SOCIAL REFORM OR REVOLUTION?

Marx, Honneth and the Capitalist Market Economy

Abstract

This article aims to examine two models of interpretation and, therefore, of response to social contradictions. In the first part we will show how Honneth explains these contradictions and which "therapies" he recommends against it. Following the Hegelian tradition to which he is affiliated, Honneth interprets the negativity of the capitalist market economy not as a result of structural deficiencies, but as “deviations” or “anomalies” (Fehlentwicklungen) to be remedied through an appeal to the moral subjectivity of individuals and therefore to the strengthening of a behavior or conscience based on solidarity. This would guarantee, for Honneth, the “humanization” or “gradual reform” of an economy that fails to fulfill its own promises. Through Marx’s analysis of the capitalist mode of production offered in his Critique of Political Economy, we argue, in the second part, that the social contradictions emerging from Modernity are the expression of its essence, contradictions that develop precisely through the fulfillment of those normative promises. Thus, we will seek to defend the thesis that, for Marx, as opposed to Honneth, overcoming these social contradictions requires overcoming both the economic reality which creates them as well as the legal principles which reproduce them.