Marxism as a Bankrupt Social Theory - Essay Example

Marxism [Name of the Writer] [Name of the Institution] Marxism Introduction Traditionally, Marxism has looked to the capitalist enterprise as the primary site of class conflict. An over determine class analysis instead theorizes class as a process of surplus-labour production, appropriation and distribution that can occur at a number of social sites including but not limited to the enterprise. By seeing class processes at the sites of household and state as well as in the enterprise, postmodern Marxism makes visible aspects of class conflict that may otherwise be overlooked or marginalised and it brings to light the contradictory effects of different types of class processes (both capitalist and non-capitalist) within and among these different sites. This multidimensional class analysis provides new insights into long standing debates and sees new possibilities for class politics. The paper critically discusses the statement that “Marxism is a bankrupt social theory. Marx constructed a powerful theory of the forces he thought shaped and generated social history. He attempted to explain how wealth and political power tended to accrue to whoever controlled the means of production. Economic power created the basis for political power. Owners of the means of production, according to Marx, acted to protect and maintain their economic advantage, resulting in political systems that enacted and enforced laws favorable to these interests. (George, 2010) However bankrupt were the political forces that subsequently expropriated Marxism as a rationale for antidemocratic policies and institutions, there is no doubt that Marx's secular analysis of society in history was a significant milestone in the development of social science. Marxism a Dynamic Theory What is important from our present perspective, though, is that Marx was among the first to view history not as inevitability but as the consequence of a dynamic array of forces that were generated by humans themselves, not as ultimately determined by an "invisible hand." He suggested not quite rhetorically that the method for understanding the complex interplay of forces in society was to attempt to change it. (McIntosh, 1977, 15-23) Taking some liberties, we might interpret this approach to mean that just as you can only uncover the complex components of a social system when you try to alter it, you can only understand the complex relationship between individuals with behavioral disorders and their environments when you try to change it. The Marxist tradition is one of the few that has given much weight to questions of means as well as of ends, and this is because of the Marxist belief that theory is born of practice, that only in the process of struggling against oppression can people formulate new visions of liberation . (George, 2010)... Whether or not one accepts this tenet of Marxist epistemology, there are other reasons for viewing questions of strategy as integral to political philosophy. One reason is that questions of ends to means are not just questions of efficiency; they also involve normative issues about what means may be morally justifiable in achieving social change." (Alison, 1983), p. 16. Although Marxist critics have often neglected the ecological dimension of materialism, the Marxist strategy of reading literary form in relation to subject positions and knowledge registers can be useful for ecocritical analysis. Georg Lukacs' account of realism is taken as a starting point for understanding how novels might function to construct knowledge about socio-ecological relations. Marxist theory has rightly criticized the view that the existing social arrangements serve society's general interest and has pointed out the power differentials that capitalism's class character inevitably involves. (McIntosh, 1977, 15-23) Their insistence on such power differentials leads them to focus on the opposition of class interests under capitalism and on class struggle as the means to social change. In doing so, however, they abstract from the complications for the struggle of the oppressed that capitalism's "dialectic of scarcity" poses. Marx, for example, declares in the Communist Manifesto that "[t]he history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles"8 and argues that capitalism is not different in this respect. I will argue that capitalism's universalistic moment sets capitalism apart from previous societies and requires a different model of emancipatory politics. The traditional Marxist assumption that there is a straightforward connection between capitalist social relations and the constitution of social subjectivity underestimates the implications of capitalism's contradictory logic. Operating in the present while simultaneously pointing to a diametrically opposed possible future, capitalism confronts its individual subjects with a contradictory interest structure. The particularistic identities based on class or other group interests have to contend with a potential new political subject that emerges out of capitalism's self-transcending moment. To the extent that this self-transcending moment creates a genuinely universal human interest in the free society beyond scarcity that is now becoming possible, it also turns "humanity" into a meaningful sociological/political category. Thus the same dynamism that accounts for capitalist globalization also creates the potential for a universalistic social identity. (George, 2010) This analysis makes it possible to avoid the "ontological primacy of class" that, as Laclau and Mouffe rightly point out, has often characterized Marxist theory without going to the other extreme of disputing the idea of an objective interest that can be traced back to the underlying social structure. (Marx, 1978, 491) The contradictoriness of the interest structure and social identity described in this article does not amount to a constructionist alternative to theories of interest and identity that focus on the social structure. In fact, this contradictoriness of interest structure and social identity derives from the contradictory logic of the capitalist social structure itself. In this sense, a discussion of objective interests and social identities that derive from the social structure does not presuppose any simple, one-to-one correspondence between positions in the social structure, on the one hand, and interests and social subjectivities, on the other. Hegemony, Socialist Consciousness and Capitalism's Dialectic of Scarcity: Gramsci's Limitations and Lenin's Undeveloped Insight The analysis of capitalism's dialectic of scarcity allows Marxist theory to advance beyond Gramsci, the Marxist thinker with the deepest understanding of the need to construct a universalistic, emancipatory project that would be based on an alliance between the working-class and other oppressed groups. According to Gramsci, a hegemonic emancipatory project cannot focus exclusively on the narrowly defined self-interest of the working class while ignoring the interests of other oppressed groups. (Marx, 1978, 491) Despite his insistence on the necessity of some sacrifice on the part of the working class, even Gramsci insists that the emancipatory hegemonic project would ultimately have to revolve around the working class and its class interest. As even this cursory summary of Gramsci's theory of hegemony makes clear, Gramsci's failure to challenge Marxism's "ontological primacy of class" is tied up with his inability to escape the reifying impact of capitalism's artificial reproduction of scarcity. (McLellan, 1971) The very idea that hegemony requires a sacrifice of the narrow, "corporatist" self-interest of the working class in favor of other oppressed groups is only meaningful if scarcity is taken for granted and the universal interest of all people in a freer society beyond scarcity is ignored. The limitations of Gramsci's conception of hegemony are all the more interesting as Gramsci's thought has often been treated as a preferable alternative to Soviet Marxism, in general, and Lenin's thought, in particular. Piccone, for example, explicitly contrasts Lenin's What Is to be Done? to Gramsci's conception of the role of the Communist Party and argues that "Gramsci's notion of the party...is in no way reducible to Lenin's "ten wise men" pulling the strings of puppet proletarians. It is rather the embryo of a new society constituted by people able both to think and to feel, and is based on an overcoming of social divisions." Piccone's claim is representative of a common criticism of the undemocratic implications of Lenin's conception of the role of the Communist Party. Ironically, the aspect of Lenin's conception of socialist politics that has drawn most of these criticisms is one of the few instances in the Marxist tradition where the paradoxical task of emancipatory politics described in this article is anticipated. To the extent that it seeks to overthrow rather than reform the capitalist social order, the revolutionary Marxist tradition is confronted with the task of building, within a social context of scarcity that encourages social conflict and particularistic identities, a movement capable of bringing about a radically different society that would conquer scarcity and serve the universal interest in a richer life for all human beings. (McLellan, 1971) Marxism on Capitalism Marx's solution to this challenge was as contradictory as the solution provided by Hegel. (Hegel, 1952) Hegel's solution, that Marx himself had criticized, reflected the contradiction between universalism and particularism inherent in capitalism's dialectic of scarcity to the extent that it consisted in the identification of a "universal class." Marx objected to Hegel's identification of this "universal class" with the state bureaucracy and rightly pointed out that in actuality the members of the bureaucracy were motivated by "crass" material interests. (Marx, 1970, 44-54) To the extent that the bureaucracy tended to transform itself into a limited interest group, it could not be expected to stand in for the universal human interest. Marx, however, did not take the extra step of recognizing that the same argument would apply to all classes or social groups. Instead he went on to reassign the status of "universal class" to the proletariat. (Marx, 1970, 141-142) The problem with this reassignment is not simply that the idea of a "universal class" is an oxymoron. More than that, this idea is politically dangerous because its translation into political practice was bound to subvert the very universalist ideal that it was supposed to serve. Once the device of treating a particular social group as a stand-in for humanity was introduced, the door was opened for a successive application of this "substitutionist" principle. In the same way that the working class and its dictatorship were supposed to stand in for humanity as a whole, the revolutionary party could be made to stand in for the working class until this process reached its logical culmination in the supreme leader's standing-in for the party. (Marx, 1970, 44-54) The purpose of these comments on the forms that Marxist politics has taken in the past is not to dismiss the importance of class struggle as a means to radical social change. My argument simply is that class struggle has to be part of an emancipatory strategy that has drawn the full implications of capitalism's self-transcending moment. After all, it is capitalism's self-transcending moment; with the specter of a society beyond scarcity that it raises that allows an alliance between the movements struggling against the different forms of oppression that capitalism's artificial reproduction of scarcity helps perpetuate. The fact that the unity of this alliance ultimately derives from capitalism's self-transcending moment means that this unity will become precarious if it does not translate into anything more than reforms within the existing capitalist order. To the extent, however, that a socialist society in which "the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all" presupposes the overcoming of material scarcity, capitalism's renaturalization of scarcity may make socialism less rather than more likely. If this is the case, capitalism's ecological destructiveness undermines the universal human interest in a non-capitalist society that capitalism's dialectic of scarcity had given rise to and the second contradiction of capitalism threatens, when viewed from the standpoint of a socialist alternative, to neutralize, rather than compound, the first contradiction. (Kurt, 1967, 283-314) This also means, however, that a Marxist discussion of the ecological crisis is inextricably linked with Marxism's approach to the relationship between class and non-class emancipatory movements. If capitalism is allowed to continue ravaging Nature, the potential to abolish all forms of oppression would be wasted and each oppressed group would be left to fend for itself. (Kurt, 1967, 403-473) The renaturalization of scarcity would make even the achievement of reforms more difficult to attain as the disappearance of the material ground for an alliance of oppressed groups would make it easier for the privileged groups to continue employing divide-and-rule strategies. In discussing the Utopian potential of capitalism's dialectic of scarcity, I have shown that it is in the interest of all oppressed social groups to struggle against the artificial reproduction of scarcity perpetrated by capitalism's first contradiction. In emphasizing the complications for emancipatory politics that capitalism's ecological destructiveness introduces, I also argue that it is in the interest of all oppressed social groups to prevent the second contradiction of capitalism from neutralizing the first one. This means, however, that the emancipatory politics of the future would have to be as ecologically-minded as it would be opposed to class, gender and racial oppression. Conclusion In closing, I would submit the following reflection of Douglas Kellner on a related subject: Whither, then, Marxism? Certainly it can no longer be regarded as the master theory and narrative it appeared to be in its classical forms, but it remains an important perspective for critical theory today and it is not at all a bankrupt theory. We continue to live in a capitalist society and as long as we do, Marxism will continue to be relevant. A reconstructed Marxism, a Marxism without guarantees, teleology, and foundations, will be more open, tolerant, skeptical, and modest than previous versions. A Marxism for the twentyfirst century could help promote democracy, freedom, justice, and equality, and counterattack conservative ideologies that merely promote the interests of the rich and powerful. As long as tremendous class inequality, human suffering, and oppression exist there is the need for critical theories like Marxism and visions of radical social change that the tradition has inspired. Marxism will disappear either when the nightmare of capitalism is finally over or when a democratic and free society emerges that will produce its own philosophy and way of life. If Marxism has inspired such a project, then the doctrine can pass on to a happy obsolescence and the sufferings and struggles of those in the Marxian tradition will be redeemed. References Alison M. Jaggar. (1983). Feminist Politics and Human Nature (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allenheld,), p. 16. Georg Lukacs. (1971). History and Class Consciousness: Studies in Marxist Dialectics, Cambridge: MIT Press. George Ritzer, (2010) Sociological Theory (7th edition), Sydney: McGraw-Hill Hegel G.W.F. (1952). Hegel's Philosophy of Right; Oxford: Clarendon Press. Kurt (1967) Writings of the Young Marx on Philosophy and Society New York: Anchor Books, pp. 283-314, 403-473. Marx Karl. (1978). Manifesto of the Communist Party., The Marx-Engels Reader (New York and London: Norton,), p. 491. Marx Karl (1970). Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right (Cambridge University Press,), pp. 44-54. McIntosh, Ian (ed) (1997) Classical Sociological Theory Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, chapter 1.1 ‘Alienated Labour’, pp 15-23 McLellan, David (1971) The Thought of Karl Marx London: Macmillan Read More