Unchaining the Dialectic: Toward a General and Intersectional Formulation of Marx’s Systematic-dialectical Method

• In Event: 121 - Section on Marxist Sociology Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 03. Marxist Research

Abstract

The goal of “bringing anti-systemic movements together” is a fundamental one. However, there is a danger that, by taking Marxian interpretations of concepts like “social system” and “world-system” for granted, theorists risk eliding many of the extra-economic practices, interests, and relations that inform social movement praxis. As such, my essay aims to critique and reconstruct traditional Marxian accounts of social systems, specifically by showing how the “systematic-dialectical” method – a method formulated by the philosopher G.W.F. Hegel and employed most famously by Karl Marx – can be generalized from its application to capitalism and used to theorize other, extra-economic systems such as those of hetero-patriarchy, white supremacy, and authoritarian statism. My justification for this project is based on an internal critique of Marx’s philosophy, whereby the validity of a critical social theory depends on its rootedness in the concepts generated through everyday life and social struggle. Given that contemporary activists are often driven not only by their experiences of exploitation under capitalism - but also by forms of oppression characteristic of extra-economic institutions like those aforementioned – it follows that, by Marx’s own epistemological criteria, the dialectical method should be extended beyond its traditional domain of political economy. Providing an initial account of such a method comprises the goal of this essay, which develops several prima facie insights, questions, and criteria of success that might guide a more comprehensive employment of the dialectical method to the end of better informing and uniting anti-systemic struggles.

Author

• Benjamin Levy