[lbo-talk] Missing the Marx

[andie nachgeborenen]

It's also debateable whether Marx rejected all moral
talk. Richard Miller has an impressive argument in his
book Analyzing Marx that he did. I think this is
wrong, and Peffer exolains why in his Marx, Morality,
and Social Justice. But talk of morality in general is
different from talk of justice, fairness, and rights.
Utilitarians, fir example, happly talk about morality
but think that justice talk is wholly derivative at
best. Bentham called it "nonsense on stilts." Marx was
not a utilitarian, but he shared Bentham's view of
justice. Jeremy Walsron even has a  book collecting
Bentham's and Marx's attacks on justice along with a
good intro essay called "Nonsense On Stilts." 

--- Michael Dawson <MDawson at pdx.edu> wrote:


> P.S.  Marx objected to talk of "unfairness" and
> "injustice" not because
> there isn't any happening, but because those he
> objected to wanted to stick
> at that level only and not analyze the material
> origins and logic of
> exploitation.  He was combating philosophical
> idealism (dissociating ethical
> categories from underlying social/material
> processes), not rejecting ethical
> anaylsis.
> 
> In other words, he was against premature talk of
> injustice, not all talk of
> it.
> 
> Too bad he himself wasn't more careful in his
> argument.  If he had been,
> perhaps the left wouldn't be so plagued by its
> bumbling hostility to this
> issue today...
> 
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>
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> 

		
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