'Socialism and Marx Deserve Better'
TAYLOR, RICHARD K.
'Socialism and Marx Deserve Better' RICHARD K. TAYLOR Take the following test as a clue to your enjoyment of Michael Harrington's new book; if, like me, you score under five, your reaction will be...
...tax system, and the welfare state...
...Louis Althusser...
...Michael Oaekeshott...
...With socialism in such disrepute in the United States, one would hope that anything written by America's best-known socialist would be clear, persuasive, and inspiring for the general reader...
...In all of this, Harrington is always erudite, often insightful, sometimes eloquent...
...But he does this without any reference to Marxian politics and thus fails to allay the anxiety that Marx and Marxism are inherently undemocratic...
...Why, then, was I so frustrated in reading The Twilight of Capitalism...
...He calls Marx an "anti-economist," who did not hold the view that the economic base determines the political and cultural superstructure...
...Again and again (I counted twenty-eight times), he makes an incomplete argument, then says "this will not be developed until later" or "the full meaning will be apparent in the next chapter," thus taxing the reader to hold one just-begun argument in abeyance while plunging into several more...
...Simon and Schuster...
...Harrington's purpose is to show that the thought of Karl Marx, which, he says, has been mechanized and vulgarized by nearly all of Marx's ostensible followers, as well as by his enemies, is really a supple, open, and vital method of social analysis, uniquely relevant for our time...
...In addition to the problem of a convoluted writing style, Harrington does not make an entirely convincing case for Marx's contemporary relevance...
...But Michael Harrington claims to be writing for the "nonspecialist, general reader...
...Maximilien Rubel...
...if, like me, you score under five, your reaction will be somewhere between weariness and a slow burn...
...Niklas Luhman...
...He is active with the Movement for a New Society...
...10.95...
...If Galbraith had trouble, imagine the plight of the "nonspecialist, general reader...
...In the second half of The Twilight of Capitalism, Harrington deals with the contemporary scene and such issues as Federal housing policy, the oil crisis, the financial problems of New York City, the U.S...
...Nicos Poul-antzas...
...George Lukacs, and Jurgen Haber-mas...
...His argument is so intricate, with so many sidelines and trips to explore this or that author's thought, that it is extremely difficult to follow him...
...Rudolf Hilferding...
...Harold Rosenberg...
...E. J. Hobs-bawm...
...In a lengthy reexamination of key Marxian concepts like surplus value, capital, and wage labor, he claims that Marx, far from being a narrow economic determinist, was actually an "anti-economist" who saw society as an THE TWILIGHT OF CAPITALISM, by Michael Harrington...
...Claus Offe...
...Ronald Meek...
...His picture of Marx as a "spiritual materialist," for example, does not answer the age-old question of how purpose, values, "oughts," and "shoulds" can arise in a universe composed only of matter...
...446 pp...
...Both socialism and Marx deserve better...
...Finally, as with so much Marxist writing, Twilight criticizes contemporary capitalism without giving even a tentative picture of a- more humane, just alternative...
...He succeeds in fixing clearly in the reader's mind the danger of taking "vulgar" or "shoddy" Marxism for the real thing...
...He reserves seventy-seven pages of appendices and notes for the "more detailed elaboration" aimed especially at scholars...
...Since the only Marxist-seeming alternative most people know is the states that call themselves Marxist, readers are left with the impression that jumping out of the bourgeois pan may mean leaping into the totalitarian fire...
...Harrington traces how "vulgar Marxism" came into vogue, built somewhat on Marx's and Engels's own episodic oversimplifications, but much more fundamentally on the willingness of communist leaders to twist Marx's thought to their own purposes, on the unwillingness of European and American scholars to take the time and energy necessary to master the huge and complex Marxist canon, and on the self-serving distortions of bourgeois defenders of the capitalist status quo...
...Quite the contrary...
...The problem is not that Harrington refers to a plethora of obscure authors, but that he presents them in such a welter of opinion and counter-opinion that reading Twilight is like playing a highspeed game of academic intellectual tag...
...If that welter doesn't make the reader lose the way, then Harrington's penchant for pursuing fascinating intellectual byways certainly will...
...Hans Albert...
...Franz Borkenau...
...organic whole and was, in fact, a sort of "spiritual materialist...
...Yet he admits that Marx made precisely this claim (Marx was "careless," says Harrington) and in describing Marx's theories he continually refers to the economic as "dominant," "primary," and "determinant," leaving only "relative autonomy" to what he continues to call "the superstructure...
...My guess is that if you can identify more than five of the following names (just a few of the many authors who appear in the book), you will find reading The Twilight of Capitalism a rewarding experience: Roman Rosdol-sky...
...Martin Bronfenbrenner...
...Richard K. Taylor is the author of "Economics and The Gospel" and coauthor of ' 'Moving Toward a New Society...
...Unfortunately, in my judgment, Michael Harrington has written a book that will open few eyes to the contradictions of capitalism and will nudge few minds in the direction of socialism...
...Piero Sraffa...
...Marxists, scholars of Marxism, and social activists committed to Marxism may be fascinated by the ins and outs of the arguments of these theorists...
...Drawing on "authentic Marxism," Harrington argues fairly persuasively that the basic capitalist structure of American society necessarily favors the wealthy and fails to solve the problems of the poor...
...John Kenneth Galbraith says it is hard to review this book because Harrington has thought deeply about books that have never even entered Galbraith's consciousness...
...Max Horkheimer...
...Alexander Gershenkron...
...Even eminent scholars with no apparent axe to grind against Marx have, he notes, been "incredibly careless" about his meaning and have put forward absurdities in his name...
...He seeks to defend Marx's "openness" and calls Marx a "champion of human freedom...
...As a nonspecialist, general reader, 1 found The Twilight of Capitalism an often frustrating, sometimes maddening reading experience...
...This is not to say that there is nothing of value in the book...
Vol. 40 • September 1976 • No. 9
