From Neo-Marxism to Democratic Theory: Essays on the Critical Theory of Soviet-type Societies

By Andrew Arato

The essays in this volume trace an intellectual odyssey, a search for a genuinely critical theory. The book begins with the question of why the Frankfurt School as well as other neo-Marxist and post-Marxist analysts, both in the West and in dissident circles in the East, failed to produce a critical theory of Soviet socialism or to establish a dynamic relationship with contemporary social movements. As the political struggle in Eastern Europe intensified, the author of this book disengaged from his own efforts to reconstruct a critical Marxism. Instead, he attempts a reconstruction of democratic theory based on civil society rather than class categories, and with a critical relevance not only to the transition from state socialism but more generally to the universal goal of emancipation.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0873328825
• ISBN13: 9780873328821
• Release Date: July 1993
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 1.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.0" x 8.9"