Western Marxism

Western Marxism is a current of Marxist theory arising from Western and Central Europe in the aftermath of the 1917 October Revolution in Russia and the ascent of Leninism. The term denotes a loose collection of theorists who advanced an interpretation of Marxism distinct from that codified by the Soviet Union.[1]

The Western Marxists placed more emphasis on Marxism's philosophical and sociological aspects, and its origins in the philosophy of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (for which reason it is sometimes called Hegelian Marxism) and what they called "Young Marx" (i.e. the more humanistic early works of Marx). Although some early figures such as György Lukács and Antonio Gramsci had been prominent in political activities, Western Marxism became primarily the reserve of the academia especially after World War II. Prominent figures included Walter Benjamin, Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer.

Since the 1960s, the concept has been closely associated with the New Left. While many of the Western Marxists were adherents of Marxist humanism, the term also encompasses their critics in the form of the structural Marxism of Louis Althusser.

Terminology

The phrase "Western Marxism" was coined in 1953 by Maurice Merleau-Ponty.[2] While it is often contrasted with the Marxism of the Soviet Union, Western Marxists have been divided in their opinion of it and other Marxist-Leninist states.

History and distinctive elements

Although there have been many schools of Marxist thought that are sharply distinguished from Marxism–Leninism, such as Austromarxism or the Left Communism of Antonie Pannekoek, the theorists who downplay the primacy of economic analysis are considered Western Marxists, as they focus on areas such as culture, philosophy and art.[1]

György Lukács's History and Class Consciousness and Karl Korsch's Marxism and Philosophy, published in 1923, are the works that inaugurated Western Marxism.[1] In these books, Lukács and Korsch proffer a Marxism that emphasises the Hegelian components of Karl Marx's thought. Marxism is not simply an improved theory of political economy, nor is it a scientific sociology, akin to the natural sciences. Marxism is primarily a critique, a self-conscious transformation of society. Marxism does not make philosophy obsolete, as vulgar Marxism believes; Marxism preserves the truths of philosophy until their revolutionary transformation into reality.[3]

While their work was greeted with hostility by the Third International,[4][5] which saw Marxism as a universal science of history and nature,[3] this style of Marxism would be taken up by Germany's Frankfurt School,[1] founded that same year. The writings of Italian Communist Antonio Gramsci, produced during this period but not published until much later, are also classified as belonging to Western Marxism.[1]

After World War 2, a number of thinkers such as Lucien Goldmann, Henri Lefebvre, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Jean-Paul Sartre would constitute a French Western Marxism.[1]

Western Marxism often emphasises the importance of the study of culture, class consciousness and subjectivity for an adequate Marxist understanding of society.[1] Western Marxists have thus tended to stress Marx's theories of commodity fetishism, ideology and alienation[1] and have elaborated these with new concepts such as false consciousness, reification and cultural hegemony.[6]

Western Marxism also focuses on the works of the Young Marx, where his encounters with Hegel, the Young Hegelians and Feuerbach reveal what many Western Marxists see as the humanist philosophical core of Marxism.[6] However, the Structural Marxism of Louis Althusser, which attempts to purge Marxism of Hegelianism and humanism, has also been said to belong to Western Marxism.

Political commitments

Western Marxists have held a wide variety of political commitments: Lukács and Gramsci were members of Soviet-aligned parties; Korsch, Marcuse and Debord were highly critical of Soviet communism and instead advocated council communism; Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, Althusser and Lefebvre were, at different periods, supporters of the Soviet-aligned Communist Party of France, but all would later become disillusioned with it; Bloch lived in and supported the Eastern Bloc, but lost faith in Soviet Communism towards the end of his life. Maoism and Trotskyism also influenced Western Marxism. Nicos Poulantzas, a later Western Marxist, was an advocate for Eurocommunism.

List of Western Marxists

See also

References

Footnotes

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Jacoby, Russell (1991). "Western Marxism". In Bottomore, Tom; Harris, Laurence; Kiernan, V.G.; Miliband, Ralph. The Dictionary of Marxist Thought (Second ed.). Blackwell Publishers Ltd. p. 581. ISBN 0-631-16481-2.
  2. ↑ Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (1973). Adventures of the Dialectic. Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press. pp. 30–59. ISBN 0-8101-0404-0.
  3. 1 2 Jacoby, Russell (1991). "Western Marxism". In Bottomore, Tom; Harris, Laurence; Kiernan, V.G.; Miliband, Ralph. The Dictionary of Marxist Thought (Second ed.). Blackwell Publishers Ltd. p. 582. ISBN 0-631-16481-2.
  4. ↑ Kołakowski, Leszek (2005). Main Currents of Marxism. London: W. W. Norton & Company. pp. 994–5. ISBN 978-0-393-32943-8.
  5. ↑ Kołakowski, Leszek (2005). Main Currents of Marxism. London: W. W. Norton & Company. p. 1034. ISBN 978-0-393-32943-8.
  6. 1 2 Jacoby, Russell (1991). "Western Marxism". In Bottomore, Tom; Harris, Laurence; Kiernan, V.G.; Miliband, Ralph. The Dictionary of Marxist Thought (Second ed.). Blackwell Publishers Ltd. p. 583. ISBN 0-631-16481-2.

Bibliography

  • Anderson, Perry. Considerations on Western Marxism. London: New Left Books, 1976.
  • Bahr, Ehrhard (2008). Weimar on the Pacific: German Exile Culture in Los Angeles and the Crisis of Modernism. University of California Press. ISBN 0520257952.
  • Fetscher, Iring. Marx and Marxism. New York: Herder and Herder, 1971.
  • Grahl, Bart, and Paul Piccone, eds. Towards a New Marxism. St. Louis: Telos Press, 1973.
  • Howard, Dick, and Karl E. Klare, eds. The Unknown Dimension: European Marxism Since Lenin. New York: Basic Books, 1972.
  • Jay, Martin, Marxism and Totality: The Adventures of a Concept from Lukacs to Habermas. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
  • Korsch, Karl. Marxism and Philosophy. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1970.
  • Lukacs, Georg. History and Class Consciousness: Studies in Marxist Dialectics. London: Merlin, 1971.
  • McInnes, Neil. The Western Marxists. New York: Library Press, 1972.
  • Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. Adventures of the Dialectic. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1973.
  • Van der Linden, Marcel. Western Marxism and the Soviet Union. Leiden: Brill, 2007.
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