Herbert Marcuse and the Crisis of Marxism

by Douglas Kellner

This book provides a critical overview of the entirety of Marcuse's work and discusses his enduring importance. Kellner had extensive interviews with Marcuse and provides hitherto unknown information about his road to Marxism, his relations with Heidegger and Existentialism, his involvement with the Frankfurt School, and his reasons for appropriating Freud in the 1950s.
In addition Kellner provides a novel interpretation of the genesis and structure of Marcuse's theory of one-dimensional society, of the development of his political theory, and of the role of aesthetics in his critical theory.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction

505 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1984

About the author

Douglas Kellner is a "third generation" critical theorist in the tradition of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research, or Frankfurt School. Kellner was an early theorist of the field of critical media literacy and has been a leading theorist of media culture generally.[citation needed] In his recent work, he has increasingly argued that media culture has become dominated by the forms of spectacle and mega-spectacle. He also has contributed important studies of alter-globalization processes, and has always been concerned with counter-hegemonic movements and alternative cultural expressions in the name of a more radically democratic society.

Kellner has written with a number of authors, including (with Steven Best) an award-winning trilogy of books on postmodern turns in philosophy, the arts, and in science and technology. More recently, he is known for his work exploring the politically oppositional potentials of new media and attempted to delineate what they term "multiple technoliteracies" as a movement away from the present attempt to standardize a corporatist form of computer literacy. Previously, Kellner served as the literary executor of the famed documentary film maker Emile de Antonio and is presently overseeing the publication of six volumes of the collected papers of the critical theorist Herbert Marcuse. At present, Kellner is the George Kneller Chair in the Philosophy of Education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Reviews

[Rachel Attard Chase]

I read one chapter from this book for a philosophy class.

It focused on Marcuse's book One-Dimensional Man and discussed his views on capitalism and its effects on the individual, who appears to have lost their identity and individuality. He proposes that capitalism will result in an advanced industrial society, that is, one which prioritises science, technology and 'technological rationality'.
He also delves into Marxism, refuting the Marxist theory that capitalism would eventually crumble due to issues such as conflict and class division, thus causing the workers to rise up and take control, creating a workers' state.

The chapter has definitely piqued my interest in reading the actual book (i.e. One-Dimensional Man), and I'll hopefully I'll get the determination (and courage) to pick it up soon.

[Daniel Schotman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though a lot of aspects of Marcuse's philosophy that is not discussed and does not deliver the promises it sets out in the beginning of the book, 40 years later it is still the most detailed intellectual biography on Marcuse available.