Anti-Marxism in Academia?

[Dooga Aetrus Blackrazor]

I'm not sure where this topic belongs. Feel free to movie it. I study Philosophy and Political Science in Canada. Here is my confusion. Despite the supposedly leftist bias in academia, Marxism receives a great deal if discredit from both faculty and students alike.

In my current class, we studied Hobbies (monarchist), Plato (elitist), Locke (capitalist, Rousseau (idealist), and Nozick (libertarian).

Of all the academic courses I've taken, no political philosopher receives more criticism from both students and professors than Karl Marx. Why? Even if you disagree with Marx, why aren't you more worried about a monarchist? Because his ideas are "dead," perhaps? It confuses me how academia seems systematically opposed to Marx more than any other philosopher. It's like we keep learning about Karl Marx solely so people can try to discredit him.

Thoughts? Similar experiences? Most philosophers who were "wrong," you'd think, would be discussed, but there incorrectness would be taken for granted. Marx's flaws seem to insisted upon in academia.

[Jimmie Higgins]

When you study Marx it quickly becomes apparent that he's not talking about ideas for the sake of ideas and I think that is threatening in academia.

Even people like Rousseau are de-fanged and talked about in really abstract ways in my experience.

Gramsci is a great example of how academia treats active radicals. Gramsci studies is a big field and most Post-modernists talk about Gramsci, but I bet if you took a course on him, they would treat his marxism and activism like a class might treat Mark Twain's experiences as a worker on a boat in his youth. Academics love a revolutionary like Gramsci (while there's no Lenin-studies or Bakunin-studies) because he was incredibly dense in his writings. He had to hide his political advocacy behind philosophical code-words because he was in a fascist jail for his activism and modern academics fell for the trick and ignore the code. So profs love to expound on him while ignoring the fact that the basis of his ideas were his revolutionary experiences in Italy and desire for the Russian Revolution to succeed and spread to the rest of the working class.

[Il Medico]

They try to discredit Marx because, for the most part, they are products of the capitalist education system. They have been trained as kids to hold these view and now as adults, they use their expanded vocabulary and reputation to discredit something they never seriously looked at, because they are afraid they will agree. And hence be punished by their bourgeois employers, and discredited themselves.

[which doctor]

I don't have a whole lot of experience within the humanities department, but I do have a professor who's told me that nearly all of the English department at my university is Marxist, maybe not explicitly, but the tendency toward Marxist theory is definitely apparent. Keep in mind that this is an academic Marxism, which is much different from a practical Marxism. I don't think I go to an especially radical school either, it's just your typical urban State U.

[mikelepore]

Daniel De Leon, letter to Charles H. Chase, 1913 :

"Lecture rooms on mineralogy, on astronomy, on the differential calculus, on law, on electricity, on anatomy, on all of these and similar subjects, are not liable to become centers from which mental corruption radiates. True, there may be, as there often is, corruption in the appointment of the professors in these, as in all other, branches - but the corruption ends there. The reason is obvious. There is no motive for misdirecting instruction. There may be lack-of-uptodateness; there may be even ignorance; a set purpose to corrupt and mislead is not likely. It is otherwise with regard to the social sciences. Some indirectly, most of them directly, bear upon the class struggle. Indeed, it would go hard to pick out one branch of the social sciences that is not begotten of the palpitations of the class struggle. Where the class struggle palpitates, material interests are at stake. It is an established principle that the material interests of a ruling class, in part, promote immorality. To promote incapacity to reason upon the domain of sociology is one of the corrupt practices of ruling class material interests."

[Nwoye]

well Marx didn't make any significant contributions in political philosophy, as that has been an area where marxism has made little venture (save for G.A. Cohen). Marxism is much more important when studying political economy or sociology.

[Pawn Power]

God, you coundln't get through my department without reading Marx.

[Jimmie Higgins]

The only time Marx was required in any of my college courses was in a basic European History class.

[More Fire for the People]

At my uni, a lot of history professors dig Bernstein's revision of Marxism.

[bezdomni]

Didn't bother reading the entire thread, but I have found the worst anti-Marxism in academic to come from academics who actually describe themselves as being Marxists.

My macroeconomics professor, for instance, was a self-described Marxist and had volumes of Marx and Engels in his office - as well as other radical literature. However, his class was always coming from the perspective of "what is the best course for america?" and never about humanity. He focused a lot on market failure and some weakness in neoclassical theory. However, when asked "what do you think the best example of actual socialism in the history of the world is?" his response was an isolated group of muslims in northern spain who all vote on matters in factories - but only men are allowed to work or drive cars and the commodities they produce are still sold on a world market. It was like a big, sexist, religious co-op. And he seriously called this socialism.

[Bilan]

Marx is regularly referred to in sociology at my uni. And usually in a positive way. Every now and then in a lecture, they'll take a cheap shot, and I'll be lurking in the crowd. :lol:
And I've battled lecturers on Marx. Most of the cheap shots are retracted quite quickly.

[Joohoo]

From what I learnt from my university, Linköping in Sweden is that in Political Science, Marx is a funny guy that has some funny ideas. That's what our teacher said straight out in the course about Political Philosophy. Only focusing on guys like Bentham, Locke and Smith and the old ones like Platon. Marx got like 5% time of the whole course, very disappointing. I didn't continue my studies after one term in disgust of the bias that is Political science, instead I moved on to Cultural Geography which is more open for everything, was here I first heard about David Harvey.

I don't even want to know how Econonmic classes are like.

Btw my first post here. :D

[Joohoo]

Marx is regularly referred to in sociology at my uni. And usually in a positive way. Every now and then in a lecture, they'll take a cheap shot, and I'll be lurking in the crowd. :lol:
And I've battled lecturers on Marx. Most of the cheap shots are retracted quite quickly.
Same at my uni. Sociology and Political Science are really two opposite sides in politics from my view and experience.

[Glenn Beck]

Discussing Marx, even positively, is accepted and even expected. Understanding Marx on the other hand is much more rare, even among self-professed Marxists.

http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/modernism/sokal2.htm (http://www.columbia.edu/%7Elnp3/mydocs/modernism/sokal2.htm)

Its like there's some kind of block in much of academia to a serious engagement with many of Marx's ideas. I suppose its because liberal-left views tend to be taken as the default and more left-wing views tend to get muddled with liberal ones leading to a mixed message.

[21st Century Kropotkinist]

I'm not sure where this topic belongs. Feel free to movie it. I study Philosophy and Political Science in Canada. Here is my confusion. Despite the supposedly leftist bias in academia, Marxism receives a great deal if discredit from both faculty and students alike.

In my current class, we studied Hobbies (monarchist), Plato (elitist), Locke (capitalist, Rousseau (idealist), and Nozick (libertarian).

Of all the academic courses I've taken, no political philosopher receives more criticism from both students and professors than Karl Marx. Why? Even if you disagree with Marx, why aren't you more worried about a monarchist? Because his ideas are "dead," perhaps? It confuses me how academia seems systematically opposed to Marx more than any other philosopher. It's like we keep learning about Karl Marx solely so people can try to discredit him.

Thoughts? Similar experiences? Most philosophers who were "wrong," you'd think, would be discussed, but there incorrectness would be taken for granted. Marx's flaws seem to insisted upon in academia.


There is a great deal of Marxist tradition within academia that emerged from the New Left. That said, in your average university, you're not going to have a majority of leftists teaching you. The Western educational system is designed to weed people out who think outside the box. So, you won't hear much positive about Marx from these people who's rough edges have been sanded down. Many people go into academia as radicals, and many probably still are, but know what they can say that will be tolerated. Look at what happened to Ward Churchill and Norman Finkelstein. If you don't know, these two men were leftists who were up-front about their politics. Both were fired for their respective beliefs concerning 9/11 and Israel. So, I think academicians are scared to bring ideology into the classroom. People need jobs, unfortunately.

However, I would say that Marx is treated better than any anarchists in academia. Oftentimes, anarchism is simply omitted from academia in its entirety; it's like it never happened. Plus, in certain departments like sociology, Marx is pretty revered. But generally, I'd agree with you: universities are extremely tame and conservative. It just shows how reactionary the right-wing is that they think academia and Hollywood, two generally stagnant and conservative entities, are far-left.

[Vincent]

My experience in Australia is that Marxism is given the academic treatment it deserves ..in whatever discipline it is being discussed in. I am at a G8 university, and I've come across Marx in political philosophy, and politics - in both cases Marx was given his fair share in the academic debates in those particular areas. Sure, there is a big practical side to Marxism ...but, Marx and Engels aren't the only ones to have written on political economy and such.

A far as academics and poopooing Marxism goes - they're allowed to, and let them do it. If you are an 'active' Marxist you don't need their opinions anyway, right?

[Post-Something]

All you need for first year courses in Sociology and Politics is a Marxist analysis. Or at least that's how I've gotten by. Most lectures, he gets at least a third of the time spent on his perspective.

Economics is another thing though..

[rednordman]

They try to discredit marx because students go to univercities for their own narcisistical gains (for instance: If i am a proffessor, i can live a cushty secure lifetyle and get treated better than someone who has to labour hard to make a living, I also get 200xs more respect and am listened to and believed). Also students go to univercity to 'get ahead of the competition' and have opportunity to live 'better than others'.

Though i understand the has been alot of marxist students in the past, those times seem to be gone as education is now a product and commodity, to be brought. Hence, it must now be seen as a bit self defeating to consider marxist ideals, as students are only their to 'get ahead of the pack' and not really to help better society nowadays.