clarify some crucial problems which usual developmental approaches (marxist, dependency, modernization theories) leave without an adequate treatment. The debate on the postmodernism has exhibited the limitations of all forms of instrumental reason, especially if it becomes the sole content of accelerated development efforts. The Critical Theory of Modernization puts into question the last normative goals of almost all development programmes and strategies (urbanization, industrialization, modernization of everyday’s life and attitudes); the eurocentric standpoint (the imitation of the achievements of the Northern metropolitan countries) represents the main feature of critique. The spread of instrumental rationality does not always correspond to a more humane and comprehensive rationality, whose task in the Third World should be to make a critical judgement not only of the means but also of the goals of evolution processes, and likewise of the ecological and demographic aspects of rapid and irresponsible modernization. The events of the last years proved that it is impossible to establish general laws of historical development and futile to assume that all societies are advancing towards a common goal. There is a broad variety of development ways (for instance with very different systems of property of the productions means), and it is absurd to ascribe only to some of them (the socialist ones) a better future.
