Injustice as the root of critique

Theodor Adorno once wrote that “The splinter in your eye is the best magnifying-glass”.

By this he meant that discomfort, experiences of marginalisation, or alienation sharpen our vision, enabling us to see injustice in the world more clearly and truthfully than those protected by privilege or comfort. It is precisely those at the sharp edge of experience, those who have been wronged or excluded who are best placed to critique society and spark change.

The Roots of Critique: Injustice as Lived Experience

Injustice isn’t simply a philosophical abstraction. As Hegel and Marx explored, it’s a material and existential reality that severs people from their potential, their labour, and often from community itself.

For Hegel, alienation was a necessary moment in the journey toward self-consciousness and social reconciliation. For Marx and later critical theorists, it exposed how the structures of power, especially under capitalism, estrange people from their work, each other, and themselves.

Those wounded by systems of exclusion, alienation, or oppression become unwilling “experts” in what isn’t working and why. Their discomfort, like the splinter in Adorno’s metaphor, forces an uncomfortable clarity onto the system’s failings.

the Authority of Alienation

Those working in charities and grassroots organisations do not just observe injustice they experience it. Whether dealing with homelessness, domestic abuse, or the aftermath of austerity, these groups operate where justice is absent.

Their work is informed by the lived reality of exclusion, which gives them a sharper sense of what needs to change and why the status quo is intolerable.

For example, projects tackling homeless articulate the failings in our broader social safety nets. Similarly, trauma-focused services challenge assumptions about individual responsibility and illuminate how policy shapes daily life for the most vulnerable.

Articulating structural accountability

Often, mainstream organisations and institutions are shielded by their own success, comfort, or structural distance from hardship, leaving them blind to injustices that persist in plain view. By contrast, those who carry “the splinter in their eye” possess a heightened clarity, becoming society’s keenest critics.

Their critique is uncomfortable precisely because it disrupts established habits, shattering the reassuring illusions that maintain business as usual.

For institutions sincerely seeking progress, it is not enough to acknowledge these disruptive voices; they must be welcomed and actively engaged. The value lies not only in listening, but in how critique is articulated: it should press beyond surface symptoms to illuminate systemic flaws.

For organisations fighting injustice

Articulating lived experience of injustice in a way that compels change is both a challenge and an opportunity.

Working with a partner like strat4 elevates these voices, ensuring messages are not only heard but cut through the noise as strategic, coherent campaigns.

strat4’s expertise in research-led insights, audience analysis, messaging strategy, and digital platforms empowers these organisations to translate injustice into campaigns that shift public discourse, build alliances, and deliver change at a systems level.

FOR organisations with power

For established institutions seeking to be more equitable and socially accountable, the work begins with unlearning insulation and genuinely engaging with the critiques arising from the margins. This means more than performative listening. It calls for ongoing dialogue, action and transparency.

strat4 supports these efforts by helping institutions frame responses, develop context-aware communications and build authentic relationships with those whose critical insights reveal underlying systemic flaws.

By embedding feedback from impacted communities and championing accountability, institutions can begin to enact the reforms that justice and progress demand.