ABSTRACT
Outside of academia, it may seem strange to consider Marxism as a major competitor in discussions of political systems, since outside of a few countries (albeit very large ones in some cases!), democratic capitalism reigns supreme as the only acceptable framework of government and economic organization (for discussion, see G. Cohen 1995: 245-65). But this judgment is based on several fundamental misconceptions: first, Marxism comes in various forms, and few political philosophers calling themselves Marxists would point to China, North Korea, or Cuba as their model for Marxist political systems; second, Marxism is not by nature or by implication (according to its defenders) anti-democratic. Indeed, left-wing critics of capitalist societies plausibly claim that the vast inequalities in wealth and power that capitalism fosters is precisely antithetical to democracy (is your impact on the outcome of government policies really equal to a billionaire’s?). Moreover, most varieties of Marxism being defended these days include a vital role for economic markets in the production and distribution of goods (for discussion of the complexity of distinguishing capitalism from socialism, see Christman 1994: Chapter 2). And third, Marxism represents more than a blueprint for throwing off capitalism and adopting socialism (though that is certainly a crucial part of it), it is also a method for conducting social theory itself, one which carries with it a certain critical stance toward capitalism, but is not reducible to that stance nor to the recommendation of any particular form of socialism. It is an approach to social theory which calls into question the fundamental normative and methodological assumptions of traditional political philosophy (and it is this aspect of Marxism that we will stress here – for discussion of what is essential about Marxism see, for example, Lukács 1971: 1, Althusser [1969] 1996, Elster 1985 and Roemer 1988).
