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Marxism and Morality: Reflections on the Revolutions of 1989

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 September 2012

Steven Lukes
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Abstract

Can the momentous events in Tianamen Square and the revolutionary changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe be seen as the inevitable triumph of one political ideology over another? Was there a political morality of “Official Communism”? The author identifies the features and framework within which Marxism endured, particularly as a promise of “political emancipation” whereby the individual would achieve “universal freedom” from capitalism and slavery through cooperation and struggle. Yet, ultimately, the pluralist-led events of 1989 demonstrated that protests were aimed at achieving justice, fairness, and identity in the name of the “people,” a refutation of oppression and the arbitrary allocation of resources and advantages by the nomenklatura. The author contends that the Marxist morality failed because it didnt deliver on its promises.

Type
Articles
Information
Ethics & International Affairs , Volume 4 , March 1990 , pp. 19 - 31
Copyright
Copyright © Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs 1990

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References

1 Dworkin, Ronald, A Matter of Principle (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 184 and 408.Google Scholar

2 Cited in Tismaneanu, V., The Crisis of Marxist Ideology in Eastern Europe: The Poverty of Utopia, (London: Routledge Press, 1988), p. 115.Google Scholar

3 Tismaneanu's book, cited above, is a good recent study of all this.Google Scholar

4 For an explanation of this claim, see Lukes, Steven, Marxism and Morality (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985), Conclusion.Google Scholar

5 Cited in Tismaneanu, , The Crisis of Marxist Ideology, p. 216Google Scholar.

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* Author's Note: I owe particular thanks to Maurice Glasman whose seminar paper on this topic inspired me to write this.Google Scholar