How do different Marxists understand the issues of social cohesion and consent?

Résumé du document

Although highly criticized, and sometimes even demonized, the Marxist thought represented one of the most serious challenges to the cultural hegemony of capitalism and parliamentary democracy. Marx and his followers attempted to understand and deconstruct this complex system of economic structures, social processes and political strategies. By assessing the way in which different Marxists saw social cohesion and consent, we will try to show how our societies are able to make norms and values that need to be spread, shared and respected by all of its constituents. It will be interesting to note how people voluntarily give up a certain part of sovereignty to reach ends in accordance with their interests. In this perspective, we will see that Marxism stresses the importance of collective conscience modes, which are a product of the division of work.

Extraits

[...] Although overtly Marxist, the Frankfurt school has been influenced by several philosophers, political thinkers and even psychologists. Very concerned by the totalitarian wave that swept across Europe in the 1930', as well as by the last developments of capitalism through their American experience, they attempted to articulate the modern notions of culture industry, bureaucratisation, reification and social control in order to cast light on new forms of alienation, manipulation, and domination. By taking Weber's theory of rationalisation, Marx's concept of alienation and Nietzsche's view of history (no progressive tendency for him), they tried to unveil the states new behaviours and characters. [...]

[...] We can here note that Marx has a very negative and narrow vision of this institution, and sees it before everything as a coercive body whose battlefield is the political sphere. A point of view which leaves very little room for more subtle means of achieving social cohesion and consent. Another institution that Marx neglected is family, although clearly important in the process of reproduction of values and norms. On this ground, Engels work is more detailed: for him, the monogamous nuclear family model is indeed perfectly suited to the requirements of the capitalist system. It produces “children of undisputed parentage and guarantees the supremacy of the male line”[5]. [...]

[...] How do different Marxists understand the issues of social cohesion and consent? Although highly criticised, sometimes even demonized, the Marxist thought represented one of the most serious challenges to the cultural hegemony of capitalism and its parliamentary democracy nest. Marx and his followers attempted to understand and deconstruct this complex system of economic structures, social processes and political strategies. By assessing the way in which different Marxists saw social cohesion and consent, we will try to show how our societies are able to make norms and values be spread, shared and respected by all of its constituents. [...]

[...] The interrogations they brought up still concern our societies and the cohesion of their components. Bibliography Joseph, J. Conflict, Cohesion and Consent Marx, K. Preface (to A contribution to the Critique of Political Economy) Marx, K. and F. Engels, The Communist Manifesto Marx, K., Critique of Hegel's Doctrine of the State Engels, F., The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State Gramsci, A., Selections from the Political Writings Gramsci, A., Selections from the Prison Notebooks Horkheimer, M. and T.W. [...]

[...] Routinised work, competition between the employed and the unemployed, but also between different branches of production, or rival firms, add to the coercive power of the system and make work become the best police. By creating and feeding danger, capitalism creates the need for security. By exploiting this need, it creates docile individuals. The division of labour is therefore much more than just a technical issue and affects the relation between people and products, people and themselves and others. For Marx, this was thought to lead to the homogenisation of the working class, and ultimately to the polarisation of society between two antagonistic groups: the capitalists and the proletariat. [...]