Editing Universal pragmatics (section)

===Communicative competence===

Habermas argues that when speakers are communicating successfully, they will have to defend their meaning by using these four claims.

# That they have ''uttered something'' understandably — or ''their statements are intelligible'';
# That they have given other people ''something to understand'' — or are speaking ''something true'';
# That ''the speaker'' is therefore understandable — or their ''intentions are recognized and appreciated'' for what they are; and,
# That they have come to an understanding ''with another person'' — or, they have used ''words that both actors can agree upon''. (1979:4)

Habermas is emphatic that these claims are universal—no human communication oriented at achieving mutual understanding could possibly fail to raise all of these validity claims.  Additionally, to illustrate that all other forms of communication are derived from that which is oriented toward mutual understanding, he argues that there are no other kinds of validity claims whatsoever.  This is important because it is the basis of Habermas' critique of [[postmodernism]].

The fundamental orientation toward mutual understanding is at the heart of universal pragmatics, as Habermas explains:
<blockquote>"The task of universal pragmatics is to identify and reconstruct universal conditions of possible mutual understanding... other forms of social action—for example, conflict, competition, strategic action in general—are derivatives of action-oriented toward reaching understanding.  Furthermore, since language is the specific medium of reaching understanding at the sociocultural stage of evolution, I want to go a step further and single out explicit speech actions from other forms of communicative action."<ref>Habermas, 1976, "What is universal pragmatics?" p. 21</ref></blockquote>

Any meaning that meets the above criteria, and is recognized by another as meeting the criteria, is considered "''vindicated''" or ''communicatively competent''.

In order for anyone to speak validly — and therefore, to have his or her comments vindicated, and therefore reach a genuine consensus and understanding — Habermas notes that a few more fundamental commitments are required. First, he notes, actors ''have to treat this formulation of validity so seriously that it might be a precondition for any communication at all''. Second, he asserts that ''all actors must believe that their claims are able to meet these standards of validity''. And third, he insists that there must be a common conviction among actors that all validity claims ''are either already vindicated or could be vindicated''.