It is clearly possible to talk of contemporary Italian thought in terms of
the debate on "postmodernism." In the field of architecture, for instance,
the work of Paolo Portoghesi and Victorio Grigotti (among others) estab-
lishes a distinctive Italian contribution to the international discussion.
For Portoghesi ( 1982), drawing on the work of Jean-François Lyotard
( 1984), the postmodern is a "rupture" with modernism rather than a
simple change of direction or a label for converging tendencies. The
incredulity of the grand récits, which has precipitated a crisis of theo-
retical legitimation, has also, according to Portoghesi, challenged the
fundamental principles of architectural modernity. Drawing not
uncritically on the new electronic technology that modulates the move
to postindustrial society, Portoghesi talks in optimistic terms, of a
return to historic forms and compositional systems as a way of estab-
lishing an architecture of communication premised on the restitution of
the role of the subject to the community of its users. Grigotti, for his
part, in the words of Lyotard believes: "There is no longer any close
linkage between the architectural project and socio-historical progress
in the realization of human emancipation on the larger scale. Post-
modern architecture is condemned to generate a multiplicity of small
transformations in the space it inherits, and to give up the project of a
last rebuilding of the whole space occupied by humanity" ( 1989, p. 7).

Expressed in these terms, it is clear that both Portoghesi and
Grigotti tend to side with Lyotard against Habermas. Indeed, as
Portoghesi ( 1982) has commented, the true "new conservatives" -- a
reference to Habermas' ( 1981a) polemic against French poststructural-
ism¹ -- are not those who return to artistic traditions to counter the
effects of modernization, but those who pose as the guardians of
modernity at any cost.

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