Marx: A Guide for the Perplexed (Guides for the Perplexed) PDF
Preview Marx: A Guide for the Perplexed (Guides for the Perplexed)
MARX: A GUIDE FOR THE PERPLEXED Continuum Guides for the Perplexed Continuum’s Guides for the Perplexed are clear, concise and accessible introductions to thinkers, writers and subjects that students and readers can fi nd especially challenging. Concentrating specifi cally on what it is that makes the subject diffi cult to grasp, these books explain and explore key themes and ideas, guiding the reader towards a thorough understanding of demanding material. Guides for the Perplexed available from Continuum: Adorno: A Guide for the Perplexed, Alex Thomson Arendt: A Guide for the Perplexed, Karin Fry Aristotle: A Guide for the Perplexed, John Vella Augustine: A Guide for the Perplexed, James Wetzel Bentham: A Guide for the Perplexed, Philip Schofi eld Berkeley: A Guide for the Perplexed, Talia Bettcher Deleuze: A Guide for the Perplexed, Claire Colebrook Derrida: A Guide for the Perplexed, Julian Wolfreys Descartes: A Guide for the Perplexed, Justin Skirry The Empiricists: A Guide for the Perplexed, Laurence Carlin Existentialism: A Guide for the Perplexed, Stephen Earnshaw Freud: A Guide for the Perplexed, Celine Surprenant Gadamer: A Guide for the Perplexed, Chris Lawn Habermas: A Guide for the Perplexed, Lasse Thomassen Hegel: A Guide for the Perplexed, David James Heidegger: A Guide for the Perplexed, David Cerbone Hobbes: A Guide for the Perplexed, Stephen J. Finn Hume: A Guide for the Perplexed, Angela Coventry Husserl: A Guide for the Perplexed, Matheson Russell Kant: A Guide for the Perplexed, T. K. Seung Kierkegaard: A Guide for the Perplexed, Clare Carlisle Leibniz: A Guide for the Perplexed, Franklin Perkins Levinas: A Guide for the Perplexed, B. C. Hutchens Locke: A Guide for the Perplexed, Patricia Sheridan Merleau-Ponty: A Guide for the Perplexed, Eric Matthews Nietzsche: A Guide for the Perplexed, R. Kevin Hill Plato: A Guide for the Perplexed, Gerald A. Press Pragmatism: A Guide for the Perplexed, Robert B. Talisse and Scott F. Aikin Quine: A Guide for the Perplexed, Gary Kemp Relativism: A Guide for the Perplexed, Timothy Mosteller Ricoeur: A Guide for the Perplexed, David Pellauer Rousseau: A Guide for the Perplexed, Matthew Simpson Sartre: A Guide for the Perplexed, Gary Cox Schopenhauer: A Guide for the Perplexed, R. Raj Singh Socrates: A Guide for the Perplexed, Sara Ahbel-Rappe Spinoza: A Guide for the Perplexed, Charles Jarrett The Stoics: A Guide for the Perplexed, M. Andrew Holowchak Utilitarianism: A Guide for the Perplexed, Krister Bykvist MARX: A GUIDE FOR THE PERPLEXED JOHN SEED Continuum International Publishing Group The Tower Building 80 Maiden Lane 11 York Road Suite 704 London SE1 7NX New York, NY 10038 www.continuumbooks.com © John Seed, 2010 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: 978-0-8264-9334-7 PB: 978-0-8264-9335-4 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Seed, John, 1950– Marx : a guide for the perplexed / John Seed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. ). ISBN 978-0-8264-9334-7 -- ISBN 978-0-8264-9335-4 1. Marx, Karl, 1818–1883. I. Title. B3305.M74S44 2010 335.4092--dc22 2010004491 Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India Printed and bound in Great Britain by the MPG Books Group CONTENTS Abbreviations vii 1 Introduction: Reading Marx 1 2 Politics: The 1848 Revolutions 15 3 Materialist Histories 44 4 Political Economy and the History of Capitalism 73 5 The Politics of Labour 103 6 Reform and Revolution 126 7 Conclusion: After Capitalism 159 Notes 171 Further Reading 179 Select Bibliography 184 Index 189 v This page intentionally left blank ABBREVIATIONS MECW Collected Works of Marx and Engels, 50 Vols, London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1975–2000 1971 Marx and Engels. Articles on Britain, Moscow: Progess Publishers, 1971 1973a Revolutions of 1848, Political Writings. Vol. 1, ed. D. Fernbach, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973 1973b Surveys from Exile, Political Writings. Vol. 2, ed. D. Fernbach, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973 1973c Grundrisse. Foundations of the Critique of Political Economy (Rough Draft), trans. M. Nicolaus, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973 1974 The First International and After, Political Writings. Vol. 3, ed. D. Fernbach, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974 1975a Early Writings, introduced by Lucio Colletti, trans R. Livingstone and G. Benton, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1975 1975b Marx and Engels Selected Correspondence, ed. S. W. Ryazanskaya, trans. I. Lasker, 3rd edition, Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975 1976 Capital. A Critique of Political Economy. Vol. 1, intro. E. Mandel, trans. B. Fowkes, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976 vii ABBREVIATIONS 1978 Capital. A Critique of Political Economy. Vol. 2, intro. E. Mandel, trans. D. Fernbach, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1978 1981 Capital. A Critique of Political Economy. Vol. 3, intro. E. Mandel, trans. D. Fernbach, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981 2002 The Communist Manifesto, intro. G. Stedman Jones, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2002 2007 Dispatches from the New York Tribune: Selected Journal- ism of Karl Marx, ed. J. Ledbetter, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2007 2009 Friedrich Engels, The Condition of the Working Class in England, ed. V. Kiernan, intro. T. Hunt, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2009 viii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION: READING MARX All social life is essentially practical. All mysteries which lead the- ory to mysticism find their rational solution in human practice and in the comprehension of that practice. (1975b: 423) Is there any nineteenth-century face as familiar as that of the bearded revolutionary sternly looking out of a Victorian London day and into the future from which we look back? By any scale of measurement, Karl Marx has been one of the most important intel- lectual figures of recent centuries, stimulating arguments across almost every intellectual discipline in every major language. Darwin and Freud are two other figures who have had a not dissimilar kind of impact. But neither of them was the inspiration for political movements which were to transform large parts of the globe in the twentieth century and to create states which proclaimed their com- mitment to his principles. But this is where the problems begin. This is not a book about twentieth-century European politics or about the varieties of twen- tieth-century Marxism or about the Soviet Union. But it is imposs- ible to read Marx without confronting a terrible and unfinished history. Any approach to Marx has to take some measure of his complex relations with Marxism, or rather, Marxism’s relationship to Marx. Everyone knows his prescient quip: ‘Ce qu’il y a de certain c’est que moi, je ne suis pas Marxiste.’1 THE RUINS OF MARXISM For much of the twentieth century the names ‘Marx’ or ‘Marxism’ immediately evoked the Soviet Union. The Russian 1
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