The HIstory of the Left from Marx To Present

253 Pages·2007·6.52 MB·English

by  Darrow Schecter

There are many ways of presenting the history of the left from a theoretical
perspective. In this concise and cogent survey, Darrow Schecter starts
with Marx and moves on to examine the diverse struggles for human
emancipation that have characterised European and world history since
the French Revolution.
Each chapter in the book builds on the previous one, analysing the
emergence and development of a specifically left wing understanding of
the relation between knowledge, left politics, and emancipation. Schecter
explores the crucial question of how to institutionalise the relation between
humanity and nature in a free society of fully humanised individuals.
Including discussions of Marxism, the Frankfurt School, Critical Theory,
Anarchism, Surrealism, and Global Anti-Capitalism, The History of the Left
from Marx to the Present is a valuable tool for understanding the theories
that have helped shape our present-day political world.
★
Darrow Schecter is Reader in the School of Humanities, University Of
\ Sussex, and previously taught at the University of Oxford. He teaches .
various courses on political and critical theory and has written numerous
V
books, including Sovereign States or Political Communities? and Beyond
\ Hegemony: Towards a New Philosophy of Political Legitimacy.
/
0-8264-8758-0
ISBN 978-0-8264-8758-2
A
9 780826 487582
www.continuumbooks.com
continuum
THE HISTORY OF THE LEFT
FROM MARX TO THE PRESENT
THE HISTORY OF THE LEFT
FROM MARX TO THE PRESENT
THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES
Darrow Schecter
\
a
continuum
NEW YORK • LONDON
2007
The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc
80 Maiden Lane, New York, NY 10038
The Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd
The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX
www.continuumbooks.com
Copyright © 2007 Darrow Schecter
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the
publishers.
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Schecter, Darrow.
The History of the left from Marx to the present: theoretical
perspectives / Darrow Schecter.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-8264-2849-3 (hardcover: alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-8264-2849-5 (hardcover: alk. paper)
ISBN-13: 978-0-8264-8758-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-8264-8758-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Socialism-History. 2. Radicalism-History. 3. Right and left
(Political science)~History. I. Schecter, Darrow. II. Title.
HX39.S25 2007
320.53-dc22
2007012466
To Costantino and Manuela, and the future
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction xi
1. Marx 1
2. Western Marxism 31
3. The Frankfurt School and Critical Theory 71
4. Building Networks instead of Pyramids:
Syndicalism, Council Communism,
Libertarian Socialism and Anarchism 106
5. The Revolt against Conformism and the Critique of
Everyday Life: From Surrealism and Situationism
to 1968 and Beyond 142
6. Towards a New Form of Internationalism?
From the Critique of Everyday Life to
Global Anti-Capitalism 179
Conclusion 217
Bibliography 222
Index 234
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Over the past few years many people have facilitated the difficult task of
providing a systematic account of theoretical perspectives on the left
from Marx to the present. Many are or have been undergraduate, MA and
DPhil students at the University of Sussex, including Penny Adamson,
Leo Allen, Ned Birkin, Tim Black, Arianna Bove, Steve Brown, Nick Butler,
Jennifer Cooke, Joanna Dawson, Claire Edwards, Erik Empson, James
Furner, Ulrich Gelb, Catherine Hollis, Mark Hopkinson, Timo Juwellen,
Peter Kolarz, Burak Kose, Wil Kuo, Charles Masquelier, Teodor Mladenov,
Richard Mullin, Dave Murphy, Simon Mussell, Chris Okane, Jorge Ollero
Peran, Leena Petersen, Patricia Priestly, Luke Stevens and Sam Thomas. I'd
also very much like to thank all of the students who took my Method­
ological Approaches to the History of Ideas seminar in the autumn of
2006. Finally, very special thanks go to David Mieres.
Others include faculty at Sussex, such as Paul Betts, Peter Boxhall,
Andrew Chitty, Rafe Hallet, Kathryn Macvarish, William Outhwaite,
Roberta Piazza, Stephen Robinson, Neil Stammers, Daniel Steuer, Celine
Surprenant, Chris Warne, Richard Whatmore and Chris Wyatt. Academics
at other universities have also helped me a great deal. I'd like to thank Eric
Jacobson, Jeremy Lester, David McLellan, Drew Milne, Alan Norrie, and
especially Alex Thomson and Fabio Vighi. In writing this book, as others,
Chris Thornhill has made me challenge my assumptions, reread history and
rethink the relation between theory and practice.
The constant input of friends has been equally important. Many
thanks to Fernand Avila, Gary Barber, Valerio Chiessi, Costantino Ciervo,
Fine Ciervo, Jean Demerliac, Diana Gobel, Thorsten Gobel, Katharyn
Lanaro, Luca Lavatori, Manuela Linti, Volker Lorek, Mand Ryai'ra, Jarret
Schecter and Imke Schmincke.
ix
THE HISTORY OF THE LEFT FROM MARX TO THE PRESENT
It has been a pleasure to work with David Barker and Christina Garbutt at
Continuum, and I very much look forward to joint projects with them in
the future.
If thesis 11 remains the categorical imperative, the point is now how
the world is to be changed for the better. This study hopes to make a
small contribution to looking at the question anew. Although all the peo­
ple cited above have aided me a great deal, I bear full responsibility for
the exposition and conclusions drawn in the book. I'd be happy to be
wrong about everything if in the process it clarifies the way forward.
INTRODUCTION
The only real critique was and remains the critique of the left.
Why? Because it alone is based upon knowledge.'
In his wide-ranging and scholarly study Demanding the Impossible: A His­
tory of Anarchism, Peter Marshall accomplishes the impressive feat of pro­
viding an account of anarchist thought and action that dates back to
ancient Greece, moving through the Middle Ages and including valuable
information on the English Civil War and the role played in it by groups
such as the Levellers and Ranters. His study then proceeds right up to the
new left and ecological currents within the new left anarchism of the
1960s and 1970s.2
This book sets out to do something quite different. In addition to look­
ing at anarchism, it examines a range of other ideas and movements on
the left. The book begins much later than Marshall's study and concludes
with a look at contemporary movements against neoliberal globalised cap­
italism. Although it is a history, as the title suggests, it is for the most part
a history of theoretical perspectives. Major events such as the Paris Com­
mune, the Russian Revolution, the Spanish Civil War, May 1968, Seattle
1999, and the founding of the first World Social Forum in Porto Alegre in
January 2001 are all discussed in varying degrees of detail. But they are
usually analysed against the background of a series of theoretical argu­
ments that run from Karl Marx to Michel Foucault, Gilles Deleuze and
Antonio Negri. The quotation above from Henri Lefebvre offers a good
indication of the central theme addressed throughout the book, which is
the relation between knowledge, left politics and human emancipation.
In order to provide theoretical and analytical coherence to the study of
this theme, it has been necessary to bypass a number of important
episodes in the history of the left that other authors may well have con­
sidered essential. There is not a great deal about new social movements