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Marx's Critique of Utilitarianism1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

G.G. Brenkert
G.G. Brenkert*
Affiliation:
University of Tennessee
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Extract

The nature of Marx's ethics has been a matter of considerable dispute since the latter part of the nineteenth century. Some have maintained that Marx had no ethics; others have claimed that his ethics is Kantian; and yet others have maintained that his ethics is utilitarian. The first two views were prominent at the turn of the century. It is the utilitarian view that seems to hold favor among a great many today. Thus Adam Schaff has claimed that ‘Marxist theory … leads to the general position that may be called “social hedonism” —the view that the aim of human life is to secure the maximum happiness for the broadest masses of the people … ’ Similarly, Derek Allen has claimed that ‘it is possible … to show that the arguments which support [Marx's and Engels’] moral judgments are utilitarian in all but name.’

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy Supplementary Volume , Volume 7: Marx and Morality , 1981 , pp. 193 - 220
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1981

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References

1 The following discussion is limited to Marx's views with respect to utilitarianism. I do not discuss Engels's views, since I do not assume that Marx's and Engels's views were identical. Indeed, there is sufficient evidence to indicate that their views were not identical. Thus, it might well prejudice the discussion of Marx's views on utilitarianism to use Engels's works.

2 Schaff, Adam, A Philosophy of Man (New York: Dell Publishing Co. 1963) 60Google Scholar

3 Allen, Derek P.H., ‘The Utilitarianism of Marx and Engels,’ American Philoso· phical Quarterly 10 (1973) 189;Google Scholar cf. also Allen, Derek P.H., ‘Reply to Brenkert's “Marx and Utilitarianism“', Canadian Journal of Philosophy 6 (1976) 517-34;CrossRefGoogle ScholarMcMurtry, John, The Structure of Marx's World-View (Princeton: Princeton U. P. 1978)Google Scholar

4 Schmidt, Alfred, The Concept of Nature in Marx (London: New Left Books 1971) 40Google Scholar

5 Hook, Sidney, Towards the Understanding of Karl Marx (New York: The John Day Co. 1933) 98-9Google Scholar

6 Kamenka, Eugene, The Ethical Foundations of Marxism (2nd ed., rev.; London: Routledge & Kegan Paul 1972);Google ScholarStojanovic, Svetozar, Between Ideals and Reality (London: Oxford U. P. 1973)Google Scholar

7 Sidney Hook, Towards the Understanding of Karl Marx, 98-9

8 I will mainly concern myself with the claims of Derek Allen (cf. footnote no. 3). His defense of the utilitarian interpretation of Marx's ethics is more detailed and worked out than the accounts of others.

9 Marx's explicit arguments and comments against utilitarianism are concentrated in roughly two periods of his work: 1844-1846 and 1865-1867. Some idea how infrequently Marx turned to the discussion of the utilitarianism of Bentham, James Mill and J.S. Mill can be obtained by noting the number of times Marx refers to these philosophers in his published and unpublished work. If one excludes personal letters, the Grundrisse, and Capital (all four volumes), Marx mentions Bentham only twice, James Mill four times, and J.S. Mill a total of seven times in the thirty seven years between 1846 and 1883.

10 Cf. Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The German Ideology,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Collected Works, Vol. V (New York: International Publishers 1976) 413Google Scholar

11 Mill, J.S., Principles of Political Economy, ed. Winch, Donald (Baltimore, Md.: Pelican Books 1970) 349Google Scholar

12 This indicates one way in which Marx was not a (moral) philosopher in the con· temporary Anglo-American sense.

13 Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The German Ideology,’ 413Google Scholar

14 For simplicity, from this point on, I will generally speak of utilitarians determining which actions produce the greatest good. That is, I will not also refer to rules. By this I do not mean to limit the discussion to act-utilitarianism, or take any position on the relation of act-utilitarianism and rule-utilitarianism.

15 Marx, Karl, Capital, Vol. I (New York: International Publishers 1972) 176Google Scholar

16 Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The German Ideology,’ 409Google Scholar

17 Mill's Utilitarianism was originally published in 1861.

18 Marx, Karl, ‘Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. Ill (New York: International Publishers 1975) 119Google Scholar

19 Marx, Karl, ‘Private Property and Communism,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. III (New York: International Publishers 1975) 299Google Scholar

20 Cf. Marx, Karl, ‘Private Property and Communism,’ 298Google Scholar

21 Karl, Marx, ‘Private Property and Communism,’ 300Google Scholar

22 Mill, John Stuart, ‘Utilitarianism,’ in Utilitarianism and Other Writings/Mill, ed. Warnock, Mary (New York: New American Library 1962) 268.Google Scholar Derek Allen points this passage out in his article, ‘Reply to Brenkert's “Marx and Utilitarianism”,’ 526.

23 Narveson, Jan, Morality and Utility (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1967) 82Google Scholar

24 Sartorius, Rolf E., Individual Conduct and Social Norms (Encino, Cal.: Dickenson Publishing Co. 1975) 28Google Scholar

25 Beauchamp, Tom L., ‘Utilitarianism and Cost/Benefit Analysis: A Reply to Macintyre,’ in Beauchamp, Tom L. and Norman E., Bowie eds. Ethical Theory and Business (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall 1979) 280Google Scholar

26 Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The German Ideology,’ 60Google Scholar

27 Sartorius, Rolf E., Individual Conduct and Social Norms, 28Google Scholar

28 Marx, Karl, ‘Contribution to Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law Introduction,' in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. Ill (New York: International Publishers 1975) 182Google Scholar

29 Narveson, Jan, Morality and Utility, 288Google Scholar

30 Cf. Derek P.H. Allen, ‘The Utilitarianism of Marx and Engels,’ and ‘Reply to Brenkert's “Marx and Utilitarianism“'

31 Marx, Karl, Capital, Vol. I, p. 153.Google Scholar The examples in this paragraph are taken from my article, ‘Marx and Utilitarianism,’ Canadian Journal of Philosophy 5 (1975) 422.

32 Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘Manifesto of the Communist Party,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. VI (New York: International Publishers 1976) 487Google Scholar

33 Ibid. 502

34 Allen, Derek P.H. makes this point himself in his ‘Reply to Brenkert … ‘ 518Google Scholar

35 Cf. Allen, ibid. 517-8

36 Cf. Section I above

37 Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The German Ideology,’ Collected Works, Vol. V, 78-9Google Scholar

38 Cf. Marx, Karl, ‘Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's … ‘ 186Google Scholar

39 Cf. Narveson, Morality and Utility, 82-5

40 This is the first criticism mentioned on p. 195.

41 Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The German Ideology,’ Collected Works 409;Google Scholar cf. also Marx, Karl, Grundrisse, trans. Nicolaus, Martin, (New York: Vintage Books 1973) 246Google Scholar

42 Cf. Barry, Brian, Political Argument (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul 1965) 4–8Google Scholar

43 Marx, Karl, Grundrisse, 163.Google Scholar Marx's view, discussed in this section, sounds similar to the view that Charles Fried recently expressed: ‘The maintenance of the integrity of the individual as the locus of valuation and choice is more important than the abstractions of happiness, pleasure, or excellence. These latter are, after all, rather the objects of individual evaluation. And if the primacy of the individual is to be maintained, if it is individuality, personality, which is the point of departure of ethical Judgments, then the “irrelevantly” particular must be allowed significance.’ Fried, Charles, Right and Wrong (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard U. P. 1978) 34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Needless to say, Marx's views of the nature of individuality and those of Fried differ.

44 Marx, Karl, ‘Human Requirements and Division of Labour under the Rule of Private Property,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. Ill (New York: International Publishers 1975) 310.Google Scholar Bernard Williams's criticism of utilitarianism on the grounds of the notion of integrity is closely related to this. Cf. Smart, J.J.C. and Bernard, Williams, Utilitarianism: For and Against (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P. 1973) 108-18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

45 Karl, Marx and Engels, Friedrich, The German Ideology,’ 408Google Scholar

46 Marx's views on dialectics with their emphasis on concreteness are also relevant.

47 Marx, Karl, ‘The Power of Money, in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. Ill (New York: International Publishers 1975) 326Google Scholar

48 Allen, , ‘Reply to Brenkert … ‘, 523Google Scholar

49 Allen gives this interpretation of ‘self-determination’ in ‘Reply to Brenkert … ‘ 520

50 Recall the argument of Sections I and II. When Marx says that desires are ‘false' he means more than simply that they happen to be based on misinformation.

51 Marx, Karl, ‘Private Property and Communism,’ 302Google Scholar

52 Cf. Allen, , ‘Reply to Brenkert ...’ 533Google Scholar

53 Marx, Karl, Capital: The Process of Capitalist Production as a Whole, Vol. Ill (New York: International Publishers 1967) 820.Google Scholar Cf. also, Marx, Karl, Grundrisse, 488Google Scholar

54 Marx, Karl, ‘Contribution to Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law Introduction,' 182Google Scholar

55 Cf. Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich, ‘The Holy Family,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. IV (New York: International Publishers 1975) 179Google Scholar

56 Marx, Karl, ‘Speech on the Question of Free Trade,’ in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. VI (New York: International Publishers 1976) 465Google Scholar

57 Marx, Karl, ‘The British Rule in India,’ in ed. Tucker, Robert C.The Marx-Engels Reader, (2nd ed., rev.; New York: W.W. Norton & Co. 1978) 658Google Scholar

58 Kant, Lmanual, ‘Perpetual Peace,’ in On History, ed. Lewis White Beck (New York: The Library of Liberal Arts 1963) 93-5Google Scholar

59 Cf. Turner, Bryan S., ‘The Concept of Social ‘Stationariness': Utilitarianism and Marxism,’ Science and Society 38 (1974) 12Google Scholar

60 Research for this paper was supported by a summer grant from the Faculty Research Fund, University of Tennessee, and by a grant from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.