Marx for our Times: Adventures and Misadventures of a Critique
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Price: $30.00
Sale: $17.95
Manufacturer: Verso
EAN (European Article Number): 9781859847121
Number of Items: 1
Binding: Hardcover
Author: Daniel Bensaid
Publisher: Verso
Dewey Decimal Number: 335.41
Publication Date: 2002-10
Reading Level: 392
Description: Without denying the contradictory character of Marx's thought, Daniel Bensad sets out to demonstrate that it was not a philosophy of the end of history, an empirical sociology of classes, or a positive science of economics positing an inexorable progress towards an ineluctable communism. Instead, Marx's 'critique of political economy' encompassed three great critiques of the scientific and political canons of its age - of historical reason, sociological rationality and scientific positivism - which make the thinker from the nineteenth century fully relevant to the twenty-first century of global capitalism. Indeed, we find here a 'post-postmodern Marx' able to inhabit a contemporary world replete with contingency, emergency and contradictory temporalities. Published in France on the eve of the strikes of 1995 that signalled a profound revolt against la pensee unique, Marx for Our Times is an invitation to rediscover our foremost contemporary, Karl Marx.
Customer Reviews
Review Summary: Reconnecting Marx with contemporary issues
Date: 2004-08-01
Details: "Marx for Our Times" by Daniel Bensaid is a scholarly and timely defense of Karl Marx, who remains the preeminent critic of capitalism. Mr. Bensaid leads us on an intellectually stimulating journey where we understand how Marx's thought is principally a "critical theory of social struggle" whose scientific methodology is replete with chaos theory and contingency. That the spectre of really non-existing socialism has allowed an unalloyed Marx to inspire a new generation of anti-globalization protesters and thinkers proves the durability and ongoing relevance of Marx's writings.
The book is divided into three sections. The first is on the topic of historical reason. Marx was opposed to capital's tendency to use its wealth to create systems characterized by domination and dependency. Marx offered a hopeful and alternative vision of how people might channel their material progress towards the liberation of human potential. Therefore, the historical determinism suggested in "The Communist Manifesto" is but one possible outcome that might result from class struggle. However, it is true that capital frequently shapes history through crises that are usually resolved by political struggle and occassionaly lead to revolutionary change.
The second section focuses on class struggle. Mr. Bensaid cites a number of theorists who have recently sought to wrap Marx into neoliberal market theory, where the invisible hand of the market might result in a just distribution of resources. The author responds to these critics by pointing out that Marx attempted to transcend the struggle between labor and capital (rather than settling for distributive justice, which was an emerging idea in Marx's lifetime). Marx believed that theories of justice and the critique of political economy were irreconcilable; equality would prove elusive as long as the working class was dedicated to producing the surplus value that sustained elitist privilege. Rather, Marx advocated a program of working-class empowerment where the people might administer their own affairs and thereby allow the state to wither away.
Section three discusses Marx's approach to the sciences. Mr. Bensaid writes that Marx and his contemporary Charles Darwin stressed instability, disequilibrium and tendential laws that represented a radical upheaval in the scientific thought of the day. In marked contrast with reductionist Newtonian science, Marx and Darwin reveled in chaos bound within systems that could be defined but whose outcomes were not always known. Understanding that quantity is a measure of qualitative processes, Marx criticized the economists of his day for their reductionism by only seeking to measure that which has already been inputed into the capitalist system; by ignoring so-called "externalities" such as ecological and human costs, Marx reminds us that the abstract measure of labor as money produces a system that is incapable of harmonizing humanity with nature. This insight in turn suggests, in the author's powerful concluding chapter, how an environmentally prophetic Marx could be essential to helping us secure a more humane, democratic and environmentally sustainable future.
In today's world where global market irrationalities are leading us towards disaster, Mr. Bensaid is to be commended for solidly reconnecting Marx with contemporary issues and providing insight into how we might do better.
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