Critical Reflections on the Fall Narrative of Communism

Smrutipriya Pattnaik; C Upendra

doi:10.5958/2347-6869.2018.00010.9

Critical Reflections on the Fall Narrative of Communism

Authors

Smrutipriya Pattnaik Doctoral Research Scholar, Department of Philosophy, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Indore, India https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5932-1384
C Upendra Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Indore, India https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7373-1451

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5958/2347-6869.2018.00010.9

Keywords:

Emancipation, Equality, Justice, Transformation, Revolution

Abstract

The paper critically addresses the fall narrative of the narrative of the failure of the communist experiment. By doing so it makes a conviction that the great fall may have had laid down communism’s burial but had not closed the spirit of revolution and emancipation. More than being loathsome to the violence the fall narrative hangs on to liberal-capitalist-democracy’s hatred for equality and justice. The paper commits to the claim that if the idea of “return to socialism” makes no sense, equally is senseless the triumphalism debate of liberal-capitalism. Saying so the commitment is for “return to the human self” whose even distant possibility lies in socialism only.

DOI: 10.5958/2347-6869.2018.00010.9

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Metrics

Metrics Loading ...

References

Badiou, A. (2010). The Communist Hypothesis. New York: Verso.
Baron, B. L. (1971). Marx on Human Emancipation. Canadian Journal of Political Science, 4(4), 559-570.
Baudrillard, J. (1983). Simulations. New York: Semiotext(e).
Bensai?d, D. (2009). Marx for Our Times: Adventures and Misadventures of a Critique. London: Verso.
Best, S. (1995). The Politics of Historical Vision: Marx, Foucault, Habermas. New York: Guilford Press.
Best, S. (n.d.). The “Culture Turn” in Marxist Theory. URL: http://www.drstevebest.org/TheCulturalTurnInMarxist.htm.
Bloch, E. (2000). The Spirit of Utopia. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Boer, R. (2014). The 'Failure' of Communism: a 'Fall' narrative Philosophers for Change. URL: https://philosophersforchange.org/2014/10/28/the-failure-of-communism-a-fall-narrative/.
Brecht, B. (2013). In Praise of Communism. [Blog] The Cahokian, URL: http://thecahokian.blogspot.in/2013/07/bertolt-brecht-in-praise-of-communism.html
Brown, W. (2003). Neo-liberalism and the End of Liberal Democracy. Theory &Event, 7(1).
Brown, W. (2015). Undoing The Demons: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution. Brooklyn: Zone Books.
Castoriadis, C., & Arnold, H. (Trans.). (2010). A society a drift interviews and debates, 1974-1997. New York: Fordham University Press.
Derrida, J. (2011). Specters of Marx: The State of The Debt, The Work of Mourning, and The New International. New York: Routledge.
Diefenbach, K., & Battista, E. (Trans.). (2011). Im/potential Politics, Political Ontologies in Negri, Agamben and Deleuze. URL: http://www.after1968.org/app/webroot/uploads/bec-min-FINAL(4).pdf.
Estlund, D. (2011). Human Nature and the Limits (If Any) of Political Philosophy. Philosophy & Public Affairs. 39(3). 207-237.
Faramelli, A. (2013). What's "Left" of Communism? Part I of II. [Blog] Critical Legal Thinking. URL: http://criticallegalthinking.com/2013/10/07/whats-left-communism/.
Harvey, D. (2000). Spaces of hope. Edinburgh University Press.
Kowarzik, W. S. (1985). Karl Marx as a Philosopher of Human Emancipation. Poznan Studies in the Philosophy of the sciences and the Humanities. 60. 355-368.
Lukacs, G. (1978). Ontology of Social Being Volume 2. Marx London: Merlin Press.
Lyotard, J. F., & Bennington, G., & Massumi, B. (Trans.). (1984). The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge. Minneapolis: Univ. of Minnesota Press.
Marx, K., & Milligan, M. (Ed.) (1988). Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844. New York: Dover Publications. INC.
Nancy, J. L., & Cornor, P. (Ed.). (1991). (L. Garbus., M. Holland., & S. Sawhney. Trans). The Inoperative Community. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Negri, A. (2011). Is It Possible to Be Communist Without Marx? A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory. 12(1). 5-14.
Negri, A., & Thomas, P. (Trans.). (2006). Goodbye Mr. Socialism. Toronto: Seven Stories Press.
Sakwa, R. (2013). The Soviet collapse: Contradictions and neo-modernisation, Journal of Eurasian Studies. 4(1). 65-77.
Strong, T. B. (2013). Politics Without Vision: Thinking without a Banister in The Twentieth Century. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Tosel, A. (2007). The Development of Marxism: From the End of Marxism-Leninism to a Thousand Marxisms-France-Italy, 1975-2005. Critical Companion to Contemporary Marxism. 16. 39-78.
Zizek, S. (2009). First As Tragedy, Then As Farce. London: Verso books.

Downloads

Published

23-08-2018

How to Cite

Pattnaik, S., & Upendra, C. (2018). Critical Reflections on the Fall Narrative of Communism. SOCRATES, 6(2), 34–50. https://doi.org/10.5958/2347-6869.2018.00010.9

Download Citation

Issue

Vol. 6 No. 2 (2018): Issue - June

Section

Philosophy

License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

Revised Copyright/CC license that applies to all the articles published after 05-02-2017

Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Author(s) will retain all the copyright of their published article. In the case of re-publishing, they will have to obtain written permission from the journal. Additional licensing agreements (Creative Commons licenses) grants rights to readers to Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material.The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.

Under the following terms:

▸ Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.▸ NonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes.▸ No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.

Nothing in this license impairs or restricts the authors’ rights. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA. Research Papers published in SOCRATES after 05-02-2017 are licensed under an Attribution -Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Date of revision: Creative common license: 05-02-2017

Copyright/CC license that applies to all the articles published before 05-02-2017

Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Author(s) will retain all the right except commercial and re-publishing rights. In the case of re-publishing, they will have to obtain written permission from the journal. Additional licensing agreements (Creative Commons licenses) grants rights to readers to copy, distribute, display and perform the work as long as you give the original author(s) credit, they can not use the works for commercial purposes and are not allowed to alter, transform, or build upon the work. For any reuse or distribution, readers and users must make clear to others the license terms of this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holders. Nothing in this license impairs or restricts the authors’ rights. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.

Research Papers published in SOCRATES are licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)