In Becoming Marxist Ted Stolze offers a series of studies that take up the importance of philosophy for the development of an open and critical Marxism. He argues that an adequate ‘philosophy for Marxism’ must be open to engagement with a diverse range of traditions, texts, and authors – from Paul of Tarsus, via Averroes, Spinoza, and Hobbes, to Althusser, Deleuze, Negri, Habermas, and Žižek. Stolze also explores such practical contemporary issues as the politics of self-emancipation, the nature of Islamophobia, and climate change.
“If you are curious and open to the life around you, if you are troubled as to why, how and by whom political power is held and used, if you sense there must be good intellectual reasons for your unease, if your curiosity and openness drive you toward wishing to act with others, to ‘do something,’ you already have much in common with the writers of the three essays in this book.” — Adrienne Rich With a preface by Adrienne Rich, Manifesto presents the radical vision of four famous young rebels: Marx and Engels’ Communist Manifesto, Rosa Luxemburg’s Reform or Revolution and Che Guevara’s Socialism and Humanity.
An accessible introduction to the author of Capital and coauthor of The Communist Manifesto, with a focus on his relevance in today’s world. Few thinkers have been declared irrelevant and out-of-date with such frequency as Karl Marx. Hardly a decade has gone by since his death in which establishment critics have not announced the death of his theory. And yet, despite their best efforts to bury him, Marx’s specter continues to haunt his detractors more than a century after his passing. As the boom and bust cycle of global capitalism continues to widen inequality around the world, a new generation is discovering that the problems Marx addressed in his time are remarkably similar to those of our own. In this engaging and accessible introduction, Alex Callinicos demonstrates that Marx’s ideas hold an enduring relevance for today’s activists fighting against poverty, oppression, environmental destruction, and the numerous other injustices of the capitalist system.
A primer on Democratic Socialism for those who are extremely skeptical of it. America is witnessing the rise of a new generation of socialist activists. More young people support socialism now than at any time since the labor movement of the 1920s. The Democratic Socialists of America, a big-tent leftist organization, has just surpassed 50,000 members nationwide. In the fall of 2018, one of the most influential congressmen in the Democratic Party lost a primary to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old socialist who had never held office before. But what does all this mean? Should we be worried about our country, or should we join the march toward our bright socialist future? In Why You Should Be a Socialist, Nathan J. Robinson will give readers a primer on twenty-first-century socialism: what it is, what it isn’t, and why everyone should want to be a part of this exciting new chapter of American politics. From the heyday of Occupy Wall Street through Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign and beyond, young progressives have been increasingly drawn to socialist ideas. However, the movement’s goals need to be defined more sharply before it can effect real change on a national scale. Likewise, liberals and conservatives will benefit from a deeper understanding of the true nature of this ideology, whether they agree with it or not. Robinson’s charming, accessible, and well-argued book will convince even the most skeptical readers of the merits of socialist thought.
In this classic exposition of Marxist thought, Raya Dunayevskaya, with clarity and great insight, traces the development and explains the essential features of Marx's analysis of history. Using as her point of departure the Industrial and French Revolutions, the European upheavals of 1848, the American Civil War, and the Paris Commune of 1871, Dunayevskaya shows how Marx, inspired by these events, adapted Hegel's philosophy to analyze the course of history as a dialectical process that moves "from practice to theory." The essence of Marx's philosophy, as Dunayevskaya points out, is the human struggle for freedom, which entails the gradual emergence of a proletarian revolutionary consciousness and the discovery through conflict of the means for realizing complete human freedom. But freedom for Marx meant freedom not only from capitalist economic exploitation but also from all political restraints. Continuing her historical analysis, Dunayevskaya reveals how completely Marx's original conception of freedom was perverted through its adaptations by Stalin in Russia and Mao in China, and the subsequent erection of totalitarian states. The exploitation of the masses persisted under these regimes in the form of a new "state capitalism." Yet despite the profound derailment of Marxist political philosophy in the twentieth century, Dunayevskaya points to developments such as the Hungarian revolt of 1956, and the Civil Rights struggles in the United States as signs that the indomitable quest for freedom on the part of the downtrodden cannot be forever repressed. The Hegelian dialectic of events propelled by the spirit of the masses thus moves on inexorably with the hope for the future achievement of political, economic, and social freedom and equality for all.
Two centuries after his birth, Karl Marx is read almost solely through the lens of Marxism, his works examined for how they fit into the doctrine that was developed from them after his death. With Marx’s Dream, Tom Rockmore offers a much-needed alternative view, distinguishing rigorously between Marx and Marxism. Rockmore breaks with the Marxist view of Marx in three key ways. First, he shows that the concern with the relation of theory to practice—reflected in Marx’s famous claim that philosophers only interpret the world, while the point is to change it—arose as early as Socrates, and has been central to philosophy in its best moments. Second, he seeks to free Marx from his unsolicited Marxist embrace in order to consider his theory on its own merits. And, crucially, Rockmore relies on the normal standards of philosophical debate, without the special pleading to which Marxist accounts too often resort. Marx’s failures as a thinker, Rockmore shows, lie less in his diagnosis of industrial capitalism’s problems than in the suggested remedies, which are often unsound. ? Only a philosopher of Rockmore’s stature could tackle a project this substantial, and the results are remarkable: a fresh Marx, unencumbered by doctrine and full of insights that remain salient today.
This international bestseller plumbs recently opened archives in the former Soviet bloc to reveal the accomplishments of communism around the world. The book is the first attempt to catalogue and analyse the crimes of communism over 70 years.
Modeled on THE NEW NIETZSCHE, this collection revitalizes the thought of Spinoza. These essays establish Spinoza's rightful role in the development and direction of contemporary continental philosophy. The volume should interest not only the growing group of scholars attracted to Spinoza's ideas on ethics, politics, and subjectivity, but also theorists in a variety of fields.
The collapse of communism was one of the most defining moments of the twentieth century. This Very Short Introduction examines the history behind the political, economic, and social structures of communism as an ideology.
