On humanistic interpretation of Marx: Communism or narcissism?

Abstract

This article analyzes two most widespread approaches towards interpretation of the humanistic content of Marx’s doctrine, which have developed within the framework of Western Marxism in the 19550s – 1970s. The first approach – Marxist humanism – describes humanism as the “initial” form of Marx's doctrine of the early period. The second approach – theoretical antihumanism – views the concept of “humanism” as ideological, unscientific and incompatible with Marxism. The analysis of modern Russian and foreign bibliographies indicates the existing ambiguity in assessment of both, Western Marxism and humanistic content of the original ideas of Marx, which defines relevance of this research. The novelty lies in the proposal to view Marxist humanism and theoretical antihumanism in conjunction with the historical establishment of Marx's theory, rather than in contraposition to each other. The author suggest to forgo the interpretation of Marx’s ideas from the perspective of humanism or antihumanism. Such interpretation not only idealizes and mystifies the content of his works, but also creates a prerequisite for narcissistic view of the surrounding material objects and nature. The latter thought is reflected in undertaken at the margin of “Capital” Marx's criticism of the commodity fetishism as one of the central elements of the capitalist manner of production.