On the Possibility of Marxist Ethics

Year 2018, Volume: 8 Issue: 1, 131 - 155, 21.07.2018

Buket Korkut Raptis

https://doi.org/10.18491/beytulhikme.446447

Abstract

Marx avoided elaborating
an ethical theory and criticized utopian socialism. Although Marx’s
attitude towards these two issues is discussed separately in the
literature, we will argue that they stem from the same ground in Marx.
It is Marx’s devotion to scientific socialism that grounds his
criticisms. We will first discuss the opposition between utopian and
scientific socialism as Marx understood it. After elaborating some
Marxist approaches in this debate, we will argue that any attempt at
reconciling Marxism with ethics must be utopian in nature. Finally, we
will give some Nietzschean arguments for explaining why a conception of
utopia is indispensable for developing a Marxist theory of ethics.

Keywords

Marx, Nietzsche, ethics, morality, utopia, revolution

References

• Althusser, L. (2003). The Humanist Controversy and Other Writings. (Trans. C. M. Goshgarian). London: Verso Publications.
• Bernstein, E. (1993). The Preconditions of Socialism. (Ed. & trans. H. Tudor). Cam-bridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Blackledge P. (2012). Marxism and Ethics: Freedom, Desire and Revolution. Albany: State University of New York Press.
• Durkheim, E. (2009). Socialism and Saint Simon. (Trans. C. Sattler). London: Routledge & Taylor and Francis.
• Engels, F. (1908). Socialism: Utopian and Scientific. (Trans. E. Aveling). Chicago: Charles H. Kerr Company.
• Fourier, C. (1971). The Utopian Vision of Charles Fourier: Selected Texts on Work, Love and Passionate Attraction. (Eds. & trans. J.
• Beecher & R. Bienvenu). Boston: Beacon Press.
• Geoghegan, V. (2008). Utopianism and Marxism. Bern: Verlag Peter Lang.
• Jal, M. (2010). The Irresistible Science of Karl Marx. Social Scientist, 38 (5-6), 22-34.
• Kumar, K. (1990). Utopian Thought and Communal Practice. Theory and Society, 19, 1-35.
• Leopold, D. (2007). Socialism and (the Rejection of) Utopia. Journal of Political Ideologies, 12 (3), 219-237.
• Levitas, R. (2004). Beyond Bourgeois Right: Freedom, Equality and Utopia in Marx and Morris. The European Legacy, 9 (5), 605-618.
• Lovell, D. W. (2004). Marx's Utopian Legacy. The European Legacy, 9 (5), 629-640.
• Luxemburg, R. (2008). The Essential Rosa Luxemburg: Reform or Revolution and The Mass Strike. Ed. H. Scott). Chicago: Haymarker Books.
• Marx, K. & Engels, F. (1980). On the Paris Commune. Moscow: Progress Publishers.
• Marx, K. & Engels, F. (1998). The German Ideology. New York: Prometheus Books.
• Marx, K. & Engels, F. (2008). The Manifesto of the Communist Party. (Trans. S. Moore) London: Pluto Press.
• Marx, K. & Engels, F. 2009. The Civil War in France. London: Dodo Press.
• Marx, K. (1988). Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844. (Trans. M. Milli-gan). New York: Prometheus Books.
• Nietzsche, F. (2011). On the Genealogy of Morality. (Trans. C. Diethe). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Owen, R. (1991). A New Way of Society and Other Writings. (Ed. G. Claeys). London: Penguin Books.
• Paden, R. (2002). Marx's Critique of the Utopian Socialists. Utopian Studies, 13 (2), 67-91.
• Thomas, P. (2008). Marxism and Scientific Socialism from Engels to Althusser. New York: Routledge & Taylor and Francis.
• Tucker, R. C. (Ed.) (1978). The Marx-Engels Reader. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
• Yassour, A. (1983). Communism and Utopia: Marx, Engels and Fourier. Studies in Soviet Thought, 26 (3), 217-227.