ALTHUSSER

A Critical Reader
bb Y
GREGORY ELLIOTT
Copyright e Preface, arrangement and editorial Gtegory Elliott, 1994;
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Althuser; A Critical Reader I Gregory Elliotr.
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c.
Indu.des bibliogr. phital referen aod indo.
ISBN 0..531-1SS06-1 (alk. papet) - ISB} 0-631-1&807-X (alk. papfr)
1. Althusser, Luis. l. Pbilosopby, French - 20th century.
3. M:oist aitici$r. I. Elliott, Gregory,
B2430.A474A65 1994
194-dc0
Typeset in 10 on Il pt Sa bon
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CONTENTS
Preface
Gregory Elliott
Acknowledgements
1 The Structure of Capital
E. ]. Habsbawm
2 Marxist History; a History in the Making:
Towards a Dlalogue with Althusser
Pirre Via
3 Althusser's Theory of Ideology
Paul Ri'coeur
4 History and Inreraction: On the Structuralist Interpretation
of Historical Materialism
Axel Honneth
5 Althussr, Structuralism and the French Epistemological
Tradition
Peter Dews
vii
xvii
1
10
44
73
104 \
6 Thinking with Borrowed Concepts: Althusser and Lacan 142
Dauid Marey
7 Mesage i.n a Bottle: Althusser in Literary Studies
Francis Mulhe
8 Analysis Terminated, Analysis Interminable:
The Case of Louis Althusser
Gregory Elliott
Bibliography of the Published Writings of Luis Althusser
159
177 ,;
203
PREFACE
Towards the end of his Cool Memories, Jean Baudiillard scornfully reflects
as follows:
Human rights, dissidence, antiracism, SOS-this, SOS-that: thes are soft,
eay, pst coitum historicum ideologie, 'after-the-orgy' ideologie for an easy
going generation which has known neither hard ideologies nor radical philo
sphies. The ideology of a generation which is nee-sntimental in its politics
tO which has redisovered altruism, cnviviality, international charity and
the individual bleeding heart. Emotional outpourin, solidarity, csmopol
iu.n emotiveessg multi-media pathos: all soft values hanhly condemned by
the Nietzschean, Marxo-Freudian age. . . . A new generation, that of the spoilt
children of the crisis whereas the preceding one was that of the accursed
children of history.'
Were it necessary to identif the thinker who best symbolizes the 'Marxo
Freudian age', a strong contender -would surely be the Communist philos
opher, Louis Althusser, whose 'ideology' (to borrow Baudrillard's casual
obscenity) prtains to the coitum historicum between the French intelli
gentsia and Marxism after the Liberaton.
That Althusser was the accursed child of more than one history is by
now wellknown; the posthumous publication of his 'autobiography',
L'avenir dure longtemps, affords suffcient, if deceptive, testimony. Yet
he _not only fgures among the intellectual progeny of a dramatic French
history, punctuated not by the tribulations of l franc fort and Euro
Disney, but by fascist leagues and Populai Front; by defeat and occupation,
collaboration and resistance; by 'savage wars of peace' abroad (Vietnam,
Algeria) and undelared civil war at home (the overthrow of the Fourth
Republic and installation of the Fifth, the 'Generals' putsch' and the OAS,
May '68 and March '7). He was not only a contemporary of Les Teps
Modernes and Tel Quel, of existentialism and (posr.)structuralism, of le
VIII PREFACE
nouveau roan and la nouvelle vague, He was a progenitor of intellectual
developments-one of which, by an unintended consquence of Althusserian
action, was his own eventual effacement from the scene. Althusser wa an
agent, as well as a reagent (and victim). In elaborating a version of Marx
ism which Francis Mulhern has aptly described as 'a critical classicism'/
he occupies a crucial - and ineradicable - position in modern French
intellectual culture.
To begin with, his endeavour to salvage historical materialism as an
explanatory science, both from its ossifcation under Stalinist auspices and
its demotion or denigration at Western-Marxist hands, renders him a
central fgure in the anti-existentialist and anti-phenomenological turn
in French philosophy in the 1960s. Just as, after reading Feuerbach's
Essence of Christianity, Engels and his contemporaries 'al! becme at once
Feuerbachians', so, upon the appearance of Pour Marx and Lire le Capital,
a cohort of young French intellectuals turned Althusserian! where Sartre
had been, Althusser would be. Or rather - and more accurately in one
crucial respect - where Sartre had not ben, Althusser would be: in the
French Communist Party. Refusing the available models of the indepnd
ent intellectual-Sartre-and the compliant ideologue-Garaudy-Althusser
took advantage of the Khrushchevite thaw in the international Communist
movement to propound his critique and reconstruction of actually existing
Marxism from within its ranks. He articulated Marxist philosophy and
Communist politics in a manner that stilled, if it did not altogether
dispel, the doubts of a generation instructed by the wunter-examples of
Zhdanovism and Lysenkoism. As his comrade and collaborator, Etienne
Balibar, remarked at his funeral:
To be at once totally a philosopher ad totally a Communist, without sac
rifcing, subordinating, or subjecting the one the other; such is the intel
lectual singularity of Althusser, such was his wager and the risk he
took + .. Because Althusser won that wager, Marxism ... and Cmmunism are
inscribed in the history of French. phi losoph
y i the scond half of the twn
tieth century. And no-one can disloge them without leavin a gaping hole.3
There is, however, a further - profoundly paradoxical - reason for
Althusser's salience in post-war French intellectual histry: namely, the
unwitting pilot role he played in the widespread transfer of Parisian alle
giances from versions of Marxism to varieties of 'post-MarxLsm'. Expelv
ling homo dialecticus and the Hegelian heritage, renouncing autarky and
restoring dialogue with non (or even antH Marxist-traditions, assimilating
'Nietzscheo-Heideggerian', as well as Spinozist-Bachelardian, motifs, the
Althusserian 'renovation' of hlstorical materialism interseted with broader
current in GaBie philosophical culture, associated with the names of Claude
Levi-Strauss or Jacques Lacan, Michel Foucault or Jacques Derrida, and
PREFACE IX
assembled under the flag of Convenience, 'theoretical antihumanism', by
those who spoke in verba magitri.
'
Source and compnent part of la pensee
68, 'structural Marxism' may be seen in retrospect as a transitional
theoretial problematic - a vulnerable compromis-formation, in effect,
between the Marxist legacy and non-Marxist modes, whose (auto-) decon
struction signalled the eclipse of one ascendant star of the 'Nietzschean,
Freudo-Marxist age'.
Whether or not the contemporary disenchantment with historical mater
ialism is justifed. is a guestion beyond the remit of this Preface and Critical
Reader (although it is touched upon in Francis Mulhern's essay). It could
be that its agents (and patients) fnd themselves in the unenviable condition
diagnosed by Sartre in Words: 'Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchant
ment for truth.' However that may be, an appreciation of what one of its
best analysts has dubbed 'the rise and fall of structural Marxism'5 is in
dispensable t an understanding of the renaissance and obsolescence alike
of historical materialism in recent decades, not only in France but in the
Anglophone world. Without pretending to exhaustivity, Althusser: A
Critical Reader aims to contribute to that task.
A few words about the principles guiding its compilation are in order.
First, although it will be for the Critical Reader on Critical Readers doubt
less in the offng to judge, I have (I hope) taken the publisher's rubric
literally: what follows is a critical anthology, composed in the belief
that critique is a more genuine form of intellectual commemoration than
apologia. Accordingly) it comes neither to praise, nor to bury, Althusser.
Hence- with the possible exception of my own- each of the articles pub
lished here refutes (which is not to say merely repudiates) quintessential
Althusserian propositions. Second, rather than reprinting and commis
sioning a host of sorter pieces, I have opted for a combination of the ters
and synoptic, on the one hand, with the detailed and discursive, on the
other; quantitative quality, as it were. Third, I have given preference to
authors who tret AlthusSer's texts in various of their contexts, locating
them, sub specie temporis, in one or more of the wider histories and cultures
to which they belong. Fourth, I have selected contributions to the debate
which are either less readily accessible, or less familiar, than other items
in the secondary literature.6 Fifth, whilst it is a matter for regret that the
budget allowed me did not permit of more than a single translation/ I have
tried to provide some indication of the continental reaction, Marxist and
nonMaixist, to Althusser- , by giving ter virtually half of the volume
to material which has for the most part been negleted by Anglophone
commentators.
Inevitably partial and ultimately arbitrary in its selections, in addition
to any sins of commission for which it is culpable, the Reader must confess
at least one of omission: the hJhly regrettable absence of any feminist
X PREFACE
contribution. This was not for want of solicitation. However, of those
approached to offer a feminist balance.sheet of the Althusserian moment,
none, for a variety of reasons, found herself both willing and able to accept
the commission. Consequently, apart from passing references by David
Macey and Francis Mulhern, the volume is bereft of any reflection on a
key dimension of the Althusserian impact upn intellectual work, and I
can on! y refer the reader elsewhere.
Each of the ensuing texts speaks more than ade-quately for itself; and I do
not propose to paraphrase their content. [t may, however, be helpful briefly
to situate them, indicate their focus, and note any editorial i' ntervenrions.
The Reader opens with E,J, Hobsbawm's review of Pour Marx and Lire
l Capital, originally published in the Times Literary Supplement in 1966
and then reprinted in Revofutionaries (1973). Hobsbawm-an almost exact
contemporary of Althusser's -should need no introduction t prospective
readers; he is quite simply one of the foremost Marxist historians of the
twentieth century. In the space of a mere fve thousand words, he brings
his immense, cosmoplitan erudition, and more than three decades' expri
ence (at time of writing) of European Communism, to bear upon the advent
of Althusserian Marxism in Thorez' Parti Communiste Pranais and de
Gaulle's France. Better than any comparable essay in English, Hobsbawm
both contextualizes Althusser's initiative and tactfully sketches the main
lines of much subequent criticism of it. In order to presrve the flavour
of the original, I have retained Professor Hobsbawm's own translations
of A!thusser's French and his citations from the frst edition of Lire le
Capital.
Seven years after Hobsbawm introduce the name of Althusser across
the Channel, Althusserianism was in fuH florescence not only in Britain
and Western Europe generally, but in Latin America, eliciting eulogy and
obloquy in equal measure. As Hobsbawm had foreseen, and as E.- P.
Thompson's broadside of 1978, The Poverty of Theory, would demon
strate, Marxist historians were especially sceptical_ of) or inimical to, what
Althusser himself described as 'the very summary (and therefore unilateral)
character of the few paragraphs devoted to "history" in the polemical con
text of Reading Capital' ,9 The- second text,printed here revolves around the
blanket Althusserian condemnation of 'empiricism' and 'historlcismj in the
practice of mainstream and Marxist historiography alike A leading mem
ber of the second generation of the Annales school of French historians,
Pierre Vilar, who from 1962 until his retirement held the chair in social
history at the Sorbonne whose previous tenants had been Marc Bloch and
Ernest Labrousse, is the author of La Catalogne dans l'Espagne modere
(1962) and A Histoy of Gold and Money {1969). His article-originally
published in Annales (January/February 19n), translated in New Left
Review that summer, and explicitly sub-titled 'Towards a Dialogue with
PREFACE XI
A
lthusser'10 - is remarkable for its equanimity in the face of Althusser's
provoc;.tions, By turns generous in its admissions and frm in its rebuttals,
Vilar's wideranging tour d'horizon has been moderately abridged by the
removal of two introductory sections (pp. 65-72 of the original, dealing
with Marx as historian and the status of economic theory), and the sacrifce
of some explanarory notes added by the English editors.
-
while stnl largely Uknown outside of the- French academy, Althusser
had in 1955 crossed swords with Paul Ricoeur over the philosophy of
hiStlty. Thirten years later, Ricoeur would be one of his interlocutors at
the stormy session of the Societe franise de Philosophie at which Althusser
read his clebrated lecture, 'Lenin and Phiiosophy'.11 A leading post-war
French philosopher, for many years based at the University of Paris X
(Nanterre), and then resident at Chicago University, Ricoeur is the author
of a volUminous oeuvre, ranging from Freud and Philosophy (19. 64) to the
three volumes of Time and Narrative (1983-85). He is unique among the
contributors ro this volume in that he is not now, and never has been1 a
Marxist. Audf{sus de !a melee marxiste, the exponent of an innovative
blend of phenomenology and hermeneutics, Ricoeur is committed, reso
lutely against the
-
Parisian current, to a certain humanism. These afflia
tions are evident in his attentive probing of Althusser's account of the
conjoint subjectifcation/subjection of social agents via the mechanisms of
ideology. Rkoeur's text derives from three lectures on Althusser delivered
as part of a series at Chicago in autumn 1975, and eventully published
by Columbia University Press in 1986 as Lecttlres on Ideology and Utopia.
The extract below essentially comprises the second and third lecture
(pp. 124-57)) specifcally focused on the theory of ideology, whereas the
frst interrogates Althusser's postulate of an 'epistemo_logical break' in
Marx's theoretical development. In preparing them for publication, I have
cut Ricoeur's resume

s of previous lectures, anglicized spelling, punctuation

and references, and slightly amended t page reference system.
In an interview released in 1985 Jiirgen Habermas remarked, with un
wonted hauteur, that '[h]aving rejected the orthodoxy of the philosophy
of history, I had no wish to lapse back either into ethical socialism, or into
scientism, or indeed into both at once. This explains why I hardly read
Althusser.'12 Fortunately, the same has not been true of all members of the
second or third generations of the Frankfurt School. In 1971 Alfred Schmidt
published a careful response to what he regarde as the 'structuralist
attack on history', which was translated a decade later as History and
Structure. The long text by Axel Hohneth translated here originally
appeared m German in 1977, in an anthology of writings on historical
materialism edited by him in collaboration with Urs JaeggiY Currently
Professor of Philosophy at the Free University, Berlin, and author of The
Critique of Power (1985) and The Struggle for ReLognitio (forthcoming
in English translation), Honneth criticizes, inter alios, Vilar (whose essay
XII
PREFACE
appeared in the same collection) for undue mdulgence towards Althusser.
Ar
g
uin
g
that Althusser conflates quite distinct philosophical and plitical
projects under the catcha!l of 'historicism', and misconstrues Marx's
anatomy of the peculiar logic of capital as the paradigm for a general
structural theory of history, Honneth lucidly articulates the main areas of
contention between the principal rival schools of Western Marxism in the
1960s and 70s. To facilitate publication of the article in its entirety, the
notes- in particular, thoe referring to the details of contemporary West
German debates and their accompanying literature -have, with Professor
Honneth's consent, been considerably abridged.
A prominent British exponent of the Habermasian brand of CriHcal
Theory is Peter Dews, whose collection of interviews with Habermas has
already ben cited, and whose Logics of Disintegration; PostStructuralist
Thought and the Claims of Crith1/ Theory, published by Verso in 1987,
was widely received as the most balanced assessment to date of Derrida,
Foucault, et al. In the course of the research which formed the basis of that
book, in 1980 Dews drafted a sixty-page chapter on 'Structuralism and the
French Epistemological Tradition', a little over half of which is published
below. (Excisions, made at points where Dews embarks upon detailed
discussion of Foucault, are signalled by ellipses.) Locating For Marx and
Reading Capital in their national ph
-
ilosophical conjuncturt; Dews in
vestigates Althusser's attempt to resolve the controversy between Levi
Strauss and Sartre over the status of historical knowledge, arguing that
his Spinozist inflection of the Bachelardian tradition of French historical
epistemology reproduces the very vices he reproves in Uvi-Straussian struc
turalism. Contrasting Althusser's subsequent development with that of his
former pupil, Foucault, Dews indicates how the incoherence of Althusser's
'self-criticisms' helped to open the way for the relativist turn of the emer
gent post-Althusserianism.
1980 was the year in whlch Althusser's murder of his wife, Helene,
sealed more than one of his fates fn their various fashions, the remaining
contributions to the Reader are retrospects, from the vantage-point (if such
it be) of the 1990s, on the invariably dramatic, and occasionally an
g
uished,
history associated with the name of Louis Althusser.
In an essay written specially for this volume, David Macey, author of
Lacon in Contexts (Verso, 1988) and an acclaimed recent biography of
Foucault (The Lives of Michel PoUault, Hutchinson, 1993), casts a scep
tical eye over the de facto 'Rejection Front' formed between AlthWser
and Lacan in opposition to Marxist and Freudian 'revisionism'. Macey
acknowledges the part played by Althusser's essy of 1964, 'Freud and
Lacan', in resuming the dialogue between historical materialism and psycho
analysis brutally interrupted in the PCF by the Gleichschaltu7tg of the
Cold War in theory, And yet he reckons both it, and subsequent Althusserian
endeavours in this feld, to have been based upn readings of La can that
PREFACE XDI
are arguably mathe in their tendentiousness only by Lacan's interpretation
of Freud. Conceptual loans have co be repaid-and sometimes at compound
interest.
Like Macey an actor in the theoretical history he surveys, Francis Mulhern
is more inclined -to

accentuate the psitive dimensions of the Freudo-Marxist

encounter staged by Althusser, at least as regards its salutary impact upn
literary studies in an AngloSixon culture largelyinnoculate by the experi
ence of the 1930s against any 'materialist' tampering with things of the
spirit. In a new overview of the English inductions of Gallic constructions,
the author of a classic study of Leavism, The Moment of 'Scrutiny' (New
Left Books, 1979), explores the diversity of Anglophone 'Aithusserianism',
isolates the aporias which smoothed the passage from euphoria to dis
enchantment, and concludes with a reassessment of Althusser's central
theses that fnds them ft neither for some arc de triomphe, nor the nearest
oubliette. As messges in bottles go, Althusser's once fared well - possibly
too well - but now deserve better.
My own piece - a considerably revised and expanded version of a
review artide
1
4-is devoted to the '.eturn of the repressed', in the shape of
L'avettir dtre lr:gtemps, in the spring of 1992. Respnding to the patently
malevolent or. merely <.edulous readings to which the philosopher's 'wild
analysis' of his own case history had been subjected, r took the oppor
tunity of Althusser's own observations on his theoretical formation, as weU
as the invaluable detail supplied by Yann Moulier Boutang, to adumbrate
themes - of Althusserian heterodoxy and non/contemporaneity - which I
intend to develop at length in a forth<oring intellectual biography for
Blackw:eU, provisionally entitled Althusser's Solitude.
Finally, at th publisher'. suggestion, a bibliography of A!thusser's pub
lished writings

is, with due disclaimers, appende for the seriously curious.

In the conception and realization of this Reader, I have incurred various
deb

s: to my editor, Simon Prosser, for his encouragement and patience; to

Dav
1
d Macey and Francis Mulhern for once again gratuitously adding to
their workloads; to Gordon Finlayson for undertaking the translation of
the Honneth article; and to Michael Gane, who invited me to write on
Althusser's 'tcaumabiography'. I am grateful to all of them.
NOTES
1 Cool Meories, Vers, London, 1990, pp. 223-24.
2 Introuction to Mulhern, ed., Contemporary Mar:st Literary Cn'ticism,
Longman, London, 1992. p. 12.
3 Adieu\ in Balibar, Ecrits pour Althus.r, L Decouverte, Paris,. 1991: here
p. 122.
XIV PREFACE
4 See Luc Ferry and Alain Renaut, La Pensie 6, Ga\limard, Paris, 1985 and
c. Alex Cllinicos, 'What i Living and What is Dead in the Philosophy of
Althusser', in E. Ann Kaplan and Michael Sprinker, eds, The Althuserian
Legacy, Verso, London, 1993.
5 See Ted Benton's exllent bOk of that title, Macillan, London, 1984.
Other full-length treatments in English are Miria Glucksmann, Structtiist
Analysis in Contempotar" Social Thought: A Comparison of the Theories of
Claude Levi-Strauss and Lvwis Althusser, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London,
1974; Alex Callinicos, Althusse's Mar:ism, Pluto Press, London, 1976; E. P.
Thompson, 'The Poverty of Theory', i his The Poverty of Theory afd Other
Essays, Merlin, London, 1978; Steven B. Smith, Reading Alth'usser: An &say
on Structural Marxism, Cornell UnivCity Press, Ithac, 1984; Gregory EUiott,
Althusser: The Detour o(Theory, Vers, London, 1987; and Robert Paul Resch,
Althusser and the Renewal of Mar:isr Social Theory, University of Clifornia
Press, Berkeley and Los Angele, 1992, To thee should be added Perry
Anderson's extended arbitration of Thompson's indictment i Arguments within
English Marxism, Verso, Lndon 1980 and the conference papers collected
in Kaplan and Sprinker, eds, The Althuuerian Ugacy.
6 This explains, for example, exclusion of Norman Geras, 'Althusser's Mrx
ism: An Acount and As5sment', New Lef Review 7l,january/February 1972
(reprinted in NLR, ed., Western Marxism: A Critical Reader, New Left Books,
L
ondon, 1977 and in Geras, l.terature of Revolution, Verso, London, 1986 );.
of Andre Glucksmann, 'A Ventriloquist Stucturalism' (1967), New Lef Review
72, March/Apri 197 (reprintd in Western Marxism); of Jacques Rancitre,
'On the Theory of Ideology (he Politics of Althusser}' (1973), Radical
Philosophy 7, Sprig 1974 (reprinted in Roy Edgley and Richard Osborne,
eds, Radical Philosophy Reader, Verso, London, 1985); of Paul Hirst,
'Aithusscrs Theory of .Ideology', Economy and Society, Jol. 5, no. 4, 1976
(reprinted in his On Law and Ideology, Macmillan, London, 1979); or of any
extract from Thompson, 'The Poverty of Theory'.
7. As a result, two insightful early critique - both from within the A!thuserian
milieu - remain unavailable in English Nico Poulanras, 'Vers une thtori
marxire', Lu Trtps Modernes 240, 1966 and Alain "Badiou, 'Le (re)com
mencement du mattialisme dialectiqu', Critique 240, 1967. Other -candi
dates for translation from the French. (to lok no fUh.er) would have ben
Henri Lefbvre, 'Sur une interpretation du marxisme', L'Hamme et Ia Societe
4, 1967, or 'Les paradoxe d'Althusser', L'Homme et Ia Sadeti 13, 1969 (both
reprinted in his Au-de/a J, struturalisme Editions Anthropos, Paris, 1971};
Lucien Goldmann, 'L'Idtologi Allemande et les Theses sur Feuerbach',
L'Homme et Ia Soiete 7, 1968 (reprinted in his Mtr1sm et scienes huahws.
Gallimard, Paris, 1970); and jean Hyppolite, 'Le "scientifque" et 1' idO
logique" dans une perspective mWrxist, Diogene 64, 1!68 (reprinted in
his Figures de Ia penste phi/osophique, Presses Universitaire de France,
Paris, 1971).
S To Michele Barrett's overview of Marxist feminim, Women's Oppression
Today, Verso, London, 1980 and to Benton, The Rise and Falf of Strutural
Marrism, pp. 134-40. For a judicious critique of Althusser by a feminist
sympathetic to elemet of humanist Marxism, se Kate Sopr_ Humtism and
PREFACE
XV
Anti-Humanism, Hutchinson, London, 1986, The main protagonist in th.e
feminist reception of Al(hussr in Britain was, of course, Juliet Mitchell: see
espcially 'Women; The Longest Revolution', New UfReview 40, November/
Demembr 1966
-
reprinted in her collection of that title, Virago, London,
1984), and Womar(s E"ate,. Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1971. A represen
tative txt of feminist post-Althussrianism is Rosalind Coward's 'Rethinking
Marxism', mf 2, 1978- .
9 In a letter of 28 March. 1979 to the editor of Neu. Lef Review, declining the
invitaton to respond to Thompson in the pages _of that journaL Ls ruffled by
Thompson than his correspondent had anticipated, Althu er stated th;t he
had fOund The Poverty of Theory 'interesting'.
10 As Vilar underlined to an interviewer- the German historian, Peter Schttder
-in Kmmu71, val. 5, no, 7, 1987, pp. 62ff., where he recalls that in the early
1970s 'the frst thing I was asked, from Athens to Grenada, and from Lima
to Berkeley, was to talk about Althusser.' For some fascinating observtions
on the i' ssues raised by Vilar's counter-critique, see Schttcler's paper, 'Althcsser
and Anna/es Hiswriography - An Imposible Dialogue?', in Kaplan and
Sprinker, eds, Th AlthussetiaH Legacy. That Vila still regarded some of
Althusser's quetions as valid, even if he reiected his answers, is perhaps
attested by the fact that the volume in which he reprinted his 1973 essay is
entitled Une histoire
-
en CO'structiom Approche marxiste et probUmatiques
conjonturetles, Paris, 1982.
11 See, respetively, Althusser, 'Sur l'objectivite de l'histoire (Lettre a Paul Ricour)',
Revue de I'Enseign t Philosophique, vaL 5, no, 4, 1955, and Bulletin de
la Societe {rl1rise de Phi/osophie 4, October/December 1968, pp. 127-81.
12 'A Pbilaso_hica-Politicat Profle', in Peter Dews, ed., Autonomy and Solidar
ity: l' tervisws Mith ]Urgen Haberms, revised edn, Verso, London 1992: here
p. 149.
13 'Geschichte und Interaktosverhiltnisse. Zur strkturalistischen Detung des
Hstorshen Msterialismus', in Therien des Historische' Matiafisus,
Suhrkamp Verlag,. Frankfurt/M., 1977. Hanneth discusses the circumstance
in which he composed his critique in a recent interview, 'Critical Theory ln
Germany Today', Rtdical Philosophy 65, Autumn 1993.
14 Published i n ELnomy nd Society, vaL 22, no. 1, February 1993.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
For permission t publish texts contained in this Reader the Editor and
publishers wish to thank the following copyrightholders:
E. J. Hobsbawm for 'The Stucture of Capital'.
New Lef Revii, London, for Pierre Vi!ar, 'Marxist History, a History in
the Making; Towards a Dialogue with Altbusser'.
Paul Ricoeur and Columbia University Press, New York, for extracts from
Paul Ricoeur, Lectures on Ideolog and Utopia.
SUhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt/M., for Axel Honneth, 'History and Inter
action: On the Structuralist Interpretation of Historical Materialism'.
Peter Dews for extracts from his 'Structuralism and the French Epistemo
logical Tradition'.
T
THE STRUCTURE OF CAF|IAL
W
E. J. Hobsbawm
A few years ago an able and acllte observer of Marxism could suggest that
the history of its e'olutmn as a theory was virtually at an end; or at all
events at a standstll. It is plainly not possible to take such a view today.
Th cracking of th6 apparently smooth and frmly frozen surface of Sta
linism in the Soviet Union and of the unifed and apparently integrated
international Communist movement has not merely produced, or revealed,
equivalent cracks in the systematic compendium of dogma elaborated in
the 1930s, and brilliantly simplifed for pedagogic purposes in the Short
History of the CPSU. The thaw of the ice-cap also watered the numerous
plants of heterodoxy, schism or mere unoffcial growth which had survived
on the maJgin of, or under, the giant glacier. The hundred flowers bloomed,
the schools began once again to contend, in a manner unfamiliar to aH
except the elderly who could throw their minds back to the 1920s or the
old who recalle- d the days before 1914. Marxism, which had apparently
aspired to turn itself-and by forLe majeure had. largely turned itSelf-into
a closed system, communicating with the outside world chiefly by series
of operations designed t show that it had no need to do so, was opened
up again.
If we leave aside, as lacking mUch theoretical interest, the attempts to
retain something like the old orthodoxy unchanged {as in China or among
some groups of sectarians in other countries), and the moves to accept
useful theories and techniques from the 'bourgeois' world without inte
grating them into the nominally unmodified Marxist system (as happened
to some extent in the Soviet Union), the Marxist re-thinking of the past ten
years has, broadly speking, followe four paths. First, it has attempted
somethmg like an archaeological operation, by identifying the strata of
theoretical thinking which had gradually accumulated on top of Marx's
original thought, and for that matter pursuing the evolution of the great
rans ideas themselves thro"gh itS various stages. Second, it has sought ro
' E. J. H08SBAWM
identify and to pursue the various original theoretical developments made
from time to time on the basis of Marxism, Out for various reasons off.
cially expelled from, or never absoibed into, the main corpus of ic:ddeas.
Third, it has attempted to ore to terms, whereth'isseemed apposite, with
the various intellectual developments which had taken place outside Marx

ism, and once again were delibeately extruded from it in the Stalinist
period. Last, it has tried to return to an analysis of the world (i.e-., primarily
of its social, economic and political developmenrs) after a long perio when
the offcial interpretacion had become increasingly remote from reality,
Among the pre-Sralinist currents of Marxism, one has long proved t be
parriclliarly fruitful and attractive to the re-thinkers, the 'central European'
strain, to use George Lichtheim's convenientterm. Most of the rare Com
munist writers who retained any reputation as independent minds i' n the
1940s and early 1950s belonged to this tradition, e.g., Georg Lukacs,
Henri Lfebvre or, nourished in the Italian rather than German version of
Hegelianism, Gramsci. The central Europeans formed part o
f
that passion
ate reaction against the evolutionist positivism and mechanical determin
ism to which the theoretical leaders of the Second International had tended
to reduce Marxism, and which, in one form or another, provided the.
intellectual base for a retllrn to revolutionary ideology in the year pre
ceding and following the October Revolution. For a brief period after
the collapse of syndicalism (which had absor
b
ed part of this left-wing
revulsion against the Kautskys of the pre-1914 era) vfrtually aU the rebel
currents fowed together into the single catara(t of BOlshevism. After . Lenin's
death they began to diverge again, or rather the gradual and systematic'
construction of a single channel of offcial theory called 'Leninism' forced
the resr out of the main stream. Yet though Lenin's own thought was one
of the forms of this reassertion of revolutionary theory againsr 'revision
ism' and 'reformism', and by far the most important in practice, it had
been by no means the only one. Luxemburg and Mehring in Germany, the
central-European Hegelians, nd others, converged with Lenin in practice
as revolutionaries, but were in no sense Leninist in origin or intellectual
procedures.
Politically the central European strain was revolutionary1 not to sy
ultra-left. Socilly, it was not so much a collection of intellectuals - all
ideological schools are that- as one of men. and women whose tast ran
to agitation, writing and discussion.rather than organization and the (Bol
shevik) executive life. In theory ir was above all hostile to the Darwinian
and positivist versions of Marxism a la Kautsky,- and - suspicious even of
those aspects of rhe mature Marx and Engels which might have encour
aged determinism rather than voluntarism. Even the young Gramsd in
Turin reacted the October Revolution by calling for a 'revolt against
Marx's Capital'. Philosophic. ally it tended to stress - againsr rhe more
offcial theorists of social democracy and the revisionists - rhe Hegelian
THE STRUCTURE OF CAPITAL 3
origins of Marx and such of his youthful writings as were then available.
The publication of the Fruehschriften by Lndshut and Mayer in 1932 was
to provide the central Europans with what has turned out to be their
basic text, the 1844 Manuscripts, and their basic operational tool, 'aliena
tion', By this time, however, the political situation had changed. The
central Europeans no longer stood on the extreme left of the movement,
a place now occupied by the Trotskyists (though in the west most of these,
as J, P. Nett! has pointed out, were in fact Luxemburgians). Their passion
ate voluntarism, their own contempt for bourgeois science and their
idealhation of proletarian consciousness had been selectively absorbed into,
even exaggerated by, the official Soviet doctrine. The main advantage
the central Europeans retained was the capacity to combine the passion
for
-
social revolution, even thB readiness to accept the Jesuit discipline of
the Communist parties, with the interests of mid-tw.entieth-cwtury western
intellectu"ls-such as avant-garde culture and psychoanalysis-and a version
of Marxist theory which, against the apparent trend of events in the Soviet
Union itself, reafrmed the humanist Utppia of Marx. War and resistance
brought them political reinforcements, especially in France, from revolu
tionary intellectuals to whom the discovery of German philosophy (in this
instance not mediated by Marxism) gave a justifi cation for the assertion
of human Uberty) the act of this aSsrtion and struggle, and therefore rhe
function of the 'engaged' intellectual. Via the phenomenologists Sartre
moved into something hke a position as honorary cntral European, and
eventually into what he at any rate considered .arxism. The collapse of
Stalinism relieved whar had become an 'increasingly intolerable pressure on
the central Europeans within the Communist movement-Stalinist rheory
had shown a diminishing toleration for the Hegelian or pre-1848 elements
in Marx- and lefr them as the most obvious ideological nucleus for critical
CmmuniH thought. Paradoxically a strain of ideas which began on the
ultra-left ended on the right wing of the revolutionary movement.
Sooner or later a reaction was to be expected. It has now emerged under
the leadeship of Louls Althusser, a philosopher who has left the shadows
of the great Ecole Normale Supirieure of the re d'Ulm for the limelight
of Parisian intelletual celebrityj or at any rare celebrity in the fi fth and
sixth arrondissements, which is even harder to achieve. His rise has been
curiously sudden. Before 1965 he was virtually unknown even to the left
wing public, except as the author of an essay on Montesquieu and a
selection from Feuerbach. In that year no fewer than three volumes came
out as the fst offerings of a series called Thiorie under M. Althusser's
direction: a collection of papers under the title Pour Marx1 and two volume
essentially recording the papers presented at an intensive seminar by M.
Althusser and his followers called Lire le CapitaU (The laconic titles are
part of the Althusserian trademark,) Their success has been startling. It is
no refletion on the very considerable gifts of the author - not least his
4
E. J. HOBSBAWM
Gallic combination of evident intelligence, lucidity: and &tyle- t observe
that he has been lucky in the moment of his emergence. The atmosphere
of the Althusserian Quarrier Latin i& the one in which every self-respting
left-wing secondary schoolboy or student is a Maoist or at least a Cstroite,
in which Sartre and Henri Lefebvre are anaent monuments and the self
lacerations of the inteUecual ex-Communists of 1956 as incomprehensible
as the 'opportunism' of Waldeck-Rochet and Roger Garaudy. A new gen
eration of rebels requires a new version of revclutionary ideology, and M,
Althuser is essentially an ideological hard-liner, challenging the political
and intellectual softening around him. It is typical that, though a member
of the Communist Party, he should choose as his publisher Fran<ois
Maspero, the mouthpiece of the ultrawleft.
This does not make him into a 'neowStaHnist' as his detractors have
suggested. The eloquent and rather moving pages of intellectual autobiog
raphy with which Pour Marx opens show no indulgence to Stalinism,
but their target is not so much 'le contagieux et implacable systme de
gouvernement et de pensee (qui] provoquait ces dClires'-the Althusserian
prose is in the classic tradition-but the 'conditions of theoretical void' in
which French Communism grew up and which Stalinism helped to conceal
behind that 'primacy of politics' which was in any cas congenial
-
to the
French. It led those philosophers who were not contnt to 'confne them
selves to commentaries and meagre variations on the theme of Great
Quotations' in sheer intellectual self-defence either r deny the possibility
of any philosophy, or to maintain some sort of dialogue with their profes
sional clleagues by 'disguising themselves- dressing up Marx as Husserl,
as Hegel, as the humanist and ethical Young Marx- at the risk of sooner
or latr confusing the mask with the face'. The end of Stalinist dogmatism
did not 'give us back Marxist philosophy in its integrity'. It merely revealed
its absence. Yet- and here M. Althusser leaves a moderately well-beaten
track and at the same time allows himself scope for a good deal of private
innovation - its absence was not due merely t the defects of the French
intellectual left. It was not there because Marxist philosophy, 'founded by
Marx in the very act of founding his theory of history, has still largely to
be constructed'; M. Althusser's ambitious purpose is to construct it.
In one sens this position has similarities with some tendencies of thollght
in the Stalin era, for one of the characteristics of that period was the
systematic assertion of the absolute originality of Marx: the sharp cut
which sundered him from Hegel and his own Hegelian youth, and from
the ptopian socialists (oger Garaudy was obliged to revise his Sources
fanraises du socialisme scientifque on these grounds in the late 1940s).
M. Althusser also talks of the coupure in Marx's evolution, and, while
placing it, with most student&, aroqnd 1845, seems reluctant to accept
anything as fully 'Marxist' before the Polery of Philosophy and the
Communist Manifesto.3 But of course the Stalinist theones had no doubt
TE STRUCTURE OF CAPITAL
5
about what Marxist philosophy was, M. Althusser is just prepared to
admit that certain thinkers in the past began to ask the crucial question
how, e.g., the purpose of Capital differs from that of political economy -
Lenin, Labriola, Plekhanov, Gramsd and various Italian scholars follow
ing the underestimated Galvano Della Volpe, the Austro-Marxists (who
fell into neoKantianism), and some Soviet comrentators (who were in
completely aware of the implications of their analyses). But he denies that
there is as yet a stisfactory answer.
For ther i none in Marx himself. Just as classical political economy did
not q1ite see the point of what it observed_ and what Marx formulated for
h, so that Adam Smith gives, as it were, the right answer to questions he
had not conSiously asked, so Marx himself surpased his own insight,
leaving us to recognize where it was he was going:
What pO
litLl economy does not see is not something preexisting which.
it might have se but did not, buc something it has itself produced in its
operation of knowing [cM1aissance], and which did not elist before this
opration. It is precisely the production [of knowledge] which is identical
with that object. What plitkal economy does not se is what it m:kes:
its production of a new answer without quetion) an at the s:me time its
prouction of a new latent question carried within that new answer (Lite le
Capital I, pp. 25-26).
*
Marx hlrslf suffers from the same weakness, which is the inevitable
concomitant
.
of the process of understanding. He was a faJ greater man
than Adam Smith1 because, while unable to emerge fully into his own
novelty, he reaches out for 'his' question, formulating it somewhere or
other, perhaps in a different context, searching for the answer 'by multi
plying the images suitable for its presentation'. We, however, can know
what he lacked: 'le concept de l'Eficace d'une structure sur ses effets'
pp. 33-34). In discovering this lack we can not only begin to grasp Marxist
philosophy - the philosophy which Marx founded but did not construct
- but also advance beyond it. For
a srieme progresses, that is to sy lives, only by paying enreme attention to
its points of theoretical fragility. In this respct it holds it life less by what
it knows than by what it de not know; on the absolute condition of
cirrumscribing that non-known, and of formulating it rigorously as a problem.
It will be evident that the core of M. Althusser's analysis is epistemolo
gical. The nature of his exercise is the eXploration of Marx's process of
understanding and his main mehod an intensely detailed critical reading
of the works, using all the resources of linguistic, literary and philosophical
discipline. The f.st reaction of his own criticl readers may well be that
the methods and wncp;s he applies are not necessarily those emerging by

E. J. HOBSBAWM
his own favourite proess of epistemological advance, from Marx himself.
To say that 'along other roads contemporary theory in psychoanalysis,
in linguistics, in other disciplines like biology and perhaps in physics has
confronted the problem without realizing that Marx had "produced" it
much earlier', may be true; but it is not impossible that the problem has
been discovered in Marx because of the new and considerable vogue for
linguistic 'structuralism' and Freud in France. (Indeed, while structural
functionalist elements are easily recognized in Marx, it is by no means so
clear what Freud has to contribute to the understanding of Capital.) But
if in fact these are to some extent insights from the outside ('nous devons
ces connaissances bouleversantes - . - i quelques hommes: Marx, Nietzsche
et Freud') it may be wondered whether the critical effort is merely confne
to 'making manifest what is latent' in Marx.
A second reflection is that the Althusserian type of analysis fnds it
diffcult, if not impossible, to get outside the formal structure of Marx's
thought. M. Alrhusser is aware of this characteristic ('at no point do we
set foot on the a!solutely uncrossable frontier which separates the "devel
opment" of specifcation of the concept from the development and particu
larity of things') and appears to justify it by abstract argument ('we have
demonstrated that the

ilidation of a scientifc proposition as knowkdge

in a given scientifc practice was assured by the interplay of particular
forms, which guarantee the presence of scientifcity [sdentifcitel in the
production of knowledge, in other words by specifc forms which confer
the character of-true - knowledge upon an act of knowlege'). Yet even
if this is true and this method of validation can be applied as easily to
Capital as to mathematical propositions (which is not obvious) all math
ematicians know that a considerable gap still remains between their dem
onstrations and such real life phenomena-for instance, the evolution and
operation of the capitalist system -.as may be found to correspond to their
discoveries. One can agree with M. Althusser's profound and persistent
dislike of empiricism, and still feel uneasy about his apparent dismissal of
any exterior criterion of pr.ctice such as actual historical development,
past or future ('nous considfrons le rultat sans son deveuir'). For in fact
Marx did get down to the diffcult problem of the concrete. If he had not,
he would not have written Capital but would have remained within the
sphere of generality which dominates that marvellous and neglected Intro
dLtio7 to the Critique of Political Economy, which is in many respects
the key work of the Althusserian Marx, as the 1844 Manuscripts are the
key work of the Hegelian-humanist Marx whom he rejects.
And indeed, as soon as M. Althusser descends from he level where
Marxism establishes what history or economics can or cannot do ('the
mathematical formalization of econometrics must be subordinate to
conceptual formalization') and turns to its actual subject matter, he says
little that is new or interesting. He produces a brilliant critique of the
TJE STRUCTURE OF CAPITAL
1
vulgar-Marxist views on jbase

and 'superstructure' and a satisfying for
mulation of their interaction. But such practical applications of rhe general
principle aS are used to 'illustrate it are taken from Marxists who have used
a more direct and less intellectually self-contained route.
While students like M Godelier4 face the concrete problems of h1storic
periodization raised by Marx, and have, for instance, taken a leading parr
in the rediscovery and re-analysis of the 'Asiatic moe of production'
which is one of the more interesting intellectual results of the revival of
original th_ught .among Communist intellectuals since Stalin, E. Balibar's
long dicussion of historical materialism (Lire le Capital, vol. 2) remains
resolutely on the hetghts of what one might call meta-history.
Moreover, M. Althusser's type of approach, valuable though it is,
simplifes away some of Marx's problems - for instance that of historic
change. It_is right to show that the Marxian theory of historical develop
ment is not 'evolutionist' or 'historicist' in the nineteenth-entury sense,
but rests on a frm jsrructuralist' foundation: development is rhe totality of
all combinations, actual or possible, of the limited number of the different
elements of 'production' which analysis defnes; those actually realized
_in the past make up the succession of socio*economic formations. Yet one
might objct to this, as to the not dissimilar Levi-Straussian view, that by
itseH it does not explain how and why one socio-economic formation
changes into another but merely. establishes the limits outside which it is
senseless to speak of historic development. And also that Mrx spent an
extra_rdina.ry amount of his time and energy trying to answer these ques
tions, M. Althussers work demonstrate, if demonstration be still needed,
the remarkable theoretical power of Marx as a thinker, his status and
originality as a 'philosopher' in the technical sense of the word, and argues
persuasively that he is far from a mere Hegel transposed fom idealism to
materialism. Yet even if his reading of Marx is correct, it is only a prtial
reading.
This does not

diminish the force of his analysis as a tool of negative

critidm. Whatever we may thiuk of the polemical formulation of his con
tentions ('from the point of view of theory Marxism is no more an histori
cism than it is a humanism'), the strength of his objections to the Hegelian
and 1844 Manuscripts interpretation of Marx is substantia the acuteness
of his analysis of certain weaknesses of the thought of Gramsci (and their
reasons) or of Sartre is impressive, the critique of 'model-building' including
that of Webedan ideal types, is to the point. This is due some extent
to the personal abilities of the man whom Le Mone (reprting the special
session of the 'French Communist Party's' Central Committee devoted to
the discussion of his and M. Garaudy's views) calls a 'philosophe de grande
qualite', a quality revealed among other things in the intellectual respct
he thinks he owes to some of those he criticize. Nevertheless, it is also due
to the thinker _nd the cause who so evidently inspire his passionate study.
8
E. J, HOBSBAWM
One reads him with attention, even with excitement. There is no mys
tery about his capacity to inspire the intelligent young, and though it may
be feared that the Althusserian school whom he wil! certainly gather round
him will be more scholastic than sparkling, the net effect of his irruption
into Marxist theoretical debate may be positive. For his procedure is,
almost by defnition, that of asking rather than answering questions: of
denying tha the right answers have merely to be re-estblished even by the
closest textual scrutiny of authority, because they have as yet to be worked
out. For M. A!thusser the relation between Marx and his readers is one of
activity on both sides, a dialectical confrontation which, like reality, has
no end. It is curious and characteristic that the philosopher (who has also,
as in one essay of Pour Marx, doubled as a dramatic critic) chooses the
metaphor of theatre - needless to say that of Brechtian theatre - to describe
both Marx's process of exposing what lies beyond him (the Darstellung
of 'ce mode de presence de Ia structure dans ses effets, done ta causalite
structurale elle-meme') and the readers' relation to him:
C'est alors que nous pouvons nons soNeni de ce terme hautement
symptomuique de la 'Darelung', le rapprocher ce cete 'machinere', et le
prendre au mot, comme !'existence mfe de cette machinerie en ses effets:
Ia mode d'existence de cette miseen-sc!ne, de ce theatre qui et a Ia fois
propre sene, son propre texte, ses propres acteurs, ce theatre dont les
spectateul ne peuvnt en itre, d'occasion, spotateurs, que parce qu'ils en
sont d'abord les acteurs frLes, pris dans les contraintes d'un tte et de rOle
dLnt iis ne puvent en Ctre les auter, puique c'est, par essence, un theatre
sans auteur (Lire le Capiti, vol. 2, p. 177}.
But the pleasure of reading an intelligent and original thinker ought not
to blind us to his weaknesses. M. Althusser's approach t Marx is cer
tainly not the most fruitful. As the above discussion has suggestd tact
fully, it may even be doubted whether it is very Marxist, since it plainly
takl no interest in much that Marx regarded as fundamental, and - as his
subsequent writings, few though they are, make .increingly cler - is at
loggerheads with some of Marx's most cherished arguments. ft demon
strates the new-found post-Stalinist freedom, even within Communist par
ties, to read and interpret Marx independently, But if chis process is to b
taken seriously, it requires genuine textual erudition such as M. Althusser
does not appear to possess. He certainly seems unaware both in Pour Mar
and Lire le Capital of the famous Grundrisse, though they have been
available in an excellent German edition since 1953, and one may even
suspect that his interpretation has preceded his reading of some of the
texts with which he is acquainted. To this extent he srill suffers from the
after-effects of the Stalinist period, which created a gap between the older
generation of enormously !erned Marx-scholars and both the political
activists and the younger neo-Marxists.
THE STRUCTURE OF CAPITAL
Moreover the revival of Marxism requires a genuine willingness t see
what .arx was trying to do, though this does not imply agreement
with all his p.opositions. Marxism, which is at once a method, a body of
theoretical thinking, and collection of texts regarded by its followers as
authoritative, has always suffered from the tendency of Marxists to begin
by deeidiig what they think Marx ought to have said, and then to look
for textual authority for their chosen views. Such eclecticism has normally
been controlled by a serious study of the evolution of Marx's own thought.
M. Althusser's discovery that the merit of Marx lies not so much in his
own writings, but in allowingAlthusser to say what he ought to have said,
removes this control. It is to be feared that he will not be the only theorist
to replace the real Marx by one of his own construction. Whether the
Althusserian. Marx or other analogous construcs will turn out to be as
interesting as the original is, however, quite another question.
NOTES
1 Louis Althusser, Pour Mar>, Francis Maspro, Paris, 1965.
2 Louis Althusser, Jacques Randere and Pierre Mcheey, Ltre le Capital I, Franrois
Maspero, Paris, 1965; Louis AltbuSr; Etienne Balibar and Roger Establet
Lire le Capital II, Franrois Maspero, Paris, 1965.
3 Althusser has sinc pushed the frontiers of the 'preMarxist' Marx stCdily
further forwad, until little before 1875 is acLepWble as proprly non-Hegelian.
Unfortunately, this eliminates the bulk of Marx's writings.
4 Maurice Goelier, Ratio1ality and Irationaity in Economics (1966), NCw Left
Books, London, 197.
Z
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN
THE MAKING:
TOWARDS A DIALOGUE WITH
ALTHUSSER
W
Pierre Vilar
( . . . ] While stressing the purely philosophical (that is, theoretical char
acter) of his work, Althusser himself believes it should interest historians
and economists. fndeed, the very legitimacy of their disciplines is called in
question when Marx is simultaneously exalted as the fmt discoverer of the
scientifc foundations of these subjects, and then respectfully but frmly
convicted of not knowing that he was, and hOt saying so either. Here too
the term 'new' is employed with particular insistence, as in 'new quant
itative history' or 'New Economic Histor.y'. The Jeference back to over a
hundred years ago in discussing Marx does not alter this, since (precisely)
a century ago his novelty was so 'new' that even he could not understand it.
The point is (I imagine) that it nswered too far in advance certiin criteria
which reent 'histories of knowledge' have suggested to the philosopher.
Like Caesar's wife, scientifc knowledge must be above all suspicion of
(i) ideology, (iil empiricism. Althusser shows easily enough (although by
allusion rather than by example, unfortunately) how non-Marxist econo
mists erect naive anthropology into thery through their appeals to the
concrete, the 'hitodcal facts'. No less easily (though again allusively) he
shows how historians, with their traditional care for 'exact' facts and their
relish for proud resurrections from the dead, have never formulated the
theoretical object of their science, Time, in particular, remains for them a
simple linear 'datum'.
We shall examine below, at the appropriate moment, the constructive
and useful elements in Althusser's pwerful contribution to te building of
Marxist science, More immediately, and no less usefully, let us try and

establish the limitations of a project which liquidates somewhat too easily
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 11
(in a way Marx was careful to avoid) the various 'habitable storeys' built
at different phases of scientifc advance, of which none deserves to be
made an object of worship.
If one is a Marxist, or simply anxious to achieve coherence, then there
is a preliminary question one must put to Althusser. Given that he accepts
the basis of a critique of 'knowledge drawn from Marx, and suspects all
ideas which depart from it as 'pre-critical', 'empirical', or 'ideological',
given that in this way he claims the right to suspect Marx himself to the
extent to which the latter's revolution remained unfnished - how then,
can he fail to be equally suspicious vis-ivis what he calls 'those studies in
the history of knowledge now available to us' (he lets the reader guess
what these are, but this is not hard)? Why is he not as vigilant towards
that 'neessary philosophical formation' which is indispensable, he daims1
in order to read Marx proftably? I fear that one ca detect here an
attitude like that of Joan Robinson and similar economists, who certainly
enjy 'reading Marx' but d so in the light of a 'necessry formation in
economics': their own, of course. Let it be dearly understoo that r am not
advocating ignorance of 'modern' economists or 'todey's' epistemologists,
in the name of Marxism. Only, it does not seem to me that it is fdelity
to Marx to see Capital as an anticipation of Foucault or a forerunner of
Keynes; it mens rather sqbjecting Foucault and Keynes to the sort of
systematic doubt Marx would have felt about them.
In the feld of economics, Althusser knows this so well that he envelops
both the greatest of old classics and the most learned young eonometriciar.s
in the same utter disdain; somewhat hastily it must be said. Whereas on
the other hand he is quite redy to borrow from 'histories of knowledge'
the themes of a 'philosophy' whose mission, he says, is to 'watch over'
(1eiller) dialectical materialism as Lenin did from 1900 onwards, after the
frst theoretical crisis in physics. However, Lenin had nothing against
physicists, he was attacking their interpreters. What would he have had to
say - one can at least pose the question- of those trends in epistemology
which for several decades now have so constantly opposed an anti-humanist
neopositivism to Marx's systematic prise de parti and an anti-historicist
and neo-idealist structuralism to wl}t Althusser recognizes quite rightly as
a 'theory of history' ? Not to speak o a critique of empiricism and com
mon sense executed in the name of the scientifc spirit, which bases itself
deliberat(ly upn individual pychoanalysis and neglects the existence of
dassesl class struggles and class illusions?
A Marxist "tudy of these intellectual trends must be tempting to both
historians and philosophers. They bear witness to the {existential) ideolo
gical reaction -of a
-
threatened class. All spontaneous 'anti-historicism', every
'critique of h,istorical reason' is a carefully cultivated antidote to Marx's
true discovery, his historical critique of reason.
Nevertheless, the indubitable Marxist sincerity of Louis Althusser and
PIERRE V/LAR
his disciples forces us to classify them among the victims of this trap,
rather than among those who set it
- and so, to explore Marx side by side
with them, although not in their fashion. On some points the historian can
do for them what they have done for him - indicate certain possibilities
and pitfalls. If they have quite properly pointed out to us that the concept
of history has yet to be constructed, we should point out to them in return
that it cannot be defned without historians, and above all without the
prodigious historian that
.
Marx could sometimes be, whether he was 'doing
history' implicitly or in an explicit and traditional way.
I willingly grant that the object Marx is constructing in Capital is a
'theoretical' one; indeed, this seems more self-evident to me than it does
to Althusser. I
.
admit that one ought neither to mistake thought for reality
nor reality for thought, and that thought bears to reality only W 'relation
ship of knowledge', for what else could it do? Also that the process of
knowledge takes place entirely within thought (where else on earth could
it take place?) and that there exists an order and hierarchy of 'generalities'
about which Althusser has had really major things to .y, But on the other
hand I fail to see what 'astoundin,mistake Engels was committing when
he wrote (in a letter, incidentally, as a casual image) that conceptual thought
progresse 'asymptotically' towards the real, while (according to Althusser}
the Jaw of value t which Engels' image referred is 'a concept perfectly
adequate to its object since it is the concept of the lim irs of its variation
and therefore the adequate concept of the feld of its inadequacy'
Such subtlety suggests, I concede, the genuine diffculties we exprience
in the defnition of our procedures and the practice of our research as
historians, in which it is easy to 'fall into empiricism' by adhering too
closely to the object described, to the 'example', However, the abyss of
empiricism is only separated by a hair's breadth from the abyss of ideal
ism. Too great a revulsion from 'examples', too strong a wish to isolate
the 'Holy of Holies of the Concept' (I came across this expression in a
reent 'Althusserian' thesis on Marx's notion of economic laws) and one
risks being 'precipitated' (or catapulted) into a world which is no longer
that of Marxism. For, when reading the 1857 Introduction, if one should
'hear its silences', one should also take care not to silence its words: 'The
totality as it appears in the head, as a totality of thoughts, is a product of a
thinking head, which appropriates the world in th_e only way it can, a way
different from the artistic, religious, practical and mental appropriation
of this world The real subject retains its autonomous existence outside
the head just as before; namely as long as the head's conduct is merely
speculative, merely theoretical. Hence, in the theoretical method too, rhe
subject, society, must always be kept in mind as the presupposition' ,2 The
whole of Marx is here. The world remains 'autonomous' only if the mind
remains 'speculative', The suject is society. The theorizer appropriates' it
only if it remains always 'present' to him.
MARXIT HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 13
Althusser may tell us that in this Introduction (from which everyone takes
what suits him, unfortunately), Marx failed to discern the hierarchy of
abstractions. But Marx points out different ways of 'appropriating the
world' in it; the empirical mode (the 'practical mind'), the religious mode
{myths and cosmogonies), the artistic mode '(of which Bachelard, Foucault
and even Althusser make ample use), The scientifc mode proceeds out of
and differs from theae .. It proceeds out of them because it cannot do with
out the 'practical. mind' (in its 'techniques') and it progressively 'rectifes'
cosmogonies and traditions, But it differs from them, and this is why a!!
serious epistemological studiel are useful in indicating the 'thresholds'
between the different types of knowledge. If by contrast one type of
abstraction is labelled 'good' and another 'bad' (as Ricoeur has done with
-ifferent 'subjectivities'),3 then the very choke of vocabulary tends to lead
to a slide towards philosophical dogmatism, and the slightest distraction
results in ill-considered ideological condemnations.
Ultimately, this dispute between empirical observation and theoretical
construction comes down to the same Methodenstreit between the 'his
torical school' and the mathematical economists, that was contemprary
and akin to the controversy between Engels and Schmidt. Now if this
dispute can be said t have been resolved and surpassed today, it is in the
diretion which Althusser describes as 'new' - that is, in terms of the now

familiar image.y of theoretical objects, combinatory game and logical

.matrices. Hence if Marx's il!novation (which, it is true, did herald all that)
is taken as heralding only tht, then it could well be argued that it has
achieved its fulflment in the recent development of economic science,
After all the latter defends itself against well-worn objections about the
gap between model and reality or the unfathomable 'richness' of the world,
in the me way a Althusser legitimately defends Marx - by answering
that the 'object' in question is not the same, Tq this sort of economics, the
. utility-scarcity game is a theoretical game quite adeuate for its object.
In addition, macro-economics has proceeded beyond such premises now
<days: is not it opt<ti"onal concept of 'capital formation' perhaps only
another name. for 'surplus value'? Some economists will not hesitate to
admit therein a belated triumph of Marxian discoveries, But would it be
'Marxist' simply to join them in accepting this claim? No. Because the
essence of Marx's discovery was not a matter of economics, of pure theory;
it was socio-historical in nature. It consisted in the exposure of the social
contradiction which the free spontaneous formation of surplus value
(the 'accumulation of capital') generated within the coherent totality of the
mode of production which sustainS it, and which it conversely defnes.
At this pint we can rejoin Althusser. Marx's theoretical object, his
cenrral .concept and coherent whole, is certainly the moe of production,
seen a$ a structure both determinate and determinant. But its originality
does not lie in ir being a theoretical object. It lies rather in the fact that
14
PlfRRf Vll.AR
this was the frst theoretical object which expressed a social whole, where
earlier attempts at theory in the human sciences had been confned to the
economy and had perceived social relations either as immutable (like the
physiocrats' conception of landed property)' or cl as ideals to be attained
{like the juridical liberty and equality of liberal tho1ght). The second origin
a!ity of the mode of production as a theoretical object is that. it is a
structure of functioning development, and as such is nether formal nor
static. Its third originality is that such a structure itself implies the (eco
nomic) principle of the (social) contradiction which bears with it the
necessity of its destruction as a structure, of its own destructuration,
Inversely, this acknowledgement does not allow one to liquidate all non
Marxist economic theory wit contempt (which would be ridiculous). It
enables one to see that the latter cn perfectly weB exist as theory, without
thereby pssessing the status of \science' (except for its upholders, and
Althusser), and at the same time be an ideology, not out of incoherence or
empiricism but because it claims universality for laws of only one le1el
(the economic) within only one mods of production (capitalism). Marx's
critique of Ricardo, which Althusser considers ins\Jffcient, is in this sense
exemplary. One can and one should acknowledge and make use of the
genius of other minds and the logic of other systems, provided one sees
clearly: (i) the logicl feld within which their hypotheses are valid; (ii) the
barriers which no bourgeois theorist may cros without denying his owl)
nature (Walrus, Keynes, Schumpeter were perfectly aware of them); (iii)
the practical domains where the true limitations of the theory's area of
judgement are revealed (not the distance between model and reality, which
is a feature of all knowledge), Here the limitation: are: modifcation in
the structure of capitalism, politico-social problems, ihe treatment of pre
capitalist societies, and the historical appearance of forms of scialism.
The analysis of these questions is a task for historians, In it lies the hope
of a 'construction of the concept of history'. However, to work in Marx's
way it is not suffcient to say, with Althusser, that 'dassics' and 'moderns'
have 'different problematics', that notions like the

optimum' or 'full
employment' are of the same kind as physiocratic harmonies or socialist
utopias, or that the 'needs/scarcity' dualism is utilized as an 'empirical
ideological datum' when it is actually an archetypal 'theoretical' dualism
or 'constructed' object. On the contrary, what we must strive to think out
historically (if we want to 'understand the facts' as Marx likes to sa,y) is
how a theory, because it is partial (the theory of one level of one mode of
production) yet claims universality, may serve simultaneously as a practical
and as an ideological tool, in the hands of one class, and for one period
of time. This time has to be 'constructed', it is true, since it consists of
alternating defeats and sucesses, movements of pessimism and optimism,
moments when even apparances (profts) have to be camouflaged, and
moments when the reality itself (surplus value) cn be exalted, if only
MARXIST HISTORY, l HISTORY IN THE MAKING
15
when_ i! is rediscovered during phases of xpansion, as investment, as the
basis of enlarged reproduction. But what matters most is the perception of
what is invariably disguised, because It is given the status of an untouch"
able hypothesis - the equivalent of landed property for the physiocrats,
which for the capitalist mode of production is: (i) the private appropriation
of the means of production; (ii} the determination of value by the market.
Once these 'relations of production' are taken for granted, there is of
course no reason why one may .not theorize effectively on the economic
level or elucidate the 'economic history' of the lands and epchs where
such relations have prevailed. But this is JUSt why the historian who wants
to be a Marxist will refuse to confne himself within 'eonomic history'
(exept to study this or that case empiriclly). I have said on other occa"
sions and I will maintain that so"caUed 'quantitative histories' are nothing
but retrospective econometric, and that the 'New Economic History' cannot
measure the realm of Clio, A Colin Clark has stated, history stands 'higher
up' in the hierarchy of the sciences than economics, because it contains the
latter.4 Fidelity to Marx demands that one add: and because it cannot be
divided.
In ry own case (this is why
1
t is dear to me) this conviction arose from
a convergence between the lessons of Lucien Febvre and the lessons of
Marx. For Febvre, the chief vice in the historical practice of his own time,
and the chief object of his ferce attacks, lay in its very cademic respect
for 'fxed bQundaries': you tkt economics, you politics, and you, ideas. So
I owe it to Louis A[thusser ta express my astonishment and disappoint"
ment at fnding that his theses on the 'Marxist conception of the social
totality' conclude by stating not only the 'possibility' but the 'necessity' of
returning to a division of history into so many different 'histories'. If
anything does have the odour of empiricism, it is precisely this plurality.
In historical knowledge it sanctions all the old pretensions of the 'spedal"
i.t'. [n social ptactice - this is one of the dramas of socialist construction
- it solicits the world of science, the world of economic technocracy, the
world of politics, the world of ideas, and the world of the arts all to live
acording to their own 'levels' and specifc 'tempos'. Meanwhile, beneath
thm, in spontaneous proceses, a syrphony is orchestrated underground.
I refuse to admit that one can affm the 'specifc dependence' of levels
on each other and then proclaim the relative independence of their histo"
ries. 'Independence within interdependence' - is not the fate of verbal
games of this .kind well known, when the content of the two terms is not
fxed ? Perhaps we should conclude that our task is to fx their defnition.
But the example given {for once) by Althusser scarcely reassures one as to
what the distinction af 'histories' has in store for Marxism. It is that of the
history of philosophy. According to chronology, we are told, philosophers
succeed one another. This succession is not the history of philosophy. Who
would disagree? What work, what manual, sti!l confuses them? It might,
16
PIERRE VILAR
perhaps, be as well if some of them did, A reference book is always useful.
The same cannot be said of all constructions. But what are the distinguish
ing marks of 'history' here? Althusser demands that there be rigorous
defnitions of: (i) the philosophical (* the theoretical); (ii) its appropriate
'time\ (i!i) its 'differential relations',_ it$ distinctive 'articulations' with the
other Ievels. "
Excellent proposals. But we have sen above how the isolation of the
economic from the social led necessarily to an ideological defnition of
the former. How is this result to be avoided in defning the philosophical?
Ideology is a superstructure. Science should not be. But where is the 'theo
retical' to be situated? What is Its degree of independence at each instant
vis-3-vis the other 'levels'? To pass )!.dgement on this would require, as
well as the necessary philosophical foaioM, a historical infation
capable of 'mastering' the whole relevant material, of the sorr Marx had
acquired before he talked about economics.
Now Althusser's procedure is the inverse: he wants to derive f!om his
particular 'relatively autonomous' history, a supposedly 'rigorous' defni
tion of 'facts' or 'events'. A 'philosophical event' is that which 'effets a
mutation of the existing theoretical problematic'. The 'historical fact' i
whatever 'causes a mutation' in the existing structural relationships. He
even speaks of 'philosophical events of historical scope'/ thus testifying to
the persistent weight of the dramtization of 'na'ively gathered' history
upon the language of theory.
There is in fact no event which is not in one. sense anecdotal. Except
in idealist historiography, even the appearance of a Spinoza or a Marx
has 'historical scope' only through and for the (more or less distant) "ime
which will heed their thoughts. Otherwis, it may even be the repression
of their thought which constitutes history. Furthermore, have 'structural
relations' ever been modifed by 'a fact'? The most conscious of revolu
tions have so far modifed them only very imperfectly. Not to speak of
techniques. Papin 'sees' the power of steam, and Watt tames it, but his
'innovation' must be 'implanted' in order to become a true 'force of pro
duction'. Amongst other factors, in one limited world. Where is the 'break'?
Professional sensationalists like to multiply 'ev.ents', 'Historic facts' are
all the rage on a day of lunar landings or barricades. It may be objected:
exactly, the theorist has to choose. But choose what? The housewife who
cannot or will not pay ten francs a kilo for be

ans,_ or the

one who does
buy, the conscript who joins his draft, or the one who refuses( They are
all acting 'historically'. Conjunctures depend on them! they are reinforcing
or undermining structures. However imperfect its interpretation may still
be, it is the objectifcation of the subjective through staistics which alone
makes materialist history possible - the history of masses, that is both of
massive, infrastrctural facts, and of those human 'masses' which theory
has to 'penetrate' if it is r become an effective force,
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 11
One is led to wonder if the theorist of the concept of history has not
spent so much energy attacking a type o history that is now outmoded,
that he has unwittingly become its prisoner. Having allowed history to b
divided up among 'specialists' he then sets out in search of 'historical facts'
and 'events'. An event certainly has its importance, above all its place -
Jorruitous or integrable - within the series of which it forms a part, But
although he will mistrust the excesses of the 'ami-eventful' historiography
which has transformed historical practice in the last fony years, the Marxist
historian remains loyal to its central principle, which was that of Marx.
He can have nothing to do, even verbally, with the myth of 'the days
which made France' or even with 'the days that shook the world'.
'Eisenstein's October ends with the declaration: 'Te revolution is over.'
We know very well that it was just beginning.
The diffculty cannot be evaded by extending the sense of the word
'event', aiter using the term 'mutation' to suggest the idea of a 'break'.
Today science and thery are ill with words. They invent esoteric words
for ideas which are not; and they give familiar names to esoteric contents,
'Event' and 'chronicle' pass into the language of mathematics, while they
become suspect to historians. Genes start t 't<ke decisions' just as it is
agreed that heads of state enjoy only the Blusion of doing so. 'Overdeterm
ination' and 'the effectivity of an absent cause' come to us from psycho
analysis, as 'mutation' comes from biology.
But will a term invented .or one structure do for all others? Even Marx
and Engels were not always fortunate in their use of this type of com pari
son. Schumpeterwrote of Marx that he effected a 'chemical' blend between
economics and history, not a mechanical mixture. For long I found the
image a seductive one, sinc I had learned at schol a very long time ago
that in a mixture the elements remain separate while in. a chemical CDmpound
a new entity is formed {in this case, the Marxist totality). But what is such
a comparison worth for modern science? And what does it teach me in my
trade? Balibar would very much like to replac 'combination' with the
mathematical 'combinatory'. Yet he hesitates: 'pseudo-cmbinatory', 'almost
a combinatory', a 'combinatory, though not in the strict sense .'7
Would it not be better, since Marx is still 'new', to decide to keep the
words which he did invent, and invent new ones where these are needed,
without borrowing from other sciences which cannot in any case speak for
our own - if they could, why should we have to 'construct' the latter? In
short, the theoreticl commentary on Capital seems to m to have had the
very great merit of showing how history had always been written without
'knowledge' of exactly what 'history' Was' (but the same could be said of
so many things!). However, once again, while it was good of Althusser and
Balibar to pose the question, they may have ben imprudent to think they
possessed the answer to it {this is not said with any intention of reviving
the positivistic sceptiCism of old Seignobos).
18
PIERRE \ILAR
It is not possible to answer the quesrwn 'what is hitory?' by theory any
more than by practice alone. One can only try to answer, in Marx's
fashion, by a passionate dual effort at making a complex: subject-mattr
'one's own', which always demands a minimum of theory, and t 'con
struct' the object of thought corresponding to that matter, which demands
that the thinker both escapes from the latter yet holds 1t 'present' to his
mind. No research without theory - and here the historian's complacency
about theory often rightly irritates the philosopher. But also, no theory
without research, or else the theorist will soon fnd himself accused {as the
economist use to b) of merely juggling with 'empty boxes'.
Looked at more closely, the bo>es may appear .less empty than was
thought, because historians are less etnpiricist than imagined, Instead of
taking idle pleasure in negative pronouncements - which are part of an
ideological trap - would it not be more reasonable to take note of some
of the steps forward that historians have made? [n the same way, it might
be more scientifc to attempt an historical balance-sheet of Mar>ism in the
manner of historians, not 'judging' it according to our political or moral
preferences, but 'thinking' it as a phenomenon to be re-situated in time.
Our philosophers are gladly anti-humanist in their theoretical require
ments; yet they appear irked by the fact that - Lenin placed religiously
apart - far too many Marxist thinkers and political leaders were ignorant
enough of the great heritage to try and live it a an 'ideology' rather than
as 'science', in a 'historicist' perspective rather than as an absolute. Above
all, they feel that compared to he accelerating rhythm of the forces of
production, the mutation of the world appears a slow process flled with
errors and horrors; while on the otber hand there exists a theory which
would make history reasonable, if only it were better understood. Althus!tr
writes: 'On the day that history exists as theory in the sense defned,- its
dual existence as theoretical science and empirical science wnl pose no
more problems than does the dual existence of the Marx1st theory of
political economy as theoretical science and empirical science.'8 'No more'?
Is that not enough? The victory of socialist economics lies in the fact that
it exists - many believed it was impossible -not in its absence of problems

.
The same may be said of socialism a a totality, as a nasLe7t mode o(
production -which incidentally prhaps invalidates the term 'totality' which
mens a global structure truly in place. Its constitution within a hostile
world is certainly no less dramatic and imperfect- pssibly more so - after
a century of thought and ffty years of action, than was the installation of
the capitalist world or of the feudal world. They took centuries to think
out their meaning, centuries to be born. The logic of the Napoleonic wars
must have seemed very tricky to contemporaries.
Impatience is not a virtue of theorists. Nicos Poulantzas is indignant at
the successive and contradictory interpretations which the Third Inter
national gave of fascism, Well! Before interpreting one has to study, t see.
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING
10
ottugg!c8 dO nOI a!wa}8 cavc !mc Ot IhI8 hc vIcIOtIc8 O'8CIcnCc atc
WOn :n Ihc !ong-tuH.
hc8c COHs|dctaIIOH8 gO 8OmcwhaI DcyOnd thc aIm8 o IhIs study. Bu!
!hcyatcnOtuntc!aIcdtOthcm. cOnOmIc8,8OCIOOgy andhl8IOty(NatxIst
aHdnon-N6txIsIaIkc)havca!was 0ccn subcctcdIo!hc`Ovct-dcIctmIHlng'
gt88utc8 O thc Qtc8cHt. oay thc atc mOtc 8O than cvct. n Ihc 8gc
Ol QOsItvI8m Ihc dccHdcd Ihcmsc!Yc 8gaIn8I 8uCh Qtc88utcs, angtI!y
and na1vc!y. MOwaday8, thcy havc a!! bccOmc applied 8cIcHcc8, practical
sCIcncc, whcthct a8 gItIcO!Og, cmQItIca! 8OcIO!Og], OtYatIOu8 Qto8Qcc
Iu8c8, whcIhct thcyacccQt thc cXsIcncc O Ihc c!888 8Imgg!c Ot bc!Icvc H
'cOn8cH8u8'. mI8tOty I8 lO!OwIng thctcxmQ!c. I Is a mQottaHt !O It !o
cxQ!8InIdc La8ttO a8mctnan |OtIr8. LutjOutna!8?hOw!hI8wc! cHOuh.
hI8 Qtct.cc O Ihc Qtc8cHI In Ihc QasI and thc Qa8I ln Ihc Qtc8cHt I8
In HD waycOnttat IO Ihcspirit OtNatx.J!I8cvcHOnc O!hca!Ict's maIH
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u8 IO Out atgumcnI. LOc8 Out way O !OOkIng at Ihc Qa8I acCotd wIIh
Natxs cQIsIcmO!OgIca! IHnOYaIIOns, cOnscIOu8y Ot uHCOn8CIOu8!y Ln
8cvcta ImgttanI pOInts, and OHOnc InQattIcu8t ~ that Ol historical time
~ 1OuI8 Pthussct's 8tudIc8 gIYc u a ccat ConsCIOusHcs8 Ol Out YatIOu8
!acuBac, Out !oya!tIcs aHd Out IHhdc!IIIr8, buIa8O 0cctta:B OOut gaIn8.
nhI8d18COutsOn 'hl6IOtIca! tmc',P!Ihu88ctwatnsOtIwOtc!atcdabs8cs:
thc 'hOmOgcncOU8 and cOntInuOu8 IImc O COmmOn8cn8c and hIstOtca!
tc8catch andthctImc Otmcgc 'c88cn!a! scctIOn8, thc'hl8IOtICa Qtc8cn!',
Ihc 0OnIInuIt Ol tmc and Ihc u0Iy Ot thc mOmcnI.`
As ot thc sccOnd O thcsc ~ WhaI hI8tOtIan Iakc8 hI8 bu8Inc88 8O un-
sctIou8!ya8IOacccQtIhc9'ab!utchOtIZOH8'IhcQhIOQhctshaYcbtought
t Itc agaInA tOtIhc htsl,thctc 8tc vatIOu8 8OtI8otcOHtInuIt. hc tImc
O Qhy8IcI8t8 I8 cOun!cd In mI!nh8 o a 8ccOnd; thc IImc ol sQOttsmcn
In tcnth8. Llvcd t|mc has ItadItIOnay bccn Ihat ol day and nIght, wInIct
and 8ummct, 8OwIng and hatvc8t, Ihc can cat8 and Ihc lat onc8, Ihc
Intctva8 bc!wccn bItIh8, thc cXpcIatIOn Ot dca!h8. mI8tOt|ca dcmOgtagh
I8 agt!8ChOc!tcaChct aslata8d\ctcnIIaIcmytaItI8 concctncd. hc
IImc O mcn whO h8Yc 8cvcnt c8t8 ahcad Ol thcm I8 HO Ongct that Ol
mcn whO had IhItIy. Pny mOtc Ihan Ihc IImc Olthc LatIb ndIan I8 Ihat
O Ihc bskImo.
Ih`c mI8takc o mcchaHIc8 QctIOdIZaIIOn has bccn cOmmtIcd, It h88
bccn m8dc b ccOHOmI8I8, whO, IH IhcIt aHxIcI tO OQQO8c an `Obcctvc
!Imc IO !haI Ol hsIOtIan8, havc cut!hc:t tcmQDta! 8ctIc8 uQ InIo dcCadc8
Otha-ccnIutIc8wIthOuItca\IngIhaIIhcywctcOc8Itoyngthc mcanIngO
!hc 8ctIc8, cYcH ttOm!hcOInIOlYIcw Ot8ImQ!c ma!hcmaIlca QtObabI!IIy.
cI mc gO cvcn tutthct. t W08 tt8dItIOna! hl8tOty whIch 'cOnsttucIcd'
Imc ~ cvcnthc Od 'AnHa8, cvcn Ihc 8chO!a8IIc LhtOnc!c8. Yrnt8 tcIgns,
ctas: Ihcsc Wctc dcOOgIca cOn8ItuctIon8, bu! nOI hOmOgcncOus oncs.
20
PIERRE VJAR
thus, when chronological preoccupation became a citiral one, how many
myths it demolished, how many rexr it desacra-lized! This too
-
is part of
the 'history of knowledge', of the 'production of. knowledge'? On the oth
hand, when Michel Foucault loses hls way m the economic .domain, both
in his own chronology and in chrnology toMt court, he ends up writing
neither archaeology, nor history, nor science, nor epistemology, but
literature.
To date for the sake of datir.g is only a (useful) scholarly technique. To
'date intelligently' remains a duty for historians. For the consciousness of
successioHs in time an of relative durations .is anything but a naiVely given
datum. It does not aris out of nature and myths, but against them. Why
is it that Althusser, who concludes that the, concept of history is to be
identifed with that of a time, has not felt to the full the content of the term
chronology?
By contrast, having red Hegel, he overestimates the signifcance of
the notion of periodization: 'On this level, then, the whole problem of the
science of history would consist of the division of this continuum accord
ing to a periodization corresponding to the succession of one dialectical
totality after another. The moments of the Idea exist in the number of
historical periods into whkh the time continuum is to be accurately
divided. In this, Hegel was merely thinking in his own theoretkal prob
lematic the number one pwblem of the historian's practice, the problem
Voltaire, for example, epressed when he distinguished betwen the age of
Louis XI and the age of Louis xV; it is still the major problem of modern
historiography.'10 Let us say that after disengaging it from myths, history
tends spontaneously to systematize chronology. It is curious that it should
be reproached for so doing. From the Revolution onwards, French his
toriography tried to do this on the bais of the concept of socal classes.
Even our school-room periodization (Antiquity, Middle Ages, Modern
Times, the Contemporary Period) translates t4e succession of the three
main modes of production, 'modern' times corresponding to the pre
paration of the third mode through the triumph of the mercantile ecn
omy. This schema is Eurocentric, poorly conceptualized, and navely
divided according to the 'mutation-events' of the sort dear t Althuser
like 1492 or 1789. However, it does ressure M to some degree about the
cnvergence to be expected btween 'practicl' approaches and theoretical
'constructions'.
It is true that in Capitol Marx gave us a 'construction of time' in the
economic feld, and that this is complex and not linear: a 'time of tlmes'
not measurable against everyday clock time, but adapted to each thor
oughly concptualized operation (labour, production, the rotation of dif
ferent forms of capital). People have oftn affected not to notice thi
discovery. However, who has taken this temporal construction - the time
of capitalism - to its logical conclusion, if not modern economists? Once
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN 'HE MAKIG 21
again, if this was the essential Marxian innovation, it would have to
be declared accepted, perfected, surpassed. But it was not. It was, rather,
Marx's demonstration that 'rotations' and 'cydes' (and naturally 'revolu
tions' too, in spite of certain plays on the double meaning of the word)
never lead back to their point of departure again, but ceate new situations
not only in the uonomY but in the social whole This is the diffculty, which
the philosophers will seize upon. To speak of 'creative time' means nothing
(I did it once myself, unwisely), Levi-Strauss proposes 'cumulative history'
and 'hot history' (to evade the problem). It is not easy to name what
makes the new emerge out of the old.
To physicists this is unimportant, and biologists may be reduced to
philosophizing about it: their subjectmatters do not alter with the rhythm
of human lives. But the historian's domain is that of change itself change
at the level of structures M well as on the level of particular 'ca$es'. To the
historian the temptation to search for stabilities is an ideological temp
tation, founded upon the anguish of change, There Is no way out of it:
save for a few fragments on the point of vanishing, men in society no
longer live in pre-history - a term whose very invention shows that the
concept of hi'stot' has itself a hi$tory, one less simple than Althusser
believes. Sh thous0nd years at the most comprise 'historical times'. A few
cnturies form our familiar horizons, and two or three of them exhaust
our economy and our science. The 'long duration' is not so very long.
Btween it and the 'event/ it is mean or usual time which is enigmatic.
Althusser agreeS that 'historians are beginning to ask questions' about
all this, and even doing so 'in a very remarkable way', But (he goes on)
they are content to observe 'that there are' long, medium and short times,
and to note the interferences res1lting from their interaction, rather than
perceiving these as the product of one commanding totality; the mode of
Production. A ten-line critique and three names ip parentheses (Febvre,
La brousse, BraudeJ)ll; is this teally enough to situate contemprary 'histor
ical practice' in relation to (i) historical time, (ii) Marx To tell the truth,
one gets the impresion that for Althusser, the evocation of these three
names is a mere scruple. His criticisms are actuaHy addressed r the whole
of historiography from its beginnings, up to and including nearly all living
historians, Not that this attide is necessarily unjustifed. It suggests a
very important investigation: it would be most valuable to know the role
of what Althusser splepdidly describes as the 'elegant sequences of the
offcial chronicle in which a discipline w society merely reflects its good
conscience, 'e.,. the mask of its bad conscience'12 in class culture and
popular culture, both academic history aD.d television spectacles.
But this would mean a world-wide inquiry. And a second and more
diffcult one, into the eventual role and sites of growth of 'true history',
supposing one could defne this, and fnd it being practiced. On this
point Louis Althusser's hopes for the
,
construction of historical timeg a
2
PIERRE' VIAR
onstruction in Marx's sense, difer from our own. We shall set out the
latter by considering the three historians Althusser mentions and with
some reference to our own personal eXperience. However, we are perfectly
aware of the limitations of the arguments below in relation to the dimen
sian of the two questions to be posed: {i) what was, what is the hiHorical
function of history as ideology( (ii) what is now, and what could be, the
role of history as science?
The only historical practice which inspires an approving word from
Althusser is that of Michel Foucault. The latter (he claims) i the dis
coverer of a 'real history' quite invisible within the ideological continuum
of linear time - time which it is enough to simply divide up into prts.
Foucault has discovered 'absolutely unexpected temporalities\ 'new lOgics'
in relation to which Hegelian schemas (here they are again!) possess only
a 'highly approximate' value, ''on condition that they are us approx
imately in accordance with their approxim:te narure'13 - ' short, he has
carried out a work not of abstraction but within :bstraction, which has
constructed an historical object, by identifing it, and hence also the
concept of its history
If, when he wrote these Jines, Althusser had known only the Foucault
of L'Histoire de Ia folie and Naissance de f dinique might be induce
to share his fervour. However, if each 'cultural formation' of this sort must
have its 'own time', then what happns to the time of society- at large? On
reding the frst of these two works r experienced an anxiouS sensation of
'enclosure', appropriate to the subject of course but due also to the way
in which the latter had been cut off on its own. thought that this dis
satisfaction was Marxist. Sinc then, Foucault has gone on to generalize
his method, in large works which display its vices more prominently than
its virtues. At the outset, a few authoritarian hyptheses. As son as it is
a question of demonstration - wherever some light on the topic already
exists, one is confronted with jumbled dates, forced readings of texts,
ignorance so gross that one must think it deliberate1 :nd innumerable
historical absurdities {a redoubtable category). Above all, Foucault is
always ready to substitute without warning for the 'episteme' he discusses,
not thought-out concepts (one would be grateful for that), but his own
prirate imagery. Althusser talks of 'delirium' in (Onnection with Miche)er.
Equal in this respect, Foucault's talent is na different. However, i he has
to choose between two forms of delirium, the historian will prefer Michelet.
Michel Foucault's modesty will surely forgive this comparison.
LucienFebvre appears much less distant from Marx. Where does Althussr
situate him, however? Among the assemblers of the 'linear time' so ill
adjusted to the historical totality? No description could be less appropriate
to the man. Among the promorers of the elegant ofci:l sequences? Who
has not been guilty of this to some degree? But who has demolished more
of them than Lucien Febvre? All things considered, where can one fnd
MARXIST' HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING
23
more 'unexpecte temporalities', 'antipodes of empirical history' or 'iden
tifed historical objects' than in his work? I not the unbeliever as good
an historical 0bject as the madman? Is Febvre's 'mental equipment' quite
useless for the 'production of knowledge'? It is very much a trait of our
times to refer to Lucien Febvre ln brackets, betwen a condemnation of
Micheler and an exaltation of Foucault, as somebody who 'began to ask
the right questions'. That 'is, of times so concerned with communication
that each understands only one language in them - that of his 'training'.
It is not by chance that we have come to read so many self-contained
'cultures' into'the past. lt would be usful to discover which other epochs
of crisis have shared this tendency to erect sealed partitions.
Febvre's sixteenth century is not closed: Luther, Lefevre, Marguerite,
Rabelais, des Periers: all appear there within the exact limits which the
cohesion
.
of the 'oveJ-determining' totality imposes on them. But the latter
is in movemert. 'One cannot JUdge a revolutionary epoch by the con
sciousness which it has of itself.' The historian had to demonstrate this
against the ideology of his own time, of the rulers. If he could do it, it was
because he had frst of all made the sixteenth century 'his own', at all its
levels, and held it 'present' through a process of research which was concrete,
bu not empirical. His resarch was systematized by his struggle t deter
mine its problematic, against the historical positivism of the age, his struggle
for the massive fact against the minute and precise fact, for true scrupu
lousness against false erudition. lr is a struggle which often yields much the
same sounds as Marx's badtempered scoldings.
'Rea! history' may spring in this way out of a practice and a criticism,
not from an affected 'rigour' but from a correct,ess shown by the absence
of any absurdity. Lucien Febvre never called himself a theorizer or a
Marxist. But it would never have occurred to him to enclose Marx in the
nineteenth century as in a prison (as Foucault calmly does in The Order
of Things).14
Erest Labrousse's more evident relatonship to Marx does not incline
Althusser to give him any special consideration. He apparently wishes to
attack all conjunctural history as such, through Labrousse. But the latter
is unjustly accused by Althusser's .critique; especially when this critique
neglects the whole immense tradition from Vico to Kondratieff, from Moore
to Akerman, from Levasseur to Hamilton {not forgetting Simiand, if
one wants to remain gallocentnc), a tradition thar pretended to explain the
relations between cycles and d6elopment, btween natural, economic and
historia# time by the observation of statistical indices. Claimed, that is, to
answe_r the real question which has beet posed.
Was this question posed as a function of 'vulgar' time, or of the Marxist
'whole', the 'mode of production'? Here we 'ace a genuine diffcUlty.
Sometimes, in dfet, conjunctural history tends -by its expository methods,
by hasty eommentary or schoolbook vulgarization - t make history seem
2
PIERRE VILAR
a product of time (which is meaningless) rather than time (i.e., non
homogeneous, differentiated ti'me) a product of history (i.e., of the moving
play of social relationships within certain structures). A Marxist objection
to this position has already been made by Boris Porshnev, who, at frst
glance, extended it (wrongly) to Labrousse's work. Te relationship be
tween con junctura! and Marxist treatments of history thus certainly needs
to be clarifed.
Marx himself can help us in this respect. Consider his characteristic way
of treating the boom years of the 1850s ('this soiety appeared to enter
upon a new phase of development after the discovery of the Californian
gold mines . , +)y or the hopes he shared with Engels at each sign of capi
talist crisis (the pardonable naivety of a man of action), or his repeated
references to the long period of economic expansion after the great
Dil
coverie which served as the launching-pad of bourgeois society, or his
interest i1 Tooke's History of Prices and his reproaches to Hume for haVing
talked of the monetary systems of Antiquity without statistical evidenc, or
(lastly) his systematic analysis of the trade 'cycle' - a much more 'modern'
analysis than is often thought. All this prevents one from counterposing
Marx to conjunctural history or from seeing the latter as an innovation
with respect to him. What ought to be contrasted with his work are rther
the underlying theoretical foundations and the often intemperate historical
conclusions of the various forms of conjuncturalism.
Observation of the real rhythms of economc acrivityshould start from
a strict conceptualizaion of what it is that is bein observed. For far too
long observers have simply registered nominal prices here, money prces
there, volumes of production here and stock-exchange quotations else
where, long term curves here and short term curves there, and faile to ask
themselves what was index and what wa object, and what theory made
this an index of that object. I criticized Hamilton a long time ago for his
ultimate confusion of capital-formation with the distance between nominal
prices and wage-aggregates - which dos not mean that Marx was ignor
ant of the category of 'inflationary profts'! A concept or a standard are
only valid for one time: in spite of Marcrewski (or Fourastib) I continue
to reject the belief that i't is meaningful ro search for the 1970 equivalent
of a 1700 income. Finally, by eliminating one movement in order to isolate
another, one can create a statistical mirage. There are pitfalls in 'construc
tion' as well. This is why the most classical of conjUnctural movements can
be questioned, and it is enough to read Imbert in order to measure our
theoretical destitution faced with the Kondratieff waves.Y As the present
international monetary crisis shows, while capitalism - sinc the failure
of Harvard empiricism - has learned to tame the shorter-term (intra
decennial) cycle,' it has yet to prove able to control middle-range time.
Some are already fnclined to dismiss the shorter cycle completely, But,
an economic time of a long phase in the mode of production, the latter 'is
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE. MAKING
"
an integral part of the corresponding historical time. The historian cannot
escape from the labyrinth of conjuncture.
Althusser dms not a'lways help us in our effort to take Marx as a guide.
Without examples, it remains purely verbal to substitute 'variations' for
'varieties ', w replace 'interferences' with 'inter lacings'; and if we can fnd
only economic times i Capital where cn we grasp the 'different tempor
alities' of the other 'levels'? He warns us that

we must regard these differ

ences in tempral structure as, and only as, so many objective indices of
the mode of articulation of the differenr elements of structures in the
general structure of the whole . . . It ls only in the specifc unity of the
complex structure of the whole that we. cn think the concept of the so
called backwardnesses, forwardnesses, survivals and unevennesses of
development which co-exist in the structure of che real historical present: the
present of the conjuncture. '16 Structure-conjuncture: in historians' practice
has this not become a typical grid guaranteeing nothing in itself but dis
tancing reserch eually from quantitative empiricism and the traditional
'elegant sequences' ? We know the location of the 'break' between the
conjunctural economism of Simiand and a structural conjuncturalism closer
to Marx: it lies in the work of Ernest Labrousse. What has this to tell u
about 'temporalities'?
If one interprets La brousse as saying: the Fench Revolution was born of
a 'fusion' between a long tm- the economic expansion of the eighteenth
century - a medium time - the intercycle of depression, 1774-88 - and a
short time -the price crisis of 1789 which cuJminated (almost too perfectly)
in the seasonal paroxysm of July- 1789, then it looks < if the demonstration
is a mechanistic explanation of the revolution which shuffles together linear
times as if they amounted to a causal concatenation. But is this what he
says?
In fact, the statistically observable short cycle which pulsates in the
economic and social reality of the French eighteenth century is the original
cycle of the feudal mode of production, in which; (i) the bais of produc
tion remains agricuJtural; (ii) 'he basic productive techniques do not yet
dominate the stochastic cycle of production; (iii) the dues levied on the
producers should vary according to the amount produced; (iv) charity and
taxation shold cushion the worst forms of misery, in a bad year. However,
this pre-capitalist temp already co-exits along with others in the eight
eenth century, which though not yet typical of the future mode of produc
tion (like the 'industrial cycle', for instance) pave the way for it and are
part of it: (i) a long period of preparatory accumulation of money-cpital,
directly or indirectly colonial in origin,' which creates a moneyed bour
geoisie

and 'bourgeoisifes' pait of the nobility; (ii) the medium-term

possibility of commercial depressions (market crises, price depressions)
affecting and upsetting growing numbers of farmers, proprietors and
entrepreneurs whose products have entered the commercial circuit and
26
PIERRE VRAR
become 'commodities' - so many social strata interested in legal euality,
free markers, and the end of feudal structures; (ii) lastly, the aggravation
of 'old-style crises' in the short run, since though they are less letha! than
in the days of famines, the new speclllation on shortages which they provoke
is less restrained by administrative taxes and ecclesiastical redistributions,
and they therefore pauperize and proletarianize the masses more than ever
and turn the poorer peasants against both feudal or royal levies and market
freedom.
What better example than this could one fnd of an 'interlacing of times'
as the 'process of development of a mode of production' or even a a
transition from one mode to another - this convergence of 'specifc tem
poralities' which in July/August 1789 resulte in the famous 'event' that
overthrew the whole juridical and political structure of society?
Althusser is, I know, professionally interested in the times of science and
philosophy; while legitimate anxiety about contemporary history makes
him even more interested in words like 'backward', 'advanced', 'survivals'
and 'under-development'. In his defnition of 'conjuncture' he precedes
such terms with an ironical 'so-called', hoping in this way to draw attention
t the absurdity {and the ideological dar.gers) of a terminology that takes
models and goals for granted, and ends up by reading like a railway time
table. And certainly, many of the graphs dear to statistical annuals justify
his irony, with their picture of a dollars-per-capita or rate-of-investment or
quantum-of-scientifc-journals line where some countres seem to be on the
'Mistral' express and others on a slow-stopping train. However, this nec.
essary criticism of the verbal vainglory o ruling classes and their economies,
and of the distorting mirror of certain quantitative criteria, ought not to
make us forget essential Marxist principles: (i) the primacy of the economic
technical as synthesized in the productivity of labour; (ii) the need to escape
from vague descriptions by q:antifcation; {iji) the ma;or reality constituted
by the inequalities of material development. Marx always kept 'present'
England's advance and the potential of the United States, as did Lenin
his concept of 'uneven development'. One must know how to go beyond
linear time. But it is not suffcient to condemn it,
Suppse thee is a disjuncture btween an _institutional form, a mode o
thought, an economic attitude or a social ethic and the mode of produc
tion which we assume to be operative (these are ail thBotetical hypotheses).
Must we then say that these 'morals', 'attitudes', 'thought
S
', etc. are
'advanced' or 'backward', are 'surviv-als\ have an 'autonomous rhythm'
and so on? Would it not be better to say: to what xtent is this mode of
production, taken to be in place, functioning, according to its own model?
In what areas does it do so? Over what "durational scale'? In which sectors
is it an effective totality {already, if it is developing, and still, if it
.
has begun
to become destructured)?
It is in this way that the full meaning of 'conjunctur!' must be nderstood
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING "
(not in Simiand's (meteorological' sense). Several different 'speifc times'
enter int it. In my own work on Spain, I have always deciphered structural
contrasts from the specifcity of eLonomic rhythms. In Catalonia, a small
zone, I distinguished up to thre different 1hythms in the process of modi
fcation of the mode of productionY During the subsistence crisis of 1766
the rebels, priests and agitators levied popular taxes (taxations sauvages)
in the name of

conceptions of justice, morality

and property belonging to
the twelth century, while at the same time almost any smaJl shopkeeper's
correspondenceon.free enterprise and tne prices is already couched in the
language of Samuelson. Here the specifcity of time is also a specifcity
of
class. Study of the 'indmtrial cycle' is no less instructive. It is disappearing
fom the socialist economies, while the slowness of their transformation
of agricultural techniques maintains the older 'cycle' still in being in the
countryside. But any attempt to restore the market as a 'regulator' soon
causes the 'industrial cycle' to reappear, with inflation as its sign. Alter
natively, when the same cycle is attenuated under capitalism, the latter is
departing from its own modeL The sectoral location of transformations,
the cas loation of suprstructures, and the spatia/ location of 'totalities'
are all disclosed by so many 'objective indices'.
This kind .of analysis allows us to go from the theory to the 'cases'. It
may help to build up the theory - above a!! with regard to processes of
transition. It cnnot be reproached with conceptualizing time without regard
to the concept of the mode of production: it refers constantly to the latter.
If, by contrast, one looks for a 'specifc time' to attach to each different
'level' then this referenc is very likely to be abandoned.
The name of the third historian cited by Althusser was an inevitable
one. Because of a rightly famous artide.18 But an article which was
doubtless the source of Althusser's misconception. When after thirty years
of practice Ferrtand Braude! takes it into his head to therize, the philo
sopher cries out: look, he's beginning to ask himself questions! Not at all!
In 1958 Braude\ ended by asking questions of other people, provoked and
even irritated by theit indifference to historians' discoveries: 'The other
social sciences know little of the crisis that our historical discipline has
undergone during the last twenty or thirty years; they tend to misunder
stand our works, and in so doing also misunderstand an aspet of social
reality of which history is a good servant but not always a good sales-girl
- that is, social duration, or those multiple and contradictory forms of
t1me in the life of man . . . yet another cogent argument for the imprtance
and use of. history or rather of the dialectic of duration exhibited in the
profession and sutained observation of historians.'19
Profession, observation, works, servant, sales-girl . , . These words must
have displeased our theorist. I note also the words which must have per
suaded him to range Braude! -among the unemancipated slaves of linear
time: the addition of days, his recitatif of conjunctures, the rotation of the
2
PIERRE VILAR
earth, time as a measure, time identical with itself and, in the plural, times
which lock into one another without diffculty and are .measured by the
same standard. All this is quite opposed to Bachelard's sociologicl time
Yet is it so diffcult to perceive the beginnings of a critique, the gleams of
irony behind Braudel's insistence? Althusser has not 'situated' the essay.
For him, the knowledge of history is no more historical than the knowl
edge of sugar is sweet. Nonsense! The knowledge of this knowlfdge is
always itself historicaly constituted, whether in Braude!, in Althusser, or
in Marx (who knew this well).
In 1958 Braude! wonders about the destiny of his persbna\ contribution
to such knowledge: the 'long tempo', 'geo-history' conceived as something
imposed by space upon time. This is a weighty question, to which he turns
twelve years after writing his Medierranee, in response to other orientations,
some a matter of 'historical practice', others no:. Implicitly ironizing at te
expense of the 'recitatif' of conjunctures, Braude! expresses the fear that
the latter may lead to a kind of return to 'events'. Labrousse had passed
from his own 'long eighteenth century' of 1933 to a subsequent emphasis
in 1943 on a prNevolutionary 'intercycle' of less than fften years, and
then - in 1948 to a brilliant summary of revolutions taken in the short
term: 1789, 1830 and 1848.20 This earns him some friendly teasing on the
'tricks of the trade' or the historian a 'fm director'. For Braude\ the
historian should take up a stance above the level of 'dramatic news'. If it
is objected chat the_ trade of the historian consists, precisely, in situating
events within the d)namic of structures, then (he insinuates) by trying to
do this the historian wil! always end by scrifcing structure to events.
When he wrote his essay, he could afford to be less anxious in the other
sense, concerning the 'long term'. Bur here he has since been outflanked._
Today, there is an 'anthroplogy' which seeks its prmanent factors in the
log1cal structure of sociological 'atoms', and an economics which has dis
covered virtues in the qualitative mathematics of 'communication'. Always
responsive to the 'latest thing', Braude! is much drawn by such seductions.
These novelties go broadly in his direction - chat of resistance to ,hanges.
Yet he loves his own trade. The historian welcomes 'long tempos'. But if
time disappears altogether, then so must he. He therefore proposes the
term structure for 'an assemblage, doubtless an architecture, but more
importantly for a reality which time wears away only with diffculty, and
carries forward only very slowly'. The theorist may still lok down his
nose at this. 'Doubtless', 'more important', that is not very 'rigorous'. And
whatever the reality may be, it is not 'time' which erodes it, but 'some
thing' which wears it away unevenly according to the realities in question.
It is this 'something' which is the problem.
If one reality lasts longer than another, however. it will envelop the
latter, and it is this term 'envelop' which Braude! selects, stressing its math
ematical meaning. For him it designates the geographical and biological
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING "
constraints, the technical impotences out of which he built up his 'long
tempos', and which include (anticipating Foucault) the 'persistent prisons'
of 'intellectual constraints' or 'mental frameworks'. Can one fail to situate
these statements in
.
relation to Mar. when Braude! refers to him explicitly
as the. frst creator of 'historical models' and indicates in which sectors he
has tried to follow his example, if not his method? I the reference is not
too persuasive, however, I think this may be because Marx never thought
with partial models` thus the concept of 'model' as applied to monetary
circulation is not Marxist, while concepts such as 'crisis' or 'mental equip
ment' are much more so, even if they do not claim to be 'models',
But this does not mean that Marxist theory will be able to ignore the
problems posed by Fernand Braude! both in this essay and in his work as
a whole. Nature, geographical space, resistant structures, a-historical
structures (if there are any suh): what will the historian make of these?
(i) First nature. In the only text of his which ca be considered as the
sketch of a possible historical treatise, Marx recalls fnlly that 'the pint
of dep<rture' is 'obviously the natural characteristics, subjectively and objec
tively';
2
1 his fundamental defnition of productivity also mentions 'natural
conditions' at the end, Last but not least. For a dialectic between man
and nature can scarcely underestimate the importance of 'natural condi
tions', Only, one must set over against these conditions techniques (and then
science). Between any two victories of the latter the mode of production
is framed within the limits thus marked out. The ffth of the 'points not
to be forgotten' in the 1857 Introduction " 'dialectic of the concepts pro
ductive force (means of prquction) and relation of production, a dialectic
whose boundaries C to be determined, and which does not suspend the
real differencem- shows, for example, how one should treat the persist
ence of 'crises of the old sort' in several modes of production in twentieth
century Europ.
To think history geographically is not therefore contrary to Marxism. It
would, however, be more Marxist ro think geography historically. Among
the 'permanences' how may we distinguish the poles where man's grip i
most effective? The Mediterranean is full of them. But they are 'enveloped'
by deserts and mountains. This i.s surely a fne object to be 'identifed' and
'constructed' by a (dialectical) history; but Althusser is not suffciently
aware of this even to discuss it.
{ii) Then, space. This is equally an object to be constructed. Theories of
it have been suggested, and then worked out,. but while Braude\ has paid
attention r them, Althusser has not. They refne (and occasionally carica
ture) the old temptations of geographers, economists and. logicians in this
respect. Men, villages, towns, felds, factories were not implanted 'any old
how', and we ought to be able to discover a logic to their locatiOn. This
can give rise to many exercises in mathematics, graphics and cartography,
none of which should be disdained. But if the historian can take
. some
30
PIERRE VJLAR
lessons from them, he also has his own to give. The organization of space
in the service of man, a 'geography of the will', is quite thinkable; this is
one of the tasks of the day after tomorrow. One can also imagine a new
capitalism upon a new space, instal!ing itself with no overall plan, accrd
ing to its own internal logic. The Unite States was almost like this
(a Marx often indicated). The impetus of development in this case was
very powerful. It is now coming t be perceived as monstrous, so that the
mystique o 'ecology' has arisen around it.
In old countries, however, the problem is more complex than this. There
history is not only an interlacing of times but of spaces as well. The logic
of a Breton village is not that of Nuremberg, which in turn is not that of
Manhattan. The nineteenth ce.ntury evicerated medieval Paris and ruined
the Marais. The twentieth century is sving the Marais, and demolishing
Les Hailes in Paris. Barcelona took fve centuries to move outside its
wal!s, invented the Cerda Plan, then disfgured it almost at once. The Latin
American city bears with it the cancer of the favela. and the barriadas. The
periphery of the Mediterranean has become a play-ground, torn between
the skyscraper and the tent. The current Vedel Plan offers the vocation of
pleasurepark to twothirds of arable France. In this world there is no
more 'long duration'.
But historians of rural landscape or urbanization usually lose their way
in prehistory or in collective psychology. While spac itself, if it escapes
the speculator, falls into the clutches of the empirical sociologist or the
technocrat. If divorced from the concept of time, the concept of space is
ill-suited to old countries in which every stage of production, every social
system, has had its towns and felds, its palaces and cottages, each histor
ical totality nesting down as best1t can in the heritage of another. A 'real
history' would draw up balance-sheets and display mechanisms and thus
help to contruct this time in a concrete sense - a properly thought-out
combination of past and future. Socialism can count some succsses In this
domain. It would be interesting to know what (if anything) they owe to
the Marxist conception of this combination.
(iii) Histoical times and srggles between groups are combined in still
another fash1on. With their terse assimilation of history to class struggle,
Marx and Engels gave rise to a long equ'ivocation over thei. thought. It
came to be believed that they despised the ethnic bases of political group
ings. And at frst this equivocation was a useful weapon in the fght against
a conception of history founded ideologically upon the, might of monarchs
and national wars. But in their correspondence and their journalistic
article Marx and Engels employ the terms German, French, English, Turk
and Russian as often as they do 'proletarian' and 'bourgeois'. Class con
tradictions are the motor of history, as technique and economy are the origin
of thes contradictions. However, this 'last instance' exerts irs power through
many other realities, Again, among the 'points not to be forgotten' of the
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY I THE MAKING ,
1857 Introduction, the very frst place goes to war, and the last to peoples,
races, etcP We are certainly complled to remember them, Nationalities
and supranationalities, fascist nationalisms and revolutionary nationalisms,
centralized states against ethnic minorities, the resistance of monetar
y
autonomies to multinational economic bonds - a !I go to show a second
half of the twentieth .. century at least as sensitive as the frst (and possibly
more so) to the existettce or the demands of political formations expressing
the consciousness of groups. Here too Marxism has a theory to propose,
decisively formulated by Stalin in 1913, and based upon 'differential ter
pos' explained in terms of the central concept of mode of production
(let me add; also of the concept of class).
The political type-formation corresponding to competitive capitalism is
the Nation-State-Market with a bourgeois ruling dass, which either devel
ops out of an over-narrow fe:da! framework (Germany, Italy) or else at
the explise of vast and heterogeneous empires (Austria, Russia, Turkey).
But the condition of such formations is the pre-existence of 'stable com
munities', not eternal in character but historically constituted by a number
of very different factors over very long periods of time. In no sense does
Marxism accept these communities as absolute ends-inthemselves, or
determining factors. They are the pre-posed framework, the instruments
offered to otte dass with which to forge its state. In irs own fashion the
feudal world had already given examples of thi"s. The mercantilist phase of
the bourgeoiSie diretly prepGted the national state in France and England.
Now this projection backward suggests another one forward in time.
Other classes cn in their turn take such 'stable communities' as the basis
for their action. Their success depends upon their ability to create a nw
mode of prouction. On the other hand, the role of capitalism as a
national instrument has meanwhile been eroded. Rosa Luxemburg unduly
anticipated the lcmg-term tendency of capital to weave multinational ties
and forge super-states (as Lenin's critique of her pointed out). But today
this tendency is manifestly asserting itself, and the national bourgeoisies
are only feebly resisting it. It is peoples which resist, to the degree to which
the class struggle has created revolutionary situations amongst them. Soc
ialism, fnally, faces the task of constru,ting the past-future combination
in the organization of multira.tional spaces, as in the organization of eco
nomic spaces (scienrifcally if possible and - of course - on the basis of a
cncept of history). Everything here depends upon its analytical fdelity to
theory.
This three-fold dialectic between (a) 'long times' and specifc times of the
mode of production, (b) the small spaces' of ethnic groups and the large
zones demanded by modern activity, and (c) between class struggles and
the consciousness of groups, has served my own historical researches very
well 1.nd thrown much light on the presen fot me. Hence I can only regret
that it was Invoked neither by Fernand Braude\ in relation to his 'long
"
PIERRE VlAR
tempos' nor by Louis Althusser with regard to his 'interlacing' of specifc
tempos. Doubtless Marxist thery becomes more opaque, as it penetrates
deeper into a history still under constructon.
(iv) Some words on a-historical structures. The historian (the MarXist.
historian above all) will distrust this concept. For him, everything changes.
And nothing is totally independent of a global structure itself in course of
modifcation. Yet if he admits the notions- of 'long times' and 'stable com
munities', why should the resistant networks of the most ancient structures
- like the family. or myth - not be integrated in the- same categories?
Naturally the historian must be grateful to the ethnologist who has recon
structed the logic of these structures when they have observed them in near
to their pure state. But what will be of more concern to him are the
gradations, modes -nd functions of such resistant networks inside societies
under transformation. Again, the 'interlacing of tempos.
Two other claims of structuralism (or structuralisms)l prhaps inevitable at
an early stage and now anyway moderated, demand a different sort of
discussion;
Firstly, the autonomy of felds of research. Anxious above all for a self
suffcient explanation in terms of its own internal structures, each feld
proclaimed any attempt at h'istorical integration of irs case-studies to be
useless, even scandalous. Quite possibly this impulse. represented - in lit
erature, for example " healthy reaction agaln:t supercial historical
treatment. of examples; yet to carry it too far means leaving any concrete
case incompletely understood. I have tried to show this myself in the
case of Cervantes/4 but I believe that essays of this kind s'hould ideally
come as the conclusion of global historical resetrch in depth, rather than
as objects studied ln their own tight and vaguely related to an approximate
hitory. Structurale-Marxist essays generally Sl)ffer from lack of suffcient
historical information; and Althusser has given us 'few particulars concern
ing his combination of autonomous-dependtmt 'levels'.
Scondly, there is another and global 'gttucturalist' pretension: .ll the
human sciences (history and the quantitative 'social sciences' excluded)
must be seen. as constituting an 'anthropology' based upn their formalizab!e
structures, and in particular upon those of communication, such str1ctures
being taken as the revelation of underlying psychologkal and inte!!ectual.
mechanisms. Curiously, this 'anthropology' with man as its 'Object' declares
itself also anti, or at least ahumanist. Yet to the extent to which it wants
to be, or thinks it is, an exact science, it would surely be vry odd if it did
not rapidly become an applied science and - consequently - tied to the
interests of human beings and their social classes. The project itself rejoins
the old metaphysics of 'human nature' and is ideological in chatacter: it
sets out to study societies on the basis of their 'atoms', before observing
them on the macro-economic and macro-social levels.
MA. XJS' HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 33
The assimilation of social relationships to-a 'language', and of economics
ro a 'communication of goods' (neglecting production, and the relationship
with nature) refurbishes the 'naive anthropology' of exchange equilibrium.
A theory of games in which all the players rake rational decisions always
makes it diffcult to explain the existence of losers. All this arises from a
generaHzed confusion with the science of li
1
1guistics, as renovated by struc
turalist discoveries after a long period of false historicization. But it is
-already becoming dear that the autonomy of linguistics ls not integraL
Above all, while the historian (as in the analogous cases of literature and
art) must assimilate enough of the structuralist lesson to avoid conferring
a historical meaning on what may only be a common inheritance, he
knows that differentiations are still his domain. I historicl semantics
remains an unploughed feld, it is because changes in signs, words, here
represent changes in things; if 1stable communities' are separated by lin
guistic birriers, why do some resist the pssage of time and events so much
better than others? The questions which interest the historian are those to
which structuralism has no answer.
It is curious that Marx thought an analogy with language useful, in h1s
discussion of production: 'however, even though the most developed ian
guages have laws and chara,teristics in common with the least developed,
nevertheless just those things which determine their development, i.e., the
elements which are not general and common, must be separated out from
the determinations valid for production as such, so that in their unity -
which arises already from the identitY of the subject, humanity, and of the
object, nature - their essential difference is not forgotten.'l Bali bar is quite
tight to pint out that this text does not seek to distinguish between
the generality of concepts and the particularity of the real, but rather be
tween two sorts of abstraction, two sorts of liaison between corcepts in
the theory of history, neither of which is privileged when it comes to
constitutirg the theory of knowledge. This remark is crucial for the debate
between history and structuralism. It should be added, though, that Marx
warns the reader against any appeal to 'generalities' about man or nature
in economics, which rely upon 'commonplaces gone mad', The common
place and the tautology are often rediscovered (not always uselessly) in an
examination of the logic of things. One must merely make sure rhat,
beneath scholarly guise or vulgar mask, the commonplace is not delirious.
I have deliberately chosen to be optimistic in a time of gloom. I have tried
to show that_ history is better equipped than is imagined by many theoretical
Marxists in pursuit of the (quite un-Marxist) goal of absolute knowledge.
I have attempted to indicate the possible utilization by Marxist historians
of everything in contemporary historical research which seeks for a global
view of society, and which has turned away from the piecemeal treat
ment of fragments of reality - but without falsely attributing to Marx such
34 PIERRE VILAR
advances as have been made without major reference to his theories.
Finally, I have endeavoured - without taking too seriously that irch for
novelty which troubles the epidermis of rbe younger human sciences - to
neglect nothing in them which may serve science in the Marxist sense of
the term, Jike their inter-disciplinary approach to society. Like empiricism,
structuralism is only ideological' t the extent to which it aspires either to
a_n immobile universalism, or to an atomistic solitude.
It remains to try and point out some consideraDie and persistent diff.
culties in the way of scientifc historical practice; '.nd also some of the
many and varie ways forward.
I do not think the problems lie in the direction of that 'theory of n-an
sition' for whid- Althusser yearns, and claims not to fn in Marx, Because
he i a philosopher, Althusser has remained more of a Hegelian than
he would like to be; so he has crystallized and endosed his concept of the
mode of production to such an extent that it beomes an anxious problem
for him how one can either get in or out of it. He i s right only if it is
necessary to erect 'transition' as such into a new object of thought. But
Marx not only proposed a viable theory of the capitalist mode of prouc
tion, after regarding and scrutinizing its operation from every possible
pint of view (a theory which includes a prevision of the system's destruc
tion). He also regarded. and scrutinhed from every angle the preeding
transition from feudalism to capitalism, starting from those days in I 842
when the debates in the Rhineland Diet revealed to him the profound
conflict between two different laws, two different conceptions of ethic
and the world, even over such an apparently trivial episode as the gath
ering of dead woo. This is, incidentally, a characteristic starting-pint,
regularly omitted from its proper place at the head of Marx's Works
because editors are not sure whether it should be clasifed as 'economk',
'political' or 'philosophical' (of course its whole interest arises from thls
unclassifabil ity).
Given the richness of the suggestions in Marx's own work, and in that
of Lenin; given the previous (but by no mens outdated) debates among
Marxist historians like Dobb, Sweezy and Takahashi; given the advanced
state of work on 'modern times' as distinct from the Middle Ages and the
contemporary period, I think we may confdently state that are pro
gressing in the 'real history' of the transition from feudalism to capitalism
and that this will in tur help us to theorize other historical transitions. I
leve out of account here my own experience of research in this feld
which, while it is not for me to assess it wOrth, has at !east enabled me
to see and assess the work of others.
One regret: at the 1970 International Conferen of Economic Histor*
ians in Leningrad the vague title of 'modernization' was chosen for what
ln good Marxist terms ought to have been called the transition from pre
capitalist modes of prOduction (feudal or even earlier), either to some form
MARXIST HSTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING
"
of cpitalism or t the socialist mode of production {even assuming that
the latter exists in the full sense). On this occasion, which called for the
widestranging reflection on the countries of Africa, Asia and America,
the <western' historians simply retired into the traditional themes of their
assorted 'specialities' ('the eighteenth century', the 'priority of agriculture',
'English leadership' . . . etc.), while the Soviet historians offered an impresw
sive set of results, in the shape of collective syntheses on the different areas
of their country, but next to nothing on the processes involved, and even
Jess on their theory. [t ill become1 me to condemn this debate, or rather
lac_k of debate, since I presided over it, However, my disappointment
makes me less restive in the face of Althusser's demands and rigours.
It is thus that the theoretical abdication of Marxism takes the form of a
renunciation of the concept of history.
So it is good that men like Boris Porshnev or Wito!d Kula have under
takxn to "onstruct a 'theory of the political economy of feudalism', in the
same way as Marx attempted to build a theory of the determinant eco
nomi nexus of capitalism.16 One can understand, too, the often passionate
interest some young historians show for the 'Asiatic Mode of Production',
which Marx only r-eferred to in passing, but whose importance and histor
ical originality are beyond doubt. The title is an unfortunate one, however,
and does not acquire higher theoretical value by being knowingly short
ened to 'AM', Occasions like this show one how diffcult it is to theod:e
validly on the basis of roo partial an experience, or too limited a knowl
edge (here the historian has the advantage over A!thusser). It will take
many yers, even decades of resean:h ro arrive at any global theory of the
very varied forms of the 'AMP'. But in this feld there is no hurry.
'What is more urgent is the elaboration of methods of passing from
theory to the analysis of cases (or frameworks for action), whose reality
generally consists neither in one single mode of production, nor in a 'tran
sition' towards one of them, but in complex and often very stable comw
binations, not merely of two, but of several different modes of production.
The distinction brween the real 'socio-economic formation' and the
theoretical object 'mode of production' should be generally familiar by
now, although often the vocabulary of Marxist studies remains indecisive
in this respet. But what we need to know (it is something I have often
asked myself) is whether complex structure, a 'structure of structures',
bears w'hin itelf a certain pwer of determination, an 'effcacity' (as a
mode of production .does).
In the case of Latin America - where the exception all but makes the
rule - Celso Furtado has employed multiplewparameter economk models
to build up a interaction of sectors with differentiated 'fLindamental laws.n
But he confnes himself to the economy, and one may wonder if the notion
of 'maximization of proft' has any meaning outside the capitalist mode
of production. Take another example, nineteenth-century Spain, which I

PIERRE VlLAR
know a little better: it would bf absurd to describe it either 'capitalist'
or 'feudal'; 'semi-feudal' is a _oor compromise term, and 'bisectora\' evokes
the idea of simple juxtaposition. Now even if one does more or less per
ceive two dominant forms juxtaposed in the same space, one must then
ask - are not the solidarities btween them sufficient to constitute an
original hody, one characterized by this very juxtaposition, with ir con
tradictions and conflicts, and the conscioOisness of these conflicts? Should
one therefore, for each such 'formation', construct a corresponding theo
retical object? This is the normal procedure in chemistry-.
The maiO problem -remains causality, and it is not resolved by the use
of a term like 'effectivity'. I share Althusser's distrust of the facile Marxism
which declares that 'necessity is assertng itself wherever it is short of an
argument which will relate its theory to reality. For Althusser, the mistake
lies in confronting theory and reality in this_ ion. They are differnt
objects. However, if the historian refuses to rally to the throng who de
dare that 'this is how things happened' (im_plying that histor is nor theo
retically thinkable), then he will quickly fnd himself forced in practice to
choose, or to combine various sorts of causal relationships: linear, a!tcr
native, statistical or probabilist. But he should not conclude this suffces to
make him a theonst. He remains within empiricism. Often enough within
the diffcult empiricism of sociologists, as when they try very cautiously to
establish correlations among series of different kinds, berween quantifable
economic relations, rather less quantifable social relations and a mental
realm which may one day be quantifable . . . Althussr wishes, very under
standably, to get away from terrain like this. But through new and tentative
methodologies which have carried them far away from their old traditions,
today's historians have begun to be conscious of the unity and complexity
of their subject-matter; rhey are aware of its originality) and of the need
to seek a new type of rationality for it) whose mathematilal forms will
come much later on.
Althusser proposes a solution: a 'structural cauality' internal to the
mode of production, founded on the key concept of Darsteffung (repre
sentation) in Marx, designating the presence of the structure in its effects.
Or (betre. still) it is in the effects that the whole e:istence of the structure
consists. This is a sed1ctive notion, and reinforces my conviction (already
stated above) rhat I global srntcture can exisr unless all its effets are
present. Yet I do not like Althusser's arguments. They are too close to
images. The Image of the Darstellung is that of a thetrical representation.
It was frst proposed by Marx and while I appreciate its suggestive force,
I can also see its vagueness and incoherence. Elsewhere Marx compares
mode of production to 'a general Hlumination which bathes all other
colours and modifes their particularity' and then to 'a particular ether
which determines the specif graviry o every bing which has materialized
within it'Y
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 37
No, this is not the best of Marx, at least on the level of expression (for
the idea is a powerful one). Neither are the other Marxian metaphors in
which A!thusser sees 'almost perfect concepts', in spite of their incompat
ibility with those. just quoted: i.e., mechanism, machinery, machine, ffion
rage (what would the reaction be if one were to exploit these terms against
Marx!). Marx also employs the word 'metabolism', While it is above all
to psychoanalysis that Althusser himself refers. How unconvincing these
comparisons are, I repeat, when after all there is no good reason to expect
the social totality to behave like either a physiological or a psychological
whole. In fact, Marx like everybody else happned occasionally to choose
a word or metaphor for the sake. of effect, and to make a more or less
happy choice. This i's why I prefer to try and grasp his thought in the whole
of his work, in his typical forms of analysis, and in their 'illustrations'.
In their applications also. A. psychoanalyst is a practitioner. [f he talks
of 'the effccy of an absent cause', this concept evokes a cert<in number
of cases for him. If a creative Marxist (whatever his theoretical contribu
tion may be - Lnin, Stalin, Mao, Ho-Chi-Minh, Fidel Castro) tests the
effcacy of the mode of production he :ishes to cre<te upon a society long
conditioned by some other (or several other) structure, it is then that he
tests the validity of its concept. The histori1n sees similar tests, less con
scious but by no means blind, in the England of 1640 or the France of
1789. Here history bears evidence.
A last diffcult)<: sometimes Althusser Is led by other influences to defne
structural causality a. a simple logic of positions. The 'relations of produc
tion' would then flow only from the place of men in the system- the latter
become the supports rather than the subjects of these relations. It. is true
that for Marx social relationships are not exclusively inter-subjective, as
they are in vulgar economics. First of all because they compris certain
relations with things (this is the primacy of production). Then too because
he was never concerned to denounce individ1tal exploiters, but to discerf
the nature of a social exploitation. Marxism can thus never be reduced to
a theory of 'human relations' (if so, why not 'public relations'!). However,
to try and exptess all this by declanng such reductionism 'an insult to
Marx's thought' is to give way to an anti-humanism which risks an insult
to his person. To the author of the Manifeto, history is no chess-board,,
and the class struggle i no game. It i not even a 'strategy', It is a battle.
The diffculties disussed above prove that the feld remains quite opn
to whoever wants to solve them by research. But for Marxist historian
two avenues seem to me excluded: {i) the repetition of theoretical princi
ples combined with criticism of whoever does not know of them, all in the
service of skeletal and weightless constructions; (ii) historical pracnce,
which, however far removed from traditional canons, confnes itself to
specialist areas, partial problems, and tentative technical innovations, and
thereby remains loyal in fact to the least creative kind of empiricism.
, PIERRE VILAR
'Real' Marxist history, by contrast, must be ambitious in order to
advance. It must - aJId no science can do otherwise - move ceaselessly
from patient and ample research to a theory capable of the utmost rigour,
but also from theory to 'cases', in order to avoid the- risk of remaining
useless knowledge.
From research to theory: we have noticed far too many ill-so[ved theo
retical problems not to stress this frst way forwr< for the_ historian -
comparative histor in the service of theoreticrl prablematics.
If we ask - what is a structure? What is a structure of structures? An
interlacing of differential tempos? A articulation of the social with the
economic, or of the mental with the social? A class struggle? A ideology
in the class struggle? The relationship between an agent's place in produc
tion and the human relationships presupposed by that place? The com
bination between class struggles, and conflicts between ethnic or political
groups? Such problems, which are both hisrorical and theoretical, impose
one fundamental duty upon us: research. They demand we take critical
account (as Marx did) of all the economic, political, and social investiga
tions of our own times, but without taking for granted the historical
specifcity of the last twenty years. One does this by going back in history.
By thinking about all countries. The theoretical validity of any subsequent
anal,sis will depend upon the depth, the precision, and te range of such
investigations (whether or not one decides to recount one's inquiry as part
o the result), The only danger of this procedure is its slowness. Engel$
knew that Marx never began to write (still less to publish) anything on a
particular subject without having read everything on it. This is one of the
reasons why, as Althusser reminds us, Capital ends with - 'Social classes.
Forty lines, then silence' ,z9 It is this silence which we should strive to
break, rather than the hypothetical 'silences between words'.
Theory wi!l not suffer from reseirch. Here it is worth recalling ( . . ,J
Marx's chapter on money. Only the vast historical information displaye in
the diversity of the facts, times, places and thoughts considered there allowed
him to attain rhe theoretical originality of the text. Of a text, thar is, which,
alone among the almost inexhaustible literature on the topic, succeeded in
demystifying the false problem of the quantitative theory of money. [n rwo
pages it sys everything there is to sy about what w later to be known
as 'Fisher's equation', wirh the difference that it leaves no doubt in rhe
reader's mind about the reversibility of the relationships involved. AU pos
sible hypotheses are mentioned, with the relevant historical examples in th
background, so that no room is left for the confusions which marheatical
formulations have inspired ln later more na'lve (or hurried) historians.
It may be objected: but this is economics, not 'history'. Firstly, this
is inexact- there is no such thing as 'pure' economics, and monetary ques
tions are ceaselessly intertwined with other sorts of history (political, psy
chological). Secondly, why not apply the same method to other concepts
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 39
which are neither more nor less theoretical and neither more nor less
historical, than that of money? Class, nation, war, and state for example,
around all of which there has accumulated such a mountain of ideological
fabulation, and so many 'lommonplaces gone mad' in the guise of theory.
Yt Althussr, who affrms at one and the same time that there is no
'general history' and that it is necessary to 'construct the concept of
history', says nothing at aH about these intermediate concepts that are so
constantly manipulated and so rarely examined. A constructive critique
ought surely to have borne upon this point, for which Marxism should
assume responsibility (as sometimes it does).
From theory to 'cases': here i s the second, no less diff0lt, obligation.
It is a "ecessary duty, for what would a 'theory' be if it did not help the
historian to understand this country, this time, or this conflict better - if
after, as before, they appeared as mere chaos t him? If it did not help the
man of action (any man of action, since all are concrned) to understand
hs country, his time, or his conflicts better? But it is a difcult obligation
too, unfortunately. Alongside some massive successes which must indicate
some degree o theoretical adaptation to 'cases' - Lenin in revolution,
Stalin in construction and war, Mao in the O'erthrow of a traditional
world - it is only too well known how Marxism has tended to alternate
between an abstract schematism whose validity depended on its simplicity,
much too 'all-purpose' to allow proper application, and (on the othet
hand) 'revisions' in the name of real complexity that risk falling back into
merely empirical treatment of each 'case' - or else, into pure speculation
which merely leaves reality 'autonomous'.
But what is the 'treatment' of a historical 'case'? (i) There are certain
kinds of 'theoretical cases', which present themsdves in a number of dif
ferent exemplifcations at one moment of history and demand a common
interpretation. Fascism, for example, or enlightened despotism: forms of
authority which, by Jnstalling a certain type of state, endeavour to save a
mode of production drawing towards it end, while adopting (or preten-
ing to adopt) part o the new mode of production whose advent appears
imminent. A theory of modes of production, a theory of transition, a
theory of the state ate therefore invol'e in the analysis of such real
cases; but their combination may in turn suggest a theory of the phenom
enon itself. (ii) Distinct from these easily grasped cases which seem to
invite theory, there are the multiple, dispersed, incoherent 'episodes' of
more 'historical' history - the rise and fall of men and governments,
parliamentary debates, coups d'itats, diplomacy, and (fnally and above all
else) wars: We know that each such 'event' should become a 'case', whose
particularities wo.uld appear. only as expressions of a wider ensemble or
historical moment, if not of a model, but we are very .far from this goal.
It must be admitted that we have no theory of the articulation between the
global functioning of societies and the incubation of 'events'.
40 PIERRE VILAR
'Po!iticology', 'polemology': such terms testify to the need for science in
this domain, but also to the trend towards fragmentation of what 'is really
unitary. Is a 'plitical theory' of fascism possible without a theory of war?
But can one call a caricatural strategic schema, a 'delirious commonplace'
which mixes up Salamis and Hiroshima, a 'theory of war'? A 'polemology'
ought to relate together modes of prodlction, types of state, types of army,
types of tension, and types of class struggle, so that each confict (past,
present, or possible) will appear within a global framework without the
effacement of its particular nature. Lenin was a master of this. (Hi') FlnaUy,
the 'case' par excellence: that of the socio-economic formation within one
historically stable framework, the 'nation' or 'state' (one of the problems
being the coincidence or non-coincidence of these two Categories), How
can the Marxist historian pass from a general sociological theory to an
attalysis of a juridically and politically delimited 'body' of this kind, which
also depends upon (and is occasionally disrupte by) solidarities of a dif
ferent type - an analysis which will be explicative of it past and effective
in its present?
The nineteenth century gave to written and taught history an ideological
role in this regard. Hence the Marxist tradition has for long sought to
break with its national, nationaUst and nationalitarian (nationalitaires)
perspectives, and every 'new' history has striven to fnd .other ones. How
ever, this old historiography bears witness to a whole age. !tis itself part
of irs own history. To expose its ideological character is certainly a step
forward in the direction of science. But it is Impossible to renoune
examination of the overall transformations of the world through the prism
of national 'cases\ All we can do is think-them in a new way, by situating
the latter in relation to the former.
One must also keep in mind the totalizin.g efects of each 'case'. We have
already observed briefly that, while the global social structure is deter
minant, the 'regional' structure of a society a complex combination,
a structure of structures - must equally be recognized through iQ effects.
Here we touh upon the notion of 'total history' which I have often
defended, and which arouses some sarcsm, As if one could say everything
about everythng! But of course it is a question only of
-
saying what the
whole depends upon, and what depends upon the whole. This is a great
deal. But it is less than the useless accumulations formerly made by tradi
tional histories, or by the juxtaposed specialist chapters in today's compen
dia, which precisely claim to treat everything.
Whether in any human group or in a 'nation', the problem is, as usual,
to distinguish appearance from reality. The appearance (which gives rise
to ideological history) is that there are 'national characters' and 'power
interests', which are given factors, and create history. The reality is that
'interests' and 'powers' are made and unmade on the basis of successive
impulses from the forces and modes of production; and that 'national
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 41
characters' and 'national cultures' are modelled, over long durations, upon
the ftame which these successive impulses either create ot maintain. The
appearance (temperaments, languages, cultures) is, naturally, registered by
common sense. During the Middle Ages, the university 'nations' already
!aJlpoond each other constantly, and the modern 'nations' have continued
to do the same in new drcu mstances, sometima god-naturedly, sometimes
violently. This is a dimension of the question one must study carefully,
since everyone needs to be wary of its influence. The problem remains:
why groups? How must one conceive nations
The answer can only be, once more: by 'penetrating' the subject-matter,
by making it 'one's own', In 1854 Marx received from the New York
Ttibne a request for some articles on a reent 'Spanish pronunciamiento
- th_e very archetype of a banal 'event', What did he do? He learned
Spanish, by reading translations of Chateaubriand and Bernardin de St
Pierre (which apparently amused htm greatly). Soon he was reading Lp
and CalderOn and at last he could write to Engels - 'Now I'm in the
middle of Don Quixote!' The great and good Spanish anarchist militant
Anselmo LorenfO was asto_nished by Marx's Hispanic culture when he met
him in 1871; admiring, I somewhat outclassed, he described it as 'bour
geois', Neverthde, in his series of articles of 1854-56, Marx had given
an historical vision of Spain of which only the twentieth century has been
able to appreciate the full lessons - one which encompassed all the major
features of Spanish history, without a single absurdity, and which in
certain judgements on the War af Independance has yet to be improved
upon.30 There was a genius at work here, admittedly. But also his method.
We asked above if Marx had ever meant to 'write a history', Here is the
answer, In order to write one anicle about one military escapade he did
not write a 'histqry of Spain'; but he thought it necessary to think Spain
historically.
To think everhing historic;ly, that is Marxism. In relation to this,
the problem of Whether there Is or is not a 'historicism' is {as in the case
of 'humanism') a verbal sideissue, I distrust over-passionate denials. It is
imponant to know (we are told) that the object of Capital is not England.
Of course not: it is capital. But the.pre-history of capital is caHed Portugal,
Spain and Holland. History m11st be thought in terms of spaces, as well as
of times: 'World history has not always existed', wrote Marx. 'History as
world history is a result.'31
Here is another crucial phrase. Born out of colonizadon and the 'world
market', capitalism has universaliud hlstory. It has no unifed it, certainly
- this will be the task of another mode of production, It is in this perspec
tive that the historian's ultimate ambition must lie. 'Universal history'
belongs to yesterday. Its time is not yet over. There is something laughable
about these remarks one now hears so frequently: 'We know too much',
'There are too many specialists', the world is 'too big' for any one man,
42 PIERRE VILAR
one book, or one teaching-method to tackle 'universal history'. This im
plicit encyclopaedism is the polar opposite of the notion of 'reasoned
history', 'total history' or - simply- th 'concept of history'.
It is possible to dream of three kinds of enterprise: (i) 'treatises of
history', an aim no more absurd than 'treatises of psychology' or of
'sociology'; (ii) national histories clearly periodized in relation t the
chronology of productive forcs, social relationships, differential tempos,
and combinations of regional structures; (iii) universal histories suffciently
well informed to omit nothing essential from the fundamental traits of the
modern world, yet suffciently schematic to let the explanatory mechan
isms be seen. The latter are bund t provoke cries of dogmatism and
ideology. Perhaps one should recall at this point the Manual of Political
Economy of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, and the discredit into
which it has fallen. Yet what has it been replaced by, except denials of the
unity of the soda! whole, and the historical whole( On every level, Marx
ist history remains to be made, as does history tout court. In this sense,
aU 'real history' must be 'new history'. And aH 'new' history without
totalizing ambition will be a history old before ie time.
NOTES
1 Louis Althusser and EtieMe Balibar, Rading Capital, New Left Books,
London, 1970, p. 82.
2 Grundrisse, Penguin/New Left R11 iew edition, London, 1973, pp. 101-02.
3 See Paul Ricoeur, Histoire et 11irite, Paris, 1955, p. 26.
4 Colin Clark, The Conditionf of Economic Progress, London, 1957, p. 2.
5 Reading Capital, p. 102.
6 Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, London, 1961, p. 44.
7 Readi1g Capital, pp. 216, 226, 241.
8 Ibid., p. 110.
9 Ibid., pp. 94-95.
10 Ibid., p. 94.
11 Ibid., p. 96.
12 Ibid., p. 103,
13 Ibid.
14 Cf. Michel Foucault, The Order of Things, Tavistock, London, 1970, pp.
261-62.
15 See Gaston Imbert, Des mou11ements de longwe duree Kondratieff, Aix
en-Provence, 1959.
16 Readi11g Capital, p. 106.
17 See Pierre Vilar, La Catalogne dans L'Espagne modene1 Recherches sur les
fondements tconomique$ dfs sncture nationales, Paris, 1962, vol II, pp.
391-400.
18 'La Longue dur6e', Annale$, October/Decmber 1958; tnnslated as 'History
and the Social Sciences' in Pete Burke, ed., Economy and Society il Early
Modern Europe: &says from Annates, London, 1972.
MARXIST HISTORY, A HISTORY IN THE MAKING 43
19 Economy and Society ilf Early Modern Europe, pp. 12-13 (translation
moifed).
20 Respectivly, Esquine des mouvemnts des prix et des revenus tlf Fnmce
XII!e scle, Paris, 1933; L Crse de Nccomie frn-aise Q Ia fn d /'ancien
rJgime et au debut de Ia revolution, Paris, 1944; 'Comment naissent le
- rvilutions', in Aces du congres historique du centenaire de Ia revolution de
1848, Paris, 194! (translated '1848-1830-1789: Haw Revlutions are Born',
'in F. Crauzet, W. CbaUoner and W. Stern, eds, ESays in European Eco1omic
History 1789-1914, London, 1969).
21 Gnmdrisse, p. 109.
22 Ibid.
13 Ibid., pp. 109-10.
24 Pierre Vi!ar, 'The Age ofDax Quixote', New Lef &vew 68, July!August 1971.
25 Gnmdriss, p. 85.
26 Boris Parshnev, Ocherk Politicheskoi Ekonomii Feodalizma, Moscow, 1956;
Wirld Kula, An Ewnoric Theory of the Feuda Sysem (1962), New Lf
Books, London, 1976.
27 Ce!so Furtado, Economic Development of lAtin America, Cambridge, 1970.
28 Grundrisse, p. 107.
29 Reading Capital, p. 193.
30 Marx's writin on Spain are collected in Marx and Engels, &vo/ution i Spain,
London, 1936.
31 Grun4ri.s, p. 109.
d
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY

Paul Ricoeur
[n the previous lecture on Althusser, I discussed his concept of the ideo
logial break and its epistemological implicadons. [' 4 4 J ln_ the presnt lec
ture, I shall discuss Althusser's concept of ideology itself. This discussion
I
wi proceed in three steps: frst, how is the problem of ideology placed in
the superstructureinfrastructure framework; seond, what can be said about
particular ideologies, such religion or humanism; and third, what i the
nature of ideology in general.
As to the frst topic, one of Althusser's most important contributions is
his attempt to refne and improve the model of infrastructrue and super-
structure borrowed from Engels. As we recall, the model is summarized
both by the effciency in the last instance of the economic bas( - this base
is the fnal cause, the prime mover - and by the relative autonomy of
the superstructure, a model of the reciprocal action (WethselWirkung)
between base and superstructure. For Althusser, the frst point we must
11nderstand is that whatever the value of Engels' moel, it is, contrary to
Engels' own beliefs, as far from Hegel's dialectic as possible".[ . . . J In For
Marx Althusser introduces the discussion by quoting the statement in Marx,
apparing as late as Capital, on which Engels relies: ' "With [Hegel, the
dialectic] is standing on hs head. It must be turned right side up again, if
you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell" ' .
1
Althusser
maintains that this declaration is not as easily intrpreted as frst appears.
Engels falsely believes that there is a common element between Hegel
and Marxism, the 'rational kernel', and that there is need to drop only the
'mystical shell'. This argument appeared frequently among Marxits, the
thought being that it was pssible to keep Hegel's dialectics and apply it
no longer to the Hegelian Spirit bpt to new objects; to soiety1 dasses,
and so on. The common use of dialectical argument would imply, so the
argument goes, at least a formal cntinuity between Heel and Marx.
For Althusser, however, thi is still to grant too much, and with good
AL THUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY "
reason. We cannot treat the Hegelian dialectic as an empty or formal
procedure since Hegel keeps repeating that tbe dialectic is the movement
of the things themselves, Hegel is against any kind of formalism that
would allow us frst to establish a method of thinking and then to go on
to solve the problem of metaphysics. This is what he discards in Kant. The
entire preface of the .Phenomenolog of Spirit is written exactly against the
claim that we must tst have a method and then do philosophy. For Hegel,
philosophy is the method, it is the Selbstd1rstellug, the selfpresenration
of its own content. It is not possible to separate method from content in
order to retain the method and apply it to new content, Therefore, even
the structure of the dialetic in Hegel (negation, negation of negation)
must be considered as heterogeneous to the structure of the dialectic in
Marx. If it is true that we cnnot separate method from content, and I am
sure that 'it is, then we must defne the Marxist dialectic in terms that leave
. only the Word dialectic' in common with Hegel.. The question then is: why
the same word? In fact we should drop the word or say either that there
I no dialectic in Hegel or no dialectic in Marx; but this is another
problem.
In place of the Hegelian dialectic Althusser substitutes the concept of
overdetermination. This concept is obviously borrowld from Freud,
although there is also an implication of Lacan. (The infuence of La can is
permanent in an Althussec's work and increasingly evidene in his later
essays.) To introduce the concept of overdetermination, Althusser starts
from a remark by

Lenin, when Lenin raises the question: how was it
possible that the soda list revOlution occurred in Russia, when Russia was
nor the most advanced indust!lal country? Lenin's response is that t claim
that .revolution should occur in the most industrial country implies that
the economic base is not only determinant in the last instance but the sole
determinant factor. What we must realize, then, is that the economic base
-never works alone; it always acts in combination with other elements:
national character, national history, traditions, international events, and
accidents of history - wars, defeats, and so on. An event like a revolution
is not the mechanical result of the basis but something involving all the
'various levels and instnces of the social formation' (PM, 101). It is a
combination of forces. This nexus is what Althusser caUs overdetermination
and opposes to the Hegelian contradiction.
It is diffcult, though. to locate exactly the difference between Althusser
and Hegel on this point. We
-
could say that there is overdetermination in
Hegel also. In,whatever chapter we read in the Phenomenology, each fure
has s many conflicting elements that precisely the dialectic must proceed
toward another fgure. We my say that the instability of the fgtre is a
product of its overdeterminatlon. Althusser's claim, and I am less convinced
by this argument, is cht c.lere exists in Hegel no real overdetermination
involving heterogeneous factors. Instead, Althusser argiles, the process is
46
PAUL RICOEUR
one of cumulative internalization, which is only apparently an overdeter
mination. In spite of the complexity of a historical -form in Hegel, it is
actually simple in its principle. Though the content of the Hegelian fgure
may not be simple, its mening 'is, because fnally it is one fgure, whose
unity is immanent in its form. In Hegel, -ays Althusser, an epoh has 'an
internal spiritual principle, which can never defnitely be anything but the
most abstract form of that epoch's consciousness of itself: its religious
or philosophical consciousness, that is, its own ideology' (FM, 103). The
'mystical shell' affects and contaminates the supposed rational 'kernel'. For
Althussr, therefore, Hegel's dialectic is typically idelistic: even if a his
torical period has complex elements, it is ruled by one idea, it has a unity
of its own. The point, then, is that if we assume with Althusser the simplic
ity of the Hegelian form, such that it can be encapsulated in a labl like
the master-slave :elation or Stoicism, the contrast is to the complexity of
Marxist contradiction. The complexity of the contradictions spawning the
Russian Revolution are not an accident in Marxist theory but rather the
rule. The argument i that the contradictions are alway.s. this complex.
If we put together this notion of overdetermination wlth Engels' concept
of causality in the last instance by the base and the reaction back on the
base by the superstructure, we then have richer concept of causality. We
see that in fact the mfrastructure is always determined by all the other
components. There is a combination of levels and structures. ThLs position
was originally developed, we must not forget, to counter the mechanicist
trend in Marxism - represented particu"larly by the
-
German Social D.emo
cratic Party. This mechanicism, which endorsed a fatalistic or deterministic
view of history, was denounced by Gramsd in an interesting argument
reproduced by Althusser. Gramsci says that it is always those with the
most active will who believe in determinism; they fnd in this fatalism of
history a confrmation of their own actions. (In a certain sense this is quite
similar to the Calvinistic notion of predestination.) Proponents believe that
they are the chosen pople of history, and therefore there is a certain
necessity in history's movement. Althusser quotes Gramsd's strong state
ment that fatalism has been ' "the ideological "aroma"' of the philosophy
of praxis"' (FM, 105 n.). The word 'aroma' is an allusion to Marx's early
essay on Hegel's Philosophy of Right. Just' as Marx criticized there the
illusions of religion's spiritual aroma,
.
here fatalism is subject to the sme
censure.
Can we sy that Althusser's introduction of the concept of overdeter
mination in any way displaces the causalist framework of infrastructure
and superstructure? In actuality this framework is more reinforced than
qualife by this analysis. Althusser repeatedly affrms that the notion of
infrastructure and superstructure is what gives meaning to overdetermina
tion, not the contrary. He acknowledges that it is Engels' formula which
in fact rules his own cncept of overd.termination. Perhaps it is-a concession
AL THUSSER'S THEQRY OF IDEOLOGY 47
to Marxist orthodoxy, I am not sure, but A!thusser is very clear on this
point. Speaking of the accumulation of effective determinations (derived
from the superstructure) on determination in the last instance by the
economic, Althusser says: 'It seems to me that this clarifes the expression
overdetermined cntradiction, which I have put forward, this specifcally
because the existence of overdetermination is no longer a fact pure and
simple, for in it essntials we have related it to its bases , . ,' (FM, 113).
The concept of overdetermination does not help to overcome the weakness
of the concept of infastructure and superstructure, since it is only a com
mentary on the same argument. The framework of causality is affected not
at all.
As a sign that this framework is still troublesome for Althusser - there
is a great sincerity and modesty in all his texts - Althusser says that when
we put together the determination in the last instance by the economy and
the reaction back on the infrasuucture by the superstructure, we hold only
'the two ends of the chain' (FM, 112). This expn:ssion is an allusion to
Leibniz' description of the problematic relationship betwen determinations
made by God and determinations made hy human free will,Thus, Marx
ism reptats a paradox that was typically theological, the paradox of the
ultimate determination; at issue is the relative effetivity of independent
actors in a play decided elsewhere and by someone else.
[I]t has to be said that the theory of the spcifc effectivlty of the supersuuc
ture and other cLcumstances largely remains to be elaborated; and bfore
the theary of ther effectvity or simultaneously . * . there mut be elabration
of the theory of the prticul
ar essence of the speifc elements of the super
structure (FM, 113-14).
The role of overdetermination remains more than a solution. It is way
of qualifyirtg a concept which itself remains quite opaq\le,
T
h
is is why I wonder whether it would not be more helpful to start from
the Freudian-Althusserian concept of overdetermination, to take it for it
self, and then ty to see whether it does not in
l
ply another theretical
framework than that of superstructure and infrastructure. My alternative
would be a motivational framework; this structure would allow us to
understand that it is in fact in termS' of motives and motivation that we
may speak of the overdetermination of meaning. Perhaps without a
concept of meaning, we cannot speak adequately about averdetermination.
,,The concept of overdetermination, I think, doe not neessarily require a
causalist framework. What confrms this attempted change is that, accord
ing to Althusser himself, we must grant Some mening to the relative
autonomy of the. superstructural sphere.
[A] revolution in the structure [of society) does not ipso facto modify the exist
ing supersttuctures ad particularly the ideologie at one blow (a i would
48
PAUl. RICOEUR
if the economic was the sole determinant bctor), for they have suffcient of
their own consistency to survive beyond their immediate life context, even
to recreate, to 'secrete' substitute conditions of existence temporarily . . .
(FM, 115-16).
The superstructure is a layer with its own consistency and fnally its own
history. As the intriguing Marxist theory uf 'survivals' attempts to takt
into account, w must come to understand why, for example, bourgeois
morality persists even after a period of social transformation. My claim is
that such practices may continue to prevail precisely because a certain
strain of motives survives the change in the social framework. To my mind
at least, the independence, autonomy, and consistency of ideologies prew
suppose another framework than that of superstructure and infrastructure.
Let me turn, though, away from this theme to what is the most inter
esting topic for us in Althusser, the theory of ideologies themselves, ideol
ogies considered for their own sake. Althusser undertakes this treatment in
two steps, and this is expressed in my own treatment of the problem: frst
2he speaks of particular ideologies, and then hi tries
-
to say somethipg
about ideology in general. The distinction between these two themes is riot
made very dearly in For Marx but appears rather in a later, very abstract
article called 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses'. This article,
included in Lenin and Philosophy, wil! be at the centre of our attention
when we discuss Alth usser's theory of ideology in general, but let me quote
it briefy here to indicate how Althusser introducs the distinction in ques
tion. '[l]f I am able to put forward the project of a theory of ideology in
.general, and if this theory really is one of the elements on which theories
of ideologies depend, that entails an apparently paradoxical proposition
which I shall express in the following way: ideology has no history'}
Mainly under the influlnce once more of Freud and Lan, Althusser says
that we need to pllrsue a theory of ideology in general, just as metapsycholw
ogy is a theory of the unconscious in general, an inquiry separate from
specifc treatment of the expressions of the unconscious found in such parw
ticular areas as mental illness, art, ethics, religion, and so on. As we shall
see, the reason ideology in general has no history is because it is a permanent
structure. Freud's metapsychology is Althusser's model for the relation
between particular ideologies and ideology in general. For our purposes,
examination of the nature of ideology in general i the more Interesting
question, and so I shall treat the problem of particular ideologies fairly
quickly.
The approach to a theory of ideology through analysis of particular
ideologies is more or less imposed by the Marxist model, where ideologies
are always presented in an enumeration. Those familiar with Marxist texts
may have noticed that when Marx himself discusses ideology, he continu
ally opens a parenthesis and refers to specifc - that is, religious, ethical,
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 49
aesthetic, and political - ideologies

. It is by enumeration of these forms

that Marx builds the more-getreral analysis, a merriO-d quite similar to
Descartes' analysis of the cogito. We should not forget either that Marx
also proceeded historically by a similar process: from the critique of relig
ion, to the critique of philoophy, and then to the critique of politics. The
dispersion of ideologies is an important aspect of the problem, the fact that
there are ideologies, in the plural. We should note, however, that within
Matxist texts as a whole the framework of response to this problem is not
always the same. In some texts the word 'ideology' is used to cover all that
is not economic, while in others differentiation is made between econom
ics, politics,. and ideologies. In his own comprehensive concept of ideology
in his later work, Althusser himself identifes the political structure as a
particular ideology.
Let me offer two examples of Althwser's adoption of this enumerative
approach: his treatment of humanism and of the stare. In For Marx the
paradigmatic example of a particular ideology is humanism. Humanism 'is
treated as an ideology and as an ideology that has determinant boundaries.
It is defned as a specifc anthroplogical feld. It is therefore a cultural
pattern, something to which some people belong and others do not. A
particular ideology may be contrasted to ideology in general, which is not
a historical pattern but a permanent structure, just like the Freudian un
conscious. Agqin, the attraction of Freudian concepts is most important.
In spite of the narrowness of the concept of ideology when identifed with
one problematic among others, this concept is nevertheless quite revealing
about the Structure of ideology in geneq, since in fact the general struc
ture of ideology in Althusser repeats the structure of humanism, as we
shall discover.
The case of humanism is crucial in another respect, since it gives us the
right to put The German Ideology within the same anthropological feld
as the earlier texts. What defnes human'ism, even that which is called
socialist humanism, is a common participation in the same ideology.
Therefore, Althusser considers the rebirth of humanism in modern Marx
ism a return to Feuerbach and the early Marx; it belongs to the same
anthropological _feld. Althusser'-s analyss of humanism is a central illus
tration of his uncompromising denial of any conceptual blending btween
ideology and science. '[IJn the couple "humanism-socialism" there is a
striking theoretical unevenness: in the framework of the Marxist con
ception [Althusser's own, of course], the concept "socialism" is indeed a
sdentifc concept, but the concept "humanism" is no more than an ideo
logical one' (FM, 223). For A!thusser, humanist socialism is a monstrous
kind of concept. Unfortunately, this position sometimes has severe political
implications. During the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, for example,
Althusser kept silent; his stance allowed' him to argue that purely theo
reticaHy, the reform movement was wrong. The Czechoslovak socialists
50
PAUL RICOEUR
were attempting something that does not exist- hum;nistic socialism; they
relied on an impure concept.
The argument against linking the concept of humanism to that of sodal
ism is that the former 'designates some existents, but it does not give us
their essences' (FM, 223 The argument is Platonic, an objection that
humanism speaks of existence - human beings, life, and so on - and not
concptual structure. Althusser's persptive is a necessary consequence of
the epistemological break, which places both the Manuscripts' idealism
of consciousness and The Germa Ideology's concrete anthropology on
the same - and wrong - side. I his strongest statement about Marx's
theoretical antihumanism, Althusser says:
Sticly in respect to theory, therefore, one can and must spak opCnly of
Marx' theretical anti-humanism, and see in this theoretical anti-humanism
the absolute (negative) precondition of the (positive} knowledge of the hu
man world itelf, and of 1ts practical transformation. It i

impossible to know
anything about men except on the bolute pre. ondition th;t the philph
ical (theoretical) myth of man is reduced to ;shes So any thought that
appeals to Marx for any kind of restoration of a thCoretiLQl anthroplogy or
humanim is no more than ashes, theoTTically (FM, 229-30).
Here is perhaps the common side to Althusser, the French structuralist
group in general, and others !ike Michel Foucault: the idea that the
'philosophical 4 4 myth of man' mu:t be reduced to ashes. On the bass of
this orientation, I do not see how it would be possible to build, for exam
ple, a protest against the betrayal of rights. Someone like Sakharov must
be treated as an ideologist, but Althusser would say that Nobel Prius are
both given to ideologists and, even more surely,.-given. by ideologists.
Nevertheless, we have a hint of something else in this analysis, when
Althusser says that knowledge of an object does not replace the object or
dissipte its existence (FM, 230). To say that something is theoreticaly
no more than ashes means that we do not change its reality by arguing
that it does not really exist. To know that an ideology bas no theoretical
status is not t abolish it. Here again there is a reminiscence not only of
Spinoza -that in the second _klnd of knowledge the frst one survives - but
also of Freud, when Freud says that it is not enough in a theraputic
process t understand intellectually, if the balance of forces - of repression
and so on - has not changed also. To explain to someone that he or she
is caught in an ideology i not suffcent; it does not change 'the situation.
The claim that something is 'no more than ashes, theoretically' i only a
qualifed claim.
We must deal, then, with a strange necessity: we know that humanism
has no theoretical status, but yet it has a kind of factual existence. By
relating humanism to its condition of existence, Althusser says, we ca
recognize its necessity as an ideology; it has, in A!thusser's strange phrase,
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY
a 'conditional necessity' (FM, 231). Althusser must resort to this trm
because if Marxism is more than a science, if it is a politics, and if politics
is itself based on the assertion that human. beings have crtain rights, then
Marxism must take something from the ideological sphere in order to
accomplish something practically. The conjunction between ideology and
science i! a 'conditional necssity' required by action, but this practical
conjuncion does not abolish their theoretical break. As we can see, it is
very .diffcult to comprehend that there may be something abolished thea
retically but still existent in such a way that we must rely on it in order
to act,
A second example in Althusser of a partial or regional ideology - the
language is somewhat Hussertian - is the state. Here too Althusser intro
duces some important changes in Marxist theory. Althusser's main im
provemeit is en
-
gendered by his linking ideology to irs politkal function,
that i, to the question of the reproduction of the system, the reprod-uction
of the 'onditions of production. This problem has become quite popular
among modern Marxists; their view is that Marx studied the conditions
of production. but there must also be reflection on the conditions of
the system's reproduction. Examination must be undertaken of all those
institutions which have the function of reinfordng and reproducing the
system's structure.
To make sere of this concept of reproduction, Althusser has to improve
the rigid Marxist concept of the state, which originates in Lenin. In State
and Revolution Lenin views the state as merely a structure of coercion.
The function of the state is repression. Nothing is ,left from Hegel's ideal
ized concept of the state as the integration of individuals who know them
selves as citizens through the constitution. On the contrary, Lenin's view
of the state is extremely pe-ssimistic: the state is an instrument of repres
sion, of 'oercion, for the beneft ofthe ruling class. The dictatorship of the
proletariat will consist in the inversion of this coercive tool and its use
against the enemie of this transformed state. Stalin effectively used this
notion of inversion to enforce his own psition, arguing that he was
simply using the bourgeois structure of the state against its enemy. On the
day these enemie.s dis
2
ppear, he said, then there wHI no longer be a ned
for the state.
A!thusser's contribution in Lenin and Philosophy is to say that we must
in fact distinguish two aspects of state power. The frst is the repressive
and coercive state apparatuses: government, administration, police, courts,
prisns, and so on. The second is the ideological state apparatuses: religion,
education, the family, the politicl systeni, communications, culture, and
so forth (LP, 136-37}. The structure of the state is both repressive and
ideological. To any who might object that introduction of ideology into
the theory of the state involves inclusion of something private and not
publiC, Althusser responds that this division between public and private i
52
PAUL F!COEUR
a bourgeois concept. If we deny the bourgeois concepts, which depend
on the concept of private property, then we must consider the state as a
system of apparatuses which extend far beyond administrative functions.
Only for the bourgeois mentality are there private and public spheres, For
Marxist theory these two spheres represent aspects of the same function,
We may connect the importance of the state's ideological apparatuses
with the problem of the system's need to reproduce itself by understanding
that this reproduction occurs through such ideological state apparatuses as
education. I know many leftist educators in Europe - in Germany, Italy,
France - who use this notion of reproduction to argue that the function
of the school is to reproduce the system, not only by the teaching of
technological ski!ls but by the -reproduction in students of the rules a the
system. The system .i maintained by the reproduction of it rule. (Once
again there i an intersection with Freud; the ideological state apparatus
has its counterpart in the superego.)
The reproduction of labour power thus revCal as its sne qua TM not only
the /productiLn of its- 'skills' but also the reprouctioM of its subjection to
the ruling ideology or of the 'practiL' of that ideology, with the prUiso that
it is not enough to say 'not only but also', for it is clear that it is in the forms
and under the forms of ideological subjection that provision is made for th
reproduction of the skills of labour power (LP, 12B).
A system of oppression survives and prevails thanks to this ideological
apparatus which both places individuals in subjection and ae the very same
time maintains and reproduces the system. Reproduction of the system and
ideological repression of the individual are one and the same. Althusse's
analysis here is quite powerful. We have to join two ideas: a. state func
tions not only by power but also by ideology, and lt- does so for the sake
of its own reproduction.
There are parallels to this analysis outside Marxism .. In Plato, for exam
ple, the role played by the sophists demonstrates that no master rules by
pure force. The ruler must convince, must seduce; a certain distortion of
language always accompanies the use of power. Naked power never

works;
( in the use of political power an ideological mediation is unavoidably in
volved. My question1 theefore, is not at all whether Althusser's descrip
tion is a good one. [. , .] Instead, it i the concepts used which interest me,
and in this context particularly the notion .
..
gLB.,. This concept
belongs to the same anonymous languagfi
.
suprstructure .nd infrastruc
ture. It is not by chance that Althusser's term is appratus and not insti
tution, because an apparatus is more mechanical. An appratus

is something
which flmctions, and therefore it has more conceptual kinship with structures
and reproduction, with structural language in general. AU these functions
are anonymous and can exist and go on by themselves. If, 0owever, w.e
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 53
raise the question: but how do these functions work, do we not need to
introduce, once again, some element !ike persuasion and therefore a certain
capturing of motivationl' Once more the problem is one of legitimacy, of
the claim to legltha< and the procss of justifcation, and I do not see
how these issues work within the language af apparatus. My diffcLlty is
with the conceptual framework of causality at a place where I think another
--motivatwnal - framework would be more helpful. The causal framework
has been imposed at the beginning by the notion of the determinant factor
in the last instance, and cOnsequently all of the new and quite interesting
changes Alchusser introduces in Marxist theory have to be put within this
imperative framCork.
Lt us set thi point sidt1 though, and t1rn t the most interesting part
of Althusser's analysis, his attempt to provide a defnition of ideology in
general. This attempt will be decisive for the rest of the lectures as a whole.
Althusse's attempt allows us to move fom what we might call a geography
of ideologies to a theory of ideology, Althussers discussion is located in
two principal texts, pages 231-36 of For Marx and pages 149-70 of Lenin
and Philosophy. The latter is the secrion of 'Ideology and Ideological State
Apparatuses' entitled 'On Ideology' and is Althusser's most discussed text.
I shall leave this text fo the next lecrure.
In For Marx Althusser puts forward three or four programmatic def
nitions of ideology, atrerprs to try, to rest, and nothing more than that,
sin9e be thinks that this effort- has not been undertaken in previous Marx
it theory. As wC shall see, Althusser's defnitions may nor be so easy to
combine. Althussels frst defnition is readily understood, though, because
it is an application of the distinction between science and ideology.
There can be no quetion of attempting a profud defnition of ideology
here. It will suffce to know very schematically that an ideology is a system
(with its own logic and rigocr) of representations (images, myrhs, ideas or
concepts, depnding on the case) endowed with a historical existence and
role within a given society. Without embarking on the problem of the relat
ions between a cience and it (ideologicl) past, we can say that ideoloy,
as a system of reprentations, is distinguished from scienc in that in it the
practicusoial function is more important than the theoretical function
(function as knowledge) (FM, 131).
There are four or fve imprrant notions here. First, ideology is a system;
'his is consistent with what Althusser called a feld - an anthropological
feld, for eXample- or a problematic. All these concepts overlap. Of what
is ideology a system, though A system ofrepresentat'ion. This is its second
trait. Althusser uses the vocabulary of the idealistic tradition; the voabu
lary of idealism is preserved in the defnition of ideology as Vorstellung,
representation. Third trait, ideology h a historical role. Ideology is not
a shadow, as it is in some Marxist texts, since it plays a role in the
54
PAUL RICOEUA
historical process. It is a part of the proces of overdeterminacon, Thus,
we must connect the notion of ideology's historical existence to its contri
bution to the overdeterminarion of events. All these traits are very coherent.
What is more problematic is ideology's fourth trait, the _relative import
Althusser ascribes to ideology's practico-social function in contrast to its
theoretical function. This trait is more diffcult to accept because if, for
example, we call humanism an ideology, surely it has some very theoret
ical claims. To take another case, what work is more theoretical than
Hegel's Althusser's point is quite diffcult to comprehend, because nothing
is more theoretical than idealism; Feuerbach and the young Marx in fact
opposed Hegel's work precisely bec;use it was theory and not praxis
Suddenly in Althusser, however, we discover that praxis is ideological and
only science is theoretical. I do not see how Althusser's point here cn be
maintained.
Althusser's second defnition of ideology is more within the framework
of the oppsition between the ilh!.sory and the rea!. As we recall from
earlier lectures, this analysis has some grounds in the young Max. This
second defnition of Althusser's will prevail in his later texts. Notice in the
following quotation the use of the phrase 'lived relation,' vfcu; this is the
vocabulary of Husser! and of Merleau-Ponty, the language of existential
phenomenology.
So ideology is a matter of the lived relation between men and their world.
This relation, that only appears as 'conscious' on condition that it i uncon
scious, in the same way only seems to be simple on condition that it is
complex, that it is not a simple rela6on but a relation between relations, a
second degree relation.
.This is a torturous way of saying that ideology reflects in t
he form of an
imaginary relation something which is already 'n existing relation, that is,
1
the relation of human beings to their world. The lived relation is :eflected
]a ideology. The more important part of the text follows:
In ideology men do indeed express, not the relation between them and their
conditions of existence, but the wsy they live the relation between them and
their conditions of existence: this presupposes both a real relation and an
'imaginary', 'live' relation. Ideology, then, is the expreion of the relation
betwen men and their 'world', that is, the (overdetermined) unity of the real
relation and the imaginary relation between them and their real conditions
of existence. In ideology the real relation is.lnevitably inveted in the imaginary
relation, a relation that expresses a will (conservativ, conformist, reformist
or revolutionary), a hope or a nostalgia, rather than describing a reality
(FM, 233-34).
The vocabulary here is quite interesting, not only because we have the
notion of the lived relation, but because this relation is lived in an imaginary
AL THUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY
mOdc. n an Idco!Ogy the way O !IVIng thIs tcatIn Is ImagInqty. hIs
dcDnItIOnIntrOduCcs an ImgttantshI!tOm lhc v0Caoulaty Othc yOung
Natx, whIch ttathtstsght tcscmb!cs. hIlc In the young NatXthc rca!
and thc ImagIn8ty atc OQQOscd, hctc thc lived and thc imagInaty atc
/

fOu!c0 tOgcthct. Pn IdOOgy s UOth !Ivcd und ImagInaty, It is !hc Ivc
(
.
_ us]J:1gInay. hctcOtc,we-nave

atcal tc!atIOn which Is dIstOItcd In a
)magInary tc!att.AIt;c:atngO\\tJatctdscssIOD, Wcmajnotc

I!:a

It
:sOlhCut tO a
d
J

st !h|1 dch0tIOn tO thc tcst O Althusser's wOtk, sinCc

P!thussrt sQcaks hctc Othc tca! tc!a!IOns O tcal lndIvIduas, cvcn !hOugh
tca! IndIvduas dO nOt bc!Ong !O the oasIC QhcnOmcna. NOtc gcncta!!y,
thOug

h, It sccms that tO gtvc an accOunt o IdcO!O wc must sQcak the

!angu8gc O IdcO!Ogy wc must sQcak O IndtvIdua!s OnsttuCtIng dtcams
Instcad o !ivIng thcIt tca! !ic.
A!hussct a!sO In!tOduccs at !hIs QOln! thc nOtIOn O OvctdctctmInatlOn
aQQ!cd nO Ongct tO thc tc!atIUn bctwccn Iustanccs ~ bctwccn ccmcnts
Ol the superstructure and infrastructure - but tO t0c rc!a!IOnshIQ bctwccB ..
thc tca! and thc ImagInaty. hc cOnccQt OOvctdctctmInation Is uscd In a
cOntcx! thatIs c!Osct tO Freud !han tO N8tx; !hc mIXtutc Othc tca! and
thc IWagInaty Is what Ftcud calls a C0mQtOmIsc OtmaIlOn, and It Is !hIs
nOunhattu!c8 A!thussct's analysis atthIs QU1nt. `tIs In thIs ovctdc!ct
mInatInOthc rca! by thc ImagInaty and Othc tmagtnatyoythc tca that
0cO!OgyI880t\v0Inprinciple , . ,' (FM, 234). hus,IdcO!OgyIs nOtsumcthIng
bad, It is nOt sOmcthIng tha! wc attcmpt t p1t bchInd us; Instcad, ir s
sOmc!h:ng that Qushcs j a sys!cm O mOtIYatIOn. dcO!Ogy Is a sys!cm O
mOtIvatIOn that QtOcccds rom thc !ack O a ccat dIstInctIOn btwccn !hc
real and thc untca!.
n _i !hItd dchnItIOn O IdcO!Ogy, P!thussct wtI!cs O IdcO!Ogy as
cxQtcsscd l) 1hc !anguag C!aycts,OInst8nccs. A!thussct nccdsthIs!an-
gu8gc !O Qtcsctvc IccOOgy'stca!Ity, its tc8! cxIstcncc In histOty. As tca,
IdcOlOgymustInvo!vcrca!nstanccs, tca !aycn, andnOtmctc!y Imaginaty
c!cmcnts; thc ImagInat has a kIUd O incxtstcncc. n hls !atct at!ICc On
'dcO!ogIca PQpatatuscs', A!thussct wI!! tty tO adjust the dchnItIOn O
IdcOOgy to InC!udc oOth thc tctms Ot1!usIOn and thc !ctms Ot historical
cXIstcncc,atgungthat IdcO!Ogy has it matcrIa!Ity In thc amOus dcO!OgI-
calaQQa1atus.hcaQQara!uswI! gIvc aCcttaInmatctIa! cxIstcncc tOthcsc
dtcam&. Pt thc tImc OFor Marx, howcvct, Athussct had nOt yct sO!vcd
thIs subt!c dIsctcQancy octwccn hIs dchnItIOns. mIs thltd dcDnI!IOn O
IdcO!Ogy mOvcs tOmthc !anguagc OthctvcdtO !hc !anguagc OInstauccs.
So ideology a such an organic part of cYcr) social totality. [t is W if
hpman societies could not rurvive without these spe. i!k formations, these
systems

of represemations (at variolls levels), their ideologies. Human soi
eties secrete ideology as the very element and atmosphere indispensable to
ther_ historical respiration and !Ic Ln!) ideological world outlook could
"
PAUL RICOEUR
have imagined societies without ideology and accepted the utopian idea of
a world in which ideology (not just one of its histoncal forms) would dis
appear without trace, to be replaced 'by science (FM, 232).
This text is quite positive toward ideology; it is a plea for recognition of
ideology's indispensability. Althusser argues against the utopian view of
those technocrats who believe that we are now beyond the age of ideol
ogies, that we may now speak of the death of ideologies. In opposition to
th.is thefTe, famous bth in Europe and in this country, Althusser contends
that there will always be ideology, because people have to make sense of
their lives. This task is not the province of scienc, which cannot do
everything, but rather the fum;tion of ideology. Alth1ssr goes far in the
direction of a positive appreciation of ideology. It is diffcult, though, to
think of ideology simultaneously as illusion (Althusser's second defnition)
and as a real instance essential to the historical life of societies. Perhaps the
mediating point is the Nietzschean view that we ned illusions to survive
the hardness of life, that we would die if w saw the real truth of human
existence. Also involved here may be the pessimistic view that people. want
ideologies because scienc does not give their lives meaning. Althusser is
very antipositivist and again typife as utopian the positivist view that
science wi!l one day replace ideology.
[T)his utopia is the principle behind the idea th.at ethks, which is in its
essence ideology, could be replaced by science or become scientifc through
@nd through; or that religion could be destroyed by sience which would in
some way take its place; that I could merge with. knowlege or become
'everyday life', etc. (FM, 232).
Against those who maintain that ethics, religion_, and art are 'survivals',
lingering remnants of earlier non-scientifc eras, Althusser tends to say that
they are necessary ingredients of any society. Ideologies are indispensable;
scieuce caunot be everything.
For my part, I interpret this turn of Althusser's in the following way. If
we raise the requirements of science so highly, then it is beyond o1r access.
The
-
higher in fact that w 'raise the concpt of science the broa-er be
comes the feld of ideology, because each is defned in relation to the other.
If w reinforce the scientifc requirement of a theory, then we lose its
capacity for making sense of ordinary life. Therefore, the feld of ideology
is so wide because the feld of science is so narrow. At least this is my
interpretation of Althusser's discussion here. Althusser's differentiation be-
tween science and ideology explains his positive recognition of ideology as
somet the indeterminate state of not being true but yet necessarily
vital, a vital ll!usion. This perspective provides a way t interpret Marx's
statement that in a class society ruling ideas have to
t
ake the form of
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 51
universality. This necesity is not a lie, it is not a trick, for it is impsed
b,the unavoidable imaginary structure itself. No one can think without
believing that what he or she thinks is in some bask sense true. The
illusion is a necessary one.
The persistence of this illusion that is ideology extends even unto the
hypothesized classless society. Whatever the classless society may mean
and again I do not discuss it at al in political terms but only according
to its own condition of intelligibility - it has about it a quality of the
eternal. (In Althusser's 'ldeological Apparatuses' article, the word 'eternal'
returns and is compared to Freud's description of the a temprality of the
unconscious.) Similarly, ideology is also atemporal. '[I]t is clear that ideol
ogy .(as a system of mass representations) is indispensable in any society
if men are to be formed, transformed and equipped to respond to the
demands of their conditions of existence' (FM, 235). The suggestion is that
in every" society, even in one where by hypothesis class struggle no longer
exists, there will always be a situation of inadequation between the
demands of reality and our ability to cope. [ am reminded of Freud's com
ments concerning death and the hardness of life, the fact that the price of
reality is too high. The- requirements of the conditions of reality are high,
and our capacity to adjust to reality is limited.
I is in ideology that the clasles sMiety lives the inadequacy/adequacy of the
relation btween it and the world, it is in it ad by it that it trasforms men's
consciousne', that. is, their attitudes and behaviour so as to raise them to
the levels of their tMks and the conditions of their existence (FM, 235}.
We have here nearly a fourth defnition of ideology as the the system of
means by which we try to adjust our capacity to change to the actual
conditions of change in soiety in genera!. Therefore, ideology has a cer
tain ethical function; it attempts to make sense of the accidents of life, the
painful aspects of existence. We must introduce an existential language;
when we .speak of contradiction, it is not a logical contradiction, a conflict
between structures. but a lived contradiction, a contradiction between our
capacity to adjust and the demands of reality.
To my mind, Althusser'S defnitions of ideology in general raise the
following questions. My broadest question i: if we assume the value of
Althusser's analysis, are we any longer able to speak of ideology simply
non-science} Under this theme, several more specifc questions foliow, which
I shall_ retun to in later lectures. First, is not the quasi-ethicl function of
ideology just as valuable as science? Second, how can we understand the
notion of the Imaginary if the real is not already symbolically mediated?
Third, is not the most primitive function of ideology - that which is said
t emerge in classless society - not distortive but integrative? And fnally,
bow do we know ideology if not bcuse it belongs to a fundamental
5
PAUL RICOEUR
anthropology; is it not only within this philosophical anthropology that
the vocabulary of Althussees defnicior- 'men', 'conditions of existence',
'demands', 'attitudes and behaviour' - makes sense? Is there_ not, therefore,
a primitive connection betwetn the lived and the imaginary that is more
radical than any distortion?
The point about A!thusser's expressions is that they belong to the
vocabulary of humanism. To speak of ideology we must rejuvenate the
vocabulary of humanism. Even in the concluding sentence of his discussion
- a sentence perhaps though, a concession to the reader - Althusser
resorts to this vocabulary. 'In a classless society ideology b the relay whereby,
and the element in which, the relation between men and their conditions of
existence is lived to the proft of aU men' {FM, 236). Who would say more
than this, that we are all dreaming of the kind of society in which the
relations between human beings and their conditions of exis.enc are lived
to the proft of all? But this is precisely the.discourse of ideology, We must
assume at least part of the discourse of ideology fn order to speak of
ideology: It seems as if we cannot speak of ideology in another language
than its own. If we utilize the Althusserian language of science, then we
can speak only of apparatuses, instances, structures, and superstrucmres
and infrastructures, but not of 'conditions of existence', 'attitudes and
behaviour', and so on. At least to a certain extent, therefore, only ideology
may spak about ideology.
A few more points also need to be made about Althusser's contention
that the 'disproportion of historical tasks to their conditions' (FM, 238)
justifes the necessity of ideology. This relationship must be lived in order
to become a contradiction and to be treated scientifcally. The relation of
disproportion also reinforces the prestige of the concept of alienation.
Althussr maintains [' + + + ] that this concept can be done away with, but are
we able to deny it theoretically and preserve it practically? Are not the
lived contradictions the conditions for te so-called .real relations? Althusser
responds that if we return to the language of alienation,
.
it is because we
do not yet have a science of ideology. It is a provisry language in the
absence of an adequate language. 'Within certain limit this recourse r
ideology mighr indeed be envisaged as the substitute for a recourse to'
theory' (FM, 240) or as 'a substitute for an insuffcient theory' (FM, 241).
Althusser has accused ali Marxist thinkers of theoretical weakness, but he
assumes a certain theoretical weakness for himself in order to speak about
ideology in positive terms. Becaus of the present weakness of our theory,
he says, we need the language of ideology in order to spak of ideology;
one day, however, our theory will be strong enough to cast aside this
vocabulary. This argument is for me the most questionable of Althusser's
claims. The question is whether rhis alleged confusion of ideology and
scientifc theory is not required by the problem itself. Does not this 'con
fusion' in fact express the impossibility of drawing the line between the
AL THUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 59
lived contradiction and the real basis? In order to speak in a meaningful
way of ideology, do we not have to spak of the motives of people, of
individuals in certain circumstances, of the adequate or inadequate relation
between human behaviour and its conditions We cannot eliminate as a
problem the statUs of a philosophical anthroplogy if we want to speak
about these issues.
[ . . 9 ]
A!thusser's most advanced attempt to provide- an inclusive concept of
ideology appears in the Lenin tmd Philosophy essay titled 'Ideology and
Ideological State Apparatuses'. The purpose of this essay, we should recall,
is to argue that the fundamental function of ideology is reproduction of
the system, training of.indi1idua\s in the rules governing the system. To the
problem of production raised by Marx we must add the problem of
-reproduction. On the basis of this recnceptualization, we must then re
formulate the Leninist concept of the state - defned only in terfns of
coercion - by adding the notion of wbat Althusser calls ideological state
apparatuses. Ideology is institutionalized and so appears as a dimension of
the state. There is a dimension of the state which is not merely administative
or po!itical but specifcally ideological. The superstructure is related to
reproduction through spcifc institutional apparatuses, and the problem
of a general theory of ideology is proposed in conjunction with this
reformulation.
In this text, AlthQsr goes so far a to ascribe to ideology all positive
functions which are not sienc. At the same time, he emphasizes more
strongly than ever the illusory character of imagination. Here Althusser
borrows from Spino:a the theme that the frst kind of knowledge is merely
a distorted conception of our relation to the world. He also and more
importantly borrows from the distinction made by the French psycho
analyst Jacques Lacan between the imaginary andrhe symbolic. Signifcantly,
Althusser drops the notion of the symblic to rerain the notion of the
imaginary understood on the model of the mirror relationship. The imagin
ary i a mirror relation at a narcissstic stage, an image of oneself that one
has in a physical mirror and also in all the situations of llfe in which one's
image is reflected by others.
In turning to the text, we shall focus prticularly on the sction of
Althusser's essay called 'On Ideology'. Althusser begins hy contrasting his
position to that of Marx in The German Ideology. Here, Althusser claims,
Marx did not take seriously the paradox of a reality of the imaginary.
In Ths Gema Ideolog, + [i]deology is'conceived as a pur illusion, a pure
dream, i.e. nothingness. All its reality i external to it. Ideology is thus
thought as an iMaginy construction whoe status is exact!; like the
theoretical status of t dm among writets before Freud. For thee writ
ers, th d was the purely imaginary, i.e, null, reult of days reidues',
60 PAUL AICOEUR
presented in an abitrary arrangement and order, sometime even 'inverted',
in other words, in 'disorder'. For them the dream was the imaginary, it was
empty, null and arbitrarily 'stuck together' (bricol) (LP, 15051).
Against this purely negative text Althusser maintains that ideology has
.
a
reality of its own: the reality of the illusory. This statement seems to
challenge another assertion of The German Ideolog, that ideology has no
history. rrhe argument, we remember, was that only economic history
really exists. This became the framework for a!! orthodox Marxist
approaches to history.) Althusser in fact agrees that ideology is non-histdrical
but in a very different sense than that argued by The German Ideolog,
(Ideology is nonhistorica! not, a the orthodox approach would have it,
ecause its history is
.
external to it but be
c
use it is omnihist

a just
hke Freud's unconsciOus. Once more the mfluence ofTrew-,s strongly
reinforced. In his essay, 'The Unconscious', Freud said that the uncon-
scious is timeless (zeitlos), not in the sense that it is supernatural but
because it is prior to any temporal order or connections, being prior to
the level of language, of culture, and sa on. (An earlier, similar asertion
appeared in the seventh chapter of Freud's The interpretation of Dreams.)
Althusser's explicit
.
pa;_alle!_!'
.
!
.
!e-
.
'_1X
-
!_the :nconcJ.? draws
on this basis and takes a step further by rendering timelessness as the
eternal: 'ideology is eternal, exactly like the unconscious' (LP, 15 2). Althusser
suggests that in the same
.
way that Freud attempted to provide a theory of
the unconscious in general - as the underlying structure of all the cultural
. fgures of the unconscious, which appear at the level of symptoms -similarly,
". he himself proposes a theory of ideology in general that would underlie the
-
. particular ideologies.
On this basis the imaginary features of ideology must be qualifed and
improved. Here I raise two points. First, what is distorted is not reality as
such, not the real conditions of existence, but our relaton to these condit- }
ions of existence. We are not far from a concept of bing-in-the-world; it
is our relation to reality which is distorted. 'Now I can return to a thesis
which I have already advanced: it is not theil rel conditions of existence,
their real world, that "men" "represent to themselves" in ideology, but above
all it is their relation to those conditions of existence which is represented
to them there' (LP, 154). This leads t a most important insight, becaus?
what 5 a relation t the conditions o existence i not already inter
pretation, something symblically mediated. To spak of our relation to 1

i
the orld requires a symbolic structure. My ain argument, there
_
fore, is
ithat
tf we do not have from the start a symbolic structure to our eXIstence;
\then nothing can be distorted. As Althusser himself observes: 'it is the
imaginary nature of this relation which underlies all the imaginary distortion
that w can observe . . . in all ideology' (LP, 154-55). We are not far from
a complete reversal in our approach to the problem of the imaginary. We
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 61
could not Jlnderstand that there are distorted images if there were not frst
a primary imaginary structure of our being in tb.e world underlying even
the distortions. The. imaginary appears not only in the distorted forms of
existence, because it is already present in the relation which is distorted.
The imaginary is constitutive of our relation to the world. One of my main
questions,. then is whether this does not imply bfore the distorting function
of imagination a constitutive function of imagination. Or, to use the lan
guage of Lcan, is there not a symbolic role of imagination distinct from
the narcissistic component of imagination, that is to say, distinct from the
imaginary taken in the sense of the mirror relationship?
.My second remark is that this relation to our cnditions of existence no
longer falls very easily within the framework of causality. This relation is
not causal or naturalistic but rather an interplay between motives, between
symbols; it is a relation of belonging to the whole of our experience and
of bein- related to fc in a motivational way. Althusser himself hints that
this relationship destroys the general framework of superstructure and
infrastrcture expressed in terms of causation; he says that here we need
'to leave aside the language of causality' (154).
Thus, we must introuce two levels of imagination, one which is the
distorting, and another which is the distorted and therefore the primary.
[AI ideology represents in its nece:rily imaginary distortion not the exist
ing relationships of prod.uction (and the other relatinships that derive from
them), but above aU the (imaginary) relationship of individuals to the rela
tions of prouction and the relations that derive from them. What is repre

sente i ideology is therefore not the S)'tem of the rel relations which
govern the eistenc of fndividuals, but the imaginay relation of those
individual to the rel relations in which they live (LP, 155).
Expressed more simply, 'this means that in fact we are never relatel"i
directly t what are called the conditions of existence, classes and so on.
i
These conditions must be represented in one way or another; they must
f
have their imprint in the motivational feld, in our system of images, and
so in our representation of the world. The so-called real causes never
appar as such in human existenc but always under a symblic mode. It
is this symbolic mode which is secondarily distorted. Therefore, the notion
of a primitive and basic distortion becomes questionable and perhaps com
pletely incomprehensible. If everything were distorted, that is the same as
if nothing were distorted. We must dig in under the notion of distortion.
In so doing, we rediscover a layer not far fnally from what The German
Ideology desribed as real life or real individuals placed under certain
circumstances. A!thusser denies this anthropological approach, however,
claiming that it is itself ideological. As a result, this discourse remains C
l'ar, floating without a basis because we must us the so-called language
"
PAUL AICOEUR
of ideology, the anthropological language, in order to speak of this
primitive, ineluctably symbolically mediated relation r our conditions of
existence.
Perhaps anticipating this diffulty, the text suddenly takes a quite dif
ferent approach, Althusser relinquishes the language of representation and
substitutes for it that of apparatus. He turns away from the questions he
has just raised to consider- the material criteria of ideology. A!thusser's
thesis here is that ideology has a material existence. The daim is that
while no Marxist can say anything that is not ideological concerning
the roo' of distortion in some more imaginary layer, he or she may still
speak scientifcally of the ideological apparatus within which the distortion
works. The only Marxist language abut the imaginary bears not upon
its ontological, anthropological rooting but upn its incorporation in the
state apparatus, in an insthution . Therefore1 we have a theory about
imagination as institutionalized but not about imagination as a symbolic
structure.
While discusing the ideological State apparatuses and their practices, I said
that each of them was the realization of an idClogy
.
. . . I nw return to this
thesis: an ideology always exists in an apparatus, and it practice, or prac
tices. This existence is material (LP, 156),
The materialist approach asks, in which apparatus does ideology work?
And not, how is it possible according to the fundamental structure of
human being? The latter question belongs to an ideological language.
Questions about the underlying imaginary - the non-distorted or pre
distorted imaginary - must be cancelled for the sake of questions about
the apparatus. The apparatus is a public entity and so no longer implies a
reference to individuals. Althusser talks about individual beliefs as belong
ing to an 'ideological "conceptual" device (dispositif)' (157), In French
dispositif expresses rhe idea of someth
.
ing which functions by itself, some
thing which shapes behaviour.
It is diffcult, though, to speak of the practice of a believer, for example,
merely in terms of an apparatus unless the apparatus iS refected in the
rules governing the behaviour. The ideological device which shapes the
behaviour of the believer - the example is Althusser's (LP, 157) - must
be such that h spaks to the attitudes and therefore to the motives of the
individual involved. We must link the apparatus with what is meaningful
for the individual. The apparatus is an anonymous and external entity,
however, so it is diffcult to connect and to have interset the notion of
apparatus with the notion of a practice, which is always the practice
of
someone. It is always some individual who is bowing, praying, doing what
is supposed to be induced in him or her by the apparatus.
Al THUSSER'S THEORY OF IQEOLOGY "
In order not to speak the language of ideology about ideOlogy, Althusser
must put the notion of practice itself ir.to behaviourist framework, the
latter being something more appropriately connected with the Marxist
concept of app;ratus. The language of ideology, says Althusser, 'talks of
actions: I shall talk of action inserted into practices. And I shall point out
that these practiCes are governed by the rituals in which these practices are
inscribed, within the material existence of an ideological appratus . , .'
(LP, 158). For Althusser the concept of action too anthropological;
practice is the more objetive term. Finally, it is only the material existence
of an ideo!ogital apparatus which makes sense of practice, The apparatus
is a material framework1 within which people do some specifc things.
The behaviourist overtone in Althusser is evident in the following
quotation:
r shalhherefore say that, where only a single subject . . . is concerned, the
existence of the ide of his blief is material in that his ide are his matrial
actions inserted into material practices gverned by material rituals which
are themselves defne by the material idelogical aJparatus fro which
derive the idCs of that sub}ct (P, 158).
The word 'material' is used in four ways: material actwns, kneeling, for
example; material practices, kneeling as religious behaviour; material rituals,
kneeling as part of a seryice of worship; and t material ideological
apparatus, the church as an institution. Just as Anstotle said that 'being'
llas several meanings, so Althusser gives several meanings to matter, a
comparison he explicitly acknowledge with some humour (LP, 156). While
admittng that the four insri'ptions of the word 'material' are affected by
differnt modalities, though, Althussr provides no rule for their different
iatlon. 'I shall leave on one side,' he says, 'the problem of a theory of the
differences between the modalities of materiality' (LP, 159), In fact, then,
we tnust qualify our concept of what 'is material in order to apply it
proprly to something that is not material in the way, for instance, that a
chair is. We must rely on a polysemy of the word 'matter' to make sense
of these differences, and this is hardly forbidden, because in ordinary
language we use the word in so many divergent contexts. We rely on a
common sense concept of matter or on the rules of everyday language, in
the Wittgensteinian sense, to extend and stretch the notion of materiality
in order that it covers the notion of practice.
The remaining part of Althusser's essay is devoted t the functioning of
the category of the subject in ideology. Althusser says that the function of
ideology and of the subject is for each tO give content to the other.
I say: the category of the subject i

Lotit1tiv of all ideolog), but at the

are time and immeditely 1 add that the category of the subject is only
84 PAUL RJCOEUR
consitu

ive o;all ieooginsofar a

a|l ideolgy has the unction (which
defnes It) of constituting concrete mdmduals as subjects (LP, 160),
Althusser puts 'constituting' within quotation marks because this is the
language of Husser!. The phenoJenology of he ego Jalls under the con
cept of ideology ro the extent that it defnes ideology; ideology is human
ism, humanism relies on the concept of the subject, and it is ideology
which constitutes the subject. Ideology and the subject are mutually con
stitutive. Whereas someone like Erik Erikson argues that idelogy is a
factor of identity and so maintains that the relationship between ideology
and the subject should be taken in a positive sense, the language of Althusser
is much more negative. We are forced to put on the side of ideology what
in a sense is the most interesting philosophical problem: how do we be
come subjects? It is a bold attempt to give so much to ideology in order
to deny it so much also. This is why I have said that if we give too much
to science, we have to give still more to ideology. It becomes more and
more diffcult to treat ideology merely a. a world of iHusi'ons, of super
structures, because it becomes so constitutive of what we are that what we
might be when separated from ideology is completely unknown; we are
(what we are precisely thanks to ideology. The burden of -ideology is to
make subjects of us. It is a strange philosophicl situation, since all our
concrete existence is put on the side of ideology.
Althusser's interesting analysis of what he calls 'interpllation' demon
strate more specifcally the relationship betw1en ideology and he subject.
'As a frst formulation, I shall say: all ideology hai!s or interpllates con
crete individuals as concrete subjects, by the functioning of the category of
the subject' (LP, 162), We are constituted subjects through a process
of recognition, The use of the term 'interpellation' is an allusion to the
theological concept 9f call, of being cal!ed by God. In it ability to inter
pellate subjects, ideology also constitutes them, To be hailed is to become
a subject. 'The existence of ideology and the hailing or interpellation of
individuals as subjects are one and the sam! thmg' (LP, 163). The idea is
that ideology is eternal and so does not belong to the history of classes and
so on, and it acts to constitute and be constituted by the category of the
subject. The theory of ideology in general rebuilds the framework of a
complete anthropology, but it does so with a negative cast. This anthro
pology is the world of illusion,
Althusser's claim about the illusory nature of what constitutes us as
subjects is based on the Lacanian notion o_f the mirror-structur_e of the
imagination. 'We observe that the structure of all ideology, interpellating
individuals as subjects in the name of a Unique and Abolute Subject is
speculary, i.e. has a mirror-structure, and doubly speculary: this mirror
duplication is constitutive of ideology and ensures its functioning'
(LPo
168). When emphasis is placed on the primacy of illusion in the symbolic
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 65
process, all ideology must be illusory. Here there is a complete merging of
the concept of the mirror - the narcissistic structure - with ideology.
Ide_ology is established at the level of narcissism, the subject looking at
itself indefnitely. Althusser rakes as an illustrative example religious ideol
ogy. He says that the function of Christian theology is to reduplicate the
subject by an absolute subject; they are in a mirror relation. 'The dogma
of the Trinity is precisely the theory of the duplication of the Subject (the
Father) into a :subject (the Son) and of their mirror-connexion (the Holy
Spirt}' (LP, 168 n.). A!thusser's treatment here is not a good piee of
work; I do not thmk it makes much sense. It i expeditive; Althusser
summarizes Trinitarian theology in a footnote. We perhaps could say that
the mirror relatibn would be more interesting as an expression of a neu
rotic way of hfe. If we took, for example, the Schreber case analyzed by
Freud, and in particular what Freud called Schreber's theology, we would
see this teduplicative process, there being in fact no god to worship bur
only a projection and retrojection indefnitely of oneself, a projection and
assimilation of one's own image.
It is most diffcult, therefore, to construct the whole concept of the
subject on the narrow basis of the narcissistic relation of mirroring. We
can more easily understand this relation as distortive, the distortion of a
constitution, but it is diffcult to understand it as constitutive itself. The
only way to maintain that this relation is cnstitutive -and this is Althusser.'s
stance - is to argue the radical position that the constitution is the distor
tion, that aU constitution of a subject is distortion. I ideology is eternal,\
.
though, if there are always already interpellated individuals as subjects, '
if the formal structure of ideology i continuingly the same, then wht
happns to the epistemological break? The problem of the epistemologic
break has to be removed from the sphere of particular ideologies to that
of ideology in general. The break with religious idelogy, with humanism,
and so on is nothing compared to the break with this mutual constitution
of primary ideology and subjectivity. I would agree that a break must
occur, but not where Althusser places it. Instead, we may break and we
have to break with the 'miscognition' (micomissatlce) that adheres to
recognition (reconnaissance). What point would there be in a critique of
miscognition if it were not for the sake of a more faithful recognition? We
must make sense of true recognition i a way that does not reduce it to
ideology

, in the narrow and pejorative sense.of that term. Althusser, how

ever, rejects this possibility. He talks of 'the reality which is necessarily
ignored (mOttue) [so 'miscognized', not ignored) in the very forms of
recognition . . .' (LP, 170). All recognition is miscognition; it is a very
pessimistic assertion. If ideology must have no value in itself, then it must
be the world of miscognition, miconnaissance. The whole dialectic of
re\ognition is broken by Althusser' ideological reduction of the problem
atic of the subject.
"
PAUL RICOEUA
Instead of there being a relation of recognition, Althusser correlates the
mirror relation with a relation of subsJlmption. 'There are no subjects
except by and for their subjection' (LP, 169), he says. Althusser uses the
play on words to indicate that the subject means both subjectivity and
subjection. The two meanings are in fact reduced to one: "tO be a subject
means to be submitted to. Yet is there not a history of the individual's
growth beyond the 'speculary' stage? What about the dialectic of the
speculary and the symbolic within imagination itself? For A!thusser, how
ever, to be a subject means to be subjected, to be submitted to an appar
atus, the ideological apparatus of the state. To my mind, if ideo1ogy must
be tied to the mirror stage of the imagination, to the submitted subject, I
do not see how it would ever be possible to have as citizens authentic
subjects who could resist the apparatus of the state. I do not see from
where we could brrow the forces to resist the apparatus if not from the
depths of a subject having claims that are not infected by this supposed
submissive constitution. How else will someone produce a break in the
seemingly closed shell of ideology(
The task, then, is to disentangle recognition (reconnaissance) from mis
cognition (meconnaissance). I shall later connect my analysis of Habrmas
precisely at this point. The problematic for Habermas is the need to start
from a project of recognition. Ideology is troublesome because it make
impossible the true recognition of one human being by another. Further,
this situation is placed entirely on the side of ideology, then no weapons
ist against ideology, because the weapons themselves are ideological.
herefore, we need a concept o"f recognition, what Habermas' more recent
work spaks of as a concept of communication. We need a utopia of total
recognition, of total communication, communiation without boundaries
or obstacles. This supposes that we have an interest in communication
which is not, we might say, ideology-stricken from the beginning. In order
to connect, as does Habermas, the

critique of ideology to an interest in

libration, we must have a concept of recognition, a concept of the mutual
task of communication, that is not ideological in the distortive sense of
that word.
Before we reach Olt examination of Haber mas, howeve, we shall spend
some time discussing Mannheim and Weber, and we have some fnal
questions of Althusser as well. To prepare for the transit from Althusser,
I would like to present a general framework of the questions arising from
our readings of his work. I shall consider fve .main problems. First is the
question of the scientifc claim of Marxism: in what sense is it a science?
While Althusser speaks in some more recent writings of the discovery of
a continent, the continent of history, even here the subject-matter is to be
raised to the level of a systematic science. The focus of this history is not
empirical historiography but the systematic concatenation of stages in the
development of economic relationships (from primitive communism to
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY
"
feudalism to capitalism and so forth), If we speak of science in a positivist
sense, then a theory mut be submitted to verifcation and therefore t the
whole community of, we might say, intellectual workers. It is hard, though,
to identify this science with the science of a class. To put the notion of
scien-tifc verifcation within the framework of dass struggle introduces a
practical concpt within the theoretical framework. My question, then, is
in what sense can Marxism be a science if it is not verifable or falsifable
in the Popperian sense? Perhaps it can be scientifc in another fashion, that
of a titaque. But what motivates a critique if not an interest, an interest
in emancipation, a interest in liberation, something which pulls a critique
necessarily into the ideological sphere? It is quite diffcult to think of a
nonpositivist scien that is not supported by a human interest, a practical
interest. T is also diffcult to think of a science. that is not understandable
for all, even for members of other classes. As we shaH discover, the prob
lem of Mannheim's paradox in fact starts !rom the generalization of the
concept of ideology at th_e point where ideological a1alysis is raised to the
level of a science, that of the sociology of knowledge.
Our second problem, a corollary of the frst, concerns the notion of the
epistemological break. Is a complete break understandable without some
kind of intellectual miracle, a sense. of someone emerging from the dark
In Althusser's more recent Essays in Self Criticism, even while subjecting
himself to reproach (saying that he has been too theoretical and needs to
return to the class st_uggl in a more militant way), he still reinforces his
concept of the epistemological break. He says that it is an iprecedented
eYeJt. Althusser even speaks of Marx as a son without a father, a kind of
absolute orphan. He argueB that it is the idealists who are always seeking
continuity. Possibly a certain providentia!ism does imply continuity, but I
do not know why historical continuity alone should be considered necessarily
ideological and, perhaps, even theological. The concept of discontinuity
gives ris to diffculty itself. It does so principally if we consider, once
more, the motivation of this break. The epistemological break appears
to be motivated, and. i we want to connect thls break to the emergence
of a certain interest, then we have to borrow this motivation from the
ideological sphere. The motivation belongs to the anthropological sphere,
to the interest in being more ful!y human. We cannot completely separate
the idea of the break from a certain human project which is to be improved,
possibly even disclose, by this science.
Fm; my part Althusser's representation of the epistemological break does
great damage not only to the theory of ideology but to the reading of
Marx. It causes us to overlook an imprtant break in Marx; it causes us
to place the break at a different point from where it should be. Though
I am not a Marxist scholar, my .eadir.g of Marx reinforces a conviction
that the more important change at the philosophical level comes not after
The German Ideology but btween the Manuscripts of 1844 and The
.
PAUL AICQEUR
German Ideology, that is t say, in the emergence of the concept _f the
real human bing, real praxis, individuals acting in certain given condit
ions. Seen in this light, the destiny of anthropology is not sealed by tha
of idealism .. The great damage done t Marx by Althusser Is that be fores
us to put under one heading - anthropological ideology - two different
notions. The frst is an ideology of Consciousness, with which Marx and
Freud have rightly broken. The second, though, is the ideology of real, con
crete, human being, a being composed of drives, labour, and so on. This
latter notion, I believe, can be expressed in non-idealist terms. Ideology
and idealism, therefore, are not identifed in such a way that no place any
longer exists for an anthropology. For me, a non-Jdea!istic anthropology
is the only way to make sense of all the other problems that we shall con
sider during the rest of the lectures. Marx's breakthrough must make sense
at the level of this deep-rooted interest in the plenitude of indvidual existence.
The issues here lead us to a third question arising from our reading of
Althusser, the problem of his conceptual framework. The conceptual
framework of infrastructure and superstructure i a metaphor of a base
with stories, an eifce with a base. This metaphor is quite seductive at frst
sight, but it becomes very dangerous when taken literally to mean some
thing prior to something secondary or dedved. One of the signs that this
metaphor is misleaditg when frozen and taken lit.rally is the diffculty of
reconnecting the action of the base and the ,eaction hack on the base by
the superstructure. We are caught in a scholastiCism of determinant factors
and real but non-determinant factors. This scholasticism, I believe, leads
nowhere, but the metaphor is harmful for even more important reasons,
It is not that the metaphor creates paradoxes, for all doctrines in fact
proceed by slving their own paradoxes. Rather, the conceptual frame
work here prevents us from making snBe of some very interesting con
tributions of Althusser hims.etf to Marxist doctrine. In particular I think of
the concept
-
of overdetermination, that is, recognition of the simultaneow
action of infrastructure and suprstructure, the fact that in history the base
never acts alone but is always intertWined with actions, sp!cifc hi$tOrical
events, and so on. I wonder whether we could not make more sense of the
concept of overdetermination. if we placed it in another concept1.al
framework than that of infrastructure. and superstructure. This might cause
us, in fact, to reconsider what fnally is really the base.
If we raise this radical question about what is basic for human bemgs,
we may come to realize that a great dea! of what is placed in the super
structure is basic from another point of view. Take into consideration any
Cllture, and we fnd that its symbolic famework - its main assumptions,
the way in which it considers itself and projets its identity through sym
bols and myths - is basic. It sems that we can caU basic exactly what is
usually called the superstructure. The possibility of this juxtaposition is
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OP IDEOLOGY
"
always present with a metaphor. We must destroy a metaphor by the use
of a contrary metaphor; we therefore proceed from metaphor to metaphor.
The opposing metaphor here is the notion of what is basic for human
bei'ngs: what is basic for human beings is not necessarily what is the base
in Marxist structure. Indeed, I wonder whether the notion of overdeter
mination does not imply that we must in fact give up the distinction
btween infrastructure and superstructure.
This point is made even more evident when we realize that the very
action of the superstructure implies some intermeiary concepts which
break the infrastructure/superstructure framework. Once again let me refer
to the concept of authority. A system of aqthority never works only by
force, by sheer violencei instead, as we have discussed, it works through
ideology, through some meaningful procedures, These procedures call for
the comprehension of individuals. Althusser's schema of 'effectivity' must
be improVed or perhaps completely recast in order to make room for the
claim to legitimacy, which is charactristic of a ruling authority whether
a group or class. I shall later turn to Max Weber to deal with this problem
further, because bis fundamental problem was how a system of authority
works. For Weber the problem of domination 'implied a system of motives
wherein the claims to legitimacy of an authority attempt to meet the
capacity of belief in this legitimacy. We are forced to deal, therefore, with
beliefs and claims, and it is diffcult to put these psychological factors
within a framework of ifrastructure and superstructure.
Another reason we should question this conceptual framework is if we
want to -make sense of another of Althusset's claims, that ideologies have
a reality of ther own. I think that A!thusser is right t assert the relative
autonomy and self-consistency of ideologies; in this he opposes the classi
cal Marxists, with the possible exception of the Italians, Gramsci above
all. The relative autonomy of the superstructure, though, requires that
ideologies have a content of their own. In turn, this requires before an
understanding of these ideologies' .us a phenomenology of their specifc
mode. We cannot defne these ideologies' structure only by their role in the
reproduction of the system. We must make sense of their meaning bfore
considering their use. The assumption that ideologies content is e:hausted
by their use is without justifcation; their use does not exhaust their mean
ing. We can take as an example the problem raised by Habermas, that in
modern sodeties - and particularly in the military-industrial structure of
the capitalist world - science and technology function ideologically. This
does not meap. that they are constitutively ideological but rather that they
are being used ideologically. The present capture of science and technology
by a certain interest - i Habermas' terms, an interest in control - is not
constitutive of the inner meaning of their feld. We must distinguish be
tween the inner constitution of a given ideological feld (granting, for
70
PAUL RICOEUR
the moment, that we still want to call it an ideology) and its function.
The problem of distortion does not exhaust tbe constitution of a certain
sociological force or structure.
As an example here, we may return to Lnin's defnition of the state. In
determining that the state is defned only by its coercive function, Lnin
neglected its many other functions; he did not see that the coercive function
is a distortion of thes other functions, Lenin's approach, however, typifes.
the orthodox Marxist mode!. Religion is said to have no otber constitution
than its distorting function, and some .now say the same of science and
technology. Again I wonder, though, is not the only way to give meaning
the relative autonomy of the suprstructural spheres to distinguish b
tween the rules of their constitution and tbe distortivemodes of their USe?
If we cannot make this distinction, then we have to say that the procedure
of unmasking is constitutive of it objet. The content of an ideologr be
comes uniquely what w have unmasked and nothing more than that, a
very reductive procedure.
The failure to recognize the specifcity of each superstructural sphere
the juridical, political, religious, culmral - has not only dangerous thooret
ical consequences but dangerous practical and political consequences also.
Once it is assumed that these spheres have no autonomy, then the Stalinist
state is possible. The argument is that since the economic base is sound and
since al! the other spheres ue merely reflexes, shadows, or echoes, then we
are allowed to manipulate the latter spheres i n order to improve the econ
omic base. There is no .espect for rhe autonomy of the juridical, the political,
or the religious, because they are said to have no existence in themselves.
Do we not want, then, a quite different theoretical framework in which
the process of distortion would have as its condition of possibility a con
stitution which would !Ot be defned by the distorting function? This
would entail that the juridical sphere, for example, retain a certain consti
tutive specifcity even though it may be true that it has been captured by
the bourgeoisie for the latter's beneft. If we take the relation between
work and capital expressed in the notion of the wage, the wage is pre
sented as a contract, and the contract is represented as a juridical act. The
juridical form of the exchange suggelts no one is a slave, since people bire
out their work and receive a wage in ret\ n. This is dearly a gr;ve distort
ion, because the juridical oncept of contract is tpp[ied a situation of
domination. Here the real situation of exploitation is concealed in an
exchange of work and salary that is only apparently reciprocal. My claim
ls thar while the juridical funcrion is greatly hanned by the way this
juridical framework in the capitalist system serves to conceal the real
structure of exploitation, it is not exhausted, as the orrhodox Marxists
maintain, by this distortive function, I insist on te possibility of discon
necting and reconne_cting rhe distortive and constitutive functions; this
presupposes, once again, a motivational framework.
ALTHUSSER'S THEORY OF IDEOLOGY 71
The fourth problem arising from our reading is that of particular ideo
logies. We may start here from the previous Jtoblem and ask what makes
these particular ideologies specifc. Let us take the example of humanism,
In the United States the argument for humanism may be too easy, because
humanism i a positive term, which is not always the case in Europe. We
must reconsider the concept of humanism in order to disentangle what
about it is ideological in the bad sense of that word, that is, a mere way
to cover up real situations. We must look for a strong concept of human
ism, which would not be ideological in a pejorative sense, Here I think that
a theory of the system of interests, like Habermas', oould help r show that
there _exists a hierarchy of interests that is not reducible to the mere inter
est in domination or control. This would imply construction of a complete
anthropology and not a mere assertion of humanism, the latter being
merely a claim if not a pretence, This strong concept of humanism must
be linked to three or four other cncepts within the same conceptual
framework. First is the concept of the rea! individual under defnite con
ditions, which has been elaborated in The German Ideology. This notion
provides a strong philosophical basis for a humanism that would not be
merely a claim. A strong concept of humanism is implied, second, in the
entire problematics of legirimacy, because of the individual's relation ro a
sysrem of order and domination. Perhaps here is the individual's major
fght to achieve his or her identity over against a structure of authority. We
need to stress, then, the important dialectic between individual and author
ity wirhin the polarity btveen belief and cla1m, Third, I would say that
the epistemological break relies on the emergence of this humanistic inter
est. We can make no sense of the sudden outburst of truth in the midst
of obscurity and darkness if it is not the emergence of something which
was distorted in ideology but now fnds its truth, In a sense) the break
must be also at the same time a recovery of what was oovered up by
ideology. I wonder whether a notion of radical break can be thought.
The ffth and fnal problem ro arise from our reading is that of ideology
in generaL This raises that most radical question: what is distorted if not
praxis as something symblically mediated? The discourse on distortion is
itself neither ideological nor scientifc but anthropological. This is in agree
ment with all the previous .uggestions concerning a philosophical anthro
pology thar includes motives and ymbols. The parallelism between the
dlsOurse on ideology in general and Freud's discourse on the unconscious
in general reinforces the argument. Thus, we must have a rheory of sym
bolic action. Recourse to the material existence of ideology does not suf
fce, for how can an imaginary relation be an apparatus? The functioning
oi the category of the subject in ideology becomes a warrant for ideology.
We cannot speak of misognition (miconnaissance) without the back
ground of recognition (reconnaissance), a background that is not ideo
logical bur anthropological. ( . . . ]
72
PAUl RICOEUR
NOTES
1 Fo Marx, Allen Lane, London, 1969, p. 89-. Further referemes to thi work
will be indicated in the text in parmthests by the abbreviation FM, followeQ.
by a page number.
2 Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays, New Left B'ooks, London, 1971, p.
150. Further references to this article will be indi<ated in -the text in p;mmtheses
by the abbreviation LP, followed by a page- number.
4
HISTORY AND INTERACTION: ON THE
STRUCTURALIST INTERPRETATION OF
HISTORICAL MATERIALISM

Axel Honneth
(Translated by Gordon Finlayson)
The group o Marxist theorists which has gathered around Loui Althusser
since the 1960s
-
has been working on a new reding of Marxist thery that
has both theoretical and political ramifcations. The cogency of Althusser's
reading of Marx depends upon its dual trajectory. It attempts to make the
elucidation of strategic questions which concern the labour movement
dependent upon the resolution of the central problems of Marxian theory.
Althusser thus remains true to the goals of a philosophically informed
tradition of oppositional Marxism - namely, to deal with actual political
problems by means of a reinterpretation of Marxist theory. The theoretical
component of the Althusserian programme consists in a critigue of tradit
ional Marxism. However, the critigue is pitched at such a fundamental
]eve[ that even manifestly opposed and discrepant interpretations of Marx
ism .are elucidated on the basis of identical theoretical premises. Althusser
contends that Stalinist Marxism and the philosophical critique of Stalinism
share the same erroneous assumption, one that was alredy part and parcel
of both the social-democratic revisionism of the Second International and
the Hegelian-Marxist critigue of this position. In short, the critical claims
of Althusser's reading of Marx are far-reaching and powerful. Between his
structuralist reading of Marx and his theoretical project proper, Althusser
practically endorses only Lenin's brand of Marxism, whilst all intermedi
ary positions (including legitimation theory and oppositional theory) are con
signed wholesale to the same history of erroi-. In its own self-understanding
the Marxism offered by the Althusserian drde is therefore an epochal
reading, countering traditional Marxist theory. The programme of structural
Marxism is advanced in place of the common assumption of economistic
14
AXEl. HONNETH
Marxism and the praxisphilosophical critique, which the Alchusser group
repudiates.
Marxism's theoretical relocation is then supposed to provide the only
legitimat access to the history of the labour movement, The political
component of Althusser's programme is to indicate the political and stra
tegic consequences of the theoretical failures of Marxism, and thereby
indirectly to make them pertinent t contemporary discussions of stratefy
.
Althusser is convinced that the central theoretical errors of the history of
Marxism were always linked to the strategic and organizational mistakes
of the labour movement. Thus he judges the interpretations of Marxism
which he deems erroneous to be direct indications of political failures.
just as today the abortive theretical critique of Stalinism points to as
yet unresolved strategic problems of the Communist Parties, so Hegelian
Marxism's abortive critique of economism betrays a strategically reckless
form of politics - namely, one based upon spontaneity.1 Consequently, the
Althusserians, in line with their political self-understanding, attempt to
forge a link with orthodox LeJiinist party politics, one which identifes
with neither the right nor the left wings of the labour movement - i.e., one
that lies between the political conceptions of social democracy, on the one
hand, and soviet democracy, on the other.
Because the. political selfconception of the Althusserians is bound up
with the critique of the systematic misinterpretation of Marxist thery,
it is dependent on the presuppositions of their interpretation of Marxism.
In this light I shall confne myself to the theoretical aspet of their self
conception. My i'nterelt lies chiefly in the systematic development of the
theory of history i n Reading Capital, \Vithin which the Ald:tusser school
wants to identify and execute the programme of a structural Marx1sm on
the basis of a structuralist reinterpretation of historical materialism. The
theory of history forms the theretical core, because it ptovidesthe reasons
for the Althusserian school's bilateral move, distancing it.elf from tradit
ional Marxism, whilst simultaneously elaborating its new interpretation.
My critique pursues the logical argument in the construction of this theory
up to the point at which it manifests its latent political function.
The extraordinary signifcance of Althusser's structural reinterpretation of.
the west Europen discussion of Marxism principally deriYes from its main
aim, which is to solve the core problems of Marxist thery with the aid
of structuralist models of thought. The interpretation of Marxism offered
by the Althusser gr01p merges two aYenues of thought: a expansion of
the domain of structuralist theory and a se!fcreflection on the patt .of
the tradition of Marxist thought, Notwithstanding frequent attempts

to
HISTORY AND INTERACTION 75
distance srructu.al Marism from social-scientifc structura!ism,2 the two
approache share a basic methodological stance, which stems from the
model of structural linguistics. The object-domain of the social sciences is
investigated as a system, in terms of deep structures which constitute the
relations between empircal manifestations or events. These relations then
provide the theoretical focus of interest. Just as the structuralist analysis
of language takes .its methodological referenc points from the distinction
between actual linguistic utterances (parole) and the linguistic rule system
(langue), so the structuraliSm of the social sciences is based on the distinc
tlon between the empirical context of events and the deep structure which
determines that context.3 The structural Marxism founded by Althusser,
though, gives a bold new gloss to this established notion of method. When
he put the structuralist method to the test, Levi-Strauss was still able to
presuppose a collective mind with an invariant structure, and thus man
aged t recOnstruct the rule-systems of archaic kinship relations and mythical
world-views. In Foucault the same. procedure assumes the form of a ret
rospective reconstruction of the fundamental rules of epochal forms of
knowledge. But Althusser extends the object-domain of structuralism be
yond the domain of cultural symbolic media of human sociality (i.e.,
linguistically structured manifestations); he now imputes the forms of organ
ization of social systems themselves to deep structures.
The second characteristic which structural Marxism shares with social
sientifc structuralism is the 'decentering of the subject'. Accordingly, the
object domain -f the social sciences, whether construed as symbolic forms
of knowledge,. or material forms of domination, can no longer be under
stood as the constitutive achievement of an individual transcendental or
species-slbje<t, The obje.t domain is now understood to be the rule-sjrstem
which frst constitutes the particular form of subjectivity; The aporias of
'anthropological dogmatism' (Foucault), which would refer the social con
text to a human centre of action, are to be resolved from the standpoint
of a structuralist thery, which conceives the social context as a centre!ess
system of order. This basic theoretical position was originally mobilized in
France against the theoretical hubris of the epistemological subject.4 The
orginal intention wa's t criticize the phenomenological attempt to treat
the whole social nexus as an obJectivation, into which the subjectivity
of a transcendental consciousness had externalized itelf. However, the
trenchancy of the structuralist. critique is in inverse proportion to its self
confidence. By his critique of Marxist theories of the subjct Althusser
himself problematically weakens the intention of social-scientifc structur
alism- namely, to impute the constitution of social formations t centre
less structures rather than to a transcendental subject. The 'decentering of
the subject' in structural Marxism is levelled not only against Marxist
atrempt to adapt phenomenological tanscendentalism to it own pur
poses, but is also invoked willy nilly against existential, anthropological
"
AXEL HONNETH
and praxis-philosophical versions, of Marxism. Thus, Althusser reformulates
the cntral questions of Marxism at a deep level, below the threshold at
which social processes cn still be described as complexes of intentional
action.
FinaHy, structural Marxism adopts the concept of history from social
scientifc structuralism, a concept which is supposed to result necssarily
from the 'decentering of the subject'. Since structuralism reduces the
historical sequence of symbolic forms or hegemonic structures to the
sequence of invariant rule-systems, the historical context of which can no
longer be guaranteed by the unifying achievements of a subject, the cat
egory of history itself must now be understood as the discontinuous, but
integrally structured, rule-systems, which merely follow one another. Uvi
Strauss and Godelier have utilized just such a concept of history, purged
of all remnants of continuity, to great effect in the feld of ethnology, as
has Foucault in the feld of the history of science. However, in the Marx
ism of the Althusser school the structuralist concept of history asswnes a
very prticular function.5 This is due to the claim that the programme of
a structuralist interpretation of historical materialism can be made plaus
ible via the critique of a!! non-structuralist conceptions of history in tradit
ional Marxism. According to its inner foundations, structural Marxism is
to be vindicated by criticizing the classical interpretations of Marx, in such
a way rhr the theoretical suggestions offered by the tacitly endorsed struc
turalist theory of history are made explicitly convincing.
With this projct in mind Althusser takes up the dualistic model into
which Soviet Marxism had pressed Marx's theory. However, structuralist
Marxism does not construct an ontological duality fom the distinction
between historical and dialectical materialism, unlike Sviet Marxism, which
envisages a separate ontological discipline, grounding the marerialisr theory
of history. In rhe early works of the Althuser school a distinction is made
between epistemology, construed as a 'theory of theoretical practice', and
a theory of history. Today, the same dichotomy of disciplines is used t
distinguish btween a philosophy which politically vindicates the basic
assumptions of Marxism and the theory of history; the theory of theoret
ical practice is now conceived as a spcifc component of the broader
discipline of historical materialism.' By subscribing to this dichotomy of
Marxian theory Alrhusser and his collaborators seek to overcome weak
nesses in the foundations of the traditional concept of historical material
ism, with the help of the structuralist concept of history. In their critique
of 'historicism' they undertake to demonstrate the convergenc of discrep
ant interpretations of Marxism in a false conception of history.
The category of historicism, which is to play such a decisive role in the
.structuralist interpretation of historical materialism, is achieved by think
ing the structuralist 'decentering of the subject' together with its conse
quences for the concept of history. The structuralist approach calls into
HISTORY AND INTERACTION
77
question the use of the concept of continuous history, which requires the
presupposition of a unifying subject. In 'historicism . . . the different levels
of the totlity of a social structure, their relation to one another and their
principle of cognition are grounded in an account of their genetic con
stitution both by a creative subject of society atld a linear principle of
history, pertaining ro the self-development of this subject.'7 However, as a
characterization of the different traditions of Marxism, idntif! by struc
turalism, the category of 'historicism' is still unclear. If structural Marxism
is to prove itself apable of grasping the specifc ideological content of
those versions of Marxism it rejects, then it must frst provide a dearer
conceptual defnition of either the notion of 'history', or the notion of 'the
subject' which historicism contains. Making this very objection, Poulantzas
has phasized the variety of senses which can be given to the concept of
the 'subject' within 'historicism'. 'In the course of the development of
Marxist
.
ttought the place of the subject has been occupied by the social
class -qua the subject of history, the concrete individual as the species-being
of history, and also social labour.'s Similarly, the concept of hisrory which
'historicism' employs displays a whole gamut of meanings, from evolution
ary models of history, on the one hand, to teleological philosophies of
history,. on the other.
The flexibility of the concept of 'historicism' seems to be its virtue, By
exploiting the vari"ety of its possible meanings, structural Marxism has
expanded 1historidsm' into a system of ideology-critical sub-predicates.
Together these designate interpretations of Marxism which share the his
toricist prejudice, but differ in their respective conceptions of the subjet
and of history. Two- of the most prominent types of traditional Marxism
which Althusser constructs in this way, are 'humanism' and 'economism'.
'Humanism' uses the model of historicism to ground an interpretation of
Marxism :In which the cncept of history is guided in a variety of ways by
the idea of human self-creation. Althusser's worries pertain to the obses
sive way in which humanist thought conceives history as a continuous
self-obfectivation of the human species. This crude caricature, into which
Althusser presses such divergent theories as phenomenological and Hegelian
Marxism, has been formed not b much from the original versions of these
interpretations of Marxism, but rather from their existentialist or anthro
pological reconstructions. In each case, it is drawn from the critique of
Stalinism which prevailed in France, and which focused entirely on the
early works of Marx.10 By 'economism' Althuser understands both the
Marxism of the Second International and that of Stalinism. In these theo
ries the me;ns of production are conceived bf as the central unity through
which the fon;es of production advance the course of history.11 'Economism'
and 'humanism' - or, to use Althusser's pointedly political formulation,
Stalinism and the critique of Stalinism - h;ve a common denominator.
They sh;ue the theoretic! ambition of reducing the cmplexity of the
"
AXEL HONNETH
historical process to either an instrumental or an anthropological centre,
so as to interpret the different domains of reality as 'expressions' of this
centre. In Stalinism this concept of history legitimates political power as an
instrumentally coerced expression of the economic system. In the humanist
critique of Stalinism the same concept of history takes the form of an
ethically oriented anthropology, which stil! only understands power relat
ions globally as a manifestation of alienation. Althusser concludes that
in both these conceptions of Marxism the specifc social form of a tran
sitional scialist society remains unclear.U
Now we are in a better position to understand how structural Marxism
attempts to educe its own theoreticl programme from rhe critique of
historicism. Rather than a centre of history being imputed to historical
materialism, there is the structure of a mode of productton, within which
the (relatively autonomous) social sub-systems assume a rule-governed
relation to each other, rhe rules of which stm from an ultimately deter
minant economic sub-system. Instead of a temporal continuum of history
there are mutually independent temporalities, which in each case are fxed
by the particular mode of functioning of the social sub-systems that
support them.
Before examining what ensues from these basic assumptions of materi
alism, I would like briefy to recontruct the tacit presuppositions of
Althusser's conception of 'historicism'.
II
The concept of 'historicism' plays a constitutive role in the vindication of
structural Marxism. In the writings of the Althusser school it comes to

designate all theoretical positions which recalcitrantly hinder a correcr
reconstruction of Marxist theory. In his own works Althusser so extends
the concept of 'historicism' that it eventually covers the whole tradition of
philosophies of history. The label of 'Marxist historicism' is then affxed
ro all versions of Marxism which, whatever their divergent political and
theoretical aims, nonetheless proceed from the assumption, inhetited ftom
the philosophy -of history, of a self-developing centre of hi
S
tory. The argu
ments with which the Althuser school tends ro substantiate its global
suspicions of Marxist historicism are to some extent congruent with West
German debates about the crisis in the foundations of the historical sci
ences. Here, the philosophy of history which is presupposed by the modern
concept of history has recently been reconstructed, in order to counter the
social-scientifc naivety of historicism, by redefning the methodological
presuppositions of a theoretically oriented science of history. In this con*
text two theoreticaHy disrinct chatlenges have been made to the categorial
implications of rhe modern conception of history - implications whose
HISTORY AND INTERACTION 79
Marxist credentials have likewise ben challenged by Alrhusser. The frst
challenge cme1 in the wake of Reinhart Koselleck's conceptual history,
which seeks out the soda-historical presuppositions of the category of
'history' in the singular. The second comes from the analytic philosophy
of history (Dan to),. and consists in an epistemological investigation of the
way in which continuity is imputed to the modern understanding of his

tory. Arguments of both kinds can also be found in A!thusser.

In a series of artides Koslleck has undertaken the task of tracing the
modern conception of history back to the experiences in which, during the
French Revolution, the historical context of events crystallized into an
object of thery. The plural form of the word Geschichte:(stories/histories)
which, up until the outbreak of the French Revolution, referred to histor
ical events. as an aggregate of individual histories, is replaced by the col
lective singular form of the noun Geschichte (story/history) in the modern
experience of history, because in the course of the revolutionary years the
potential for progress and the uniqueness of history bcame palpable. The
category of 'history' which integrates historical events into the context of
a process which is in prlndple alterable, suppresses the category of many
'histories' in which historical events are thought together as self-contained
episodes. 'Behind this fnding of linguistic history our specifcally modern
experience begins to make itself heard: movement, alterability, accelera
tion, openness to the future, revolutionary trends and their astonishing
uniqueness, modernity ceaselessly renewin-g itself - the sum of these tem
poral experiences of our modern age is covered by the collective singular
form of history and the concept thereof."
1
3
This terminological mutation ushers in the theoretical fction of a sub
stantfal unity of action, which guarantees the relations between historical
events within a process of history. The basic assumption of bourgeois
philosophy of history, which arises with this conceptual alteration, is the
adoption of a historical macro-subject (the people, the state, or the spcies).
History can then be understood as the process of the self-development
of this macro-subject. Odo Marquard, drawing on Kose!!eck's conceptual
history and on the work of Karl L6with, has taken issue with this tend
ency of the philosophy of history, by attacking the various versions of the
fctional subject of hiStory.' Jlirgen Habrmas traces th same conceptual
alteration analyzed by Koselleck back to the socio-economic constellations
in which the modern experience of history is originally rooted, Accordingly,
it is not so much the abtract exprience of te hisrorkal proces [historischet
Prozessualitit] .that provides the backdrop in front of which history can b
philoophically represnted as -progress, as the capitalist system of production
which aims for a perpetual increase in productiv'ity. The experience of
progress in the philosophy of history is accompanied by the experience of
crisis, induced by the social context of capitalism, in such a way that
progress and crisis are the cnpint central categories from which the
80
AXEL HONNETH
philosophy of history emerges in the eighteenth century. The wor!d.historical
subject then becomes the theoretical quantum by means of which the
crisis-ridden flux of history and the progressive autonomy of action can
be thought together in a process of emancipation which encompasses all
parochial and social indeterminaciesY H. J. SandkUhler sees the fction -of
the species-subject, by dint of which historical events can be assigned ro
a common history, as the pressure for legitimation which arises when the
bourgeoisie insists that its particular class interests, as opposed to the
feudal claim r domination, are the universal interests of the human species.
'The consciousness of "history" in the singular is not, in the fnal analysis,
a result of the dispute between the revolutionary bourgeoisie and the feudal
ideology of legitimation, for it is not simply mankind, but rather mankind
as the bearer of the mandate of divine rule, which is empowered t make
history.'16
The A!thusser school implicitly endorses considerations of this kind when
it tries to show that historicist versions of Marxism rely on patters of
thought which are invariably congruent with the philosophy of history. In
his dispute with John Lewis Althusser explains the theoretlCal presuppo
sitions of the bourgeois philosophy of history as the bourgeoisie's interest
in self-legitimation. He claims that in the assumption of a macro-subject
in control of history the revolutionary bourgeoisie recasts its own rol.e as
that of the rational subject of action. The concomitant concept of history
only made sense insofar as 'the revolutionary bourgeoisie was struggling
against the feud3l regime. which was then dominant, To proclaim at that
time, as the great bourgeois Humanists did, that i is man who makes
history, was to struggle, from the bourgeois point of view (which was then
revolutionary), against the religious Thesis of feudal ideology: it is God
who makes history.'17 Althusser concludes that1 with the break-up of the
political constellations of the burgeois revolution. the theoretiCal grounds
of its conception of history also vanish: namely, the assumption of a
universal cntre of action, which reduce the complexity of history t a
linear temporal development. The unifcation of history in the positing of
an historical macrosubfect seems to Althusser to be a legitimate theret
ical move, only insofar as tlu politically progressive (but still partial) inter
ests of the
.
bourgeoisie require the cloak qf univ!rsalism agamst the feudal
claim to power. From this point of view the. historical-materialist versions
of the modern concept of history, which presuppose. the macro-subject
either qua class-consciousness (in the philosophy of consciousness), or
substantially qua the forces of production, can only be regarded as
bourgeois relics in the tradition of Marxism, In fact these Versions of
Marxism share with bourgeois philosophies of history not only the same
conception of history, but also the same interest in legitimation.
Althusser attempts to show that 'economism' and 'humanism' share. the
ideological ambition to locte the politically authoritative unity of action
HISTORY At0 INTERACTION "
in.the cntre which they each assign ro history. What Althusser means by
the 'economism' of the Second International, or of Stalinism, is concep
tions of Marxism which try, in a self.-legitimizing gambit, to reduce the
domain of political action to the progress of the system, which is autono
mous with respect to theory and merely instrumental in character. In the
'humanism' of Hegelian Marxism or existentialism Althussr is pointing t
conceptions which philosophically mask thetr political impotence vis-3-vis
the organization. of the labour movement, with the concept of a class or
species-subject in control of history. Althusser contends that 'humanist
historicism may, for example, serve as a theoretical warning to intellectuals
of bourgeois or ,ptty-bourgeois origin, who ask themselves, sometimes in
genuinely tragic terms, whether they reatly have a right to be members of
a history, which is made, a they know or fear, ourside them.'18 Thus far
these lines of argument have been pursued no further in structural Marxism.
Althusset himself has only briefly sketched his own thoughts on the matter.
H. M. Baumgartner's worl can help to demonstrate the lecond area
in which Wesr German theontical discussions complement the Althusserian
reflections on historicism.1, Drawing on the work of A. C Danto,
Baumgartner has produced a philosophkal reconstruction of the notion of
continuity in the philosophy of history. He undertakes an epistemological
inspection of rhe various conceptions of a unifed history, in order to make
clear the outline of a new historicism. His criticism is levelled ar those
versions of cr!tical theories of history which seck to overcome the onto
logical conceptions o.f continuity in metaphysical history, by exposing them
as reifcations. He sets out to prove that even the post-Hegelian attempts
to think the continuity of history as the unifying achievement of a cogni
tive subject are tied to the onrological presupposition that history provide!
an objective context of meaning, Baumgartner argues that it is impossible
to construct a systematically representative relation between the multiplic
it of historical events and the notion of historical continuity, since the
historical language of the objecr fails in principle t reproduce the whole
'factical' course. of history. Therefore the expressions employed by the
critical theory of history ought not to be associated with any ontological
notions of continui't. However, Baumgartner fnds just such associations
in concepts like .life, development and formation (Bidungsprouss) which
are used in the tradition of the epistemological philosophy of history.
Baumgartner draws some radicl conclusions from his analysis: 'If the
continuity of history is neither the tranquil certainty of continual change,
nor the task of creating a nexus of events, to be accomplished by intellect,
action or self-reilecrion, then histozy in general is not to be understood a
a process, bur only as a phenomenon of consciousness, namely man's
mastery of the past with respet to its possible interpretation now and in
the future.'20 Baumgartner no longer values continuity as a fearure of the
historical object domain inelf, bur as rhe mere formal principle of every
82 AXEL HONNETH
historical proposition. The Wli6cation of historic events to historical con
tinuity according to interests now necessarily belongs to the transcendental
structure of nart<tive formation, within which alone w may experience
historical events as 'history', There is no longer a stight path from this
result of Baumgartner's investigations to the critique of historicism in -rhe
Althusserian school. However, from his critique of the ontological notion.
of continWity we can begin to show what theor,etical path must be taken
by structural Marxism, if it is to redeem its promise to reject objective
notions of historical continuity, and at the same time to avoid Baumgartners
transcendental philosophical solution.21
Like Baumgartner Althusser criticizes concepts of history which harbor
the notion of historical continuity as an ontological presupposition. In some
places he traces the historicist versions of Marxism back to the Hegelia-n
conception according to which hitorical time can be thought as a homo
geneous continuum of history. History can be read the process in which
spirit comes to itself in a dialectical self-identifcation.22 Althusser rightly
sees a characteristic weakness of traditional Marxism in this trop, an
insight which holds independently of the material content of his critique
of Hegel. The question of the conditions of the theoretical unifcation of
history- a question posed by the disintegration of the idealistic philosophy
of history - is dogmatically prejudged by the very fact that history is
Lepresented as a process of self-realization. If history can be thought as a
process of the internal cevelopment of a supra-individual systematic unity
or unity of action, to which all historical events may be ascribed, then the
self-realizing macro-subject must already be pesupposedA This relic of the
metaphysics of history has assumed the form of a dehistoricization of
the concept of the proletariat in the Hegelian-Marxist tradition. Lukacs
has taken the category of the proletariat so
. .far byond any historical _and
empirical determination that he ultimately depicts the emanciption of the
proletariat a the formation (Bildungsprozess) of the subject of history . . For
Lukics the actlality of history in historical materialism can orily come to
slf-knowledge beLue the prletariat recognizes this actuality as its own
creation. The idea. of self-knowledge then contains the notion of historical
continuity, since it grasps all historic events as objectivations of a single
identical subjecr.n In the tradition of th $!cond International the relic of
the metaphysic of history assumes the form of an economistic ideology- of
history. Here the dialectic btween the forces and the relations of production
has been so narrowly circumOcribed t the role. of the instrumets of pro
duction that historical changes have t be interpreted as causal conse
quences of the development of production. History is understood in sum
as an autonomous progression, the locomotive of which is the unfolding
of the techniques of production,24 The development of productive force
which has shnk a mere vector thus purports t provide the meaning
of all historical events.
HISTORY AND INTERACTION
"
In the cases of Hegelian Marxism and the Marxism of the Second
International alike the unity of history is vouchsafed by the process of
development of a selfcreating subject. Structural Marxism oppoes this
theoretical presupposition. However, whereas Baumgartner reads the con
tinuity of history merely as a methodological trope, Althusser replaces it
himself ontological!y with the notion of discontinuity. Althusser goes
beyond the structural model of the Ann-les School, which starts from
the assuffiption of objectively overlapping layers of continuity with varying
temporal rhythms, by conceiving history as the discontinuous succession of
modes of production each with their own time. Althusser even assumes
that there are different social strata, each with its own internal temporal
ity, within the confnes of these modes of production. History then be
comes plural: a complex series of complete, yet internall:r differentiated,
temporali'ties. 'We can and must say: for each mode of production there
is a pecullar time and history, punctuated in a specifc way hy the devel
opment of the productive forces. The relations of production have their
peculiar time and history, punctuated in a spcifc way; the political super
structure has its own history . . . scientifc formations have their own time
and history, etc. Each of these peculiar histories is punctuated with peculiar
rhythms and can only be known on condition that we have defned the
concept of the specifcity of its historical temporality and its punctuations
(continuow development, revolutions, breaks etc.),m The quotation demon
strates how radilly structural Marxism departs from the notion of
continuity in the philosophy of histor;. Continuity becomes a possible
form of historical time; with respect to the discontinuity of histodcal devel
opment, however, it is secondary. Whilst Baumgartner draws the tran
scendental philosophical conclusion that continuity is merely the formal
principle of historicl cognition, the Althusserian school make discontinu
ity into the objective form of the course -of history. Whilst for Baumgartner
the collecdve singular form of history dissolves into a multiplicity of
histories, to which we assign historical events from the standpoint of
prevailing interests, in structural Marxism the unity of history split. into
different histories, composed of their own respective modes of production
and sub-systems. Both conceptions are obviously rooted in a single pre
mise: namely, the: rule out the possibility that the idea of historical con
tinuity could be vindicated internally to the historical process. Neithe.r
Bumgartner's transcendental grounding of historicism, nor the structur
alist conception of historical materialism, take into consideration that not
one but two histories have to be unifed: the history that is only construed
as a nexus of continuity by thought, and the history that creates from itself
a real nexus of continuity. The continuity of history need not always b
presupposed as an ontological nexus of all historical events, but can still
be grunded objectively in the social contexts of action, i which historical
events are always interpretatively embedded in an historical continuum.
8
AXEL HONNETH
If we start from this theoretical possibility, then ,the conceptual presup
positions of Baumgartner and Althusser become problematic. The theory
of history would then have to contend with an inter-subjectively already
constituted object-domain. The process of history would then b neither
the chaotic feld of events which, according to Baumgartner, is only unifed
by the construction of narratives, nor the disontinuous succession of
rule-systems which, according to Althusser, -completely excludes notions of
continuity, but rather a binding process that is only disclosed by inter
action. Theoretical representations of historical continuity are then materi
ally embedded in the context of a life-world, within which history is
collectively -appropriated and bequeathed. The representations would refer
r communicatively generated i'nterpretations of history, in which social
groups and classes have already unifed historical events prior to any
scientifc theories.16 The idea of a real nexus of world history can then be
thought materialistically, insofar as the process of capitalist international
ization amalgamates the space of unifying actions into an equally real
global unity. Under these conditions the concept of the subject of history
no longer becomes a .merely ontological posit, but a normative projection,
in which the historically possible integration of all socially and regionally
varying unities of action would be thematized in terms of,a self-conscious
humanity. The 'subject' of historical materialism is not to be understood
as a presu,pposed theoreti<al quatUJun, the self-realization of which conni
tutes history as a whole, but rather as a global unity of action, which
results from the process of its slf-formation,
This construction cannot be accomplished in strul ural Marxism, where
the concept of the subject of history can only be seen as a necessary result
of the philosophy of history, whilst the notion of historical continuity is
deeme a mere metaphysical self-delusion. Hence the limitations of 'his
toricism' are also the limitations of structural Marxism. Whilst Jt is true
that the concept of 'historicism' remains bound up with relics of the Marxist
tradition of the philosophy of history, not all conceptions of history can
be tarred with the same brush, for certain among them could. still provide
a new material basis for the old notions of the philosophy of history.
According t the assumptions from which the critique of historicism pro
ceeds, it is imposible to distinguish the philosophical idea of the historical
macro-subject from the materialist notion of an interactvely constituted
world society. In both cases Althusser would see only historicism, as if
there were no difference betwen them, The systematic reason for this
logical impasse lies in the structural version of historical materialism. Here
the object domain of history is conceived along structuralist lines as a deep
structure that categorial!y occludes the inter.subjective process of interpre
tation in which historical continuity could be anchored. This short-circuit
in the critique of historicism is at the same time the index of a conceptually
over-simplifed reconstruction of historical materialism.
HISTORY AND INTERACTION
..
Ill
Marx undrstood the unifcation of many different histories into a single
world-history as itself an historical event. In The German Ideology worldw
history is held to be the result of a process whereby local productive
communities gear into each other, by dint of their
'
increasing market
dependency, and are fnally united in the world market as a real complex
of relations. 'However far, in the course of this development, the individual
circles that act upon each other expand, however much the original self
contained natures of the single nationalities are broken down by the
development of the modes of production, circulation and thus the naturally
cultivated division of !abouT btween different nations, to this extent
history becomes world-history , g It follows that this metamorphosis of
history into world-history is not an abstract accomplishment of slf
consciousness, world-spirit or some such metaphysical spectre, but rather
a wholly material, empirially demonstrable event, an event the proof of
- which lies in every Individual, in its walking, talking, eating, drinking and
even its way of dressing.m The unity of histo)y - o which we now refer in
the collecti-ve singular form is not assumed to be an historical macro
subject, whos development yields the process of history, but is rather a
result of the historical oncatenation of individual histories. The continuity
of the process of history becoming world-history is, strictly speaking, only
conceivable in theor if it can fnd support in a comprehensive. historical
experience which underlies all particular interpretations of history. Only
from this perspective can a notion of history be produced, which would
sublate all preceding interpretative systems in the unity of world-historical
continuity. With the concept of the proletariat larx wanted to grasp this
universal experience of history, in which the manifold of historical events
forms itself into "n ;.ction-orient-ated continuity. Unfortunately, he was
unable consistentlY to avoid over-taxing the concept of the proletariat
from the standpoin-t of the philosophy of history. However, Althusser is
not even able ta pursue this line of Marx's thought, which returns in the
mature works, owing to the theoretical presuppositions of his own critique
of historicism, wherein the idea of a world-historical continuity can only
be understood as a metaphysical fction of history.
Althusser is forcd into dividing the Marxian oeuvre into a pre-scientifc
phase, which he .f
'
nds problematic, and a scientifcally mature theory.
Although constantly revising the dating, Althusser had to distinguish a
historicist from a post-historicist stage of. Marxian theory. However, his
toricism iS .relevant here only in its humanist form, In Althusser's eyes the
historicist elements of Marx's argumentation are those which refer the
spheres of political and socio-economic phenomena back to an anthro
poloical substrate (either species or labur), in or.r then to treat them
an alienation of the hum;.n essence. Initially, Althusser levelled the
"
AXEL HONNITH
objection against this trope of the philosophy of history only with reference
to the early works influenced by Feuerbach - in particular, the Economic
and Philosophical Manuscripts. However, later in his systematic critique of
Hegelianism, Althusser pursues Marx's historicism even in the minutiae of
the arguments in the mature works.28 _Nonetheles the works of the Althusser
school are sustained by the systematic supposition that the idea of a non
historicist theory of history can be derived from the theoretical structure
of Marx's Capital.
In Reading Capital Althusser take issue with the concept of rotality 1n
the tradition of Hegelian Marxism. Whilst in this intellectual tradition all
social appearances can be shown to relate concenttical! y to an historical
substrate, structural Marxism thinks the social totality as decentred unity
If Hegelian Marxism is organized on rhe moel of an 'expressive rotality'
which orders the different soial domains around a centre, understood
essence, so Althusser attempts to derive from Marx's Capital a model of
social totality which sets out the social sectors in a certrdess yet hier
archica!ly structured, system of relations. In the concept of the 'structural
totality' soiety is conceived as a whole, within which scial subsystems
are interrelated in a manner determined by the economic base-system. 'We
know that the Marxist whole cannot possibly be confused with the Hegelian
whole; it is a whole whose uniry, far from being the expressive or "spir
itual" unity of Leibniz' or Hegel's whole, is constituted by a certa_in type
of complexity, the unity of a structured whole containing what can be called
levels or instances which are distinct and "relatively autonomous", and
co-exist within thiS complex structural unity, articulated with one another
according to specifc dererminarions, fxed in the last instance by the level
or instance of the economy.'29
The notion of 'structure' is supposed to suprsede the historicist concep
tions of historical materialism harboured by the philosophy of history,
because it pos'ts the social nexus as a unity, whoe elements are no.t
concentric to a middle point, but rather are determined by their mutual
positions. From this notion of a 'structural totality' Althusser hopes to
derive a Marxist theory of history which presupposes its object to be
neither a continuoUs, nor a subject-centred, nexus of events. According to
Althusser, historical materialism is a theory of history which penetrates the
course of historical occurrences to the relevant srructural totalities beneath
- totalities which determine the 'epiphenomena' of which we have only
empirical analysis. Hence the attempts in the tradition of Hegelian Mx
ism to conceive historical materialism as a theoretical system for making
sense of anti-capitalist sOcial experience is unsound, precisely because they
take theory, in historicist fashion, to be an expression of the historical
cntre of reality.30
By contrast, Althusser wants to understand hisrorical materialism as a
theory of structural totalities, which applies throughout history. He Ends
HISTORY ANO INTERACTION "
the basic form of such a structural totality in Marx's category of the 'mode
of producton'. This notion is the connection between A!thusser's reading
of Capital and a theory of history denuded of any remnant of the phi!os
ophy of history He starts out from the large assumption that in Capital
Marx had already worked out the deep structures of capitalist systems
from a politico-economic. point of view, and that the Marxist theory of
hitory can onlY analyze historical phases of development in general by
widening the scope of its social theory. Althusser's version of historical
materialism attempts sociologically to enrich and historica!ly to generalize
a concept which Marx had already developed in the critique of political
economy. 'The object of history as a science has the same kind of thea
-retical existence and occupies the same theoretical level as the object of
political economy of which Capital i an example, and the theory bf
history as a science lies in the fact that the theory of political economy
considerS one relatively autonomous component of the social totality
whereas the theory of history in principle takes the complex totality as
such for its object. Other than this differenc there can be no distinction
between the science of political economy and the science of history, from
a theoretical view-point.m
The Marxist critique of political economy provides the model, complete
with categories and method, according to which Althusser construes a
wlle Marxist theory of history. The work of the Althusserian school
largely amounts to the attempt to extrapolate a general theory of history
from rhe cnceptual framework and the methodological articulation of
Capital.
In Althusser's estimation the category of practice IS the ky term with
which the concept of the 'mode of production', developed by Marx from
his analysis of capitalism, is to be transposed into a concept applicable to
history in genera!. Even in his early essays he takes the category of practice
as the basis of historical materialism, by understanding social systems as
a relational nexus of practices. Each social sub-system can be thought as
a socially stabilized form of practice, such that under the general rubric of
'social p!actice' Althuser distinguishes between economic, political, ideo
logical and theoretical types of practice, In a social system it is, in the last
analysis, always the economic instance - i,e., the institutionally reproduced
structure of economic practice - which determines the relevant hegemonic
factor. The concept of 'structural causality' maintains the methodological
alm not to concei1e the infuence of the economic base on the superstruc
ture in the manner of historicism, where the latter is directly dependent on
the former, but in structuralist fashion, -s6 that the economic base merely
delimits the functions of the superstructure, In structural Marxism social.
systems are taken as hierarchical matrices of relations based on an eco
nomic sub-system, within which the non-economic sub-divisions are only
determined in terms of the scope of their influence, and not in terms of
"
AXEL HONNETH
their internal modes of functioning. The caregory of 'practice', however,
which is to some extent supposed to characterize the sLibstrate of this kind
of social system, is no longer used by Althusser in jt Marxian snse, as
the purpsive or goal-oriented activity of one or more acting subjects, but
is itself used in a structuralist way to designate an intrinsically subjectless
relation of elements in action. On the model of insrrumental action all
forms of practice should be conceived as structures, in which the agent, the
technique and the object of action functionally interlock. 'By practice in
general I shall mean any process of transformation of a determinate given
raw material into -a determinate product, a transformation effected by a
determinate human labour, using determinate mean$ ("of produq:ion"), In
any practice thus conceived, the determinant moment ('or dement) is neither
the raw material nor the product, but the practice in the narrow sens: the
moment of the labour of transformation itself, which sets to work, in a
specifc structure, men, means and a technical method of utilising the
means. This general defnition of practice covers the pOssibility of particu
larity: there are different practices whiCh are really distinct, even though
they belong organically to the same complex totality.m
Societies should be unstintingly bwken down into forms of practice, and
'transformational labour' is the model which globally represents the inne.r
functional nexus of these practice forms. Individual typ of practice are not
seen as processes of action which are to a certain degree supra-subjective,
yet still intentionally articulated; rather, they are

read as self-contained
systems of rules, which are independent of the subject, and in which a
corresponding 'material' is reworked with the help of systematic tech
niques, Althusser can then grasp the social instances, of which social systems
are composed, as sub-systems in which the relevant, historically formed
structures of such objective practics are stabilized. Along with the four
forms of practice he therefore also distinguishes four social instances: the
economic system, the state as hegemonic apparatus, ideology-forming
institutions, and the instance of theoretical practice.
Althusser pluralizes the concept of practice in yet another prophylaxis
against the historicis concept of history. He distinguishes between several
independent forms of practice in order not to have to reduc history to
labur, in the sense of a world-constituting life practice. Another singularity
of Althusser's concept of practice- namely, its quasi-cyberetic constitution
- results ftom a similar consideration. In order not to have to anchor the
social substrate of action in an intentionally acting subject, Althusser grasps
social practice per se as instrumental action - that is, as the systematic
activity of working on an object. However, Althusser only eludes historicism
on this point at the cost of an even crasser reduction; if, in historicism,
social development can only be thought as the se!f-objectivation of the
species through labour, for Althusser all social dimensions of action are
conceived in terms which are tailored to insrrumental-objective actions,
HISTORY AND ITERACTION
..
BaHbar too presuppses this instrumentalist reading of the category of
practice, which Althusser explicitly bases upon the notion of labour in
Capital, when he tries to establish what is in fact the central proof of
structural Marxism. In 'The Bask Concepts of Historical Materialism'
.Ba!ibar argues that the concept of mode of production, which Marx de
veloped in the critique of political ecpnomy, already contains the basic
conceptual equipment by means of which history as a whole can be recon
structed as a discontinuous succession of social totalities. Balibar claims
more explicitly than Althusser that modes of production cannot be com
pletely reduced to the relevant structures of technical actions, but must be
seen the social forms of organization of the labour process: with the
ctegory of 'modes of production' Marx reads the economic structure of
society as the unity of productive forces and relations of production1
To make this insight. into capitalist societies capable of forming the basis
of an historically universal theory, Balibar breaks down 'modes of produc
tion' into their components. The constitutive elemtnts of all historically
conceivable modes of production are: (a) direct producrs (labour-power);
_(b) means of production. (objects and instrument of labour); (c) non
labourers (appropriators of surplus labour). Furthermore, Balibar draws a
distinction btween two systems of relations, in which these three system
atic elements are always inter-connected. In the relation of appropriation
direct producers, means of production and non-labourers are connected
in the transformation of nature; in the property relation the same three
in:tances are connected in the distribution of hegemony. [n this way modes
of production are diferentiated by virtue of the relation that crystal!izes
in each case between the relevant structure of the forcs of production
(appropriation relation) and that of the relations of production (property
relation). 'By varying the combination of thee elements according to the
two connexions which are part of the structure of every mode of pro
duction, we can thereiore recnstirute the various modes of production,
i.e. we call
'
.Se_t out the presuppositions for theoretical knowledge of them,
which are quite simply -the concepts of the conditions of their historical
existence.
In order to rurive at a concept of social totality from this concept of th
mode of prouction, as prescribed by the programme of a general theory
of history, Ba!ibar
'
begins by construing a\! other instances of practice
according to the same model of the combination of invariant elements.
The social sub-systems, like the economic system that Marx encapsulates
in the concept of the 'Inode of production', are composed of elementary
components the functiOn of which is ordertd in historically changing struc
tures. ' , , [A}U levels of social structure , . . are themselves presented in the
form of specifc complex combfatlons ( Verb,ndugen). They therefore imply
specfc social relations, which are no more patterns of the intersubjectivity
of the agents, than are the social relations of production, but depend on
90
AXEL HONNETH
functions of the process concerned; in this sense [ shall be rigorous in
speaking of political social relations or ideological social relations.'34 How
ever, these social sub-systems only become integrated in the logical context
of a structural social totality if the mode of production is not simply one
instance of practice amongst others, but is the socially determinant instance.
Then the structures within.which the non-economic levels of practice are
socially stabilized, are once again subordinate to the economic structure.
Althusser deploys the term 'mattix' t refer to this tole of the mode _of
production as the structure of structures; the economic system is there
by represented as the all-encompassing social structure, containing the
remaining social instances as its own components. From thi point of view
the mode of production is no longer mer.ely the self-contained economic
system of relations, but the deep strucrure which regulates all other struc
tures of practice. A displacement in the structure of one mode of prouction
sets in train displacement in the structure of its other instance$ of practice.
In this way we can construct a picture of a sodal system as an hierarchically
constituted system of dependencies, which does not have to treat the
dependent sub-systems of a society as mere epiphenomena.
Balibar wants to illustrate this with rhe example of the history of
science. From the perspective of the structural theory of history scientifc
labour is only of interest insofar as it emerges in the relational network of
instances of practice, established by the economic structure. The system of
science, which Balibar deems intrinsically autonomous, only becomes thea
retica!ly relevant in the function that it assumes, in the confnes of a mode
of production, for another sub-system, According to Bali bar, Marx worked
out 'that inteHecrual production is a branch of production in the economic
sense of the term. But it does mean that intellectual production intervenes
in the history of the mode of production (in the strict sense) through is
products, which are su,ceptibl e to importation (knowledges). And the
analysis of the displacement of elements within the mode of production,
which I have reproduced above, alone enables us to explain why and in
what form this intervention takes place. This analysis cancels out all the
questions tht have been posed as t the technological "(outine" of the
ancient world and the middle ages, since the application of science t
production is not determined by the "possibilities" of that sdence, but by
the transformation of the !about process which is an organic part of the
combination of a determinate mode of production.'3s According to this
picture, the relatiOn between economic mode of prpduction and social
instance of pracice can be elucidated in the following general manner. The
economic system is taken a the structural template which establishes the
functional_nexus in which the soda! instances of practice are co-ordinated.
Because the notion of mode of production not only describes the structure
of an economic instance or practice, but also has a say in the functionil
HISTORY AND INTERACTION "
composition of a social totality, Marx managed to lay the foundations -of
a Marxist theory of history in Capital.
Thus all furthtt basic concepts of historical materialism, which (to begin
with} were supposed to grasp the historically unspecifc deep structure of
history, can be installed as sub-structures or functional quanta in terms of
the central category of the 'mode of prouction'. In this manner Balibar
derives both the concept of social 'reproduction' and of 'transition' be
tween modes of production. 'Reproduction' is a reference system that
consists of historically invariant elements such < the subsistence level of
labour, nd the division of production into means of production and means
o' consumption. The historically specifc structure of this reference system
is always established by the relevant mode of production, and guarantees
the permanence of the soda! framework of practice in structurally deter
minate ways. By 'transitional' form between two modes of production
Balibar understands a particular type of mode of production in which the
economic axis of the productive forces is differently structured from the
re!Mions of production. In the fully differentiated capitalist mode of pro
duction both the process of production and the system of property divide
the labourer from the means of production (Marx terms this 'real
subsllmption'}. However, in the ptecapitalist transitional stage the manu
facturing labour process still conjoins the 'labourer and the means of
pro
duction1 although they are already separated in the manufacturing system
of property ('formal sulsumption'). Balibar generalizes this scenario into
the assumption that i n the modes of production of historically transitional
stages the structures of production relations and productive forces are
always distinctly or 'non-homologous!y' organi:ed. The disjunction be
tween rhe structure of production and the strcture of property, which
arises with the dual determination through former and future modls of
production, he.re puts <n end to the capacity of a society to reproduce. itself
(a capacity which is part and parcel of its structural constitution), and
instead frees the individual Instances of practice from their dependence on
the economic base structure. Only the advent of newly stabilized modes of
production will cause the instances of practice to be once more articulated
hierarchically with the functional constitution of an economic structure.l6
By W<Y of this kind of conceptual explanation structural Marxism in
flares the categorie of Marx's Capital into a theory .of history, which
eventually even conceives individual human beings as functional elements
of a mode of production. Rather as Marx, in the notion of th 'character
mask', sees acting subjects as mere personifcations of economic relations,
individuals in the thery of history are supposed to be treated in general
as links in suprasubjective chains of practice, Not acting subjects but
forms of individuality are now the focus of theoretical interest. Beyond the
politico-ecnomic viewpoint of Capital these forms of individuality can be
92 AXEL HONNETH
distinguished from each other by instances of practice which_ determine
their respective functions. 'We can now say that these "men", in their
theoretical status, are not the concrete men, the men of whom we told
in famous quotations, no more than that they "make history", For ech
practic and for each transformation of that practice, they are rhe different
forms of individuality which can be defne on the basis of its combination
structure . . . . Men do not appar in the theor.y except in the form of sup
ports for immanent structural relations and the forms of their individuaHty
only appear as determinate effers of the structure . .n A in functionalist
role-rheory, structural Marxism only ever regards that portion of indi
vidual actions which is already subordinated to the claims of social. hc
tions. Processes of socialization, which in the structural-functionalism of
Parsons are still conceived as mediating processes btween the driYeS and
energies of indiYiduals, on the one hand, and the cultural system of norms,
on the other, go by the bard, in order t avoid the danger of any anthro
pcentric argumentation entering through the back door of socialization
theory. This means, howeYer, that the social integration of the acting
subjecu into functional supprts in this theory becomes simply one system
immanent mechanism amongst others. The structure of sciety is not
reproduced by mea!ls of individual personality structures. On the contrary,
it subordinates individuals, a structutal elements, t the functional hier
archy. The agencie of socialization do not mediate bnween_ the claim of
the functioning of society and the needs of individuals, but rather refle,t
the norms of class hegemony straight onto the
-
tabulae rasae- of personality
structures.
Althusser's concept of practice fosters this reductionism, in wh1ch acting
subjects become deindividualized systemic units, in order that soial inte
gration can be treated as systemic intgration. Because he deems social
contexts of action merely 'to be systemic labour processes, he can only
explain the functioning of the ideological instances of practice - 1.e., of the
socialization agencies - wirh the aid- of instrumental notions. The agencies
of socialization 'work upon' individuals 'by means of ideologies'. With this
picture, redolent of theories of manipulation, in his. essay
-
'Ideology and
Ideological State Apparatuses' Althusser wants t establish .those areas of
social reproduction within which individuals. are moulded into politically
conformist and functionally competent members of the system. The con
cept of ideological practice here is simply the complement, in social theory,
to the idea of the functional 'support' or ''bearer!: fn conjunction both
notions are supposed to explain the process by which individual actions
become functionalized into socially determined forms of behaviou-r, which
Balibar and Althusser term 'forms of individuality'. Even i the notion of
an ideological labour of the state individuals are tacitly presupposed as
merely passive objects of practice, .hat can be influenced willy nilly, which
is precisely what is meant by the concept of 'functional supprt'. Both
HITORY AND INTERACTION "
categories underplay the suuctural-functionalist notion of the 'role', by
bracketing out of their analysis the motivational and affective dimensions
of prsonality by means o which hegemonic norms frst become socially
binding; Parsons, by contrast, acknowledges these. dimensions as categorie_s
of basic sociali_zation.
Structural Marxism is forced into this conceptual position because it
wants to make not only the categorial framework, but also the methodo
logical articulation, of Capital into the prototype of a general theory of
history. According to Althusser's reading of the scientifc structure of Marx's
analysis of capital, this prototype of the theory of history requires theretical
abstraction from a!! individl contexts of action. In their stead the theory
of history reconstructs, like the aMiysis of capital, the non-intentional
mecanism of its object, before systematically examining the historical
forms of its realization. Just as Marx worked analytically through the
historical reality of capitalism to the internal structure of the economic
system, so the theory of hi1tory aims to capture the 'fundamental forms of
historical existence' - that is, the structural totalities specifc to the modes
of production. From here the theory draws inferences regarding the reality
of history:
It i true that the theory of political economy i woIked out and developed
by the investigation of a raw material provided in the last resort by the
practice of real cncrete history; 1t is tru-e that it can nd M1 be realized
i what are called 'concrete' eLomic analyses, relating to some given con
juncture or given priod of a given social 'ormation; and these trllths are
exactly irroe in the fact that the theory of history, too, is worked out and
developd out by the investigation of raw material, provided b real concrete
hisrory and that it too is realized in the 'concrete analysis' of 'cncrete
situations'.31
I order t make the methodological parallel between Marx's analysis of
capital and Marx's theory of history clear, AlthllSser evidently makes use
of the Marxist distinction between order of investigation (Forschung) and
order of exposition (Darstellung),. With these two categories Marx wanted
to distinguish between the processes of scientifc investigation and scientifc
exposition, which would be useful in the formation of the theory of political
eco.nomy. The concept of the 'order of investigation' is intended to cover
the broad procedures of data creation and data evaluation. In Marx's own
case these included the tretment of economic statistics, the testing of
classical economic theories, and tbe evaluation of everyday experience, By
the concept of 'order of exposition', however, Marx wants to designate the
particular form in which scientifc presentation does not pursue chrono
logical development, but rather the 'internal logic' of capitalist relations.
Capital reconstructs the capitalist social totality not by historical stages of
94 AXEL HOINETH
the process of capitalization, but by the logically necessary steps of the
creation and accumulation of capital.
Now, Althusser's theory of history takes as its methodological prototype
precisely the same pattern of refection with which Marx, in the course of
his material social research, infers the 'concrete totality' of capitalism from
the relation of capital which is fundamental to society. As with Marx's
critique of plitical economy, Althusser's theory of history is methodolo
gicaHy grounded in material historical investigation and concerned with
historiography. The structural thery of history elaborates the historically
fundamental modes of production from the material under investigation
modes of production which can be conceptually reproduced according to
the 'logic' operative in the articulation of their instances. From this 'logi
cal' plane of analysis the theory rises to the level of historical reality, by
gradually encpsulating the historical context of events in the increasingly
comprehensive categorial network of social-structural totalities. In this
process, however, historical peribds can never be completely grasped in
theory by reference to the structural totality of -a mode of production,
Rather, they must be brought into the framework of mutually overlapping
modes of production (or social formations). Historical events are only
adequately explained when, a Kar.sz succinctly puts it, their 'social histor
ical functional mechanism' is established. 9
- Over and above the methodological vagueness in which this concept of
historical explanation is shrouded, it also reveals a singuLar consequence
of Althusser's argument. If setions of historical reality - in Althuser's
terms, 'concrete situations' - can only be grasped in the structuralist theory
of history when integrated int the logical context of a social-structural
totality, then only the already systemically organized parts of these 'car
crete situations' can be grasped by thought ar all. This is because in the
theoretical reference system of 'modes of production' soda-historical phe
nomena only ever occur qua structural elements or functional quanta. An
historical complex of events can only be partially derived by analyzing the
scale of its functional mechanisms - namely, as an objective domain of
events; however, the historical and factual exploitation of leeway in the
system take place within interactive contexts of action, which Althusser's
theory must ignore. Because, with the analytic fr<mework of the structur
ally unifed theory of history, the historical process takes as its moel only
the reproduction of a social-structural totality1 this theory of history is not
able to thematize the communicative process of interpretation through
which the system-process becomes relevant .to action and thereby creates
situations in the frst instance, Due to this conceptual shortcoming, the
historical reality which Althusser's theory of history is in a pos'ion ro
grasp remains an impoverished reality; in this theory historical reality
exists only as a functionally hierarchized history of a system, not -also as
a collectively experience history of actions.
HISTORY AND INTERACTION "
Alrhusser and his students seem not to be aware of this analytic obstacle
to their theory of history. They bgin fro the assumption that the categorial
framework of the univcrsal theory of history already contains all the con
cepts needed to describe the real process of history in Marxist fashion,
as a nexus of events. Under this presupposition a materialist version of
history is a mere lppllcation of the structural theory of history, Althusser's
reference to the ''concrete analysis of concrete situations' towards which
the theory of history is supposed tb be heading, bespeaks the same meth
odological self-understanding. Clearer still are Althusser's claims to be able
to infer Seam!essly from the level of abstraction of the general theory of
sodal-structural totalities to the empirical history of events, These are
made explicit in a deand that Althusser makes upon his own version of
Marxism. 'Marxism cannot claim to be the theory of history, unless, ever
in its theory, it can think the conditions of its penetration into history,
into all Strata of society, even into men's everyday lives.'40 This sentence
reproduces a classical claim of Marxist theory. Historical materialism must
be able to determine t social-structural presuppsitions and historical
domains of action within which it has a good chance of being translated
into a politically effective programme of action. Only when theory has
been informed as to the emancipatory content of collective repositories of
needs and orientations of interests can it hope to deduce orientations of
practice, adequate to the situations of social group.
However, Althusser seems not to notice that his own structural theory
of history, in its dispute with historicism, conceives historical development
merely as a structural displacement of functional mechanisms, and there
fore expressly abstracts from situations of communicative action. But how
is the theoty of history suppsed to be able to inform itself about social
learning processes, from which it could draw political strength, when dealing
with specifc historical situations, when it has already decided that it has
to abstain from this historical context ofnteraction? The structural theory
of history has purifed its basic concepts so thoroughly of determinations
of social action that not even retrospectively - qua historiography - can
it understand individual historical occurrences in the interactive network
of social struggle and collective processes of agreeent. Hence in the- ambit
of it own analytic framework the structurally reinterpreted historical
materialism is indeed able, with increasing precision, to confne the histor
ic.l domain of events to the functional limitations of social subsectors. In
other words, it cn describe an historical period as an epoch of structurally
enabled possibilities of ation. However, the .social realization (or rather
nonrealization) of the objective logic of reproduction is not theoretically
accessible.
Pierre Vilar has diffculties such as this in mind when he questions the
theory of history advocated by the Althussedan school as to its potential
for practical investigation. For how can a materialist historiography which
9
AXEL HONNETH
concentrates on 'this country, this time, or this conflict' be theoreticaUy
focused by means of basic structural concepts, when these basic concepts
cannot be transposed onto an historical context of event!{?
41
Urs Jaeggi
reaches a similar conclusion: he attacks the categoria! exclusion of the
'class struggle' in structural Marxism'S rheory of history.4 In the opinion
of these two authors the structuralist reformulation of historical materialism
reaches its limits where a materialist analysis of a particular historical
reality begins. Both authors nonetheless still hold the structural theory of
history to be supefior to alternative approaChes and think that it would b
relatively easy to extricate it from the diffculties that S"em to bes(t its
analysis, by simply extending its categories. For this reaon the systematic
limitations of Althusser's reading of Marxism remain hidden in their
appraisal of his theory. In contrast I hope to show, by way of conclusion,
that structural Marxism only succeeds in reinterpreting historical mater
ialism by means of the methodologically unsound move of making Marx's
analysis of capital into the prototype of a general theory of history.
IV
Althusser and his students have taken the critique of historicism to the
point at which their programme of structurally re-interpreting historical
materialism comes dearly into focus. The structural concept of history is
supposed to suppress the received ideas that have been so influential within
the history of Marxism, and which imply that historical reality i the result
of a co!lective human or technologicl progress of creation. Whilst these his
torical conceptions depend upon the assumption of a history-constituting
subject, Althusser seeks to gain access to the histotical totality in a wholly
different way, not via the philosophy of history. To this end his structur
alist premises play the role of fundamental assumptions with which his
torical processes can be understood as supra-individual acts of reproduction.
I 'modes of production', which Marx investigates with the example of
capitalism, can be understoc structurally, as systems of rules, then every
historical process of development can be conceived as a succession of in
ternai!y regulate processes of reproduction. In this mannet Althusser can
convert the whole of history into an object of theory, which does not have
to make the comp!'ementary presuppositions of an historical macro-subject
and the continuity of all historical occurrences. [n this thery history is
only accessible in the various histories in which operative modes of produc
tion structurally reproduce themselves. However, the limits o this. pro
gramme of the theory of history are only really visible agait the backdrop
of Althusser's theoretical self-understanding. Both the critique of histor
icism and the carefully constructed theory of history promise more than
they deliver.
HITORY AND ITEAACTION "
The critique of historicism blurs the difference betwen a continuity of
history which is simply presupposed as an appndage of the philosophy of
hiscory, and a continuity which has been reconstructed from material his
tory, by imputing to both the same basic notion of the subject. Althusser
makes no distinction between a Marxism which only speaks of a unifed
history with respect to the rea! historical unifcation of all particular read
ings of history, and a Marxism which already presupposes this unity in
the
guise of a unifed centre of all histonca! occurrences. In both cases Althusser
attacks the notion that all historical processes are centred around a macro
subject, although it is only in the latter case that the unifcation can be.
imputed either to a collective subject of action or ro a technological substrate
of history; whilst the former conception of history orientates itself around
the historical relations of inter-subjectivity. But then, in the former case,
the critique of historicism is usless, for history is no longer thought as the
product Of a history-constituting macro-subject, in analogy to a world
constituting epistemological subject Althusser makes no effort t distin
guish between a conception of the subject that is over-burdened by the
philosophy of history and a cnception of historical Inter-subjectivity; he
is therefore forced to leap from the critique of a Marxism which is grounded
in the philosophy of history to the concept of a supra-individual systemic
history1 without even becoming aware of the function of interactive con
texts of. action in realizing history. However he pays the price for the false
critique_ of .historicism in his expositmn of the theory of history.
The
-
structural thery of history attempts to explain an historically con
crete nexus of events simply by reconstructing the functional logic of the
socialstrctural totality. rr is interested solely in the supra-individual sys
temic nexus so as to avoid completely the danger of dissolving the social
process of reproduction into inter-prsonal actions. FuttheFmore, it is in
terested only in rhe structure of this systemic nexus in order to exclude
theoretically the historical centering of history in a history-constituting
subject. However, Althusser can only identify the actual course of history
by its structural possibilities and cannot provide a concrete material explana
tion of events a historical relities. Althussees thery of history fails to
consider that the structurally construe functional tendencies of social
systems are only translated into real historical occurrences through the
interactive historical pr1ctics of subjects of action, which is precisely what
his approach categorically excludes. The social framework of instance
does not isolate individual actions per se, but only in the
-
form of their
social interpretation, in order that the historical 'surface of events' can
then be composed from these actions. Fo: by methodologically isolating
social functions from the interactive relations in which they ate realized as
situations, the structuralist rheory of history encounters similar analytical
limitations to structuralist linguistic, with its division of linguistic rule
systems from the practir;al context of spoken language.
"
AXfL HONNETH
Since the systematic concption of the structural theory of history can
not be derived solely from the critique of historicism, Althusser is forced
to call upon the scientifc model of Marx's analysis of capital in order to
make it intelligible. The general theory of history is scientifcally estab
lished insofar as it is a fruitful ge.neralization of the methodologu:al and
categorial framework of Capital. Only this prior structuralist reading of
the critique of political economy enables Althuser to transpose the basic
tenets of structuralism onto a Marxist theory of history This is because
in Althusser's view the analytic framework of the analysis of capital is
tailored wholly to the supra-individual functional mechanism of the capit
alist process of reproduction, and by virtue of this narrownes of analytic
fous the theory of history manages to mesh with the structuralist con(p
tion of the event-constituting system of rules. Moreover, it is only because,
in Althusser's view, the categorial framework of Marx's analysis of capital
is tailored to the elementary components of:the capitalist process of repro
duction, that the theory of history i supposed to be able to confne itsef
categorially to the structural elements of the mode of production. The
vindication of the structuralist unifcation of historical materialism then
hangs on a very tenuous thread of argument. Althusser makes the theoret
icai claims of his theory of history depend solely on the contention that
Marx, in the critique of political economy, also worked out the general
framework from which a theory of historical totality could be extrap
Ia ted. In this contention, though, Althusser and his coliaborators subscribe
to a crass misunderstanding of Marx's own claims for his analysis in
Capital. One does not need a highly nuan'ced critique of the structutalist
reading of Capital, but only the most cursory glance at the fundamental
structure of the analysis of capital, to show that Marx made his concep
tion of method and the categorial formation of his theory depend un
equivocally on the historically specifc structure of the capital relation.
Capital is so closely interwoven with the sodo-historical presuppositions
of its object of en
q
uiry, that it can only be made into Q g1nerl theory of
history by oversimplifying its analysis.
Recently, several different attempts to dear up the method of the analy
sis of Capital have been able to throw light upon the historkal content of
Marxian theory.4 In direct confrontation with Althusser's reading of Capital
these works focw their interest on the theoretical presuppositions under
which Marx harnesse the structure of Hegel's Logic fOr a systemath; critique
of capitalism. They follow a line of questioning whch has b n well known
since Lenin's referen1 t the exemplary sratus of Hegel's Logic, but has
never been given a detailed and explicit treatment. I shall make do at this
juncture with a brief sketch of the results of these interpretations, insofar
as the different accounts fnd points of agreement. They concur in the
contention that, although Marx distances himself from Hegel in hi early
works, with his critique of idealism, he nonetheless gravitates back towards
HISTORY AND INTERACTION "
Hegel's systematic form of refection in the economk theory of the late
work.
The Marx of the &anomie and Philosophical Manscripts thinks Hegel's
Phutometology as an anthropological and epistemological insight into the
universal-historical signifcance of human labour. Against Hegel Marx
emphasize the left-Hegelian motif of the factidty of human subjectivity,
which evaprates under the presuppositions of identity philosophy to a
moment of the self-developing spirit. At this stage Marx holds the theory
of cpitalism to be a theory of the self-alienation of labour through private
property. The Marx of Capital however, seeks a quite different meth
odological access to the critique of capitalism. He no longer describes
capitalist social relations from the immete standpint of human subjec
tivity as a relation of alienation, but rather immanently follows the cap
italist suppression of subjectivity. Marx takes the real historical autonomy
of the capitalist process of valorization as the point of departure for the
analysis of capital, by making the self-valorization ofvalue into the subject
of theory. Because Marx sees the 'structural identity' (Reicheft) of capital
through the lens of Hegelian 'Spirit', he is able to make systematic use of
the structure of argument in the Logic. The process of the unfolding of
capital can be expounded in the dialectical fgre of thought of the self
knowing Spirit. Marx thus abstracts, along with Hegel, from all human
subjectivity in order to be able to harness the latter's dialectical logic as a
model method for the analysis of capital, suited to the real abstraction of
capitalism. However, as a critique of capitalism this metho remains
embedded in the anthropologically grounded theories of the early work,
from which persptive the subject of capital can be shown to be an
illu$ory subject that is grounded in human labour.
These -sketches alone suffce to demonstrate the consequences of such
interpretation for Althusser's theory of history; for if the critique of political
economy systematically grasps only the process in which capital subsumes
living social relations, te the historical reality which is investigated in
this critique can also only be t_he social nexus which has been oppressed
and deformed by capitalism. The price of the form of exposition borrowed
from Hegel's Logic is an attenueted picture of realit. 'The fully fledged
critique of plitical economy does not aim to expound the historical phe
nomenon of capitalism, but frst and foremost the "general concept of
capital", Thereby history, insofar as it-amounts to more than the documen
tation of social struggles, can only be thematized from standpoints covered
by this concept. Histor steps into the purview of theory exclusively as the
ground upon which the general
.
concept of capital is realized.'44 Structural
Marxism ignores precisely this methodological limitatJon of historical reality
in Capital: instead it blithely generalizes the methodological and categorial
basis of the analysis of capital into a theory of history, whereas Marx took
it exclusively as a scientifc

ttempt at the exposition of capitalism.

100 AXE HONNEH
In the critique of political economy Marx abstracts from social relation!
of interaction, because he wishes theoretically to expound only those do
mains of reality which have already been subsumed by the capitalist process
of valorization. He denotes acting subJets with the category of 'character
masks' because, i terms of the methodological analysis of the framework
of capital, he is only interested in the functions of individuals which are
relevant to valorization. Moreover, he largely .educes the social context of
action to instrumental or instrumentalized socia1 relations, because in the
process of capital accumulation only these reduced forms of action could
be relevant. However, this conceptual move only makes sense owing to the
methodological presupposition of the analysis of capital and does not
suffce for either an explanation of the .eality of history under capitalism,
or an analysis of other social formations. Marx is fuHy aware of this; his
historical and political works, and his remarks about pre-capitalist socie
ties, change their basic conceptual framework according to their theoret
ical perspective. By contrast, Althusser blieves that he can transpose the
analysis of capital back onto the theo.y of history, without taking this
deliberate methodological reduction into consideration, through a categorial
consideration of communicative processes of action. Only in this way can
he generalize- from the concept of the 'character mask' to that of the 'form
of individuality', and from the concept of 'abstract labour' to that of the
'form of practice', in order that modes of produ

ction as a_ w_hole can be

conceived as functional logical systemic unities,
Becaus Althusser and his collaborators wrench the analysis of capital
apart from the unique historical context in which it 1s theoretically located,
they can only perceive the whole of historical reality as a process of repro
duction, independent of the relations 6 interaction. Although Marx
describes historical reality in the same terms, for him this is only a desription
of social relations under conditions of capitalism. The tacit transformation
of the restricted historical perspective of the critique of political economy
into the whole truth of a Marxist concept of history allows the Althusserian
school to reconstruct historical materialism on the basis of structuralist
theor. For only on the assumption that the historical reality whic is
theoretically conceived in Capital, is in fact coextensive with the whole of
scientifcally accessible history, can the historical object of investigation be
so utterly divorced from relations of interaction that it can ultimately be
understood on the structuralist model as a theory of social rules of deter
mination. Such a theory has to occlude the communicative dimensions of
action, which constitute a social framework of re!at!ons as historicl real
ity in the frst place, bcause it mistakes Marx's abstraction fom the
history-formi'ng context of action as an historically nwttal theoretical
strategy,
Such a_ cass misunderstanding ultimately entails practical-political con
sequences. The theory of history which the Althusserian school develops
HISTORY AND 1NTERACT10N
101
by

he methodological dehistoridzation of Marx's analysis of capital at

tenuates the concept of socialist prax along with the concept of historical
reality. Because Althusser's historical materialism conceives the capitalist
process of history ooly as a reproduction of the socialstructural formation
not as the >priential process of social groups and classes, it cannot eve
forge a politicil link with the selfinterpretation of social re1olutionary
movements. Th is why Alrhusser i politically ried to Lenin's conception
of the party, In place of a theoretical relation to the consciousness and
interests of of the class moyment steps the party, a a surrogate for class
consciousness. The poHtical acts of the party with respct to social
movements are instrumental, just like Althusser's representation of system
atic practice in eneral.
NTES
I would like to thank my friends Hans Joas and Rainer Paris for their advice. and
comments.
1 Of course, this ?icture of the histor
y of Marxism is challenged by the attempt
of the early Luk:cs to combine the Hegelian critiqJle of the objec6vism of the
Scnd International with the philoophical leitimation of Leninist politic.
Z C., in particubu, Louis Althusser, 'Elements of Self-Criticism', in his Essas
in Self-Criticism, New L# Books, London, 1976, chapter 3, and SaUl Karsz,
Thiorie et poltique. Louis Althusser, Fayard, Pari, 1974, chaptn 6.
3 See Jean Piage, Struturali$m, RoJltlfdge and Kegan Paul, London, 1971 and
.Frano Wahl, e., Qu'est-e que 'It .structuralisre?, Editions du suil, Paris,
1968.
4 Georges Canguilhem, 'Mort de l'h
.
omme on 6puisement du cogito?', Citique
242, 1967. Pierre Bourdieu and Jen-Claude Passeron have expounded the
thCoretic development of the French social sciences since 1945 a dispute
with subject-centred trope of thoughH Sociology and Philosophy i Fran
sin 1945: Death and Resrrection of a Philosoph.y without a Subjct', Social
Research 34, 1967.
5 Compre Clallde Levi-Strauss, The Savage Mind, Weidenfeld and Niclson,
London, 197, chapter 9 ('History and Dialecti!}; Maurice Godelier, 'Le
concept d tribu. Crise d'un concept ou crise des fondeents empiriques de
l'anthropologie\ in his Horizon, trajets marxistes en anthropo(ogie, vol. I,
Franoois Maspero, Paris, 1977; MiQel Foucault, Introduction to Archaeology
of Knowledge, Tavlstock, London, 1972; Louis Althuser and Etienne Balibar,
Reading Capital, New Leh Books, London, 1970, pp. 119-44.
6 For the early conception of the difference
.
betwen historicl and dialectical
matCialism in Althusser, see

on the Materialist Dialectic' in his For Marx,

Allen Lane, London, 1969, p. 161, and &ading Capital, p 182. On the new
_conception of the diffrence, see 'Elements of Self-Criticism', chpter 2.
7 Nicos Poulantzas, 'Theorie und Geschich. K_urze Bemerkung iibr den
Gegenstand de Kapitals', in W. Euchner and A. S<: hmidt, eds, Kritik der
102
AXEL HONNEH
pofitischen Okorwmie heute. 100 jahre 'Kapital', Frankfurt/M., 1968, pp.
58-59.
8 Ibid., p. 60.
9
Here structurl Marxism remains very vague in its categories; for the most
part the differences between M social-scientifc concept of eYolution .and the
cocept of 'telology in the philosphy of history C blurre' see Reading
Capital, p 120.
10 See rhe very early review article by I. Fetscher, 'Der Marxismts im Spiegel der
franzbischen Philoophie', inMa:ismus Studirm, TGbingen, 1954. And d. Mak
Poter, Existential Marxism in Postwar France: From Sartre to Althusser,
Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1975, On Alth\sser's concept of
'humanism', see 'Mar7ism and Humanism', in For Max; Readirg Capital;
pp. 119ff.; 'Reply to John Lewis', i Ewrys in Self-Criticsm; and 'Marx's
Relation to Hegel', in Althusser, Politicsand.Hluor Montesquieu, Rouseau,
H gel and Marx, New Left Boks, London, 197.
11 On the econom1Sm of the Second International see Lucio Colletri, 'Bernstein
and the Marxism of-the Second 1ntetnarional', in his From RoUJseau ro Lem,
New Left Books, London, 1972. For Alrhusser's concept of 'economism', see
Reading Capital, pp. 138., lnd 'Note on "Tbe Critique of the- Per!nality
Cult" ', in Essrys in Self-Cttlcism,
12 'Note on "The Critique of rhe Personality Cult'", passiM. Far a critique of
this concption, which completely divorces Stalinism, theoreticlly and polt
ically, from Leninism, see Valentino Gerratana, 'Althussr and Stalinism',
New Left Review 1011102, January/ipril 1977.
13 Reinhart Kosetleck, 'Wo:u noch Historie?', in H. M. Baumgartner and J.
+ Riisen, Seminar: Geschichte und Theorie, Frankfurt/M., 1976, pp. 17, 23. See
the same author's 'Historia Magistra Vitae', in Natu und Geschichte: Fesschift
fUr Karl LOwith, Stuttgart, 1969.
14
See 0. Marquard, S.hwierigkeiten mit der Geschichtsphilosophie, Frankfurt/
M., 1973, epcially pp. 66{f.;.Karl LOwirh, Wehgeschche Ud Hesgecbehen,
Stuttgart, 1953.
15
Jiirgen Haber mas, 'Ober das Subjekt der Geschichte\ in his Kuftururd Kritlk,
Frankfurt/M., 1973.
16 H. J, S;ndkiihler, 'Zur Spzifk des Geshichtsb<wusstseins in der biirgerlihen
Gesliscbaft', in R. Kose\leck and W. Stem_e. eds, Geschichte Ereignis- und
Erzih/ung, Mlinchen, 1973.
17 'Reply to John Lewis', p. 46 n. 9.
18 Reading Capita{, p. 142.
19 H. M. Baumgartner, Koltinuitit -nd Geschichte, Frankfurt/M., 1972.
20 Ibid., p. 253:
21 However, Althusser's early works were so epistemoloically vague that some
of his fnest critics thought they had discovered arguments stemming from
Kant: see Andrf Gluckmann, 'A Ventriloquist Stru1uraism, New Left Review
72, Marcb/April 1972. Sinc then Althussr has clarifed hi epistemology in
such a way as to dispel such worries (d. 'I it Simple to be a Marxis in
Philosophy?', in Essays in Sei(-Criticijm}.
2 Re4ding Capital, pp. 93-95.
HISTORY MID INTERACTION
23 Georg Lukics, 'Reifcation and the Consciousness of the Proletariat', in his
History and Class Consciousness, Merlin, London, 1971.
24 Cf. Nikolai Bukharin, Historlca/ Materialism (1922), Ann Arbor Press,
Michgan, 1969
25 Reading Capital, p. 99.
26 See Habermas' objections to Baumgartner's transcendental narrativism in
'Geschichte und Evolution', in his Zr RekonstTuktior des Historische
Maerialismus, Frakfurt/M., 1976.
27 Marx and Engels, Werke, volume 3, p. 45.
28 On the distinction between the 'humanist' and 'scientific' parts of Marxian
thery, see Jacques Ranciire, 'The Concept of "Critique" and tbe "Critique
of Political Eonomy"' ( 1965), mAli Rattansi, e., Ideolog, Method and Marx,
Routledge, London, 1989. On the dating and re-dating of the 'epistemological
break' in Marx's ouvre, se Althussr, 'Preface to Capital Volume One', in
his Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays, New Left Books, London, 1971.
29 Reading Capital, p. 97.
30 See Alex Cellinicos' Althusser-ori'ented critique of Hegelian Marxism in
Althusser's Maxism, Pluto Pre , London, 1976, pp. lOff.
31 Reading Capital, p. 109,
3i For Marx, p. 166.
33 Reading Capital, p. 216.
34 Ibid., p. 220,
35 Ibid., p, 25Q.
36 Ibid., pp. 309ff.
37 Ibid., p. 300'; se 1lo JP. ll2ff.
38 Ibid., pp. 109-10.
39 Thorie et po/itique, p. 171.
40 Readig Capital, p. 128.
41 :ierre Vi\ar, 'Marxist Hitory, A Histor in the Making', reprinted as chapter
2 of thi. volume (here p. 39).
42 See Urs Jaeggl, Theoretische Praxl's: Prohleme ines strukturalen Marxis,
Frankfurt/M., 1976, pp. 93ff.
43 l am referring especiaUy to the work$ of H Rekhelt, Z"r logischen StruktU
des Kapita/begriffs bei Karl Marx, Prankfurt/M., 1970; M. Theunissn, 'Kri
de Macht: Thesen zur Theorie des dialektischen Widerspruchs', in W. R.
Beyer, ed., Hegel-]ahrbuch 1974, KOln, 1975; and R. Bubner, 'Logik und
Kapital. Zur Methode einer "Kritik der po!itischen Okonomie" ', in his
Diaektik und Wissenscha{t, Frankfurt/M., 1973. All the works are inspired
by the seminal essay of H. J. Krahl, 'Zur Wesenslogik der Marxschen
Warenanalyse', in his Konstitution und Klasstmkampf, Frankfurt/M., 1971.
44 Theunissn, 'Krise der Macht', p. 325.
b
ALTHUSSER, STRUCTURALISM, AND
THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL
TRADITION
W
Peter Dews
The central theme of philosophical debate in France in the immediate posh
war period - the problem of the relation between the individual subject
and the overarching structures of history - may be seen as the product of
conflicting moral and theretical imperatives. Both Sartre and Merleau
Ponty, deeply infuenced by the_general interpretation of history offered by
Marxism, became disstisfe with the unconditional status accorded to
consciousne$S in the phenLmenological tradition, and in. reasingly attempted
to accunt for the embeddedness of consciousmss 'in a social and historical
world with its own immanent laws. Yet neither thinker could entirely
abandon the starting-pint of the prceiving and acting subject inherite
from phenomenology, for within their frame of reference, to do so could
only mean surender to the objectivism and determinism represented by
the codifed Marxism of the French Communist Party. Sartre's solution,
exhaustively developed in the Critique of Dialectical Reason, was to place
the individual subject - no longer primarily a subject of thought and
perception, but of praxis * within the complex and perpetually shifting
structures of group, party and class, in 'an attempt t show how the original
freedom and lucidity of praxis could be transformed into the inexorability
and opacity of the social and historical world. Yet, despite the ingenuity
of its elaboration, Sartre's position rmained open to the objection, frst
voiced by Merleau-Ponty in The Adventures of the Dialectic, that history
cannot be seen as neatly divided between the transparency of wills and the
opacity of things, but is rather composed of an interwoTld'
-
of signifcations
which are neither entirely subjective nor entirely objective. More broadly,
Sartre shows a remarkable innocence in his use of a vocabulary of dUalities
- subject and object, interiority and exteriority, neessity and freedom -
inherited from the western metaphysical tradition.
-
By contrast, Merleau-

A
i '
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 105
Panty's last work is reticent, tentative, oriented towards a domain in which
subjectivity is so bound up with an inherited wodd of meaning - of which
the pre-eminent bearer is language - that any strict separation between the
two becomes impossible. The very categories of the philosophical tradition
are t be revealed rn their inadequacy when confronted with the primary
experience of what Merleau"Ponty terms l'etre vertical or l'etre sauvage.
At the start of the 1960s, however, these lines of enquiry were tempor
arily to be cut short. Sartre's concrn with the process in which 'Structures
axe created -by an activity which has no structure, but suffers its results as
a structure'/ with the way in which an original freedom can turn against
1tself and become its own prison, was to remain neglected until over a
decade later, when Deleuze and Guattari's Anti-Oedipus would revive the
same paradoxes

in the new vocabulary of 'desire'. And Merleau-Ponty's

attempts to circumvent the illusions generate by the very language of
philosopliy would not fnd their continuation until the emergence of Jacques
Derrida's project of deconstruction. For a time the centre of the philo
sophical stage remained unoccupied, as attention was displaced towards
the 'human sciences' - particularly the anthropology of Ivi-Straui - and
the renaissnce which they appared to be enjying under the impact of
mefhods imprted from the feld of structural linguistics. Levi-Straui>
himself tended towards the view that philosophy can only be a premature
and sp-culative attempt to deal with
.
problems whose- real solution must
depend upon an extension .of the domain of science, and this was a view
which gained credence in some quarters. Certainly there was a widespread
feeling that the feld of philosophical thought was undergoing a fragmen
tation, and that the totalizing ambitions of 'metaphysics' (a term implicitly
equated with 'Sartrianism') now stood in the way of a scientific knowledge
of human beings and their soial practices. The evident incompatibility
between the premises of Levi-Strauss' apparently rigorous and successful
explanations - an abstraction from all considerations of genesis and devel
opment,
.
and view of human activity as entirely determined by social
structure - and the central concerns of the philosophy of the 1950s reinM
forced the plauaibility of this. assumption. The advent of structuralism was
experienced both as a 'crisis of the subject' and_ as a 'crisis of history'.1
However, this criSis cannot simply be attributed to .a temporary enthu
siasm for a particular blend of positivism and rationalism among sections
of the French inre!igentsia. The Hegelian and existentialist assumptions
which had been cenrral to French philosophy since Kojfve's influenrial
lectures in the 1930s were long overdue for reconsideration, and Levi
Strauss' characteristic amalgam of sound .argument and sophistry - par
ticularly as exemplifed by the set-piece battle with Sartre which concludes
The Savage Mind successfully identfed the vulnerable point in the
philosophical architecture of the Critique. For Sartre the fundamental
narrative of human history is defned by the norian of a los and recovery
10
PTER DEWS
of freedom. Despite their apparent hopelessness, the 'counterfna!itie and
infernal circularities' which characterize the fe of the practice-inert rep
resent the only means by which humankind can advance towards a new,
non-ntagonistic form of reciprocity, the attainment of which will mark
the end of historicity as we understand it_ History thus recounts the con
sequences of a fall from a state of original innocence - free individual
praxis which can only be recovered on a collective level at the 'end of
time'. However, since for Sartre 'scarcity' is pre$nl .,t the beginning of
history and constitutes one of its preonditions {although it "is not a suf
fcient condition), and since human history is 'born and developed within
the permanent framework of a feld of tension produced by scarcity? the
original freedom of praxis ca only be mythical: it C<nnot be equated with
the stasis of actually existing 'primitive' societies. Such societies do in fact
have a history behind them, but hve reached a state in which scarcity is
no longer a source of destabilization and development, but is lived as an
equilibrium, as a 'practical project of keeping institutions and physical
corporate development at the same level'.4 Yet the members of such soci"
eties do not thereby evade the miseries of the historical process, rather they
are condemned 'to work from dawn till dusk with these (primitive)
technical means, on a thankless, threatening earth'.5 Since, for Sartre, it is
only within history that the true ptential of humanity can be realized,
what he terms 'societies of repetition' must remain trapped in an endless
cycle of deprivation, abandoned on the margins of time,
Levi-Strauss fnds this vision of hiStory, :nd of humankind's status within
it, scientifcally unacceptahle.and morally abhorrent. Abve ali, his objetions
are centred on- the vision of history as a_ process of convergence towards
a single universal idul, for such a vision reuces past societies an culture
to a series of hierarchically- ordered stepping"stones on the path to a true
humanity. Against this Lev
-
i-Strauss argues that past and 'primitive' societies
cannot be seen as forms of alienation in which human capacities are con
fned and distorted: 'Man does not realize his nature in a abstract humanity,
but in traditional cultures whose most revolutionary changes sdll retain
whole sections and
-
are themselves explained as a funcrion of a situation
strictly defned in time and space.'6 In part Levi-Strauss' resistance to any
evolutionary ranking o humanity is based on the standard philosophical
argument that any ciiterion for the comparative evaluation of cultures
must itself be the _product of a particular culture. But in relation this
question, as to a number of others, it is possible to detect in Levi-Strauss'
work a tendency to ubstitute for explicit philosophical argument the state"
ment of an ostensibly 'scientifc' position. Thus Levi-Strauss: relativism at
the level of culture can be seen as dependent on his theory of the relation
between mind and society, which is itself rooted in a materialist ontology,
For if all social and cultural forms are simply permutations and projections
of certain innate characteristics of the human mind. {perhaps even of a
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITfON 107
pttern of binaty oppositions -physically coded in the brain), then all must
be seen as equal - and by implication equally valuable - 'realizations' of
human potential. Crrespondingly, the transition from one social or cultural
form to another cannot itself be seen as an expression of human capacities
in this sense. Historical change must be consigned to a region where, as
Levi-Strauss' metaphors - the throw of the dice, the turning of a kaleido
scope -emphasize, contingency and acident reign. Thus LevicStrauss' view
dispossesses human praxis of what is for Sartre its defning characteristic:
an ability to realize a communal project in transcending a pre-given situation.
Since, for Levi-Strauss, human action is uniquely determined by social struc
ture, it cannot be the source of the transition from one structure to another.
Time ceass to be the privileged dimension of human self-realization, and
Sartre's Hegelian-Marxist myth of history is exposed as 'the last refuge of
a transcendental humanism'?
This critique of the Sartrian vision of history is dearly premissed on an
account of the status of sccia!scientifc knowledge which differs radically
from that of Sartre, The Critique of Dialectical R6ason must be placed within
the postKantian hermeneutic tradition, a tradition which affrms that the
kind of systematic knowledge appropriate to human action must be based
on a form of 'understanding', rather than the kind of causal explanations
employed in the natural sciences. This is because, unlike events in nature,
actions cannot even be correctly identifed without raking account of the
-intentions and interpretations of agents. In the classic form elaborated by
Dilthey, understanding involves a 're-experiencing' (Nacherlebnis) in which
the thought-processes of the agent are imaginatively recreated; the capcity
of the historian to interpret the traces of the past is directly attributable
to his or her own breadth of experience and receptivity. In Sartre's version
of this principle the participatory aspect of understanding is pushed to an
extreme in which it is the. individual who 'makes' history who is also the
ideal interpreter of history. 'Comprehension', states Sartre, 'is simply the
translucidity of praxis to irself, whether it proucs its own elucidation in
cnstituting itself, or recognizes itself in the praxis of the other.'1 The
assumption of the Critique is that an implicit interpretation of the entirety
of history can b gathered up 'nto the immediacy of the moment of free
action.
For Levi-Strauss, however, any philosphy which attempts to found
knowledge in the immediate experience of praxis is condemned to remain
within 1 circle of iUusion. The exprience of praxis cannot be considered
as common to at! human beings in all times, and therefore as the initial
bridgehead of understanding,, since such' experience is determine by
'unconscious' categorial structures which are specifc to a particular cui
rure. Thus LiviStrauss' remark that 'Descartes believes that he proceeds
diretly from a mall's interiority to the exteriority o( the world, without
seing that societies, civilizations - in other words worlds of men - place
108
PETER DS
themselves btween these two extremes'/ equally expresses his attitude to
Sartre. The fundamental error of the phenomenological approach to
human action is that it reads experience within a parricular society as uni
versa! human exprinc_e; it strives to attain a 'general inrr1otity', Whereas
there are only the 'interiorities' of spcifc cultures. Far LeviStrauss 'under
standing' must consist in total participation - in which

case the social

scientist ceases to be an 'interpreter' - or it cannot take place at alL In
contrast to Sartre's view of the original lucidity of praxis, he considers that
'a conscious being aware of itself as such pses a problem ro which it
provides no so4ltio-n.'10 However, there dos exist a solution, which con
sists in considering human action as governed by an unconscious system
of social rules comparable to the rules of a grammar. To isolate this system
of rules requires a deliberate break both with the immediate exprience of
the members of the society under investigation, and with the assumptions
which the enquirer brings from his or her own culture. Thus, although
Levi-trals rejcts the possibility of a 'general interiority', he does accept
what could be termed a 'general exteriority', which he equates with the
domain of a structuralist social science.
In the early and middle 1960s the spread of procedures .originating in
structural linguistics to other areas - mythology_, literature, cinema, in fact
all symbOlic social practices - and their apprent success in isoladng cer
tain formal principles of organization, seemed to vindicate entirely Levi
Strauss' stand against an all-embracing Dialectical Reason. Voices as diverse
as those of Lucien Goldmann, Paul Ricoeur, and Henri Lefe'byre y.ere
raised against the new intellectual fashion, but werdmrvftably iS!atd ca.es
of resistance t what was in effect a massive shift of sensibtfity: for time
to rais objections to structuralism coUld qnly mean preferring same form
of metaphysic to 'science', In some quartersit was acknowledged that the
status aud explanation of historical change had now bcome problematic.
But. in general it was either asserted that structuralist procedures could
already deal with the diachronic dimension, or that the question of 'dia
chronic structures'. although posing more difculties than that of synchronir
structures, could eventually be resolved by structural analysis. Certainly
Levi-Strauss staunchly defended himself agai'nst the charge of having ren
dered historiography epistemologically disreputable. His only aim, he sug_
gsted1 was to challenge the privileged psitio[. which had been accorde
to historical knowledge by postwaf phenomenology.n
Yet a closer look at the arguments contained in the fnal chapter of The
Savage Mind makes dear that, although Levi-Strauss begins with a refu
tation of the particular vision of history represented by the Critique, he
concludes by disqualifying history- understood as the temporal succession
of events in human societies - as an objecr of ri'gorous knowledge. Con
temporary accounts of LeviStrauss sought to minimize this implication,.
pointing to the passages in his writings where he pays tiibute to the work
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 109
of historians and suggests a complementarity beween the perspectives o
history and of anthropology. Yet in fact this apparent complementarity is
the thin disguise of a crude subordination: history exists as a reservoir of
fact to be absorbed and ordered by synchronic Analysis. This is not a
temprary aberration on Levi"Strauss' part, but a view which ha5 remained
constant throughout his career. In an article on 'History and Antho
pology' frst published in 1949 LeviStrauss writes: 'By showing institu"
dons in the process of transformation, history alone makes it possible to
abstract the structure which underlies many manifesttions and remains
prmanent throughdut a sucession of events.m While in his polemic against
the Critique he remarks: 'History consists wholly in its method, which
exprience proves ro-be indispensable for cataloguing the elements of any
structure whatever, human or non"human, in its entirety.'13 Insofar as only
certain of the potential vari:mts of a structure are concretely realized,
anthropolOgy must 'begin by bowing before the pwer and the inanity of
the event';14 Once the underlying srructure has been identifed, however, it
can be instated as the true object of science, while its empirical realizations
.must be abandoned to the domain of an untheorizable contingency.
In one respect LeviStrauss agrees with the phenomenologists:

since a
narration of all past events, even if it were possible, would amount to no
more than a meaningless chaos of data, the writing of history requires a
principle of selection which will be depndent on the interests and ethicl
political commitmenrs of a particular individual or group. History, he
argues, is always 'history"for'. But whereas for Sartre, as for other
hermeneutic thinkers, this distin!tion supplies the knowledge of history
with a special human relevance and epistemological dignity (in the natural
sciences, Sartre suggests with evident distaste, Reason must transform itself
into 'a system of inertia'),u: for Levi-Strauss this 'subjective' factor in the
codifcation of events renders historiography unft for inclusion amongst
what he. calls the 'hard' sciences. Yet rhis critique of the subjective element
in historical knowledge inevitably raises questions about the epistemolog
ical assumptions on which Levi-Strauss. own work is based. For, at frst
glance, it is diffcult to appreciate why anthropology should differ from
history in its need for a selection and organization of material, which will
be based on certain preferences and interests. Either these preferences must
be seen as not ultimately affecting the results of an enquiry whose aim is
objective explanation (but then why
-
cannot history aim for such expla
nation?), or the objections which Levi-Strauss raises to the coifcation of
historical events can also be raised about the codifcation of anthropolog
ical data.
Levi-Strauss' only answer to this diffculty relies on the bare affrmation
that structural anthropology is 'objective' because it isolates and describes
objectively existing strucrures, while history is condemned to remain marred
by subjectivity sinc it -consists of 'a method with no distinct object
110
PETER DEWS
corresponding to it' .16 Signifcantly, LeviStrauss is also scornful of what he
considers to
-
be the dilettantish use of structuralist procedures in literary
analysis, precisely because, here also, structure is a product of the method
and not a property of the objectY Viewed in this light, Levi-Strauss'
repeated affrmations that the imprtation of the methoological tools of
structural linguistics has enabled the social sCences to cross a major epis
temological threshold, and that they can now aspire to equality with the
sciences of nature, cannot be viewed as occasional lapses into positivism.
They are an integral part of an epistemological psition which affrms that
'structural hypotheses . . . can be compared with independent, well-defned
systems, each in its own right enjoying a certain degree of objectivity,
which test the validity of the theoretical constructs.'18 tn LeviStreuss this
tendency is reinforced by an assumption that 'objective' must ultimately
mean 'material'. Like Freud, Levi-Strauss cannot resist taking out the 'In
surance policy' of suppsing that statements about the 'human mind' shou1d
ultimately be reducible to statements about the physical structure of the
brain. He affrms that the human sciences are merely a 'shadow theatre',
the direction of which has been temprarily entrusted to them by the
sciences of natureY'
This objectivist and reductionist conception of the status of the human
sciences produces a number of curious discrepancies in Levi-Strauss' work.
As we have seen, Levi-Strauss has a strong afective commitmcnt to the
cognitive and cultural parity of all societies - 'Those societies we call
primitive', he affrms, 'are no 'less rich in. Pasteurs and P3lissys than the
others.'20 Yet his own methods of analysis are a vivid indication of the
cognitive asymmetry of cultures, since. they rdy on the assumption that
the anthropologist may be able to provide an accunt of social practices
which is unavailable to members of a society. 'In addition, Lvi-Strauss' view
of the natural sciences as model to be emulated by the human sciences
dearly requires him occasionally to admit what he terms the 'absolute
superiority of Western science'.11 Thus Levi-Strauss' fundamental affr
mation that 'man thinks the world in accordance with certain mental
constraints, and the way i which he thinks the world determines very
largely the way he acts upon it\
22
is never allowed to impugn the status
of knowledge in the culure ro which he himself belongs. Similarly, LEvi
Strauss' rationalist argument that the method of structural anthropology
dem<nds < sharp break with the evidences of experience is never reconciled
with his repeated use of an<iogies based on a highly expedme.ntalist view
of the natural sciences. [t is one -of the paradoxes of Levi-Strauss' work
that it repeatedly and powerfully raises the question of the cultural rela
tivity of knowledge, only to dismiss this question as a 'philosophical'
diversion from the explanatory tasks o science.
Set against rhese incoherences of Levt-Sttauss' psition, certain aspects of
the early project of Alehusset and his collaborators, which emerged more
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 1 1 1
or less simultaneously with the vogue for strucruralism;spring into clearer
relief. Althusser is concerned, like Levi-Strauss, with the critique of Hegelian
accounts of history and of phenomenological theories of knowledge. Indeed,
he wis'hes to make this critique the foundation of a renovated Marxism.
But he also wishes to avoid the structuralist relegation of the historical to
the status of a contingent and untheorizable residue, and its concomitant,
a naively positivist view of social science. 'However, in approaching this
task1 Althussr does not reject the aumption that only objects governed
by certain immanent laws of structure can be rigorously known, or reassign
to temporality a status superior to that of the synchronic. Rather, he argues
simultaneOlsly on two fronts: against the phenomenological assumption
that history possesses a distinctive dialectical form of lntelligi.bility, and
against the Levi-Straussian assumption that .structural intelligibility is not
characteristic of history. Thus Althusser's task is both t show that there
exists a set
,
. of concepts in accordance with which it is posible to organize
the historical past.as

an object of scientifc knowledge; and t justify these
concepts nor by bare affrmation of their correspondence with their
object, or by illusory- nalogies with the exprimentalism of the n(tural
sciences, but by a theoretical refection on the historical process of forma
tion of scientifc concepts, and on the particular formation of the concepts
of Marxist theory. It is precisely these two tasks which Althusser sees as
the central, though as yet unconsolidated achievements of the work of
Marx himself: 'Marx could not possibly have become Marx except by
founding a theory of history and a philosophy of the historical distinctiOn
between ideology and science
,

In many of its fundamental aUmptions Althusser's conception of the

'science .of history', which he tkes to have been founded by Marx, closely
resembles Levi-Strauss' conception of a structw-al anthropology. For Levi
Strauss social strQctures are 'entities independent of men's consciousness of
them ('althollgh they in fact govern men's existence), and thus as different
from the image which men form of them as physical reality is differerit
from oQr semory prceptions of it and our hypotheses about it.'14 The
cognitive, affective and practical capacities of the individul are deter
A
mined by systems of relations between categories which are unconsciously
shared by all membrs of a given community. In Levi-Strauss' account a
society is formed by an ensemble of such 'symbolic systems', of which
language, marriage rules; economic relations, art, science and religion are
amongst the most promment, and between which it is possible to detect
relations of correspondence, transformation and reversal.
Although Levi-Strauss 0ffrms strongly thar it is structural linguistic$
which provides the model for the analysis of these diverse systems,_ he is
far more ambivalent about specifying any order of determination between
them. At one point M The Savage Mind he argues that 'Men's conception
of the relations between nature and culture is a function of modifcations
of their own social relat1ons.'25 Yet in the same work he also suggests that
112
PETER DEWS
it is always the 'conceptual scheme which mediates between praxis (under
stood a the general human cpacity for action) and individual practicu'.16
In fact, if a ultimately determinant factor is to be isolated in Uvi-Strauss'
work, this factor is not of a social character at all, but is rather the
'objective structure of the psyche and brain': culture must in the last resort
be reducible to nature, By contrast, AlthusBer's theory remains resolutely
at the level of- scial structure, and follows the ttaditional priorities of
Marxism in attributing ultimate determination to the economie level of
society. In common with Levi-Strauss, howevtr, Althusser sees the social
formation as a 'structure of structures' whose functioning escapes the
consciousness of its members, Human individuals are nothing more than
the support or bearers of various kind of social relations - economic,
ideological, political - whose forms cannot b dissolve back into an
original intersubjectivity. For both Alth.usser and Levi-Stn.us all efects
are effects of structure.
Despite these convergeces, A!thusser is high'ly critical of the implka
tions of Levi-Strauss' conception of structure for the epistemological statu
of history. He prceives clearly that, in Levi-Strauss' scheme, 'Diachrony
is
reduced t the sequence of events and to the efects of this sequence of;
events on the structure of the synchronic: the 'historical then becomes the
unexpcted, the accidental, the factually unique rising or falling in the
empty cntinuum of time for purely contingent reasons' (RC, 118). In
addition, Uvi-Strauss sees societies as constituted by a complex pattern of
mirrorings and correspondences; the various symbolic systems 'aim to
express certain aspects of physical and social reality, and to an even greater
extent, the relations which these two types of reality maint,in w.ith each
other and which the symbolic- systel themselves maintain with each
other'P In this respect, argues Althwser, the intelligibility of symbolic
systems does not greatly differ from that of the Hegelian 'expreSlive total
ity', each part of which serves to summrize all the other: in bth cases
essence is revealed by a synchronic section which erases the real diversity
of practices, In Althusser's account the converse error is committe by
certain historians associated. with the Annales schooL Although the notion
of diverse 'historical times1 introduced by authors such as Braude!, Labrousse
and Febvre represents an advance over the expresive totalities of Hegelian
historiography, the Annates authors tend merely t affrm the existence of
different temporal strata and rhythms - the political, th economic, the
geographical - without attempting to establish any systematic Jinks be
tween them. Faced with these two opposing tendencies, Althusser's task is
t elaborate a theory of history which will avoid the spurious homogeneity
of the Hegelian conception, without allowing the historical past to become
fragmented into a plurality of unrelated diachronies.
The Althusserian solution t this problem depnds on a return t one
of the fundamental principles of Marxist theory: a periodization of the
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 113
history of human societies in terms of modes of production. Etienne Balibar,
Althusser's collaborator in Reading Captal, goes so fa as to suggest that
'Marx's construction of the central concept of the "mode of production"
has the

ftnction of an epistemological breik with respct to the whole
tradition of the philosophy of history' (RC, .210). The argument behind
this affrmation, revealed by Althusser in the .course of an analysis of Hegel
(RC, 93-97), is that there exists a dose relation between conceptions of
the social formation and conceptions of historical time; in Hegel's case the
expressive totality of any given moment is complemented by the teleologi
cal cntinuity of history as the development of Spirit. I this is correct, then
the as-yet-unconstructed Mar)ist !ncept of historicil time will depend
upon the elucidation of Marx's theory of SQcial formations as governed by
their modes of production, which is implicit in the analysis of the capitalist
mode of production to be found in Capital, In this way a Marxist theory
of historY can be recovered from the work of Matx's scientifc maturity,
avoiding a reliance on earlier texts in which Marx himself appars to
equivocate over the relation between structure and agency.
Accordin-g to Althusser, the distinguishing. feture of the Marxist con
ception of the social whole is its refusal to reduce real complexity to some
underlying principle of unity, whether this principle be envisaged as spir
itual or material. He suggests that two. forms. of such a reduction, which
he refers t by the generic title of 'historicism', have been active in the
Marxit tradition itself. One of these, originating in the Marx1sm of the
Second International. envisage an ;utomatic progress of civiliztion based
on the dialectic o'f forc and relations of production, and tends politically
towards reformism. The other ;Ssociated with the Hegelian Marxism of
the young Lukacs, identifes Marxist philosophy with the self-consciousness
of the prolerariat, which it sees .as being ptentially the universal subject
object of history, and implies an ultraleftism. Both these forms achieve an
;U-tooliteral inversion of the Hegelin vision of history as the progressive
unfolding of Spirit, whlle failing t displace the core of Hegel's philosophy:
the very notion of a subject of history. By contrast, Althusser affrms that
a social formation must be viewed as a 'decentred tptality' in which each
instan - tbe economic, the political and the ideological being the initial
thcee which Althusser distinguishes - possesses its own autonomy and
ef!ectivity. This conception implies thateach instance or practice is deter
mined not simply by the economic level, as in reductionist Marxism, bllt
is 'pverdetermined' by the totality of other practices, which it also in part
reciprocally determines. However, A!thusser is caceful not ro allow this
conception of the social formation to result in an equality of interaction
between all instnces. He affrms that in each social formation there is one
instance which is dominant. This need not necessarily be the economic -
under feudalism, for example, it is politics which is in command. But it is
the moe of production which ultimately determines which level is to b
114
PETER DEWS
dominant, Tht.s fhe traditional Marxist affrmation of the causal plimacy
of the forces and rdations of production should be taken to mean that it
is the economic 'base' which distributes effectivity between the instances
of a social formation.
Undoubtedly, in the years immediately following the publication of For Marx
and Reading Capital, Althusser's reformulation of the central concepts of
Marxist theory, although portrayed by its opponents as dogmatic and
mechanistic, was primarily experiencd as a liberalization and a liberation.
The introduction of the concept of 'relative autonomy' meant that it was
no longer necesary to trace the form and function of each superstructural
instance back to its determination by the economy. Art, politics, science?
ideology: each had its own particular immanent structure and temporal
rhythm which merited an indepndent and untrammelled investigation.
Signifcantly, conservative critics of Althusser within the French Cormuv
nist Part accused him of having weakened the explanatory basis of Marxim
by lapsing into an incoherent pluralism. Both those for and against Althusser,
however, tended to overlook that Althusser's liberalization' was accom
panied by a highly inflexible and aprioristic conception of adequate his
torical explanation. In Althusser's view the causal and narrative sequences
of trditio1al historiography have no scientifc vnlidity: a historical event
has not been truly 'explained' unril it has been identifed as an overdeter
mined Effect of the complex structure. of a social formation, In this area
the concept of 'determination in the last instance has a vital role to play,
since it is only this concept which 'makes it possible to escape the arbitrary
relativism of observable displacements by giving these displacements the
necessity of a function' (RC, 98). But since the notion of. structural causality'
on which this necessity relies has yet to be elaborated, judged by Althusser's
criterion no historiography so far produced can be considered to have
croed the threshold of scientifdty. Althu$ser places himself in a position
no less absurd than that of those English-speaking philosophers who have
insisted that historical explanation should conform to the 'covering-law'
model appropriate to- an inductivist conception of the naru.al sciences,
despite the fact that the practice of historians shows no tendency whatver
t approximate to this mode].28 Althusser's similar attempt in Reading Cap
ital to force all scientifc knowledge of history into < preconceived mould
leads to a number of equally perverse conclusions. He suggests, for example,
that the apparently 'historical' pges of Capital deaJing with 'primitive
accumulation', the struggle for the reduction of the working day, the rranv
sition from manufacture to industry, are merely raw marerials for a history,
since these events are not subsumed under formal laws of structure. On the
other hand, the theoretical sections of Capital are more truly 'historical'
since they construct the theory of one region .of the science of history.
Indeed, Althusser argues that 'The only difference that can be established
STfUCTURALlSM AN THE FRENCH EPlSTEMOLbGlCAL TRADITION 115
between the theory of political economy and the theory of history lie in
the fact that ecnomics considers only one instance of the social totality,
whereas history considers the totaliy as a whole' (RC, 109),
It will be clear that Althusser's attempt to rescue historical knowledge
from its complicity with phenomenology, while avoiding its demotion at
the hands of structuralism, concedes far too many structuralist assump
tions. Perhaps the most crucial of these ls the assumption rhat the elements
of a social whole exist in a relation of mutual supprt, and therefore form
an autonomous and selfperpetuating system, for it is this which underlies
Alrhusser's decision to ta'ke modes of production as the fundamental forms
of histodcal being. rn. Structural Anthropology LeviStrauss argues that
kinship sysrems could not be 'the arbitrary product of a convergence of
several heterogeneous institutions . . . , yet nevertheless funcrion with some
sort of regularity and effectiveness' .29 Accordingly, kinship practices should
not each be traced .bak to a disparate source, but rather integrated within
a synchronic system. Similarly, Althuer argues in Reading Capital that
knowledge of A Sciety must b 'obtained exclusively from the theory of
the "bodyn, Le., of the contemporar structure of society, without its
genesis intervening. in any way whatsoever' (RC, 65). In neither case is any
attempt made to justify the belief tht all the compnents of a social
system must b necessary and funional element of that system. Alrhusser
simply affms that 'when we spak of the "existing conditions;' of the
whole, we are speaking o its "conditions of existence" ',30 thereby
eliminating the possibility of variations within a structure. Indeed, Althusser's
concept of 'structural causality', of the structure as only being 'present i
i effects', implies that - correctly read these variations simply M7 the
structure.
By introducing this concept of 'structural causality', Althusser hopes to
distance his theory both from the position of Levi-Strauss, in which the
social system is seen as a -ontingent realization of a set of ne.cessary
relations, and from the psition of Engels -criticized in For Marx - in which
the necessity of historical evenrs is the product of an interaction of micro
scopic contingencies. Althusser considers that if a science of history is to
be possible, its objecr must be governed by a strict necessity at all levels
of irs theorization. Yet, in thinking this neceSity, Althussr does not take
the usual view that each particular historcal confguration must be seen as
determined by a preceding confguration, and so on in an open-ended
sequence. Rather, both Althusser and Balibar tend in Reading Capital
towards a Spinozist view of science - although this is never made fully
explicit- according to which all knowledge of neceity must be logico
deductive- in fCrm. 'All theory is syr.chronic', suggests Balibar, 'in so far as
it expounds a systematic set of conceptual determinations' (RC, 298). The
Spinozist distinction between the random sequence of ideas produced in
the mind by the impact of exte!nal bodies, and the 'concatenation of ideas
PETER DEWS
which takes place according to the order of the intellect ard enables the
mind to perceive things through their frst causes', 31 becomes the Althuerian
distinction between the realm of ideology and the empirical, and the rigour
of a Marxist science in which all the characteristics of a social formation
can be deduced from a 'theoretical object', the concept of its mode of
production. Similarly, the Althusscrian concept of 'structural causality' is
modelled on the relation which Spinoza envisages between God and the
fnite modifcations of his attributes. That the hoplessness of this ration
alism was not more frequently appreciated at the time may be attributed
to the fact that Althusser tacitly adopts the Spinozist assumption of the
metaphysical identity of logical and causal relations. He can therefore
speak indiffetently either of the deterministic mehamsm of the social
formation itself, or of the logical implications of the 'theoretical object'
which corresponds to it: 'we are confronted wfth a system which, in its
most concrete determinations, is governed by the regularity of its "mechan
ism", the specifcations of its concept',n It is for the sme reason that
Althusser never appears unduly concerned about the relation, which many
(:ommentators have found highly problematic, between the 'real object',
which remains in its selfidentity oucside thought, and the theoretical object
of Marxist science.
One of the intentions behind A!thusser's decision to view the autonomy
and necessity which he considers to be essential to any object of science
as characteristics of a structure, is to allay any lingering suspicion that
Marxism conceives of history as an inelectable progress towards - a pre
ordained goal. If historical events are only truly 'explained by being
deduced from the structure of a social formation, if there is 'no history in
general, but specifc structures of historicity, basec in the last resort on the
specifc structures of the different modes of producton' (RC, 109), then
the totalizing ambitions of a Sartre are vain. Most. importantly, no social
formation can be seen as automatically giving birth to its successor, for if
it is axiomatic that a mode of production is a self-reproducing structure,
then the dissolution of that structure must a .be process of a 'completely
different kind' (RC, 274). Yet this critiqne of teleology overshoots the
mark. For if modes of production are the fundamental forms of historicity,
there can be no 'historical time' in which the transition from one mode- of
production to another takes place. In Reading Capital Balibar attempts
a solution to this problem by introducing what he terms 'forms of trn
sition'; 'manufacture', for example, may be considered as a form of transi
tion between feudalism and capitalism. Yet since these forms are themselves
considered by Balibar to be 'temporary' modes of production, this 'solu
tion' leads only to an infnite regress. Thus one of the ironies of Althusser's
theory of history is that it ends by reproducing that division between a
synchronic necssity and an untheorizable contingency whlcb he had origin
ally criticized in LeviStrauss.
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 117
In tradieonal empiricist theories of knowledge, objectivit is ultimately
g\larantee. by the psibility of a - more or less complex - reduction of
theoretical statements to statements about the experience of a perceiving
subject, which are considered to form a secure epistemic base-line. How
ever, Althuss_ei follows the structuralist lead ln affirming the socially rela
tiveand symbolica!ly determine status of 'immediate' experience. He argues
that 'Without a critique of the immediate concepts in which every epoch
think the
-
history it lives, we shall remain on the threshold of a true
knowledge of history, and a prisoner of the illusions it produces in the men
who Jive it.'n As a result he is obliged to follow the LeviStraussian dictum
that 'in. order to attain the real, one must frst repudiate live experience, '34
Yet; unlike Levi-Strauss, he is aware that the aJfrmation of this principle
raises many epistemological problems of its own; in partiular, that an
alternath;e account of the objectivity of scientifc knowledge is required.
One of the major resources to which Althusser turns in order to solve
chis problem is the work of the French school of historical epistemology,
most eminently represented by Gaston Bachelard, a philosopher princi
pally concerned with the physical sciences and with the theory of the
imagination, !ld by Georges Canguilhem, an historian and philosopher of
the life sciences who owes certain fundamental assumptions to Bachelard.
This rerourse was entirely in accord with the temper of the 1960s, for in
Bachelard's work, produced at a time when phenomenology and exisren
tialism were the dommant currents within French philosophy, and the
prestige of the natural sciences at a low ebb, it is possible to fid a highly
developed critique of empiricist and phenomenological theoris of knowl
edge. Unlike its structuralist successors, however, Bachelard's critique of
phenomenology is ultimately based on a philosophy of the human mind,
which he sees a marked by a fundamental duality, divided between
a
'nocturnal' facet which constantly inclines towards reverie and the arche
types of the unconscious, and a 'diurnal' facet which strives towards in
creasing, abstraction and the rational application of concepts. In Bachelard's
view our everyday exprience (l'exptrtence commune, l'expbience 1ulgaire)
is inevitably imbued with affective Colourings, and haunted by the values
and libidinal investments of the unconscious. More generally, the mind
shows a spontaneous tendency towards both exaggerated particularity
and facile generalization which form an obstacle to the development of a
scientifc knowledge .of phenomena. In consequence, such knowledge can
only be initiated by an 'epistemological break' (rupture Cpistemologique)
with the assumptions and givens of the e
-
"eryday world, and a purging of
the sensuous - and even animistic - overtones which cing to the concepts
of pre-scentifc theory; For Bachelard this break is not simply a regrettably
necessary preliminary to the real process of development of scientific
knowledge, but is a essential moment of its constitution. No statement
which appears 'flatly and evidently true' can claim the name of science:
118
PETER DEWS
self-evidence should rather be a cause for susp1C1on. For it is only in
correcting previous error that knowledge identifes itself as such. 'The
essence of reflection', states Bachelard, 'is to understand that one had
not
understood.'35
Accordingly, the grayamen of Bachelard's critique is that phenomenol
ogy rests complacently within the orbit of immediate experience, attached
to the misleading axiom that 'the primitive is always the fundamental.' In
doing so, it remains pny to precisely that play of imaginary investments
which it is the task of science to recognize and suppress. Furthermore,
phenomenology endoses itself within an outmoed cognitive individual
ism. It fails to take account of the fact that the elaboration of knowledge
can only be a collective process, that. the experienc of the indiyidual cannot
be considered as unimpeachable, but must b laid. open to the testing of
the 'labourers of the proof', the community of scientists engaged in en
quiry. Free of this collective constraint, the phenomenologists can simply
indulge 'the facile convictions of a soul illuminated only by its intimate
experience',36 In a striking anticipation of Lev
.
.Strauss, Bachelard suggests
that the phenomenologist must 'end by describing a. personal vision of the
world as if he had naively discovered the meaning of the whole universe'.37
Unlike Levi-Strauss, however, Bachelard does not consider the domain of
science to be automatically protected from such dangers. Even here
constant guard must be mounted to prevent the purifed rationality of the
concept from sliding back towards the reverie of the image. The 'psycho
analysis of objective knowledge' which Bachelard began to develop as a
result of his investigations into the imaginary explanations of pre-science,
is intended to aid the detection and neutralization of unconscious intru
sions into the feld of scientifc rationality.
These views lead Bachelard towards a distinctive account of the object
of scientifc knowledge and the nature of scientifc truth. Since he denies
that scientifc knowledge can be seen as a extension or inductive gener
alization of 'common sense' or everyday experience, Bachelard is obliged
to argue that the objct of science is not discovered, but is rather 'con
structed' by a system of concepts, whose reference to senseexperience .
becomes increasingly tenuous. At the same time, since he tends to identify
immediate experience with the 'real', Bachelard does not assume. that such
a system of concepts corresponds to some deeper reality underlying
appearances.3s Already in his doctoral thesis of 1928 he had dismissed a
an 'epistemological monstrosity' the 'idea of a coincidence between thought
and reality, of an adequation between theory and experience'.39 Rather, the
truth of science is embodied only in the constant snsceptibility of scientifc
theories to rectifcation and adjustment in the light of further evidence, and
in the increasing coherence and comprehensiveness of their fundamental
concepts which this brings about. This process is not simply one of minor
correction within. a broad accumulation of knowledge. For major scientifc
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAl TRADITION 119
advances can provoke shockwaves which reach down to the very fo\lnda
tions of scientifc method. Thus, even after the initial break with the lived
world, the history of science cntinues to reveal signifcant epistemological
discontinuities.
In his discussions of Marx's theoretical development, Althusser makes
crucial use of the Bachelardipn concept of an 'epistemological break', for
it is this concept. which allows him to discredit Hegelian and existentialist
readings of Marx, by arguing that the central texts on which these read
ings are based - above all the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of
1844 must be seen a belonging to a 'pre-scientifc' phase of Marx's
work. Marx's e?rly texts are dominated by Hegelian and Feuerbachian
modes of thought, in w hch human beings are seen as the unconscious, and
therefore 'alienated', creators and movers of their own scial world, and
as such hey precede the discoveries through which Marx establishes his
own distinctive theoretical terrain. Althuss argue that the epistemological
break in Marx's work takes plac atound 1845, and is most evident in The
Ger:man Ideology and the Theses on Feuerbach. It is in these works that
Marx begins to abandon his early 'anthropological' assumptions, and to
think t history of human societies in terms of an entirely new system of
concept! mode of production, relations of production, ruling class/
oppressd class, ideology+ This new system of concepts no longer leaves
any room for human agents as the 'makers' of history: :arx decisively
abandons the 'obviousness' of the belief of bourgeois humanism that 'the
actors of history are the authors of its text, the subjects of its production'.
By using the term 'epistemological break' to describe this process, Althusser
stresses that the. later '&dentifc' Marx canLt be seen as a development or
- in Hegelian terms - as the 'truth' of the young Marx. The concepts of
'alienation', 'species-being', 'praxis', cannot be simply amalgamated with
the theoretical system of a work such as Capital: they belong to a different
'pToblematic'q
It is this last term which Althusser employs to describe the solidarity of
the fundamental concepts of a theory, and their priority over its supposediy
empirical engagements. The term is rarely \lsed in Bachelard, but in principle
is clearly present throughout his work. In The Philosophy of No, for
example, h
e
argues that the results of experiment and observation in the
physical sciences can have no signifcance unless they are placed within a
specif theoretical ftamework, since it is only a structure of attitudes and
expectatks which can cause the scientist to lOok and examine, rather tban
simply see. In Reading Capital Althussr develops this argument into a
general critique of theories of knowledge! founded on the metaphor of
vision, which assume the possibility of an unfettered encounter between
subject and object. He points to 'a fact peculiar to the very existence of
a science; it can only pose problems on the terrain and within the horizon
of a defnite theoretical structure, its problematic, which constitute its
120
PETER DEWS
absolute and defnite condition of possibility' (RC, 24 ), The failure t note
certain facts within a particular scientifc theory is not the result of a
fortuitous oversight, for withln any problematic there is 'an organic link
binding the invisible t the visible' (R 24). Within this general parallelism,
however, there is one major difference between Althuser and Bachelard.
For Bachelard a problematic, as an organization of pertinent questions, is
a sign of the maturity of a science, of a capacity to narrow and direct
attention, to be contrasted with the vague spontaneity of the untutored
mind, Furthermore, there cannot be a theory of this rind, of .the native
imagi

nation: 'the image', drums Bachelard,. 'can .only be Studied by means

of the image in dreaming images such as they assemble in reverie. It is
nonsense to daim to study the imagination objeti:ely,'4 For Altusser, to
abopt these assumptions would be to remain tributary to the humamsm
which Marx has-theoretically disredited. He argues that the epistemological
break does not consist 'in a leap from the spntaneous to the organized,
from nature to culture, but rather in a shift from one system of cor.cepts
t another: from an 'ideological problematic' to the problematic o a science.
This is not primarily a passage from incoherence to coherence, for an
ideology may offer a highly systematic view of the world. The central dis
tinction between ideology and science is that the p,oblematic of the former
is prescribed by practical and social determinations of which it qmnot b
conscious, while the problematic of a science make<s p0sible an a!ltonomous
development in accrdance with an immanent criterion -f truth. In the
case of Marxism there is an additional distintion, however. The epistemo
logical break not only reve0ls the prehistory of a science as erroneous,
it
makes possible an explanatory account of that error: precisely a 'theory of
ideology'
.
On the basis of this account, Althuser is able to l0unch a further attack
on that broad current within the Marxist tradition to which he gives the
title 'historicism', As we have already seen, historicism tends to reduce the
structured complexity of the scial formation to some simple unifring
principle. But it can now b perceived that, in the particular domain of
epistemology, the characteristic fault of historicism is to possess no rigor
ous conception of the break between science and ideology. In it central
Hegelian form - to be found in Luk.cs or Gramsci - historicism affrms
that the cognitive validity of thery !an not b assessed indepndently of its
role in expressing the world-view of certain social forces at a p;rticular
epoch. Marxism tends to be viewed as simply the most recent and the most
universal of a series of philosophies which have tr
.
uctured human thought
and action throughout history. Thus historicism places knowledge in
dependency upon a form of historical reality which is considered t be more
fundamental, thereby impugning its autonomy and (by implication) its
aurhority. Precisely because he placs such emphasis on the indepndence
of Marxist theory, Althusser considers the status attributed t scientifr
STRUCTURAliSM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAl TRADITION '21
and philosophical knowledge to be the 'symptomatic point? (RC, 132) at
which the reduction of levels characteristic of historic.m reveals itself. Far
from viewing Marxim as a theorization of the experience of anti-pitalist
struggle, Althusser considers that the only possible relation between theory
and politics - already indicated in his early essay on Montesquieu -is 'the
correction of errant consciousness by well-founded science'.41
In his discusions of the theory of science and of the general theory of
history in Reading Capital, there is one corpus of historical research to
which Althusser refers with unwavering approval. This is the work of
.Michel Foucault. The innovatory studies produced by Foucault of the
transformation of medical and psychiatric discourses in the west - of the
historicity of our conceptions of mind and body - are taken by Althusser
to be exemplary in their dismantling of continuist accounts of the history
of scienc'e, and their investigation of the 'paradoxical logic of the condit
ions of production of know ledges' (RC, 45). Foucault shows how the 'self
evidence' of the gaze of clinical medicine, or of the ,perception of madness
as a malady of the mind, is the result. of a complex overlapping of medical,
legal, religious, ethical and political practices, which are themselve deter
mined by the eonomic, political and ideological structures of a particular
epoch. In this respect Foucault'a work not only offers a model for that
'theory of the history of the production of know)edge' which the earlier
Althusser takes to be the task of Marxist philosophy; it teaches a general
lesson concerning the structure of a historical tim which cannot be
reduced t the 'ideoloical' categories of expressive simultaneity or teleolog
ical succession.
Althuser was not mistaken in identifying a convergence between his
own interests and those of his former pupil during the 1960s. For the
historkal .nalyses of scientifc discourse, or 'archaeologies', which Foucault
produced at that period are clearly indebted to the tradition of historical
epistemology which is also central to Althusser's work. Inded, from the
point of view of Althusserianism, Foucault tended to be seen as simply the
inheritor and developer of this tradition. A late as 1971 Dominique Lecourt,
a follower of Althusser who has specialized in epistemology, could suggest
that Oachelard, Canguilhem and Foucault belonged to a common current
of 'antipositivism' (understood as the rejection of any general theory of
scientifc metho) and 'antievoiutionism (understood as the denial of any
unilinear growth of knowledge) in the philosophy of science.42 Foucault and
the Althusserians diverged, however, with regard to their predominant
allegiancs within this tradition. AlthusSer's central interest was in the
theory of epistemological discontinuity developd by 'Bachelard, a theory

which could be used to reperiodize Marx's work and to reestablish the
scientifciry of Marxism. Although, during the 1960s, Foucault placed an
equal - if not stronger - emphasis on discntinuities in the development
"
PETER DWS
of knowledge, his work is much closer to the studies in the history of the
life sciences produced by Georges Canguilhem, in which the concerns o
historiography tend to predominate over those of pure epistemology.
Furthermore, whereas Bachelard tends to define the matrix from which
science emerges in terms of an atemporal psychology of the unconsci.ous,
Canguilhem is far more interested in the social relativity and normative
foundations of certain basic biological concepts, and even allows that the
life sciences may- be permanently dependent on certain fgurative modes of
expression, often of a political or idoologicl prigin, Placed in this lineage,
Foucault an be seen as once more shifting the focus of attention, thls time
from the 'life' to the 'human sciences', and a extending the consideration
of ideological factors to include the social and institutional frameworks
within which these sciences have emerged.
The keystone of this tradition as a whole is the assumption that know!
edge can only be adequately understood if studied in its historical devel
opment rather than considered as the product of an encounter betwcen
empirical reality and certain immutable faculties of the mind. Ultimately)
the influence of this assumption in France must be traced back to Comte
who - in the frst lesson of the Cours d philosophie positVe - debunks
the 'psychological method' ('the so-called study of the mind by the mind
is a pure illusion') and argues that the task of positive philosophy is to
trace 'the course actually followed by the human mind in action, through
the examination of the methods really employed to obtain the exact
knowledge that it has 1lready acquired'.' Comte's determination t take
history seriously also entils a appreciation of the fact that 'in order to
devote itself to observation the mind needs some kind of theory',4 an insight
which will remain central to the tradition as renewed by Bachelard and
transmitted to the epistemology of the 1960s. However, the way in which
this prioricy of theory over experience is presente by Althusser and Foucault
differs widely. In Althusser's work the critique of empiricist theories of
knowledge takes the form of a theoretical debat; cntred on the concept
of a scientifc problematic. In Foucault's wiitings, by contrast, one rarely
discovers explicit philosophical argument; rather, his philosophical posit
ions emerge from a skein of narrative whose ostensible concern may be
more with political and social transformations than with the theory of the
sciences. This is a technique which Foucault derives from Nietzsche, with
whom he shares a profound suspicion of the traditional discourse of phtlo-
ophy. Like Nietzsche, he is in search of a novel mode of expression whkh
will evade absorption by 'the interiority of our philosophical reflexion',
without lapsing into 'the positivity of our knowledge'.4$
The Birth of the Clinic, the first of Foucault's works to be_ written 'n te
shadow of structuralism, offers a clear example of this oblique proed.ure.
Apparently, Foucault is concerned to analyse certain transformations
which took place in medical discourse at the end of the eighteenth and the
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRAOITIOt t23
beginning of the nineteenth centuries, and their relation to the scial and
political upheavals of the French Revolution. But The Birth of the Clinic
may also be re_d as a critique of phenomenological accounts of knowl
edge. In his later work Merleau-Ponty had attempted to outline what he
referred to as a 'genealogy of truth': he wished to show how discursive
knowledge must, at some ultimate pint, be anchored in a revelation of
being which b prior even to the division between subject and object. Down
t the very headings of its chapters (oir, savoir, /'invisible visible), The Birth
of the Clinic offers a subtly inverted echo of Merleau-Ponty's psitions. In
place of a 'genealogy of truth', Foucault proposes an 'archaeology of t-he
gaze' which will show how 'immediate prception1 must be seen a a com
plex end-product rather than as a point of departure. His historical analysis
shows that the supposedly pristine look with which clinical meicine
contemplates the body of the diseased patient is in fact the result of the.
congelation of a complex set of procedures of observation and registration,
institutional rules and forms- of conceptualization; while his description of
the faith of the initiators of clinical medicine - 'The gaze will be fulflled
in its own truth and will have access to the truth of things if it rests on
them in silence, if everything keeps silent around what it sees'4 - offers a
sly allusion to the na'ivetf of phenomenology, its blief in the possibility of
access to a pure, pre.Hngu'istic level of experience. Thus, despite striking
differences i mode of presentation, the positions of Foucault and Althusser
in the eatly 1960s appear to be parallel. In both cases a critique of the
traditi1al metaphor of knowledge as a form of vision leads to a conception
of the rdations between the perceive and the unperceived as linguistically
determined. Althusser's 'problematic' seems t reappar in what Foucault
terms 'the odginal distribution of the visible and invisible insofar as it is
linked with the division between what is stated and what remains unsaid' .7
l both Althusser and Foucault, however, this argument goes a crucial
step beyond anything to be found in Bachelard, or in Canguilhem. There
can be no contesting that Bachelard's philosophy stresses the primacy of
theory over experience: he often refers to his position as a 'rationalism' -
although an 'open rationalism' - in which the increasing conceptual coher
ence and mathematization of theory, .rather than an accumulation of
empirical dtail, is seen as the true tnark of scientifc advance, and he
tirelessly criticizes philosophies which view scientifc knowledge as 'the
pleonasm of experience'.48 Yet Bachelard never suggests that theories
uniquely determine the facts to which they are applied, or that exprience
and experiment play no role 'in the construction of theory. And while he
criticizes the abstract opposition betweerr subject and object which he sees
as characteristic of traditional metaphysics, this is nOt t reduce both
subject and object to 'dfects' of the determinism of conceptual systems,
_but in order to explore a more subtle dialectic betwen 'theory' and
'experiment' as it is manifested Jn the actual practice of the sdences. For
'"
PETER DEWS
Bachelard the task of an_ adequate philosophy of science is to steer a
delicate course between realism and rationalism! rather than clinging blindly
to one or other of these alternatives. Inded, his concption of an 'open
rationalism' consists precisely in the readiness of the scientist to revise hiS
theories in the light of new evidence. 'When it is exprimentation which
brings the frst message- of .a new phenomenon', states: Bachelard, 'the
theoretician ceaselessly modifes the reigning theory, to enable it to assimi
late the new fact'4 Nor "is this adjustment limited to the superfcial and
ad hoc elements of theory, major transformations being attribute purely
to conceptual innovation. In the concluding chapters of The Philosophy
of
No Bachelard suggests that no theoretical principle, not even fundamental
logical principles such as the law of identity, can be considered as immune
t revision in the light of novel experimental evidence.
In Althusser's work, however, the possibility of a 'feedback' from expri
ence to theory is entirely excluded. This becomes apprent in a number of
contexts. Firstly, from For Marx onward, Althusser adopts the metphor
of scientifc activity as a 'theoretical practice', a process of production in
which the conceptS of a theory (which he terms 'Generality II') operate on
a 'raw material' "hich consists of ideologicl concepts, scientifc 'facts',
and already elaborated scientifc concepts (Generality 1), in order to pro
duce new knowledge (Generality IJ[), This metaphor of production implies
that exprience, which Althusser globally equates with 'ideology', can only
b a passive primary materiaL which the concepts of a scienc must shape
and elaborate: Althusser speaks of 'the priority of Generality II (which
works) over Generality I (which is worked on)' (FM, 191). Seondly, in his
discussion of the concept of a 'problematic' in Reading Capital, Althusser
describes the problematic- as constituting 'the absolute determination of the
form in which .ll problems must be psed at any given moment in the
science' (RC, 25), If this determination i absolute, however, there can be
no possibility of a modifcation of the problematic being provoked by an
empirical discovern indeed, the distinction between the empiricl and the
theoretical becomes meaningless. Lastly, Akhusser's neglect of the role of
empirical evidence rs reinforced by his Spinozism. In Reading Capital he
argues that once sciences have been 'truly constituted and developed they
have no need for verifcation from external practkes to declare the
knowledges they _produce to be "true", i.e., to be knowledges' (RC, 59).
This is because, as we have already seen, Althusser envisages a science
which has successfully constituted its. 'theoretical object' as operating in a
purely logico-deductive manner. On this basis Althusser is led to argue
that the experiments of the physical sciences are in some way internal to
their 'theoretical practice', thereby rendering incomprehensible the role and
signifcance of prediction, which necessarily assumes a theory-independent
reality. In general, any attempr to identify correlations and distinctions
between theory and exprience is condemned by Althusser_ as a lapse into
'pragmatism'.
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGIAL TRADITION 125
In Foucault the relation between theory and experience is similarly pre*
sented as one of unidirectional determination, although in his case the
reasons for this conception are considerably wider. Althusser's argument
is specifcally concerned with the 'theory-laden' status -f scientifc facts; he
only touches on the question of a general priority of language over experi
ence l his implicit recourse to the Lacanian concept of the Symbolic as the
basis for a theory of ideology. In Foucault, however, the argument is pre
sented from the start in terms of a primacy of the discursive over the 'lived',
of the kind broadly asserted by structuralism. Thus Foucault's denial of
'the heaven which glitters through the grid of all astronomies'50 is less an
expression of his adherence to Bachelardian epistemology, than to the kind
of viewpoint suggested by Levi-Strauss' argument that: 'there are no natural
phenomena in the raw. Thes do not exist for man except as concep
tualisations, seemingly fltered by logical and affective norms dependent em
culture. In The Blrth of the Clinic, for example, when Foucault argues
that - at the level of his analysis there exists 'no distinction between
theory and experience, methos and results; one had to read the deep
structure of visibility in which feld and gaze are bound together by codes
of knowledgt ,sz these codes tend to be seen as merely particular embodi
ments of the general codes of a culture. At the close of the book Foucault
suggests that both the emergence of clinical medicine and the lyrical poetry
of a HOlderlin cqn be seen as symptoms of a new onsciousness of mortality,
of an 'irruption of finitude',. which characterizes one phase of nineteenth
century thought. In his following book, The Order of Things, Foucault
greatly expands this conception, arguing that all the discourses of a par
ticular epoch must be seen as determined by an qnderlying structure which
he refers to as the episteme. This structure, which Foucault terms an 'his
torical a prior', c0nstitutes the fundamental ordering principles of a culture,
thereby proVidifig an implicit ontology in which all it concrete. modes of
knowledge are tooted. As a result, there can be no possibility of any pr
ticular empirical discovery disturbing this ontology: change can only come
with the global shift from one episteme to its successor. In Foucault's ac
eount, the history qf western culture since the Renaissance is divided into
thre immense and disconnected blocks.
In The An;haeology of Knowledge, the retrospective discourse on
method which wal the. last of his books of the 1960$, Foucault greatly
modifes this conception, under the guise of a correction of misinterpreta
tions of his earlier work. He now denies that the episteme should be viewed
as 'a form of knowledge or type of rationality which, crossing the bundaries
of the most varied sciences, manifests the sovereign unity of a subject, a
spirit or a period'.33 If the term episteme is still to be used1 it should be
taken t denote a fluid system of disparate yet interloking 'discursive
practices. However, this lessening of th rigidity of the episteme does not
extend to an admission of a possible interaction btween empiricl discovery
and the theoretical structure of scienc. Foucault insists that the object of
'"
PETER DEWS
a science 'does not await in limbo the order that will free it and enable it
to become embodied in a visible and prolix objectivity'.H The task of the
archaeology nf knowledge is to account for the constitution -of such objects
'without reference to the ground, the fou'dation of things, but by relating
them to the body of rules that enable them to form as objects of discourse
and thus constitute the conditions of their historical appearance'. Its cen
tral assumption is that 'discourse i not a slender surface of contact or
confrontation betwe_en a reality and a language, the intricaton_ of a lexicon
and an experience,
.
This exclusion of any relation btwen theory and experience leads to
serious diffculties i the work of both Foucaultaid Althusset. ln Althusser's
case the 'symptomatic point' at which these diffcultie become apparent
is in his account of the historical emergence of the Marxist 'science of
history'. For Marx and Reading Capital treat this emergence almost purely
a a intellectua] event, as a break from ideology to science within the
domain of theory. This treatment is reinforced by the theory of philosophy
which Althussr epouses in these works. He suggests that 'philosophical
revolutions' follow on the heels of major scientifc development: Platonism
after the discoveries of the early Greek mathematicians, Cartesianism after
Galileo. Such revolutions may be sen as 'the "leprise" of a basic scientifc
discovery in philosophical refection, and the production by philosophy of
a new form of rationality' (RC, 185), Accordingly, Althusser's own task
will be to elucidate and formalize the new form of rationality which is
contained in a 'practical sta:te' in Marx's work, to provide the 'Theory
(dignifed with a capital letter) of (Marx's) theoretical practice'. Such a
theory will prfOrm a task similar to that of Bachelard's 'psychoanalysis of
objective knowledge', It will protect established sciencs from the ideolog
ical lures which constantly surround them, expose 'scientifc ideologies'
which have illicitly occupied the 'continent ofhistory' opened up by Marx,
and establish new branches of Marxist research on the corret concptual
foundations, Soon after the publication: of Reading Capital, however,
Althusser began to abandon this conception, And in his Elements
d'autocritique (1974) it is denounced as a 'rationalist' and 'theoreticist'
deviation, the essence of which is the flaw characteristiC of his early work
in general: a neglect of the reality and effectivity of the class struggle. The
recognition of this effectivity poses or of the central problems of Althusser's
later work. For he must do so without reducing Marxism to a theoriz(ti'on
of the experience of class stuggle: such a reduction would return him to
the framework of historicism,
Althusser's answer to this problem is a new view of the nature of
philosophy. The role of philosophy i still to trace a line of demarcarion
between the scientifc and the ideological, but it no longer does so in the
psitivist guise of a 'science of the scientifcity of the sciences'. Rather
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 127
philosophy must be sen as a representation of 'the clas struggle in theory'
- a political battleground on which materialist and idealist tendencies
mark out their ever-shifting positions. Philosophy possesses no 'theoretical
object' of its own, but acts as a kind of go-between, representing politics
in the domain of science and scientifcity in the arena of politics. To defend
the scientifc status of Marxism, therefore, now amounts to adopting a
class position in philosophy, to the issuing of 'matrialist' theses which
may be ;ustiable, but which are not demonstrable, as are the propositions
of a science. Furthermore, a shift in philosophical position now precedes
and makes possible the emergence of a new science, since philosophy
works by 'modifying, the position. of the problems, by modifying the rela
tions between the practices and their object'!6 On this basis Althusser
attempts to provide an historically denser account of the emergence of
Marx's discoveries. He argues that, .on Marx's road towards historical
materialim, 'it is politics that is the determinant element: the ever deeper
e.ngagement in the political struggles of the proletariat' .57 Marx frst had
to adopt a proletarian political .position, which was then 'worked out into
a theoretical (philosophical) position', in order to effect the displacement
on which the emergence of a science of hlstory depended.
It is in this way that Althusser attempts t preserve the non-positionality
of scien"e ('all scientifc discourse is by defnition subject-less discours,
there is no "Subject of science" except in an ideology of science')/

while
admitting the imprtance of the class struggle and of class viewpoints. But
this attempt cannot be consistent. For, however mediatedly, Alrhuss_!r is
still obliged to admit the possibility of a knowledge which is not the
knowlege of a science. In order to found his theory of history Marx had
to adopt 'a psition from which these mechanisms (of class exploitation
and domination) become visible: the proletarian Sandpoint'.59 Yet if the
mechanism of society is already - in a reinstatement of that crucial meta
phor - visible from the standpoint of the dominat!d class, then Althusser's
whole project, whose core is a defence of the priority and indispensability
of Marxist theory, begins to falter. It is as a result of this contradiction,
among others, that Althussedanism rapidly faded as a political and thea
retical force in France in the 1970s.
Like Althusser, during the 1960s Foucault attempts to produce a theory
in which subject and object are seen as merely effects of the feld of
discourse, rather than as its origins ot causes. Just as the objects of a
science are a product of the discursive p<tterns of that science, so 'the
subject (and .its substitutes) must be stripped of its creative role and ana
lysed as a complex and variable functiOn of discourse.'60 In order to
explain the apparance of discourses, therefore, we need no recourse to
existential or pychological considerations: this appearance is governed
purely by 'code of knowledge', or epistemes, or 'rules of formation', Yet,
in making this recommendation, Foucault, who appears to equate the
128
P.T!R CtWS
psychological subject or the transcendental subjectuf phenomenology with
the subject tot court,. entirely oveilooks the importance of the moment of
enunciation in discourse .. His posit1on rests on the characteristic structur
alist confusion between the 'conditions of possibility' and the causes of an
event, In isolating what- in reference ro The Order of Thmgs - he terms
the 'formal laws' which govern- a domain of statements, Foucault is not
thereby enabled t explain why any particular statement should be pro
duced on a particular occasion, iust as Lvi-Strauss' isolation of putative

grammar of mythology does not explain spcifc instances of the- prod_uc
tion of myth, but only the rules in accordance w'ith which such production
must take place. Any structural analysis of this kind must be supplemente
by a causal explanation of the individual event. 51
In The Au;haeology of Knowledge Foucault attempts to overcome this
problem by denying that he is seeking t achieve a formalization in the
structuralist sense. His aim is rather t describe the immanent regularitie
of precisely those statements which have historically been produced But
this change Jails to resolve the diffculty for a number of reasons. Firstly,
Foucault himself admits that the description. of regularities is an endless
task, since there are innumerable ways in whih statements may be said to
resemble and differ from ech other: no defnitive 'theory' can be achieved,
Secondly, even if such a theory were possible, it would still have no ex plan
-tory force. Such a post hoc reconstruction would only be of use in a
hermeneutic perspetive; but, since Foucault is relentlessly critical of projecr
of interpretation, this possibility i excluded. Thirdly, the conGntration on
the Immanent 'rules of formation' of discourse distracts attention from the
fact that on many occasions (for example, the generation of a science in
a climate of religious or polidcal terror) even the internal confguration of
discourse require explanation in terms of 'external' factors. One may con
elude that what Foucault sees as the central question of 'archaeology' -
'for what reason did a certain statement appar and no other in its place?'62
- has been left unanswered,
Foucault's portrayal of the objects of scientifc discourse as entirely con
stituted by that discourse contributes to the same impasse. Clearly, there
is an imprtant element of truth in Foucault's claim that 'one cannot speak
of anything at any time; it 'is not easy to say anything newi it is not enough
for IS to open our eyes, to pay attention, or to be

aware, for new objects
suddenly to light up and emerge out of the ground.'63 This insight into the
priority of frameworks has become a commonplace of recent philosophy
of science. But, in arguing for a total discursive determinism, Foucauh takes
a crucial stp beyond both his contemporaries in the English-speaking
world, and even such an imprtant influence on his work as Georges
Canguilhem. It is true that, in La CoMal'ssQnte de fa vie, CanguHhem
affnns: 'theories never emerge from facts. Theories only emerge from
previous theories, often of great antiquity.'64 Yet he immediately goes on
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION
129
to -offer vital qualifcation of this statement which reinstates the role of
em-pirical reference: 'Facts a merey the path, rarely direct, by which
theories emerge from each other+ I general, Canguilher's Nietzsche
influenced philosophy of the value of the aberrant and the exceptional
forbids any determinism of the Foucauldian variety. He speaks of: 'a
certain anteriority of intellectual adventure over rationalization, a presump
tuous overstepping (dipassement), resulting from the demands of life and
action, of what it is already necessary to know and to have verifed.">s For
Foucault even 'discoveries' are rule-determined.
Part of Foucault's -- and of Althusser's - mistake consists in making
the not uncommon leap from the discrediting of the idea of naked, pre
theoretical facts to the conclusion that there can be no discrepancy between
the empirical implicatio!IS of a theory and the actual course of events. (This
assumption is reinforced, in Foucault's case, by a concentration on the
taxonorlc and descriptive - rather than the predictive- aspects of system
.atic knowlege, and in Althusser's case by his Spinozist conception of
science.) But the fact that the decription: of eveno is always relative to the
vobulary of a particular theory, does not entail that such events must
always be consonant with the implications of such a theory. Much reent
philosophy of science in the English-speaking world bas been concerned
with precisely such discrepancies: with rhe fact that they continue to ocur
even in well'tested' theories; with the ad hoc strategems which are devised
to disarm their implications; with those moments of scientifc crisis which
are provoked by tb.e accumulation of such discrepancies; and with the
prob
l
em of. the point at which it becomes rational t abandon such a
contradiction-burdened theory. In the work of Foucault and Althusser,
however, no such problems can be posed. In For Marx Althusser takes care
to stress that even pre-scientifc ideologies are coherent, unifed by a
problematic, thereby excluding an intensifying consciousness of contra
diction as a factor in the. transition from one theory to another. Similarly,
Foucault's narratives of episteric shifts communicate little sense of crisis-
In The Order of Things, for example, the contemporary discoveries of
palaeontology are attributed no role in the transition from the fxism of
Natural History to nineteenth-century evolutionary biology. And when
Foucault does disCU$ a moment of scientifc crisis,. as in the tenth chapter
of The Birth of the Clinic, he 1s careful t emphasize ('the diffculty of
reaching an understanding when one was in agreement as to the facts')
that what is at stake is a pure clash of theoretical frameworks ('two
incompatible. types of medical expeiience'), and not a situation in which
one theory began to apper increasingly inadequate in the light of another.66
As the preceding discussion h:as indicated, theories of the coherence of
systems of scientifc concepts are closely linked with theorie of continuity
and disontinuity in the history of science. If each proposition of a sience
130
PETER DEWS
is seen as capable of facing the tribunal of exprience independently, then
scienc will be seen as a gradual proess of alteration and accumulation.
If, on the other hand, the propositions of a science are seen as so closely
interrelated that none can be changed without altering the sense of all the
others, then each theory will determine it' own set of 'fact' and there will
be no common world of reference shared by different theories. Since both
Althusser and Foucault emphasize the rigidity and solidarity of problematics1
or epistemes, or 'regimes of disco\lrse', the concept of discontinuity plays
a central role in their respective accounts of the history of scienc. Again
the theme may be traced back to Bachelard, who was cqncerned' through
out his career to expose rhe notion of 'an abstract and invariable system
of reason' which would underlie both 'common sense' and the successive
stages of science. In contrast to this assumption, Bachelard affms. that
'thought 'is modifed in its form if it is modifed in its object.'7 The history
of science is characterized by 'epistemological discontinuities', after the
occurrence of which a science is concerned with new objectS, conducts its
research according to new principles, and even adopts a new logic. There
can be no simple linear accumulation of truths.
A number of commentators have pointed to a similarity between the
innovations introduced into epistemology in France by Bachelard and his
successors, and a similar transformation of philosophy of science in the
Englishspeaking world, initiated by the work of Kuhn. Hanson and.othes
in the early 1960s.08 In Kuhn's The SrurtWl of Scientifc Retolutions the
history of science is seen as divided up into a succession of what he terms
'paradigms', theoretical frameworks which are discontinuous in their
background assumptions, the kinds of entities which they psit, and their
assesment of which phenomena call for explanation. For Kuhn the trans
formation between one paradigm and its successor is so comprehensive -
his favoured analogy is that of a Getalt-switch between two irreconcilable
images - that he is led t argue: 'In so far as their only recourse to [the]
world [of their research engagement] is through what they see and do, we
may want to say thar after a revolution scientists are respnding to a
different world.'6 This may be compared with Bachelard's affrmation
that: 'contemporary $dence, i inviting [the mind] to new form of thought,
conquers for it .a new type of representation, and hence, a- new world.'70 In
bth cases theoretical frameworks appar to detemine the very nature _of
reality.
However, this convergence is far .less close than it at frst appears. In
Kuhn's case, at least in his early statements of his position, the theory of
paradigm changes leads towards relativism. Kuhn argues that, since there
can be no paradigm-independent access to reality, there can be no neutral
standpoint from which t access the comparative verisimilitude of different
paradigms. Consequently, the history of seience can no longer viewed as
the epic of cognitive progress: 'We may . . . have to relnquish the notion,
STRUCTURALISM _AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOlDGJCAL TRADITION 131
explicit or implicit, that changes of paradigm carry scientists and those
who learn from them closer and closer to the truth.171 None of these
considerations apply to the work of Bachelard. Indeed, Bachelard's con
ception of the transition between scientifc theories is a remarkably tradit
ional one. It is true that he affrms an initial disjunction between common
exprience and the reality posited by .sience ('The world in which one
thinks', states The Phiosophy of No, 'is not the world in which one
chinks'),72 but within the histor, of science itself Bachelard refers fat
more frequently to a 'rectifcation' or 'recasting' of the organizing principles
of a branch of science, rather than to a further process of rupture.
One of the comparatively rare ocasions when Bachelard employs the
term rupture ipistbnologique to refer to a break in scientifc development,
rather than to the initial break with the lived world,. is to be found in The
Philosophy pf No, in a passage concerned with the discovery of the ;tomic
substrudure of chemical elements. Yet even here Bachelard emphasizes
that 'a non-Lavoisian chemi'stry . . . dos not overlook the former and present
usefulness of classical chemistry. It tends only to organize a more general
chemistry, a panchemistry.m In the fnal chapter of the book Bachelard
extends this obserxation: 'Generalization by the "no" should include what
it denies. fn fact, the- whole rise of scientifc thought over the last century
derives from such diaectical generalizations, which envelop what is
negated. Behind its Hegelian phrasology, this account of scientifc devel.
opment differs little from the traditional realist conception of earlier scientifc
theories as 'limiting cases' of later theories, as approximately true or true.
given crtain additional initial conditions. Such developments may involve
a major reorganization of scientifc knowledge - and in this sense there
may be said to be 'discontinuity' - but there is no hint in Bachelard's work
of what'English-speaking philosophers of science have come to refer to as
'incommlnsurability'. As a result, Bachelard has an extremely forthright
view of science as an enterprise of cognitive progress. In a lectue given in
1951 he affrmed: 'The temporality of science is a growth of the numbr
of truths, a deepening of the coherence of truths. The history of the sci
ences t: the story of this growth and of this deepening.m
Althusser's relation t this aspect of Bachelard's work is highly ambigu
ous. On the one hand, he wishes to affrm the objectivity of science, yet
his general opposition t 'philosophies of history' makes him extremely
suspicious of the use of the concpt of progress, i n whatever domain. Thus
m Reading Capital Althusser suggests that 'the real history of the devel
opment of knowledge appears to us today' to be subject to laws quite
different to this teleological hope for the religious trimph of reason. We
are beginning to conceive this history as a history punctuted by radical
discontinuities . . . , profound reorganizations which, if they respect the
continuity of the existence of the regions of knowledge (and even thi is
not always the case), nevertheless inaugurate with their rupture the reign
PETER OWS
of a new logic, which, far from being a mere development, the "trlth" or
"inversion" of the old one, literally takes its place' (RC, 44). However, i
scientifc change does consist in one theoretical space being substituted for
another, if it involves 'a transformation of the entire terrain and its entire
horizon' (RC, 24), incommensurability must follow, and with it relativism.
Althusser's argument that 1every 'deology
-
must be regarded as a real whole,
internally unifed by its own problematic, so that it is impossible to extract
one element without altering its meaning' (FM, 62), appears to pint in the
same diretion: it would be impossible t challenge ideological proposit
ions except by employing their terms in precisel,thdr sense, and th1s
would require already having accepted the problematic of the ideology in
question as a whole. Althusser, however, draws back from these impHcat
ions of his own positions, In For MQrx, for example1 he. speaks of the
transition from 'Generality I to 'Generality III' in Bachdardian terms as
the production of 'a new scientifc generality which rejects t old one even
as it "englobes" it, that is, defnes its relativity and the (subordinate) limits
of its validity' (PM, 185). At other times, although preful to substitute the
term 'process' for that of 'progress', Althussr is prepared to admit an
accumulation of knowledge, In his 'Philosophy Course for Scientists' he
refers to 'a double "dialectic": the total elimination of "errors" and the
integration of earlier fndings, still valid but transformed, into the theoret
ical system of the new insights'?" At a deeper
-
level, Athusser's view of the
emergence of Marxist science as being also the emergence of the science
of its own ideological pre-history indicates a realist commitment (relativ
ism can have no theory of the social function of error); yet this commit
ment is never reconciled with the relativist implications of many of his
own formllations.
[
]
Undoubtedly, one of the reasons for the failur! of the.Althusseriansto note
the relativist implication of Foucault's historie of knowledge is that a
similar ambiguity is deply embedded in the work of Althusser himslft it
dings to the terms 'objectivity' and 'autonomy' which are central to
Althusser's account of science. When Althussr writes that; 'It is not indi
viduals who make the history of the siences, but its dialectic fs realized
in them and in their practice'/7 this statement may be taken as indicating
the kind of view of science put forward in the English-speaking world in
the later work of Karl Popper. For Popper, too, has attacked epiricist
theories of knowledge and the view that the statements of science can -b
ten @ symbolic linguistic expressions of mental states, resulting from
encounters between a subject and the world of perception; he has called
for an 'epistemology without a knowing subject'.78 Such an epistemology
would be based on the 'Sheer autonomy and anonymity' of what Popper
terms 'the third world', the world of propositions, theoretical systellS,
STRUCTURALIS' "NO THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 13
problem-situations, errors and solutions, which exists independently of the
consciousness and volition of human individuals. However, Popper's thi'rd
world can only exist on the presupposition that its element are linked not
by causal sequences, but by chains of argument, whose validity can only be
assessed by reference to the contemporary pr_oblem-situation in the third
world, and not by recourse to any psychological or sociological considerat
ions. Such a view is also hinted at by Bachelard when, in a lecture such
as L 'Actualite de l'histoire des $ciences, he argues for an autonomous
temporality of science on the basis that 'In the history of the sciences -
bestdes the link from cause to effect - there is established a link from
r
.
eason to -onsequence,m
There are a numbr of points in Althusser's work at which this appears
.to be the sense of 'objective' which IS intended, although this sense and this
intention are never adequately clatifedJ for example, when Althusser mys
teriously affrms that science is not pa.t of the superstructure (RC, 133);
or insists on the distinction between
.
historical and dialecticl materialism,
despite the fact that the latter, as 'the discipline which reflets on the
history of the forms of knowledge and on the mechanism of their produc
tion' (RC, 157), appears to be simply one region of the former. In thee
cases Althusser seems to be groping towards a defnition of the specal
autonomy and historicity of sdence as that of

an axiological activity, the

quest for truth'.8 His reluctance to formulate this autonomy deady may
be attributed to the fact that such a conception appears t concede an
unacceptable efectivity to ideas; it seems to ignore the rootedness of the
theoretica:J practice of science in determinate social and historical condit
ions. Thus there appears- in Althusser's discussions of science a second
type of formulation in which theoretical practice is seen as autonomous,
but onlY in the sense of 'autonomy' which is applied to all forms of
practice- within the Althusserian social formation. In Reading Capital
Althusset writes: 'we have paid great attention to the concepts in which
Marx thinks the general conditions of economic production 6 ,

not only to
grasp the Marxist theory of the economic region of the capitalist mode of
production, but also to asertain as far as possibk the basic concepts
(production, structure of a mode of production, history) whose formal
eiaboration is equally indispensable to the Marxist theory of the produc
tion of knowledge, and its history' (RC, 44). In short, what Althusser does
is to confuse the objectivity of a process with the 'process of objectivity',
rne epistemological independence of the development of science from the
consciousness of individual knowing subjects is confused with the independ
ence
-
of soci3\ process from human consciousness and volition assumed by
Althusser's determinist social theory, while the 'rational autonomy' of science
is not distinguished from the 'relative autonomy' of an instance within the
Althusserian social formation.
One of the few commentators to notice this ambigUity in Althusser was
134
PETER DEWS
Alain Badiou, the author of an influential review of .For Marx and Reading
Capital. In this essay, 'Le (Re)commencement du materialisme dialectiqu
e
',
81

Badiou noted a tension in Althusser's work between '[a] philosophy of the
concept which strongly resembles an exhibition of the structured feld of
knowledge as multi-transcendental and subjectless', and a Spinozist theory
of 'causality without negation.Bl The frst of these allows for an auo
nomy of logical relations, but at the price of introducing the 'dangerous'
notion of the transcendental; while the second eliminates transcendence at
the cost of presenting scientifc statements as purely causally determined.
Althusser is faced with the 'diffcult combination of a regional, regressive
and historical epistemology and a global theory of the effects of structure'.
This diffculty is clearly reflected in Althusser's changing psition on the
status and nature of Marxist philosophy. In For Marx and Rsading
Capital Marxist philosophy is presented as bing simply the theory of
theoretical formations and of their history, yet at the same time - at least
in Reading Capital Althusser reallzes that this defnition alone is in
adequate, since it treats 'knowledge as a fact, whose transformations and
variations it treats as so many effets of the theoretical prastice which
prodllCeS them' (RC, 61). In other words, a. 'scientifc' hiatory of knowl
edge, based on the Marxist conception of the 'ocial formation, cannot in
itself provide the means of distinguishing theoretical ideologies from.
scientifc theories: astrology would be treated with the same impartialityas
astronomy. Thus what is needed, in addition to a history of knowledge,
is an account of the 'mehanism' by which the object of knowledge
produces the cognitive appropriation of the real object, since ultimately
'the relation beteen , . , the object of knowledge and the real object . . .
constitutes the very existence of knowledge' (RC, 52). Althusser, of course,
is unsuccessful in supplying such an account, since the description of such
a 'mechanism' already presupposes a critrion for the identifcation of
know ledges. Furthermore, in posing the question as one af 1appropriation'
of the real (the notion of correspndence is not far away), Althusser not
only cancels all the daring of his account of science as a form of produc
tion, he also denies himself the "
e
ntral .insight_ of the Bachelardian tradit
ion: that objectivity is not an ahistorical relation, but must itself be
progressively and historically constituted.
Althusser's revised cnception of philosophy as a kind of theoretico
political go-between fails to ameliorate this psition, sinc Althusser still
does not question the division between an 'objective' history of science and
the philosophical justifcation of science. Rather, philosophy becomes
simply a process of issuing theoretical diktats on the objectivity of the sci
ences, while the history nf the sc1ences is now consigned enirely to historical
materialism. As late as his Essays in Self-Criticis, Althusser continues to
affrm the 'idealism or idealist connotations of all Epistemology' considered
as a speculative discourse concerned with the furnishing of 'justifcations'
STFUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION
135
of science1 and to suggest that 'if Epistemology is based on Historical
Materialim (though naturally possessing a minimum of concepts which
are its own and s_pecify its object), then it must be placed within it.'83 This
viewpint has been taken up and elaborated in works by the Althusserian
Dminique Lecourt. In his bok Bachelard: le jour et la. nuit Leourt
argues that Bachelard ha opened the way to 'a thery of the history of
scientifc ,practice of its conditions (historicl and material) and of its
forms'.84 How_cver, Bachelard himself remained the victim of the 'epistemo
logical illusion', .and continued to employ the traditional vocabulary of
the theory of knowledge_ even as he opened up new problems. He may be
read as attempting in the 'speculative' and 'idealist' mode- of philosophy,
to answer questions which in fact belong to 'the science of the process of
scientifc praice, a canton of historical materialism'Y
Both Althusser ad Lecourt fail to recognize that their original error lies
in the suPposition that discussion of the sciences must be divided btwen
an objective and materialist history, and a 'speculative' epistemology.
Althusserianism never takes cognizance of the fact that -in the domain of
the sciences - history and philosophy are complementary and intertwined,
that, in Canguilhem's phrase, 'without relation to the history of the
sciences, an epistemology would be an entirely superfuous double of the
scienc of which it claimed t speak';86 while, without a philosophically
normative dimension, the history of science cannot even identify its object.
This is the position of Bachelard who argues, at the beginning of La
Formation de /'esprit scienti(que, that 'The pistemologist must , . . sift the
documents collected by the historian. He must judge them from the pint
of view of reason, indeed from the point of view of a reason which has
evolved.'87 It is also the posititm of Canguilhem, lucidly proposed in tP,e
lecture which serves as a introuction t his _'udes d'histoir et de
philosophie des sciences, where he argues that the relation of the history
of science to its object cannot be equated with the relation of a science to
it object. The object of a science is determined by the ensemble of verifed
propsitions which have been established about that objct at a specifc
moment. There may well be changes m this -ensemble of propositions, but
these change do not concern the science itself, whose object may be
considered - in this sense - as non-temporal. The history of the sciences,
however, is concerned precisely with che transformations. of the concepts
which defne the objects of the sciences. But concepts are not objects. Since
the boundaries and. transformations of a cncept are lways relative to a
specifc interpretation of that concept, the histry -of the sciences cannot
itself be 'objective' in the scientifc sense: it can only be written from a
defnite philosophical standpoint. For Canguilhem the history of the sci
ences is not description of discourses or practices, but 'a represntation
of meanings\88
Yet even if-these asswnptions be granted,-there still remains the problem
136
PETER DEWS
of the epistemological viewpoint from whkh the history of the sciences
should be written, In Bache!ard's work this problem is resolved by the
introduction of the concept of 'recuirence'. Bachelard assumes that the
only possible point from which to begin is the scientifc values and atti
tudes of the present, since to deny these values would be to deny the
rationality of the development of science itself. Once this viewpoint has
been adopted, the mass of doumentation on the history of a science can
be divided into what is 'lapsed' and wht is 'ratifed', between those results
which must be consigned to the prehistory of scientifc knowledge, and
those which can be integrated into the sequence of the 'progressive forma
tions of truth'.E This choice of standpoint does not imply any form of
dogmatism, however. The relation between what is lapsed and what is
ratifed is labile, since such a 'recurrent' history of the science appreciates
that the values and results on which it is based are themselves destined to
be replaced by unforseeable future discoveries and developments, and
that therefore the history of the sciences mUst be continually re-written.
Canguilhem, who adopts the Bachelardian conception of recurrence,
expresses the distinctiveness of this position in the following way: 'One sees
the whole difference between recurrence, understood as a critical judge_
ment of the past by the present of science, assured, precisely because it is
scientifc, of being replaced and rectifed, and the systematic and quasi
mechanical application of a standard model of scientifc thery exercising
a kind of epistemological policing function over the theories of the past.
The scientifc presnt does not represent immutable truth, but it offers the,
only plausible perspective from which to judge the scientifc past.
[ . . . ]
Althusser's central concern is to establish the conceptual foundations of a
Marxist science of history, and to ensure that this science is not itself
threatened with relativism and historicism by being portrayed as the prod
uct of historical experience or historical forces. To achieve this end he
affrms an absolute disjunction betwen history as subjectively apprehended
and spontaneously theorized, and the 'theoretical object' of a Marxist
science of history, which is constructed entirely in thought, according to
a rational necessity. This conception obliges him, at certain pints) to take
his distance from Marx himself. In The German [deolog, for example,
Marx and Engels repatedly af6rm that their aim is to set out from 'real
active men and on the basis of their real life-process': only in this way can
the illusions of ideology and philosophy be exposed. But for Althuser this
appeal to 'real history' and to 'real active men', to life against conscious
ness, is itself ideological, a Feuerbachian residue in the works of the 'epis
temological brek'. In For Marx he argues that 'The critique which, in dte
last instance, counterposes the abstraction it attributes to theory and to
science and the concrete it regards as the real itself, remains _n ideological
STRUCTURALISM ANC THE FRENCH EPISTEMOlOGICAL TRADITON 137
crltique1 since it denies the reality of scientifc practice, the validity of its
-abstractions and ultimately the reality of that theoretical "concrete" which
is knowledge' (FM, 187). However, as we have already seen, Althusser's
own position leads to intractable problems in its attempt to construct a
purely ductive 'science' of history. Later Althusserian texts acknowledge
this error. In his essay 'Sur Ia dialectique historique', tienne Bali bar
admits that Reading Capital, despite its critique of reductionism, had
remained wedded to economism insofar as the other .instances of the social
formation were seen as ultimately determined by the requirements of, and
therefore defnable in terms of, the conditions of reproduction of the moe
of production. Balibar concdes that it is impossible to determine 4 priori
the essence of an- social instanc independently of its combination with
other instance within a given social formation. Furthermore, it is now the
social formation, understood as a prticular system of class struggles, which
relroduces or fails to reproduce a given moe of production, rather than
it being the mode of production which defnes the relations of a hierarchy
of subordinate instances.91 However, this concession to what would for
merly have been rermed 'empiricism' does not lead to any revision in the
fundamental -ssumptions of Althusserian epistemology. Unable to accm
modate the real without abandoning its own principles of scientifcity,
Althusserianism simply collapses into inconsittency.
With Foucault the situation is quite different. Indeed, one- of the deepest
principles of his work is precisely that return from 'metaphysics' to real
history which Althusser denounces in the Marx of The German [deology.
In Foucault's case, of course, the source is Nietzsche, who writes at the
beginning of Human, AU-too-Humah: 'Lack of historical sense is the
hereditary defect of all philosophers . . . Many of them take man. automat
ically as he bas most recently been shaped by the impression of 1 particular
religion or even of partitular political events , , , But everything his be
come; there are neither eternal facts nor eternal verities.'92 Thus, where
Althusser seeks. t neutralize empirical history in order to make way for
the philosoJhically-accredited object of Marxist science, Foucault con
siders that real history has already exposed the vagaries of philosophy. It is
for this reason that, whereas Althusser criticizes the authors of the Anna/es
school for having inadequately theorized their object, Foucault orgues in
the introduction t The Archaeology of Knowledge that the history of
disjunct temporalities and chronological series discovered by the Annales
historians has in itslf exposed the illusions of totalizing philosophies.
Foucault's position is well summed up by a remark he makes at the end
of The Archaeo/og' of Knowledge: 'If you lecognize the rights of empirical
research, some fragment of history, to thallenge the transcendental
dimension, then you have ceded the main point.'93
The contrast in the status of knowledge itself which these opposing
_positions imply is prhaps even more striking. Althusser appreciates that
138 PTE DWS
in discussing the history of science in terms of modes of theoretical pro
duction he is running a great r.k. For such a history 'takes knowledges for
what they are, whether they declare theinselves know ledge or not, whether
they are ideological or scientifc etc.: for knowledge.. It considers them solely
as products, as reults' (RC, 61).- I other words, the objective history
of
science which Althusser supposes possible fails to provide a normative
criterion for knowledge. And however much he twists and turns. Althusser
cannot avoid the need for such a criterion. I Foucault's case, however,
this is precisely the effect which he wishes to achieve: his aim is t treat
knowledge in an objective, third-person manner as simply a form of social
practice like any other, without making any epistemological judgement. It
is for this reason that, whereas Bachelard and Canguilhem take the sctentifc
preent a the unavoidable vantage-point of historical eptstemology, Foucauh:
'-ttempts to distance himslf from every presup.osition of contemprary
science. However, this does not mean thH 'Foucault- has attained a
philosophical neutrality, as he himself often supposes. Rather, during the
1960s, he adopts a position which, although not identical with that of
Nietzsche - who views knowledge as a pragmatic nvention', the lrouct
of a play of unconscious drives, biological contingencies and moral
imperatives - nevertheless has the same effect. In describing modes of
rationaHty as determined by structures which are themselves historically
contingent, Foucault '-do.ts rhe Nietzschean view of the 'irrational' origin
of reason itself. In this way, even in those of Foucault's works in which
political struggle has all but disappeared from view, rhe ground is being
prepared for the account of knowledge which emerges during the 1970s.
For
if forms of scientifc discourse cannot be seen as accepted by subjects
on rational grounds, it bcomes possible to cnstruct a theory in whkh
such forms are imposed on subjcts by the operation of power. The way
is open for a 'politics of truth'.
NOTES
1
Jean-Paul Sartre, Beee1 Exirtentialism and Marxism, New Left Books,
London, 1974, p. 55.
2 See Bernard Pingaud, Introduction to L'Arc 30, 1966 (speial issue on Sartre)
3 Critique of Dtalectical &ason New Left Boks, London, 1976, p. 125.
4 Ibid., p. 126.
5 Ibid.
6
Claude Lrvi-Scrauss, StrUctural Anthropology 2, Penguin, Harmondswonh,
1978, p. 330.
7 The Savage Mind, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 19661 p. 262.
8 Critique of Dialectjcal Reason, p. 74.
9 Structural Anthropolgy 2 p. 36.
10 The Savage Mind, p. 253. .
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRADITION 1:9
11 See 'Claude UviSttaus: A Confrontation', New left Relew 62, July/August
1970.
12 Structural Anthropology, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1972, p. 21.
13 The Savage Mindr
.
P 262.
14 Du Miel dux cerdres, Libraitie Pion, Paris, 1966, p. 408.
15 Critique of Dialectical Reaso1, p. 75.
16 The Svage Mind, p. 262.
17 Se the remarks on 'Strcmralism and Literry'Criticism' in 'Answers' to Some
Investigatons', Strutral Anthropology 2, pp. 274-76.
18 Ibid., p. 274.
19 L'Horrte nu, Librirle Pion, Paris, 1968, p. 574,
20 Structural A"thropolog 2, p. 349.
21 L'Hom1 nu, p. 569.
22 'Entretien ave' Claude Levi-Strauss', in 'Raymond 'ellour and Catherine
Clement, eds; Clade Uvi-Strauss, Paris, 1979, p. 160.
23 Louis Althusser and Etienne 'atibar, Reading Capital, New Left Books,
London, 1970, p. 17, Further references to this work will be indicated in the
teXt in _parentheses by the abbreviation RC, followed by a page number.
24 Structural Anthropology, p. 121.
2S The .Savage Mind, p. 117.
26 Ibid., pj 130.
27 'Introduction a !'oeuvre de Marcel Mauss', in Marcel Mauss, Sociofogie et
anthropologfe, Pati,. 1950, p. xi.
28 For a reprentative- statement. of this position, see Cart G. Hempe\1 'Reasons
and Covering Laws i Historicl Explanation', in Sidney Hok, ed,, PhUosophy
and History: A Symposium, New York, 1963 (reprinte in Patrick Gardiner,
The Philosophy of History, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1974).
29 Structural Anthropology, p. 35.
30 Fr Mar,, Allen Lane, London, 1969, p-. 208. Further references to this work
will be indicated in the text in parentheses by the abbreviation FM, followed
by a page number,
31
Ethirs, Part 2, Proposition XVIII.
32 Quoted in, Urs Jaeggi, Theoretisrhe Pra:is, Frankfurt/M., 1976, p. 105.
33 Politics and Hfsoy: MoHtesquieu, Rousseau, Hegel and Marx, New Left Books,
London, 1972, p. 99.
34 Tristes Tropiges, Pengin, Harmondsworth, 1976, p. 71 {translation modifed),
35 Gaston 'ache lard, Le Nouvel esprit sdentifque, Prese Univeritair de Prance
Paris, 1978, p. 178.
36 L' Actviti rationaltste de Ia physique contemporaine, Presses Universitaires de
France, Paris, '19.1, p. 10,
3 7 L'Engagement nitionaliste1 Presses Universitaires de Prance, Paris, 1972 p. 36.
3'8 Tis statement require B quali1cacion. Bachelard' oscillates betwen Gnstruc
tivism and the tacit asumption that sientifc theories do refer to an undor
lying realty. 'ut since he tends to equate 'naive' rcilism with realim tout court,
he is unable to give a theoretical status to such a reality.
39 Essai sur Ia connaissance approchie, Librailie Philosophique J. Vrin, Paris,
1928, p. 43.
40 La Poitique dtla reverie, Presses Universitaires de France, Pads, 1960, p. 46,
140
-41 Politics and History, p. 38.
PETER DEWS
42
See 'Archaeology and Knowlege (Michel Foucault)', i Dominique Lcurt,-
Marxism and Epistemology, New Ldt Books, London, 1975.
4
3
Stanislav Andreski, ed., The Essential Comte, London, 1974, p. 32.
44 Ibid., p. 22.
45 Michel Foucault, 'La Pen$6e du dehors', Critique 229, 1966, p. 526.
46
The Birth of the Clinic, Tavistock London, 1973, p. 108.
47 Ibid., p. xii.
48
Le Rationalisme appiiqui, Presss Univeritaire de France, Pari 1975, p. 38,
4 9 Ibid., p. 2.
:50' The Archaeolog of Knowledge, Tavistok, London, 1972, p. 191.
51 Structural Anthropology 2, pp. 231-32.
52 The Birth of the Clinic, p. 90.
53 The Archaeology of Knowledge, p. 191.
54 Ibid., p. 45.
55 Ibid., p. 48.
56 Essas in Self-Criticism, Ne Lft Books, London, 1976, p. 58n.
57 Ibid., p. 168.
58
Lenin ad Philosoph and Other Essays, New Left Books, London, 1971,
p. 160.
59 Essas in Se/(-CriticisW, p. 161.
60 Language, Counter-Memory, Practice, Basil Blackwell, oxford, 1977, p:. BS.
61 For discussion of this point, see Charles Taylo, 'Force et se!s', in G. B.
Madison, ed., Sens et existnc, Paris, 1975.
6Z 'RCponse au Cerde d'epistemologie', Cahiers po1r /'analyse 9, Summer 1968,
p. 17.
63 The Archaeo{ogy of Ktu{ed
g
e, pp. 44-45.
64
Georges Canguilhem, La Connaissance de Ia vie, Librairie Philosophique ].
Vrin, Paris, 1965, p. 50.
65
Ido!gie et rat(on(/iti, Ibrairie Philoophlque ]. Vrin, Paris, 19n, p, 56.
66 The Dirth of the Clitic, p. 174.
67 Le Novel esprit sdentifque, p. 56.
68
It shollc be
-
noted that the French term 6pistrmo/ogle has a narrower con
notation than its English equivalent, being closer to the English term 'philos
ophy of sctence' than to 'theory of knowledge'.
69 Thomas Kuhn, The Strutue of Scientific Rvolutions, Chicago University
-
Press,
Chicago, 1974, p. 111.
70
L Philosophic du non, Preses Universitaires de France, Paris, 1975, p. 122.
71
The Structure of Scientic Re1lutions, p. 170.
72 La Pbilosophie du 1on, p. 110.
73 Ibid., p. 65.
74 Ibid., p. 167.
75 'L'Actualite de l'histoire des sciences', L'Engagement r(tionaliste, p 139.
76 Philosophy and the Spontaneous Philosophy of th Scieltists and Other
Essays, Verso, London, 1990, p. 122.
77 Politics and History, p. 168.
78
See Karl Popper, Obiective Knowledge, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1972,
especially Lhapters 3 and 4. The suggestion of an affnity between Althussu
STRUCTURALISM AND THE FRENCH EPISTEMOLOGIAL TRADITION 141
and Popper Qn thi p_oint has been made, among othen, by Ian Hacking, 'Imre
Lakatos's Phiiowphy of Science', rtf8h]Ovrn0JOt fh8 1hIOsOphy O]c8nc8
3, 1979, p. 3941 and Paul Patton, 'Althusser's Epistemology', 0dc01hOs-
Ophj 19, Sutnmer 1978, p. 8.
79 !ng8m8nf t0Ot:csf8 p. 46,
80 Georges L8uguJhcm.Cfvd8sdhtsf0z88fd8hO$0h8d8s:c8tIc8s, Librairie
Philosophique J. Vrin, Paris, 1970, p. 19.
81 Ltfgu8 240, May 1967.
82 Ibid., p. <66.
83 !sy n 8JLrfc8m, p .+ '124n.
84 dthc0rd; L8 ]0ut 8f c 0mf Grasset, Paris, 1974, p. 95.
85 Ibid., p. 1 OL
86 fud81 dhsfO18 8 d Jh0sOh8 q8s sc8nc8s p. 12.
87 Jc Ormcf0n d8 8srf sO8nfgu8, Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin, Paris,
1977, p_. 17.
88 Gerge Cnguilh.em, L rmcfOn dv cOm8fd8 r8J8X8au XV 18cf18
sitcles; "Prese- Universitaites de France, Paris, 1955, p 158.
89 See Ltltvf0 r0fOndst8 d8 l hysgv0 onfwO0n8 chapter 1.
90 d600I8 8ft0fI0n0lf p. 21.
91 (ng cfm8s du m0l8fMt8 htsf0tgu Fran<is Maspero, Paris, 1974, pp.
203-45. For an English. version, see Etienne 1alibt, 'Self Cri6cism: An Answer
tP Question from "Th.eoretical Px>tice"', h8Or8fc0 !tdcftc 7/8, Janury
1973.
92 -Frtedrich Nietzsch.e, Hurall, All-To-Human, IIi, paragraph 2.
93 h8 ArchmO0gj O] fnOv8dg8 p. 203.

THINKING WITH BORROWED

CONCEPTS: ALTHUSSER AND LACAN

David Macey
Te reference to psychoanalysis, sometimes overt,
.
sometimes covert, so
imbues the Althusserian project of founding and elaborating a science of
modes of production and social formations .that it .-ppears almas't natural.
No doubt it always seemed rather less than natural to many in the French
Communist Party, which had offcially denounced psychoanalysis as a
'reactionary ideology' in 1949.1 No signifcant revision of that condem
nation had taken place when 'Freud and Lacan' was frst published in 1964
and Althusser's public gesture of theoretical sympathy for Lacan was a
courageous one. Yet the presence of psychoanalysis in. Althusser's dis
course does, with hlnd$ght, begin to look distinctly unnatural, though not
because psychoanalysis is to be rejected as a reactionary ideology in favour
of Pavlov. To go back to Althusser"s references to Freud, Lacan and psy
choanalysis is to return to texts which were- once a familiar part of the
mtellectual landscape on both sides -f the Channel. due allowance bei11g
made for the remarkably slow migration of concepts across that stretch
of water. Going back can often b an unsettling experience: the familiar
begins to look uncannily strange, natural allies to look like unnatura1
bedfellows.
In France, the mid1960s saw the cementing of what Michel Pikeux
nicely termed a ' "Triple Alliance" in theory' between the names of
Althusser, Lacan and Saussure.2 Saussure appears to have bee_n of no great
interest to Althusser himself, but the Triple Alliance was very much a
theoretical reality. It could, on occasion, be tactically expanded to include
Foucult - and espcially the Foucault of The Order of Tl'ngs and The
Archaeology of Knowledge and i could drift towards a flirtation with
a more generalized structuralism, though Althusset would later admit that
his cadinal sin had been Spinozism and not structuralim.3 The oligins of
the Triple Alliance are, however, to be found in the Rejtion Front
unilaterally declared by Althusser in 1963.
ALTHUSSER AND LACAN
143
In an article on philosophy and the human iences written & 1963,
Althusser remarks that 1Marx based his theory on the rejection of the myth
of the "homo oeconomlcus", Freud based his theory on the rejection of
the ryth of the 'homo psychologus" ', adding that Lacan 'has seen and
underStood Freud's fiberatLng rupture',4 In corre&pondence with Lacan,
Althusser is more expnsive and tells the psychoanalyst: 'You are . . . the
.frst thinker to assure the theoretical responsibility of giving Freud the
real concepts he deserves, 4 It was at the point where I realized that I was
capable of giving Marx's thought . , . its theoretical for, that I found myself
on the threshold of understanding you.'
Lacan and Althusser had, in the latter's view, the 'same adversaries',
namely the 'pseudo-psycho
-
logists and the other philosophers of_ '1the
human person') and of "intersubjectivity" ', the 'technocrats' of structural
ism, with their pretentious, homilies and their amateurism, 'in short, their
theoreticalimposture'. The Ftendian and Marxist revolutons are analo
gous in that their respective theorists were obliged to think in a 'non
philosophical form' because the historical constraint of the day had reduced
their thought to a 'wild' {sauvage} state. To that extent, neither revolution
was complete, but Althusser feels justifed in prophesying its victory and
speaks of the joy of 'a reason which has at last "come home" to its most
disconcerting and nearest objects, I prophesy: we have, largely thanks to
you, entered a ptriod in which it is possible co be prophets in our own
country., I do not have the merit of running any risk in making this proph
esy; we now have the right to make it, as we have the means t do so in
this country, whih has at last become ours/ Lacan replied that he
h-d
read the copy of 'On the Materialist Dialectic' sent him by- Althusr,
adding, in the characteristic tone that combines fattery of his reader w1th
a self-assurance bordering on arrogance, 'I reognize my questions in it.'
Preoccupied with his own battles and With psychoanalytic politics, Lacan
cid not bcome a major participant in the project that was being tenta
tively outlined by Althusser.
The Rejection Front and the subsequent Triple Alliance had enemies in
common rather than a shared project, an9 their primary enemies were
humanism and eclecticism. Once more Althusser's undoubted courage has
to be noted. There is a real and trgic grandeur to his proclamation in
April 1965 that the development of Marxist science is 'a duty for Com
munists' and his claim that 'the party wants to unite theory wit_h its prac
tical application.'7 This surely, was always the voice of a prophet crying
in the wilderness of his own land, of an intellectual in the wilderness of
his own party. Arguing the case for theoretical antih\.manism in the PCP
was
-
never going to be easy. This was the party which, since the Popular
Front of 1936, had insisted that the proletariat was the rightful heir to a
national culture which was being debased hy the bourgeoisie. And a major
par-t of that heritage was precisely the humanism of the Enlightenment. It
'
DAVID MACEY
was also the party which, according to Althusser,_ had ben born into a
theoretical void.
There were many reasons, in Althusser's view, to stress the nee for
ideological struggle and 'theoretical formation' - not least the ideological
effects of the widening Sino-Soviet split, as reflected in the long-standing
tensions between the 'Italians' (proto-Eurocommunists) and the 'Chinese'
(proto-Maoists) in the PCF and its student organization. Hence the further
'analogy' between resistance t psychoanalytic and political 'revisionism'.
Althusser speaks of the need to combat 'psychoanalytic revisionism' and.
the 'fall into ideology [that} bgan . . . with the fall of psychoanalysis into
biologism, psychologism and sociologism'.9 The return to Freud and the
return to Marx are, that is, both struggles against revisionism. One is a
struggle against the Marxist humanism of, say, Garaudy; the other battle
against 'the reduction of a distnguished practice to a labl suitable to the
"American way of life "' and a 'theology of free enterprise'.10 The per
version in question ls of course ego-pychology, or the theory that analytic
treatment should promote and strengthen a 'conflict-free' zone within the
ego. Ego-psychology ls anathem; to Lacan's insistence that the ego itself
is an illusory and alienating construct; there is no therapeutic gain to be
had in strengthening an illusory construct. The thrust, if not the letter, of
Althusser's call to arms deflects the argument away from any clinical context
and establishes a further analogy. At some level, he implies, the struggle
against psychoanalytic and theoretical revisionism are one and_ the same.
At a more banal, but no less real level, Lacan's scornful reference to the
'American way of life' would have touched an anti-American chord in
many a French Communist (and not few Gaullists). The allusion to a
'pact of peaceful coexistence' between psychoanalysis and psychology11 -
which, as will become apparent, is probably brrowed from Georges
Canguilhem - was also highly cathected with po1itical connotations at a
time when peaceful coexistence between the 'super-powers' was regarded
in pro-Chinese circles as a prime symptom of revisionism. Political signifers
are being used here to connote the existence of a conceptual parallel be
tween Althusser's Marxism and Lacan's psychoanalysis.
At no point is there a real attempt on the part of the Triple Alliance to
'articulate' psychoanalysis and historical materialism, probably bcause it
would be doomed to failure - not least because of the incompatibility be
tween their respective emphases on intrapsychic reality and socio-economic
reality. Bali bar, for example, speaks rather circumspctly of the possibility
of discovering or detecting 'epistemological analogies' between the theo
retical work of Marx and Freud, and explains them in terms of the similiar

'ideological situation' of the two theorists. '2 Psychoanalysis is not a partner
in an articulation but, rather, a provider of concpts. There is an obvious
irony at work here. Althusser describes Freud as having been forced to
think with imported concepts, with 'concepts borrowed from the
Al THUSSER AND lACAN 145
thermodymamic physics then dominant'13 (thereby avoiding the diffcult
issue of whether or not Freud's reference to thermodynamic physics is a
metaphor, a borrowed conceptual framtwork, or an integral part of his
descriptions of the 'libido and the primary processes), and then borrows
psychoanalytic concepts for a variety of purposes,
When a !lied with Mao's essay On Contradiction (1937), psychoanalysis
supplies the concept of overdetermination, originally elaborated in The
Interpretation of Dreas to describe the manner in which every element
of the dream-content is expressed many times in the dream-thoughts. It
provides the protocols for the practice of symptomatic reading, modelled
on the manner in which Marx reads the texts of classical. political economy,
exposing the second text which exists in their slips and silences, and repro
duced in the rc ading that allows Althusser to detect the epistemological
break divorcing the mature Marx from the young humanist of the 1844
Manusciprs.14 The model is the suspended or evenly-poised attention with
which the analyst listens to his or her analysand, refusing to reject or
privilege any veibalization, just as the analysand follows the fundamental
rule of saying all and omitti'ng nothing. Having had years of personal
experience of analysis, Althusser was well aware of just what the analytic
situation involved and, as if to forestall the obvious objection that analysts
listen rather than read, he again argues in terms of tacit analogies: since
Freud, we have begun to understand what is meant by speaking; since
Marx we have bgun to suspect what reading meansY In a slightly more
mysterious way, psychoanalysis provides the raw materials for the con
struction of the idea of metonymic or structural causality, which describes
the effects of a structure on. its component elements. Here, the import
process is less clear than ft might be; the reader tends r be referred by
Althusser to JacquesAlain Miller/6 and thence to Lacan.
More conspicuously, psychoanalysis will feed into the theory of ideal
. ogy, classically the most diffcult area for any variety of Marxism seeking
to ecape the antinomies of false and true consciousness or the simplicitie
of economic determinism. Althusser displaces debates about ideology in
two directions in the influential essay on ideology and ideological state
apparatusesY The two directions ate nor easy to reconcile. On the one
hand, Althusser moves towards a sociological account centre on the
reproduction of the conditions of production, effectively reviving certain of
Gramsci's comments on the distinction between state and civil society, 18 or
those apparatuse which function 'by ideology' as opposed to the repres
sive agency of the state itself. On the other, he moves towards psycho
analysis and a theory of the constitution of .subjects and even subjectivity.
I 'Marxism (nd Humanism' (1964) ideology is desribed as being
'a matter of the ltved relation between men (sic) and their world',19 The
canonical and slightly different formulatinn is from 1969: 'What is
expressed in ideology is . . . not the system of the real relations which
146
DAVI MACEY
govern the existence of individuals, but the tma-ginary relation of those in
dividuals to the real relations in which they live.120 Initially, no specifcally
Lacanian connotations appear to attach to the notion, and imaginary i
effectively synonymous with false, the antonym of science or Theory. It is
also made synonymous with lived experience.
Highly positive terms in any variant
-
of the phenomenological tradition,
'lived' and 'lived experience' (le v8cu) are, for Althusser and his associates,
negatively connoted. As a bitterly self*critical participant in the Lire le
Capital project wa to note after the event, an exclusive concentration on
theory and theoretical formation made it possible to 'relegate everything
else, all the ptty academic, fnancial or sexual miseries of students to the
domain of illusion which, in our discourse, was designated Py a Concept:
le vecu.'
'
-1 Le vecu W$ to take a bitter revenge. One of the omens of May
'68 was the situationist pamphlet entitled De la midre en milieu Btudiant
(On the Poverty of Student Life), and the issues raised in May certainly
prtined to le vecu. As a slogan of the day proclaimed, 'Structure do not
take to the treets.' Another and more ad hominem slogan wa yet more
cruel: Althusser a rien ('Althusser no good/A I, you're useless' [tu sers a ren] ).
Perhaps it is signifcant that the ISAs essay, which places so much stress
on the role of the eduational apparatus, makes no mention of the fact
-
that that apparatus had recently ground to a halt. And that the praise for
the efforts of schoolteachers and masters should be innocent of any refer
ence to the rebellion of students. It is also striking that no mention is made
of the Ecole Normale Superieure - the 'amniotic fluid' in which_ Althusser
lived for so long - or of its undoubted role in the reprodLiction of social
and intellectual elite.ll
'Freud and Lacan' originally appeared in La Nouvelle Critique in 196-4,
When it appeared in English translation in New Left 'eview fve years later,
Althusser prefaced it with a letter to his translator and a note. Arguing
that certain of his earlier theses required expansion or correction, Althusser
made some strange suggestions that were never followed up. On the one
hand, 'the unconscious' should be 'rechristened' as soon as a better term
could be found. Further discussion should be devoted to 'forms of familial
ideology' and the 'cruci"l role they play' in initiating rhe function of the
instance of rhe unconscious. Their elucidation was a task for historical
materialism, and one that could not be undertaken by Lacan, 'given his
theoretical formation'. Althusser concludes that
'
n theory of psycho
analysis can be produced without basing it on historical materialism (on
which the theory of familial ideology depends, in the last instance).m
'Familial ideology' remains sadly unspecifed, as does the reference in the
ISAs essay to the 'other' (non-ideological) functions of the family. Lapsing
into near-banality and frustrating the hope that his work might have some
thing to offer feminism, Althusser merely remarks in a footnote that '[t]he
family . . . intervenes in the reproduction of labour power. In different modes
AL THUSSER AND LACAN 141
of production it is the unit of production and/or the unit of consump
tion.'24 The formulation provides little ammunition for struggles against a
male--dOminated society (or party).
The proiect that is being outlined here clearly reveals the hegemonic
ambitions of historical materialism as it aspices tO the role of epistemolog
ical High Court ot even meta-science. Although he speaks in general terms
of the need for i"eologlcal criticism and ep
.
iStemological elucidation - a
labour at leaBt inifiated by Lacan - if the specifcity of Freud's discovery
is to be graspd., and if it is to be defended against 'psychoanalytic revis
ionism'. the comments added in 1969 introduce a disquieting note. The
'rechristening' of the unconscious would be revisionist indeed, and the
implication that the kernel of psychoanalysis must somewhow be separ
at.ed out from 'familial ideologies' would be no less far-reaching. It would
at least appear to imply some recaBting of the Oedipal complex, which
seems to'be the referent for Althusser's portmanteau allusion to 'the ideol
ogy of paternity-matrnity-conjugalityinfancy',25
More astonishing is the use of familial metaphors in 'Freud and Lacan'
itself. Arguing that Western Reason has always paid great attention to
births, Althusser continues: 'When a young science is born, the family
circle i s always ready for astonishment, jubilation and baptism, For a long
time, every child even the foundling, has been reputed the son of 'a father,
and when it is a prodigy, the fathers would fght at the gate if it were
not for the mother and th.e respect due to her.'26 The nineteenth century,
.however, saw the birth of three 'natural' or illegitimate children: Marx,
Nietsche and Freud. No more will be heard of Nietzsche {or of mothers),
Foundlings and illegitimate children are, of course, the principal fgures
in Freud's 'family romances' - the myths invented by children in their
attempt to negotiate Oedipal diffculties -by saying 'these are not my .eal
prents.' A strange family romance appears to be at work in Althusser's
text, and especially in the claim that 'fathers in theory [Freud] could fnd
none' nd that he had 'to be himself his own father, to constt\lCt with his
own crafumans hands the theoretical space in. which to situate his own
discovery' P If a family .romance is at work here, the implications of the
Young Marx/Mature Marx. dichotomy and of references to a return to the
Freud of 'his maturity28 begin t0 look like elements in a complex network
of fantasy. Illegitimacy, or the fantasy of being one's own father, would
.
seem to be the precondition for the legitimacy of concepts and theory.
The theoretician must not only be his own father; he must also deny ever
having been a child.
The loneliness of the innovative theoretician is a recurrent motif in
Althusser: Marx, Freud, Machiavelli and Spinoza together make up a pan
theon of lonely individuals struggling in theoretical solitude to give birth
to their concepts
29
In 1964, it was not diffcult to add Lacan to the pan
theon. He had recently been removed by the International Psychoanalytic
DAVID MACEY
Association from its list of approved training analysts, and had openly
likened his situation to that of Spinoza when he was expelled and excom
municated from the synagogue on. 27 July 1656.30 Althusser clearly iden
tifes with his pantheon and would later speak with nostalgia of the
'marvellous times' when he at last achieved his one desire: 'Being alone
and right in the face of all'.31 Theoretical work obviously does not suspend
the working of the imaginary.
At the end of 'Freud and Lacan', Freud is credited with the diScovery
'that the human subject is decentred, constituted by a structure which has
no "centre" either, except in the imaginary misrecognition of the "ego",
i.e. in the ideological formations in which it "recognizes" itself.'31 The
formulation occurs after a reference to Fteud's comparison of his discovery
of the unconscious to the Copernican Revolution, that locus cltssi of
his heroic history of the sciences and a crucial element in his self-image
{or self-mirecognition), Freud speaks of the realization that 'the ego is not
master in its own house', meaning that the unconscious has reasons of
which the reason of the ego knows nothing.
Althusser ls projecting onto Freud Lacan's theory of the mirror-stage, as
described in two of the best-known crits,33 The mirror-stage describe! that
crucial stage of development i which a child of approximately eighteen
months recognizes its own image in a looking-glass. The image is unifed
and presents leveJ of co-ordination that the child has yet to achieve in
its actual life; it is therefore greeted witb jubilation. It also represents,
however, an imaginary other - and an image of the other - and the child's
identifcation is therefore alienation, a misrecognition. Identifcation,
alienation and misrecognition combine to produce a characteristic pttern
of behaviour: the child identifes with others, crying when it sees another
child fal!, and complaining that it has been struck when it is in fact the
aggressor. Lcan fnds in this pattern the origins of all subsequent alienations
and identifcations: the identifcation of master with slave, of seduced with
seducer. It is the prototypicl situation that will lead to man's desire being
defned as the desire of/for the other. This is the mirror to which Althusser
turns in his description of ideology as an imaginary order.
Whilst he draws on Freud's theory of narcissism and the description of
the fort-da game irr Beyond the Pletsure Principle, Lacan's text. also makes
it clear that h sources are not confned to the psychoanalytic tradition.
The behaviour of a child- is contrated with that of a chimpanzee of s'imilar
age - an animal with better motor coordination and no lasting interest
in mirror-images. Primate ethology provides the contrasting modelt and it
fndings are combined with those of child psycholog'ists such a Walln.34
Far from signalling a rejection of homo p$ychol'giCus, the mirror-stage
represents the introduction of elements -of psychology and ethology into
psychoanalysis,
A the child-chimpanzee comparison suggests, Lacan is also concerned
AL THUSSER AND LA CAN
149
with a humananlmal contrast or differentiation; the same concer appears
in his frequent referenceB to Levi-Strauss' nature/culture transition. And
his concern here is overdetermined by his most powerful and lascing
philosophical infuence - namely, Hegel - for whom the break-up of a col
lectivity of individLals associated a 'a communiy of animals' is a major
momem in the development of individuality, and according to whom 'self
consciousness , . , only has real existence so far as lt alienates itself from
itself.'3s Th Hegel in q11estion is the creation Qf Alexandre Kojeve, whose
seminar, held at the Ecole Pratique des Haures Etudes from 1933 t 1939
and regularly attended by Lacan i n the years 1933-37, influenced a gen
eration.38 {A renewed interest in it recently triggered a debate about the
'end of hitory' ,37) It was Kojtve who provided the particularly violent
reading of the Phenomenolog of Spirit and the conceiltration on the master
slave dialectc. that so mark Lacan, Kojeve and not Hegel himself supplies,
for instai1ce, rhe notion of a struggle for recognition aud pure prestige, and
virtually every mention of the name 'Hegel' in the Eits should Jn fact
read 'Kojeve' 38
Althusser speaks of Lacan's 'paradoxical resore to 'philosophies com
pltely foreign to his scientifc undertaking (Hegel Heidegger)',3 That he has
misrecognized a vital element in Lacan can be simply demonstrated by
means of two quotations petaining to the phenomenology of 'the basic
category of the unconsdou5': desire.0 The frst is from Kojev himself:
'Desire is human . . . only if it js directed towards other Desire and
ro.wwds the Desire of an other .'41 The second, from probably the greatest
of France's post-war Hegelians, illustrate the ease with which a Lacanian
sounding iormula can appear in a reading of Hegel: 'The desire for life
becomes the desire for an other desire or rather, given the necessary reci
procity of the phenomenon, human desire is always a desire for the desire
of an other.'2 In his inaugural lecture at the College de France, Foucault
descrbed the recent history of French philosophy as being the history
of an attempt to .scape Hegel, via either logic or epistemology, and added
that appeals against Hegel might be 'one more of the ruses he uses against
us, and at the end of which he is waiting for us, Immobile and elsewhere.'43
Lacan's mirror iS te 'elsewhere' in which Hegel wair for Althuser.
The existence of the Hegelian-Kojfvean strand ln Lac an is not the only
problematic area. Althusser's theses on ideology are dualistic, operating
with a science/ideology, rel/imaginary dichotomy, whereas Lcan intro
duces a triadic or trinitarian structure of Real, Symbolic and Imaginary.
The orders interact rather than being opposed to one another, and there
is crtainly no question of the subject's e'scapin thefr combined actions.
And although the differences between Lacan and Althusser may appear
verbal, they are conceptual. For the Marxist theorttlcian, 'real' is presum
.ably synonymous with 'actually existing'; for Lacan it refers to that which
lies forever outside discourse, that which is unamenable co analysis and
150 DAVI MACEY
akin to the deity of negative thelogy: susceptible to description only
in terms of what it is not, 'Imaginary' is not synonymous with 'fctive', and
designates the ability to create and identify with images or images. Lacan's
use of rhe term 'imaginary' is no doubt affected by the characteristic
tendency of twentieth-century French philosophy to think the problem of
the other in purely visual terms, M classic example being Sartre's theory of
'the gaze' [!e regard]. Insofar as it is synonymous with the realm of culture,
it would seem that it is in fact the symbolic which i' closest to most
defnitions of ideology. The identifcation of the symbolic with ideology is
not, however, an option open to Afthusser. since it. would.create an oppo
sition between science and not only ideology, butalso the whole of human
existence.
The operation of ideology and its constitution of subjects ('[a]ll ideology
hails or interpellates concrete individuals as concrete subjecu, by the func
tioning of the category of the subject'44) i illustrated by a primal scene of
Althusser's devising: an individual walking down the street is hailed -
'Hey, you there?' - and turns around. He thus becomes a subject, 'because
he has recognized that the hail was "realt" address-d to him Exprience
shows that the practical telecommunication of hailings is such that they
hardly ever miss their man: verbal call or whistle, the one hailed always
recognizes that it is really him who is being hailed'40 That an element of
humour may be in play here : suggested by the footnote in which Althussr
alludes to the 'special' form of 'the policeman's . . . hal.Ung of "suspects"',
but it unwittingly signals a flaw in the argument: the workings of ideology
are illustrated by a state repressive practice. A sardonic Michele Barrett
raises a further objection when she notes that interpellation's supposed
universality is unlikely to apply to women, for whom the 'experience of
being hailed (especially by whistling!) on the stret more ofren has the
opposite effect of denying their individual identity and interpellating them
in unnervingly generic terms.'46 Nor is it likely to apply to the young
blacks whose interpllation on the streets of Paris is more likely to rult
in a beating (or even death) than in recognition. In 'erms of the relation
ship with psychoanalysis, it is, however, the superimposition of a structure
of recognition upon one of misrecognition that is so disastrous. The sub
ject of Lacan's mirror-stage does nor recognize himself through the verbal
interpellation of an other; he (mis-)recognizes himself in an image of the
self as other.
The interpellation thesis relMes to a sort of primal scene,
.
in keepi_ng with
the argument that 'ideology' (as -opposed to 'ideologies') is eternal and has
no history-. The suggestion is tentatively related to 'Freud's proposition
that ihe uJconscious is etemal, i.e., that it has no history',47 No reference
is given for this allusion, but it is probably to Freud's description of the
'timelessness' of the unconscious. Timelessnes is however, merely one char
acteristic of the unconscious, which is also typifed by exemption from
AL THUSSEA AND LAC AN
151
mutual contradiction, the dominance of primary processes, and the
replacement of external by psychical reality.+! Whether or not the uncOn
scious (of an individual) has or does not have a history is in fact the
subject of considerable psychoanalytic debate, with some arguing that it
is. a phylogenetic heritage transmittlng a uni versa! cntent, and others that
it is constituted by < process of primal repression, mythical or otherwise.
Once more, an epistemological qnalogy proves to be misleading in the
extreme.
The supposed eternity of the formal structure of ideology, and the
primal scene that demonstrates its gender and race-bound operations, indi
cates the direction in which Althusser's essay seems to be moving: towards
a symbol-based theory of ideology and, ultimately, towards Durkheim.
Signi'fcantly1 an earlier essay specifes that 'the frsdorm of this ideology,
the realicy of this bond, i's ro be found in religion ("bond" is one of the
possible etymologie: of the word religion)/H This is far removed from the
Commuist Manifesto's insistence that the history of all hitherto existing
society is rhe history of class strug$1es. That history would appear, on the
contrary, to have been preceded by the establishment of elementary forms
of ideological life, Hence, perhaps, the neaNautology: 'Ideology has always.
already interpellated individuals as subjects . . . individuals are always
already interpellated a: subjects . . . individuals are always-lready subjects.'50
Althusser1s borrowings from Lacan are marked by a number of impor
rant misrecognitions, the most crucial being the failure to recognize the
relevance to Lacan of the Hegelian tradition. Althusser attempts ro recruit
Lacan fot purpses of his own, and the form of the recruitment. (or inter
pellation?), reveal much more abut the Marxist philosopher than the
psychoanilyst. Founded on the basis of oppsition to a hot of adversaries,
rhe Rejection Fmnt provides the starting-pint for a new project: the
epistemological liberation of Freud from the ideologies that beset him,
just as they beset Marxism. Lacan is the vital ally here because he defends
rhe 'irreducibility' of pychoanalysis and its objecr (rhe unconscious)/1 and
because he 'thinks nothing but Freud's concepts, giving rhem the fonn
of our sdentlfcity, the only scientifcity there can be'.52 This is wishful
thinking on Althsser's part, As I have argued elsewhere, Lacn thinks a
good .deal .more -and le - than Freud's concepts. He also 'thinks' sur
realism, rhe Jegsons of the classical psychiatry in which he rrained (and to
which he owed Qis clln'iCal and diagnostic acumen), rhe disrincth verston
of Hegelianism bequeathed him by Alexandre Kojeve, elements of phe
nomeno!ogy-. . . 53 The wishful rhinking does, on the other hand, help to
locate Althusser's reading of Lacan/Freud within a specfc tradition.
In an essay originally published as the preface to American translat
ion of George Canguilhem's Le Norma{ et le pathologique, Michel Foucault
describes rhe postwar history 'of French philosophy a being characterized
by a division between 'a philosophy of experience, of meaning and of rhe
152
DAVI MACEY
subject' and 'a philosophy- of knowledge, rationality and of the concept'.
The former tendency is associated 'ith Sartre and Mer-leauPonty, ihe
latter with Jean Cavailles, Gaston Bachelard, A1exandre Koyre and
Cnguilhem himself.54 The representatives of the philosophy of conscious
ness include the main shared 'adversaries' of the Lacan-Aithusser front.
In a survey of the academic feld of rhe 1950's, Pierre Bourdieu .outlines a
very similar intellectual typology, and speaks of the 'almost universal cult'
of Cnguilhem. The historian of science who, in the 1950s, had been a
symbol of serious-mindedness and rigour at a time when existentialism
was triumphant, later came t be an almost totemic fgure or tutelary deity
for those rejcting dominant models in philosophy.55
Canguilhem is a major representative of the epistemological tt<dition
within the history of the sciences. His history is one of discontinuities - of
breaks, ruptures and concptual shifts - in which the sciences do not
evolve in linear fashion; whilst his concept of scientificity is a matter of the
constitution of a theoretical object, and neither of some empirical "0equation
to the real nor of a complacent reference to 'experimental method\ The
normal/pathological distinction, without which modern medical practice
and thought would be incomprehensible, IS not, for instance, an empirical
'fact', but a way of organizing knowledge about the body. It results
.
from
the existence of a knot of conceprs;56
Canguilhem was Cavailles's successor at the Inst'itut d'Histolre des Sci
ences et des Techniques. Logician, historian of the sciences, and victim of
the Gestapo, Jean Cavailles argued in uncompromising terms that science
was a matter of logic and therefore that '[I]t is not a philosophy of con
sciousness, but a philosophy of the concept that can supply a doctrine of
science.'57 In h
1
S fSthumously published autobiography, Althusser would
admit to kowing relatively little about Cavailles and to having contented
himself with 'a few formulations'.58 The constantly self-deprecating tone
and mood of the autobiography make it diffcult to know just wh<t value
should be attached to the disclaimer, but Althusser had cert3inly borrowed
'formulations' that would mean a great deal to the younger theorists working
with him,
Canguilhem himslf was a figure of enormous importance to those who
pursued the implicatTons of the Althusser/Lacan alliance. In the period
leading up to the publicatiOn of Lire le Capital, Canguilhem's work and
that of Althusser's team overl"p to a high degree, The Lire le Capital
seminar held at the ENS in 1964-65 coincided with Canguilhem 's seminar
on the prob!emaic of the history of the sciences at the Institut d'Histoire
des Sciences et des Techniques. A detailed comparison of Althusser's
meditations on 'the object of Capital' and of Canguilhem's on 'the object
of the history of the sciences' would no doubt be illuminating, but will
not be undertaken here:S9 In 1967-68, the current of influences would b
reversed when Canguilhem bgan to re-read and reformulate Bachelard in
AlTHUSSER AND lACAN
the light of the work of Althussr <nd Foucault. The reult wa a short
lived enthusiasm for the topic of 'scientifc ideologies' ,60 In the preface
to th- second edition of the relevant essays, Canguilhem enigmatically
remarks that '[]o err is hunian; to persist in error is diabolical' and leaves
it to his reader to decide whether or not his work of this period was
'aberrant'
_b1
Although Lacan does refer to the Canguilhem tradiion, and was later
to adopt the 'mathematization' model of sdentifcity associated with some
representatives of the epistemo1ogical school (notably Alexandre Koyre),
he was in fact notoriously hostile to rigorous cnceptualization and
objected, for instance, to the eminently conceptual Lnguage of Psycho
analysis produced by Laplanche and Pontalis - Laplanche describes
.
it as
'a criical reflection on every concept' - on the grounds that it was 'tao
scholastic',02 For a long time, Lacan's concepts remained fairly fluid, and
were subject to a constant and tactical process of redefnition. The highly
conceptual index appended to Etrlts is, of course, the work of Jacques
Alain Mil,ler and not Lacan.
Althusser himself did not pursue the tasks he had set historical mateti-
alism vis-3.-vis psychoanalysis. They .would be taken up by Cahiers pour
f'amt!yse. The journal of the 'Eplstemological Circle' of the ENS began
publication in January 1966 and continued to appear until 1968, with
Jacques-Alain Miller as its principal editor. The 'AvertiSement' to the frst
issue - devoted to 'Truth', no less - announced that it would publish texts
dealing with logic, linguistics and psychoanalysis, with. a view to constitut
ing. a 'theory of discourse' . That dialectical materialistn would be of major
importance. to the Cahiers went without saying, but the possibility of a
science of social formations soon became largely irrelevant. Noth1ng in the
prqject related to the 'particularity of a doctrine'; the aim was to. '[f)orm
ourselves, following the example of our masters, in accordance with the
rigour of concepts'. As with the original Rejection Front, there was a
marked tendency to make analogies srve as arguments. Th it could be
claimed that psychomalysis, like Marxism, provides the principle for
'a new organization of the conceptual feld'/4 but the analogy was now
between the
.
feld of the statement [fnond], defned as the feld of logic,
and psychoanalysis, defne as the feld of speech.5 The philosophy of the
concept was to be given a new incarnation.
To the extent that the Cahiers was a quasi-Marxist project, it is a dis
tinctly odd one. Categoties such as class are almost totally absent; the
econOmic and the political disappear. A formal logic is increasingly brought
to bear on psychoanalysis, Lacan is re'ad in terms which obliterate his
philosophical-psychological past and promote the image of a psycho
analyst bor
.
n purely of an encounter between Freud and a formpf theory
of discourse. Par from being a spcifc discurse, Lacan's work now becomes
part of a general instance of conceptuality. Whereas Althusser and Bali bar
154
DAVID MCEY
began by looking for 'epistemological analogies', the Cahiers group would
search for a logic of the signifer that typife the discourse of Science, and
not of the plural sciences of which Canguilhem was the historian. The
emphasis on logic overrode the vision of a plurality of 'continents' com
mon to Canguilhem and Althusser.6 From the early 1970s onwards, Lacan
was to internalize this reading via the theory of the 'ra theme' - suppos
ed!y formal system of notation designed to ensure the integral transmission
of his teachings.
The second issue. of Cahiers pour l'analyse (Man:h-April 1966} was
devoted t 'What is psychology?' The title reproduces that of an article
by Canguilhem, or'iginally red to the College philosophique in 1956 and
published in the Re'e de Metaphysique et de morale two years laterP
The answer to the question i not favourable: psychology is a philosophy
without rigour, an ethics that makes no demands, a medicine without
comrols.6g Most modern psycholo-gy is 'a professional practice, the whole
of whose "science" is inspired by the sarch for the "laws'r' of adaptation
to a socio-technical environment'.69 The original target had been Daniel
Lagache, former professor at the Sorbonne, a longterm associate ofLacan's
and the author of an unsucces"ful attempt to '1.mify' clinical psychology
-and psychoanalysis.70 In Canguilhem's view the alleged unity of psychol
ogy represented no more than a peaceful coexistence pact between hetero
geneous practices.71 Lagache was not particularly relevant in 1966, and .the
target of Canguilhem's polemic is displaced, By implication, it becomes a
defenc of Lacan's psychoanalysis, which is not discussed by Canguilhem
in this article.
At this-point, it is authority, rather than concepts, which i being borrowed
by the Cahiers group. Its opposition t psychOlogy usually remains remark
ably lll-defned in that specifc theories are rarely invoked Canguilhem's
criticisms of a specifc projct become part of a generalized anathema and
Contribute t the creation of a climate in which Thomas Herbert (i.e.,
Michel Pecheux) can quite casually dismiss Melanie Klein and object
relations theory as an empiricist concept of the relation between signifer
and signifed grounded in an account of 'the pseudo-genesis of the order
of the symbolic within the biological' order'.72 By now, Frege was more
likely to be the theoretical mentor than either Althusser or Canguilhem.
Althusser's sole wntten contribution to the Cahiers waS a reading of
Roussau on the Socal Contract whiclt looked rather out of place, if not
simply archaic, in the context of the proposed 'genealogy of the sciences'.73
The ultimate heritage of the Rejction Front of 1963 would lie not in
hisorical and dialectical materialism, but in the formalized Lacanianism
that was to emerge in the 1970s. Althusser would vie it with a certain
dismay, referring to it as mere variant aLa logical formalism?+ In 1977,
Althusser's reading of Freud himself was not dissimilar to what it had been
in 'Freud and Lacan', and he still referred to the need to relate the theory
AI THUSSEA AND LACAN "
of sexuality to ideological ag\m:ies and apparatuses. The dream of
scientifcity was still a Possibility. Freud's concept of fantasy, Althusser
concluded, was not a scietttifc concept because h was a metaphor, 'but for
us, on the other hanQ, it may be. the concept of the limit that separates a
theoretical formation which has not yet become a science, from a science
that is to come. For there is, thank God, a little bit of fantasy betwen
theoretical formation and science; the illusion of having attained scientifcity
and, given that fantasy is contradictory, perhaps a bit of a true desire to
attain scientifcity.m Maybe it is the dream of sdentifcity that is eternal.
NOTES
1 'La Psychanalyse, idtologie rCactionnaire', La No1elle Critique, Ju
ne 1949.
2 Micliel PCcheux, Lagu<ge, Sem.anccs ad !deo!ogy,Macmillan, London, 1982,
p. 211.
3 Louis Althusser, Elements d'autcrcritique, Hachette, Paris, 1974, p 65.
4 Louis Althusser, 'Philosophie et sciences huaines', Revue de f'enseignemt
philosophique, June-July 1963, cited in 'Freud and l.acan' in Lenin and
Philosophy and Othe ssays, New Left Books, London, 1971, p. 181n.
5 Louis Althusser, letter of 26 November 1963 to lacan. reprodu<d in Magazine
Litteraire 304, November 1992, p. 50.
6 Jacques Lac.n, letter of 1 DeCember 1963 to Althusser, reproduced in ibid.
7 Louis Althusse, 'Theory, Theoretical Practke and Theoretical Formation:
Ideology and Ideological Struggle', Philosophy and the Spontaneous Philosophy
of the Scentists and Other Bssays, Verso, London, 1990, pp. 19, 41.
8 Louis Althussr, 'Introuction: Today'; in For Marx,AUen lane, London, 1969.
9 'Freud and Lacan', p. 17..
10 JacuC Lacan, 'Subversion du sujet et Uialectique d u d!ir dans l'inconscient
frendien' (1960)1 Erits, Seui Pari, 1966, pp. 808-09; 'Viant de Ia .cure
typ (1955), ibid., p. 335, n. 1.
11 'Freud and Lacan', p. 186.
12 ienne &libat, 'Sur les concepts fondamentaux du matCrialisme historique',
i Althusscr and Balibar, Lire le Capital, Maspero, Paris, 1968, vol. 2, p. 137.
13 Alihussr, 'Freud and Lacan', p. 182.
14 Louis Althus:, 'Du Capital" a Ia phi!olphie de Marx', in Althussex and
Balibar, Lire le Capital, Maspeo, Paris, 1968, voL 1, pp. 12-1:; cf. pp. 28-
29, where Althuser refers to 'a reding which w might dare to call symp
tomdlic inofar it detects a single movemet what is undeteted in the
text it is reading and relates it to another text, present i a necesary absence
in the frst text'.
15 Ibid., pp. 12-13.
16 Jacques-Aiain Miller, 'Actton de I a structure' (1964), Cahiers pour /'analyse 9i
Summer 1968, pp. 93-105. See a!soJacque5 Randhe, Lire le Captal vol. 3,
Maspero, Paris, 1973.
17 Louis Althuser, 'Ideology and ldeologk! State Apparatuses (Notes Towards
an Invetigation)', in.Lenin and Philosophy, pp. 121-76.
156
DAVID MACEY
18 Ibid., p. 136n.
19 'Marxism and Humanism', in For Ma73, p. 233.
20 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses', p. 155.
21 jacques Rancitre, La Leron d'Aithusser, Gal!imard, Paris, 1974, p. 88.
22
Louis Althuser, L'avenir dure longtemps, sui vi de Les faits: Autobiographies,
Stok/IMEC, Paris, 1992, p. 155: '
W
hat did the Ecole beome? , substitute
for a maternl environment, for the amniotiG fuid,'
23 'Freud and Lacan', pp. ln-78.
24 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuse', p. 137 n. Cf. the note to 'Freud
and Lacan', p. 194: 'It is not enough to know that the Western family is
patriarchal and exogamic . . . we must also work out the ideological forma
tions that govern paternity, maternity, conjugality and childhood: what are
"husband-and-wife-beng", "father-being", "mother-being" and "child-being"
in the modern world/ A mass of reserch remains to be done on these ideological
formations. This is a task for hstorical materialism.'
25 Ibid., p. 177.
26 'Freud and Lacan', p. 181,
27 Ibid., p. 182.
28 Ibid., p. 185.
29 See Gregory Elliott, 'Althussr's Solitude', in E. Ann Kaplan and Michael
Sprinker, eds, The Althusserian Lgacy, Verso, Londop., 1993.
30 Jacques Lacan, The Four Fundamental Cocepts of Psychoanalysis, The.
Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psychoanalysis, London, 1977, pp. 3-4.
31 Louis Althusser, L'avenir dure /ongtemps, p. 177.
32 'Freud and Lacan', p. 201.
33
Jacques Lacan, 'Le stade du miroir comme formateur de Ia fonction du J e telle
qu'elle nous est revelee dans !'exprienc pschanalytique' (1949)", Ecrits, pp.
93-100; 'L'aggresivit en psychanalyse', ibid., -p, 101-124.
34 See, i particular, Herui Wal!on, Les Origines d1 caradfe chez f'tm{t, Presses
Universitaires de France, Paris, 1949.
35 G. W. F. Hegel, The Phenomenology of Mind, tr. f. B. BaiHie; Harper and
Row, New York and Evanston, 1967, p. 514,
36 On Kojive's very odd career, see Dominique Aufiret, Ale:andre Kojeve: La
philosophic, l'etat et Ia fn de l'histoire, Grasset, Paris, 1990.
37 Francis Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Ma, Hamish Hamilton,
London, 1992.
3B Kojve is never mentioned in Ecrits. Lacan refera to him as a 'master' in a
paper delivered in 1967 ('La me prise du sujet suppose sa voir', Scilicet 1 1968,
p. 33); cf. Le Siminaire. Livre XX: Ecore, Seuil, Paris, 1975, p. 97.
39 Althnser, 'Freud and Lacan', p. 1B8.
40 Ibid., p. 195n.
4 1 Alexandre Kojtve, Introduction i la lectue de Hegel, GaUimard, Paris, 1979,
p. 169,
42 Jean Hyppolite, 'Situation de l'homme dans Ia "Phenomenologie'' hegelienne'
(1947), in FigUes de Ia pense phi/osophique, Presses Universitaires de France,
Paris, 1991, p. 115.
43 Michel FucaLllt, .L'ordre du discours, Galtimard, Paris, 1971, pp. 74-75.
44 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatues', p. 162.
ALTHUSSER AND LACAN 157
45 Ibid., p. 163.
46
Michele Barrett, 'Althusser's Marx, Althusser's Lacan', in The Althusserian
LegaCy, p. 174 ..
47 'Ideology and Ideologicl State Apparatuses', p. 152,
48 Sigmun4 Freud, 'The Unconscious', in The Pelican Freud Libtary, Vo/ 11: On
Meapsychology: The Theory o( Psychoanalysis, Harmondsworth, 1984,
p. 191,
49 'Theory, Theoretical Practice and Theoretical Formation', p. 25.
50 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses', p. 164.
51 'Freud and Lacan', p. 187.
52 Ibid., p, 198.
53 David Macey, Laan in Contexts, Verso, London, 1988.
54 Michel Foucault, 'La Vie: !'exprience et Ia science', Reve de mitaphysique
et de morale 90, January/March 1985, p. 4. First published as the preface to
On the Narma! and the Pathological, Riedel, Boston, 1978.
55 Pieri:e Bourdieu, 'Aspirant philosophe: un point de vue sur Ia champ univcrsitaire
dans Jes annfes 50', in Les enjeu: philosophiques de$ anies 50, Centre Georges
Pompidou, ParL.
56 George Canguilhem, 'Le normal etle pathologique' (1951), in L conn1issance
de fa ve, Vrin, Paris, 1989, p. 155.
S7 Jean Cavail!es, Sur Ia logique et Ia thiorie de la scie:ce, 4th edn, Vrin, Paris,
1987, p. 78.
58 Loms Althuser, L'aveuir dure /o"gtps, p. 75.
59 The gist cf Cnguilhem's arguments will be found in his 'L 'objet de l'histoire
des sciences', "tudes d'histQire et de philosophie des scienes, ffth edu, Vrin,
Paris, 19891 pp. 9-2"3.
60 Georges Cauguilhem, 'Qu'est-ce qu'une ideologic scientifque?', il Idio!ogie et
raionaliti dans l'histoire des sciences de I vie, second edn, Vrin, Paris, 1988,
pp. 33-46.
61 Ibid., p. 10.
62 Jean Laplanche, Seduction, Trats!ation, Drives, John Fletcher and Marrin
Stantou, cs, Institute o{ Conremprary Arts, London, 1992, p. 3.
63 Jacques-Alain Miller, 'Avertisement', Cahiers pour l'analyse 1, January/
February 1966.
64 Jacques-Alain Miller, 'Action de la stmcture', p. 93.
65 Ibid., p. 100.
66 Cf,. Elisabeth Roudne&co, Jacques Lacan & Co.: A History of Psychoanlysis
in Frae 1925-1985, Free Association Books, London, 1990, pp. 398-99.
67 For the baclground and context, see Elisabeth Roudinesco, 'Situation d'un
texte: "'u'ct-ce que Ia psychologic?"' , in the collective volume Georges
Cagli/hem: Phifosophe, historim des sciences, Albin Michel, Paris, 1983,
pp. 135-44.
68 Gerges Cangui\hem, 'Qu'est-ce que Ia psychologic?, Cahiers pour l'atalyS 2,
March-April 1966.
69 Ibid., p. 89.
70 Daniel Lagache, L'llnite de la psychologie, Preses Universitaires de France,
Paris; 1949,
71 Canguilhem, 'Qu'est-ce que la psychologle?', p. 89.
158
DAVI MACEY
72 Thomas Herbert, 'Pour une thtore gCrterale des_ ideologies', Cahiers pour
/'analyse 9, Summer 1968, p. 81.
73 Louis Althussr, 'Sur Je Contrat Sorial (Les Dicalages}', Cahers pour /'analyse
8, February 1968, pp. 5-42.
74 Louis Althusser, 'La Decouverte du docteur Freud' (1977), in Leon Cherrk,
ed., Dialogue francosovittique sur 'Ia psychanalyse, Privt, Touloue, 1984,
p. 86.
75 Ibid., pp. 96-97.
1
MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE:
ALTHUSSER IN LITERARY STUDIES

Francis Mulher
Writing books is like sending messages in bottles, Louis Althuser was
once heard to remark, in sorrowful reaction to the international phenomH
enon of 'Althusserianism': you can never tell who will come upon your
words or what they will make of them,
rn literary studies, which were neither frst nor last among Althusser's
interests, these messages were soon found <nd read. The experience (a
neWly fatdul word) was a daunting one, but there was also elation; it felt,
for many, like the defnitive moment of liberation, But like all such mo
ments, it was only a beginning, and, after nearly three decades of commen
tary and elaboration, itS meaning has come to seem more ambiguous and
.elusive, nothing so simple as the. revelation it once appeared to be.
1
Althusser's theoretical intervention 'for Marx' bore upon both the sub
stance and the status of historical materialism.2 Marx's revolution had
entailed more than a materialist inversion of Hegel's dialectic, he main
tained, The new theory abandoned the supposed expressivism of the old
phiosophy, substituting the idea of an inherently complex social whole
whose politi!al and ideological instances were 'relatively autonomous',
'specifcally effetive', determined only 'In the last instance' by the eco
nomic. Determination, in this conceptua scheme, W<S likewise complex:
not singular yet not merely plur<l, it was, so to say, typically exceptional
in its workings. Any contradicton was as a rule internally marked by rhe
contradictions that formed it conditions of existence, in irreducible. states
and p1oceses of 'overdetermination'. A complex whole and thus complex
tire history so conceived could not moVe according to a single, regular
beat; rather, it must be seen as possessing a 'differential' temporality,
yielding an arhythmic succession of unique conjunctures.
These, for Althusser, were the eCments of historical materialism proper,
after its critical disengagement from historicism and humanism. Against
too
FRANCIS MULHIAN
the frst, it proposed a decentred nonexpressive process; agamst the sec
ond, It- aserted the prmacy of struct'res and practices over the concrete
individuals who were, rigorously conceived, their bearers; and in. both
respects it broke decisively with the problematic of 'the subject' as author
or source of history. 'The subjct' was the pivotal category in Althusser's
main specifc undertaking in historical materialism, the exploration of the.
concept of 'ideology'. This term and its associated meanings had led an
irregular, mercurial life in Marxist tradition; in Althusser's thought, it
assumed a constant and overwhelming role. Ideology here was a relatively
autonomous practice whose principal function was to secure the repro
duction of the relations of production; yet received notions of illusion.
mystifcation, false consciousness and spiritualized interest conveyed little
of its existential sway., Not the work of subjects, .ideology worked them,
'interpllating' the social singularities called individuals 'a" subjects\ into
the identities that qualifed them a soial agents. Thes identities sustained
an 'imagma_ry' relation to real conditions, and yet were indispensable, now
and in any human future. To live at all was to live in ideology.
Knowledge, strictly speaking, was scientifc knowledge, the fruit of a
non-subjectivist theoretical 'labour upon the heterogeneous data of expri
ence, that is, ideology. Here was Ahhusser's complementary cla_im - the
second aspect of his intervention - concerning the status of Marx's inno
vation. As a science, historical materialism founded itself in a break with
ideology, constructing its theoretical objects, and elaborating analyses that
would be governed by the protocols of theoretical practice itself, .not by
the (ideological) indications .of the empirical world.
Althussec's prospictus for theoretical-practice must eem overweening,
and in imprtant respects it really w. Like Kar[ Popper, whose fallibilism
is not the most distant of comparisons, Althusser not only accorded unique
cognitive privilege to science but invested lt with the pathos of heroism. It
was not surprising that suspicions of neopositivism and Stalinist dogma
tism should so readily have arisen. Yet notwithstanding the leitmotiv of
Marxist triumphalism in .his writing,_ Althusser's 'return to Marx' was not
an intellectual reversion to party type. His insistence on the integrity of
science did not entail a claim of exdusivity for historical materialism. The
theoretical feld within which he situated Marx's science was not the old
'dialectical materialism' but the human sciences - specifcally, the new
'quadrivium' of history, ethnology, psychoanalysis and linguistics, and their
lingua franca, 'structuralism' .3 The pursuit of sdentifcity here meant the
repudiation of intellectual autarky.
The general themes and orientations of Althusser's larxism were in
themselves suffcient to establish his appeal for the Left in English literary
studies, among whom a sense of intellectual illegitimacy was deep and
prsistent. From the classics, they inherited the-synopsis of a generaL. theory,
and a few famous- fragments concerning Ancient art or Balzac's politics or
AL THUSSEf IN LITERARY STUDIES
'"
reilism in the novel and drama. The great systematizers of the Second
Interational, irrespctive of their individual cultural complexions tended
to see art mainly as a prestigious test case for their general explanatory
claims; they brought it down to earth, but then left it there. The Bolshevik
generation - notably Lenin and Trotsky - foillld occasions for ideological
intervention i literary life, but wrote little that might serve more general
purposes. The British Marxism of the 1930s -represented by Alick West,
Ralph Fox and, -bove all, Christopher CaudwelL- was a collective embar
rassment.4 Its db:ect .inheritors sponsored an uncompelling Communist
variant of familiar literatycacademic procedure, The eventual scope of
Raymond Williams's long revolution was as yet undiCfme. Georg Lukics's
work furnished the inescapable point of contemporary reference, with his
successor Lucien Goldmann an increasingly conspicuous second. And what
both thinkers offered were lines of analysis that, though strong and sophis
ticated, were incorrigibly schematic in their treatment of history and texts,
and - norori0sly in Lukacs's case - prone to aethetic dogmatism. The
Frankfurt School, or what was known of it in Britain at that tme, offered
a richer and crucia1ly more modern intellectual culture, but was not
exempt fto'm the general suspicion of summary- totalizing constructions,
Thoroughly as such Marxist styles might be learned1 crupulously th0gh
they might be practiced, the internalized reproach of the dominant tradition,
with its watchwords of fdelity to the empirical record and the detailed life
of the text, 'WOQ}d not be stilled. 5
Then came Althusser {'Contradiction and Overdeterminat1on appeared
in English in 1967, the entire Fat Marx in 1969; Reading Capital fol
lowed in 1970) and the prospect of a new departqre. Thanks to the new
historical concepts, the determinist and schematizing tendencies apparently
ingrained i Marxist literary studies could be criticized and overcome in
uncompromisingly Marxist terms. The new understanding of ideology,
with its crucial revaluation of 'experience', discomposed the- frst principle
of conduct in the dominant cdtical tradition. Beyond the complementary
errors of Marxist 'historicism' and liberal-humanist 'empiricism', it was
possible and necessary to broach the scientific, historical-materialist con
cept of art as an irreducible social' practice, to imagine a properly Marxist
theory of an unambiguously spcifed object.
Althusser's personal interest in this project inspired two compelling
occasional-essays, one on Strehler's Paris pmduction of El Nost Mih, the
other on the paintings of Cremonini. Beyond their egagement with par
ticular -cases; these texts display ke'n awareness of general questions of
theory and method, Both accord analyti primacy to the material event
{the play, the canvas) and the pr;tice it instantiates. The 'subjects' of
these practices (author, director, painter, spectator) are registered but
displaced the reading of Cremonini's canvases is not <Ontolled by the
evidence of the painter's intentional project; the Bre<htian reflection on
162
FRANCIS MULHERN
empathetic theatre explores a nonHpsychologistic understanding of audi
enc response, And .both essays are framed <S polemics .ag;tinst critical
'gastronomy', the established obstacle to criticism as knowledge.
Yet they cannot be taken as pilots of such a criticism. Althusser seizes
1pon Strehler's Bertolazzi because its strange dual tempo dramatizes some
thing like his own understanding of the ideological. Cremonini's verticals
and drcles excite him because he se in them a fguration of his own anti
humanism. Both texts are, as it were, moments of counter-ideological
'reognition' (the indispensable word), the more euphorically articulate for
that, but the less instructive a adumbrations of a new theory and practice,
However, Althusser's only programmatic declaration concerning aes
thetics, the letter to Andre Daspre, appeared to underwrite this emUlation
of theoretical specification and aesthetic preference. Althusser's goal was
'a real knowledge of art'; his means - 'there is no other way' - a 'rigorous
reflection on the basic concepts of Marxism'. For now, he would elaborate
'a frst idea'. Art is categorially distinct from science; it dos not pro
duce knowledge in the strict sense. Yet it is not an indifferent mode of
the ideologicaL For art sustains a differential relation to knowledge; it can
'make us see' the 'reality' to which it 'alludes', and this- by virtue of the
'itrternal distance' it establishes within ideology. He was, of course, talking
here abut 'authentic art, not works of an average or mediocre level' + + +
If this was a call to a new theoretical quest, it seemed that the likely route
would be circular. 'First ideas' are always awkward {Althusser wrote
movingly abut the unequal struggle to innovate in received idiomsY, but
this one seemed all too settled. Art as ategorially distinct from science,
rooted in everyday language yet capable of privileged insight; aesthetics as,
in effect, the elucidation of art1sth greatnessr not the knowledge of a
spcifc practice but an elaborated protocol of discrimination - these were
the commonplacs of the literary academy. It was not easy, at this point,
to see how :arxist self-reflection (which was not encouraged, on this
occasion, to commllnirate with other criticl knowledges) would trans
mute them into science.
The declared context of the letter to Daspre was the work of Altbusser's
young collaborator Pierre Macherey, wh'ose Pour une theorie de l
productiOn litdraire (appearing in the same year, 1966} was t inau
gural statement of Marxist theoretical practice in the feld of the literary.8
Macherey's book was, in two senses, a study in morp'hology. Its first
concern was to determine the characteristic shape of received literary criti
dsm - the forms of its attention - and assert the contrasting protocols
of a scientifc alternative; its emerging theme, elaborating the founding
thesis of this science, was the action of literary form in ideology. Received
criticism acted as if to regulate writing and reading in rhe 'domain' of
literature. As a 'normative' practice, it judges comparative achievement; as
ALTHU&SER IN LITERARY STUDIES
'interpretation' it offers t resolve and mediate meaning; and i both modes
it proceeds fallaciously, actually 'replacing' what it claims to analyse with
ideal others - the work as it might have ben or in its 'full' meaning. A
scientifc criticism, in contrast, would be a discourse of knowledge, a sys
tematic inquiry intQ the 'laws' of a theoretically speifed object: literary
'production' as a determinate material practice in ideology.
The results .f literary production, Macherey went on to claim, were the
opposite - those affrmed m critical tradition: not composure and fullness
but incompleteness, discrepancy and absence. These were the effets of
literary form. 'For although literature was not Sience, it 'naturally scorn[ed]
the credulous view of the world'; held within ideology, its 'determinate
insuffciency' nevertheless parodied and caricatured ideology, thus offering
an 'implicit critique' of it} The task of a Marxist criticism was to race the
workings_ of this productive disorder and to explain it.
Macherey's theoretical excursion was in all relevant sense Althusserian,
but. it was not in any ordinary .sense Marxist. The official inspiration of the
book was Lenin - invoked h!re as elsewhere with unstinted ceremony -
but ir more substantial, though tacit, intellectual debt was to a thinker
whos example had become canonical in Althusser's circle: Freud. Th
imago of text and critic in Macherey's discourse was the symptom and its
{psycho)analyst. Literary works could be understood as the dreams, jokes
and parapraxe& of a divided collective subjectivity. The analogy is a power
ful one (indeed, a little .urther meditatio-n upon it might have refned
Macherey1.s. undiscriminating critique of interpretation), but it does not
license the further assumpton concerning the differential critical value of
the literary. Freud's symptomatic texts are valuable as evidence for analy
sis; in themselves they are modes of unknowing, denial, confusion. But
according to Macherey, cognit1ve privilege belonged to the literary as such,
and not only to the thery that could explain its fgurations. Like Althusser,
he conceded literature a place of c-primacy with science in the hierarchy
of culture,
Macherey would subsequently take quite different bearings,ro but, fr
now, a distinctive Althusserian problematic remained in fore: the object
proper to Marxist tbebretical investigation was 'ideology and literary form',
This was the title of the frst English-language initiative under Althusser's
general aegis, Terry Eagleton's pilot essay for his Criticis and Ideolog.n
The model of theoretical practice was evident in the shape of Eagleton's
inquiry. A probing review of the received critical culture in its liberal and
socialist forms (Lea vis and Williams respectively) led to a general theoret
ical construction of the place of the literarY in the social whole, and thence
towards the summit, !science of the text'. The central propositions of the
book were in the main familiar: 'materialist criticism' as an anti-humanist,
antihistoricist practice forwarded in a break with ideology; literature as
ideology 'raised to the second power'; Freud as the exemplary theorist and
164
FAANCIS MULHER
reader of self-divided textual production, Yet as well as elaborating and
varying these themes, Eagleton lodged punctual criticisms of Althussr and
Macherey. He noted the tendentious reservation in the letter to Daspre,
and insisted, in opposition to Macherey, that the literature-ideology
relationship was not necessa1:ily subversive, It was, he observed, as if
literature must be spared 'the shame of the sheerly ideological', as if 'te
aesthetic must still be granted mysteriously privileged status, but now in
embarrassedly oblique scyle'.a Exactly so, But Alrhusser and Machere
r
were nor alone in the hour of their temptation. What Eagleton feared in
their texm he was in the end unable ro ban'ish from his own. The central
chaptet of Criticism and Ideology recorded a struggle i proess, here
assigning spdal powers to literature, there reserving them to the (duly
rigorous) reader, and never surrendering the conviction, which wns also
secure in A!thusser and Macherey, that there existed a stable entity .named
!literatuie' (or 'form') to be known, a real object awaiting its adequate
concept.
This undischarged essentialism found its counterpart in the closing chapter
of Eagleton's study, .an attempt without precedent in Alrhusser or Macherey
to theorize differential literary value. Rightly affirming the necessity of
such a theory (differential judgement is for many strictly analytic p1Jrposes
irrelevant or even diversionary, but in the ordinary world of culture it is
ineluctable), Eagleton also maintained that a Marxist account of value
would be relational or transitive: a text is valuable, that is, not in itself, but
'for certain users in specifc conditions (the presiding spirit here was Breht).
Yet his discl.ssion gravitted towards the opposite conclusion, seeking
value in the historical conditions of prouction of the text, and so suggesting
an originary and lasting endowment of distinction or banality; literary
value was, after all, the immanent variation of an essential categoryP
In these texts, the project of an Althusserian Marxist theory of the
aesthetic was boldly launched and as surely frustrate. '!'heir governing
problematic was, as Althussr might have sid, 'amphibological': an old
category refgured as a new concept, an atempt t furnish a scientifc
answer to an unsurmounted philosophical question.H Macherey 1timselfwent
on to reject the question 'what is literature?' ns an unwarrantable lntrusion
into sovereign theoretical space. Hi-s later work at once redrew the theo
retical image of literature. to emphasi'e its role .in the production of ide
logical compromise, and, more radically, turned from literature as text to
literary culture as an instirutionalized ideological prectice - to 'the literary
effect' as it is deploye in the eductional apparatus of the dass-div'ided
nation.15 Eagleton noted the possibility of such modified lines of analysis,
but chose not to pursue them; his subsequent work turned away from the
architectonic prospectus of Criti.is an Ideology i favour of an inter
ventionist, 'plitical' criticism that, though not less theoretically engaged
and still- emphaticlly Marxist, could not be called 'Althusserian'Y
ALTHUSSER IN LITERRY STUOIIS
165
Meanwhile, another initiative had sprung into vigorous life. Taking early
shape in the years of Althusser's greatest productivity, the collaborative
work of the Tel Que! circle centred on Phillipe .ollers and julia Kristeva
developed rapidly, reaching a critical moment of self-defnition -so history
was pleased rohave it- a few months after the events of May-june 1968,17
Althusser's affliates maintaine a pointed distance from Tel Quel, as if in
awkward consciousness of eager but unsought cmpany.18 Althusser was
a canon'ical reference in the journal - like Lacan, an acknowledged levier,
lever or influence, in its work.19 But its .closr mentors were Barthes, Derrida
and Foucault, who led off the collective volume, Theorie d'ensemble.20
Abve all other things a resumpton of French avant-garde traditions in
the arts, and at rhis time devoted to an anarcho-.aoisr programme of
cultural revolution, Tel Que! set its theoretical bearings in an intellectual
network. (rBseau was a favoured metaphor) that included Althusser and
partly sustained him, but with very different intellectual and political
priorities, Althusserian Marxism was thus at onc valorized and displaced,
functioning here as a pdvileged citation in a context at once familiar and
alien.
The more sanguine, less defensive evaluation of this development was
that Tel Quel offered a possible realization of Altbusser's vision of a non
autarkic Marxism developing as a science among others, in the space of
cultural theory. This, indeed, was the spirit animating a kindred project
that took shape in Britain, in the work of Screen.
'The Saeer project' is a familiar way of evoking a collaborative enter
prise that eluds :im,ple summary, The magnine never was intellectually
homogeneous, in large part because of the discrepant interests in play in
its parent organization, the Society for Education in Film and Television.
Its dominant intellectual tendency, in the critical passage of the 1970s, was
-itself unstable, in part becuse of the quick tempos and syncopated rhythms
characteristic of sn import-dependent vanguard culture, and in part also
because there was no pre-established harmony among the theoretical
interests that now came to the fore. 'The Screen project' is not a true
singular, and there is no defnitive version of it, However, with such
qualifcations made, there was no mistaking the difference between this
and the other, more strictly canonical reading of Althusserian possibilities.
There was, to begin with a weighty difference of circumstance. It
cannot have been unimportant that Screen's given feld of activity was
cinema rather than literature. The sheer materialitY of cinema as industry,
technical practice and experience was less easily spiritualized than that of
the literary institution - whose conservatiVe deYotee indeed, would affrm
just W much, knowing full well the difference between a conventicle anc'
a crowd. The strategic topai of modern critical culture were not settled
truts here: auteudsm may have reiterated traditionalist notions of
composition and reading, but it also helped to undo the disciplinary
188
FRANCIS MULHERN
segregation of 'art' and
-
entertainment'; and while essentialist theories of
'.film' were advanced, they encelUntered stubborn resistance M the objective
complexity of the developed flmic reprtoire, with its multiple and variably
ordered matters of expresion. Furthermore, the availability of a diverse
oppositional flm-making culture, in
-
which some of the journal's editors
were directly involved, was bound to inflect all theoretical reflection - as
Benjamin was awate, any object appears differently .in th! perspective of
production.
Althusser's demand for the analysis of specifc, relatively autonomous
practices and his construction of ideology as institutionalized material
practice furnished the general terms leg!timatng an unconstrained explora
tion of cinema in its full historical and structural compleXity; at the same
time, the whole history of bt domiMnt and critical cine.ma acted against
the kind of conceptual inertia that patterned the letter to Daspre. Saeen's
inquiry into the formation, functioning and tendential effects of cinematic
practics was pursued along lines at Jrst parallel and son cnverg!nt with
that of Tel Quel, in an inter-theoreticl discourse on idelogy, subject and
text.
Semiotics, developing through a critical ingathering of modern scientifc
initiatives in poetics and linguistics - formalist, structuralst and other -
offered concepts and taxonomies that bore the promise o a post-aesthetic,
materialist analysis of textual forms and functions. Psychoanalysis
appeared not merdy as a potent analogy but as a decisive contributor to
the understanding of subjectivity. Marxism furnished terms of historical
understanding and defned the politics of text and subject. There was more
than one summary of this theoretical conjunction. Peter Wollen identifed
a meta-theoretical unity of purpose: 'each concerns itself with an area of
human activity thu articulates natural with social history' - signs, labour
and sexuality. Stephen Heath, more tntative, spoke of 'the encounter of
Marxism with psychoanalysis on the terrain of semiotics' .2
1
There was,
equally, no regularity of proportion in the work produced under its aegis.
Wollen's work did not {and does not) take the totalizing course that his
general formulation might be taken t indicate, rather moving from topic
to topi' with unruffled flexibility of emphasis and theoretical reference.
Heath was, in practice, the more concerned to probe the sense of the
general strategy in particular settings of analysis. In the Screen circle
generally, variations multiplied. Consistent with its own critical themes,
this was an impure' proje,t, lacking an essence.n The yield was very
impressive, but it furished the evidence that this second \ersion of
Althusserian initiative - all at once broader, bolder and more modest -
was scarcely better insured than the frst. The renunctation of Marxist
autarky in favour of a dialogic theoretical discurse enhanced productiv
ity, but not, therefore, predictable analytic output. This was not a story of
scientifc progress from incompletenes into notional suffciency .
.
Marxist
AI. THUSSER IN LTERARY STUDIES
18
cultural theory had need of that critical contact, but, dialogue being what
it i when not a pious simulation, theories have a way df talking back -
and wit results that owe something to rational debate but rather more to
force of drcumstance.
Throughout the 1970s, Althusser remained an inspirational reference. The
intensifying and increasingly influential work of the Birmingham Centre
for Contemporary Cultural Studies was indebted to him. The names of
Eagleton and Macherey identifed a whole critical tendency. Marxist-feminist
writers - Cor< Kaplan and Penny Boumelha, for example - looked to
Althusser's historical concepts as a means of articulat'ing class and gender
determinations in textual analysis.n Tony Bennett set out to liquidate
Marxism's deep dependence on essentialist notions of literature and value
in line of investigation that, though inevitably divergent from the prior
analyses of Macherey and Eagleton and critical of them, was nevertheless
plainly Althusserian in spirir.24 It was .easy to believe, looking around, that
the outlook for theoretical practice was good.
In retrospect, however, the 1970s may be seen as he years of the great
Althussrian inflation, a trompe l'oeil sequece .in which ever-greater
discurs[ve circulation concealed a draining of conceptual value. There were
at least three agencies at work in this. One was the banalizing process to
which any infl_ucntial idea is vulnerable. Another, more substantial, was
the progress
-
of Althusser's leading British exponents, whose quest for
rigour led them to press one after another of their mentor's philosophical
proposals to the paint of self-destruction.2J The third, and much the
weightiest, was more. general, and strictly political: a relative dedine of all
Marxisms, artendant upon the frustration, re_ersal or decomposition of
the historical tendencies that had seemed to vindicate them. Marxism
commanded the pttentlOn of a whole gallery of intellectual and political
interests because, irrespective of is theoretical or programmatic cogency in
any given area (which, indeed, might not impress at all), it seemed the
inescapable context of -radicl thought and activity. A the ideological
banner of a practica'\ .movement, it had a record of achievement (however
mioed), a social constituency actual or potential (the labour movement).,
and immediate _prospects i n every global theatre, Given such historical
,endowments, MarxUt theory could survive any particular challenge. The
corollary - that without these practical supports, the theory would have
far less intuttive appeal - was not much dwelt upon, but there was no
evading the .force of the eventual demonstration.
The course of the 1980s, in every part of the world, mocked every
nventional socialist expectation. Social democracy, Cmmunism, anti
imperialism and revolutionary socialism - all were visited. by
-
counter
fnalities that could be sa'id to falsify them as general formats of political
advance. The very name of socialism, long the site of ferce discursive
168
FRANCIS MULHERN
rivalry1 now seemed too monologic. for some left-wing sensibilities. His
torical materialism - the appropriately general theory of historical pro
cesses as dynamic wholes -fared no better. Appearing no longer to answer
to common-sense estimates of the probable Or the prctical, it suffered a
co-ordinate loss of critical authority. The stronger raPical political trends
of the eighties were particularist; and.in the radical academyr above all in
its departments of literary and cultural studies, matching styles of analysis
appeared -perspectivist, and agnostic or hostile towards tOtalizing thought.
It was this great ecological shift, rather than any newly discovered problem
or any pregtven outcome of intellectual arbitration, that redrew the
patter of selection presures, to the disadvantage of Marxism and in
favour of the counter-enlightenment thematics that now proliferated as
post-structuralism, or post-modernism, or - a hybrid fot the time - post
Marxism.26
But even now, in a milieu increasingly indiffen:nt tP Marxism and ever
more ignorant of it, the name of Althuser continued to be inv.ohd, For
he it was whose concept of relative autonomy had cautiously

opned the
transition to a social theory no longer inhibited by the dogma of a dosed
totality with a determining economic ground. He it was whose theory of
ideology, once relieved of its functionalist embarrassment, had recentred
cultural analysis on the question of the subject and its constructions He
it was who had helped to nurture the inter-theoretical dialogue that was
now entering its maturity. In truth, or so some theorists persuaded them
selves, Althusser really was a post-structuralist, the Monsieur Jourdain of
the avant-garde. One veteran of the thery wars, Antony Easthope, dis
cerned in the whole sequence a grand narrative of anti-humanism. Easthopes
British Post-structuralism, a serial review of the seventies and eighties,
is generous, pleasingly worldly, and frmly socialist in spiit. Yet as a
construction of theoretical history it is shaped by a Whigish evolutionism
that assimilates all pre-existing virtue to Althusser, and then forwards it
to the culminating moment of posNtructuralism

. Ne Lft Review's
Gramscian theses on Britain are glossed in the light of the journa1's later
interest in Althusser, who is now accredited with sole authorship of a
theme (relative autonomy) as old as Engels. 'Aithusser' we are told,
'imported into Britain at least three lines
.
of thought . . . which can be
validly regatded as post-structuralist the account of the historical formati'on
as decentred; the assertion that knowledge

.as proceeding from theoretical
practice is. discursively cOnstructed; the account of the .subject as effect
rather than cause.' So much, then, for Darwin (the fst 'line.') or Popper
(the second), or Freud (the third). And so much fot Althusser, whose
work, for all its self-interpellation as Marxist, 'is best regarded now as a
structuralism passing over into post-structuralisml ,P Excess of hmdslght,
teleological reversion, rationalization: Easthope's rendering provokes any or

all of these objections. However motivated, it i. untenable as a swnmation

ALTHUSSER IN LITERARY STUDIES
"
of the-left theoreticl culture of the paJt thirty-od years. But it does, in
its way, confrm the poignant impression th.at, by the end of the eighties,
Althusser's name, enfolding certain vestiges of his ideas survived as little
more than a souvenir in a culture that had largely forgotten his intellectual
and political projects.
The transition to post-structuralism, in the sense of a generalized thematics
now current in a postMarxtst_ -academic Left, was not so much an auton-

omous critical process, more the effect of manifold political disenchantment
- not a working out, however unforeseen, of A!chusser's logic but an
abandonment of -1c. To say so is not to deliver a summary judgement on
the -iverse thinkers that found the post-structuralist canon, or on the
varied work now proceeding in their joint and several names: the new
culture of subversion is a whole far less than the sum of its parts. Neither
is it to daim that there exist a pristine theoretical practice, obscured but
not annihilated by years of misappropriation, t which, like Althusser to
Marx, we must now return. The matter is more diffcult and the prospect
far less clear. In conclusion - though that is not the ideal word - it may
be worthwhile to dwell a little on some of Althusser's key ideas, and to
offer provisional latter-day assessment of them.
Idology was the theme for which Althsser became clebrted in radical
literary and cultural studies; and the course of his thinking marked it as
his most ambiguous theoretical venture. Althusser's view was in one
respect familiar: the concept of ideology implied a determinate relationship
btween cognltive defciency and social interest; it was, in the authorized
words of his English translator, a mode in which 'the practico-social
predominates . . . over the theoretical, over knowledge'.28 But the discrep
ancy
-
between knowledge and the pra.ctico-smial had never been so insisted
upon. Ideology was pervasive1 the -pontaneous knowing-unknowing of
human experience in this and all possible societies.29 Without relinquishing
the frst, more familiar sense of the concept, Althusser then pursue his
elbotation of the second. The 'imaginary relation' o ideology was the
mode in which the ideoaffective life of humans assumed its socially viable
form as identity: ideology 'interpe!lares the individual as a subject.' In.
arguing thus, Althusser effected .a drastic and damaging conflation of two
distinct problems: the functioning of ideology in its more familiar sense,
as a socially motivated differential relation to knowledge, and the general
mechanism of human subject-formation. How, in this prspective, could
ideology be known or displaced? Althusstr's established response was: by
science and art. But if ideology was now identical with the anthropological
constant of identity-formation, how could thes be conceptualized as
ordinary hiHbrical practices? And if, contrariwise, they could be retained
only as quasimtraculous interventio in the imaginar
-
y - if, that ls, they
170
FRANCIS MULHERN
could not be retained at all, .but musnather be discarded as rationalist and
romantic mystifcations - what would remain of ideology as a Critical
concept? These and. ki"ndred objetions came from sympathetic and hostile
commentators alike, and most influentially from poststructuralist quar
ters, where a counter-construction had already taken shape. Althusserian
'science' was implicated in the characteristic disavowal of meta-discourse,
which exempted itself from the conditions of existence that it stipulated
for its objects. The account of subject-formation was either false, and
hence inadequate, or valid, and therefore subversive of its own pretensions
to fnal Jationality. In either case, the ideal of scientificity was unfounded,
as als was its putative other, the supprting fction of ideology. 'Science'
was a gambit in 'the politics of truth', a power-play in the contention of
discourses and their subjects.
This destructive response has proved most attractive t contemporary
taste, but there were others, inclUding at least one of Althusserian inspi
ration. GOran Therborn proposed a mechanism internal to ideology, such
that the fatalistic unity subjectifcation-subjection could pass .into self
contradiction, generating crises of identity and belief with uncertain out
comes - i other words, a material 'dialectic of consciousness' ofthe kind
that Althusser tende to resist. 30 The limitation of Therbotn's aalysis,
taken over from Althusser, was its br<cketing of science (along with art)
as a special case. Just as Althusser's formalist analysis of subjectifcation
occluded the fact that all ideology advances 'truth-claims, so Therborn
encouraged the specllar inference that knowledge-bearing discoQrse is
somehow not implicated in the formation of subjects. Thre i no such
division of labour in the real world of discourse, where logics and rhetorics
act indissociably, and seldom according to a rule of inverse proportions.
If the theory of subject-formation holds at all, it must hold for all discur
sive practice. Yet Althusserian reason seemed unable to secure irs legitim
ate philosophical defence of scientifcity without abstractions of this kind,
so provoking agnostic and irrationalist counter-attack. This predicament
had a strictly epistemological ground in an anti-realist account of science,
which then found self-destructive confrmation in a false reduction of cultlte
to idelogy,
Raymond Williams has been seen a$ the humanist antithesis of the.
Althusserian sensibility, but his developd theory of culture, far from
mcompatible with the science/ideology distinction, may prove its safer
setting, Culture, in Williams's sense, is the integrally historical making of
sense and of subjects, always both,31 Its substance is the work of material
practices - rhetorics, institutions. Culture does not constitute an expressive
totality: its antagonisms are complex, its times differential, and its mean
ings discrepant and changeable, Ideology (restored to a stricter sense as
.
socially determined mystifcation) and science (understood, less heroically,
as fallible rational inquiry into the real) are preent, but as contingent
AL THUSSEA IN LITERARY STUDIES
faculties of cultural practice, not its primordial essences. Literature is present
too, of course, but now in a role more evident to the later Macherey than
to Althusser, as an ideological .formation in the history of writing and
reading. However, Macherey's analytic. shift from text t institution, though
productive in itself, was less a resolution of his earlier theoretical diffculty
than an escape from it. Inquiry into the forms and functions of.textuality,
however formalist it must often appear, will remain central to any literary
theory deserving its name .. It seems to me very striking, in retrospect, that
Williams's understanding of literary form was from earliest days free fiom
the essentialism that hobbled Althusser and Macherey, as indeed it has
frustrated most Marxist aesthetic theorizing.
Ideology enjoyed rel(foe autonomy within a complex whole determined
only in the. 13st instance by the economic. This was probably the most
immediately appaling of Althusser's messageS, legitimating as it did the
elaboration of 'regional' theories and analyses uninhibited by the snap
totalizations for wh1ch mechanistic and Hegelian styles of Marxism had
become notorious. The rich yield of work done under its sign is a tribute
to its intellectual worth. But as a concept, it too displayed a propensity to
develop by its bad side. 'Relative autonomy' soon came under suspicion as
-a compromise formation mediating the antagonism between a dogmatic
philosophy of history and a properly critical and materialist concept of
practice. Proposed as a resolution of Marx's social topology, it was in
creasingly exploited as a passage into alternative theoretical space. Here
agin this unsought outcome was facilitatd by problems in Althusser's
theoretical formulations, though these were not nearly so grave as those
besetting the concept of ideology. It is true that the term 'relative' often
serves as an ad hoc lubricant of inter-prepositional friction. Bur the objec
tion, delivered with an air of unsparing m'aterialist rigour, that ideology is
either determined or autonomous - no third way - was ill-ounded.32
Conditional autonomy (a more precise designation) is the typical status of
complex systems; only the humanist assumption that social life is utterly
distinct from the rest of reality lent credence to the confdent disjunctions
of Althusser1s progeny. It is also true, or so I would maintain, that
Althusser'S formulation of 'the last instance' was defcient, cnflating the
tempral and structural meanings of the concept with unfonunate results:'
But there is no great diffculty in amending this aspect of the analysis, in
a plainly Marxist sense. Indeed, it seems odd that 'relative autonomy' and
'the last instance' should have attracted so much attention when, arguably,
the more origmal contention of Althusser's discussion lay elsewhere. The
titular concept of his essay was not either of these, after all, but overdeter
mination, Althussei's purpose was not- or not merely- to loosen the bad
wlioles of mechani'st or.expresivist reasoning, redistributing causal resurces
upwards- from base to superstructure, but to substitute an alternative
FAANCJS MULHEAN
conception of the social as a whole. The concept of overdetermination did
not merely designate the resultant of relatively autonomous efectivities; it.
offered to specify the t}p1Ll form of unity of the social process, to show
how any practice was internally marked by the other practices that con
stituted Its conditions of existence, and thus- - 'Hegelian' though it must
seem - to rethink, not to discard, the notion of the presence of the whole
in all its parts.
If 'relative autonomy' was the licece Aithusser granted to radical liter
ary and cultural studies, 'overdetermination' was the corresponding obli
gation or challenge. It was scarcely limiting, in an operational sense: this
was a conceptual instrument suited equally to loalized textual analysis
and to large-scale historical constructions of petiod and genre. It legitim
ated productive working relations with psychoanalysis (the source of the
term, indeed) and semiotics, where such conc epts as Kristeva's
-
'inter
textuality' provided support and speifcation;. and it cleared. a conceptual
space within which key social determinations othe than cass could be
explored in a non-reductionist manner. But it was the distinctively Matxist
element in Althusser's scheme - unlike 'its associated concepts, which might
be accommodated within any laodicean sociology of cuture and was not
spared the general devaluation of the times. 'Overdetermination' was the
frst word of many of Althusser's English-spaking offspring; its meaning
remains under-explored.
,
This short story of a concept and its fortunes may serve as a parable
concerning the status of historical materialism in a wider theoretical cul
ture. Althusser's restrictive defnition of dialectical materialism and his
revised account of Marx's concept of history were complementary aspects
of a single, fundamental decision to renounce the vision of Marxism as a
cosmology in the making, and therewith to renounce
-
theoretial autarky.
The return to Marx would be rational only if practiced as a turning out
into critical solidarity with scientifc inqUiry in general. Althusser's defence
of Lacan - theoretically, against the Zhdanov1st traditions of h!s o\
party and, practically, against psychoanalytic offcialdom - furnishe the
strongest imaginable warrant of his commitment to this revisd ethics and
politics of culture. (It is now common knqwhdge that experience had
granted him a terrible cognitive advantage in the understanding of 'differ
ential temporality' and 'specifc effectivity' in psychic life.) Hi great theme
of 'reading' as work on the materiality of texts, which drew inspiration
from psychoanalysis and also from the stncturalism of the day, was the
appropriate practical form of a critical and slf-critical mo of
.
intellectual
conduct.
This was Althusser's most important single contribution to a Marxist
culture, but because it was not merely pious it was not merely a gift. There
was here a diffcult - and _increasingly unwelcome - demand. It was possible
AL THUSSER IN LJTERARY STUDIES 173
to believe, In more euphoric nioment, that a new theoretical synthesis was
in prospect: an anti-humanist materialism. But this favoured loution was
actually so weak ('materialism' spcifes nothing about the material world,
'antihJmanism' is a crude polemical -theme) that in practice it sponsored
the opposite of synthesis: a new, or not so new1 prspectivism. It has
always seemed to me that Althusser's orien:tation was less than the frst but
more than the second of these,
A project of synthesis-can hardly help but rekindle the old cosmological
dream, and in doing so, inhibit rather than assist theoretical inquiry. His
torical materialiSm Qlaims that human formations of sense- and subject'ivity
are organized by determinate modes of production and their associated
class relations Psychoanalysis claims that these formations register the
enduring. effects of the primal entry into sodality, i patters that are at
once more and less variable than economic systems. Neither can fully
account for the textual evidence; yet it seems diffcult to take these claims
seriously and at the same time to believe that some higher resolution
awaits them. A small illustration may conGretize the 1ssue. It is true, let us
grant, that LEducation sentimentle dramatizes and validates the process
of a certain bourgeois political disappointment, after the fallure of the
1848 revolutions. It seems true, too, that Flaubert's fguration of persons
and theit relations is governed by the ImAgo of the mother. The novel
condense these distnct matters in such a way that thi,Y can be neither
separated .nor co-ordinated in a relationship of essence and expression.
Flaubert's teJtual space is as it were occupied twice over, staturated at
once by the social meanings of French society in a certain perio and by
a certain pattern of unconscious desire. In this, we might say, it epitomizes
the condition of all ulture, where social and psychodynamic meanings are
always jointly ctive, not only in their shared. semiottc space but within
each other and according to. logics that neither exclude patterns of co
ordination nor depend on them.
To reason

so is not, however, to offer simple support for a notion of

'pluralism', a word in whic a damaging ambigu'ity has flourished for too
long. As an institutional principle affrming the rights of all intellectual
tendencies, pluralism is a necessary condition of fruitful inquiry. But this
meaning of the term is often used, wittingly or not, t valorize a second
meaning, which is more clearly registered as relativist or prspectivist.
These too have their rights, but they derive no prvilege, as intellectual
positions, from their simulation of institutional virtue: collective pluralism
does not vindicate, let alone enjoin, individual eclecticism. And they are
validated leaSt of all by appeal to the name of Althusser. To say that no
theory can claim a monopoly on knowledge of the social is not to
-
claim
that truth is relative, or parcdlized. Althusser affrmed the frst proposition
but would hAve. rebutted its fallacious sequeL Marxism cannot, in heroic
isolation, harvest the yield of our possible social knowledge. Yet in so far
114
FRANCIS MULHERN
as it lodges claims concerning the general structure of the sodal, it not
only opposes alternative conjectures of the same scope, but also exercises
a critical check on claims of more limited application. This is a logical
entailment, by which Marxism survives or fails as a self-consistent ratkmal
theory.3 Reduced to tending 'class factors' in a perspectivist schedule of
analysis, the theory would b("ome precisely the kind of thing against
which Lenin famously defned it: a 'trade-union con_sciousness' i cultural
1tudies.
Renouncing the old cosmoJogy (though his tone sometimes belied the
gesture) and resisting the false alternative of perspecdvlsm, Luis Alth1sstr
drafted a bold, vulnerable proposal: in his own words, here transposed, an
overdetermined unity of theoretica
l
a1tivity, endlessly novel in its oonfgur
ations but determined in the lastinstance by Marx's science of history Just
how suggestive that proposal was, and how vulneable to reduction or
rewriting, the past twenty years have shown. Today, it remains, much
worn by time and handling but still legible; a message to read, think about
and act u pen.
NOTES
1
These pages offer what, for wt of a better phrase, migt be called a tho
reticl memoir. Laying no claim to the systematic a.hievement of critical or
historicl reconstruction proper, they ar
e
more ptrsonal
l
n bac_kground and
prhaps idiosyncratic in balance and range. The text is also, and for this
reason, somewhat Angloentric - a limitation I cannot surmount here, but
nevertheless wish to acknowledge My thanks to Gregor Elliott for his
encouugement and critical advic.
2 For Max, Allen Lane, London, 1969; Reading Capital, New Left Boks,
London, 1970; Lenin and PhHosophy and Otfer &says, New Left Books,
London, 1971, passim.
3 Roland Barthes spoke of 'a qtadn'vium of pilot sciences', though listing
economics and not psychoanalysis a lang with the other
-
three \see 'lements of
Scmio{og, Hill Qnd Wang, New York, 19681 pp. lUl-02, n. 55).
4 My own contribution to this culture of embarissment ('The Marxist Althetics
of Christopher Caudwell', New Lef Review 85, May/June 1974}'was typical
in its 'Althus erian' desire to raze the loal theoredcal herifge. Though I
stand by the demuctive analysis proposd there, I have long felt that Ca1dwel\
deserved a more generous and more resourceful (that is, more truly critical)
reading.
5 Williams's famous judgement on Caudwell epitomized a whole stmcture of
left literary-riticl,feeling: 'for the mot part his discllssion is not even specifc
eno1gh b wrong' (CultJe and Society 1780-1950, Pengllin, Harmonds
worth. 1961, p. 268).
6 'The "Piccolo Teatro": Bertolazzi and Breht', in For Max and 'Cremonini,
Painter of th Abstract', i Lerrin and Philosophy.
AL THUSSER IN LITERARY STUDIES 175
7 'A Letter on Art in Reply to Andre Daspre', Lenin and Philosophy, at pp, 207,
204.
8 A Theory of Literary Production, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1978.
9 A Theory of Literary Prouction, pp. 133, 59,
10 In collaboration with Etienne Balibar: see their 'De Ia litt&atuce come form
id66logique', Liitirature 13, Februry 1971; trarlated as 'On Uterature as
an. Ideological Form' (Oxford Literary Rriew 3, 1978) and reprinte in
Frand1 Mulhern, ed., Contemporary Marxis Literary Criticism Longman,
London, 1992 (to which subsequent reference refer).
11 'Ideology and Literary Form', New Lef Review 90, March/April 1975;
Ctiticis and Ideology, New Left Books, London, 1976.
12 Criticism and Ideology, pp. 83-84.
13 See Jy 'Marxism in Literary Criticism', New Left Revew 108, March/April
1978, which advanced this critical argument, among other - but whicn, as
a whole, shared with ir interloutor the limiting probleatic discussed abve
14 The edency of Michael Sprinker's work, in the United States, runs counter
to this suggetion. For him, the relation btween the aesthetic and the ideo
logical forms our 'current horizon of understanding' and, to that extet, 'we
remain determtnately within the Althussrian problematic.' He would add,
howe_ver, that the concept of the aesthetic is more elusive than

the traditions
of bourgeois and Mnst reflection acknowledge (Imaginary Relations,
Verso, London, 1987, pp. 2, 3). See, for more general interest, E. Ann Kaplan
and Sprinker, eds, The Afthserian Legacy, Verso, London, 1993, which
includes a vaiety of North Ameicn (and other) appreiations of Althusser's
work,
15 'On Literature as an Ideological Form', p. 35.
16 Criticism and Ideology, p. 56. Eagleton'$ retrospective assesmentof Althus5er
appea[i in the prefac of his Agoinst the Grai1; Essays 1975-1985, Vers,
London, 1986, pp. 2-4; in the same volume,, see also his 'Macherey and
Marxist Literary Theory' ( 1975), pp. 9-21.
17 Tel Que\, Theode d'ensemble, Editions du Seuil, Paris, 1968.
18 Balibar and Machetey associated Tel Q,el with a vision of art as 'anti-nature'
and 'violation of order' - a 'reversl . . . characteristic of conSeL'ative ideology'
('On Literature as an Idelgicl Form', p. 54, n. 10). See also Eagleton,
Against the Grain, p. 4,
19 Theorie d'ensemble, p. 8.
20 See Foucault, 'Distance, aspect, origine'; Barthes, 'Drame, pome, roman';
and Drrida, 'La differance', Thtorie d'etuemb!e, pp. 11-14, 25-40, 41-66
respectively.
21 Wollen, Readings aHd Writings; Semiotlc Couter-strategies, Verso, London
1982, p. 211; Heath, Questions of Cinema, Macmillan, London, 1981, p. 201.
Wollen's version of this trinity formula was always frmly grounded in a
cmmitment io science; he was correspond,ingly more disrant from Tel Que/
than Heath, who was for a time an active collaborator in the journal. Heath's
Sigrof the Times; Introduaory Readings i Terti a( Semiotics (co-edited with
Ci MacCabe -and Christopher Prendergut, Granta, Cmbridge, n.d.) marked
the entry of Tel Que/ into
\
ritish left culture.
22 Rosalind Coward ad John ElHs's Language and Materialism (Routledge and
17
FRANCIS MULHERN
Kegn Paul, London, 1977) was widely reccived as a synopsis of SCreen's
thinking, but did not claim that status for itself.
23
See Boumelha, Thomas Hardy and Women: .exual fdolog; and Narratve
Form, Harveter, Brighton, 1982, and Kaplan, Sea Changes; Cuture and
Feminism, Verso, London, 1986.
24 See his Formalism and MarxisM, Methuen, London. 1979; also 'Marxism and
Popular Ficion', frst published i Literature and Histoy 7, 1981, ,.nd reprinted
in Contemporay Marxise Literty Criticism.
25 The sociologists Barry Hindess ad Paul Hirst were the key .gures here; their
reading of Althusser quickly ros to quasi-canonical status in Screen and its
literary-theoretical hinterland,
26 TOny Bennett explains his transition to 'post-Marxism' (not, he stresses,
aHti-Marxism) in his Outside Literature, Routledge, London, 1990; pSrt 1.
27 British Poststructura/ism since 1968, Routledge, Lon!oTI, 1!8, pp_, 171 21.
28
For Mtrx, 'Glossary' (compod by Ben Brewster and amended by Althusser),
p, 252,
29 The absolute quality of this thesis was- cnfrmed a conrtrio by Althusser's
one attempt to qualify it. Ideology, he wrote, i 'an omni-bistorical reality,
in the sense (that its) structure and funtioning are immutable, preent in
the same form throughout what we can cl history, i the sense in which the
Communist Mtnifesto defnes hitory as the history of class muggles, i.e. the
history of cla5s societies' (Lenin and Philosophy, pp. 151-52). If this purported
qualifcation is valid, then the substantive thesis fails.
30 The Ideology of Power tnd the Power of Ideology, Verso Lond_on, 1980.
31 For one compact smmary, see Williams, Maxism a7d Uter.tle, Oxford
University Prs Oxford, 1977,
32 See, for example, Paul Hirst, On Lawa.,dldeology, Macmillan, London, 1979,
pp. 52-53, 71-72 and pasim, and forthesetded retrospect, Easthope, Britilh
Poststr1cturalism, pp. 213-14.
33 Cf. the introuction to Contemporar; Marxist Literary CriridWt, p. 25.
34 Stephen Resnick and Richard W_oolf appeu to me to be trying to evade this
unaccommoating conclusion * LT L bwdleriu it - when they maintain,
frst, that for Althusser there cn b no one social truth, only a plrality of
truths; but, second, that Marxism should acceptor rejet exogenous theoretical
claims following an asmbmen of their 'social conditions aud consequences'
('Althusser's Liberation of Marxian Theory', in The AlthuJserian Legacy,
pp. 65, 67).

ANALYSIS TERMI NATED, ANALYSIS

I NTERMINABLE: THE CASE OF LOUIS
ALTHUSSER
W
GregcqE0c|t
Onco everything hu been &aid, everythlilg still remalna to be said . . , . Ever
thing attll remalne to aay; everything attV8 remains to be eald.
AndrO Gorz, The Traitor
Sl au Iiiii de bnl OL excpmmunler, on cormenQalt par comprendn?
Louis Althusser, Jurnal de capvt6
In a text red at te funeral of Luis Alrhusser, Jacques Derrida obserYed
of him that he had
traversed so many lives . + so many personal, historical, philosophical and
plitll adventures; marked, inllected,-infh.enced so may discourses, aLtions,
and existences by the radiant and proVcative forc of his thought, his
manner of bing, of speaking, of teaLhing@ that the mast diverse and contra
dictory ECOUnts could never exhaust their source.1
And yet whilst rhe 'unique adventure which
b
ears the name of Louis
Althusser' was indelibly singular, it has asumed, well beyond the borders
o
f
his native courry, a representative status, inseparable from the post
war adventures of th dialectic. In a celebrated formula of 1960, criticized
for its historicism by Althusser, Sartre accredited Marxism 'the untran
scendab!e philosophy for our time',2 According to a pervasive self-image
of the age, the historical moment 'expressed' by .M<rxism has been sur
passed, ceding, cica June 19681 to Rorty's North At
l
antic Postmodern
Bourgeois Liberal Demoracy' as the un.tanscendable horizon of contem
porary thought. In consequence, the past-war thinker who, perhaps more
than any other, sought to render Marxism genuinely contemporary, by
articulating modernist phiosophy and Communist plitics, had been laid
to intellectual rest well bfore the offcial obsequies of Otober 1990.
17
GREGORY fLUOT
If Althusser's effacement from the scene occurred no less rapidly than
his rise to prominence within it, this is, in part at least, attributable
to his
intolerability for a generation in whose 'former philosophical consciousw
ness' he once loomed so large. But the ties that bind are not so easily
severed. Where denegation prevails, repression obtains. The 'enormous
condescension of posterity', to borrow a phrase from E. P. Thompson,3 is
no more reliable a guide to its objects true worth than the gratuitous
adulation of anteriority. Moreover, it is index enough that what Althusser
represented -the summation of the 'illusion of the epch' (Althusserianism,
highest stage of Marxism?) - is one component of the theoretical unconv
scious of the present.
Althusser was not merely a Marxist- suffcient:in itself to condemn him
to the philosophical equivalent of the Natural History Museum, so far as
much of the class of '68 is concerned (having embarked for Beijing in its
_youth, and landed in Bel Air in middle age)+4 _He was a Cmmunist and
what is doubtless worse a French (not an Italian) one, and is core
spondingly susceptible to the tendency to affx the label 'Stalinist' to any
thing and everything which moves in that comple; history. Furthermore
and notriously - he was Nietzsche's companion in lunacy, compounding
the philosophico-political actes d'accusation of the late 1970s by the murder
of his companion of 35 years and wife of four in November 1980, And
such cases are, at best, of pathologkal curiosity (unless, that is, they enjoy
the good fortune of having been editd and introduced by Michei.Foucault).5
'Neither amnesia, nor disgwt, nor irony produces even the shadow of
a critique.'6 In rhe event, the frst option is no longer available to us. As. is
its wont, the repressed has, to the evident discomfort of some, returned
A vindication of the Althusserian programme across the disciplinary board
has recently been attempted; while the ppers presented to a conference in
1988 on the Althusserian legacy have now been collected? Abve all, the
simultaneous publication in April 1992 of the frst volume of Yann Moulier
Boutang's biography of Althusser, and of the philosopher's 'autobiography'
(due to appear in English translation in autumn 1993), has aroused a
massive wave of interest on both sides of the Channel.8 Within months of
its release in France, L'4vtr dure logtemps had sold 40,000 copies, accrac
ting sustained - and, in the main, serious - attention in the _French press9
and prompting a two-hour T programme. The longest book written by
Althusser is set - if it has not already done so - to beome the highest
selling; the thinker who endured a living death for the last decade of his
life is enjoying a posthumous existence among an audience much of which
had probably never heard of, let alone read, For Marx or ReadiHg Capital.
Predictably, British coverage to date (including a slot on BBC 2's Late
Show in October 1992) has taken im cue from Althusser's 'confessions'
and focused predominantly, if not exclusively, on the sensational dimen
sion of !'affaire Althusser. lbe ritual monotony of the tides prefacing reviews
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS INTERMINABLE 179
- 'A Mgr:it murderer', 'Sex, murder and philosophy', 'Marx and murder'
- explains the space devoted to the deceased adherent of an outmoded
(and/or iniquitous) doctrine by the mainstream press.10 If French com
mentators had, doubtless inadvertently, conveyed the impression that
Althus_er's murdel of his wife weighed less heaviy with them than his
failure t abjure the God that falledu -given Helene Rytman's biography,
morality tales about antiCommunist beauty and the Stalinist beast were
implausible. --sotrle of their AngloAmerican counterparts were readier to
insinuate the. equation; fait divers @ fait pbilosophique, or (Althusserian)
Marxism" MadneS= Murder. It was left to the Sun's Augean stable-mate,
The Tim,. Literary Suppltment, under Murdochite proprietorship and
Oakeshottian presidency, to give full vent to the outraged decency of the
moral majority, in an article, riddled with errors, that entered an unwitting
affdavit against the benevolence of the values it indignantly cunterposed
to the Pafislan contagion of theoretical anti-hutnanism.12
'I am one thing, my writings are another', proclaimed Nietzsche in his
putative autobiography.1l The point applies to Althusser1 as to_ any other
thinker: the genesi, the structure, the validity, and the eUectivity of a body
of thought are analytically distinct issues for any inquiry that aspires to
something other than ad hominem iocrimination or exculpation of ideas.
At any rate, the seQets of Althuserian Marxism will not be exposed by
edifying inspection of its artisan's adolescent bdclothes (or the glacial
improprieties of his parents' marriageHbed, for that matter); 'as a general
rule', he once objecte t Plekhanov's imprudent speculations on the causes
of the French Revolution, 'concepts are not hidden in beds.'14 By way of
variation on a Sartrean theme, it might simply be remarked Louis A!thusser
became a manicdepressive murderer, no doubt about it. But not every
manicdepressive murderer is Louis A\thusser The heuristic inadequacy of
literary supplement psycho-babble is contained in these two sentencesY
The frat thing to be noted about the occasion far Althusser's renewed
celebrity (or notoriety) is that the status of both his texts is no less com
plex than their character. Les faits, written in 1976 and unfoiShed, was
scheduled for inclusion in an abortive jo11rnal edited by Althusser's pupil,
Regis Deb_ray. L'avenir dure longtemps, .almost four times the length
(some 270 pages), and drafted, characteristically, in feverish haste in the
spring of 1985 between bouts of hospitalization, was initially intended for
publication, but then simply laid aside. No will having been left by Althusser,
his closest surviving relative - a nephew became his exe11or and decided
to authorlze teir appearance under the a\lspkes of the Institut Memoires
de !'edition cntemporaine and the seemingly scrupulous editorship of
Olivier CorJet and Yann Moulier Boutang.16
Althussr"s unavailing struggle against t&e psychological torment that
predated nd punctuated his public career - the 'war without memoirs or
memorials' evoked by him in his single most powerful essay, 'Freud and
180
GAEGORY ELLIOT
acan'' - has bnaI) bccn tantcd ts mcmotIa and yIcdcd mcmoIts o
a kInd. but can thc autobIogtaphct's tac o how hc brcamc what hc was
bc ttustcdr Jhat thctc atc tcasonablc tounds ot doubt ts suggcstcd, I by
nothIng csc, by thc matkcd dIsctcpanccs bctwccn Les faits and L'avenir.
hc !otmct, undct a typcaly aconIc |and tonIc) ttc, Is compscd n a
cOmIc tcgIstct (It contaIns, ot cxamQc, bctIona cncountcts wIth Iopc
]ohn XXIII and Lcncta dc LauIlc [AOL, 338-39] )+ hc attct pcttaIns to
thc convctsc modc - Its ttaIc scotc untcIIcvcd (Indccd, ntcnsIbcd) by thc
ascy Opt|mIstIc notcs It sttkcs towatds ts concuson. LscntIay covct-
Ing thc samc tcttaIn, thcy dO so gutc dctcnty, octIng not so much a
mutua cottcct:vc as atctnatIvc pctspcctIvcs upon thc Athussctan dcstIny.
Vhcrc tcadIngs havc not bcn agtanty cupabc, thcy havc too otcn
bccn unduy Ingcnuous, In ptcItcudian ashIon takng Athussct at hIs
wotd and thctcw|th subsctIbng to an 'dca o tcadIng whch makcs a
wtittcn dIscoutsc thc mmcdIatc ttanspatcncy o thc ttuc, thc tca dIs-
coutsc O a vocc' .' As thc authot o Reading Capital Insstcd at thc Outsct,
thctc s no such thng as an nnoccnt tcadng. Athussct's own sttatcy
vs-avIs Natx - thc 'symptomatc tcadIn' whIch souht :o tcconsttuct
thc atcnt sttuctuta mattx (ot thcotctIca 'ptobcmatc') cnctatvc o thc
manIcst sctaI dIscoutsc - dtc upon thc tcudIan ntctptctaton o dtcan:s.
|Is anayss o thc AIthuss casc and thc tcasons ot his untcason - thc
tangcd causa skcIn that cumlpatcd In an 80t o cDn]oInt d&ttuctIon and
sc-dcsttuctIon- tcguItcs an analoOus opcratIOn. hr occasIonaly onc;rc
dIscoutsc o L'avrrlr ctIcs out, amost Itctay, ot a symptomatic tcadn.
It s Immasutaby atdcd by NouIct boutan's mctcuou8 ttconsttuc-
tIon o Athussct's c up to 1956, whIch pctmIts Inotmcd and ptopcty
ctItca sctutIny o! hIs own tcndcntIous tcndIton. Iot thctc wctc many
Athusscts, o whom Athussot's is OnIy Onc - onc who docs not cxhaust
(may cvcn ttducc) thc puta and conttadIctoty tcaty commcmotatcd
by LcttIda and who must, accDtdny, bc apptoachcd en cotttraissance de
cause. Yct thc ptobcm, badIy statcd, Is that, dcsptc hs bIogmphct's
hctoIc cndcavouts, such knowcdgc s not at out dspo1a and s unikcy
to bc cvcn whcn wc Qosscss thc compctcd 0IogtaQhy. 1hc batc zcts o
what Althussct oncc dubbcd hs 'auto-hrtctobotaphtca Otcmnstauccs',''
and thct concatcnaton, atc In thc ptoccss o bcIng cstabIshcd; thc
mpacabc IogIc o hs unconscIous rcmaIns tccaIcttant to cucdatIon.
'IothIng_ hc justIy tcmatkcd In onc vctson o thosc acts tom ano\hct
sccno, s as sImpc as thc unconscious ccmcnts on whIch ana1yss wotks;
but nothIn is as compIcatod as thct IndvIdua combnaton' (ALI, 354).
bccausc thcy appcat undct hs sInatutc Athussct`s own disconccttng
sImpc|tIcs havc bccn tcccIvcd as thc dIscIosutc o that ndIvIdua combI
naton n t!s pcnaty cOmpIcxIty- a |, contra asca, Ihc AthussctIan htatt
had ts tcasOns and thcy we known to Athussct's hcad. Iutthctmotc, hs
ptoccton o thc shadow o 'Athussct OntO thc young Althussct thc
ANAl SIS TERMINATED, ANAl YSIS INTERMIABLE 181
constructwn of his own history in the 'future anterior'2tl -has been accepted
as the authoritative (since authorized) version.
L'avenir advertises itself as the public explanation which Althusser was
at once excused and denied by the nonlieu ('no grounds') decreed, under
Article 64 of the French penal code, after the murder of his wife:
This is why, :since everyone has bee able to speak -in my place and the legal
process has prohibited me frm any public e7plantion, I have relved to
elplain Jllyself publicly,
I. do so f[r of all for my friends andQ if poiible, for myaelf1 in order to
lift this heavy tombsrone which weighs down on me, , , . Yes, to free myself
hom the condition i which [r have been placed] by the extreme gravity of
my state , . , rcy murder, and also - and tpecially - by the equivocl effects
of the deree of nclie from which I benefted, without bing able, in fact
or in l, to Cltet the procedure. For it is under the tomb-tone of the
nonlieu of silenc nd public death that I have been forcd to suviv and
learn to lie (ADL 23).
Reminding us that there was an Althusser bfore. and after - as well
during - Althusserianism, the author stipulates that L'avenir constitutes
'neither a journal, nor memoirs, nor autobiography' (ADL, 15), but rather
what he once described to his biographer as a 'traumabiography'. He
daims to be 'sticking strictly to the facts', but immediately attaches a
crc-d qualifcation: 'hallucinations are also facts' (ADL, 74). We are
dealing, not with the tranquil recollection. of an acomplished life, but the
angu'ish
.
ed retrospction of a death foreold - one which amply confrms
Malraux's observation that what is tragic about death is that it transforms
life inro destiny. L'aveir, in the words of its editors, is an 'inextricable
melange of "facts, and "fantasies'" (ADL, i'x}.
Derrida had renarked that whilst public discourse about Althus$er tended
to as9ociate his nante with those of Marx. or Lenin, hi9 intimates were
compelled to invoke other fgures: Pascal, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, or Artaud.
Anticipating this insight. Althusser seeks to situate his text by allusion to
Foucault's edition of Pierre Riviere's testament and Rousseau's Confessions
(adding, 'alas, I am not Rousseau'). Other autobiographical writings thae
come to mind are Sartre's Word. and President Shreber's MeMoirs
of
my Nervous ll Tess+ In effect, this is a fragmentary 'wild (self.) analysis';
something akin to the testimony of a Nietzsche in the discourse of a Freud.
Just as Althusser can lay claim to Rousseau's privilege and bane - 'I am
like no one il) the whole world'11 - so his confessions are literally excep
donal, _or better and worse alike.
Much of their poignancy, as well a their ambivalence, derives from a
fact so blinding as to risk invisibility: L'avenir is a symptom of the chronic
manicdepressive syndrome which it hops to exorcize through a public
ta!king,cure. It opens - excruciatingly - with the scene of the crime and
GREGORY ELI.IOTT
loses, after apparent seJf.detection, with the explanatory commentary of
an 'old medical friend' (AD 273-79), th
erewth reinstating the noniieu
in conclusion. The frst half of the book i's given ovrt to the aetwlogy of
its subjet's mental illness {or the origins of his madness) in a 'family
romance', eMcted in A|gct\a and southern FranCe entre ks deux rres,
which son acquires the contours of a fmilial horror-story. From his
maternal aunt Althusser learnt the fami!. secret: that his mother's fance
had been killed during the First World War; that :she had subsequently
accepted the marriageproposal of his broher; and that she had named
her only son after the love of her youth - and of her life, Thus informed,
Althusser drew a devastating conclusion: he had, so to speak, been born,
not made. For inscribed in the infant Louis' Christian name was the true
- and other - object of her affections;
above all, it said: him [lui I, the third person pronoun which, Tinging like the
summons of an anonymous third peron, deprve me of any prsonality of
my own, and referre to thisman behind my back1 Him was Louis [L, Citat
Louis}, my uncle, whom my mother loved, not me (ADL. 34),
As depicted by him, Althusser's mother iS a mater dolorosa straight out of
the pages of de Beauvoir's Second SexP Remembered as a violated wife
- 'a martyred mother bleeding like a wound' (ADL, 33) - Lucienne A!thusser,
ne Berger - the maiden name (proprio sensu) to which sP,e reverted after
her husband's death in 1975 -is portrayed as a ctrating mother, impelled
by her phobias to enforce a strict regime of social anO sexual 'hygiene'
upon Althuer and his sister, Georgette. Fror_ the domestic milieu in
which her uncontested writ ran his father was, literally or metaphoncally,
absent, inspiring in the son the sns that he had.no father. The consequence,_
so Althusser claims, was a feling of fathomle solitude, relieved only
by his relationship with his maternal grandparents ('my true f!mily, my
only family') in the 'infant paradise' of the Bois de Boulogne, overlook
ing Algiers, or of Larochemillay, in the Morvan, to which they retired
IADL, 56f.J.
As Althusser notes (ADL, 162-65), the related theres of the 'fatherless
child' and 'solitude' would recur in his philosophical wrirngs/3 Cherchez
la femme is the leitmotif of his cas history:
My mother loved me profoundly, but it was only much later, in the light of
my analysis, that I understood how . . . the unh@ppy woman, she lived a
best she could what had happened to her: having a child whom she could
not restrain herself from baptizing 'Louis', with the name of the dead man
whom she had loved and still loved, in her soul. . . . I am recompsing here
what I livd and what I mvc rome to understand of it . . . . In my case death
was the death of a .man whom my moth.er loved above all else, beyond me.
In her 'love' for me, something parlyzed and marked me from earlit
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS ITERMINABLE 183
childhood, fxn for a very lo

g time what was to be my fate. It wasn't a

question of a fantasy, but of the very reality of my life. Thus it is, for each
of 1s, that a fantasy becomes life (ADL, 48).
Whatever it was, it induced, we are told, the project that structured
Althusser's existence: 'to seduce her by 'realizing her desire':
1 realized what my mother desired and expected . . . from the prson of the
other Louis -and T achieved it in order .to seduc he. wisdom, purity, virtue,
pure intellect, disincarnation, scholarly success, and, to crown it all, a 'liter
ary' "1reer , , . and admision co an Eole Normale Suptrie1e,_ not Saint-Cloud
- my uncle's - but bter stil the rue d'Ulm. Then I bcame the intelletual
whom peple know of, who fercely refused to 'dirty his hands' with the
media . . . and, my nme on the frst page of
_
some boks which my mother
read with pride, < renowned philosopher (ADL, 51-52.).
Thus to win his mother's love, by realizing her desire, was for Althusser
simultaneously to realize his own being, by fashioning an ego (psychic and
corporeal) .. The paradoxical effe1t of his project - as with its petition in
his rdationship to his teachers (ADL, 81) -was to exacerbte the pw;eived
original ex-centricity: seduction of others meant Althusser's seduction into
his own betrayal. For, 'I always had the impression of nor being me, of not
genuinely existing, but of exiSting only by and in artfces, namely th artifces
of seduction achieved by imposture . , ,' (ADL, 53).
In 'revelations' onto which critics have latched, Althusser confdes that
the imposture extended to his philosophical culture (more precisely, the
lack of it) (ADL, 157-58). However that may be, his formal education was
interrupted, after he had come sixth -in the examinations for admission to
the 'Ecole Normale Supfrieure, rue d'Uim, by the advent of war in September
.1939. The political option current in the Catholic and monarchist circles
in which he had moved at the Lycfe du Parr, Lyons - 'rather Hitler that
the Popular Front' - materialized with the collapse of the Third Republic.
Among those sacrifced to Travail, Farille, Patrie in the 'strange defeat' of
June 1940 was Althusser. That the e_xperience

of captivity was a formative

infuence is clear. Notwithstanding the manifold privations it records. his
own account stresses the redeeming feature: while Sartre had never felt
freer than under the -Occupation, Althusser had never felt more secure
than in his prson(rofwar camp (ADL, 99). Released from the maternal
embrace, he fnal!y disovered masturbation and,.-in the person o" Robert
Dael, a friend whom he ;ecalls as 'tender with me like
a woman (the
genuine mother whom I had not had)' (ADL, 100). Accordingly, liberation
in 1945 induced not elation, but disorienation, betokening reversion to
the isolation which enhanced that 'nostalgic desire far _fusion' (ADL, 88)
motivating subsequent attachments.
184 GREGQRY !LLIOT
Post-war, those attachments reduced, in essentials, to three: the Ecole
_ormale Superieure - 'it too the substitute for a maternal milieu, the
amniotic fluid' (ADL, 155) - where Al
.
rhusser resumed his education and
secured an academic post after being received second at the philosophy
agtigation in 1948; Helene Rytman - Jewess, risistante, exComtnunist,
fallen on hard times -whom he met in 1946; and the French Communist
Party, to which he adhered in November 1948.
Helene 'gave me . , . the. prodigious gift of a world which r did not
know ) 4 a world of solida(ty and struggle, a world of action 4 a world
of courage , , .' (ADL, 123). Yet the prospct of redemption so miracul
ously opened up soon gave. way to the threat of perdition. The relation
ship with Helene, eight years his senior, to whom, Sd he claims, Althusser
lost his virginity at the. age of 28, was traumatic from the outset, plunging
him into a deep depression which necessitated the 6rst of a score of
hospitalizations, after Pierre Mile had diagnosed schizophrenia. (1ut for
the reversal of this verdict by Julian Ajuriaguerra, and its replacement by
severe melancholia, the affair might have ended there [116-17).)24 According
to Althusser, he and Helene performed an indispensable maternal and
paternal function for one another. While Althusser replaced the parents to
whom, terminally ill, Sh had administered fatal euthanasiac injections,
Helene was everything for which he ha yeared:
.
simultneously like a good mother and a good father meT older rhaM me,
loaded with exprience and life, she loved me as a morher loves her child,
her miraculous cbild, and at the same tlme like a father, a good father,
since she quit simply imtiated me imo rhe real world, this infnite world
into whiuh I had never been able to enter, . , , Through her desire for me
pathetic me - she also .initiated me into my rple and maulinir as a man
she loved me as a woman lovs a man! (ADL, 123-24)
Indissolubly linked to these rites de passage was Althusser's induction
fnto the world of French Communism, which he embraced, so he narrates,
after the loss of his Roman Catholic faith (ADL, 197). As the hopes borne
by the Resistanc suqumbed to the Co!d War, and the 'united front' of
1944-47 fractured into the 'two camps' of 1948, Althusser arrived at the
PCF's own conviition: paraphrasing St._ Augustine, hors- dU parti, poit de
salut politique (outside the party, no political salvation). Even without
acentuating circumstances, the conjuncture would have proved inclement
for the new academic recruit. Nizan's Srge Pluvinage may accurately
convey the pre-war experience of Communist intellectuals ('the question
of original social sin was absolutely never posed');15 as Althusser's Intro
duction to For Marx attested - possibly in conscious reminiscence (and
contradiction) of The Conspiracy - during the cultural Cold War imputa
tions of original social sin flourished and prospered.26 Accentuating circum
stances there were, however, in the form of Helene's exclusion from the
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS INURMINABLE 185
party and A!thusser's assumption of the missicn to secure her readmission.
So explosive
-
an issue was this that if no salvation was to be had without
the party, damnation beckoned within it.
Althuner basically reiterates the standard account of the affair, attrib
uting his wife's misfortunes to the malevolence of Elsa Triolet, and con
firms the details supplied .by one of the participants in it, Emmanuel Le
Roy Ladurie.21 Accepting Helene's version of events, Althusser sought
to clear her name of the charge of having been double agent (to whom
rumours of supervising a sar.guinary episode of epuration attached),
Without bnefting her, his zeal merely served to expose him to the inqui
sltion and censure of the PCF cell at the ENS for consorting with a 'Hit!ero
Trotskyite' (as the inimitable Stalinist amalgam of the era had it). In a
narrative signifcantly at variance with that supplied in Les faits |ALL, JJ),
Althusser claims in L 'avenir to have joined the unanimous vote for HfJfne's
expulsion from the Peace Movement, but to have defed the insttQction
of his branch to -sever relations with his companion (ADL, 194-95).

Dis
consolate at the temporary ostracism of his comrades, yet consoled by her
love, Althusser asserts that this 'veritable Moscow trial in the heart of
Paris' inducd a realistic appreciation of the PCF and the methods of its
adamantine leadership - an assessment confrmed by his experienc of over
hearing Laurent Casanova, then responsible for subjugating intellectuals
to ideological rectitude, berate the biologist, Marcel Prenant, on the subject
of 'bourgeois' arithmetic (ADL, 197).
While there is no reason to doubt Althusser's insistenc that he never
subscribed to the dementia of Lyserikoism, upon the public repudiation of
which his own epistemology was based,zs it is possible that his proclaimed
clairvoyanc about the PCF
-
is a retrojection of subsequent disillusion
ment (as memorably expressed in Ce qui ne peut plus durer dans le parti
communiste in 1978).29 What is im:ontestable, as we sha!l see, is that the
comparafive equanimity with which he affects to have greeted the sanc
tions of his comrades i belied by the historical record.
In Les -aits, discussing his imprisonment in Germany, Althusser recounts
a plan which consisted in giving the guards to think that an escap had
been effected, and then, some weeks later, when the enemy had failed t
recapture the 'escapees', making the genuine attempt. For him it exem
plified 'the problem of all philosophical {and plitical and military) prob
lems: namely, of knowing how to exit from a circle while remaining within
it' (ADLg 313). Having identifed his attachmen:s, L'avenir becmes a
tale .of a 'circle of circles' - the family, the Ecole, the companionship, the
party, the clinic - and their mutual implication and overdetermihation to
produce, via what he once called the 'necessity of contingency', a singular
destiny. Applying his own formula, it might be said .that his narrative
enacts his inability to fn an egress from circles whose arc was inAected,
but not designed, by him, and which degenerated from the seemingly
18
GREGORY ELLIOT
virtuous to the intermittenty vicious to the ultimately infe.nal. Pace Sartre,
Hell is not other people.
By his own admission, Althusser and Helene constituted a COilpie who,
by the end, could live ne1ther with, nor without each other. Dependent
upon her as a mainstay and refuge, his self-destructiveness found expres
sion in courting realization of his greatest terror: abandonment by her.
In addition to the burden of anxiety and distress imposed by his recurrent
depression, Helene was subjected to his 'provocations' and humiliations
ifor example, his relatonships with other women) - espcially when iu the
manic phase of his psychosis (ADL, 147ff.). Quite why things deteriorated
so inexorably and fatally in 1980 is not adequately explitined by Althusser's
slf-analysis. If it is to 'be blieved. confronted with yet another depression
- possibly the most acute to date - Helene determined to leave him and
spoke of suicide, but did not act upon _her, resolution. What supervened,
in Althusser's fnal harrowing image o November 1980, amounted to the
'Hell for two, bhind dosed doors, of a deliberately organized solitude'
(ADL, 244), terminated only by the murder in which 'my own destruction
symblically passd through the destruction of others -especially my dearest
and closest friends, including the woman whom I loved the most'
(ADL, 269).
By then, the failure of a plethora of <treatments' to release Althussr
from the unrelenting grip of his madness, which dictated hospitaliation at
least once every two years, was evident. Althusser is painfully frank about
his psychiatric h1story - from a wrenching account of subjection to ECT
at the hattds of a hospital orderly whom his patients nicknamed 'Stalin'
(ADL, 1 17-18), through the narcotic-ana)ysis undertaken, from 1950-62,
with Lurent Stevenin (ADL, 140), to the medical psychoanalysis, dispens
ing with the indignities of the couch, he embarked upon with Rene Diatkine
thereafter. (Interestingly, Althuser does not linger over the rationale for
this option - at the antipdes of his contempraneous endorsment of
Lacan's 'retur to Freud' in 'Freud and Lacan' .) The conscious theme of
his depression he isolates as the terror of abandonment; the fear of vulner
ability to a demand for love of which he was incapable; and anxiety abour
public exposure as an impostor (rhis was the source of rhe 'spectacular
depression' he suffered at the height of his celebrity, in the immeiate
aftermath of publication. of Pour Marx and Lire le Capital, in the autumn
of 1965). Whatever their uncorucious promptings and signifcance, tracked
down by Althusser to the maternal 'castration' which deprived hi'm of
his 'physical and psychic integrity' (ADL, 128), their course 'invariably
involved transition from melancholic depths to manic summits:
Very rapidly I passed from depression to hypomania, which sometimes tok
the form of violent genuine mania. Then 1 felt myself to be omnipotet
ove everythig the external word, my friends, my projects, my prblems,
ANALYSlS TERMINATED, ANALYIS INTERMINABLE 187
and thos of othes. Evcci! smed to be an Wi-in1reibly easy. , , . It
will be understood that in this extraordinary facility and pretention there
was a massive dose of aggression, Nhich was release . . . like a symptom of
the fantasy of impotence and hence depression, for it was merely a defece
against my tendency to depres$ion and against the fantasies of impotence
which norihed it. q , . My fen of being utterly imporent and y desire to
be omnipotrt, my megalomania, were simply two sides of the same thing:
the desire to possess what .l lacked in order to be a full and fee mt, and
which I was terrifed of Jacking (ADL, 135).
Paradoi-ally, the 'security' of the psychiatric clinic answered to the
dire for omniptenc even as it certifed Althusser's impotence (ADL,
133). Wirhin the coru entric circles of the academy and the party the same
drama was played out in the exercise of his public functions. GiNen that
Althusser's characterization of his purpose in the chapters dealing with
philospli.y and plitics has frCquently been ignored by commentators; jt
bears citation:
, . . what I owe my reader, because I oe it myself, is elucidation of the
subjective roots of my specifc attacment to my profCslon of philosophy
racher at the Ecole Normale Supirieure, to philosophy, politics, the prty,
my books and their impact, i.e., how I k.nd m
yself . . . led to invest
and inscribe my subjective fanta.ies in my objective and pObli\ 1crivitie
(ADL, 152).
In effect1 Althusser essays an explanation of how the bearer of the name
Louis A!thusser became the artisan of Althusserianism. Without conflating
questions of genesis and validity, his reflections on the former provide
some elements for an understanding of how lt was he who arrived at the
elaboration of whar, as he readily concedes to Raymond Aron, was an
iaginary Marxism' {ADL, 214).10
Althusser's refusal to stage a retraction of Marxism and all its works
"(induding his own) has provoked hostile critics to construe L'avenir as
a self-detraction. Quite the reverse of engaging in renunciation - a fact
which will no doubt irritate some readers and reassure others - Althusser
is unapologetic about the philosopli.ico-politka!. 'war of position' conducted
by him and his collaborators within the PCF and affrms his enduring
cmmitment to 'the materialist inspiration of Marx', disdaining the thrills
and spills of postmodernism (ADL, 215-16). Whilst criticizing the PCF
(oYr its treacherous role in the May Events, for example; ADL, 223),
Althusser vigorously defends the rationaHy of French socialists opting for
membrship and explains why he persevered in his chosen course:
When I stayed i the party, I thought . , , that by so doing on the basis of
en overtly opp.Ltional poition . . . I could prove, at least formally, that
188 GREGORY ELLIOT
oppositional activity inside the party was possible on serious theoretical and
political bases, and hence that a transformation of it, maybe in the long run,
was a possibility (ADL, 227-28).
In a letter of August 1972 t his former Ctholic teacher, Jean Guitton,
Althusser had written: 'It is true that philosophy is a battle. No doubt I
make many mistakes, but it is a combat which I love. And when [ resume
the battle it is a sign that I am regaining my health a bit. 131 After the defeat
of the Union of the Left in March 1978, dashing the accumulated hopes
of a decade or more, no further such signs were forthcoming from Althusser.
In a subsequent letter to Guitton, dated 3 December 1978, he announced:
'My universe of thought has been abolished. I can no longer think. To
speak in the language [of my youthJ, I entreat your prayers.'32 All inter
cessions having proved vain, Alrhusser succumbed t his destiny.
A if in uncanny echo of Nietzsche's exaltation - 'My time has not yet
come, some are born posthumously'J - the closing pages of L'avenir are
leavened with a desperte optimism of the will:
So, despite its dramas, life VB still be beautifUl. I a 67, bnt at last I fed
- I who had no youth, since I wa not love for myself .I feel young as
never bfore, even i the affair must soon end.
Yes, the future lasts a long time (ADL, 272).
Perhaps - but not for the author of these lines. With ultimate pathos, what
the text cannot know is that, rather than registering the conquest of
Althusser's illness, its conclusion berrays the manic phase of his depressive
cycle. Within weeks of its completion, persecuted by the French gutter
press, he was back in hospital. Louis Althusser's time had come and gone.
Most are not reborn posthumously.
The overwhelming impression conveyed by L'avenir is of Althlsser's
self-destructiveness, extending, in that lonely hour of the last instance, to
the destruction of Helene. Yann Moulier Boutang's exhaustive research,
and its riveting frst instalment, confrm that this propensity is mimed by
the text itelf_ in a consistent selfdenigration - even s6lfdefamation -
which conceals a fact warrnte by many of those to whom Derrida
referred in his eulogy: Althusser was a man with qualities,_ Hls own express
wish was that his testament would solve his enigma to public satisfaction,
thus putting an end to demands for its elucidation and releasing him
into an emancipatory anonymity iADL, 202).
34
L '{venir frustrates that
aspiration and courts, instead, a further burst of the voyeurism attend
ent upon the events of 1980-81. For if not the 'tissue of lies and half
truths' detected by one--a his closest associates/
5
it is, as Moulier Boutang
conclusively demonstrates, a re-writing of a life through the prism of its
wreckage.
ANALYSI TERNINATED
,
ANALYSIS INTERMINABLE 189
Setting aside romparative1y_ minor issues (such as Althusser's affectation,
-a Ia Wirtgenstein, of ignorance of the history of philosophy), his biogra
pher can claim to have revealed the profundity of Althusser's revisions
in fve principal respects. Firstly - and crucially - the inversion of the
Althusserian family rom;nce can be frmly dated - to July 1964 - and
confdently attdbured-to none other than Htlne Rytman. She it was, in
a letter of 26 July 1964 quoted by Moulier Boutang (LA, 74-75), who
advanced the 'wild analysis' of the familial dynamic, a a fatality ab origine,
faithfully reproduced by- her companion. H;vlng, like Althusser's closest
male friend ofthe.19S0s -the suicide, jacques Martin -endured a wretched
childhood, Htlfne, to put it _no higher, abetted- Althuser in the projection
of the manic-depresive shadow of maturity onto his infancy.3 Secondly,
and relatedly a cental reationship in the young Althusser's existence is
underplayed and left largely unexamined in his narrative: his intense bond
with his' sister,_ Georgette, wbose own history of 'nervous illness' infallibly
tracked his own. Suffce it fOr now to indicate that, some two weeks after
reeiving Helene's revelatory letter in the summer of 1964, Althusser had
a dream which anticipates the scenario of Novembr 1980. Transcribed
by him, and found among his papers, it commenced thus: 'I must kill
my sister . . . . Kill her with her agreement, moreover . . .' (LA, 75),37
Thirdly, Althussr postdates the onset of his recurrent depression to the
post-war period, passing over in silence the trials he experienced both
during. his schooldays and then in captivity. The latter,. however, are
inscribd in the desolate record of une vie sans histoire (]C, 245
'
) he kept
at Schleswig,31
Moulier Bourang's other m;in contributions concern Althusser's rela
tionship with Roman Catholicism and the contrversy over Helene's Re
sistance record. Regarding the former, it is like! y chat, whilst not po'litically
aligned with Action Franaise, the pre-war Catholic-Nationalist activist
of Jeunesse Chretienne was considerably further to rhe right than he ls
prepared to concede in L'avenir. More imprtantly, his gravitation to the
left after the war, and eventual affliation to the international Communist
movement, involved no 'break\ epistemologica'l or otherwise, with the
faith of the one holy and apstolic Catholic Church into which he had
been born. On the contrary, as his frst post-war publication suggests,3
Althuaser's involvement with the left-Catholic Jeunesse de I'Eglise reached
its pak afer his adhesiOn co the PCP (LA, 276ff.). He gradually detached
himself from it between 1950-52, terminating his association only when,
in 1953, the Vatican anathematlted it and the 'worker priest&'. Thereafter,
the philosopher who quoted NiccolO Machiavelli and Cardinal de Retz
with equal facility, who placed the devotional writings of Santa Teresa of
Avila al'ongside the Colected Works of Comrade Lenin of Petrograd on
his bokshelves, and who reportedly pinned Pascal's evocation of the
'eternal silence' of the Galilean universe, as well as Marx's injunction to
19 GREGORY ELLIOTI
change the world, on his study wa!l, responded with virtual aMor fat to
his ineluctable identity: a lapsed Catholic.
If the organization to which Althusser transferred his allegiances _prved
so unamenable to the rehabilitation of his companion, it was, so Moulier
Boutang gives us to understand, bec_\US there was no smoke without fre.
Eventual illumination of this obscure episode is promised in the. second
volume of the biography. In the account to hand, while indicating that
Althusser was playing with fre, Moulier Boutang suggests that his claim
to have voted for Helene's exclusion from the Peace Movement amounts
to a screen-memory for the catastrophi'c breakdown which, cntrary to his
own narrative, he suffered after submitting to the will of the ENS cell on
his liaison dangereuse (LA, 423ff.)
In sum, it can be said that Mou\ier Boutang has the virtues of Althusser's
vices, putting every reader of the 'autobiography' in his debt by the metic
ulousness with which he has scanned the return of a repressed history
that has yet to be concluded, If he has not (thus far?) resolved the
Althusserian enigma, he has sounded it and, in so doing, rendered his
work at once indispensable to every student of his subject.
That said, we may return the compliment. when it comes to the ques
tions of Communism and. Marxism, Althusser possesses the virtues of his
biographer's vices. The second volume may make amends. Its predecessor,
however, is marked by an antipathy which does less than justice to Althusser
in tQis respect. However offensive it might sound to anti .talinist sensibil
ities, it needs to be remembered that, in the aftermath -of Vichy and Occu.
pation, and given the SFIO's promotion of the Cold War and French
colonialism - a record Smmaried by two critics as socialisme expedition
naire4 - the PCF, whose role, once it committed itself to the Resistance,
was perless, was an eminently defensible option for anyone on the left in
France.41 Here the fCw pages devoted to the issue by Eric Hobsbawm are
worth infnitely more than Moulier Boutang's many. Writing Althusset's
script avant la lettre on the dilemmas faced b:y Communist intel!ectuai. of
his generation, Hobsbawm observed in 1964 that
rhe communist who ct himself off from the party - and this was long
almost the automatic consequence of dissidence - lost all posibility of infu
encing it. In countries like France, where the party increaingly W!S tbe soclist
movement, leaving it meant politiLal imporenr or treason to scialism; and
for communist intellectuals the

possibilitie of settling

down as succesful
academic or cltul fgure. wa no compensation. The fare of those who left
LI were expelled was anticommunism \I oblivion excpt among the readers
of little magazine Conversely, loyalty left at least the pssibility of infuence:u
Hobsbawm's polarity is too stark, a> Sartre's endeavour, during the
Korean War, to theorize the political practice of the PCF from outside it
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS INTERMINABLE 191
ranks testifes,43 But as Anderson argues, whatever the choice about mem
bership, the likes of Althusser and Sartre were united in their conviction,
corroborated by political reality, that the Communist movement repre
sented the only available embodiment of socialist politics,44 Consequently,
they were damned if they did; and damned if they didn't, The price Althusser
paid for his party card - submission to the exigencies of the line of the day
- was heavy, by any calculation. Yet the opportunity it afforded, in a
country in the heart of whose capital Algerians could be murdered in their
scores in October 1961 by the guardians of Libert, Egalit, Fraternit,
should nnt be underestimated, Beautiful Parisian souls in the present are
unreliable guides to the 'dirty hands' of the not so distant past,
Pending Moulier Boutang's sequel, the theme of 'imaginary Marxism' -
Aeon's accusation and Althusser's admission - is worth dwelling upon
briefly. Raymond Williams once drew a distinction between three varieties
of Marxism in post-war Britain: the 'legitimating', the 'operative', and the
'academic' .45 Assimilation of the Althusserian project into Britain fell,
primarily, into the third category, Its moti. tion in France, by contrast,
was predominanty operative; a contribution to the transformation of the
PCF via theoretical reconstruction of its offcial ideology. The paradox, of
course - conducive to the pervasive reception of Althusserian Marxism
as legitimating - was that, in order for the operation to be licit within
the PCF, it had to wear the colo\lrS of legitimacy. Transformation co\lld
only proceed by the revindication o' tradition: hence the ruse de guerre,
identifed by Althusser, of a heresiatch psing as a defender of the faith
(Spinoza rrade the point long ago: there is no heretic without a text):
. . . objectively-, there exited no possible form of political intervention in the
party other tha1 the purely theoretical, and, moreoveL, one based upon the
existing or recognized theory so as ro rurn it back against the party's use of
it. And since the reogmzd theory no longer had anything t do Nith Marx,
but conforme to the highly dangerous inanities of dialectical materialism
Syiet- (i.e., Stali} style it was neessary - and this was the only possible
route - to rturn to Marx, to this thougt which was politiclly quite un
impechable, for saLred, and U demonstte that dialectical materialism a Ia
Stalin, wt al iB theoreticl, philosophical, idelogical and plitical conse
quences, was utterly aberrant (AL, 188-89),
Althusser's enterprise may have been 'theoreticist' - based upon the wager
that political history could be put back on the tracks of October by a
conversion to theoretical rectitude; it" was far from Marxological, invoca
tions of a reversion to the letter of Marx notwithstanding.
Althuser is both frank and lucid about the tendentiousness of his
!symptomatic reading' of the Marxist canon and recnstruction of the
corpus. His purpose, he maintains, accurately divined by his seniors in the
GREGORY ELL!OTT
PCF, was to release contemporary Marxism from what he regarded as
the false promissory notes issued by them in. Its name and thereby to
'render it genuinely contemprary':
I acknowledge it willingly, for I did inded supprcl everything in Max
which struck me as incompatible with his matrialist principles, but also
such ideology as remained i hi above all, the apologetic tegories of
the 'dia]tttic', even the dii!ectic itself. This, in the shape of ic fmous 'laws',
seemed to me to serve merely B a retrospective applogy (justifcation)
vis-i-vis the accomplished fact of the altory development of history for the
decisiof of the party leadership .(ADL, 214).
Integral to any redemption of the contemporaneity of Marxism was the
conception of it as a developing, 'fnite theory' of history,

rather than te
cosmology, accomplished sLience of anything and everything 'from protein
to poetry' ,46 bequeathed t the Third International by the Se_cond. Althusset's
intervention was designed, as it were, to salvage 'historical materialism'
-
the scientifc research programme initiated by Marx - from historical
Marxism' - the institutionalized ideology of politial organizations (abo-e
all, those of historical Communism).47 Accordingly, while Althusser pre
w
served the traditional terminology of the sanctioned tripartite. division of
Marxism int 'dialectical materialim', 'historical materialism', and 'scien
tifc socialism', in his rendition the second of these was emphatically not
a sub-set of the frst,, assigned the regional (socio-economic) instantiation
of the laws of a dialectic cast, in Plekhanovite or Stalinist fashion, as an
ontology of matttr-in-movement. Contrary to the materialist metaphysic
of Marxist orthodoxy, 'historical materialism' connoted no more - and yet
no less - than the 'science of history',48 merely commenced by Marx and
in urgnt need, after the depredations of decades, of re-commencement -
if nds be, by a comprehensive recasting of its theoretical problematic.
Althusserian 'imaginary Marxism' aspired to constitute that renovation of
historical materialism apr t interpret the contemprary world, thereby
arming those, in the main affliated to the international Communist move
ment, endeavouring to change it.
The antiquity of Althusserianism - and of Marxism in general - is
ubiquitous article of intellerual faith in these new times (in the words of
two commentators from the mid-1980s,. Althusser's Marxism

seems very
dated and, like the Betles' music or Godard's frst films, inevitably evokes
a recent but vanished past').49 Progression doe not invariably constitute
progress and Freud's caution might. be ereted over the philosophical
adventure-playground of postmodernism: 'a contradiction is not a refuta
tion, an innovation not necssarily an advance.'50 Yet that sense of a 'recent
but vanishe past' indicates something partially confrmed by L'avenir: the
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS INTERMINABLE 193
complex non/contemporaneity of Althusserlanism, or the degree to which
it represented a philosophical formation transitional between Marxism
and postmodernlsm, one of whose e(fts pervers was to f3cilitate intellec
tual transfer from the one to the other.
In his fne obituary of Althusser, Ted Benton noted that much post
Marxist theorization effects a unilateral, antiMarxist radicalization of
Althusser's own theses.n Various examJles of this might be cited. But to
restrict ou!selves to one dimension in which Ah:husser anticipated the
postMarxist bonfre of metaphysical vanities, we may select an issue on
which L'avenir and Moulier Boutang's biography offer some fascinating
and illuminating material: meta-narratiVes and the 'end of history'.
A persistent theme of Althusser's discussion of his Marxism is that
philosophies of history seduc their partisans into that most hapless of
political. indispositions: 'telling ourselves stories' (ADL, 203 ). 52 Althusser's
recasting amounted, in effet if nor in word, to revolt against orthodo
historical materialism, with itl meta-narrative of the advance of the pro
ductive forces rowards an ineluctable communism, as pseudo-materialist
'inversion' of Hegelian thedicy - its mystical kernel concealed within a
material shell - stauing the Ruse of Economic Reason. The abiding sin of
all such 'philosophical novels' resided in their incorrigibly 'realist' narra
tive structure, plotting a story with a hero (e.g., humanity or the prole
radat) and an appointed end ('e.g., communism), that abstracted from the
specifcities of the conjuncrure whih it was the task of an authentically
historical materialism to elucidate. therewith furnishing the knowledge
of a 'concrete situation' mandatory for any political practice aspiring to
transform it for th:e. better, Accordingly, 'philosophical novelists - among
whom Althuser instances Sartre (170) - were no more adequate a 'guide
to action' than the 'akhemists of revolution' ridiculed by Marx. Capital
- the 'Book in which the Second International read the fatality of the
advent of sodali5m as if in 4 Bible' - supplied, so Althusser insisted, the
requisite corrective; the opening up of the 'continent of History' to sden
tifc exploration.n
Mention of Sartre reminds u that, in tandem with his rejection of
the Stalinist prolongation of the philosophy of history in a 'right-Hegelian'
version - economism as Soviet raiso d'etat -Althusser dismissed any 'left
Hegelian' variant- humanism as raison. d la revolution - by way of anti
Stalinist respnse. Indeed, by taxing Marxist humanism with instatement
of an odyssy of the human essence, from its alienation in capitalism to its
reappropriation under communism, Althusser asserted an underlying con
ceptual affnity between these philosophiCal symbolic antagonists, whatever
their overt plitical animosity. Furthermore, so the later Althusser would
maintain, theoretical Stalinism was marked by a combination of economism
and humanisr, 'histomat' amounting to what Raphael Samuel has dubbed,
in another context! a technological humanism.H
'" GREGORY ELLIOT
De te fabula narratur, - might be tempted to respond. For thanks to
Moulier Boutang's research, we now know that the young Althusser was
a partisan of an apocalyptic Hegelian Marxism, {mis)construed as the
philosophical vindication ofa Stalinism at the height of its postwar powers
of attraction (and repulsion).55 Yet-before Althusser was Althusser- prior
to his own epistemological break with Hegelianism- he_eclined a ontral
postulate of the Hegelian Marxism nourished in France by Alexandre
Kojeve's immensely influential lectures on the Phetomenolog (published
as Introduction to the Reading of Hegel in 1947), and lately given, via an
inversion of the inversion, a new lease of pst-Cold War life by Francis
Fukuyama: the 'end of history' ,56
In L'avenir (169) A!thusser notes the salience of the theme in postwar
French inteilectual culture, criticizing the 'astounding bureaueratic content'
with which Kojeve, as a selfproclaimed (albeit nonpractidng) 'Stalinist of
strict observanc', endowed it. WhatMou'lier Boutang discloses (LA, 314ff.)
is that in an extraordinary 72-page letter of 2 December 1949 - 2
January 1950 to his former teacher, Jean Lacroix, explaining his adhesion
to Marxism and the PCF, A!thusser reproved both Jean Hyppolite's attri
bution of the nee-Hegelian notion to Marx and the then common deduc
tion from the fashionable equation History C Alienatioru i.e., End of
Alienation = End of History. Quoting the relevant passage from the 1859
Preface to A ContributiOn to the- Critique of Political Bean om)- Althusr
insisted that Marx had projected communism as_ the end of 'p history' -
historically determinate economic alienation/exploitation - and not of his
tory - some realm from which the dialectic and contradictions would have
vanished, ushering in universal harmony among humankind, Consonant
with the Cold War times, Althusser's meditations ended on a bureaucratic
- philo-Stalinist - note of their own: 'And I believe that we can close this
chapter on the end of history, while rejoicing together at the fact that his
tory continues, that Marx was not Hegel, and that Stalin and Thorez are
not Hyppolice' (LA, 319).57
In his synoptic account of the 'end of history' topos, Anderson discusses
the part played by the nineteenth-eentury philosopher, AntoineAugustin
Cournot, in its Gallic transmission. Wiat he understandably neglects is
Cournot's possibly equally important role in its repudiation by Althusserian
Marxism. (Understandably, bcause A!thusser's one -positive -reference to
Cournot is made in passing.)58 Thanks t a recent essay by Althuser's former
pupil, Emmanuel Terray, a posible subterranean inuence of Cournotupn
the Althusserian mutation of historical materialism, and commitment to
communism as a quasi-Pascalian wager, has been brought to the surface. 59
Anderson writes of Coutnot's theory of chanc and probablility:
I a famous defni.tion,_he declared hance events to be chose that were pro
duced by the encounter of two independent causal series. Sine the univere
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS INTERMINABLE
was not the outcome of single natural law, but was planly governed by
a variety of different mechanisms, there were both proesses govered by
more or less linear' causal sequence, and occurrences set off by intersections
between them. This was the difference between what was regular and what
was random, eah equally intelligibl. -the contrast, for examp!, between
the movement of plarfts and meters, or of tides and glaers . . . .
The innovation of his philosophy of history to be what he called
aetiology: a sysrmti_ equir into the weave of causes that composed the
fabric of histOry, The task of such an eqir was to trace out the compli
cated patterns of chance and necessity that had shaped human development,
by distinguishing between threads of 'independence' and 'solidarity' within
its causl continuu.'
Transposed to historical materialism - especially in the Althusserian
manifeto of 1962, 'Contradiction and Overdetermination' - the yield is a
reconceptualization of any social fortion as a dCentred 'structure of
structures', each possessed of 'relative autonomy' and 'specifc effectivity',
correspondingly irreducible to an economic frst cause or primordial
essence, and governed by an (admittedly elusive) 'structural causality\ Con
sequently, historical materialism was not a philosophy with guarantees -
a transcription of historical necessity. But nor was it a ratifction of
htstoncal ct,aos. Positing and respecting the complexity of the historical
process, as the product 0 ndpendent causal series and their interlacement,
it was the scientifc theory of necessary contingency. Therein revolution is
the (explicable) exception that proves the (implacable) rule.61
Hi"storical materialism ( !'Althusser, then, was not a histoiicism, econom
istk or humamst. As 'process without a subject or goal(s")', t

o use the
specifcally Althusserian category, history was neither agonistic alienation
- the descent from primitive communism into class society - nor its irenic
sublation - the realization of the classless telos present in germ at the origin.
The political, i_mpliction was apparent - and drawn (bringing Althu:ser
into disrepute with the leadership of his party, to "look no further). To the
complexity of history, irreducible to a unique causal mechanism, there
corresponded the constitutive complexity of any communist society that
might- just might- arise from it. Reje,ting some, at least, of the elements
of ninereenth"century utopian scialism assimilated by its putatively
'scientifc' succ,sor, Alrhusser advanced an. anti-utopian conception of
communism. In a conjugation of Durkheimian functionalism and Freudian
.realism abut 'civilization and its discontents', he explicitly contradicted
the prospectus of an 'end of ideology', and implicitly dispensed with the
projection of an 1end of politics' (the mfre SaintSimonian 'administration
of things' envisaged by Engels in Anti-DUhring and Lenin in State and
Revolution.).61
It is not necessary to ndorse Althusser's extravagant claim in L 'avenir
- 'thoreticl antihumanism was the sole [position] that authorizd a real
GREGORY EUIOT
practical humanism' (177) - to appreciate the impulse behind it. Rightly
or wrongly, Althusser's .Cmmunism retricte itself to goals that are moPet,
and yet sufciently imprative at a time when the proclaimed end of his
tory has not terminated the problems that brought Communism into bing
as a political movement: the eradication of Hell from 'Ea!th, not te con
struction of Heaven upon iti or, alternatively put, humanity's entty 1nto its
earthly inheritanc - one that did not exclude the 'everyday unhappiness'
ascribed by Freud to the common human condition (and for which Louis
Althusser might readily have exchanged his awesome capadty for suffer
ing). Such a commitment to practical humanism accounts for the presence
of some impeccably humanist passages in an oeuvre notorious for its
astringent theoretical pronouncments on the 'myth of man', One of them
- quoted by Derrida at Althusser's funeral - beautifully captures the con
JUnction that imparted something of its singularity to Althusserian Marx
ism and rendered its author human, all too human:
Yes, we are . . . united by. , . the same myth&, the same theme that go;ern
us without our consent, by the same spontaneollsly lived ideology. Yes . , .. we
still eat of the same bread, we have the same rages, the ! e rebellions, thl
same madness (at least in the memory where stlks this ever-imminent pos
sibility), if not the same prostration before a time unmoved by any History.
Yes, like Mother Courage, we have the same war at out gates, and a
handsbreath from us, r not in the same horrible blindness, th- same dust
in our eyes, the same earth i our mouths. We have the same dwn artd
night, we skirt the same abyss: our unconsciousnes. We even share the
same history - and that is how it all started.'l
NOTS
1
'Louis Althusser', Les Lettres franises, Decmber 1990 (now translated in
E Ann Kaplan ad Michael Sprinker, eds, The Altb"se6a L&gay, Verso
London, 1993).
2 Jean-Paul Sattre, Critique of Dialectical Reason, Volume 1, New Left Books,
London, 1976, p. 822; cf. Louis Althusser and Etienne Balibar, Reading
Capital, New Lft Books, London, 1970, p 135.
3 Preface (1963) to Th Making of th English Workitfg Class, Peguin,
Harmondsworth, 1980, p. 12.
4
See Regis Debray, 'A Modest Contribution to the Rires and Ceremonie ofthe
Tenth Anniversary', New Left Review 115, Mayfjune 1.7, pp. 56-59.
5 Cf. Etienne Balibar's obsrvations in 'The Non-Contemporaneity o Althusser',
Kaplan and Sprinker, eds, Th Afehussen"an Legacy, p. 1.
6 Louis Althube, For Marx, Allen Lane, London, 1.69, p. 139,
7 See Robert P: Resch, Althssr rmd the Renewal ot Marxist Social Theory,
Califoria University Press, Berkeley and Lo Angele, 1.92 and Kaplan and
Sprinker, eds, The A(thusserian Legacy. Two further reCt publictions of
.tALYS.I TERMINATED, ANALYSS INTERMINABLE 19
note arc Etienne Balibar, Errits pour Althussu, La PfcouvCrte, Paris, 1991,
which includes H text read at Althusser's funeral (translated in Rethinking
Marxism, vol. 4, no. 1, Spring 1991); ad Sylvain Lazarus, ed., Pofitique et
phifosophie dans /'oeuvre d Louis Althusser, Presses Universitaire de France,
Paris, 1993, containing papers by Balibar and others presented to a colloquium_
oi Althusser at the University of Paris VU, (SaintDenis) in March 1991.
8 Luis Althuser, L'aveir due longterps, suiri de Les faits: Autobiographies,
edited and introuced by Olivier Coqt and Yan Moulier Boutang, Stok/
IMEC, Pads, 1992 (henceforth APL); Yann MoulierBoutang, Louis Alth1sser:
Une biographie. Tome 1 - L formation du mythe (1918-1956), Bernard
Grasset, Paris, 1992 (hencefonh LA). Subsequently, a second volume in the
'Edition posthume d'oeuvres de Louis Althusser' has appared, consisting of
fi!tedal utilizd by Moulier Boutang in his coverage of the 1939-45 period
Louis Althusser, journal de captiviti; St(/ag XN1940-1945,. Garnets -
Correspondarces - Textes, edited and introduced by Olivier Carpet and Yann.
Modli:er B'outang, Stok/IMEC, Paris, 1992 (henceforth JC).
9 See, for example, the reviews by Michel Contat, Le Mode des livres, 24 April
1992; Robert Maggiori, Lbiratiofl, 23 April 1992; Didier Eribon, Le Notwel
Obsrvate1r, 23-29 April 1992; and Jean Lacoste, Le Quinwiue Littiraire,
April 1992.
10 See, respectively, the accounts by Edward Fox, Indeperdeflt Magadre, 11 Jly
1992; Gilbert Adair, I.rdependent, 2 JUly 199Z; lnd MEk Lillag Tims Literary
Supp/emer , 2 September 1992. The most informed and sympathetic response
was that of Martin Brighr, Guardian, 27 June 1992.
11 A point underlined to me by David Macey (personl communication).
12 In fairness, it sho!d be noted that as regards presentation coverage reached
a nadir. elsewhere - with the front plge ofthe London Review of Books, 17
Decembr 1"992, which strove maintain its repU[ation. following the depar
ture of its former editor, by featuring a photogr'aph of AlLhuser beneath the
captiom 'he; Paris Strangler'.
13 Ecce Homo: How One Becomes What Oe Is, Penguin, Harmondswonh, 1975,
p. 69.
14 Althusser and Balibar, Reading CapJta/, p. 112.
15 Sartre's reprof of vulga1"Marxist treatment of Valery is to be found in his
Searh for a Method (1960), Vintage Books, New York, 1968, p. 56.
16 Perhaps the only immediate cause for regret wa the non-inclusion, in an
appndik, of three chapters from an earlier dra_t of ADL, two of them- on
Machiavelli and Spinoza - replace by Althusser's rsum of his 'oad to
Marx' on pp. 208-12 (in the current chapter xiii), and the third (signalled in
chaptrxix, p 233) cnsisting of reRections which AlthuMer likewise planned
to develop elsewhere (in. a work. devoted to La virtable tradition matbialisu).
The Machiavelli ant Spinoz chepters have now ben published, however,
with an introuction by Crpet, under th tide 'L'unique tradition matrialiste',
LigNes 18, Editions Hazan, January 1993, pp. 72-119.
17 See Essays on Ideology, Verso, London, 1984, pp. 157-58.
18 Althussr and Balibar, Readiflg Capital, p. 16.
19 De Ia $uperstrurre; Droit -hat -idiologie, uMpublished manuscript, March
- April 1969, p. 13_8.
198 GREGORY ELLIOT
20 Cf. For Marx, p. 54. For some funher rellections, inspired by Freud, on the
theme of 'retrspective anticipation', se 'L'unique tradition mactria)iste', p. 90:
21 Cf. the opening declaration of ROusseau's Con(essioTIS (Penguin editi9n.
Harmondsworth, 1953, p. 17); 'I have resolved upon an enterprise which has
no precedent, and which, once complete, will have no imitator. My purpose
is to display to my kind portrait. in every way true o natUre, and the man
I shall portray will be myRlf. Simpl'y myself # + Bllt r
-
am made unlike any
one I have ever met; I will even venture to u.y that I am like no one in the
whole world. I may be no better, but at least I different', Note too his
pertinent disclaimer in the introduction to Book Sven (p. 262): 'I may omit
or transpose facts, or make mistakes in date; but I cannot go wrong about
what I have felt, or about what my feelings led me to do; and these are the
chief subjects of_ my story.'
22 See Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, Penguin edition, Harmondsworth,
pp. 529-30.
23 See, for example, the opening p!rlgraphs of 'Freud and Lacan', Essays on
Ideolog, pp. 147-48 and my exploration of the theme i n 'Aithusser's Sli
tude', Eco:my and Society, val. 17, no. 4, 1988 (reprinted in Kaplan and
Sprinker, eds, The Althu$serian Lgacy).
24 For further details, the reader should consult Elisabeth Roudinesco, L batailfe
de cent aru1 Histoire de la psychanalyse fn Frace, 2
-
- 1925-1985., Editions
du Seuil, Paris, 1986, pp. 384-85, 389-90, and .especially Moulier Boutang,
L, pp. 365ff.
25 Paul Nizan, Th Conspiracy (1938), Verso, London, 1988, p. 223.
26 'It is also characteristic of our sol history that the intellectuals of petty
bourgeois origin who came to the Paty at that time [i.e., afttt the Libertion
- GE] felt that they had to pay in pure actity, :not in plitical ativism,,
the imaginary Debt they thought they had contracted by not bing proletarianS'f
For Marx, p. 27.
27 See, for example, Roudinesco, La batai/le_ de cent ans, - 384 and Emmanuel
Le Roy Ladurie, Paris - Montpetlier; P. C-P. S. U. - 1945-1963, G;dJimard,
Paris, 1982, pp. 76-77.
28 See, inter alia, For Marx, pp. :1-39 and espciaUy Althusser's forthright preface
of 1976, 'Unfnished History', to his pupil Domin'ique Lecourt's Proletaia
Science? The Cae of Lysnko, New Lft Books, London, 1977.
29 Substantially translated as 'What Must Change in the Party', in New Left
ReviBw 109, May/June 1978.
30 Cf. Raymond Aron, 'Althusecou Ia lecture pseudostructualite de Mrx',
in his D'une sainte famille a /'autre: Essais sur les mrxisnus imagiraireS
GaUimard, Paris, 1969. Althusser doe not, however, endorse Aron's related
reproach (pp. 73, 78-79} that Alrhusserinilm constitute 'Marxism for
agreges': quite the reverse.
31 Quoted in jean Guitton, Un -iede, une vie, Raben Laffont, Pari's, 1.88, Part
r, chapter 4.
32 Ibid.
33 Ccce Homo, p. 69.
34 Signifantly; in a conversation wirh QuittQn in which he revealed the exist
ence of. his memoirs - 'the story of my featfu\ traumas' - Ah:huser had
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS I"TERMINABLE "'
repudiated the pretention of their author: 'I have never achieved tranparecy.
So, like Ma1larme, Alain and Heidegger, I have practised the method of
obscunn per obscuriJ, to the obscure via the more obscure.'
35 PiCre Macherey, quoted in Fox, Independent Magazine, 11 July 1992.
36
The impact on Althu&er of Martin's death, by his own hand, In September
1963 i intimated not only in the moving dedication of Fo Marx to him, but
by the obituary notice Althusscr wrote for the A:nuaire de I'AsodQtion
Amiles des-anciens i/iues de /'Ecole normle supbif re (967), in which he
observed tht Martin 'had struggled for twety years - cold, calm, strong,
precise - without ever collapsing or giving in, without a single word of
complaint: dignifed. He choe deliberate death so as not to Jive anotber death
in the night of an agony without end' (quoted in Moulier Boutaug, LA,
p. 451).
37 Something of the intimacy of the relationship is conveyed by the letters from
brother to sister publishe in JC, pp. 265-84.
38 Sec bpecia\ly"]C, p. 88 - Althusser's entry fo 12 April 1942, after a gap of
several wekS I have just lived one of the most severe trials of my existence,
and the most daugerous.' Althusser's prison noteboks also refute the notion
chat it ws contact with O mmunits in Germany which ra!ed him to the
PCF. A tex of 1943 - 'L'esperance', published in the Stalag XA journal, L
LieO - doe, however, intimate affliation to a kind of proletarian French
nationalism, inspired, no doubc, by his former history teacher, Josph Hours
see JC, pp. 4S-S2.
39 'Une qtestion de faits', in L'euangile cptf, Cahier X of jeu:nesse. de I'Eglise,
Paris, 1949.
40 Gerge Ross and Jane Jenson, 'T,he Tragedy of the French Left', New Left
Reuiew 171, Septembr/October 1988, p. 18.
41 J\lst as its Sister-panies were for soialists in other coJlnLies. Cf. Lucio Magri,
'The European Left btween Crisis and Refoundation' New Left Reuiew 189,
Septmbr/October 1991, pp. 6-7: ' . . . a historical experience is now eding
in painful defet- an experienc wh1ch, both materially and in terms of ideas,
serve sometimes as a model" and in auy ca5C as a reference point for broad
movement of liberation. It is now fashionable in the West, even on the Left,
to treat that cqmtion as a thoroughly harmful product of manipulation or
folly - that . to consider the October Revolution and its sequel not as a
procss which degenerated in stages but as a regression ab origirw, or a pile
of rubble. But the historical reality is rather different. First Stalinism, then the
authoritarian power of a bureaucratic, imperial caste, were one side of that
historical process . . , but for dades another side als continued to operate:
the sid"e of national indepndence; the spred of literacy, moerniu.tion and
soial protection across whole continents; te reistance to fasism and victory
over it as a general tendency of capitalism; support for and involvement nthc
liberatiOn of three-quarters of humanity .from colonialism; containment of the
power of the mightiest imperial state.'
42 'Intellectuals and Communism', reprinted in E. J. Hobsbawr, Revfutio:aries,
Quartet, London, 1977: here p. "9.
43
Th Communi5s and Peace (1952-54), Hmish Hmilton, London, 1969; d.
Andre Gorz, The Traitor (1958), 'VersO> London, 1989, pp. 2.5-29.
"' GREGORY EL.L.OT
44 Perry Anderson, Consider1tions on Westem Marx# New Left Books,
London, 1976, p. 44.
45
'Notes On Maxism in Britain since 1945', New Lef Reuiew 100, November
1976 - February 1977 lreprinted in Williams, Problems in Mtrialism ancl
Culture, Verso, London, 1980),
46
The coinage is Francis Mulhern's, in the Introduction to his anthology, Conten
porar Maxst Literary Critidsm, Longman, LortdOn, 1992, p. 6. As Althuser
wrote in an essay dating from 1967, 'Marx did not '"say everyhing", not only
becaus he did not have the time, but because to "say everything" makes
no sense for a sientist: only a religion can pretend. to "say everything", By
contrast, a scientfc thery, by defnition, always ha somerhing el$e to say,
since it exists only in order U discover, in the very solution of problems, as
many. if not more, problems than it resolves' ('O

n, Theoretical Work: Diff

culties and Resources', in Philosophy and the Spontarus Philosophy of the
Scentists and Other Essays, Verso, London, t990: here p. 59). The echoes of
Popprian epistemology are striking.
.47
The formula 'historical Marxism' is adoprd from Costanzo Preve, 'La lutte
contre le sens cmmull dans le mouvemcnt cmmuniste "histrique" au 77C
siiclc', in Sylvain Lazarus, ed., PolitqMe et philosophie dans l'ouvre de
Louis Althu$ser, who glosses it thus (p, 130): 'i. e., really, effetively existing
[Marxism], incorporated into huge party, srate and trade-union appratuses'.
Althusser's most explidt comments on the subject ocur in his 'Marxism
Today' (1978), in Phiosop y and the SpontaneoU Philosophy of the Scietists.
48' The point is made by Ba\ilar in Reading 'apita(, p. 202 and by Althuser
in Lenin and Philosophy ad Other Esays, New Left Books, London, 1971,
p. 43.
49 Luc Ferry and Alain Renaut, La pensee 68: Essai sr /'antihumt1 isme
contemporain, Cal!imard, Paris, 1985, p. 200.
50 Quoted in Peter Gay, Freud: A Lif for Our Tie Macmillan, London, 1989,
p. 334.
51 'Louis Althusser', Indepdent, 27 October 1990.
52 Indicative of Althussr's heterodoxy here is his citation of the 'revisionist'
historian of the French Revolution, Frantois FUret, for repudiating the
'ideology' of 1789 in hose costretiou .nd propa
g
ation French

Communist
intellectuals (e.g., Albert Sobou!) played a ntral role.
53 Reading Capital, p. 120. As he makes dear (ADL,. p. 168), Althusser is
rfrring not to Nausa or the Roads to Freedom tdlogy, when he speaks
of 'philosophicl novels', but to feing and Nothing,es and the Critiqe of
Dialectical Reason. Whatever the jstice of the ch:rge, one thing is certin:
the dilemmas confronted by Sartre's fctional biographer, Antoine Roquentin,
are not surmounted by Althsser's own outobiographicl storyrelling. See
Nausea, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1983, pp. 61-63.
54 'British Marxist Historians, 1880-1980', New Lef Review 120, March/April
1980, pp. 83-84. For Althusser's analysis of theoretical Stalinism, see 'Note
on "The Critque of the Penonality Cult" y in his Essays in Self-Critics, New
Left Books, Lndon, 1976.
55 See LA, pp. 2S9-76, cntaining- ample quotation from Althusser's 1947
MCmoire de Dip!Ome d'Ctudes sup&ieures, 'La. notion de cntenu dans la
ANALYSIS TERMINATED, ANALYSIS lNTfRMINABLE 201
philosophie de G. W. F. Hegel'. Thks far, only a brief extract from this key
early work ha appCred in print, 'L'esprit d'Itna contre Ia Prusse', muguIn0
JIftutr0 .93, NOvember 1991. Its publictiOn in fuU is ptomised in a
forthcoming collection of Althlser's philosophical text by IMEC/Editions
Srk.
56 Francis Fukuyama, 'The End of Hitory? I0 Naiomzl nf0r0sf 16, S\lmmer
1989, and ThtEttd o{Ristory 0nd|h0J08I mcn, Hamish Hamilton, London,
1992. Of the many critical respnses, reders are referred to oseph McCarney,
'Hi tr Under the mammct`m8s1ghcr ducdfOn

, 1 De< em
ber 1989 and 'Edgame of History, udcd Philosohy 62, Autkmn 1992;
Perry Andersn, 'The Ends of History', in his A 2On0O[nugmunfVena,
London, 1992.; and Alex Callinicos, 'Is HiStory Really Over(', pper read
at the Radicl PolitiCal Thought Conference, University of Sussex, November
1992. My own thotghts on the controversy are set O\lt in 'The Cud of
Confusion: Reflections on Historicl Communism and the "End of History'' ',
4drcPhilosophy 64, Summer 1993, (to be reprinted in ChristQpher Brtram
and Andrew Chitty, eds, 8}0hd fb0 Lnd of 8f0r}:, forthcoming, Verso,
London, 199"4).
57 Signifcantly, in his mO4In Prh6h Phil08oph (Cambridge University Press,
Cambridge, 1980), which commences with Kojeve, Vincnt Descombes employs
the identical formula to Althuser - 'philosophicl novel' - to characterize
Kojeve's constructio of Hegel: 'the austere Hegelian h0nOm0n0k)turs into
a kind of serialized philosophical novel, where one draatic sene follows
another; picturesque characters eome fac to face, reversals of situation kep
up the suspens, and the reder, avid to know the end f the story [uJn 40
l'hiaoire], clamous for more' (p. 27).
Dcscombes' analysis of Althusser's Skbsequent philosophical strategy
(p. 118) anticiPates Afthusser's own:
. . Marxism WOI Il djfcultie& on two sides.
L [n the ar, where it TWthe dsk of being drawn along in the decline of those
philosophies (assembled by Alrhusser under the heading 'theoreticl humaniam)
with which opinion tended to associav it.
2. [n the front, where its theory of economic determinism (positing a relation
of L a1d efec, rather than o1e of isomorphism, between ilramuctute and
superstructure) came 1nder !re from structuralist pruitions.
Caught bereen the two, Althnsser, a oelf-a,kowledged communist philol
opher, might well have described himself i the word that Stendhal givea to
L\cien Luwen: 'I am a 1valry general in a lost bttle, who forget his own
in[tren and atrempt to have his cvalry dismount in order to engage the enemy
infantry.' It is a diffcult manoeuvre that Althusr attempts in abandoning the
trecherous ground of paxis and the 'dialectic', leaving the eisrmialisr tegi
meOts 3O fg it out alone witb the stmctilralist artillery, siding with the latter
b!mielf, takin adv;mtge of the general surpdse to consolidate his bold and
emerging fnally as winner of the day, Soch audacius Lctiu eviently entail
certain sacrifcs which hi6 ranks must fr be peruaded to accept: the entire
.Heg\ian hCritagC mnt be repudiated, and likwise all kinship between Maoiam
and dialetial. philosophy of history. The ager of 'contradiction, driving force
202
GREGO ELLIOT
of history', on whch only a whll befpe the Marxist philosopher was-seen to
parade, becomes a jaded Rosinante, to be rid of i all hasre.
Note, fnally, that after the bttle had been defnitively lost, Altbusser's addres
in Paris was none oher than 8, rue Lucien Leuwen , . .
58 In the 1968 lecmre 'Lenin and Philosopby' Philosophy and the Spontaneous
Philosophy of the Sci,mtists and Other Essays, pp. 172-73 !' . . . French philos
ophy . . , can be salvaged from its own history oniy by the few gret romds
against whom it set its face like Comre and Durkheim, or buried 'in oblivion,
like Cournot and Couturat . . . .).
59 Le troisfeme iour du commu'isme, Actes Sud, Aries, 1992, pp. 63-68, to which
I am indebted for what follows.
60 'The Ends of History', pp. 295-96; sTe also p; .297.
61 'Contradiction and Overdetermiuation' can be consulted in Althusser's For
Marx. For his own retrospetive on it, !e 'Is it Simple to be a Marxist in
Philosophy?', in Philo.ophy and the Sp011taneas Philosophy of the Scie7!ists,
pp. 213-23. The shrewdness of Terray's account is cnfrmed by compring
the article in which he frst sketched it - 'One rencontre: Althusser et
Machiavel' (in Sylvin Lazas, ed., Poftique et philosophie da11s l'oeu11e de
Louis Althusser, espcially pp. 157-58) - with Althusser's own comments on
Machiavelli M the posthumous publication, 'L'unique t1dition matfrialiste',
p. 105.
62 Thus, it is no cause for surprise that_Althusser-js recalled by one of his former
students as having rebuked him for the suggetion that 'if people were com
munists, it was for the sake of happiness. In esence,, his :eply > you
mustn't say that. It is in order t bring about a cbange of mode of produc
tion . . . .' See Philippe Gavi, jean-Paul Sartre and Pierre Vicmr, On a raison
de se revolter, Gallimard, Paris, 197', p . 197. f addition to Freud's Civil
ization and its Discontents, see the New Introductory Lctures on Psycho
a.,alysis (Penguin edition, Harmondsworth, 1973, pp. 213-19) for Q summary
statement of his ;nti-utopianism, specifcally aimed B Bolshevism. For some
contemporary reflections on these issues by Marxist influenced by Ahhusser,
see Ted Benton, N'atural Relaticms, Verso, London, 1993, pp. 200, 215-21.
Althusser's Freudian affliations doubtless go some of the way to explain his
disdain for Herbert Macuse (cf. the peremptory dismi5l in Essas in
Self
Criticism, p. 118 n. 13), whose attempted Freudo-Marxist synthes
i
s i Eros
and Civlization repudiates Freud on this score. A I hope to show elsewhere,
Althusser an Marcuse are -ultimately les in-comptible. in certain Freudian
respects than tbey imagined.
63 For Mrx, p. 150.
BI BLIOGRAPHY OF THE PUBLISHED
WRITINGS OF LOUIS ALTHUSSER
W
Any bibliography of Altbusser's work suffers hom an in-built (if not planned)
obsolescence, g1ven- the regular emergence of new material from the philosopher's
anhives depsited with the Institut Memoires de !'edition contemporeine, b:ed in
Pais, in July 199t Three more collections of previously unpublished material are
currently scheduled fo publication by IMEC, in collaboiatio with Editions Stock
a two-volume selection of pbilosopbical and political text (including the 1947
thais on Hegel) and a cplltion o. cortespondene(, Accordingly, what follows doe
not claim to be complete, but is as comprehensive (and accurate) as posible, as of
November 1993. Items are listed in chronological order of appearance, rather than
composition, the date of the latter being provided i brackets when appropriat
Where Engllh translations ae available, fuil details are given on a separate line.
949
1 'Une question de faits', in L'evangile capif; Cahier X of feunesse de I'
E
glise,
Pais, 1949
1
pp. 13-24.
191
2 Contribution to the discussion, in 'JournCes nationales d'Ctudes pedagogique
des profeseurs de phitosophie' (1950)1 Revue de l'Enseig
1
tlltnf Philosophique,
vol. 1, nos 1-2, 1951, p. 12.
.
193
3 'A propos du marxisme', Revue de ./'Enseignerent Philosophique, vol. 3, no.
4 1953, pp. 15-19.
4 'Note sur le materialisme dialectique', R.ev!le de I'Ensei_1ement Phi/osophique,
vol. 3, no. 5, 1953, pp. 11-17.
1955
5 'Sur l'objetvitC de l'histoire {Lettre . Pul Ricoeur)', Rwu d /'Eignemem
Phi!osophique, vol. 5, no, 4, 1955, pp. 3-15.
..
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHED WRITINGS
1558
6 'Despote et monarque chez Montesquieu', Esprit, vol. 26, no 11, 1958,
pp. 595-614.
Extract -from 7.
1959
7 Mctesquie: Ia politique et l'bistoire, Presse Universitaire de France, Paris,
1959.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Montesquieu: Politics and History', in Louis
Althuser, PolitiC and History: Montesqleu, RouSJru, Hegel and Marx, New
Let Books, London, 1972, pp. 9-109.
196
8 'Note du traducteur' (1958), in Ludwig Feucrbach, Maifestephllosophiques.
Textes choisis (1839-1845), edited and translated by Louis AlthJlsser, Presses
Universiraire de France, Paris, 1960, pp. 1-9.
9 'Le HManifestes philoophiques" de Feuer:bach', La Nouve' e Critique 121,
December 1960, pp. 32-38.
Reprinted in 24, pp. 35-43.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Feuerbach's "Philosophical Manifestoe"', In
Louis AlthJlsser, For Marx, Allen Lane, London, 1969, pp. 41-48.
1961
10 'Sur le jeune Ma (Quetioru; de theorie)', L Penste 96, April
'
1961, pp.
3-26.
Reprinted in 24, pp. 45-83.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'On the YoUng Marx Theretical QuestionB', in
For Marx, pp. 49-86.
1962
11 Review of Raymond Polin, L po/itique morale de john Locke, i Revte
d'Histoire Mod erne et Contemporaine 3, 1962, pp. 150-55.
12 'Contradiction et surdetermination (Notes pour une recherche)', La Penle 106,
December 1962, pp. 3-22.
Reprinted (with ap
f
endix} in 24, pp. 85-116.
Translated by Ben Brewster 'Contradiction and Overdetermination: Notes
for an Investigation', New_Left-Rerew 41, Januar !February 1967, pp. 15-35;
reprimed in For Marx, pp. 87-128.
BIBJ. JGRAPHY OF PUBJ lSHED WRITINGS "'
13 'L "Piccolo, Brtolazzi et B'Icht (Notes sur un thtitre mattrialiste)', Esprit,
vol. 30, no. 12, 1962, pp. 94'6-65.
Reprinted in 24, pp. 129-52.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'The "Piccolo Teatro"

: ,Bertolazzi and Brecht

ores on a Materialist Thetre', in For Marx,.-pp. 129-51.
1963
14 'Les Manuscrits de 1844" de Karl Marx (
l
onomie politique ec phllosophie)',
La Pensie 107, Febrary 1963, pp. 106-09
Reprinte in 24, pp. 153-60.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'The "1844 Manuscripts of Karl Marx: Political
Eonomy and Philosophy', in For M.x, pp. 153-59.
15 'Philospphie et sdem;es humaines', Revue de I'EHseignstnent Phifosophique,
vol. 13, no. 5, 1963, pp. 1-12.
16 'Sur I dialectiquc matCrialiste (De l'infgaliti des origine)', L Pensee 110,
August 1963, pp. 5-46.
Reprinted (minus appendix) in 24, pp. 161-124.
'
fcanslated by Ben Brewster as 'On the Mateialist Dialetic: On the Unevennes
of Origins', in For Mar;, pp. 161-218.
196
17 'Problemes 6tudiants', La 'Nouvele Critique 152, January 1964, pp. 80-11 L
18 'Torja e metodo' and 'Gli strumenti del marxismo', Rinacita, 25 Janury 1964,
pp. 27-28; 1 February 1964, pp. 28-29.
19 Presentation of Pierre Macherey, 'La philosophie de Ia science de Georges
Canguilhem', L Pensee 113, February 1964, pp. 50-54.
20 'Marxisme et humanisme', Cahiers de l'Institut de Sdence lconomique
Appliqute 20, June 1964, pp. 109-33.
Reprinted in 24, pp. 225-49.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Marxism and Humanim', in For Marx, pp.
219-41.
21 'Freud et Lacan', La Nouvelle Critique 161-162, December 1964 - January
1965,

pp. 88-108.
Reprinted in 78, pp. 9-34 and in 110, pp. 23-52.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Freud and Lacan', New lft Review 55, May/
june 1969, pp. 49-65; reprinted in Louis Altbusscr Lenin and Philosophy and
Other Esa;s, New Uft .ooks, Lndon, 1971, pp. 177-202, and subsquMtly
in Louis Althusser, &says on Ideology, Vers, London, 1984, pp 141-71.
1965
22 'Note cmp!Cmentaire sur "l'humaisme reei"', La Nouvefle Critique 164,
March 1965, pp. 32-37.
206 BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHED WRITINGS
Reprinted i 24, pp. 251-58.
Translated by Ben Brewsrer as 'A Complementary Note: on "Real Humanism"',
in For Marx, pp. 242-47,
23 'Preface; Aujourd'hui', in Loub Althus er1 Pour Marx, Fran'is Maspero, Paris,
1965, pp. 9-32.
Translated by Ben Brewsrer 'Introuction: Today', in Por Marr, pp. 19-3.9.
24 Pour Ma,-x, Fran!ois Maspero, Paris, 1965.
Contains 9; 10; 12; 1); 14; 16; 20; 22;. l.
Translated by Ben Brewster W For Marx, Allen Lne, London, 1969 (subse
quently reprimed by New Lf Books and Veso).
2 'Esquise du concpt d'histoire', l Pen see 121, August 1965, pp. 2-21.
E.tract from 27.
26 'Preface: Du "Capital" 3 ]a philosophic de Marx', in Louis Althusse, Jacque
Rancitre and Pierce Macherey, Lire le Capital!, Fran"ois Mapero, Pads, 1965,
pp. 9-89.
Second, revised edition (Franwis Maspero Paris, 1968) translated by Ben Brewster
as 'Parr I: From Capital to Marx's Philosophy-, in L14l Althusstr and Etiene
Balibar, Reading Capital, New Leh Books, Lon4on, 1970, pp. 11-69.
27 'L'object du ucapial "', in Louis Althusser, :rienne Balibar and Roger lstablet,
Lire !e Capital I, Franoois Maspero, Paris, 1965, pp. 7-185.
Second, revisd eition (Franoois Maspro, Paris, 1968} translated by Ben Brewser
as 'Part I: The Objet of Capital', in Reading Capital, pp. 71-198.
19BB
28 'Thtode, pratique thorique e formation thCoriqlle. Idtologie et lutte
idologiqllC' (1965), published in Spanish in Caa de las Americas (Havana) 34,
1966, p p. 5-31.
Translated by Jame H. Javanagh as 'Theory, Theoretical Practic and Theoreticl
Formation Ideology and I.eolOgical Strggle', in Louis Althusser, Philosopr' and
the Spontaneous Philosophy of the Sdetits & Other Essays, Veso; London,
1990, pp. 1-42.
29 'MatCrialisme historique et mattrialisme. di'lectiqlle', Cabiers Maistss
Uninistes 11, April 1966, ' 90-122 ..
30 'RCponse a Andre Daspre', in 'Deux lettres sur Ia connaissance de !'art', La
NoUelle Critique 175_ April 1966, pp. 141-46.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'A Letter on Art in Reply to Andr Daspre' in
Lnin and Philosophy and Other &says; pp. 203-08'; reprinted In Essays O
Idelogy, pp. 173-79.
31 'Crmonini, peintre de ]'abstraction', Derocratie Nouve'lle 8, Augus
1966,
pp. 105-20.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Cremonini, Painte of the Abstract', in Lenin 4nd
Philosophy and Other Essays, pp. 209-20.
BIBUOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHID WRITINGS 207
32 'Sur le contrat soCiQl (Les Dicalages), in L'impene c Jean-jacques
Rousse(u, Cahiers pour /'Analyse 8, 1966, pp. 5-42.
Translated by Ben Brewster as Rousseau+ The Social" Contract (The Discrepan
ctes)'1 in Politics and History; M0tesquieu, Rousseau, Hegel and Man; pp.
111-.60.
33 'Sur Ia rvolution culturel!e', cahiers MlrxistesUninistes 14, November/
'December 1966, pp. 5-16.
1987
34 'Sur le travail thiorique. DiffcultCs et ressources', l Pesie 132, April 1967,
pp. 3-22.
Translated by James H. Kavanagh as 'On Theoretical Work: Diffcultie and
Resources', in Philosophy and the Spontaneous Philosophy of the Scientists &
Other Es;ays, pp. 43-67.
35 'Prefazione', in Louis Althuser, La nEvoluci(m teOrica de Mar;, Siglo XXI,
Mexico/Buenos Aires, 1967, pp. ii-xvi.
36 Crrespondence with K Domergue, i Louis Althuser and R. Dmergue, Max
ismo segwzdo Altbusse: polenUca Althusser-G'ra!y, Signal, Sao :Paulo, 1967.
37 Obituary of Ja\ques Matin, Annuaire de l'Assoirtion Amicales des {ciens
ileves de I' Ecole Mrre slip6rieure (1967), ENS, Pari, 1967.
198
38 'La flosofa1 Ia politica et Ia scienza (Una leu era di Louis Althusser sul pensiero
dt Gramsci)' Riraultt 15 March 1968, pp. 23-4.
39 'La philo
O
phic comme arme de Ia revolution (Rtpons huit questioO),
interview with Maria Antonierta Macioc hi, La Pensie 138, April 1968, pp.
26-34.
Reprinte in 78, pp. 35-48.
Translate by Ben Brewste as 'Philosophy as a Revolutionary Weapon', Ne
Left Revew 64, November/Decembr 1970, pp. 3-11; reprinted in Le1rn and
Pilosophy and Other &says, pp. 13-25,
"0 'An die deutschen Leser' (1967), in Louis Althussr, PUr Marx, Sulukamp,
Frankfurt M., 1968, pp. 7-15.
41 'La tiche hisrorique de Ia philosophic marxiste' (1967), published in revised
form in Hungaiian as 'A Marxista Filoz:Ola Ttrtinelm1 Fe!adata', in Louis Al
thusser, Marx-Ar FJmilet Porradalma, Kosuth, Budapst, 1968, pp. 272-306.
42 'A Magyar Qlvas6hoz' (To My Hungarian Readers), iu Mar: - Az Elmilet
Foradaltna, pp. 9-15.
Publi'shed i n.French in Saiil Kusz, Thiorie et politique: Luis Althusser, Fayard,
Paris, 1974, pp. 315-20.
43 'Avertissement' (1967), in Louis Althusser and Etienne Balibar, Lire /e
C1pitaf, 5econd edition, 2 vols, Fran9ois Maspo} Pari, 1968, pp. S-6.
Translated by Ben Brewster & 'Foreword to the Italian Edition', in Reading
Capital, pp. 7-8.
"'
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHED WRJTINGS
44 'Lenine et la philosophic', Bulleti M Ia Societe Fran.aise de Philosophfe -,
October/Decembr 1968, pp. 127.
.81.
Reprinted' (minus the interventions of Jean Wahl, Paul Ricoeur, et al.) as Uni
et l philosophie, Fran'ois Maspero, Paris, 1969 and in 60, pp. 5-47.
Translated by Ben- Brewster as 'Lenin and P_hilorophy\ in Lenin um Philosophy
rd Other Essays, pp. 27-68; reprinted i Philosophy and the Spont( eous Philos
ophy of the Scientists & Other Essays, pp. 167-202.
1969
45 'Comment lire L Capital"?', L'HwnjtJ, 21 March 1969.
Reprinted in 78, pp. 49-50.
Translated as 'How to Read Marx's "Capital"', Marxism Toay, Octoer 1969,
pp. 302-05.
46 'Avertissement aux lecteurs du Livre I du "Capital'", in Karl Marx, Le
Capital: Livre I, Garnier-'iammarion, Paris, 1969, pp. 5-30.
Translated by Ben Brewster as "Prefaoe to Capta( Volume One', in LnJn and
Philosophy and Other Ess)s, pp
.
69-101.
47 Letters to Maria Antonietta Macciochi (1968-69), in Macciocchi, Lettere
da/l'intemo def P.C.I., Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, Milan, 1969, pp. 3-6, 23-26,
5'-64, 126-27, 331-61.
Translated by Stephen M. Hellman i MacciLchi, Letters fom inside the Italian
Communist Party to Louis Althusser, New Left Books, Londan, 1973, pp. 3-5,
21-23, 48-57,_ 112-13, 295-320.
48 'A propos de !'article de MiclJel Verret sur "Maj Ctudlant"' La PensiB 145,
June 1969, pp. 3-14.
49 'To My English Readers' .(1967), in For Marx pp. 9-15.
50 'A Letter to the Translator', in Fo Mx,. pp. 257-58.
51 'Lettera a Pesenti', Rinascta 32, 1969,
52 'Crise de l'homme et de Ia societe', in 'L'Eglie aujourd'hui', Lumiere et Vie,
vol. 28, no. 13, 1969, pp. 26-29.
1970
53 'ldeologie et appreils idOlogiques d'etat (Notes pour une recheche)', La Pesie
151, June 1970, pp. 3-38.
Extract from De l supersrture: Droit-itat-Idiofogie (unpublished manu
script, 1969), reprinted in 78, pp. 67-125.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuss: Notes
towards an Investigation', in Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays, pp. 121-
73; reprinted in Essays on Idelogy, pp. 1-60.
54 'Sur le rapport de Marx a Hegel' (1968), in Jacques d'Hondt, ed., Hegel et
Ia pensie rodeme, Presses Universitaires de France, Paris, 1970, pp. 85-111.
Reprmted in 60, pp. 49-71.
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHED WRITINGS 20i '
Tranlated by Ben Brewster as 'Marx's Relation to Hegel', in Politics and His
tory. Montesquieu, Rosseau, Hegel and Mar, pp. 161-86.
55 'Lnine devant Hegel' (1969), in W. R. Beyer,. td., Hegel -]ahrbuck 1968/
1969, Mesmheim A.. Glan, 1970, pp. 45-58.
Reprinted. in 10, pp. 73-90.
Translated by Ben Brewster as 'Lmin before Heel', in Lenin and Philosophy
and Other Essays, pp. 103-20.
1971
56 'Foreword' (1970),, in Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays, pp. 7-9.
57 Lett<i to the tran$lator (on 'Freud and Lacan'), in L6lin and Philosophy (d
Other Essays, pp. 177-78; reprinte in Esays on Ideology, pp. 141-42.
58 'Prefaione' (1970), in Marta Harnecker, Las c01ceptos elemetales .del
mateHalismo M6rica, second edition, Siglo XXI, MexicolBueno Aire, 1.71.
Pllblshed in Frmch as 'Maxisme et lutte de dasse' in 78, pp. 61-6.
1972
59 'Sur une erreur pclitique. Les maires auxiliaires, les etudiants travailleurs et
l'agregation de philosophic', Fr.c Nouvelle, 25 July 1972, pp. 9-12; 1 August
1972, pp, 1-13.
60 Linine et I philosophie, secon_d (expande) edition, Fran'ois Maspro, Paris,
1972.
Otains 44; 54; 55.
61 'Reply to John Lewis (Self-Critids),Ma:s Toa, October 1972, pp. 310-
18; November 1972; pp. 343-49.
Published in French in revised form in 66, p_. 9--8*
193
62 'The COnditions .f Marx's Scientifc Discovery (On the New Drtition of
Philosophy)' (19'70), Theoretical Practia 7/S, January 1973, pp. 4-11.
Published i French as 'Sur I'Cvolution du jeune Mar in 72, pp. 103-26.
63 Preemation ofDominfque Lecourt, Une crie et son e;eu, Fran<ois Maspero,
Paris, 1973.
6 'Note sur "Ia critige du culte de Ia personnaliu!"' (1972), in Louis Ahhuser,
Riponse ( ]ghn LM. Fran'ois Maspero, Paris, 1973, pp. 69-90A
Translated by Grahame Lock 'Note on "The Critique of the Personality
Cult"

, in Luis AlthuMcr, Esas in Seff-Criticism, New Left Books, London,

1976, pp. 78-93J reprinted in Ess!ys on Ideoogy, pp. 115-32,
65 'Remarq!le sur 1ne categorie: prO sns Sujet ni Fin(s)', in Repose a john
Lewis, PP

n.8.
210
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHED WRITINGS
Translated by Grahame Lock as 'Remark on the Category: Process without a
Subject or Goal(s}', in
+
ssys in SelfCriticism, pp. 94-99; reprinted in Essays
on Ideology, pp. 133-39.
66 RCponse t john Lewis, Fran"oi Maspero, Paris, 1973.
Contair 'Avertissement'; 61; 64; 65.
Translated by Grahame Lok as 'Reply to John Lewis', in Essas i1 Selfw
Criticism, pp. 33-99; reprinted i Essas on Ideology, pp. 61-139.
67 Intervention on 'Les communists, les inrellectuels et Ia culture', France
Nouvelle, 18 September 1973, p. 11.
1974
68 [Mimeographed text] (1970), in SaUl Karsz, ThCorie et politiquf: Louis
Althusser, pp. 321-23.
69 Letter (1967), i R6gis Debray, La critiqu des armes, Editions d u Seuil, Paris,
1974, pp. 262-69.
Translated by Rosemary Sheed as 'Letter frm Louis Althusser', in_ Debray, A
Critique of Arms, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1977, pp. 258-67.
70 'Justesse et philosophic', La Pensie 176, August 1974, pp. 3-8.
Extract from 71.
71 Philosophie et philosophie spontanCe des saJats (1967}, Franlois Maspero,
Paris, 1974.
Abridged and revised version of Cols de philorpbie pour scierifques: bitro
duction, unpublishe manwcrpt, Novembr 1967.
Translated by Warren Montag as 'Philoophy and the Spontaneous Philoophy
of the Sientists (.1967)', in Philosophy and the Spontaneous Philosophy of the
Scientists & Othe- Essays, pp. 69-165.
+
72 "/ements d'autocritique (1972), "Hhette, Paris, 1974.
Also contains 62.
Translated by Grahame Lock as 'Elements o Self-Criticism', in Essays in Self
Criticism, pp. 101-61.
73 'Quelque chose de nouveau', L'Hum,ante, 12 October f974,
Translated by Gr<heme Lock -as 'Something New', in Essrs in Self-Criticism,
pp. 208-15,
1975
74 'Les communistes et Ia philosophie', L'HIniti, - }QIy 1975.
75 'Est-il simple d'tre marxste en philosophie1 (Sourenance d'Amiens)', La PensCe
183, October 1975, pp. 3-31.
Reprinted in 78, pp. 127-72.
Translated by Grahame Lock as 'Is it Simple to be a Marxist in Philosophy?',
in Bssoys in Self-Criticism, pp. 163-207; reprinted i n Philosphy and the Spona
ous Philosophy of the Scientiss & Othf &sls, pp. 203-40.
BIBI. IOGRA?H,Y OF PUBI.!SHED WFUTIGS 211
1976
76 Letters to Luis Francisco Rebello (1975)1 in Louis Alth.usser and Luis Fran
.Sc Rebello, Cartas sobre a 181olufiO portuguesa, Seara Nova, Lisbon, 1976,
pp. 15-25, 33-36, 41-42.
77 'Avnt-Propos: Histoire terminCe, histoire "ntermiable', i Dominique Lecourt,
Lyssenko. Histoire r!elle d'une 'scie ce proletarienne', Frais Mapro, Paris,
1976, pp. 7-19.
Translated by Grahame Lock as 'Tntrodution: Unfnished History', in Lecourt,
Proletarian Science? The Case of Lyserko, New Left Books, London, 1977, pp.
7-16.
78 Positions, Editions Sociale, Paris, 1976.
Contains 'Note'; 21; 39; 45; 53; 58; 75.
79 L tr{ormaci6n deJa floso{a, Universicad de Granada, Granada, 1976.
Translated by Thomas E. Lewi-as l'fhe T ransormaron of Philosophy', in Phi los
ophy ad the Spntaneaus Philosophy of the Scientits & Other Essays, pp.
241-65.
1917
SO 'The Hisoric Sigmfcance of the Und Congress' (1976), in Etienne Balibar,
On the Dictatorsh:p of the Proletaria, New Left Books, London. 1977, pp.
193-211..
Published in French in revise form as f3.
81 'Sur Marx et Freud' (1976), published in German as 'bt Marx und Freud',
i Louis Althuser, Ideoogie und ideo!ogische Staatsapparqte, VSA, Hamburg,
1977, pp. 89-107.
l'ublisbed in French in slightly abridged form as 'La decouverte du Doteur
"Freud dans ses rapports avec Ia thCorie manste', i The Uncorscious, vol. I,
Metsniereba, Thilisi, 1978, pp. 239-53; reprinted i 110, pp. 222-45.
Translated by Warren Montag as 'On Marx and Freud', in Rethinking Marxism,
vol. 4, no. 1, 1991, pp. 17-30.
82 'Note sur les appnreils idcologiques d'Ctat (AIE)' (1976}; published in Germnn
as 1Anmerkug tiber die ideologishe Statsapparate', in Idelogic un idrogische
Sta"tsapparate, pp. 154-68.
Translated in abridged form by Jeremy Leman in 'Extracts from Althusser's
"Note on the ISAs ', Economy and Society, vol. 12, no. 4, 1983, pp. 455-65.
83 2lme Cohgres, Franoois Maspcro, Paris,
.
1977.
Translated by Ben Brewrter a 'On the Twenty-Second Congress of the French
Communist Party', Nw_ Lef Review 104, July/AugUst t9n, pp. 3-22.
84 'Aicune. parolC grosse', Paese Sera, 16 April 1977.
85 'Finalmente -qualcosa di vira.!e si Iibera dalla crisi e ndla crisi del marxismo',
Manifesto,. 16 November 1977,
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PUBLISHED WRITIGS
Published in French in MMifesto, ed,, Pouvoir et oppositi0dans les sociits
post-rivolutionnaires, Editions du Seuil, Paris, 1978.
Translated by Grahame Lock as 'The Crisis of Marxism', Marxism Todl, July
1978, pp. 215-10, 217; reprinted in 11 Malfesto, ed., Power and.Opporiti01in
Post-Revolutionary Societies, Ink Links, London, 1979, pp. 225-37.
1978
8 'Avant-Propos' (1977), Gtrad Dumfnil, U "oncept de loi iconorique dans
'Le Capital', Fraos Masper Paris, 1978, pp. 7-16.
87 'La questione del!o stato, o e nella transizione', interview with Rossana
Rossanda (1977), II Mamfesto, 4 April 1978.
Reprinted as II manismo como teoria '"fnita" ', in Louis Althusser et a!., Discutere
lo stato, De Donato, Bari, 19-8, pp. 7-21.
Published i n French as 'Entretien', Dlafectiques 23, Spring 1978, pp, S-12.
88 'Des intellectuels communistes $ignent une lettre collective pour reclamer "une
veritable discussion politique" dans leur patti;, letter fo Louis Althuser, Ecenne
Ba!ibr, Guy Bois, Gerges Labica, Jean-Pierr Lfevr and Maurice Moisnier,
Le Monde, 6 April 1978.
89 'C qui ne peu
i
: plus durer dans le parti comrunistc', Le Mode, 25-28 Apd!
1978.
Expanded version published as Ce quine peutplus durer dans le parti corrniste,
Fran"ois Maspero, Paris, 1978.
Translatec by Patrick Cmiller as 'What Must Change in the Party', Ne Left
Review 109, May/june 1978, pp. 19-45.
90 'AI "punta zero" della teoria', interYiew with Giorgio Fanti, Paese Sera, 6 May
1978.
91 'Je ne yex pasetre un martyr', inteyiew in Les Norwelles Uttiraires, 15 June
1.78.
92 'Statt cines Vorworts: Vier Fragen an Louis A!thusser', interview with Peter
SchOtt!er, in Louis Althusser, Die Krise des Marxismus, VSA, Hamburg, 1978,
pp.
7-17.
93 'II marxismo oggi', i Encidopedia ropea, val. VII, Aldo Garzanti, MilBn,
1978.
Reprinted in Louis Althusser, Que/ che deve cambiare nel partito communi$tO,
Aldo Garzanti, Milan, 1978, pp. 107-26.
Published in French in M Mensue{, maXisme, mouvement, 43, January 1991,
pp. 7-11.
Translated by James m. Kavanagh as ''Marxism Today', in Philosophy and the
Spontaneous Philosophy of the Scientist$ & Other Essays, pp. 267-80.
1982
94 'Lam' (1977), in Exposition Antalogica 'Hammaie a Wilfredo Lam', 1902-
1982, Madrid, 1982, pp ., 141-42.
BIBIIOGRAPHY OF PUBIISHED WRITINGS
1983
95 'La decouverte du Dr. Freud' (1976), Revwe de Midecire Psychosomaique,
vol. ,5, no. 2, 19$3.
Reprind in Leon Chertok, d., Dialogue fanco-sQ1iitique Slr Ia psych4alyse,
Editions Privat, Toulouse, 1984, pp. 81-97; and in 110, pp. 195-219.
1987
96 'SolitUde de Machlavel' ( 1977), publisbed in German as 'Die Einsamkeit
MachiavelliS' in Louis Althu, Schrifen, Band Z Machiavelli, Montesquieu,
Rols$au-Zur politiscben Phifosophie der Net, Argument, West Brlin, 1987,
pp. 11-29.
Published in French in FutUI' Antirie 1, Spring 1990.
Transfated by Ben Brewster as 'Machiavelli's Solitude', E'onomy and Soiety,
val., 171 no. 41 1988, pp. 468 79.
1988
97 Filosofa y marxismo, interviews with Fernanda Navarro, Siglo XXI, Mexico
1988.
Forthcoming in Frehch, Lettres franoaises/Mercure de France, 1994.
1990
98 [Dream text], El sm41aJ, November 1990.
1991
99 'L'espnt d'fCna contre Ia Prusse', Maga-in Ltt6raire 293, November 1991,
pp. 43-45.
Extract from 'La notion de conten\1 dan& Ia philosophie de G. W. F. Hegel',
Memoire de Dip!Bme d'etudes supCriemes, Paris, 1947.
1992
10 L'tVetlir dure /ongtemps, suivi de Les faits: Aurobiographies, edited. and
introduced by Olivier Corpet and Yann Moulier Boutang, Stock/IMEC, Paris,
1992.
Translated by Richard Veasey as The Future Last's A Long Time, Chatto and
Windu London, and The. New Pres, New York, 1993.
101 Jornl de captiviti: Stalag XA 1 1940-1945, Clrets - Conespondances
Tetes, eited and itrucd by Olivier Corpet and Yann Moulier Boutang
Stock/IMEC, Paris, 1992.
214
BIBLJOGRAPHV OF PUBLISHED WRITINGS
102 Letter of 26 November 1963 ro Jacques Lacan, M MagaW!! Lttiraire 304,
N
ovember 199Z, pp. 49-50; printed in 110, pp. 272-5.
1993
103
'L'unique tradition matiria!iste', Lgs 18, January 1993, pp. 75-119.
104
'Letrres a D . + .' \1966), in Louis Althusser,
E
crits sur Ia psychanalyse: Freud
et Lacan, edited and presented by Olivier Corpt and Fram;ois Matheron,
Stock/IMEC. Paris, 1993, pp. 57-110.
105 TrMis notes sur Ia thWrie des discours' (1966), in Paits sur Ia psychanalyse,
p. 117-170.
106 'Sur le transfert er le cntre-transfert (etites mcongruirCs pnatives)' (1973),
in Pcrits sur Ia psychanalyse, pp. 173-186,
107 'Leure ouverte aux analysnts et analystes se reclamanr de Jacqu_es Lacan'
(1980), in Ecrits sur Ia psy4hara/y, pp. 249-57.
.
108 RemarqUes compl6nentaires sur Ia reunion du PLM-Saint-Jacques du 15
mars 1980' (1980), in crits sur /t psychat!yse, pp. 258-66.
109 Correspondence with Jacques La can (1963 69), in Ecrits sur /t psychart/yse,
pp. 271-305.
110 Palts sur Ia psychanalyst: Freud et Laatn, edited and introduced by Ollvier
Corpet and Franrois Matheron, Stock/IMEC; Plris, 1993.
Contains 21; 81; 95; 102; 104; 105; 106; 107; 108; 109.