Psychoanalytic-Marxism

Book excerpt: In this important new work, Eugene Victor Wolfenstein rejects the reduction of psychoanalysis to conformist psychology and Marxism to Stalinist orthodoxy. Instead, he illuminates the critical and emancipatory force of both traditions. He persuasively argues for a ``binocular'' view that integrates interests rooted in work and economic production with desires based in emotional life and human reproduction. Without obscuring the obvious differences between psychoanalytic and Marxist theories, his integrative approach provides the reader with a clearer, more complete understanding of modern society. The book opens with a review of the work of Marx and Freud, the classical Freudian-Marxists (Reich, Fromm and Marcuse) and such recent thinkers as Habermas, Benjamin, Kovel, and Lichtman. Wolfenstein then develops the foundation for a psychoanalytic-marxist theory and practice. He reconceptualizes praxis and dialectics, and history and human nature, and presents a framework for social analysis. The book's final section utilizes these grounding notions for the analysis of class, gender, and race; psychoanalytic practice; and political practice (the modern state and its potential transformation). Written in a bold and unusually lucid style, PSYCHOANALYTIC- MARXISM will serve as a benchmark for all further reflection on this topic. It offers fresh insights for those with an interest in psychoanalysis, Marxism, and a broad range of related concerns: philosophy, the modernism/postmodernism debates, feminist theory, African-American studies, critical social theory, political theory, history, and sociology.