Marxism and Critical Theory

2019

Marxism and Critical Theory derive from a long and broad intellectual tradition that originated in the nineteenth century in the so-called “Hegelian Left” group in Berlin, which included the young student Karl Marx. This German philosopher has left us a rich theoretical- critical legacy that, from philosophy to political economy, sociology, history, psychoanalysis, etc., allows us to subject capitalist society to a substantive social critique with emancipatory interest. Nevertheless, it is in this critical spirit that the idea of this publication emerged as a special issue entitled Marxism and Critical Theory.

Educational Philosophy and Theory, 2021

Critical theory as a Post-Marxist discourse is a category of academic thought that broadly involves theoretical scholarship aimed at interrogating the structures and discourses of power. As such, i...

In this chapter I give an overview of “Post-Marxism.” Primary attention is paid to what should be considered the core of Post-Marxism in relation to Marxist and Non- Marxist critical theory, namely, its conception of the social. This shift is of importance for the overall post-Marxist philosophical vision of society, theory, and politics. Theorists discussed include Badiou, Honneth, Ranciere, Laclau/Mouffe, Foucault, Gorz, and Hardt/Negri.

Critical theory is a school of thought connected with the Institute for Social Research called the Frankfurt school (Institute fur Sozialforschung). The Institute was founded in Frankfurt, Germany in the year 1923, as the first Marxist oriented research and was directed by Carl Grunberg (Kellner n.d). His contribution to the institute was the establishment of an historical collection mainly oriented to the study of the labour movement also known as the Grünberg Archiv (Corradetti 2012). In 1930, Max Horkheimer became the Director of the Institute and continued with the Marxist revolution. Horkheimer explained the Institute’s goal was to be more directed towards an interdisciplinary integration of the social sciences (Abroment 2011).

Political Theory, 1974

Panel 1 - Critique of history and history of critique with Christian Garland, Harry Cross & Matt Bolton British Sociological Association (BSA), Durham University, 20th September 2017

Most individuals approach the ideas proposed by Marx in a very stagnant, robotic manner. This is a dangerous thing to do because the dynamic of our current day and age is not taken into consideration. Marx himself, on his deathbed in 1883, proclaimed that “I am not sure of many things in this life but the one thing I am sure of is that I am not a Marxist.” This shows that he wasn’t set in his ways but made space for new findings as they came along. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to briefly look at Marxism and fit it into the context of modernity. The first section will deal with a short description of Marx’s life and various works. His main ideas or propositions will be looked at with specific reference to the ones that are most popular today. The second section will deal with a criticism of Marxism and finally the conclusion will show if Marxism is even relevant in the 21st century at all.