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The Task of Critical Theory Today: Rethinking the Critique of Capitalism and its Futures

Globalization, Critique and Social Theory: Diagnoses and Challenges

ISBN: 978-1-78560-247-4, eISBN: 978-1-78560-246-7

Publication date: 6 November 2015

Abstract

Purpose

To demonstrate that, at its core, Marx’s critical theory is not a critique of a mode of class exploitation that distorts modernity, undertaken from a standpoint that affirms labor, but rather one that uncovers and analyzes a unique form of social mediation and domination that structures modernity itself as a historically specific form of social life.

Methodology/approach

Critical reconstruction, interpretation, and application of Marx’s critique of political economy as developed in the Grundrisse and Capital, to the massive global transformations of the past four decades.

Findings

Marx’s critical analysis is well-suited to function as the foundation for a theory that systematically illuminates modern society in the 21st century. It is more conducive to grasping the contemporary world than traditional Marxism or most versions of post-Marxism.

Originality/value

The historical transformations of the past century suggest the central significance of a critique of capitalism for an adequate critical theory today. Such a critique must be capable of grasping the core of a social formation that is generative of a peculiar dynamic of identity and non-identity, of pointing beyond itself while reasserting itself. It indicates that the realization of the possibility of the abolition of proletarian labor is a necessary response to a deep structural crisis of capitalism.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgment

I would like to thank Fabian Arzuaga for valuable critical feedback.

Citation

Postone, M. (2015), "The Task of Critical Theory Today: Rethinking the Critique of Capitalism and its Futures", Globalization, Critique and Social Theory: Diagnoses and Challenges (Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Vol. 33), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 3-28. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0278-120420150000033001

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2015 Emerald Group Publishing Limited