Marxist thought was a powerful force in French political and intellectual life throughout the twentieth century. This book takes you from its early beginnings to its peak in the 1970s, when it dominated the battle of ideas. You will follow conceptual debates on the materialist dialectic, explore Marxism as a system of thought, and experience the ambition of the men and women of letters who sought to change the world. This second edition is augmented with essays on how Marxist thinkers grappled with religion, everyday life, the Cold War, and other leading intellectual movements.
Introduction to the Second Edition
Introduction to the First Edition
1 Beginnings 18451929
1Marx, Engels, and the Hegelian Dialectic
2Marxism in France before 1917
3Hegel in France
4The 1920s
2 The Irruption 192939
1Marxism and the Crisis of the 1930s
2A New Elaboration
3The Self-Inverting Dialectic
4Stalin and Dogmatism
5In Defence of Materialism
3 War and Post-War 193948
1Marxism and the Second World War
2Liberation and Reconstruction
3Towards an Objective Idealism
4Back to Hegel
4 Cold War 194856
1Two Camps
2Nadir of Philosophy
3Stirrings of Recovery
4The Early Althusser
5Critiques of the Existentialist Dialectic
5 New Beginnings 195662
11956 and its Aftermath
2Lefebvres Problems with Marxism
3Dialectics and Dialogue
4Existentialism and the Dialectic
6 Innovations 19628 Part One
1Althusser: Against Inversion
2Contradiction and Overdetermination
3The New Model Dialectic
4Althusser and Garaudy
7 Explorations 19628 Part Two
1The Destalinisation of Philosophy
2Godelier and the Cybernetic Dialectic
3Tran Due Thaos Materialist Inversion
4Garaudys pluralist dialectic
5Sève and the Scientific Dialectic
8 Changes 196874
11968
2The Fate of Garaudy
3Development of Althussers Theory
4Sève and the New Consensus
9 New Directions 197480
1Jaeglé, Science, and Dialectics
2Labica Against Philosophy
3DHondt on Contradiction and Difference
4Mercier-Josa and the Detour via Hegel
10 Conclusion to the First Edition
11 Annotated Bibliography
1French History
2French Marxism
3Individual French Marxists
12 Marxism and Faith
13 Les Lendemains qui Pensent
14 French Intellectuals and Zhdanovism
15 The Historical Emergence of Everyday Life
16 Towards a Heuristic Method: Sartre and Lefebvre
17 Demystification: A Dialogue Between Barthes and Lefebvre
References
Index
Michael Kelly is Emeritus Professor of French at the University of Southampton. He has published widely on French intellectual movements and French culture of the twentieth century, on European language policy and on languages in war and conflict.
