Marx, Karl (1818–1883) was a German philosopher, economist and
revolutionary of Jewish lineage whose work spawned Marxism as a stream of
thought. The key influences on his work were German philosophy, notably that
of Hegel, and English political economy, including the writings of Adam Smith.
Marx is most closely associated with an analysis of capitalism as a class-based
system of exploitation and the need to transcend it with an egalitarian
socialist/communist society. Marx argued in favour of a philosophy of historical
materialism that could grasp the historical specificity of human affairs in the
context of the material conditions of existence. Thus human consciousness and
culture were to be explained in the context of the primary influence of economic
and class structures.
Marxism can make a strong claim to being the most important theoretical
paradigm within cultural studies at the moment of its institutional foundation
though its pre-eminence has arguably been superseded by that of
poststructuralism. Cultural studies writers have had a long, ambiguous but
productive relationship with Marxism so that, while cultural studies is not a
Marxist domain per se, it has drawn succour from it while also subjecting it to
critique. Indeed, many of the leading figures associated with the ‘origins’ of
cultural studies – Williams, Thompson, Hall – all engaged with Marxism as an
economic, social, cultural and political theory of immense importance. Stuart
Hall, perhaps the most significant figure in contemporary cultural studies, still
makes claims to be ‘a Marxist’ though post-Marxism is perhaps a more prudent
designation.
As its name implies, Marxism is a body of thought derived from the work
of Karl Marx which dates from the mid-nineteenth century and stresses the
determining role of the material conditions of existence, the development and
dynamics of capitalism and the historical specificity of human affairs. The
central place of class conflict in Marxist theory and the promise of a classless
society supply Marxism with its claim to be an emancipatory philosophy of
social equality. Marxism is, above all, a form of historical materialism that
stresses the changeable character of social formations whose core features are
located in the material conditions of existence.
Marx argued that the first priority of human beings is the production of
their means of subsistence through labour power and the use of tools. Thus the
means of production (tools), and the relations of production constituted by the
social organization of labour, form a mode of production, which is a central
category of Marxism. The organization of a mode of production is not simply a
matter of coordinating objects, rather, it is inherently tied up with relations
between people which, while social, that is, cooperative and coordinated, are
also matters of power and conflict. Marxists regard social antagonisms, which
are an intrinsic part of a mode of production, as the motor of historical change.
Further, given the priority accorded to production, other aspects of human
relations, for example, consciousness, culture, and politics are said to be
structured by economic relations.
For Marxism, history is not a smooth evolutionary process but is marked
by significant breaks and discontinuities. Thus, Marx discusses the
transformations from an ancient mode of production to a feudal mode of
production and thence to the capitalist mode of production. Different forms of
material organization and different social relations characterize a mode of
production and each is superseded by another as internal contradictions,
particularly those of class conflict, lead to its transformation and replacement.
The centrepiece of Marx’s work was an analysis of the dynamics of
capitalism, a mode of production premised on the private ownership of the
means of production. The fundamental class division of capitalism is between
those who own the means of production, the bourgeoisie, and those who, being a
propertyless proletariat, must sell their labour to survive. The central driving
force of capitalism is the endless search for profit that is achieved through the
extraction of surplus value from the workforce. The realization of surplus value
in monetary form is achieved by the selling of goods as commodities. By
commodity fetishism Marx means that the surface appearance of goods sold in
the market place obscures the origins of those commodities in an exploitative
relationship. At the same time, the fact that workers are faced with the products
of their own labour that are now separated from them means that they are
alienated from the core human activity of labour and indeed from themselves.
Capitalism is a dynamic system whose profit-driven mechanisms lead to
the continual revolutionizing of the means of production and the forging of new
markets. Indeed, for Marx this was its great merit in relation to feudalism.
However, the mechanisms of capitalism also lead to perennial crises and
ultimately, or so Marx argued, to its superseding by socialism. Notably, Marx
hoped that capitalism would be rift asunder by class conflict with the
proletariat’s organizations of defence, trade unions and political parties,
overthrowing and replacing it with a mode of production based on communal
ownership, equitable distribution and ultimately the end of class division.
For Marxism, culture is a material force tied into the socially organized
production of the conditions of human existence and refers to the forms assumed
by social existence under determinate historical conditions. This idea is
expressed in the metaphor of the base and the superstructure wherein the cultural
superstructure is shaped or determined by the organization of the economic
mode of production. This is a form of cultural materialism. Amongst the
criticisms of Marxism to have emerged are:
The apparent teleology intrinsic to it, that is, the positing of an inevitable
point to which history is moving (that is, the demise of capitalism and the
arrival of a classless society).
The determinism and reductionism inherent in some readings of Marxism
by which culture is to be explained by reference to the workings of the
economy.
The apparent success of capitalism, not merely its survival but its
transformation and expansion.
The failure of proletarian revolutions to occur on a widespread scale and
to generate classless societies where they have transpired.
(Chris Barker, The SAGE Dictionary of Cultural Studies)
