Moralität and Sittlichkeit: Marx on moral justice reconsidered

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In what sense did Marx think that capitalism was ‘immoral’ or ‘unjust’? There are four responses: for Marx, 1) capitalism is morally deficient according to some external criterion; 2) capitalism is just, at least on its own terms; 3) capitalism is both just and unjust because the terms capitalism uses to defend itself as just simultaneously reveal its injustice; 4) capitalism is neither just nor unjust, for justice is an inadequate evaluative standpoint that should be overcome. Marx’s thinking cannot be fully captured by any one of these positions; he instead held all of them without contradiction. The crucial interpretive question is how they relate to each other. This article argues that while accepting that capitalism could be criticized externally, justified internally, and undermined by its self-justifications, Marx ultimately emphasized transcending the ‘act-based’ conception of morality and replacing the immanently contradictory capitalism with an alternative, ideal mode of human life.