During the period when Laclau and Mouffe were urging us to go beyond Marxism in our politics, critical voices were also beginning to be heard from within the Marxist camp itself, and from the 1960s through to the 1980s we can observe the boundaries of Marxism being subjected to some rigorous testing. Hindess and Hirst, for example, although still proclaiming themselves Marxist, come very close to espousing a post-Marxist position in books such as Pre-Capitalist Modes of Production, Mode of Production and Social Formation, and Marx’s ‘Capital’ and Capitalism Today, and their impact on the development of post-Marxism deserves consideration – particularly since their rejection of classical Marxism is nearly as vigorous as Laclau and Mouffe’s. Hindess and Hirst adopt a reformist stance, drawing our attention to Marxism’s theoretical inadequacies, as well as to a tradition of ‘vulgar’ Marxism based on what to the authors is a series of misinterpretations of the original material. While to some extent their project is a contribution to the ‘what Marx really said’ genre, eventually it goes well beyond this in its criticism not just of the history of Marxism but of Marx himself, suggesting that a large-scale revision of the theory is urgently called for if it is to continue to play any significant cultural role.