Lenin Reloaded: Toward a Politics of Truth

[sic] #7

by Sebastian Budgen (Editor), Stathis Kouvelakis (Editor), Slavoj Žižek (Editor)

Lenin Reloaded is a rallying call by some of the world’s leading Marxist intellectuals for renewed attention to the significance of Vladimir Lenin. The volume’s editors explain that it was Lenin who made Karl Marx’s thought explicitly political, who extended it beyond the confines of Europe, who put it into practice. They contend that a focus on Lenin is urgently needed now, when global capitalism appears to be the only game in town, the liberal-democratic system seems to have been settled on as the optimal political organization of society, and it has become easier to imagine the end of the world than a modest change in the mode of production. Lenin retooled Marx’s thought for specific historical conditions in 1914, and Lenin Reloaded urges a reinvention of the revolutionary project for the present. Such a project would be Leninist in its commitment to action based on truth and its acceptance of the consequences that follow from action.These essays, some of which are appearing in English for the first time, bring Lenin face-to-face with the problems of today, including war, imperialism, the imperative to build an intelligentsia of wage earners, the need to embrace the achievements of bourgeois society and modernity, and the widespread failure of social democracy. Lenin Reloaded demonstrates that truth and partisanship are not mutually exclusive as is often suggested. Quite the opposite—in the present, truth can be articulated only from a thoroughly partisan position.

Contributors. Kevin B. Anderson, Alain Badiou, Etienne Balibar, Daniel Bensaïd, Sebastian Budgen, Alex Callinicos, Terry Eagleton, Fredric Jameson, Stathis Kouvelakis, Georges Labica, Sylvain Lazarus, Jean-Jacques Lecercle, Lars T. Lih, Domenico Losurdo, Savas Michael-Matsas, Antonio Negri, Alan Shandro, Slavoj Žižek

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, Theory, Nonfiction, History, Lenin

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

Reviews

[Christian Haines · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book consists of an interesting set of essays, each of which asks the question of what is to be done with the work of Lenin. The presupposition of this question is that interpreting Lenin means asking how one relates to his historical reality in the present. For many of the writers (Jameson, Eagleton, Zizek, Badiou, Negri...), this is an opportunity to 1) suggest a critique recognizing systemic problems/contradictions in the capitalist world-system (in other words, the figure of Lenin looks at the larger picture, not just the local conditions); 2) articulate the possibility of radical antagonism (not just the shuffling of party positions, but a critique of the state system, and, more significantly perhaps, a division of the world into capitalists and a revolutionary subject). In a sense, Badiou's "one becomes two" is a distillation of these thrusts - the unified system of global capitalism is countered by dividing it against itself, by splitting it into those willing to support it and those willing to overthrow it. All of these writers confront the question of whether revolution is or ever will be on the table of political and historical possibilities, which is to say they all confront the sense of the "end of history" (the unchallenged hegemony of liberal democracy and capitalism) that some hasty and over-simplifying liberal intellectuals imagined following from the end of the Soviet Union. For Jameson, thinking of Lenin keeps alive the very idea of revolution as systematic change or even the change of the system itself, instead of permutations or modifications of an already established system. All of this being said, Lenin constitutes not an answer in this volume but a series of questions or problematics. Many authors disagree about the direction to take Lenin. For example, some argue for a dialectical Lenin, others for a biopolitical Lenin incompatible with the logic of the dialectic. Some argue for Lenin as the figure of the analyst (Eagleton, Zizek), others as the figure of spontaneity. I think what makes this an interesting volume is that one finds communication between these different takes on Lenin's thought, without collapsing into any homogenous party-line.

[Shulamith Farhi · Rating 5 out of 5]

A stimulating collection of essays. Michael-Matsas, Jameson, Balibar and Lih go the furthest in theoretical re-framing. A number of interesting gestures can be found in Badiou, Anderson, Kouvelakis, Lazarus, Lecercle and Shandro.

***

Take two. The Michael-Matsas piece alone is worth the price of admission. I want to say a bit about why that essay blew me away (I'm still thinking about it). His move is incredibly ambitious: the part of Lenin that is hardest to swallow, his embrace of Hegel in WWI to prove a point to the Machists, turns out to be a shift from the aporetic frustration of What is to be Done? to the increasing programmatic certainty of State and Revolution and the Imperialism text. This sentence still sends shivers down my spine: "The 'assault on heaven' began in the Berne Library, over the open books of Hegel." Hegel turns out to have been the Marxist red sea, which we must pass through to arrive at the freedom of materialist dialectics. Along the way, he finds amusing material from the archive; a personal favorite is Lenin's take on Aristotle:

"Delightful! There are no doubts about the reality of the external world. The man gets into a muddle precisely over the dialectics of the universal and the particular, of concept and sensation... of essence and of phenomenon etc."

Lenin was a funny dude!

I'm grateful to this text. In his short story The Dusty Hat, Mieville describes a strange encounter at a conference, where an old man reveals himself to be made of sentient dust bent on bringing about communism of the Intellect. Reading this essay was like meeting that man. This was the text that recruited me to join the war on the side of the dust, and I will never forget it.

No matter how deep the melancholy you're feeling, I guarantee you it's not worse than what happened to Lenin at the collapse of the SI. That he found a way out of his despair is a lesson in hope that we can still apply today. When in doubt, go deeper down the rabbit hole. The worst thing that can happen is you get pie on your face. At best, you find others who have new strategies and you train each other to get better at solving problems.

[Jacob Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Truly a mixed bag of essays. Some were brilliant explorations of Lenin's thought and relevance for contemporary politics, issues, and theory; other essays in this edition were truly morbid symptoms of its publishing date: utter unserious fluff, unconcerned with the central question of the text.

Hard to recommend this book without serious qualifications. Individual pieces within, however, can and should be sought out. Especially re: Lenin's return to Hegelian dialectics, and his insights into materialist *practice* of idealist dialects. Interesting ideas in here as well about Lenin and Luxemburg's insights into finance in an era of finance capital run amok. However, one can and should ignore the scribblings about Lenin and culture or Lenin and religious affect and Lenin and Lacanian linguistics unless they are specifically your fields of study-- they are the principal discreditable works sandwiched among the really interesting bits.

[Paul Ispas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Zizek este unul dintre puținii filozofi contemporani care ne merită atenția. Recunosc că am luat cartea datorită numelui autorului. Ea este o colecție interesantă de eseuri pe tema relevanței contemporane a lui Lenin, însă mă așteptam la puțin mai mult decât a fost prezentat. Zizek reușește să prindă atenția cititorului cu câte un argument aparent relevant, dar îl pierde în explicarea acestui argument. Unele argumente le-am recunoscut din alte lucrări ale lui, deci n-a fost nevoie să le înțeleg. Altele însă m-au pierdut. De aceea zic că această carte este un pic cam ”pentru fani”. Și în timp ce ajută la înțelegerea Leninismului și a unor aspecte bune ale acestuia, are carențe în a realiza ceea ce-și propune: relevanța contemporană a primului lider Soviet.

[Harry · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection very much of its era, 17 lads come together to discuss Lenin at the Millennium. Contributions vary from people who have deeply read and lived with Lenin, those who have played with him, and many who are writing not because they have something to say, but because their profile means they 'ought' to have something to say.

Standout, and worth dipping into, are the Bensaid, Balibar, Losurdo, Lih, and Shandro.

[Cosmin Sipoş · Rating 4 out of 5]

Didn't expect Zizek to be so compelling and attractive. Definitely a relevant voice for the so-much hated and undeservingly "marxisistized" Left.

[Chet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read Domenico Losurdo's contribution.

[Derek · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s just interesting to read articles by modern intellectuals who haven’t given up on Lenin. Fashion is truly cyclical.

[C · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely an interesting set of philosophical essays, by giants in the field of philosophy.
As usual, what Badiou and Zizek have to say is either incomprehensible, or asinine. One feels that the only reason Zizek's essay made it into this book is because he's the editor. Otherwise, the essays by Terry Eagleton, Frederick Jameson, Lars Lih, Domenico Losurdo, and others, are top notch.

[Barbara Allen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The essays by Terry Eagleton and Lars Lih were thought-provoking, written with clarity and wit, and enjoyable to read.