Marx and Capitalism as Moral Tragedy

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My essay argues that Marx follows Hegel in adopting a tragic meta-ethics. This stands against interpretations of Marx that deny he made moral commitments and those which argue that he saw exploitation and alienation as immoral or unjust. Moral tragedy is the view that historical circumstances can justify two or more irreconcilable moral standpoints that conflict with one another. I detail Hegel’s tragic notion of morality inspired by Oresteia and Antigone and how it opposes the Enlightenment universalism of Kant. I show how Marx’s meta-ethics takes up this tragic framework through three examples: (1) between an ascetic ethos of efficiency and an ethos of consumption and luxury; (2) between political economists and ethicists; and (3) between capitalists and workers over the length of the workday. For Marx, socialist revolution resolves moral tragedies and makes a truly universal morality possible by resolving the historical contradictions that produce them.