21 Marxism in Anthropology

Chatali Tandon

Contents

1. Marxism

2. Marxist Anthropology

3. Crux of Marxian Philosophy

4. Important thinkers of Marxism

5. Important Literature Produced Under Marxism

6. Neo-Marxism: A novel Wave in Marxism

7. A Critique of Marxism in Anthropology Conclusion

Learning objectives

This module will introduce the reader to

the theory of Marxism in anthropological thought
the crux of the Marxian theory of Marxism, main thinkers , important literary works under Marxism
New wave of Neo-marxism developed from Marxism
the critique of the theory of Marxism

1. Marxism

Marxism is a philosophical doctrine, a worldview, an economic doctrine, a revolutionary way of social transformation which was developed in mid nineteenth century by Karl Marx and to lesser extent by Friedrich Engels. More than a philosophy, for many, it’s a methodology, which is unique in realm of radical political and social thought.

Marxist understandings have been applied to diverse subjects for researches like history, philosophy, culture studies, historiography and other social sciences. Marxism as a philosophy has further developed into many branches and schools of thought.

2. Marxist Anthropology

Marxist Anthropology is one of the most significant anthropological theory applied to study different cultures around the world. Marxist anthropology developed as a critique of the domination of Euro – American Capitalism.

Marxist Anthropology is based on the writings of two German philosophers of nineteenth century, namely Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. These two are considered as the main protagonists of Marxism philosophy. Marxist Anthropology discusses material factors are the main cause of social transformation in any culture or society. It is basically economic understanding of history. Marx and Friedrich laid emphasis on the forces of production and their relationship with social organization. The crux of Marxism was that any economic system is based on relationships of power, which eventually lead to a class struggle. Therefore, Marxist Anthropology studies Social class, class conflict, economy, means of production and distribution and the way it leads to a social change in any given culture.

3. Crux of Marxian Philosophy

Unlike Idealist philosophy , that laid emphasis on “Ideas” and existence of god as primary and matter that exists in real as secondary, the materialist Philosophy followed by many philosophers like Marx Gave importance to Matter as the most important component of universe. Reality for them could be explained without the concept of god. Plato’s work is based on Idealism and Marx’s work is based on Materialism.

Materialism is the way of understanding the world. Three features of Materialism that separates it from idealism are.

Universe is made up of matter. There are laws of matter and motion.
Matter is primary, thought/ideas are secondary. Matter is objective reality.
Thus Materialism believes that universe and its functioning can be known.

Materialism of Marx should not be confused with the “Materialism” or naturalism used in philosophical sense. Marx went beyond the general meaning attached with the term materialism which was seen as the substratum of all mental and spiritual phenomenons. Marx’s philosophical materialism is direct opposite of philosophical idealism. For Marx , Materialism should include history and its process. Marx materialist method included study of real economic and social life of man and thus influence of his economic and social life on his thinking.

Dialectics is a method of thinking and interpreting nature and society. Dialetics is a way of looking at universe as something that is in constant state of flux and this change always involves contradiction. So, Dialectics explains the logic of contradiction. There are three main postulates in understanding dialectics.

All real things are connected.
Everything is in constant flux.
All phenomena experience change. Quantitative changes lead to qualitative changes. Old things transform into new things.
Change is result of interaction of opposing forces, leading to internal conflict and transformation.

It is with the help of this logical framework of Dialectics Marx tried explaining the conflict between two classes that are absolutely opposed to each other, i.e. the working class and the capitalist class. Dialectical materialism is nothing but Marx’s approach towards nature, the method of studying and apprehending the phenomenon of nature, the way he understands and perceives the phenomenon of nature is a theory, which can be given the name of materialism. Dialectic Method by Marx was different and opposite of Hegelian concept of Dialectics.

Historical materialism is an extension of the principle of dialectical materialism applied to the study of social life and its history. For Historical materialism is not a psychological theory depending upon the man’s drives and passion , rather according to Marx, the way man produces determines his thinking and desires. For him, the objective condition is economy, mode of production in a social organization and the way it determines the ideas and interests of a man.

Historical Materialism dialectically analyses and understands causes of the societal development and reasons for the changes in society based upon man’s economic life. The social classes, the political arrangements and all other ideologies depend on economic activity. Economic activity in form of forces and relations of production is considered the base and superstructure in any society.

For Marx, there exists a conflict between development of the material productive forces and relations of production resulting in a social revolution that ultimately alters the superstructure. The socio-economic conflicts according to Marx are driving forces of history. Marx described four stages of development in history based on means of production, these are

1. Primitive communism

2. Slave society

3. Feudalism

4. Capitalism.

Socio-Economic revolution as predicted by the Marx in Capitalism (and all of these stages of human development above) was as a result of class consciousness, where the exploited class got aware of their common miseries and revolted against the capitalist system. Marx believed that the transformation from Capitalist to socialism was inevitable phase in human history of development.

Marx philosophy laid emphasis on importance of class for people and social change in any communit y. He focuses on the means of production, technology and the relations of production. He gave the concept of Alienation, theory of value and Surplus value, theory of exploitation, theory of class struggle , and finally a theory for an utopian form of societal set up against capitalism , i.e. communism. .Thus, Marx offers a distinctive method in social science enquiry that is empirical in explaining the phenomenon of capitalism.

4. Important thinkers of Marxism

i. Karl Marx (1818-1883)- Marx is often considered as the founder of modern Social science, as he started scientific analysis of the modern economic life in a community. Marx got inspired by Hegel and his idea of ‘dialectics. Marx tried studying the political and economic changes in history through dialectical materialism and historical materialism. Marx developed a theory of change, where the social classes could become equal by changes in the mode of production and relations of production. Marx along with Weber and Durkheim is considered the most influential classical social scientists in history so far.

ii. Friedrich Engels (1820-1895)- Engels helped Marx in establishing Marxism. Engels first important work on the plight of workers of England “The Condition of The Working Class in England in 1844” helped him to connect to Marx and his ideas. Engels edited and revaluated marx work after his death for publication. Marxism id often seen as a collaborative work of both Marx and Engels.

iii. Eric Wolf (1923-1999) – he was expose to Marxism in his early years. He soon became a famous Marxist who proposed three types of modes of production in his work “Europe and The People Without History” (1982). The three modes of production are the capitalist, the tributary, and the kin-ordered. Eric Wolf was a very significant anthropologist.

iv. Maurice Bloch (1939) – he is a British anthropologist and supporter of Marxian anthropology. He revived French Marxism in British social anthropology. His works revolve around the themes of ideology, cognition and language. These are considered as important cursors of power in a structured system.

v. Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937). He was an Italian communist who formulated the concept of hegemony. He was one of the prominent thinkers of Marxism before World War II. For him, role of human history was primary in Marxian understanding of change. He articulated the concept of Cultural Hegemony to explain the reason for the revolution that couldn’t take place.

vi. Louis Althusser (1918-1990)- He is the Neo-marxists of the 1960’s. His approach was structural Marxism. He was critical about the French Marxist school and the Structural Marxist School. He selectively used both these school to use Marxism in economics.

vii. Maurice Godeiler (1934) – He belonged to the school of French Marxism and his work is on economic anthropology. He is a very important anthropologist who uses Marxian theory within a structuralist frame. He tried understanding the way the modes of production, infrastructure and superstructure will b, in societies that are non western in nature.

5. Important Literature Produced Under Marxism

Economic and Philosophical Manuscript (1844) – this work of Marx remained unpublished till his death. The work displays his intellectual framework and philosophical convictions. In this work Marx talks about the feeling of estrangement among the working class of capitalist society. He also critiqued Hegelian dialectics in the third manuscript.
Communist Manifesto (1848) – it is a strong collaborative work of Marx and Engels. It laid the foundation of Marx’s economic theories. The communist manifesto begins with a very provocative statement by Marx “history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of class struggle”. The main aim of Communist Manifesto was to start a political action “Workers of the world Unite”.
Capital or Das Kapital (1867) – it is one of the elaborate works of Marx describing the exploitative nature of the capitalist society. Marx has described methodology of Marxism in Das Kapital. This work is a mature attempt by Marx with more scientific rigour than his earlier writings of the Manuscripts and Communist Manifesto. He explained the concepts of labour theory of value, capital, surplus value and exploitation in detail.
Ancient Society (1977)- it’s an classical anthropological work where Lewis Henry Morgan through process of social evolution understands the material change in society. This wok was of prime importance to Marx and Engels as it expressed the importance of materials in economy and change.
The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884). This was a very anthropological piece of writing by Engels. It describes the societal evolution of mankind from primitive communism to slavery to feudalism to capitalism to communism which transended all the stages prior to communism.
The Evolution of Culture (1959) – This is a classical work of Leslie White discussing the nature of the culture and role of the material culture. His theory explains how the technological aspects of one’s culture results in structural and this in turn leads to the ideological aspect of culture.
Perspectives in Marxist Anthropology (1973) – this book is in form of collection of essays by Maurice Godelier discussing the possible applications of different forms of Marxist way of analysis to the cultures before capitalism.
The Modern World- System (Volumes I to VI )(1974) Immanuel Wallerstein charts out the origins of the World System. This is an interesting and relatively modern work discussing the interconnections between nations based on the lines of production, some locations being at the core and some at the periphery.
Europe and The People Without History (1982) – Grounded in the discourse of Social science and pwer relations, this work proves to the Eric Wolf’s critique of Western Scholarship which focuses on the lack of attention on the unwritten history so far.
Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History (1986) – The work discusses the role of labour and production of sugar in the last thousand years. This is the work of Sidney Mintz explain the relationship of sugar with the society using Marxian ideal of integrated approach.
Critical Medical Anthropology (1995)- this is a work of Merril Singer and Hans Baer that uses the Marxian perspective and understands the differences in power in different social classes exposed by the medical system.

6.Neo-Marxism: A novel Wave in Marxism

Neo-Marism is a term given to the theories of the twentieth century that have been used to either adjust, revise, or extent Marxism in one form of the other by integrating elements from other intellectual traditions. Neo-Marxism as a loose theory integrates Max Weber’s approach of social inequality too to the Marxian understanding of Inequality. Neo-Marxism forms a new political ideology that is often considered as the new left. Neo Marxism arose to answer all that was not explained with the traditional Marxian Approach to understand social change in society. Neo Marxism therefore came out as a re-analysis of Marx’s work to answer many political and social problems which Marxian philosophy couldn’t answer.

One of the features of all the Neo-Marxist approaches is to move beyond the red revolution predicted by the Marx for any social transformation. Unlike the violence in form of revolution, as indispensible for any social change according to Marx, the Neo-Marxists have been just focused on keeping the revolutionary message of Marx for change.

There have been Neo-Marxist theories on development dealing with dependency and world system theories. Neo-Marxist Economies deal with monopolistic rather than competitive nature of capitalism.Neo-Marxist Feminist Therapy is another school of thought which believes knowledge, culture and pedagogy are part of the ‘privileged’ epistemology, means where there is absence of injustice. Neo-Marxist Theorists rely on critical theory and postmodern thought .Teresa McDowell and Rhea Almeda use this theory in a method of liberation based healing.

Neo-Marxism includes: critical theory, Analytical Marxism and French Structural Marxism and other offshoots of Marxism that are being discussed in the following segment.

Analytical Marxism: It was strand of Marxism, a new intellectual development, a theory famous among the English social scientists of1980’s. G.A Cohen, John Roemer, Hillel Steiner, Jon Elster were famous Analytical Marxists of this time. G.A Cohen’s work on “Karl Marx Theory of History: A Defense (1978)” was the first important work of Analytical Marxism. As the name suggests ‘Analytical’ Marxism was more scientific in terms of elaborating theory and conducting research unlike Marxism, which according to them was burdened with meta-theoretical commitments. The main aim of Analytical Marxism has been to bring the elements of rationality, neo-classical economies, and contemporary political science systems to understand the problems of classical Marxism like the exploitation, historical change, class struggle and social transformation.

Cultural Marxism: Along with Analytical Marxism, there also developed Cultural Marxism, an ideology that stated non-economic cultural dimensions to be the root cause of all inequalities. It’s often regarded as a conspiracy theory to end western culture. It was all about the intellectual tradition of the Frankfurt School dealing with critical theory. The main thinkers of Cultural Marxism learnt from the work of Kant, Helgel , Weber, Freud, Marx. They used methods of Psychoanalysis, anti- positivist philosophy, and existential philosophy. Institute for Social research, in Frankfurt School was the first marx oriented research center affiliated to a German University. since 1960’s Frankfurt School has been led by the works of Jurgen Habermas and his work on communicative reason, inter-subjectivity of linguistics and a discourse on modernism that is philosophical in nature .

Critical Theory: It is often described as the Neo Marxist Philosophy of the Frankfurt school. Most important social thinkers of twentieth century fell under the school of critical theory. Important theorists of critical theory are Adorno, Horkheimer and Marcuse. This school of thought used the concepts of Marx, like alienation and fetishism and doubts the empirical grounding of Marxism. Thinkers of critical theory have tried moving Marxism towards a philosophy that is away from social science that is based on empirical and historical research. Exception to this has been the work of social thinker Habermas, who tries to understand Marxism as a deep philosophy with giving respect to Marx’s empirical and historical approach to social science.

Marxist Historiography / Materialist History: Many writers of the twentieth century have been inspired by the style of investigation formulated by Karl Marx and extended by other social thinkers.

Marxist theorians of 20th century like Perry Anderson, Albert Soboul, Marc Bloch have used broad Marxian perspective to conduct historical researches. E.P Thomson is also one of the greatest Historiographer of this times and he wrote a very important work as a contribution to Marxist historiography “The Making of English Working Class” (1966).

Marxist humanism: This is another offshoot of Marxism, which deals with the earlier writings of marx, especially, “Economic and Philosophical Manuscript of 1844” where marx, discussed the theory of Alienation. Marx Humanism was anti humanistic in nature. Antonio Gramsci, Ernst Bloch, Wlter Benjamin, Jean Paul Satre are few of the Marx Humanists

Cultural Materialism and Cultural Ecology: .Marxism in anthropology had led to Many other approaches in anthropology too, like cultural materialism (dealing with the technological sphere and its influence of structure and cultural ideology) Leslie White (1900-1975) studied American cultural material and cultural ecology (dealing with the relationship of means of production and the environment) which was studied by Julian Steward.(1902-1972)

Feminist Post Maxism: Marxism also influenced the feminist anthropology, and led to Feminist Post Marxism, led by Judith Butler (1956) where she studied linguistic differences in gender due to power relations. The relationship of gender, language, sexuality with class power were also studied by Sally McConnell-Ginet, (2002) , she highlighted the use of terminology in social solidarity and conflict in gender.

French Marxist school of Thought: Marxist philosophy was also brought together with Levi Strauss Structuralism resulting in the French Marxist school of Thought. This school of thought also witnessed the existentialist Marxism by Jean Paul Satre (1905-1980), Michel Foucault (1926-1984) and his denunciation of history, structural Marxism of the Athusser. Tenets of French Marxism were found in Post Modernism too.

Open Marxism: It is also a school of thought that demands openness in praxis and history for practical reflexivity of marxs ideology. It deals with the libertarian socialist crituiques of communism. Three volumes of ‘Open Marxism’ were published in 1990’s.

Post Marxism: It is another strand of Marxism that is born out of Marxist philosophy. It started around 1960’s and refers to investigations of philosophers and social scientists on the original orthodox writings of Karl Marx. Giorgio Agamben, Micheal Albert and Jean Francios Lyotard are few of the Post Marxists.

In current times, Marxism is assessed as an age old philosophy in social sciences, however Anthropology has still maintained its prominence in distinct contemporary Anthropological works.

Neo Marxism has been prevalent under the name of political economy. Andre Gunder Frank (1925 – 2005), Immanuel Wallerstein (1930)and Naom Chomsky (1928) produced contemporary works dealing with political economy .

7. A Critique of Marxism in Anthropology

Marxism has been one of the most influential and dominant tradition in social sciences. The contemporary supporters of marxism find the theory vital but in parts and not as a whole. For instance , the ideas of Marx were collaborated with the ideas to form , the Frankfurt school of thought. For some Marxism is incomplete and outdated in nature. It has been criticized by various philosophers of different paradigms on many grounds. It has been criticized on ethical, empirical and economic levels.

Democrats and democratic socialists reject socialism that can be attained through conflict and revolution in society. Marx for them talks about an utopian socialism, on the other hand Anarchists and Liberetarians have a view that socialism can be established by decentralized, non-coercive organization. For individual anarchists, Marxism is a statist ideology that gives primacy to state over individual.

Over emphasis on the economic relationship to explain change has led to a number of criticisms in Marxism. Marxism is accused of being economically deterministic. Marx in his theory has overemphasized the role of economic relations that overpower all other aspects of society like family, kinship, education, and religion. For Marx , everything in society depended on economic factors.

One of the very interesting criticism of Marxism is , that is is not anthropological in nature . it has nothing to do with culture or ethnography .

The theory of Marx is not unified, rather it appears as a predesigned plot where there is ingrained inequality and potential class struggle awaited, as the mode of production and relations of production are owned and dominated by the ruling class, and the working class is exploited to a level, they are conscious of their plight and form one class to revolt and overthrow the rulling class , to establish equality for all in a state of communism. So, Marx has given a predictable plot.

By concentrating on the conflict that arises in due to economic relationships , Marx ignored the conflicts that take place in other spheres of society, like the conflict of male and female , the conflict of siblings , the conflict over social power etc. Marxian perspective always explains everything in terms of conflict. It always examines social relationships on their conflictual basis. Any society do not just survive on conflictual relationship, there are levels of consensus too , which Marx failed to discover.

Marx in his theory has given no importance to subjective interpretation of the individual. He has nowhere given importance to the individual point of view regarding class and class struggle. Subjective interpretation of class which Marx lacked will always differ from the objective class position.

Capitalism as a political and economic system was much strong, stable and durable than what marx had forseen. Communism was seen as the final stage after capitalism, which again was unworkable and too ideal yet unavoidable.

Many forms of Neo-marxist theories have been criticized by other Marxists as being a variety of functionalism with a bent towards the left wing. According to thinker Jock Young neo Marxism is nothing but a left functionalism. Neo Marxism perspectives have been called a “giant conspiracy theory” where only ruling class manipulates and exploits the working class for their own profits.

Marxism has often been accused of being unscientific in its nature and methodology .Critics like Sir Karl Popper argue that Marxism as a theory cannot be tested and falsified because according to Marx , capitalism is replaced by communism which is “historically inevitable”, so in this respect , Marxism is not a theory of change , rather it’s a “Faith”.

Marxism, be it old or the new one, ignored the role and position of Women. It never took into consideration the ‘other sex’. But lately, there has been an offshoot of Marxism dealing with the feminist Marxism, so this criticism is not valid now as it was once upon a time in history.

Conclusion

Despite all these criticisms and ingrained flaws, Role of Marxism in anthropology has been immense both in terms of studying the transforming societies based on economic forces and the contribution of Marxism in 20th century Social science too cannot go unnoticed. It has raised a number of questions in anthropological reasoning dealing with class conflict and social change in any society. Anthropologists can use method of historical materialism to study change in present day context. For instance Government of China and Soviet Union/Russia work on the philosophy of Marxism as, predicted by Marx, the only societies seeking a communist life would be societies with peasant class. Russia on lines of Marxism, was the model society for communism.

Summary

Let us begin by understanding what is Marxist Anthropology. Marxist Anthropology is one of the most significant anthropological theory applied to study different cultures around the world. Marxist anthropology developed as a critique of the domination of Euro-American Capitalism. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels are considered as the main protagonists of Marxism philosophy. Marxist Anthropology discusses material factors are the main cause of social transformation in any culture or society. It is basically economic understanding of history. Marx and Friedrich laid emphasis on the forces of production and their relationship with social organization. The crux of Marxism was that any economic system is based on relationships of power, which eventually lead to a class struggle. Therefore, Marxist Anthropology studies Social class, class conflict, economy, means of production and distribution and the way it leads to a social change in any given culture.

To understand the Crux of Marxian Philosophy, its important to understand the methodology marx used to study society, i.e. dialectical and historical material. Materialism is the way of understanding the world. Three features of Materialism that separates it from idealism are.

1. Universe is made up of matter. There are laws of matter and motion.

2. Matter is primary, thought/ideas are secondary. Matter is objective reality.

3. Thus Materialism believes that universe and its functioning can be known.

Materialism of Marx should not be confused with the “Materialism” or naturalism used in philosophical sense. For Marx, Materialism should include history and its process. Marx materialist method included study of real economic and social life of man and thus influence of his economic and social life on his thinking.

Dialectics is a method of thinking and interpreting nature and society. Dialetics is a way of looking at universe as something that is in constant state of flux and this change always involves contradiction. So, Dialectics explains the logic of contradiction. There are three main postulates in understanding dialectics.

1. All real things are connected.

2. Everything is in constant flux.

3. All phenomena experience change. Quantitative changes lead to qualitative changes. Old things transform into new things.

4. Change is result of interaction of opposing forces, leading to internal conflict and transformation.

It is with the help of this logical framework of Dialectics Marx tried explaining the conflict between two classes that are absolutely opposed to each other, i.e the working class and the capitalist class. Dialectic Method by Marx was different and opposite of Hegelian concept of Dialectics.

Historical materialism is an extension of the principle of dialectical materialism applied to the study of social life and its history. For Historical materialism is not a psychological theory depending upon the man’s drives and passion , rather according to Marx, the way man produces determines his thinking and desires. For him, the objective condition is economy, mode of production in a social organization and the way it determines the ideas and interests of a man. Historical Materialism dialectically analyses and understands causes of the societal development and reasons for the changes in society based upon man’s economic life. For Marx, The social classes, the political arrangements and all other ideologies depend on economic activity. Economic activity in form of forces and relations of production is considered the base and superstructure in any society.

1. Primitive communism

2. Slave society

3. Feudalism

4. Capitalism.

Exploitation of one class by the other according to Marx was the socio-economic feature of the societies. Those who owned means of production and controlled the relations of production (Bourgeois) were controlling and exploiting those who worked under them, i.e the working class (proletariats) as named by Marx. Marx critiqued capitalism of this exploitation of the workers due to surplus production and profit making of the capitalist class. This exploitation of workers in capitalist society was inevitable and lead to what Marx called as “Alienation” which is feeling of estrangement of people from humanity. Alienation was objective characterization of Worker’s situation in a capitalist set up. Socio-Economic revolution as predicted by the Marx in Capitalism ( and all of these stages of human development above ) was as a result of class consciousness, where the exploited class got aware of their common miseries and revolted against the capitalist system . Marx believed that the transformation from Capitalist to socialism was inevitable phase in human history of development. Thus, Marx offers a distinctive method in social science enquiry that is empirical in explaining the phenomenon of capitalism.

Important thinkers of Marxism are Karl Marx (1818-1883), Friedrich Engels (1820-1895), Eric Wolf (1923-1999) Maurice Bloch (1939), Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) , Louis Althusser (1918-1990), Maurice Godeiler (1934). Important Literature Produced Under Marxism are Economic and Philosophical Manuscript (1844), Communist Manifesto (1848) , Capital or Das Kapital (1867), Ancient Society (1977), The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884) Perspectives in Marxist Anthropology (1973), The Modern World- System ( Volumes I to VI )(1974) ,Europe and The People Without History (1982)Sweetness and Power : The Place of Sugar in Modern History (1986) ,Critical Medical Anthropology(1995Neo-Marxism : A novel Wave in Marxism.

Now , lets understand the concept of Neo-Marxism. Neo-Marism is a term given to the theories of the twentieth century that have been used to either adjust, revise, or extent Marxism in one form of the other by integrating elements from other intellectual traditions. Neo-Marxism as a loose theory integrates Max Weber’s approach of soial inequality too to the Marxian understanding of Inequality. Neo-Marxism forms a new political ideology that is often considered as the new left. Neo Marxism arose to answer all that was not explained with the traditional Marxian Approach to understand social change in society. Neo Marxism therefore came out as a re-analysis of Marx’s work to answer many political and social problems which Marxian philosophy couldn’t answer. Neo-Marxism includes critical theory , Analytical Marxism and French Structural Marxism and other offshoots of Marxism that are being discussed in the following segment.

Analytical Marxism is strand of Marxism, a new intellectual development. G.A Cohen, John Roemer, Hillel Steiner, Jon Elster were famous Analytical Marxists of this time. The main aim of Analytical Marxism has been to bring the elements of rationality, neo-classical economies, and contemporary political science systems to understand the problems of classical Marxism like the exploitation , historical change , class struggle and social transformation.

Cultural Marxism is an ideology that stated non-economic cultural dimensions to be the root cause of all inequalities. Its often regarded as a conspiracy theory to end western culture. It was all about the intellectual tradition of the Frankfurt School dealing with critical theory. The main thinkers of Cultural Marxism learnt from the work of Kant , Helgel , Weber, Freud, Marx.

Critical Theory in Marxism is often described as the Neo Marxist Philosophy of the Frankfurt school. Most important social thinkers of twentieth century fell under the school of critical theory . Important theorists of critical theory are Adorno , Horkheimer and Marcuse. This school of thought used the concepts of Marx , like alienation and fetishism and doubt the empirical grounding of Marxism. Thinkers of critical theory have tried moving Marxism towards a philosophy that is away from social science that is based on empirical and historical research.

Marxist Historiography / Materialist History : Many writers of the twentheith century have been inspired by the style of investigation formulated by Karl Marx and extended by other social thinkers . Marxist theorians of 20th century like Perry Anderson, Albert Soboul , Marc Bloch have used broad Marxian perspective to conduct historical researches.

Marxist humanism: This is another offshoot of Marxism , which deals with the earlier writings of marx, especially , “Economic and Philosophical Manuscript of 1844” where marx, discussed the theory of Alienation. Marx Humanism was anti humanistic in nature. Antonio Gramsci , Ernst Bloch, Wlter Benjamin, Jean Paul Satre are few of the Marx Humanists

Cultural Materialism and Cultural Ecology : .Marxism in anthropology had led to Many other approaches in anthropology too, like cultural materialism ( dealing with the technological sphere and its influence of structure and cultural ideology ) Leslie White (1900-1975) studied American cultural material and cultural ecology ( dealing with the relationship of means of production and the environment) which was studied by Julian Steward.(1902-1972)

Feminist Post Maxism : Marxism also influenced the feminist anthropology, and led to Feminist Post Marxism, led by Judith Butler(1956) where she studied linguistic differences in gender due to power relations. The relationship of gender, language, sexuality with class power were also studied by Sally McConnell-Ginet,(2002) , she highlighted the use of terminology in social solidarity and conflict in gender.

French Marxist school of Thought : Marxist philosophy was also brought together with Levi Strauss Structuralism resulting in the French Marxist school of Thought. This school of thought also witnessed the existentialist Marxism by Jean Paul Satre (1905-1980), Michel Foucault (1926-1984)and his denunciation of history, structural Marxism of the Athusser. Tenets of French Marxism were found in Post Modernism too.

Open Marxism is also a school of thought that demands openness in praxis and history for practical reflexivity of marxs ideology. It deals with the libertarian socialist crituiques of communism. Three volumes of ‘Open Marxism’ were published in 1990’s. Post Marxism is another strand of Marxism that is born out of Marxist philosophy. It started around 1960’s and refers to investigations of philosophers and social scientists on the original orthodox writings of Karl Marx. Giorgio Agamben, Micheal Albert and Jean Francios Lyotard are few of the Post Marxists.

Marxism has been one of the most influential and dominant tradition in social sciences. The contemporary supporters of marxism find the theory vital but in parts and not as a whole. It has been criticized by various philosophers of different paradigms on many grounds. It has been criticized on ethical, empirical and economic levels.

Democrats and democratic socialists reject socialism that can be attained through conflict and revolution in society. Marx for them talks about a utopian socialism, on the other hand Anarchists and Liberetarians have a view that socialism can be established by decentralized, non-coercive organization. For individual anarchists, Marxism is a statist ideology that gives primacy to state over individual.

Over emphasis on the economic relationship to explain change has led to a number of criticisms in Marxism. Marxism is accused of being economically deterministic. Marx in his theory has overemphasized the role of economic relations that overpower all other aspects of society like family, kinship, education, and religion. For Marx, everything in society depended on economic factors.

One of the very interesting criticism of Marxism is , that is is not anthropological in nature . it has nothing to do with culture or ethnography .

The theory of Marx is not unified, rather it appears as a predesigned plot where there is ingrained inequality and potential class struggle awaited leading to a state of communism. So, Marx has given a predictable plot.

Marx in his theory has given no importance to subjective interpretation of the individual. He has nowhere given importance to the individuals point of view regarding class and class struggle. Subjective interpretation of class which Marx lacked will always differ from the objective class position.

Capitalism as an political and economic system was much strong, stable and durable than what marx had forseen. Communism was seen as the final stage after capitalism, which again was unworkable and too ideal yet unavoidable .

Marxism , be it old or the new one, ignored the role and position of Women. It never took into consideration the ‘other sex’. But lately , there has been an offshoot of Marxism dealing with the feminist Marxism , so this criticism is not valid now as it was once upon a time in history .

Despite all these criticisms and ingrained flaws, Role of Marxism in anthropology has been immense both in terms of studying the transforming societies based on economic forces and the contriburtion of Marxism in 20th century Social science too cannot go unnoticed. It has raised a number of questions in anthropological reasoning dealing with class conflict and social change in any society. Anthropologists can use method of historical materialism to study change in present day context. For instance Government of China and Soviet Union/Russia work on the philosophy of Marxism as, predicted by Marx, the only societies seeking a communist life would be societies with peasant class. Russia as foreseen by Marx, was the model society for communism.

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Suggested Reading:

Dahrendorf, Ralf (1959). Class and Class Conflict in Industrial Society. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Maclellan , David (2007), Marxism After Marx.Basingstoke . Palgrave Macmillian
Screpanti , E. ,S.Zamagana (1993), An Outline of The History Of Economic Thought.