The political ideas of Marx and Engels

Monthly Review, June, 1986 by Paul Le Blanc

The fact also remains that, ideology aside, we continue to face all of the problems, oppressions, and horrors described by Marx--and then some. Even if we decided to forsake the "adolescent furies" of socialism, there is no way to escape the age in which we live. We continue to face the questions of which side we are on and what is to be done. Even deciding to take no sides and to do nothing constitutes a choice to acquiesce in the injustice and violence of the status quo.

As Richard Hunt would have argued, we cannot expect to establish heaven on earth. Ours must be the more modest task of struggling for dignity, justice, and survival. Marx argued that there is little hope of securing such goals without a socialist revolution.

It was Hunt's conviction that the political ideas of Marx and Engels would be invaluable tools in the struggle for a better world. Despite "end-of-ideology" and "liberal consensus" and "neoconservative" intellectual fashions, not to mention the grubbier pressures of the status quo, he continued to take Marxism seriously and wanted to help pass it on to others. He would have been the last to see these ideas as holy dogma to be enshrined and worshipped. Rather, they must be utilized in this crude and corrupt world of ours, and in this way be continually renewed and refined. But first these ideas of Marx and Engels must be understood in a way that is faithful to their original meaning, and it is to such understanding that Richard Hunt sought to contribute.

Something of his own outlook, an intertwined pessimism and optimism, comes through in the words with which he chose to conclude his final book:

We must likewise remember that visionary ideals, even if never realized, offer useful vantage points from which to examine and criticize existing institutions and search for alternatives. "To be radical is to grasp the root of the matter," Marx had written, "but for man the root is man himself. . . . The criticism of religion ends with the teaching that man is the highest being for man, hence the categorical imperative to overthrow all relations in which man is a debased, enslaved, forsaken, despicable being" (vol. II, p. 367).

Whatever the limitations of this two-volume study, it is far more than simply a monumental work of scholarship. It is a tremendous resource for those prepared to engage in the process of renewal and in the struggle for social justice.