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RECENT STUDIES ON MARX

The Social & Political Thought of Karl Marx . By Shlomo Avineri.(Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1968) . Pp . viii, 269.$5 .50 cloth, $2 .45 paper.

Philosophy & Myth in Karl Marx . By Robert C. Tucker. (Cam-bridge : Cambridge University Press, 1961) . Pp. 263. $5 .50cloth, $1 .95 paper.

Theory and Practice: History of a Concept from Aristotle to Marx.By Nicolas Lobkowicz. (Notre Dame : Notre Dame UniversityPress, 1967) . Pp . xvi, 442 . $8 .95.

Non-ideological analyses of Marx's thought, of which the volumes

under review constitute a sample ; are free from the distortingpressures of immediate political objectives . This condition for ra-tional discussion does not however mean there will be agreementeither as to the genesis or significance of Marx 's views. Any studyof the prehistory of his speculations presupposes an explicit or im-plicit identification of what is central and what is peripheral, just asany discussion of the body of Marx's work must deal with its his-torical antecedents . Marx is concerned with the perennial questions:the relationship between man and man, between man and nature,and between man and God . He also dealt with historically con-tingent philosophical and social problems ; he inherited as well aschose the Hegelian, or rather the Young Hegelian intellectual edifice,the sentiments of romantic revolution, and the concerns of politicaleconomy. Moreover, he left all three in a different state than hefound them. Theoretical analyses of Marx's writings must be con-cerned with both Marx 's answer (or, in some instances, his non-answer) to the perennial questions and with Marx 's place in thestream of European intellectual history . Even if, in some measure,such a treatment remains a desideratum, the modal interpretationsfrom which a comprehensive study could be fashioned have beenestablished : on the one hand it is argued that Marx is a com-monsensical or even a philosophical analyst of individual and socialexistence within the historical horizon provided by European andNorth American industrialization. On the other, it is said that heis a primitive religious enthusiast, an activist mystic who proselytizeda dogma of human self-salvation .

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THE POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEWER

Speaking very broadly, Avineri argues more for the first alterna-tive while Tucker and Lobkowicz prefer the second.

I

Avineri begins his discussion with a consideration of the im-portance of Hegel-in particular, of Hegel's Philosophy of Right,because " it is from Hegel ' s political philosophy that Marx workstoward the roots of the Hegelian system-and not the other wayround ." What Marx objects to in Hegel 's political teaching is notits intentions ("to bridge the gap between the rational and theactual" ), but rather its "main institutional consequences," which" invested empirical reality with a philosophic halo " that it did notdeserve . Hegel 's Idea, "which should have been a criterion for judg-ing reality, turns out to be a mere rationalization " ; it " leads to aquietistic acceptance of the socio-political situation as it is, andelevates a contemporary phase of history arbitrarily into a philo-sophic criterion . " 1 As early as March, 1843, Marx had mastered atechnique, originally invented by Feuerbach and known as the" transformative method, " whereby the seemingly objectionable em-pirical implications of Hegel's political views could be tackled with-out destroying the entire system.' The result of Marx 's Feuerbachiantransformation is the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right, a care-

ful reading of which, as Avineri shows, "can demonstrate that thedistinctive patterns in Marx's later thought had already taken shapewhen he attacked Hegel in this work . "

Hegel 's error, according to Marx, was that he confused subjectand predicate : sovereignty, the essence of the state, was conceivedas a subject while the real subject, the "concrete man, " was con-ceived as a predicate of the state. Marx does not deny this to be anaccurate observation of early nineteenth century German politics,

1 Avineri, pp . 13, 9, 14 . Hegel has not lacked defenders against Marx' s chargethat he provided a rationalization of the status quo . See, for example, thearticles by Knox, Pelczynski, and Avineri himself, in W. Kaufmann, ed ., Hegel'sPolitical Philosophy (New York, 1970) or the essays by Pelczynski, Shklar,Ilting, and Berki in Z . A . Pelczynski, ed ., Hegel's Political Philosophy: Problemsand Perspectives (Cambridge, 1971).

Z Compare Marx' s letter to Ruge, 20 March 1842 with his letter also to Ruge,of 13 March 1843. Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Werke (Berlin, 1963), vol.XXVII, pp. 401,417.

sAvineri, p . 13


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but he does deny Hegel 's claim that the state is general and uni-versal . Consequently, Marx denies the necessary mediation of civilsociety between the particularity of the individual and the univer-sality of the state . Indeed, there can be no mediation when one ofthe elements is non-existent, and it is Marx 's argument that inreality the state merely masquerades as universal ; the Sande whichHegel saw as representing the general interest and the bureaucracywhich was to serve it are, Marx said, simply additional special in-terests . What Hegel attempted to do with his discussion of Stiindeand bureaucracy was restore the classical distinction between thepublic or general and the private or particular, in such a way that,as in the Hellenic polis, the general or political determined the pri-vate or economic .' But, Marx objected, since no general interestappears, the result is that some particular interests are sanctifiedby being invested with an illusory general interest.

What does obtain is not Stande, Marx said, but classes . Unlikethe medieval reality denoted by the term and even more unlikethe classical polis, one 's position in the household does not auto-matically affect one 's position in politics . The shift from Stande toclass with the concomitant attrition of political obligations and re-sponsibilities was initiated by the organization of nation states andwas completed, in principle, by the French Revolution which, asexpressed in its motto and battle cry, completely eliminated thesignificance of social position for politics . But the formal univer-sality of liberte, egalite, f raternite is simply a token for a thoroughlyparticularist and arbitrary definition of politics as a predicate of civilsociety . Now, since a man's position in civil society is a consequenceof his property, property relations as such are no longer private, asthey must be acording to both Hegel and Aristotle. But they are notfully public either, as the universalist motto stands in contradictionto apparent inequality in property relations . The contradiction be-tween existing social relations and the expression given to them byHegel 's Philosophy of Right is a dilemma for people outside civilsociety who lack property and therefore lack political visibility aswell .' These people, Marx says, are " less a class of civil society than

4 Cf . Aristotle, Politics, 1252a1-1253a38.5Cf . Hegel, Philosophy of Right, Tr. T. M. Knox (Oxford, 1952), para . 237-

245, especially Hegel' s discussion of the " rabble of paupers" created by povertyand ressentiment (Emporung) . Para . 244, addition .

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the basis upon which the strata of civil society rests and move ."'That is, they are the very condition for the existence of civil society.Avineri comments : "The circle is thus complete : since Hegel ' s theoryignores the human subject, it must ultimately reach an institution-alization from which a whole stratum of human subjects will beexluded . " 7 Even within civil society, classes which are politicallyrepresented are not represented as subjects but as predicates of thatin virtue of which any social appearance at all is possible, namelyproperty . Furthermore, it is precisely entailed property, which Hegelsaw as providing an economic base sufficiently insulated from themarket forces of civil society to enable the nobility to devote them-selves to the public bureaucracy, that Marx finds the most arbi-trary of all : the absoluteness of an entailed estate makes it a kindof absolute subject and "its" aristocratic bureaucrat is a kind ofabsolute predicate .' The state per se is therefore both an epihe-nomenon of real social forces and a means whereby real social forcesare hidden from sight.

The discovery of real classes in real conflict, with no dialecticalascent (Aufhebung) to the universality of the state implies that civilsociety and the activity carried on in civil society rather than thepolitical realm and political activity are the center of concern . Theactivity, of course, is economic, but Avineri is careful to point outthat the role of economics in Marx 's scheme is perhaps more subtlethan it is often made out to be : Marx does not postulate the aboli-tion of class antagonisms because any economic mechanism pointsin that direction . No economic analysis precedes his dictum aboutthe abolition of classes ; "they will be abolished (aufgehoben) be-

cause historical development has brought the tension between thegeneral and the particular to a point of no return . " The point ofno return has been achieved by capitalism, but capitalism, the es-sence of which is infinite accumulation, was made possible onlythrough the emergence of civil society as an autonomous sphere ofeconomic activity devoid of political or religious restraints . The

°Werke, I, p . 284 . Later in the Deutsch-Franzosische Jahrbiicher Marx iden-tified the proletariat as " a class of civil society which is not a class of civilsociety . " Early Writings, Tr . T. Bottomore (London, 1963), p . 58.

7 Avineri, p . 26.°Hegel, Philosophy of Right, para . 305-307 ; Marx, Werke I, pp. 303-05;

Avineri, pp . 27-31.°Avineri, p. 59 .


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ecumenical expansion of capitalism which, as Marx puts it in theCommunist Manifesto, "batters down all Chinese walls, " has createda new world of economic interdependence . 10 Moreover, the geo-graphic universality is complemented by a universality of depend-ence : not, to be sure, the dependence of this individual man uponthis particular master but of all men upon all other men . Thedynamics of the capitalist mode of production and the intricacies ofthe division of labor have created, Marx said, a universal inter-dependence of mankind ." Pointing to an inconspicuous passage inCapital III, Avineri shows how Marx, as early as 1864, describedcertain structural modifications of entrepreneurial capitalism, latercalled the " Managerial Revolution," that resulted from the processof production but which were both unintended and unforseen bycapitalists themselves or by other economists . 12 Similarly, Marxnoted the change in British rule of its overseas empire in India fromthe relatively straightforward economic exploitation, responsible toParliament, carried on by the East India Company to the almosttotal anonymity of the later bureaucratic rule of India House . 13

The above account of a few themes in Marx ' s work which Avineritreats seem to corroborate the view that Marx was first of all anempirical social scientist or even a commonsense critic of Hegel.For, was not what Marx said about capitalist production true? Hadit not established for the first time a worldwide economic structure?Did not governments pursue policies, both foreign and domestic,designed to increase productivity? Are we today not all too familiarwith huge private bureaucracies that are capitalist only throughlinguistic indulgence? And likewise we know public bureaucraciesthat suffer so little public scrutiny as to make them indistinguishablefrom "private" corporations . Or again, when Marx called Hegel ' s

'°Selected Works (New York, 1968), p . 39.1 'As a matter of fact, Hegel made precisely the same point but draws quite

different conclusions in a text unknown to Marx, the so-called Jenaer Real-philosophie . See Avineri's discussion in " Labor, Alienation, and Social Classesin Hegel' s Realphilosophie, " Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol . I No. 1 (Fall,1971), pp . 103 if.

12Avineri, pp . 177-79 ; the passages cited are from Capital, III, Ed . F . Engels,(New York, 1967), pp . 437-441 . See also the remarks of Ralf Dahrendorf,Class & Class Conflict in Industrial Society (Stanford, 1959), pp . 41-48.

13See "The Government of India," New York Daily Tribune, 20 July 1853, inAvineri, ed . Karl Marx on Colonization and Modernization (New York, 1968),pp . 110-115 ; Werke, IX, pp. 181-87 .

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notion of Mande obsolete and argued that his bureaucracy was justanother particularistic group within civil society, is there not morethan a grain of truth in his assertion? Assuredly, much of what Marxsaid was and may be still applicable to the real situation of actualworkers, actual bureaucrats, actual capitalists and so on. But Marxalso implied that in Avineri 's words, a "point of no return " had been

reached, that the Hegelian project of reconciling particularity withuniversality had broken down, but also that Hegel 's basic notion wasa sound one . What we would like to know, whatever the validity ofMarx's observations on economic, political and bureaucratic realities,is what Marx thought of the significance of the facts he observed,why he conceived them to constitute a point of no return, and whatlay "ahead . " In short, is what Marx meant also applicable toreality, or has he constructed a speculative " reality " of his own de-vising, a "second reality" as it has been called . 14 Avineri 's caution inthis regard is understandable . If Marx not only told men what was

"going on under our very eyes, " 15 as he put it, but also providedthese facts with their real significance, that is one thing . One mayanticipate no extraordinary problems in textual explication . But, ifMarx is constructing a speculative system which provides a meaningto the phenomena he describes on the basis of his own imagination,and if he employs a philosophical or economic language in such away as to disguise, as well as he can, his own non-recognition ofthe meaning of the historical and social existence of man, then aformidable task of decoding arises . Avineri appears to fall betweenthese two fundamentally antithetical positions.

A closer scrutiny of one of Marx 's more potently evocative sym-bols may expose the difficulty . Marx argued that Hegel 's state was

an inverted reality ; the prescriptive trick therefore is obvious:"reality must be inverted once more by the transformative method:man must be made again into a subject ." Y8 In Marx's view, " true

society" which, like Hegel 's, reconciled the particular with the uni-versal, could be achieved not through integration by the state of the

14E . Voegelin, Anamnesis : Zur Theorie der Geschichte and Politik (Munich,1966), pp. 302-313 ; P. Berger, "The Problem of Multiple Realities : AlfredSchutz and Robert Musil, " in M. Natanson, ed ., Phenomenology and SocialReality : Essays in Memory of Alfred Schutz (The Hague, 1970).

"The quote is from the Communist Manifesto, Selected Works, pp. 46-47.16 Avineri, p. 32 .


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particularity of civil society, but by the universalization of man whoabolishes both the property which makes of him a predicate andthe state which pretends to achieve universality . For Marx, when thedistinction between the particular and the universal is overcome,man will have actualized his " true self, " which is identical with his"social self ." A society of "true selves" is a "true society" or, asMarx sometimes terms it, " true democracy ." Such a society is theactualization of "man's communist essence" or "socialized man ." 1r

What one may reasonably expect from a political scientist givingan exegesis of an argument such as the one Marx has made is aconcern with the meaning of the original Hegelian symbols such as"subject," "self," or "reality " which clearly do not have any com-monly accepted conceptual significance . What must "reality " beif man can "invert" it? How can man be in a position to performthis task? How can man be "made again " ? Is a "self" still a humanbeing? And if not, who is this new Adam and who is his creator?Moreover, we would expect a closer scrutiny of Hegel 's notions of"particular" and "universal," and how they rely for their significanceupon a view of history whose validity Avineri leaves unstated andunexamined. Instead of a philosophical analysis of the symbols used,Avineri accepts them at face value and passes on to an elementalanalysis of " true democracy" as if it were a perfectly ordinary term,even though he shows that it has nothing to do with classical ormodern forms of government suggested by the word . He then pointsout that it occupies a place in Marx 's speculation akin to the placewhich Christianity occupies in Feuerbach ' s . Here again, instead ofa critical exploration of Feuerbach 's tricks, he gives a straightforwardcomparison : just as the appearance of Christianity implied its even-tual disappearance as the need for religion was abolished and trans-cended (auf gehoben) , "so [true] democracy as conceived by Marxposes the question whether it is not at the same time the apex andthe transcendence (Aufhebung) of the political constitution, i .e . ofthe state . . . . Not only the state disappears : civil society as a dif-ferentiated sphere of interest disappears as well . " i8 The resulting" true society" is one in which the contradiction between public andprivate is ended . There is no inquiry either into what this Au f hebung

17 Werke, I, pp . 283, 231 ; Avineri, pp . 31-34.18Avineri, pp . 35-36 .

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des Staats might likely mean as a pragmatic eventuality, nor is thereany theoretical analysis of the symbolism, its derivation, or its realsignificance . This is surprising in the light of Avineri 's acute sug-gestion that the generalization of the Greek polis under conditionsof modern society is more likely to achieve Hobbes ' Leviathan thanPericles' Athens."

Avineri does provide us with an account of Marx 's appropriationof Hegel's notion of universal class . As late as October, 1842, Marxstill wrote of `the poor" in a quite ordinary manner ; 20 it was onlyafter his reflections on Hegel ' s political views that the significance ofthe proletariat as the "real" universal class emerged . The necessaryattributes of true universality are apparent from our earlier discus-sion : the class must be without political visibility and thus withoutproperty ; it must have no particular interest but express, in the veryconditions of its existence, a human universality ; it must be totallyalienated from civil society . 2 ' When the condition of the proletariatbecomes coextensive with mankind there will be no more property,no more particularism, no more civil society, and consequently nomore alienation . 22

In the following chapter Avineri explains Marx 's teaching con-

cerning the relationship between man and nature, the anthropologywhich sustains Marx 's dramatic vision . He also answers a questionposed earlier, how Marx conceives of "reality " such that man can"invert" it. Marx ' s epistemological "materialism," he says, "occupiesa middle position between classical materialism and classical ideal-ism, . . . it synthesizes the two traditions, it transcends the classicdichotomy between subject and object . 723 Avineri amplifies thisopaque description by noting that Marx "derived his view thatreality is not mere objective datum, external to man, but is shapedby him through consciousness" from Hegel's Phenomenology, so

that epistemology "ceases to be a merely reflective theory of cog-nition, and becomes the vehicle for shaping and moulding reality . "And finally : "To Marx reality is always human reality not in the

19 Avineri, " Labor, Alienation and Social Classes," p . 110.LO See his article in the Rheinische Zeitung, 27 October 1842, Werke, I, p.

119 ; Avineri, p . 57.21 Marx, Early Writings, pp . 58-59, 132-133.22 Avineri, pp . 59-60.23 Avineri, p. 69, cf . ; Richard J . Bernstein, Praxis and Action: Contemporary

Philosophies of Human Activity (Philadelphia, 1971), pp . 43-45 .


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sense that man exists within nature, but in the sense that man shapesnature . This act also shapes man and his relations to other humanbeings. . . . " 24 It may be possible to give an intelligible interpreta-tation of Marx 's epistemology from what Schelling has calledmeontological metaphysics, but this is doubtful prima facie becauseMarx confines his argument to what has been called man ' s "natural "and "historical" situations . 26 Moreover, if we look carefully atMarx's own explanation of the meaning of his words, we find thedifference between "nature " and "history" eroded and we are leftin a confusion of contradiction . 28 This confusion is present in Avi-neri 's commentary as well.

On the one hand, it would seem that "reality" is the same as"nature " understood in a commonsense way as indicating externalthings, rocks, trees and perhaps animals, in which case it makes akind of sense to say that man "shapes and moulds reality . " But inorder to labor upon nature, to "shape" it, man must also be "within"

nature in the sense that he shares some of the characteristics of na-ture-corporeity, for example . If men were without bodies therewould be no problem ; but if we are human rather than angelic, thevery condition for "shaping " nature is that we exist "within" it . Atthe same time, however, if we were simply "shapers of nature " wewould be unaware of ourselves as "shapers . " If nevertheless, we areaware of ourselves, even if it is simply an "artistic" awareness,27

then human reality is not exhaustively described by saying that man"shapes" nature . On the other hand, it would appear that "reality"means something quite different from "nature" as can be seen in ananalysis of Avineri's account of the relationship between "conscious-ness" and "reality . " Even with Hegel who attributed rather extra-ordinary powers to consciousness or, more exactly, to the self-con-sciousness of the wise man, the link to " reflective . . . cognition " wasnever broken . 28 With Marx, and also with Avineri 's explication,there is a profound ambiguity . No one would wish to dispute the

24Avineri, pp . 68, 71.25 See Emil Fackenheim, Metaphysics and Historicity (Milwaukee, 1961), for

a concise elaboration of the problems involved.28See, for example, Marx ' s play with the connotations of "nature " in his

Early Writings, pp . 164-166, 206-207.27 Avineri, pp . 73, 282.28 Most emphatically in the famous passage of the Preface to the Philosophy

of Right, pp . 12-13 .

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contention that external reality may be given significance throughthe ability of consciousness to project ; indeed, what we mean byinstrumentally rational action is simply the ability to organize activityin such a way as to achive a desired goal . But if consciousness weresimply instrumental rationality, we would be unable to decide whichgoals are better than others . Moreover, we would be unable to raise,let alone understand, the question of the meaning of our projects.At the very least, consciousness implies an ability to "stand outside"of the endless chain of practical projects ; it is only by "standingoutside" that we can raise questions of goodness and meaning . More-over, if we ask questions concerning the whole project includingthe instrumental consciousness that shapes each individual project,then whatever . experience of reality follows, it cannot be simply an-other project of consciousness but, on the contrary, it must be ex-perienced as an "objective datum, external to man . " The reason

is apparent enough : if we knew that "reality" was simply a conse-

quence of conscious activity, if, that is, we knew that the meaningof the whole of our project could be derived from consciousness aswell as experienced in consciousness we would also know that it wasnot the whole but quite obviously a part.

Rational consciousness, in the emphatic sense of apprehendingreality as meaning which is not created by instrumentally rationalconsciousness, implies among other things the reality of limits tohuman projects . Contrarily, if there is no rational experience of theexternality of meaning, there is no intrinsic reason why there shouldbe any experience of the limitations of human projects, since allapparent limits are simply the projects of conscious activity whichtherefore can be transcended by further activity . But the structureof reality is not altered simply because it is unrecognized . Rather,such non-recognition exerts a kind of pressure on the argumentwhich is either to be resisted by dogmatic ukase or ignored by flightsof fancy prepared by non-sequiturs, unanalyzed terminology and so

on .In particular, the absence of a notion of "limit," which re-

flectively expresses the reality that existence is not the whole of being,is analyzed by Avineri in a passage from the 1844 manuscript whereMarx explains the genesis and transcendence of natural needs . 29

"Early Writings, pp . 206-07 ; Avineri, pp . 79-81 .


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Needs are not simply "natural" in the sense of biological require-ments, they are also "social and historical" and therefore determined,in the end, by man himself . 30 Granted that there are certain bio-logical aprioris, what is focal in Avineri 's analysis is the "conscious-ness that will see the need for these particular objects as a human

need . " This consciousness is not apriori but rather is historically con-tingent . In a way this can only be true trivially : Cicero could notpossibly consider an automobile to be a "human need . " But thistriviality hides a more fundamental ambiguity, masked in Avineri ' spresentation, which may be brought to light by the following ques-tions : is there a distinction, in reality, between needs and wants ordesires? And if so, is this distinction better to be understood in termsof changing objects of desire (e .g . chariots versus automobiles) orchanging conceptions of need (e .g . the automobile as a necessity)?Or rather, is it not a more sound procedure to consign a "need " tothe realm of biology and examine desires, which presuppose thesatisfaction of needs, in terms of their inherent goodness and ra-tionality? The example of Marx, cited by Avineri, of a small housethat seemed adequate until a palace was built nearby whence it wasseen as a mere "hut," shows that "our desires and pleasures springfrom society " and thus are measured "by society and not by theobjects which serve for their satisfaction ." 31 Avineri's gloss main-

tains Marx 's original equivocation : "Since historical developmentenriched human wants, they cannot be measured without being re-lated to the modes of production which created them . " The point ofMarx and evidently of Avineri as well is not a prelude to an analysisof base desires and wants, nor of the irrationality and uncertaintyof the measure provided by society,32 and certainly not of the sig-nificance of the tenth commandment . Rather, Avineri concludes that

since wants or "human needs" are not "naturalistic facts, . . . theycan be consciously mastered and directed . " We are blessed with animplicit guarantee that if "human society can generate a certainlevel of needs, one needs only adequate social organization to satisfythem. If society had not reached that level of potential satisfaction,

30Cf., The German Ideology, Ed . S . Ryezanska, (Moscow, 1964), pp . 39 if.31The quote is from " Wage Labour and Capital, " Selected Works, pp . 84-85;

Avineri, p . 80."See Avineri' s comments on Lindsay and Galbraith, p . 81 fn .1 .

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the level of felt needs would not reach as high ." 33 On the basis ofthis guarantee all wants in principle can be satisfied because theyare all mediated through consciousness and therefore are "human . "The nihilistic implications of Marx 's teaching are overlooked byAvineri and he passes on to a consideration of the necessary pre-suppositions : if there are no limits established independent of ourdesires that can be apprehended by reason, if all wants are to bemeasured by society, and yet if also and at the same time there isa real meaning to be found in conscious activity, it necessarily fol-lows that man both creates the world and himself. 34 What is as-tonishing in all this is that while Avineri writes about Marx with astraight face, as it were, he is also aware of the reason for Marx ' sirrational refusal to recognize reality : "Man as creator of himselfand of his world also provides a criterion for the analysis of the con-ditions of his contemporary historical existence . Had Marx lackedsuch a criterion, he could not have liberated himself from a relativistpositivism which . would of course have created an unbridgeablegulf between history and philosophy, between the proletariat and therevolution as the realization of man 's potentialities as homo faber ."

36

That is, if man were not creator of himself and his world, if therewere an "objective datum external to man " that situated and there-fore limited man qua man, then indeed history would cease to bethe story of the coming of the proletarian revolution, the finalAuf hebung, and the perfection of man's self-creation.

Avineri is not always so uncritical . In both the Introduction andthe Epilogue he devotes a few excellent comments to what othershave seen as the centerpiece of Marx's speculation, " turning the pos-sibility of human redemption into an historical phenomenon aboutto be realized here and now."" Moreover, Avineri indicates theHegelian origins of Marx ' s "eschatology of the present ." 37 What hedoes not do, but what nevertheless ought to be done, is explain thetheoretical illegitimacy of applying symbols which pertain to a classof experiences devoted to man's relationship to God to the realm ofmundane affairs . Indeed, properly speaking the transformation is not

3SAvineri, p . 80.34Avineri, pp . 84-85 ; cf Marx, Early Writings, p . 207.36 Avineri, p . 86.36 Avineri, p . 250.37 Avineri, pp . 4, 250 .


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Tucker says, is "understandable" and even "reasonable," but it is"erroneous . " 42 Moreover, Tucker disagrees with the presuppositionsthat governed the "basic question in the mind of an older generationof students and critics of Marx 's system"-namely, "is it true?" Sucha question implied that the "chief problem" was one of "verifica-tion, " and presupposed that Marx 's first concern was to provide anaccount of empirical events . 43 But this is the wrong question and itis based on presuppositions which, Tucker says, are misleading:"Marxism . . . did not arise out of an empirical study of economicprocesses in modern society ." "Although he documented [his con-ception of capitalism] with materials from real economic history,and thus made it appear economically real to many people, it wasnot, even in his own time, descriptive of an actual capitalist eco-nomic system . " The view that Marx is now "obsolete," which pre-supposes the problem of verification, is also dismissed : " the assump-tion that Marx's doctrine represented a successful effort to explainthe social-economic phenomena of his time, that it was broadlydescriptive of the actual social world in which Marx lived " is "super-ficial" and "erroneous . " "Marx," Tucker concludes, "was not asocial scientist ." 44 In developing his interpretation of Marx, Tuckerprovides us with a justification of these claims . But whatever itscompleteness appears to be, Tucker's hermeneutical circle may be asrestricted as Avineri' s ; the answers he gives are reflected not justin the questions he asks, but also in the presuppositions he acceptsand which may effectively obscure problems which Avineri con-fronts.

Tucker begins with a question : instead of Marx the philosophicalcritic or empirical social scientist whose views are subject to verifi-cation or disproof, "may [his work] not be comprehended basicallyas an ethical or religious system?"" None too scrupulous aboutconnotative distinction, Tucker concludes that indeed "Marx is un-questionably a moralist . " At the same time, he draws a very finedistinction between a "moralist " and a "moral philosopher " basedupon two criteria : first, Marx does not follow the correct "form ofinquiry" which proceeds from "the Socratic tradition" and consists

42 Tucker, p . 125."Tucker, p . 12.44Quotes from Tucker, pp . 218, 234, 227.45Tucker, p . 14.

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in "a methodical doubt, a suspension of commitment" as to whatconstitutes the supreme good for man . Marx 's work violates thiscriterion because : "It does not start by raising the question of thesupreme good for man or the criterion of right conduct; these ques-tions are not raised by Marx as questions ."'" In addition to this pro-cedural exclusion of Marx from the company of "moral philos-ophers," Tucker excludes him because it is impossible to ascribe oneor another familiar ethical positions to him . Marx is not an utili-tarian because he criticized Bentham, nor is he a socialist because heis not concerned with distributive justice . Nor again can Marx becalled a "moral futurist " as Popper argued .47 The argument is thenrefined : Marx was "a moralist of the religious kind . " The "religiousessence" of Marxism is obscured by Marx 's atheism, but, upon closerexamination, it turns out that Marx did have a notion of a "supremebeing" after all, "man ." Moreover, "from a structural viewpoint"we can observe similarities between Marxism and " the Christianreligious system ." Specifically, both "provide an integrated, all-in-clusive view of reality," both view "all existence under the aspect ofhistory," both contain a "scheme" of redemption, and . both conjoin" theory and practice ." The most important aspect, however, the"master-theme of the system, " which "corresponds to the master-theme of salvation of the soul in the Christian theology of history, " isthe idea of "a radical `change of self'" which produces "a whollynew man . " 48

There is a certain robust vigor to Tucker 's argument that can-not help but impress us . At a time when the articulate are deviousand those who hold to their views are consumed by their passion, itis refreshing to encounter a strong argument . An admiration forTucker 's frankness, however, cannot preclude us from drawing at-tention to certain deficiencies in his presentation . We have alreadynoted his indiscriminate identification of ethics with moralism withreligion . His rhetoric seems to say : "why not look at Marx as amoralist or a religious thinker?" But then this conceptual liberalitycontracts to a pinched stipulative precision as he distinguishes be-tween moralist and moral philosopher only to broaden again as hecompares Marxism to " the Christian religious system . " Tucker' s

"Tucker, pp . 15-16.47 Tucker, pp . 16-20.48 A11 quotes are from Tucker, pp . 22-25 .


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presentation, to say the least, lacks technical sophistication . First ofall, the notion of a "Christian religious system" ignores fundamentaltheological differences among Christian groups ; moreover, it is ques-tionable whether the term "system" has any meaning in a Christiancontext . He also fails to discuss what is meant by a "structural view-point" from which Marxism and Christianity appear as similar"systems . " It may be countered that such general objections toTucker 's argument simply reflect an aesthetic judgment upon hisrhetoric. Surely, one might say, it is possible to recast his argumentin a more theoretically adequate vocabulary . The criticism offeredhere is not simply of his rhetoric however, but also of the conceptsexpressed in it ; one objects to Tucker's vocabulary precisely becauseit is, upon close inspection, quite difficult to know what he means byhis use of words . For example, does his persistent use of the adjective"medieval" in connection with Christianity imply any particulartheologian or philosopher, or any specific time period? Does it implyperhaps that "modern" Christianity or Christianity without anyperiodizing adjective is not, from a "structural viewpoint, " com-

parable to Marxism? One simply does not know.Let us examine the argument which justifies the title of his book

so as to determine as clearly as possible the core of Tucker's thesis.Hegel ' s "philosophy," he says, provides the background to Marx 'swork : "Truly, Marxism may be seen as Hegelianism inverted.Speaking very broadly, the relation between them may be describedas follows : Hegel represents the universe as a subjective process;Marx, turning the system around, ends up by representing a sub-jective process as the universe-the social cosmos . " Marx really had

"gone beyond philosophy" but was it, as he claimed, to reality?"Now it is quite true that he had an arresting vision of something

real . . . . But the reality that Marx apprehended and portrayed wasinner reality . The forces of which he was aware were subjectiveforces, forces of the alienated human self, conceived, however, andalso perceived, as forces abroad in society ." Since "the decisive char-acteristic of mythic thought " is "that something by nature interioris apprehended as exterior, that a drama of the inner life of man isexperienced and depicted as taking place in the outer world, " there-

fore, Marx "had gone beyond philosophy into that out of whichphilosophy, ages ago, originated-myth ." 4s It would be a relatively

49A11 quotations are from Tucker, pp . 218-219 .

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simple matter to call into question the adequacy of Tucker's under-standing of the "decisive characteristic of mythic thought " 50 butsuch an exercise would hardly be worth the effort, for it turns outthat Tucker is not really interested in the phenomenology of mythicreality so much as the metaphorical or connotative aspects of theword . Thus, for example, he writes that "Marx's Weltanschauunghas become a political mythology, a narrative associated with therites of single-party politics . " s' No doubt Marx can be conceivedas a "myth" maker, his system can be conceived as " religious," andSoviet party politics can be conceived as a "rite . " It is plain, how-ever, that in order to conceive the phenomena the way Tucker wouldhave us, we must appreciate his rhetoric and ignore his lack of con-ceptual control . Apart from the wholly vague counsel to accept a"structural viewpoint, " Tucker never tells us why Marx ought beconceived as a "religious moralist . "

In part, Tucker 's defective concepts appear only in light of themore adequate theorizing about the relationship between secularchange and religious enthusiasm that has appeared since the pub-lication of his book . We now possess an extensive and precisevocabulary to analyze the phenomena involved . Research on mille-narian movements in the non-industrial world provides an indis-pensable background for the re-examination of European and NorthAmerican social movements . 62 Studies on the experiences and sym-bolism of gnosticism, magic and alchemy as well as historical ac-counts of the transmission of symbols, 63 studies on specific problems

"Tucker mentions H. Frankfort et al ., Before Philosophy and E. Cassirer,Language and Myth, though not directly in connection with his definition ofmythic thought (Tucker, p . 224 fn.) . A recent exposition of the complexities ofmyth which, incidentally, takes issue with Tucker's authorities is G . S . Kirk,Myth : Its Meaning and Function in Ancient and Other Cultures (Berkeley,1971), pp . 101f, 263-268.

51 Tucker, p . 233.52 Bibliographies can be found in any of the following representative works:

V. Lanternari, The Religious of the Oppressed : A Study of Modern MessianicCults, Tr., L. Sergio (New York, 1963) ; P. Worsley, The Trumpet Shall Sound:A Study of "Cargo " Cults in Melanesia, 2nd ed . (New York, 1968) ; Sylvia L.Thrupp, (ed .), Millennial Dreams and Action: Studies in Revolutionary Re-ligious Movements (New York, 1970) ; W. E . Miihlmann et al. Chiliasmus andNativismus (Berlin, 1961) ; Archives des sociologies des religions, No. 4 and 5,(1957-58).

5sIn this context one must mention the work of Hans Jonas, The GnosticReligion, 2nd ed, (Boston, 1963) ; Mircea Eliade, The Forge and the Crucible


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of modern politics in general and Marx 's speculation in the contextof modernity have provided the elements of a proper interpretationof Marx as a religious thinker . b " But, to return to our text, it turnsout that Tucker is not really interested in "religion " or even "myth"

but in psychology.We quoted Tucker above to the effect that the "reality " involved

in Marx's "arresting vision" was an "inner reality ." More precisely,it was the experience of "an alienated human self . " The origin ofMarx's concept is still Hegel's civil society. Marx "sought the` anatomy ' of civil society in political economy, but the anatomy ofpolitical economy, in turn, was given in the idea of ` political-economic alienation . ' " The consequence was the notion of " thealienated species-man or the species of alienated men, " who ful-filled the assigned roles in Marx's dramatic conflict . That is, "con-flicting forces of the alienated self were thus conceived as externalsocial forces." " Tucker objects to Marx projecting individual spirit -

ual disorder onto society in general because, while all men are borninto society, "Man is not born alienated, although he is born witha potentiality of becoming an alienated individual . No matter howmany individual men may belong to this category, it is always anindividual matter ." es Alienation may befall a man but it is not anindependent category of existence which somehow he inherits atbirth. Indeed, Tucker explains, alienation is " an ancient psychiatricterm meaning loss of personal identity or the feeling of personalidentity" 67 so that the individual is an accomplice of society in thecreation of the alienated self.

Again, the language Tucker employs is not, technically speaking,

(New York, 1971) [French ed . 1956] ; A. Koyre, Mystiques, spirituals, alchem-ists du XVIe siecle allemand (Paris, 1955) ; C .G. Jung, Collected Works,vol, XII (Princeton, 1968) ; N. Cohn, The Pursuit of the Milleinium, 2nd ed.(New York, 1961).

"Here we need mention the work of Karl Lowith, Meaning in History(Chicago, 1949) and From Hegel to Nietzsche (New York, 1969) [Germaned . 1941] ; Eric Voegelin, The New Science of Politics (Chicago 1952), Science,Politics and Gnosticism (Chicago, 1968) [German ed . 1959] and " The Forma-tion of the Marxian Revolutionary Idea," Review of Politics, 12 (1950), 275-302; J. L. Talmon, Political Messianism (New York, 1960) ; Gerhart Nie-meyer, Between Nothingness and Paradise (Baton Rouge, 1971).

"Tucker, pp . 219-220."Tucker, p. 240."Tucker, p . 144 .

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the best, but there is an important truth in what he says . Everybodyhas reason to be dissatisfied, from time to time, with his situation.It is not quite so reasonable to impute the cause of dissatisfaction tothe world rather than to the individual ; nor, even if the world is"wrong," or perhaps imperfect, does it necessarily follow that mencan do anything to make it "right . " Tucker shows quite well thepsychological dynamics of alienation as they appear in Marx ' s specu-lation and points out that what Marx thought was the descriptiveanalysis of a social fact was in truth a sophisticated description ofMarx's own "neurosis . " 68 Even so, we still must discover what Marxconsidered to be the true reality in virtue of which existing affairscould be conceived as the consequence of alienation.

It is somewhat tedious to spell things out, but Tucker neverplaces the constituitive elements in their properly intimate relation-ship. Class conflict is a reflection of the self-alienation of mankindin so far as the world and the self created by labor-power are usedto maintain unnatural and inhuman institutions such as religion, thestate and so on . The insight that the self and the world is createdby labor-power is the result of the Feuerbachian transformation ofHegel 's notion which provided Geist with the same task . And howwas Geist and its activities understood by Marx? As the apotheosisof man. Whether the joyful news that man had become divine wasexpressed in the cryptic form of Hegel 's code, openly in Feuerbach ' stransformation of the code, or cryptically again in Marx's assimila-tion of Feuerbach's "humanism," the experiential core which pro-vides the trial from Hegel to Marx with its unity is retained : "man'sself-realization as a godlike being or, alternatively, as God." 69Marx 's spiritual problems now appear in a different light : if helearned from Hegel that man had become divine, and if he thenlearned from Feuerbach that the divinity man achieved was imagi-nary, it was his own contribution to discover that within thisimaginary self-divination a true divination was proceeding apace.If we return to reality for a moment, the significance of Marx'sposition, no less than that of Hegel is clear : neither could abide thecondition of being human, neither could accept himself as creature.

"Tucker, pp . 1441f.69 Tucker, p . 31 .


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Marx 's alienation is self-alienation indeed . 60 It is the alienation ofa man possessed by an infinite desire to become God but whose de-sire is constantly thwarted by reality . Marx hailed Prometheus as hispatron but neglected to notice that Aeschylus considered Prometheus"stricken with no small madness ."

III

Our main criticism of Tucker has been to point out a theoreticalsloppiness which can lead to a host of misleading conclusions evenwhen the general thrust of his argument is correct . His discussionof Kant, for example, plays with the ambiguities of "reason" as acommonsense term and as a highly specific technical term in Kant ' sphilosophy . 61 His identification of pride with something like originalsin is confusing, and his declaration that Hegelianism is simply an"apologia for pride" ignores the dialectical subtlety of Hegel's posi-tion which combines a monumental self-confidence with an equallymonumental humility . 62 No similar comments can be made of thethird work under review. Lobkowicz is a master of classical, me-dieval, and modern philosophy . His tone is measured, his argumentprecise . Unlike both Avineri and Tucker the title is excessivelymodest so far as Marx is concerned : Theory and Practice providesa lucid exposition of several of the major themes in Marx 's work be-yond the notion of " the unity of theory and practice . " Lobkowicz' slarge book is the first part of an even larger account of the develop-ment of the concept of practice in Soviet philosophy. Moreover, hismethod is less the defence of a thesis than the recounting of a his-tory, keeping as close as possible to the empirical materials. Oc-casional explicitly critical passages serve to expose lacunae in anargument, sophisms, inarticulate premises and so on . Such a presen-

66 The argument of this paragraph is in approximately the reverse order ofTucker's argument . That is, he concludes with a consideration of myth inPart IV, gives the substance of his psychological translation of Marx ' s "myth"in Part III and provides us with the clinical, philosophical details of the"psychology of aggrandizement" in Parts II and I.

61 Tucker, p . 38."Tucker, pp . 32, 67. See Hegel's statement concerning the share of the

"particular individual" in the advent of self-conscious spirit . Phanomenologiedes Geistes, ed . J . Hoffmeister (Hamburg, 1952), pp . 58-59 .

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tation no less than the sheer bulk and richness of narrative make acomplete analysis impossible . We can only summarize Lobkowicz' smajor additions to our understanding of the genesis of Marx'snotion.

The first section contains a collection of "materials for a pre-history " to Marx's treatment of theory and practice . It begins withan account of the classical distinction between philosophical andpolitical dimensions of existence . Neoplatonic degradation of politicalpraxis into a cathartic preparation for a non- "theoretical " andstrictly contemplative mystical ecstasy, subsequent alterations tocontemplation provided by Christian demands for charity, and the"post-theoretical" practice of Duns Scotus provide the necessarybackground for the characteristically modern view exemplified byBacon and Descartes . For politics, the important factor was thedenial of the reality of tradition and practical knowledge : ethicaland political decisions, because they depended upon contingencies,can never be taken on the basis of knowledge . This view is quitedifferent from Aristotle who argued that practical, that is, politicaland ethical knowledge had a smaller degree of certainty because itsobject was changing and contingent : "By reducing all knowledgeto one kind Descartes commits himself to a radical irrationalism inthose areas, most significantly ethics and politics, where mathematicalknowledge is irrelevant ." 63 Such a conclusion, despite the effortsSpinoza, Malebranch, Leibniz, and even Locke to extend mathe-matics to the ethical and political realm, greatly disturbed Kantwho was committed both to a genuine ethics and to Cartesiannatural philosophy.

Kant's well known solution was to divide reality in two : non-metaphysical appearance is mathematical and the non-appearing,non-theoretical is metaphysical. Knowledge having to do with thenatural world was "theoretical" ; knowledge having to do with the"truly real " suprasensible world was "practical ." The one is studiedin terms of natural scientific concepts, the other is 'apprehendedthrough freedom . Freedom places man in a world additional to theworld of nature, but, because he is first of all in the world of nature,moral, that is, "practical" laws appear as "oughts . " Theoretical,scientific laws deal with "what is . " An "ought," an ideal, is bydefinition remote from actual conduct, which is precisely Kant's

B3Lobkowicz, p . 119.


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point : the laws of the intelligible world are not implemented, butwilled. Hence Kant's famous aphorism that the only unqualifiedgood is a good will is based not upon the ontological status of thegood, but upon the status of will . But the ontological law of the willis freedom which makes a good will simply obedience to the verynature of will . The vast inflation of the commonsense observationthat a person has some choice about the life he leads implies that"all except strictly physical laws are imposed upon man by him-self,"" since man is free in everything but physical laws to definehis own place in the world.

Hegel 's contribution, in this context, appears as a rather simpleone : he treats will as a special mode of thought, in particular, as adesire to have reality conform to "reason ." As history unfolds, theimportance of will and activity declines as reality achieves greaterand greater reasonableness . Pragmatically, there is a good deal ofambiguity in Hegel 's formula : after all, all men may not describe"reality" in terms of its reasonableness . Lobkowicz argues that, forHegel, the reasonableness of the present is simply not problematic;it is a fact of history that must be recognized . 65 . The notion, soprominent in the preface to the Philosophy of Right, that " thefuture holds nothing new " is also found, as Kojeve has argued, inthe Phdnomenologie . 88 When a thinker is of the opinion that historyhas come to an end certain rather obvious psychological problemsarise that are less acute if the end of history is seen as a futureoccasion . In particular, historical facts whose meaning is obvious toeverybody must be "reinterpreted" so as to have them conform tothe imaginary millennial present . Hegel's method of achiving thistask, Lobkowicz argues, is to glorify the present by arguing that inreality man is participating in God ' s eternal life, to secularize Chris-tian eschatalogical symbols, and to develop a "science" whichcomprehends the now secularized symbolisms in terms of the trans-figured empirical events of actual history. 67

64Lobkowicz, p . 135.66 In the Phfinomenologie Hegel issues a kind of spiritual death warrant on

those " representatives " of the public who resist recognizing the reasonablenessof reality . Philnomenologie, p . 58.

66A . Kojeve, Introduction a la Lecture de Hegel, 2nd ed . (Paris, 1947), pp.280 ff, 442 . Lobkowicz gives a brief account of the pre-history of the symbolismof "nothing new, " pp . 166-73.

67 Lobkowicz, pp . 174-181 .

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What remained as the unshakeable experiential ground for thespeculations of Hegel's followers after the master's death in 1831was the knowledge, vouchsafed to them in Hegel 's own words, thatman was in possession of absolute, all-embracing certainty . Trueenough, the empirical world did not conform to absolute knowledge,but that meant only that the activity which would transform realitywould literally save the world . The traditional political virtue, pru-dence, had no place . How could it? If one knows, past experienceis of no account, for "facts could be no real challenge to those whoknew ; they could always be reinterpreted or changed." 68 The firstsalvo was fired in 1833 with the publication of Friedrich Richter ' streatise on the Last Things which, inter alia, questioned the ade-quacy of Christian eschatology from the perspective of absoluteknowledge afforded by Hegelianism . Richter also pointed out thatthe bliss provided by Hegelianism was purely speculative and hadnothing to do with the real world of men . Nevertheless, he insistedthat if the transfiguration of reality was meaningful to the intellectof philosophers, there was no reason in principle why it could notbe meaningful to the rest of mankind as well .°°

Once the secret was out, a whole new set of problems arose,particularly for men who were dissatisfied with reality, who con-sidered it " irrational." The theological debate, which wound itstortuous way through Strauss ' "proofs" that the Gospel was mythand Feuerbach ' s "proofs" that man was God, are simply continua-tions of what Richter began . New vistas, however, were opened bytwo men : Bruno Bauer and August von Cieszkowski. Indeed,Cieszkowski's small tract, the Prolegomena Zur Historiosophie, isconsidered "the crucial link between the theological problems ofthe early Hegelians and the political radicalism of thinkers such asHess and Marx." 70 Hegel's error, Cieszkowski said, was to believethat wisdom was only retrospective and absolute knowledge confinedto the past.' Cieszkowski countered that if Hegel could bring Kant' sthree absolutes of God, freedom and immortality within the purview

88 Lobkowicz, p. 185.89 Lobkowicz's study of Richter is based upon J . Gebhardt, Politik and

Eschatologie : Studien zur Geschichte der Hegelschen Schule in den Jahren1830-1840 (Munich, 1963), pp . 71 if.

70 Lobkowicz, p . 202 ; cf. Avineri, pp. 124 ff.71 The alternative formulation, favored by Kojcve, is that history had ended.

Either way the implications are the same. Cf. Kojcve, pp . 194, 284 f, 288f.


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of his "science, " why not time as well? He answered by the con-struction of a view of universal history by means of a then currenttrichotomy of historical progression. There were, he said, three waysto know the future : by imagination, as with pre-Hegelian "seersand prophets, " by thought, as with Hegel, and by action which wasthe "direction, of the future . " The action involved was "post-theoreti-cal," it was the praxis of an absolute knower . "Man was now anaccomplice of the Absolute ; he could fulfill the aims of Providencesimply by acting according to reason, according to his ownreason . 7 72 Where Hegel transformed Kant 's absolute moral will intoabsolute thought, Cieszkowski succeeded in transforming absolutethought back into absolute will, only unlike Kant, he placed it notbeyond "theory" but rather had it absorb theory on the way by . Thiswas important for one reason : if Rosenkranz was genuine in hisfear that the generation of philosophers which followed Hegel weredestined to be merely "gravediggers and monument builders, " 73 itwas Cieszkowski 's great contribution to relieve the nervous anxietywhich the spectre of such occupations provoked in the young menwhose libido dominandi was equal to that of the master . For a mansuch as Bruno Bauer however, even Cieszkowski would not do . True,Cieszkowski differed with Hegel's view that the absolute knowerakin to Minerva 's Owl, but in his opinion that reality developedalongside knowledge, Cieszkowski ' s "post-theoretical practice" wasnot "critical ."

After having read Marx 's sarcastic comments in the GermanIdeology and The Holy Family, it is difficult to take Bauer ' s "criti-cism" very seriously . And yet, Bauer was simply a consistent He-gelian ; the only difference between him and Hegel was that forHegel the world was rational and hence to be justified while forBauer it was not and hence to be criticized. Bauer is comical onlybecause the world he critically annihilated remained untouched.But exactly the same was true of Hegel' s "justified" world. Tworoads and two roads only were possible as the consequences of"critical destruction " became apparent : either one could take theroad of Marx where criticism issued in political activity, or onecould remain faithful to criticism, secure in the knowledge that

72 Lobkowicz, p . 198."Karl Rosenkranz, Hegels Leben (Berlin, 1844), p . xix.

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criticism alone was the way to truth . But even Marx did not takehis final path immediately ; in the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy ofRight Marx is more realistic than Bauer only because he advocatespropaganda rather than an esoteric development of the truth, butthe premise, that the proper path lay in "criticism, " was not chal-lenged . 44 Even so, Marx was the first to suggest an answer for aproblem that had bothered him even in his dissertation : if absoluteknowledge is not actualized, then it can hardly be absolute and ifcriticism is necessary, then this fact is evidence that the critic 's knowl-edge is less than absolute . 75 Marx's answer is that "real" or "practi-cal" salvation may be attained in the deeds "of an extraphilosophicalhumanity, or a part of it, which meets the theory half-way . " 76 If, asMarx argued, salvation would come when humanity or its repre-sentative accepted "criticism" as its principle of action, then itsurely was possible to argue that such representatives had been des-tined for their salvific role by history in much the same way thathistory destined Hegel to achieve absolute knowledge.

In fact, it is upon the basis of Marx 's "knowledge" that theproletariat is the representative of mankind that his elaboratespeculation on alienation retains a degree of intelligibility . We beginwith the "knowledge" that the self-suppression of the proletariat asa separate class establishes a socialist society, a society in which eachman acts as the representative of mankind . In this sense, socialistsociety is simply a "goal," a Kantian "ought . " But Marx also saysthat proletarian self-suppression will be an Aufhebung of alienation,a "negation of a negation . " One can' t have it both ways ; if indeedhuman history is the laborious self-actualization of man 's species-being, then Aufhebung must follow Aufhebung to its dialectical in-finity, in which case socialist society must appear as an arbitraryand premature totalization. On the other hand, the Kantian"ought" is non-dialectical . The juxtaposition of dialectical and non-dialectical elements is resolved to Marx ' s satisfaction because he canconceive of the self-development of mankind as dialectical while the"knowledge " of the telos of this process ensures that any merelylogical inconsistencies can be dismissed as "abstract . " Thus whatappears to be the premature totalization of an open dialectic is,

74For example, Early Writings, p . 52."See Lobkowicz, pp . 239-247.76Lobkowicz, p . 276 .


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in reality, Marx says, the radical disjunction between "pre-history"

and "history." For socialist society, the past, and therefore all priorsocieties and the self-actualization that went on in them, in funda-mentally external . No wonder that when Marx spoke of "socialistman" he demanded everyone else keep silent ."

Marx 's "knowledge" is also the inspiration for his furious po-lemics against the other Left Hegelians, in particular against Bauerand Stirner . Against the first, his argument turns upon the relativeimportance of economics and politics ; against the second, the truthof Hegel's dialectical understanding of history and, as Lobkowiczargues, it is important to keep both fronts distinct . Thanks to En-gels' "Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy" which Marx readearly in 1844, "Marx discovered that the proletariat's role in thehistory of human emancipation might be described as due to thesocioeconomic nature of mankind's self-development- a discoverywhich obviously suggested that the philosopher 's role was far lesscentral than either he or his Left Hegelian colleagues had believed ." 78

It also suggested a new role for the critic and a new subject for hiscritique : through a critique of the reflection of reality in the disci-pline of political economy, Marx could seek to demonstrate thatthe very principles of political economy imply the Au fhebung ofthe world order they reflect. Once this truth, hidden in the abstrac -

tions of bourgeois political economy, is exposed to the proletariat,it will become conscious of its necessary task ." It is from this per-spective that Marx met Bauer's objection to mass action . He agreedthat all previous revolutions were failures, but added that this wasbecause the men who carried them out were not truly representativeof mankind . Thus, the premise of Bauer's critique was false, and hisformer friend was critically annihilated by showing that Left Hegel-ianism generally was simply a reflection of an already condemnedworld-order.

On the other front, Marx had to defend his position against the

77 Cf . Early Writings, pp. 165-166. Lobkowicz ; pp . 359-372.78 Lobkowicz, p . 375.79 Lobkowicz (p . 382) indicates that in a second volume he intends to show

that, when faced with the obvious fact that the bourgeoisie too could becomeconscious of Marx's "laws" and so " amend " them (p . 376), that is, that thereal problem, pauperization of the proletariat, could be contained, if not exactly" solved " by the incorporation of the trade unions into industrial society, newexplanations of the respite given to the bourgeoisie had to be concocted .

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attack upon the entire Hegelian enterprise launched by "Stirner ' sodd book, The Ego and Its Own ." S0 If we look upon the Hegeliansuccession as a story of every-increasing profanation, from Hegel'soriginal reduction of the world-transcendent God to a world-im-manent Geist, to the reduction of Christ by Strauss from the axis ofworld history to a mythical symbol of the species divinity of man-kind, to Feuerbach's transformation of God likewise into the divinespecies and finally to the reduction of the divine humanity by Hessand Marx to society, then "Stirner seems to have taken the nextlogical step, and to have reduced everything from God, throughMankind to Society, to the bare individual that each of us is ." 81

For Stirner, everything from Hegel ' s Geist to Marx's communismwas simply an "ideal" to be consumed by the insatiable individualwhich alone retained reality . Such an objection had to be met . Stir-ner had gone too far in his eclipse of reality, for if everything weresimply a divertissement for an aggressive self, there was no point inlaboring to achieve socialism . Prior to the German Ideology, whichLobkowicz suggests was aimed primarily at Stirner, SZ Marx hadnever thought it necessary to argue why socialism was desirable;the problem was always posed in terms of showing how socialismwas the "correct" consequence of Hegelianism . Stirner's attack onHegelianism in all its forms meant that the only reply that Marxcould make was to argue that the role of the proletariat was notan " ideal," and that his condemnation of the present world orderwas simply a reflection of the laws of history, while everybody else'swas a reflection of the existing world-order . The answer to thefirst problem was his notion of "historical materialism " ; the answerto the second was his notion of "ideology . "

8OLobkowicz, p . 391.81 Lobkowicz, " Karl Marx and Max Stirner, " in F . J . Adelmann, S . J ., ed.,

Demythologizing Marxism, Boston College Studies in Philosophy, Vol . II(Chestnut Hill and the Hague, 1969), p . 75.

82His argument is inherently plausible : Marx and Engels both had moreinteresting things on their minds than a return to what Engels called " thistheoretical twaddle . " After the publication of The Holy Family, there wouldseem to be no reason critically to destroy "Bauer and Company" all over again.But the publication of Stirner ' s book after The Holy Family demanded, if nota public reply, then at least a private refutation, as indeed Marx called TheGerman Ideology some years later, "Preface to The Critique of PoliticalEconomy," in Selected Works, p . 184 . Lobkowicz, Theory and Practice, pp.403 ff ; cf . E. Voegelin, " The Eclipse of Reality" in Natanson, ed ., op . cit.,pp . 188-89 .


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This was surely an ingenious answer to Stirner, but it containsa fundamental ambiguity. Marx claimed, early in the text of theGerman Ideology, that the premises from which he began were notdogmatic but "real . " Consequently, "these premises can be verifiedin a purely empirical way . " 83 If Marx is, as he claimed, simplydescribing reality, then what he is describing as "history" is, ab initio,"revolutionary." There is no need for "ideals" because reality isalready revolutionary ; but this is surely as unsatisfactory as Hegel' sclaim that reality was "rational . " On the other hand, if there is atruly revolutionary practice which is not simply what happensanyhow, there must also be an " ideal" in precisely the sense thatStirner criticized . Lobkowicz summarizes this "hopeless" ambiguity:"if ideas formed in the human mind are `materially prescribed, '

nothing but the expression of objective necessities, then there is noneed to urge people to be `practical, ' to act. On the other hand, ifthere really is a `point ' in purposefully revolutionizing the existingworld, if it matters whether people `practically attack the changegiven things'-that is, freely decide to do it rather than do it underthe pressure of existing circumstances-then undoubtedly there mustexist ideals which are more than only a reflection of circumstancesthemselves . " S4 Again, one cannot have it both ways : communismcannot both be necessary and be the object of deliberation andaction . Either Stirner is right, and Marx is a strict determinist orStirner is wrong, and Marx's attempt to translate his ideal of com-munism into a historical necessity is self-contradictory.

Lobkowicz 's narrative concludes with this brief discussion of thegenesis of "historical materialism," and we must await a morethorough analysis of the concept in a subsequent volume . 86 As itstands, Theory and Practice is clearly a major contribution to Marx

83 German Ideology, p . 31.84Lobkowicz, p . 422 . This objection to the dilemma of " revolutionary praxis"

is not, it should be noted, a criticism of Marx ' s theory about practice . Indeed,there is a good deal of truth in Marx' s observation that because of the con-tingencies of one ' s situation, history, in the sense of "what men do," dependsupon the conscious, rational intentions of men, but this same contingency cansubvert their intentions and provide men with consequences quite antithetical towhat they sought . Thus, for example, there is nothing but an obvious empiricaltruth in the observation that "circumstances make men just as much as menmake circumstances . " The German Ideology, p . 51 . Cf . Lobkowicz, pp . 415,417, 426.

85 Lobkowicz, pp . 408-409, 426 .

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research, and one hesitates indeed to offer even a mild disclaimer toan intellectual edifice of such imposing significance . Nevertheless, afew critical observations are demanded . A relatively minor point isthe question of what it takes to be a Left or Young Hegelian. Atone point, only Bauer is, "properly speaking, " a Left Hegelian andyet, "between 1839 and 1843 they all [i .e., Bauer, Hess and Ruge]were occupied with the same problem : what it meant to translateabsolute theory into practice ." 80 The only unique characteristic aboutBauer is that he managed to attain a university post 87 More seriousperhaps than the question of who is and who is not a Young He-gelian, is a metaphysical problem which, given the stated purposeof the book, need not be raised but which, if raised by a meta-physician of Lobkowicz 's stature, should be thoroughly explored . Anearlier reviewer described Lobkowicz 's metaphysics as "Thomist" inthe perjorative sense of the term ; 8$ there is some justice in the identi-fication, one suspects, but little in the innuendo. The problem is ofmetaphysical significance because Marx and, more importantly,Hegel denied the reality of human nature while, at least in theexample of Hegel, upholding the reality of metaphysics, specificallya metaphysics of self-actualization which does not necessarily dissolveinto a mystical gnosticism and alchemy 8 9 A consideration of ameontological metaphysics of selfhood might provide a more ade-quate analysis of what has been called "authentic existence " which,in the context of alienation, may be the significance of the "humanpotentiality" which alienation reveals. 90 A final comment concernsLobkowicz 's criticism of Hannah Arendt 's view of Marx. Arendtargued that Marx 's paradoxical view, that labor is both what con-stitutes man as man and that which will be abolished with the con-

B°Lobkowicz, p . 215.s ''Lobkowicz, p . 239 . I might add, in passing, that a recent study by William

J. Brazil], The Young Hegelians (New Haven, 1970), places the religiousquestion as the central concern of the Young Hegelians . This principle of selec-tion, despite its justification, has the unfortunate consequence of excludingMarx, Engels and even Hess.

"George Lichtheim, New York Review of Books (11 April 1968), p . 27."Cf. Fackenheim, op. cit ., and also his study of Hegel, The Religious Dimen-

sion in Hegel ' s Thought (Bloomington, Ind ., 1967).so Cf . Lobkowicz, p . 315 . This is not to say that Lobkowicz's treatment of

alienation as developed by Marx is deficient but only to suggest that beneathMarx' s deficient symbolism, logical inconsistency and so on there may be ametaphysical and not just a psychological thesis .


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summation of history, is the result of a failure to distinguish betweenthe truly different activities of labor (Arbeit) and work (Her-stellen) . 91 Lobkowicz comments that Marx is not confused : "Whathe wants to say is in fact quite simple : the labor of our body canachieve so radical a transformation of man and his world that itceases to be a burden and becomes a full expression of man's free-dom . `Labor is man's coming-to-be for himself within alienation oras alienated man ' ; it transforms man 's condition to the extent thateventually man will no longer have to labor in order to satisfy hisneeds . As far as I can see, Marx never intimated how this mighthappen . But one has only to imagine that one day man will producemachines which service and even reproduce themselves to acknowl-edge that this idea is far from being wildly Utopian . " 92 It is notat all clear that Arendt 's objection and her argument are met byLobkowicz ' s observation : while machines can surely ease the painof labor, it is by no means clear that they can satisfy biologicalneeds . Moreover, Arendt's understanding of the significance ofman 's world and its relationship to the stability of man 's workswhich constitute his world makes it more than dubious that theworld is a "burden," or that freedom could ever be the consequenceof a "world" no longer a "burden . " Indeed it may well be thevery threat of a "worldless " activity of painless labor, perhaps tend-ing the machines that reproduce themselves, that Arendt finds dis-quieting . What is "wildly Utopian" is the notion " that eventuallyman will no longer have to labor in order to satisfy his needs " be-cause labor is precisely the activity which satisfies needs . Lobkowicz' scomments, and the readiness to blur the distinction between laborand work, 93 are particularly surprising in the light of his own verycareful initial distinctions . 94

IV

Of the three books under review, Lobkowicz ' s is clearly the best.He substantiates with sound philosophical and theological argumentthe cruder, psychologically based opinions of Tucker . Moreover, he

91 H . Arendt. The Human Condition (Chicago, 1958), pp . 104-105."Lobkowicz, p . 348 ; the quotation is from Marx' s Early Writings, p . 203."Cf . Lobkowicz, pp . 333, 334, 338, 342.94 Cf . Lobkowicz, pp . 3-15 .

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hints, on the final page, that despite its dubious origins, there may besome insight in Marx's idea of praxis . With the argument and analy-sis of Avineri before us, it would be difficult to think otherwise . Butthis faces us with a new problem : How to account for the twoMarxes, the historian-social scientist and the gnostic prophet? Wecan do no more than give a brief suggestion.

Beneath Marx's cure for the condition of his age may be detecteda genuine diagnostic insight . But the whole problem of understand-ing Marx lies in the gap between diagnosis and therapy and thedialectic which spans it . A contrast with Platonic therapeia may beinstructive, for Plato, as Marx, found his social order perverse.Plato 's diagnosis was that his fellow citizens loved the wrong thingsor, what was the same thing, that they were ignorant "in the soul"as to what they truly loved, namely the good . What is required then,is a mestatrophe, a "conversion" whereby the entire soul is turnedaround. Such is the task of the educative regimen, paideusis, spelledout in Book VII of The Republic . Two things distinguish Platonic"revolutionary" paideia from Marx 's revolutionary praxis . The firstis that the philosopher is representative because he can "measure"the goodness of the desires of the polis . He can do so because hedesires the highest good, because the god is the measure of thephilosopher ' s psyche. 96 The Platonic teaching suggests that the inter-locutor, that is, Socrates, will first of all have ordered his own psychein conformity with the divine measure . The physician must heal him-self before he is fit to "cure" a "sick" polls . The instrument fortherapeutic conversion is, of course, dialectic, rational discussion . Incontrast, Marx prevents rational discussion from ever arising. Thecondition for even speaking about "man" is the acceptance of theby no means obvious proposition that "man is directly a naturalbeing." 96 We noted above, in connection with Avineri's exegesisof Marx's notions of "nature," that there was a profound equivo-cation in his use of the word . Moreover, Marx explains that if manwere not directly a natural being he would owe his being to some-thing else and therefore would not truly be anything at all . This istrue, of course, only if the premise is true . But Marx never defendsthe premise . Moreover, in a context which is surely parallel to the

95 Theatetus, 152a ff ; Republic, 501b, 589d ; Laws, 716c ff.9 "Early Writings, p . 206 .


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origin of philosophical speculation on the arche of human being,Marx explicitly refuses to answer questions and to undertake arational defense of his opinions. 97 Marx's refusal to argue is comple-mented by a lack of moderation . For Marx, man is his own "mea-sure" which means there is no measure ; in plain words, Marxrefuses the conditio humana . This refusal leads to a second com-ment . The philosopher does not "know," for as Socrates explainedto Phaedrus, only the god can be said to know . In contrast, manmay fairly be said to be a lover and not a professor of knowledge . 98

As an experiential corollary, the philosopher is also a lover of thegood. The contrast made by Marx with a philosophic understandingof representative human existence has been pointed out oftenenough. Marx 's Promethean "madness" is simply a corollary of thelust to possess "actual knowledge" that he inherited from Hegel . Butsince, in reality, the gods are still the gods and men are men, thenon-recognition of humanity and the speculative transfiguration ofmen into gods can only become an additional source of irrationalityand disorder.

At the beginning of this review, we noted the existence of twotypical non-ideological interpretations of Marx . In the light of hisown badly deformed self-understanding, Marx ' s scientific diagnosismay appear purely fortuitous . Yet, the pragmatic success of Marx 'steaching, even if vulgarized into a mass creed, suggests that therelationship may be more complex. Contemporary formulations ofthe psychopathology of schizophrenia may be suggestive . Phenomeno-logical accounts of schizoid existence reveal the coexistence of a" true" and a " false," an "imaginary " and a "real" self, 99 and some-thing similar obtains in the existence of thinkers such as Hegel ' °°

and Marx . A comprehensive analysis of Marx requires that the" true" and the "real" elements of his writings, which are both genu-ine symptoms of bourgeois political disorder and genuine analysesof the sources of bourgeois disorder, be carefully untangled from the

"Early Writings, pp . 165-167."Phaedrus, 278d.99 The true-false distinction is from R . D. Laing, The Divided Self (Balti-

more, 1966) ; the real-imaginary distinction is from J.-P. Sartre, L ' Imaginaire:Psychologie phenomenologique de l'imagination (Paris, 1940).

'°°Such a study of Hegel recently appeared by Eric Voegelin, "Hegel-AStudy in Sorcery," Studium Generale, 25 (1971), 335-368 .

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"false" and "imaginary" elements which, as the substance of a politi-cal movement, are so intimately linked to the bourgeois pathologyMarxism pretends to oppose. Such a treatment may expect modestenough pragmatic consequences given present political realities ; per-haps it can contribute to a restoration of political science, which mayindeed be Plato ' s therapeia .

BARRY COOPER

York University

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