Everything about Western Marxism totally explained
Western Marxism is a term used to describe a wide variety of
Marxist theoreticians based in
Western and
Central Europe (and more recently
North America), in contrast with
philosophy in the Soviet Union. While
Georg Lukács's
History and Class Consciousness (External Link
) and
Karl Korsch's
Marxism and Philosophy (External Link), first published in
1923, are often seen as the works which inaugurated this current, the phrase itself was coined much later by
Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Its proponents have mostly (but not exclusively) been professional
academics.
Distinctive elements
The term is usually applied to thinkers, such as the
Marxist humanists, who view Marx as primarily a
philosopher and who stress the
Hegelian and
humanist elements of his thought, but sometimes to "
anti-humanist" movements such as
Structural Marxism as well. Certain strains of Western Marxism have tended to downplay the primacy of
economic analysis, emphasising instead the importance of the study of
culture for an adequate Marxist understanding of society. Western Marxists have thus elaborated often-complex variations on the theories of
ideology and
superstructure, which are only thinly sketched in the writings of
Marx and
Engels themselves. On the other hand some schools of thought, such as the capital-logical school of Germany and Scandinavia, ended up in Hegel-influenced Economics through their engagement with Marx's
Grundrisse and the Theorien manuscript.
Political commitments
Western Marxists have varied in terms of political commitment: Lukács,
Gramsci and
Althusser (famous for his supposed "anti-humanism") were all members of
Soviet-aligned parties; Karl Korsch was heavily critical of Soviet Marxism, advocating
council communism and later becoming increasingly interested in anarchism; the theorists of The
Frankfurt School tended towards political
quietism, although
Herbert Marcuse became known as the 'father of the
New Left';
Sartre, Merleau-Ponty and
Lefebvre were, at different periods, supporters of the
Communist Party of France, but all would later become disillusioned with it;
Ernst Bloch lived in and supported the
Soviet Union, but lost faith in it towards the end of his life.
Maoism and
Trotskyism also influenced Western Marxism.
Western Marxists
Ordered chronologically, based on the period during which each thinker did his main writing.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Western Marxism'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://western_marxism.totallyexplained.com">Western Marxism Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
