Actually the criticisms of the utopian socialists by Marx and Engels take on a slightly absurd air once one has read the full corpus of their work (which I have not done, but enough to catch some absurdity). Certainly they do assiduously avoid most of the time "utopian" theorizing about what socialism would be like, an avoidance that many have criticized as allowing for all sorts of ugly stuff to get carried out in their names (was Stalin a true Marxist or not, who knows?).
Among locations where one can find descents into utopianism I would suggest starting with the "platform" at the end of the _Communist Manifesto_. Some of the planks look like garden variety socialism, e.g. nationalizing banks, etc.. Some of it is now standard fare in modern mixed capitaist economies, e.g. progressive income taxes. But some looks pretty utopian to me, e.g. the dissolving of the distinction between city and countryside. They didn't mean the suburbs did they?
Another place of course is in _Critique of the Gotha Program_, where Marx showed what a hard-nosed guy he was with his bit about how under communism the state would "wither away." Uh huh. And then there is all that stuff about people doing one thing in the morning and another in the afternoon. Right. If this isn't utopian, then I am Robert Owen.
BTW, as those who have seen me on these on these lists before knows, I am not against intelligent "utopian" theorizing within some limits. Hence I find the usual orthodox Marxist dismissals of such basically silly, especially given Marx and Engels' own tendencies. Barkley Rosser On Sun, 1 Nov 1998 09:42:59 -0500 James Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com> wrote:
> Although it is fashionable for Marxists to bash utopian socialists I
> do think there is a place for the kinds of discussions that people like
> Roemer, Schweickart, Pat Devine, Cockshott-Cottrell and Hahnel-Albert
> engage in because such discussions can help to persuade people
> that viable alternatives capitalism are possible. Even Marx & Engels
> whose criticisms of the utopians are recapitulated by Lou thought
> that they did make some useful contributions to the workers
> movement. I remember reading (in _Capital_ I think) a passage
> where Marx praised the experiments of the Owenites because
> they demonstrated that modern industry could be operated by
> the workers without the assistance of capitalists.
>
> At a time when many working people have been indoctrinated
> with the myth "that there is no alternative" - to use Maggie Thatchers'
> words - such discussion can help to persuade people that alternatives
> to capitalism are both possible and desirable. People cannot be expected
> to fight vigorously against the bourgeoisie and capitalism unless
> they believe in the possibility of such an alternative. I remember
> once when Justin Schwartz justified his concern with discussing
> market socialism by arguing that he found such discussion to
> be necessary for persuading working people that a non-capitalist
> future is possible. Regardless of what we might think of Justin's
> proposed alternative (i.e. market socialism) I think that his
> point is well taken. As long as we do not allow such discussion
> to divert us from attempting to understand how capitalism works
> and how it might be fought and as long as we do not succumb
> to the illusion that social change can be accomplished without
> class struggle then I think there is a legitimate place for the
> kinds of discussions that Schweikhert, Albert & Hahnel etc.
> engage in.
>
> Jim Farmelant
>
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