A Review of Shlomo Avineri, "Karl Marx: Philosophy and Revolution” (Yale University Press, 2019)

Daniel Skidmore-Hess

doi:10.25148/crcp.9.1.009651

Abstract

A Review of Shlomo Avineri, "Karl Marx: Philosophy and Revolution” (Yale University Press, 2019)

Highlights

Avineri has returned to the subject of Marx on the request of the editors of the Yale University Press Jewish Lives series
The difficulty with Avineri’s approach to Marx has always been that it underestimates the salience of Marx’s shift from philosophical to revolutionary criticism as the touchstone of his life’s work and as succinctly stated in the 11th thesis on Feuerbach; "Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it." As this reviewer has emphasized in a recent CRCP article, Marx’s political commitment must be understood as consistently receiving his first priority whether it be his work as a newspaper editor in the years leading up to the revolutions of 1848 or his subsequent efforts on behalf of emerging socialist movements during his years of exile
While the shortcomings of Marx’s early work on alienation are beyond the scope of this review, it is worth noting that Avineri moves quickly from a single page of discussion of this “echo” to a much more extended discussion of Marx as advocate of a peaceful, parliamentary road to socialism; Marx as “nascent social democrat?,” is what is suggested in a sub-title

Summary

Introduction

The difficulty with Avineri’s approach to Marx has always been that it underestimates the salience of Marx’s shift from philosophical to revolutionary criticism as the touchstone of his life’s work and as succinctly stated in the 11th thesis on Feuerbach; "Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it." As this reviewer has emphasized in a recent CRCP article, Marx’s political commitment must be understood as consistently receiving his first priority whether it be his work as a newspaper editor in the years leading up to the revolutions of 1848 or his subsequent efforts on behalf of emerging socialist movements during his years of exile. A Review of Shlomo Avineri, "Karl Marx: Philosophy and Revolution” (Yale University Press, 2019)

Results

Conclusion