From: Jurriaan Bendien (adsl675281@TISCALI.NL)
Date: Sun Dec 02 2007 - 05:58:00 EST
As far as I know, "Neo-Marxism" is a loose term to refer to various intellectual approaches (mostly post-WW2) which amend, modify or extend (orthodox or classical) Marxist theory, usually by including insights from other intellectual traditions. Examples would be the theories of the Frankfurt school, the "surplus approach" pioneered by Paul Baran, EO Wright's Marxist sociology or Althusser's structuralist Marxism. The presumption of the "neo-" stance is, that some aspects of Marxist orthodoxy are either inadequate or faulty, and therefore that some other theorems need to be added. The force of the "neo-" distinction therefore depends very much on how Marxist orthodoxy or classical Marxism is defined. For example, Lukacs defined Marxist orthodoxy exclusively in terms of adherence to Marx's own method, and not in terms of any particular Marxist doctrine or result. In that case, neo-Marxism would be defined as an approach which in some respects deviates from Marx's own method (if we can agree what it is). However, notions of "orthodox Marxism" and "classical Marxism" are themselves highly suspect (since Kautsky, Lenin, Trotsky, Luxemburg, Stalin, Gramsci and others also modified some of Marx's insights) and therefore what is "neo-" about neo-Marxism is a controversial matter. It presupposes that we can define the necessary and sufficient conditions that distinguish Marxism from all other approaches. Jurriaan
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