Marxism and Critical Theory in the 21st Century

UNIVERSITY OF THE FREE STATE DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY Topic: Marxism and Critical Theory in the 21st Century Name of student: Patricia Mapipi Student number: 2011121247 Module: WYS314 Lecturer: Prof. P. Duvenage Due date: 16/03/15 I am familiar with the UFS policy on plagiarism and the departmental/university penalty clauses. I declare that the enclosed assignment is my own work, that I have acknowledged all my sources, and that I have not lent out my work to a fellow student. Signature: P.Mapipi Date: 16/03/15 Table of Contents 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………………………1 Historical Overview……………………………………………………………………………………………….2 Marxism …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………2 Critique of Marxism…………………………………………………………………………………………….3-4 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………………………………………5 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………………………………6 ‘For not one of us lives for himself, and not one dies for himself.’ Romans 14:7 1. Introduction A famous English poet by the name of John Donne once said: ‘no man is an island unto himself.’ By this he meant that every single person on our planet is part of an interconnected web of beings that essentially, rely on one another. In other words Donne’s weighty statement is trying to advocate for a sense of communal responsibility between individuals at a time when, because of mechanisms like capitalism, every man is out for his own. At the end of the day it seems that humanity has forgotten this simple yet crucial lesson and we’re reaping the rancid harvest of our selfishness. After reading up on Marx It became clear that one idea, one thought has the inherent potential to change the way we live and completely alter society as we know it. Weber (1946:280) bravely states: ‘world images that have been created by ideas have, like switchmen, determined the tracks along which action has been pushed by the dynamic of interest.’ Almost like a pebble that is thrown into a motionless lake, ideas can create a ripple effect because they carry an intense feeling of transformation with them. This feeling then vibrates through the ether and in turn through humanity as a whole. No other tradition understands this on a more profound level than philosophy does. Thus to explain Marx one cannot start with Marx but has to backtrack to the writings of people like Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Ludwig Feuerbach. This is because Marx used Hegel’s idea of history and ‘phenomenology of spirit’ to narrate a tale of corruption and oppression that is perpetuated through the massive apparatus of capitalism. The story eventually ends on a high note with everyone basking in the afterglow of freedom and equality. However, this only comes about after a great revolt on the part of the proletariat. Notably, Marx also drew on Feuerbach’s critique of religion. In this way Feuerbach helped to persuade Marx that the central source of human alienation is not ‘intellectual or philosophical but social and economic’ (West, 2010:46). This comes to the fore when Marx states that ‘religion is the opium of the masses.’ By this he meant that metaphysical thoughts and aspirations such as religion which portray the possibility of a blissful afterlife are a distraction to the current, pressing issues of the day. This all seems very intriguing but the problem is that most individuals approach the ideas proposed by Marx in a very stagnant, robotic manner. This is a dangerous thing to do because the dynamic of our current day and age is not taken into consideration. Marx himself, on his deathbed in 1883, proclaimed that “I am not sure of many things in this life but the one thing I am sure of is that I am not a Marxist.” This shows that he wasn’t set in his ways but made space for new findings as they came along. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to briefly look at Marxism and fit it into the context of modernity. The first section will deal with a short description of Marx’s life and various works. His main ideas or propositions will be looked at with specific reference to the ones that are most popular today. The second section will deal with a criticism of Marxism and finally the conclusion will show if Marxism is even relevant in the 21 st century at all.The sources used to substantiate the argument, by means of a literature study, were books, journals and the internet. 2. Historical Overview Karl Marx (1818-1883) was a German philosopher, economist and political thinker. He is usually portrayed as the father of twentieth century communism. After a brief career as a university teacher, Marx took up journalism and became increasingly involved with the socialist movement. He moved to Paris in 1843. He finally settled in London after being expelled from Prussia, and worked for the rest of his life as an active revolutionary and writer supported by his friend and lifelong collaborator Friedrich Engels. In 1864 Marx helped to found the first International, which collapsed in 1871 because of growing antagonism between Marx’s supporters and anarchists led by Bakunin. Although much of his voluminous writings remained unpublished at his death, Marx’s classic work was the three-volume Das Kapital. His best-known and most accessible work is the Communist Manifesto (Heywood, 2007:55). 3. Marxism In a nutshell one of the biggest claims proposed by Marxists is that modes of production are the cornerstone of civilization and the world system to date. In other words, they are stating that ‘the manner in which humans have organised the way in which they use capital, technology, raw materials and labour power to produce economic value actually forms the foundation of society and international relations’(McGowan, Cornelissen & Nel, 2006:39). Currently the dominant means of creating value is the capitalist mode of production and it’s inherently defective, Marxists contend, because it clusters wealth in the hands of capitalists while the rest of the population has no choice but to sell its labour power to them to make a living and survive another day. As Thomson (2010:86) puts it: ‘The ruling class is exploitative because it doesn’t pay the full value for this labour. Capitalists pay enough to ensure the workforce can reproduce itself, ensuring the survival of a labour force, but they share little of the profit from this productive process with the proletariat.’ Marx & Engels (1967:82-94) themselves state: ‘the executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie. What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces, above all, is its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.’ They are basically saying that the egoism and self-centredness of the people at the top has gotten out of hand and they shall eventually have to pay for it when the people at the bottom wake up and decide to revolt against them. A good example, one could say, was the French revolution in 1789. Another crucial issue, when it comes to Marxism, is property. Both Marx and his companion Engels came to acknowledge the social purpose of eradicating private property and capitalism in general. Only then would it be possible to triumph over alienation and class division. Thus for them ‘the proletariat is a revolutionary agent, not because it is only a question of their emancipation, but because in their liberation is contained universal human emancipation’ (West, 2010:52-53).Interestingly enough even Kant (2003:249) proclaims: ’how is freedom measured…? By the resistance which has to be overcome, by the effort it costs to stay aloft.’ 4. Critique of Marxism As a big lover of music it was quite disappointing that Marx didn’t see how oppression can be countered by mechanisms like aesthetics. In other words vehicles such as music, art, poetry and theatre can be used to pave the way to emancipation. For in the end that is all that Marx wished for humanity. He wanted us to enjoy true freedom and equality and was searching for a way to make this happen. Art fits this equation perfectly because it’s a form of expression and liberation like no other. As Von Schelling (1936:3) said ‘the artist’s inventive power is the recognition of the utmost organic power found in nature. Nature and human beings, thus, equally connect with one another. The latter can be viewed as the means as well as the ends for nature.’ Marx was also frustrated at how people were so removed from their work and eventually became just as much a commodity as the things that they created. Art, however, alleviates this problem on an exponential level. One can pour their heart and soul into a painting, for instance, and someone else will be able to see a reflection of this in their work .Marx, however, took none of this into consideration and instead decided to focus all his energies on the tangible or the rational which is famously known as his ‘iron laws of history.’ In my humble opinion I think that to achieve something as great as ultimate freedom for one and for all it will take more than that. Human beings are such complex creatures that It would probably take something that just dances on the edge of the empirical but fearlessly leaps into the unknown abyss of the metaphysical to truly get us there. Speaking of empiricism, I consider most of the sciences to be quite narcissistic in discrediting other practices like philosophy, yet it is from them that they originated. Essentially what happened is that people became sceptical of what one could truly know about the great beyond and opted to concentrate on what is ‘observable’ or is in our grasp, thus creating an epistemological tradition that is very solipsistic and rigid. This is wrong for two reasons: First of all the act of observing what’s in nature doesn’t mean you know its true form in reality for when you look at something you look at it with subjective goggles no matter what. Landy (2013:157) states: ‘since form comes from the individual, there are no grounds to assume that any one person can be an expert in deciphering our complex human nature. In other words, since concepts and categories that are used to form experience come from the agent, these concepts can’t reflect reality itself. Secondly, sticking to one line of thought also doesn’t give you a holistic view of reality and human nature. As Solomon (2012:10) states: ‘scientists will, at the very least, need to widen their focus to supplement their disciplinary tradition with insights from other disciplines in order to adequately comprehend phenomena in their correct context.’ In this way Marx’s work lacks objectivity in that he just focuses on the empirical and on coercive power. Another concerning issue is that he spoke about economic oppression but didn’t consider other forms of oppression, like gender roles, religious discrimination or ethnic majorities marginalising ethnic minorities. This is why critical theory is so important in any age. It creates the space for current critical theorists to approach Marx from a more detached stance. Figures like Habermas, for instance, argue that “Marxism had overestimated the influence of labour on social organization and on human history, and underestimated the role of ‘interaction’-the forms of communication that have facilitated the search for levels of agreement and understanding that make it possible for people to live together in viable societies” (Burchill, S. et al, 2013:134). In other words he is saying that Marx just focused on coercive power but didn’t think to add the point that the people who are being oppressed have the option to use consensual, communicative reason to attain liberty. For Habermas it is the best argument that will win when it comes to the very broad and complex institution of the public sphere (which, in itself, is a highly politically charged thing). It’s almost like a universal auditorium for all the contested issues of the day, especially those concerning power and the state. The public sphere is also considered to be the sole arbiter of these issues. It is, in a sense, using ‘soft power’ or diplomacy to eradicate the flaws that are prevalent in society or what he calls ‘social rationalisation’. To him, one can convince people to alter their corrupt ways argumentatively and not by force or muscle like advocated by Marx. Habermas believes that as humans we are here for something more refined than using power and advocates for the individual thinking for him/herself within society and having the option to put their arguments in public. In his opinion, just relying on power almost takes us back to the Neanderthal age. Baylis, Smith & Owens (2011:138) also note: ‘In understanding how the prevailing order was maintained, Marxists had concentrated almost exclusively on the coercive practices and capabilities of the state. While this characterization may have held true in less developed societies, such as pre-revolutionary Russia, it was not the case in the more developed countries of the West. Here the system was also maintained through consent. Consent, on Gramsci’s reading, is created and recreated by the hegemony of the ruling class in society. It is this hegemony that allows the moral, political and cultural values of the dominant group to become widely dispersed throughout society and to be accepted by subordinate groups and classes on their own.’ Gramsci was simply advocating for Machiavelli’s view of power as a centaur, half beast, half man: a mixture of coercion and consent. As for Marx’s strong admonishment of private property and him acknowledging the social purpose of eradicating it, I think that it was quite a hasty move on his part. The question remains: “what will replace the void?” There was an attempt to implement Marx’s mad scheme under the Soviet regime but they found no method to it and ended up living under shoddy buildings that scream of claustrophobia. The dwellings felt more like jail cells than anything else. The main point is that one can’t simply fumble with the fundamental fibres of society without considering the implications 5. Conclusion The purpose of this paper was to briefly look at Marxism and fit it into the context of modernity. The first section dealt with a short description of Marx’s life and various works, with specific reference to the ideas that are most popular today. The second section dealt with a criticism of Marxism. The sources used to substantiate the argument, by means of a literature study, were books, journals and the internet. Finally the question remains if Marxism is relevant in the 21st century at all. In my opinion it is. It has ideas that seem to ring true across all space and time. As Snyder (2008:31) notes: ‘[Marxism] will endure because its pessimistic emphasis on selfinterest, conflict and power seems to capture important elements of the human condition. We may not like the emphasis on tragedy and evil, but we have yet to find a way to escape it.’ However, as clearly seen by its criticism, Marxism isn’t an “answer all” remedy and has many loopholes or phenomena to answer for. This is especially apparent in our current day and age. There are other scholars who completely refute Marx’s work. Nietzsche, for instance, appears to have two closely related problems with socialism. The first has to do with the view of exploitation as unjust and historical. For Nietzsche, such a position depends on a conventionally moral perspective, which he also considers nihilistic, in the sense of being life-denying or “anti nature.” The second problem deals with the populist dimension of socialism. In Nietzsche’s view, not only does this make socialism a movement of the “herd”; it also explains its moral standpoint which, as in the case of Christian morality, he considers a kind of “slave morality” arising from resentment (Kilivris, 2011:27). This statement makes one turn back to World War II and think about the fact that in Nazi-Germany it was actually the working class that was swept away with a need to dominate because of Hitler’s concept of a perfect ‘Aryan race’ and ‘thousand year Reich.’ They were in essence supporting a dictator, something that Marx had never predicted or vouched for and proves that his concept of a revolutionary proletariat might have been flawed. Also, ironically, the West has not witnessed a fervent revolt by the working class because conditions have become better under capitalism. We have definitely come a long way from the feudal era or the days when we could own slaves. Thus, in a sense the proletariat didn’t ‘deliver’ according to Marx’s standards. Nietzsche actually goes as far as to say that class division is necessary. ’We can observe that in any building there is a line of division among the building stones i.e. lower most, lower, central, upper & upper most, because all the stones cannot occupy the same place, if so then we cannot build a building because it will just be a debris and nothing else . By applying the same idea to class division among human beings, we can understand the concept of class conflict. “Exploitation”, in turn, does not belong to a corrupt or imperfect and primitive society: it belongs to the essence of what lives, as a basic organic function; it is a consequence of the will to power, which is after all the will of life’ (Nietzsche, 1992:393). 6. Bibliography Baylis, j., Smith, S. & Owens, P. 2011.The Globalization of World Politics: An Introduction to International Relations.5th ed. New York: Oxford University Press. Burchill, S. (et al.). 2013. Theories of International Relations.5th ed. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. Heywood, A. 2007.Politics. 3rded. New York: Palgrave Foundations. Kant, E.2003.The Critique of Pure Reason. N.K. Smith, trans. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Kilivris, M.2011. Beyond Goods and Services: Toward a Nietzschean Critique of Capitalism. Kritike.5 (2), pp.26-40. Landy, D. 2013.Sally Sedgwich on Hegel’s Critique of Kant: From Dichotomy to Identity. Kantian Review. 18(1), pp.157-162 Marx, K. & Engels, F. 1967. The Communist Manifesto. Harmondsworth: Penguin. McGowan, P., Cornelissen, S. & Nel, P. 2006. Power, Wealth and Global Equity: An International Relations Textbook for Africa. 3rd ed. Cape Town: University of Cape Town Press. Nietzsche, F.1992. Beyond Good and Evil. W. Kaufmann, trans. New York: Modern Library Press. Snyder C.A.2008. Contemporary Security and Strategy. 2nd ed. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Solomon, H. 2012. 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