Contenu du sommaire : Communisme ?

Marx and Communism. Marx was always extremely reluctant to offer a positive description of a communist society. Communism, for Marx, is neither an ideal nor a utopia. This does not mean that communism is an immanent process through which capitalism is to abolish itself, in a quasi-automatic manner. Capitalism sows the seeds of a communist society. However these seeds cannot grow spontaneously. This is because capitalism simultaneously generates obstacles to their full development. Clearly, the idea of communism has no meaning for Marx apart from an action that is consciously and voluntarily opposed to these impediments. Communism is thus a dynamic which already exist. Its only existence is however through the praxis of those who actually struggle for the flourishing of a higher form of life.

Rosa Luxemburg and Communism. There are four topics in Rosa Luxemburg's writings which are of particular importance from the perspective of a refoundation of communism in the 21th century : internationalism, an “open” conception of history, the importance of democracy in the revolutionary process, and the interest in the “pre-modern” communist traditions. This last aspect of Luxemburg's thinking is less well known. By confronting the industrial capitalist civilization with the communitarian past of humanity, Rosa Luxemburg broke with linear evolutionism, positivism, social-darwinism and with all the interpretations of Marxism which tend to reduce it to an advanced version of the philosophy of inevitable progress. The issue, in these texts, is, in the last analysis, the very meaning of the Marxist conception of history.

Some Occasional Remarks on Communism. The following preparatory notes are offered as a reaction to a somewhat surprising event : the renewed interest in « communism » and its symbolism. These remarks seek to define the conditions for a genuine debate, one that will avoid confusions and impostures. “Who are the communists ?” in a given political conjuncture. That is a question which, today, in the framework of a global capitalist crisis, must be given primacy over the question “what is communism ?” We must remind ourselves, furthermore, that this was already the case in the Communist Manifesto. A genealogy must nevertheless be attempted, if we are to trace back Marxian communism to its multifold (Western) background. To conclude, these remarks offer a diagnosis of the theoretical aporias in Marx, which are also the conditions for a critical incorporation of his theory within new emancipatory projects.

Is it possible to be Communist Without Marx ? It is evident that when Marxist communism achieved its actual realization the State became omnipotent and the Public falsified the Common. Do struggles for communism therefore have to start by eliminating Marx's thought ? The answer is no. Communism needs Marx in order to root itself within Common praxis. Contrary to what a few contemporary philosophers think, without historical ontology there is no communism. Without a logic of production, the communist struggle cannot become an “event”.

The Common that is Least Common. It is not a mere accident if the notion of The Common designates both what is shared by several and something which is banal or trivial. Nothing is more shared than that which is most ordinary. The consequence is that the representations of a « Communism » -even if we leave aside the reference to the various regimes which appropriated the idea of « communism »- are so easily charged with the mistrust which is addressed to the idea of levelling, and with the accusation of seeking to liquidate distinction and superiority. What is collective is accused of stifling originality. « Real » communisms did nothing to try to project a different image. However the communist idea need involve nothing that is « common ». On the contrary. It should open upon the denunciation of the vulgarity of individualism.

The Return of the Political Economy. If value, as the abstraction of use value, as real abstraction, is at the very beginning of conceptual thought, it implies an idealistic representation of society. Hegel's logic is not however that of Marx's Capital. It is rather a mystifying expression of the real inversion, between man and thing, of a subjectivity that is immerged in a substantial totality and which is to be understood in materialistic terms : Spirit is a substance that subsists only through the activity of the subjects engaged in it. Such is the process of capital. Communism emerges only through its failures to actualize itself fully. This is the starting point for a consideration of material labor and rent.

Communism or Radical Democracy ? It is the very idea of Communism that is to be questioned, insofar as it implies an anti-political view of society whereby all antagonisms would eventually be ruled out, and in which domination, the State, and all the other regulating institutions would be deprived of any relevance. Clearly, social divisions and antagonisms are socially constitutive. They demand or aspire to hegemonic order. In consequence, the substance of emancipation does not consist in reconciliation but in a radical democracy, in the extension of democratic struggle to ever larger social fields.

Communism Between Philosophy, Prophecy and Theory. Communism opposes both Liberalism, which articulates the standpoint of capitalist property, and Socialism, taken as the model of those who incarnate « managerial competence”. So far as Marxism is concerned, it conveys the ambiguous design of a Communism understood in terms of Socialism. In this sense, Marxian discourse does entail a certain relation with « real socialism », and also with Western socialisms. The discredit which has fallen upon the latter would appear to be an invitation to take up the banner of Communism or of the “Common” as an alternative to the (socialist) alternative. The approaches of Badiou, Rancière and Negri are here reconsidered in the light of a « metastructural » problematic.

Marx's Eurocentrism : Postcolonial Studies and Marx Scholarship. This article takes as its starting-point the fourfold concept of Eurocentrism developed in postcolonial studies and global history. Against this backdrop, it traces the treatment of non-Western societies throughout Marx's work. His 1853 articles on India are shown to be Eurocentric in every respect. They are partly based on a travel narrative written by François Bernier. Bernier's text is analyzed in some detail as one of Marx's sources. Marx's treatment of the 1857-59 Indian rebellions also displays Eurocentric traits. However his writings on British colonialism in Ireland begin to break with the Eurocentric mould. The Marxian critique of political economy is, in contrast, saturated with Orientalist motifs. The late work is however quite different in this respect. Both in the excerpts from his readings from 1879 on and in his discussions with the Russian Social Revolutionaries, it is evident that Marx breaks with Eurocentrism. The development of Marx's thought thus shows that the somewhat hasty dismissal which he is frequently subjected to in postcolonial studies is, in many cases, inadequately thought out. The fact remains however that Marxists striving to apprehend global capitalism, historical progress and contingent development have something to learn from postcolonial studies.

On Marx et Marxisms. In response to the questions addressed by Jacques Bidet and Bruno Tinel, Gérard Duménil, Michael Löwy and Emmanuel Renault here outline the approach they adopted in their two recently published books on Marx, (Lire Marx, “Reading Marx”, PUF, 2009) and on Marxisms (Les 100 mots du marxismes, “The 100 Words of Marxism”, PUF, 2009). The questions raised here mainly hinge on the articulation between the political, the philosophical and the economic dimension of Marx's writings, and the way these can be mobilised within contemporary debates.

The Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School and the 68 Movement : a Difficult Relationship The article examines the relationship between the critical social theory of the Frankfurt School and the student and youth movement of the Sixties. In the course of the decade, it was precisely the young radicals who rediscovered the body of critical theory of the decade of the Thirties which had fallen into total oblivion, even for the leader of the Frankfurt School, Max Horkheimer. Many of the key issues of the 68 movement have a strong connection with the theories developed by Horkheimer, Adorno and Marcuse : the critique of the authoritarian personality, the critique of the consumer society and of the culture industry, the fight against sexual repression and for a new kind of liberation, one which is both collective and individual. The critical theory of the Frankfurt School would thus seem to be the only philosophical perspective to emerge from within Marxism and to have developed a theoretical analysis of the new dimensions of conflict and of the new forms of subjectivity which emerged through the 68 movement.

On the Paths of Anger : The Space-Time of a Revolt, Athens, December 2008. The aim of the article is to throw some light on a particular form of political conflict, one which has till now has been little explored in theoretical terms : insurrectional collective action. While the article is an examination of the « events of the Greek December », taking these events to be a typical expression of this sporadic mode of collective action, its primary task is a conceptual one. Events of a similar nature are often interpreted as cases of rioting. Having first defined the notion of the « riot », the article then goes on to argue that the “Greek December” was not a “routine” riot, that it constituted a specific and conflictual mode of engagement in politics : insurrectional collective action. The article argues that the distinctive and determining factor is to be located in the process of propagation of the acts of rioting over a spatial span going far beyond the initial flashpoint. The process of diffusion cannot be apprehended if we fail to take into consideration three dimensions of a conflictual politics, which till then had been neglected : the emotional, the spatial, and the temporal.

From Work to Ecology : A New Way for Socialism. The articulation between social and ecological questions connects, on the one hand, with the question of the ends of human work, insofar as it is an activity aimed at the production of goods and services which can satisfy needs and, on the other hand, with a conception of wealth going beyond the exclusive framework of commodity value that capitalism imposes. The article presents the current state of thought on a number of theoretical questions which are being debated within this perspective. It invites us to renew our connection with the critique of political economy whose starting-point is the analysis of commodity.

The Crises of the Economy-World and the Overcoming of Capitalism : From the 1970s to the New Century. The current crisis of neoliberalism can only be understood if we resituate it within the context of the historical dynamic of the capitalist mode of production. The precedent most often cited is that of the 1929 crash. There is however another comparison which is equally apposite, the comparison with the structural crisis of the 1970s. How are we to compare the economic factors which are involved here, the conditions which led to the crisis and their political consequences ? Can we argue that the current crisis is ushering in a new phase of capitalism, or that it is opening up a number of alternative paths ? These are some of the crucial issues addressed here by Gérard Duménil in the questions put to Immanuel Wallerstein.