## 1. Biography




Herbert Marcuse was born on July 19, 1898 in Berlin. His mother was
born Gertrud Kreslawsky and his father was a well-off businessman,
Carl Marcuse. According to Marcuse, his childhood was that of a
typical German upper-middle class youth whose Jewish family was well
integrated into German society (Kellner 1984: 13). Marcuse's
formal education began at the Mommsen Gymnasium and continued at the
Kaiserin-Augusta Gymnasium in Charlottenburg from 1911-1916. In
1916 Marcuse was called to military service. It was in the military
where his political education began, although during this period his
political involvement was brief. The experience of war and the German
Revolution led Marcuse to a study of Marxism as he tried to understand
"the dynamics of capitalism and imperialism, as well as the
failure of the German Revolution" (Kellner 1984: 17). Marcuse
also wanted to learn more about socialism and the Marxian theory of
revolution so that he may understand his own inability to identify
with any of the major Left parties at that time (Kellner 1984: 17).
However, this study of Marxism would be brief. In 1918 Marcuse was
released from military service.



In 1919 he entered Humboldt University in Berlin and took courses for
four semesters. In 1920 he transferred to Freiburg to concentrate on
German literature and to take courses in philosophy, politics, and
economics. This period of study culminated in a doctoral dissertation
entitled *Der deutsche Kunstlerroman* (*The German
Artist-Novel*), which was accepted in 1922 (Kellner 1984: 18). This
work would be the first in a life-long engagement with aesthetics for
Marcuse. 


 After the acceptance of his dissertation Marcuse returned to
Berlin where "his father provided him with an apartment and a
share in a publishing and antiquarian book business"
(Wiggershaus 1994: 96). Marcuse worked mainly as a catalogue researcher
and bibliographer, and published a Schiller bibliography in 1925
(Kellner 1984: 32-33). In 1924 Marcuse married his first wife,
Sophie.



While in Berlin, Marcuse began reading Martin Heidegger's newly
published *Being and Time* with a friend in 1927. Although
Marcuse was already a student of philosophy, his interest in
philosophy had remained second to his interest in German literature up
to this point. The excitement caused by *Being and Time* would
lead Marcuse to a life-long serious engagement with philosophy.
According to Douglas Kellner, this move from a primary concern with
art to a deeper engagement with philosophy suggests that Marcuse was a
bit skeptical about the power of art as a "cognitive source of
knowledge and as an instrument of personal liberation and social
change" (Kellner 1984: 36-37). The impact of Heidegger was
so great that Marcuse returned to Freiburg in 1928 to study philosophy
with Heidegger and Edmund Husserl. While in Freiburg Marcuse worked as
Heidegger's assistant and began work on his second dissertation,
*Hegel's Ontologie und die Grundlegung einer Theorie der
Geschichtlichkeit* (*Hegel's Ontology and the Theory of
Historicity*) (1932 [1987]). Although this dissertation was never
approved by Heidegger (and according to Marcuse, perhaps not read), it
was published in 1932.


 In 1932 Marcuse and Heidegger parted ways due to the
latter's developing interest in National Socialism, although
Heidegger didn't officially join the Nazi Party until 1933. As
the Nazis soared to power and anti-Semitism began to spread, it became
clear to Marcuse that he "would never be able to qualify for a
professorship under the Nazi regime" (Kellner 1984: 92). Given
his situation, Marcuse began to inquire about employment with the
Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt. After an interview, a
letter of support from Edmund Husserl, and a word of support from a
member of the Institute (Leo Lowenthal), Marcuse was hired
(Wiggershaus 1994: 104; Kellner 1984: 92)


 Due to Nazi activity, Marcuse never actually worked in
Frankfurt. Anticipating the fascist takeover, the Institute deposited
their endowment in Holland. A branch office was established in Geneva
where Marcuse began his work with the Institute. He would go to Paris
for a short time and then finally in July 1934 to New York. From
1934-1942 Marcuse worked at the Institute's branch at
Columbia University. In 1942 he moved to Washington D.C. to work first
with the Office of War Information and then with the Office of
Strategic Services. Later Marcuse would teach at Brandeis University
and then the University of California, San Diego. He became a United
States citizen in 1940 and remained in the United States until his
death in 1979.


## 2. The Aesthetic Dimension




The bookends of Marcuse's literary, philosophical, and political
life are works on aesthetics. In 1922 he completed a doctoral
dissertation entitled *Der deutsche Kunstlerroman*
(*The German Artist-Novel*). In 1978, one year before his death
he published *The Aesthetic Dimension: Toward A Critique of Marxist
Aesthetics*. Between these two works are several smaller works on
aesthetics. However, even the works that do not deal directly with
aesthetics still contain (we might say) an aesthetic dimension. It is
not possible to discuss the role of aesthetics in all of
Marcuse's works. Therefore, the role of aesthetics in
Marcuse's critical theory in general will be discussed. There
are three key works on aesthetics which were written at different
times that reveal the overall point of Marcuse's aesthetic
theory. 


 Even in his youth, Marcuse had a love for the classics of German
and world literature (Marcuse 2007a: 4). After serving military duty
and after his brief period of political engagement Marcuse returned to
his literary studies. However, in the aftermath of his reading of
Marxism, Marcuse's literary studies had a decisive political
orientation. He was interested in the revolutionary and transformative
function of art. 



This turn to art and literature was a return to an earlier love with a
new mission. This new mission was of course inspired by his encounter
with Marxism and the crisis of Marxism. The turn toward literature was
also a quest for revolutionary subjectivity. Put another way, from the
beginning to the end of his literary career Marcuse looked for spaces
of a critical consciousness that had not been completely whittled down
by the oppressive and repressive forces of capitalism. Revolution and
social change demands a space for thought and action that make
resistance to the *status quo* possible. Well before he began
to use the term "the Great Refusal", he was in search of
such.



In his dissertation of 1922, *The German Artist-Novel*, the
artist represents a form of radical subjectivity. Marcuse makes a
distinction between epic poetry and the novel in this work. Epic
poetry deals with the origin and development of a people and culture
while the novel does not focus on the form of life of a people and
their development, but rather, on a sense of longing and striving
(Marcuse 2007a: 72). The novel indicates alienation from social
life. The details of Marcuse's argument will not be addressed
here. The point is to show that there is a certain orientation of
thought in Marcuse's 1922 dissertation that is motivated by his
encounter with Marxism and will stay with him as his project becomes
more philosophical. In short, the artist experiences a gap between the
ideal and the real. This ability to entertain, at least theoretically,
an ideal form of existence for humanity, while at the same time living
in far less than ideal conditions, produces a sense of alienation in
the artist. This alienation becomes the catalyst for social
change. This function of art stays with Marcuse and will be developed
further as he engages with psychoanalysis and philosophy.



As a dialectical thinker, Marcuse was also able to see both sides of
the coin. That is, while art embodied revolutionary potential, it
was also produced, interpreted, and distributed in a repressive
society. In an oppressive/repressive society the forces of
liberation and the forces of domination do not develop in isolation
from each other. Instead, they develop in a dialectical
relationship where one produces the conditions for the other. 
This can be seen throughout almost all of Marcuse's writings and
will be pointed out at different points in this essay. The task
here is to take a look at how this dialectic of liberation and
domination occurs within the context of Marcuse's aesthetic
theory. This should not be taken to mean that there will never be
a point in time when human beings are liberated from the forces of
domination. This simply means that if an individual group seeks
liberation, their analysis or critique of society must come to terms
with how things actually work at that moment in that society if any
form of liberation is possible. As Marcuse saw it, there is a
form of ideology that serves domination and creates the conditions for
liberation at the same time. This will be discussed later. 
Also, there is a form of liberation that lends itself to be co-opted by
the forces of domination. 


 Just as art embodied the potential for liberation and the
formation of radical subjectivity, it was also capable of being taken
up by systems of domination and used to further or maintain
domination. This is the theme of Marcuse's 1937 essay
"The Affirmative Character of Culture". Culture, which is
the domain of art, develops in tension with the overall structure of a
given society. The values and ideals produced by culture call for the
transcending of oppressive social reality. Culture separates itself
from the social order. That is, the social realm or civilization is
characterized by labor, the working day, the realm of necessity,
operational thought, etc. (Marcuse 1965: 16). This is the realm of real
material and social relations as well as the struggle for
existence. The cultural realm or civilization is characterized by
intellectual work, leisure, non-operational thought, and freedom
(Marcuse 1965: 16). The freedom to think and reflect that is made
possible at the level of culture makes it possible to construct values
and ideals that pose a challenge to the social order. This is the
emancipatory function of art. However, art itself does not bring about
liberation; it must be translated into political
activity. Nevertheless, art is important because it opens up the space
for thinking that may then produce revolution. 



The separation between culture and society does not suggest a flight
from social reality. Instead, it represents an alien or critical
space within social reality. The ideals produced by culture must
work within society as transformative ideas. In "The
Affirmative Character of Culture", Marcuse, in good dialectical
fashion, shows how culture separates itself from society or
civilization and creates the space for critical thought and social
change but then succumbs to the oppressive demands of bourgeois
society. It does this by "separating 'culture'
from the everyday world" (Marcuse 2007a: 23). In
affirmative culture art becomes the object of spiritual
contemplation. The demand for happiness in the real world is
abandoned for an internal form of happiness, the happiness of the
soul. Hence, bourgeois culture creates an interior of the human
being where the highest ideals of culture can be realized. This
inner transformation does not demand an external transformation of the
real world and its material conditions. 



In such a society the cultivation of the soul becomes an important
part of one's education. The belief that the soul is more
important than the body and material needs leads to political
resignation insofar as freedom becomes internal. "The soul takes
flight at the hard truth of theory, which points up the necessity of
changing as impoverished form of existence" (Marcuse 2007b:
222). Hence, the soul accepts the facts of its material existence
without fighting to change these facts. Affirmative culture with its
idea of the soul has used art to erase radical subjectivity. 



In his last book *The Aesthetic Dimension* (1978), Marcuse
continues his attempt to rescue the radical transformative nature of
art. In this text he takes a polemical stance against the problematic
interpretation of the function of art by orthodox Marxists. These
Marxists claimed that only proletarian art could be
revolutionary. Marcuse attempts to establish the revolutionary
potential of all art by establishing the autonomy of authentic
art. Marcuse states: "It seems that art as art expresses a
truth, an experience, a necessity which, although not in the domain of
radical praxis, are nevertheless essential components of
revolution" (Marcuse 1978: 1). It is the experience that art
tries to express that Marcuse will focus on and it is this which
separates him from orthodox Marxists. 


 It must be remembered that for Marcuse and the Frankfurt School
there was no evidence that the proletariat would rise up against their
oppressors. In addition to developing theories that disclosed the
social and psychological mechanisms at work in society that made the
proletariat complicit in their own domination, Marcuse saw
possibilities for revolution in multiple places. Some of this will be
discussed later. The student revolts of the 1960s confirmed much of
the direction of Marcuse's critical theory from early on. That
is, the need for social change includes class struggle but cannot be
reduced to class struggle. There is a multiplicity of social groups in
our society that seek social change for various reasons. There are
multiple forms of oppression and repression that make revolution
desirable. Hence, the form of art produced, and its revolutionary
vision, may be determined by a multiplicity of oppressed/repressed
subject positions. 



Orthodox Marxism focused on the proletariat by excluding all other
possible sites for revolution. For this reason, orthodox Marxism
itself becomes a form of ideology and produces a reified state of
affairs. In orthodox Marxist aesthetics



> 
>  The subjectivity of individuals, their own consciousness and
> unconscious tends to be dissolved into class consciousness. Thereby, a
> major prerequisite of revolution is minimized, namely, the fact that
> the need for radical change must be rooted in the subjectivity of
> individuals themselves, in their intelligence, and their passions,
> their drives and their goals. (Marcuse 1978: 3-4)
> 
> 
> 


 In orthodox Marxism, radical subjectivity was reduced to one
social group, the proletariat. Marcuse greatly expands the space
where radical subjectivity can emerge. Marcuse argues that
"liberating subjectivity constitutes itself in the inner history
of the individuals" (Marcuse 1978: 5). Each subject as distinct
from other subjects represents a particular subject position. For
example; white female, working class, mother of two, born in the
mid-west, etc. However, with each distinct feature of the individual
subject corresponds a structural position. That is, in a given society,
gender, race, class, level of education etc., are interpreted in
certain ways. Experiences and the opportunities provided by them are
often affected by subject and structural position and produce what
Marcuse calls "the inner history of the individual"
(Marcuse 1978: 5). 



Given that there are many subject positions that are positions of
repression and dehumanization, radical subjectivity and art may come
from any of these positions. Economic class is just one structural
position among many. Hence, it is not only the proletariat who may
have an interest in social change.
 


## 3. The Search for a Philosophical Foundation for Marxism and the Radical Subject


### 3.1 Phenomenological Marxism




Inspired by his reading of Heidegger's *Being and
Time*, and having already been influenced by Marxism during his
military days, Marcuse went to Freiberg to study with Heidegger in
1928. Between 1928 and 1932 he attempted to develop what has been
called Heideggerian or phenomenological Marxism. This project was
Marcuse's response to what has been called the "crisis of
Marxism." 



By the early twentieth century it appeared to be the case that
the proletarian revolution predicted by Marx was not going to
happen. Europe had witnessed several failed attempts at a
revolution. The Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 was not lead by the
proletariat and it simply produced a different form of
totalitarianism.



> 
>  Marcuse undoubtedly accepted Rosa Luxemburg's trenchant
> critique of the authoritarian implications of Lenin's
> vanguardism. In fact, most European socialists viewed Lenin's
> voluntarism as inappropriate for Western and Central Europe, where a
> more advanced and experienced proletariat existed. (Wolin 2005: xiv)
> 
> 
> 



This situation produced the *political crisis* of Marxism.



The political crisis of Marxism was entangled with its
*epistemological crisis* (Wolin 2005: xiv). The
epistemological crisis was the result of the scientific reductionism
of Marxism which was encouraged by Engels and Karl Kautsky (Marcuse
2005: xiv). So-called scientific Marxism is a non-philosophical,
mechanistic form of Marxist theory that teaches the inevitable,
automatic collapse of capitalism. This form of theory ends up being
non-revolutionary to the extent that the "subjective factor of
working class consciousness is down played" (Marcuse
2005: xiv). The Second International produced a form of positivism that
eliminated the dialectical approach of Marxism and erased the role of
human subjectivity. That is, if the collapse of capitalism was
inevitable because of the effects of certain natural laws and not due
to the conscious, intentional efforts of the proletariat, then there
is no need to work toward the development of revolutionary
consciousness. 


 Marcuse's entire project can be seen as an attempt to rescue
radical, socially transformative subjectivity. He gravitates toward
Marxism because Marxism is an attempt to rescue subjectivity or
humanity from the reifying, oppressive forces of capitalism.
Unfortunately, the Marxism of the Second International also erased
human subjectivity as this form of Marxism became mechanistic in
nature. It is in this context, where subjectivity and human agency are
being whittled down, that Marcuse turns to Heidegger for a possible
solution. Marcuse saw in Marx and Heidegger "a demand for
radical action" (Wolin 2001: 146). 



> 
> 
> For Marx, it took the form of "praxis,"
> "revolutionary, practical-critical activity." On the basis
> of authentic temporality, *Dasein*, too, demanded a radical
> response to the realities of alienated social existence. (Wolin 2001: 147)
> 
> 



For Marcuse, radical action was needed to overcome the oppressive,
repressive, and reified structure of advanced industrial society. He
saw common ground between Marx and Heidegger regarding this
problem. At this point in his career, Marcuse read the oppressive
structure of advanced industrial society through three lenses, the
Marxian lens of alienation, The Lukacsian lens of reification,
and the Heideggerian lens of inauthenticity. Although Marx's
*1844 Manuscripts* which includes a discussion of alienation
were not yet available to Marcuse when he went to Freiburg,
Marx's theory of alienation is implicit in various places in
volume one of *Capital* where he discusses the reduction of
social relations between persons to the relations between things while
the relations between things are treated as social relations.



> 
> 
> Thus, Marcuse believed that Heidegger's *Being and Time*
> represented a potentially valuable ally in the struggle against the
> reified social continuum of advanced industrial society. He
> conjectured that Heidegger's philosophy of existence possessed
> the conceptual means required to counteract an inverted social world
> in which, according to Marx, "social relations between men
> assume...*the fantastic form of a relation between
> things*." In part, Marcuse read Heidegger's philosophy
> as an ontologically veiled *critique of reification*: an
> indictment of the way in which oppressive social circumstances
> militate against the possibility of human self-realization. It seemed
> that, like the critical Marxists Lukacs and Korsch, Heidegger
> strove to surmount the fetishization of appearances that characterized
> the shadow-world of bourgeois immediacy. Like Lukacs and
> Korsch, in *Being and Time* Heidegger strove concertedly to
> break with the deterministic worldview of bourgeois science, in which
> human being or *Dasein* was degraded to the status of a
> "thing among things." After all, this was the main point
> behind Heidegger's critique of *Vorhandenheit* or being
> present-at-hand as a mode of inauthenticity. (Wolin 2005:
> xiv-xv). 
> 
> 



Marcuse's reading of Marx, Heidegger, Lukacs, Korsch, and
even Max Weber is based on his quest for radical or revolutionary
subjectivity. Like Horkheimer and Adorno, Marcuse saw western
society as moving in the direction of a totally administered
society. His later notion of one-dimensionality was developed
*via* his critique of such a society. However, he
eventually became disillusioned with Heidegger.



Even while under Heidegger's influence Marcuse was never a mere
Heideggerian. He recognized early on that Heidegger's philosophy
had certain limitations. He would eventually discover that
Heidegger's philosophy was not all that concrete. While
Heidegger's philosophy explicated the ontological structure of
*Dasein* in its everydayness, it never dwelled at the ontic
level. At the ontological level Heidegger merely examined the
fundamental structures of *Dasein*. That is, *Dasein* in
general carries out its life within a certain universal structure
which is constituted by modes of existence such as fallenness, idle
talk, boredom, care, being toward death, etc. What has been disclosed
here are mere universal conditions or modes of existence in which
*Dasein* happens and experiences happenings. However, these
modes of existence are experienced in different ways, at different
times, and with different levels of intensity by different
individuals. 



At the end of the day, Marcuse sees that Heidegger avoids the type of
analyses that would reveal systems of oppression and domination from
which many human beings suffer. The modes of existence for
*Dasein* have a social, historical, and political context that
shape the way they are experienced. For example, *Dasein* has a
race, gender, class, etc. These particular features come with specific
social interpretations which affect *Dasein*'s
life's prospects. According to Marcuse, Heidegger's
*Dasein* is a sociologically and biologically neutral category
(Marcuse 2005b: 167). Heidegger gives no account of the multiple forms
of oppression and domination present in advanced industrial societies
nor the way that individuals respond to these forms of oppression and
domination. In a 1977 interview conducted by Frederick A. Olafson,
Marcuse raises the following criticism of Heidegger:



> 
> 
> How does the individual situate himself and see himself in
> capitalism--at a certain stage of capitalism, under socialism, as
> a member of this or that class, and so on? This entire dimension is
> absent. To be sure, *Dasein* is constituted in historicity, but
> Heidegger focuses on individuals purged of the hidden and not so
> hidden injuries of their class, their work, their recreation, purged
> of the injuries they suffer from their society. There is no trace of
> the daily rebellion, of the striving for liberation. The *Man*
> (the anonymous anyone) is no substitute for the social reality
> (Marcuse 2005b: 169) 
> 
> 
> 


 Hence, Heidegger's concrete philosophy is not so concrete as
he defines human beings and their historicity in such a way that omits
the real, concrete struggles in which social actors find
themselves. In the same interview quoted above, Marcuse claims that he
and others realized that "Heidegger's concreteness was to
a great extent a phony, false concreteness," removed from
reality (Marcuse 2005b: 166)



We can see now that the very thing that drew Marcuse to
Heidegger's philosophy was missing. Heidegger's philosophy
failed to provide Marcuse with a concrete philosophical foundation for
Marxism as well as a theory of the radical act or radical
subjectivity. Heidegger's interest with Nazism made it easy for
Marcuse to leave Heidegger in 1932. This move was also made easy by
the publication of Marx's *1844 Manuscripts* first
published in 1932. 


 Although Marcuse breaks with Heidegger in 1932, for some scholars
the break is not all that clear. Martin Jay claims that when Marcuse
joined the Institute, the influence of Horkheimer was so great that
Marcuse "abandoned Heidegger's vocabulary, as the impact
of phenomenology on his thinking began to recede" (Jay
1973: 76). However, in a letter to Horkheimer on May 13, 1935, Adorno
strongly suggests that Marcuse was still a Heideggerian
(Marcuse/Kellner 1998: 16 n.22). One must, however, maintain some level
of suspicion of Adorno's claim since he and Marcuse were engaged
in competition for Horkheimer's favor. Nevertheless, the
question of Marcuse's Heideggerianism is still of interests for
Marcuse scholars. For example, Richard Wolin writes: "In
Marcuse's postwar writings, the Heideggerian dimension is muted
but nevertheless traceable" (Wolin 2001: 167). 



Does Marcuse continue to employ Heideggerian ideas in a new language?
Is Marcuse's critique of one-dimensionality nothing more than a
Heideggerian critique of inauthenticity? Both terms refer to "a
mass society of blind conformity" (Wolin 2001: 168). Wolin also
raises the question of parallels between Heidegger's ontological
elitism and Marcuse's notion of an "educational
dictatorship" (Wolin 2001: 172). The issue of an educational
dictatorship occurs in *Eros and Civilization* (1955) as well
as in "Repressive Tolerance" (1965) and reflects
Marcuse's pessimism about the development of radical
consciousness in the working class. The problem of some form of
intellectual elitism is not only found in Heidegger but in Marxism
itself. One need only think about Lenin's notion of the
Vanguard. However, whether the source be Heidegger or certain
Marxists, the wave toward elitism, in one form or another, remains a
problem in Marcuse's work. 


### 3.2 Philosophical Anthropology and Radical Subjectivity




In 1932 Marcuse published one of the first reviews of the newly
published *1844 Manuscripts* entitled "Neue Quellen zur
Grundlegung des historischen Materialismus" (New Sources on the
Foundation of Historical Materialism). According to Marcuse, the
*1844 Manuscripts* had the possibility to accomplish two things.



> 
> 
> These manuscripts could put the discussion about the origins and
> original meaning of historical materialism, and the entire theory of
> "scientific socialism," on a new footing. They also
> make it possible to pose the question of the actual connections between
> Marx and Hegel in a more fruitful way. (Wolin 2001: 86)
> 
> 
> 



However, these manuscripts also provided Marcuse with the necessary
theoretical tools needed for developing a critical, philosophical
anthropology that would aid him in the development of his own brand of
critical theory.



In this context, "anthropology" does not refer to the
study of past cultures, as it often does in the United
States. Instead, it refers to the German idea of anthropology which is
more of a philosophical and social scientific examination of human
nature. The *1844 Manuscripts* are important for Marcuse
because in them Marx provides a philosophical foundation for his later
critique of political economy as well as an action-theoretic,
philosophical anthropology. Philosophical categories such as labor,
objectification, alienation, sublation, property, and others all
explored in Hegel's philosophy were scrutinized dialectically by
Marx (Kellner 1984: 79). 



In a nutshell, what Marcuse sees in the *1844 Manuscripts* is
an analysis of the social conditions for a communist revolution. 
The revolution itself requires the development of radical
subjectivity. Radical subjectivity refers to the development of a
form of self-consciousness that finds present social and economic
conditions intolerable. The radical act is a refusal of these
conditions and an orientation toward social transformation. To make
sense of Marcuse's position we must ask: what are these
intolerable conditions and how are they produced? Philosophical
anthropology and radical subjectivity are connected here insofar as the
intolerable conditions that must be overcome by revolution or the
radical act represent social distortions of the human essence. It
is Marx and Hegel who provided Marcuse with a philosophical
anthropology that discloses human essence and the social mechanisms by
which it is distorted. The key category here is that of
"alienation" which cannot be understood without examining
the role of labor and objectification.



According to Marcuse, Hegel, and Marx, human beings develop through
a self-formative process wherein the external world (nature) is
appropriated and transformed according to human needs. Labor is
one of the main areas for this self-formative activity. The idea
that labor is an essential part of a self-formative process is what
distinguishes Marx from the classical economists such as Smith,
Ricardo, etc. In classical economics, labor is simply the means
by which individuals make provisions for themselves and their
families. In these theories labor is not viewed as that activity
by which the human subject is constituted. The Marxian view of
labor as a self-formative process is what makes possible the Marxian
theory of alienation and revolution.



Marcuse argues that in the *1844 Manuscripts* Marx shows how
the role of labor as a self-realization or self-formative process gets
inverted. Instead of having his or her subjectivity affirmed, the
individual becomes an object that is now shaped by external, alien
forces. Hence, Marx's theory makes a transition from an
examination of the self-formative process of labor to a critique of the
forms of alienation caused by the historical facticity of capitalism.
Within the historical facticity of capitalism



> 
> 
> this fact appears as the total inversion and concealment of what
> critique had defined as the essence of man and human labor. Labor is
> not "free activity" or the universal and free
> self-realization of man, but his enslavement and loss of reality. The
> worker is not man in the totality of his life-expression, but
> something unessential [*ein Unwesen*], the purely physical
> subject of "abstract" activity. The objects of labor are
> not expressions and confirmations of the human reality of the worker,
> but alien things, belonging to someone other than the
> worker--"commodities." (Marcuse 2005b: 104)
> 
> 



Marcuse will spend the rest of his life carrying out the
investigations started in these early works. What distinguishes his
project from Marx's is the way in which each will deal with the
problem of concealment mentioned in the above quote. Marx will
develop two different but related approaches. His critique of
political economy is an attempt to disclose the inner logic of
capitalism (how it works) as well as the contradictions that will lead
to the collapse of capitalism. The second approach is to work out
a theory of revolution which presupposes the awakening of
self-consciousness in the working class. In both approaches
concealment will give way to disclosure and social
transformation. We saw earlier that Marx's predictions did
not come true on either account. This failure in part led to what
has been called the crisis of Marxism to which the birth of the
Frankfurt School was a response. Marcuse's work will go
through many phases as he tries to unlock the key to revolutionary
action. The next key move for him is to engage in a deeper study
of Hegel as a source for critical social theory.


### 3.3 Negative (Dialectical) Thinking and Social Change




In 1941 Marcuse's studies of Marx and Hegel culminated in a book
entitled *Reason and Revolution: Hegel and the Rise of Social
Theory* (1941 [1983]). This book accomplished several
things. First, it disclosed the role of Hegel's most critical,
revolutionary, and emancipatory concepts in the development of
Marx's critical philosophy. Secondly, it rescued Hegel from the
charge that his social and political philosophy was conservative and
legitimated the oppressive Prussian state. The third great
accomplishment, or at least goal, embodies the first two
accomplishments and is perhaps the most important for the formation of
Marcuse's form of critical theory. The Hegelian/Marxian notion
of dialectic or what Marcuse will call negative thinking becomes a
central element in Marcuse's critical theory. In part,
*Reason and Revolution* is not an attempt to rescue Hegel, but
rather, an attempt to rescue dialectical or negative thinking. Marcuse
makes this clear in a new preface to the 1960 edition of the book. The
new preface entitled "A Note on Dialectic" can actually
stand on its own as a guide to reading and understanding Marcuse.
Marcuse begins with the claim that this book is an attempt to rescue a
form of thinking or a mental faculty which is in danger of being
obliterated (Marcuse 1960: vii).




The purpose of dialectical or negative thinking is to expose and then
overcome by revolutionary action the contradictions by which advanced
industrial societies are constituted. The problem of concealment
occurs here because not only does society produce contradictions and
the forms of domination that come with them, but also produces the
social and psychological mechanisms that conceal these
contradictions. An example of a social contradiction is the
co-existence of the growth of national wealth and poverty at the same
time. Those who own, control, and influence the means of production
(the minority) grow richer while the workers (the minority) grow
poorer. The idea that the unbridled attempt by the rich to become
richer will somehow allow their wealth to trickle down so that all
will benefit has been proven false as the gap between the rich and
poor continues to grow. However, the trickle down ideology is still
very effective. The capitalist belief that unbridled competition is
good for everyone conceals the goal of purging society of competition
by allowing large corporations to buy out their competition.



In this situation, the worker does not become a free and rational
subject through her labor, but rather, an object to be used by the
economic system, a system that is a human creation, but over which the
worker has no control. In the capitalist system, the worker is used as
an object for the sake of production while not reaping the full
benefits of production. In such a situation the worker is not able to
actualize his or her potential as a free and rational human being but
is instead reduced to a life of toil for the sake of survival. The
existence of the worker erases her essence. The task of dialectical
thinking is to bring this situation to consciousness. Once this
situation is brought to consciousness it can be resolved through
revolutionary practice. Thus, Kellner writes:



> 
>  The central concepts presented are precisely those of the
> book's title, "reason" and
> "revolution". Reason distinguishes between existence and
> essence through conceptualizing unrealized potentialities, norms and
> ideals that are to be realized in social practice. If social
> conditions prevent their realization, reason calls for
> revolution. (Kellner 1984: 131) 
> 
> 



Marcuse's concept of essence is not transcendental but
historical. That is, there is no human essence apart from
historical context. Within the context of historical happening,
within material existence, what the human being could potentially be is
already present. For example, it seems logical to assert that no
human being would want to spend his or her entire life engaged in
alienating labor just to remain in poverty. Nevertheless, this is
precisely the situation in which many human beings find
themselves. However, essence is embedded in this historical
appearance insofar as the potential for the worker to be free from
exploitation and alienating toil is present as a real possibility that
need only be actualized. In the society wherein the worker works
there is enough wealth (produced by the worker) to free the worker of
endless toil. In an essay entitled "The Concept of
Essence" Marcuse writes: "Materialist theory thus
transcends the given state of fact and moves toward a different
potentiality, proceeding from immediate appearance to the essence that
appears in it. But here appearance and essence become members of
a real antithesis arising from the particular historical structure of
the social process of life" (Marcuse 1968b: 67). 



The above passage is crucial for understanding the theme of
*Reason and Revolution* and Marcuse's famous later work
*One-Dimensional Man* (1964) (which will be discussed later). His
concept of essence is not static or transcendental. Essence
presents itself as the possibility of a free non-alienating,
non-repressive form of life within a particular historical,
social/political structure. Appearance (the present order of
things) is in contradiction to the very possibilities that are produced
by the present social reality. For example, the capitalist mode
of production has made it possible for all members of our society to
live non-alienating and fruitful lives. However, many are still
in poverty. Dialectical or negative thinking sees this
contradiction and attempts to negate such circumstances. 


 The concept of negation is best understood by distinguishing
between two levels of negation in capitalist societies. The concept of
negation employed by Marcuse is actually a critical response to a
prior form of negation. This prior form of negation will be referred
to as negation1 and the response to it as negation2. Negation1 is the
negation of human essence or freedom by an oppressive, repressive
socio/economic system. Here the potential for liberation,
self-development, self-determination, the good life, etc. are all
erased by various forms of domination. Hence, the human individual is
negated. Negation2 refers to the development of critical,
revolutionary consciousness that seeks to negate these oppressive
social structures. The goal of negation2 is liberation (Farr 2009: 85-86). 



There are many other features of *Reason and Revolution* that
are worth discussing here, especially Marcuse's critique of
positivism. However, these issues will come up again in other
works that will be discussed later. Suffice it to say that at
this point Marcuse presents negative thinking as an alternative to what
he will later call one-dimensional thinking. It is through
negative thinking and revolution that liberation becomes
possible. In the next section we will examine another possibility
for liberation. 


## 4. Psychoanalysis and Utopian Vision


### 4.1 The Historical and Social Nature of Human Drives




Psychoanalysis was an essential theoretical tool for the Frankfurt
School from the beginning. When Max Horkheimer took over as director
in 1931, he had already been influenced by psychoanalysis (Abromeit
2011: 192-195). Soon after becoming director he brought
Psychoanalyst Erich Fromm on board. The initial goal was to use
psychoanalytic theory to understand the psyche of the working
class. That is, the goal was to understand why those who would benefit
most from a revolution of social change seemed to resist it. Marcuse
did not engage psychoanalysis until later. Although he made the
same use of psychoanalysis as his colleagues, Marcuse also developed
his own unique approach to interpreting psychoanalytic
theory. While *Eros and Civilization* is a work on Freud and is
replete with the language of psychoanalysis, it is as Marxian as it is
Freudian. The name Marx it not mentioned in the text, and rarely
are Marxian categories be introduced. Nevertheless, the Freudian
categories are bent toward a Marxist/Marxian type of analysis of
advanced industrial societies.



Although Marcuse had read Freud in the 1920s and 1930s, his serious
engagement did not begin until the 1950s. Marcuse was invited to give
a series of lectures in 1950-51 by the Washington School of
Psychiatry. The result of this engagement was one of Marcuse's
most famous books, *Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry
into Freud*. Marcuse's book is a response to the pessimism
of Freud's *Civilization and its Discontents* (1930
[1961]). Freud's book paints a bleak picture of the evolution of
civilization as the evolution of greater and greater repression from
which there seems to be no escape. The death and life instincts are
engaged in a battle for dominance with no clear winner in
sight. According to Marcuse, Freud fails to develop the emancipatory
possibility of his own theory. Marcuse's task is
two-fold. First, he must show that human instincts or drives are not
merely biological and fixed, but also social, historical, and
malleable. Secondly, he must show that repressive society also
produces the possibility of the abolition of repression (Marcuse 1955: 5). 



That the instincts can be repressed already suggests that society and
its form of organization play a role in shaping the instincts. 
If this is the case, the instincts cannot be fixed. As society
and its mechanisms of repression change, so does the instincts. 
Marcuse claims that:



> 
>  The vicissitudes of the instincts are the vicissitudes of the
> mental apparatus in civilization. The animal drive become human
> instincts under the influence of the external reality. (Marcuse 1955: 11-12)
> 
> 
> 



In this transformation of the animal drives into human instincts there
is a transformation of the pleasure principle into the reality
principle (Marcuse 1955: 12). In *Civilization and its
Discontents* Freud claimed it was the program of the pleasure
principle that decided the purpose of life (Freud 1961 [1930]:
25). However, the external world does not conform to the dictates of
the pleasure principle and is even hostile toward it. Hence, the
pleasure principle reverts, turns inward, is repressed. 



For Marcuse, liberation means a freeing up of the pleasure
principle. However, he realizes that if human beings are to
co-exist, some degree of repression is necessary. That is, if one
acted simply according to the demands of the pleasure principle, this
would lead to an infringement on the freedom of others. Hence,
there has to be a mutual limiting of freedom and happiness if we are to
co-exist. It is with regards to this problem that Marcuse comes
up with one of his most creative modifications of Freud's
theory. 


### 4.2 Repression




Marcuse introduces two new terms to distinguish between the biological
vicissitudes of the instincts and the social. *Basic
repression* refers to the type of repression or modification of
the instincts that is necessary "for the perpetuation of the
human race in civilization" (Marcuse 1955: 35). At this level,
repression does not lend itself to domination or
oppression. *Surplus repression*, on the other hand, refers to
"the restrictions necessitated by social domination"
(Marcuse 1955: 35). The purpose of surplus repression is to shape the
instincts in accordance with the present "performance
principle" which is "the prevailing form of the
*reality principle*" (Marcuse 1955: 35).



It is in this idea of the performance principle where Marx and Freud
meet.



> 
> 
> The performance principle, which is that of an acquisitive and
> antagonistic society in the process of constant expansion, presupposes
> a long development during which domination has been increasingly
> rationalized: control over social labor now reproduces society on a
> large scale and under improving conditions. For a long way, the
> interests of domination and the interests of the whole coincide: the
> profitable utilization of the productive apparatus fulfills the needs
> and faculties of individuals. For the vast majority of the population,
> the scope and mode of satisfaction are determined by their own labor;
> but their labor is work for an apparatus which they do not control,
> which operates as an independent power to which individuals must
> submit if they want to live. And it becomes the more alien the more
> specialized the division of labor becomes. Men do not live their own
> lives but perform pre-established functions. While they work, they do
> not fulfill their own needs and faculties but work in
> *alienation*. (Marcuse 1955: 45)
> 
> 



Marcuse's point here is that while work is necessary for the
maintenance of life, in our society there has been a transition from
the basic amount of work needed to maintain life to what we might call
surplus work. There is a distinction here between the work that
is needed for one's satisfaction and work that is needed for the
apparatus. The worker has no control insofar as he has no say in
what his wages will be and cannot determine the amount of work that is
needed to meet his needs. Work in a capitalist society extends
itself beyond what is required for the satisfaction of the worker to
what will maximize profit for the capitalist. The
"pre-established function" of the worker is to produce
commodities and maximize profit for the capitalist. The worker
must work to live but the conditions under which she works is
determined by the apparatus. 



Being used by the apparatus requires conformity with the
apparatus. This is what Marcuse means by the performance
principle. Members of society must perform according to the
dictates of their pre-established function. This performance
requires the restriction of the libido. The worker must be
manipulated in such a way so that these restrictions seem to function
as rational, external objective laws which are then internalized by the
individual. The desires of the individual must conform to the
desires of the apparatus. The individual must define himself as
the apparatus defines all humanity. As Marcuse puts it, "he
desires what he is supposed to desire" (Marcuse 1955: 46). 



Although Marcuse's theory of repression and the recognition of
two forms of repression is a useful theoretical tool for understanding
why we have not entered a revolutionary period, it falls short of
explaining how desires are manipulated in such a way that
one-dimensional identities are formed. One of the most
interesting and fruitful criticisms of what is now called the
"repression hypothesis" (Foucault 1976 [1990]: 17-49). 
For Foucault, forms of subjectivity or identity are not a result of the
repression of some primordial desire. Rather, identities are
formed through power and certain discursive practices. Further,
in the process of identity-formation, knowledge is not repressed but
rather, called forth or produced. In his critique of Marcuse,
Foucault writes:



> 
>  I would also distinguish myself from para-Marxist like Marcuse who
> give the notion of repression an exaggerated role--because power
> would be a fragile thing if its only function were to repress, if it
> worked only through the mode of censorship, exclusion, blockage and
> repression, in the manner of a great Superego, exercising itself only
> in a negative way. If, on the contrary, power is strong this is
> because, as we are beginning to realize, it produces effects at the
> level of desire--and also at the level of knowledge. Far from
> preventing knowledge, power produces it. (Foucault 1980: 59)
> 
> 


### 4.3 Eros and Logos




Chapter Five of *Eros and Civilization* entitled
"Philosophical Interlude" occurs as a bit of a rupture in
the text. After discussing the Freudian theory of the instincts
for four chapters, Marcuse takes a break from Freud and engages
philosophy instead. However, this break is consistent with the
purpose of the book. One of Marcuse's main concerns in all
of his work is the rationalization of domination. This was a
major theme in *One-Dimensional Man*. This chapter also
gives us a clue as to why Freud is so important for critical
theory. Freud is put in opposition to the entire western
philosophical tradition. The problem with the western
philosophical tradition is that it constructs a view of rationality
that is in compliance with the oppressive function of rationality or
the form of rationality that supports domination. For example,
the Kantian notion of moral duty for the sake of duty subordinates
happiness to duty. Although Kant provides good reasons for this,
he does not adequately address the need for happiness. According
to Kant following, the moral law makes one worthy of happiness perhaps
in the afterlife, but there is no real concern for happiness in the
present world. 



Marcuse's criticism of western philosophy is very similar to
recent criticisms by feminists and Africana philosophers. That
is, philosophy tends to treat human beings as pure, abstract
consciousness. The body and the passions are to be subdued by
reason or *Logos*. Marcuse does not intend to subjugate
*Logos* (reason) to *Eros* (desire). He simply
wants to return *Eros* to its proper place as equal to
*Logos*. It is Freud who recognizes the central role of
*Eros* as a motivating factor in human action. 


### 4.4 The Ideology of Scarcity




One of the most important features of Marcuse's work is his
dialectical analysis of western society. In his work he tries to
bring attention to the co-existence of possibilities for liberation and
the further development of mechanisms of domination. Our society
produces the necessary conditions for freedom while at the same time
producing greater oppression.



> 
> 
> The very progress of civilization under the performance principle has
> attained a level of productivity at which the social demands upon
> instinctual energy to be spent in alienated labor could be
> considerably reduced (Marcuse 1955: 129)
> 
> 
> 



The capitalist performance principle (the maximization of production
and profit) has actually created the preconditions for a qualitatively
different and non-repressive form of life. However, we have not
entered into this new form of life as more repression is
demanded. 


 Individual workers continue to engage in alienating labor although
their labor has produced enough wealth to sustain them without ongoing
toil. The problem is that the capitalist system is structured in such
a way that all of the wealth goes to the minority who own or control
the means of production. Although wealth is socially produced, its
ownership and use is restricted to a few individuals. Hence the
concept of scarcity has become obsolete and is used in an ideological
sense to control the worker. The inhibitions and forms of repression
that the worker must impose on himself so that he may direct his
libidinal energy toward work goes beyond producing the goods that he
needs for survival and instead produces extreme wealth for the
capitalist. It is here where Marcuse, relying on his distinction
between basic and surplus repression, goes beyond Freud. Regarding
Freud's metapsychology Marcuse says:



> 
> 
> For his metapsychology, it is not decisive whether the inhibitions are
> imposed by scarcity or by the hierarchical *distribution* of
> scarcity, by the struggle for existence or by the interest in
> domination. (Marcuse 1955: 134)
> 
> 



Marcuse's point is that in advanced industrial societies there
is no longer a problem with acquiring the resources needed for existence
or even the optimum life for members of those societies. The
problem is with the fair and just distribution of resources. The
very existence of the concept of scarcity in this age functions
ideologically and supports the domination of the worker by the
capitalist. 


### 4.5 Fantasy, Utopia, and the Rationality of Gratification




While the first half of *Eros and Civilization* does not sound
any more optimistic than the conclusion of Freud's
*Civilization and its Discontents*, it does move from diagnosis
to prognosis or from critique to hope. At the diagnostic level,
Marcuse examines the form of social pathology that permeates advanced
industrial societies. The conclusion is that capitalism demands a
level of surplus repression that supports the development of the death
instinct and social domination. However, repression is never
complete. Even Freud was aware of the incompleteness of repression in
a 1915 essay simply entitled "Repression". Both Freud and
Marcuse recognize that repressed instincts never go away, but continue
to assert themselves in one way or another. The erotic drive, which is
the builder of culture, continues to assert itself in its conflict
with the death instinct. According to Marcuse, the erotic drive for
happiness and pleasure lives on in fantasies, art, and utopian
visions.



The second half of *Eros and Civilization* is devoted to the
work of fantasy and the imagination. Marcuse builds a case for the
emancipatory function of the imagination by reconstructing Freud,
Kant, Schiller, and others. His main point is that through the
imagination we can envision a better world. This is not a blind
utopian vision insofar as the resources for creating a qualitatively
better form of life already exists. At the prognostic level, Marcuse
argues for a fusion of *Logos* and *Eros*. This fusion
he refers to as the "*rationality of
gratification*" (Marcuse 1955: 224). Here, the struggle for
existence is based on co-operation and free development and
fulfillment of needs. 



Although *Eros and Civilization* is one of Marcuse's
more optimistic works and offered a new and radical interpretation
of Freud, it is not without controversy. Marcuse's
attempt to make Freud's drive theory central to an emancipatory
critical theory drew criticisms from several sources. I will
discuss the response by some feminists in a later section. 



In an Epilogue to *Eros and Civilization* entitled
"Critique of Neo-Freudian Revisionism", Marcuse accuses
several prominent psychoanalysts of revising Freud's work in such
a way that it is purged of its critical implications. These
revisionists use psychoanalysis to develop a conformist psychology
rather than a critical one. This led to an open debate between
Marcuse and a former member of the Institute, Erich Fromm. The
debate took place in the mid 1950s in the journal *Dissent*. 
Marcuse believed that Fromm and others had rejected some of
Freud's key insights such as his libidinal theory, the death
instinct, the Oedipus complex, the primal horde of patricides,
etc.



> 
>  The essential problem for Marcuse, was that as the years went by,
> Fromm moved further and further away from the instinctual basis of
> human personality. He had instead embraced "positive thinking
> which leaves the negative where it is--predominant over human
> existence" (Friedman 2013: 195). 
> 
> 



Fromm's approach differed from Marcuse's insofar as he
was more concerned with the role that society played in shaping
one's character. This different approach does not mean that
Fromm has become less critical. Fromm is perhaps correct in his
claim that Marcuse misread him. Given Fromm's continued
commitment to Marxism, it is not likely that he would reduce
psychoanalysis to a conformist psychology. What appears to be
positive thinking in Fromm's work is really not far from what
Marcuse was after himself in *Eros and Civilization*. That
is, Fromm, in a way that differed from Marcuse, was attempting to
rescue *Eros*, the builder of culture from the oppressive forces
of capitalism. The Fromm/Marcuse debate represents an unfortunate
moment in the history of critical theory where two major thinkers spoke
right past each other. 


## 5. One-Dimensional Thinking and the Democratic Rejection of Democracy




The first chapter of *One-Dimensional Man* begins with the
following sentence:



> 
> 
> A comfortable, smooth, reasonable, democratic unfreedom prevails in
> advanced industrial civilization, a token of technical
> progress. (Marcuse 1964: 1)
> 
> 
> 



*One-Dimensional Man* is a further analysis of the worry at the
center of *Reason and Revolution*, the whittling down of
critical or negative thinking. As we saw earlier, negative thinking is
two-dimensional as it sees the contradictions by which society is
constituted, and it is aware of forces of domination. The person who
thinks critically demands social change. One-dimensional thinking
does not demand change nor does it recognize the degree to which the
individual is a victim of forces of domination in society. 

 

The idea of a democratic unfreedom refers to the free acceptance of
oppression and surplus repression. In *One-Dimensional
Man* and in *Eros and Civilization*, Marcuse makes a decisive
move beyond Marx and Freud in his explanation of the containment of
social change. He uses Freud to go beyond Marx insofar as Freud
helps us understand the psychological mechanisms at work in individuals
who accept surplus repression. However, he goes beyond Freud
insofar as Freud's theory of the super ego is obsolete. 
That is, in Freud's theory, the super ego develops through the
internalization of the values of some authority figure. According
to Marcuse, the authority figure is no longer needed. The super
ego has become depersonalized and is no longer fed by authority figures
such as the father, ministers, teachers, the principle, etc. He
writes:



> 
> 
> But these personal father-images have gradually disappeared behind the
> institutions. With the rationalization of the productive apparatus,
> with the multiplication of functions, all domination assumes the form
> of administration. (Marcuse 1955: 98) 
> 
> 



Marcuse's point is that domination no longer requires force or
the presence of an authority figure. The function of
one-dimensional thinking is to produce a one-dimensional society by
whittling down critical, two-dimensional consciousness. This is
accomplished in several ways which will simply be listed here. 
 


1. The system must make the citizens think that they are freer than they
really are.
2. The system must provide the citizens with enough goods to keep
them pacified.
3. The citizens must identify with their
oppressors.
4. Political discourse must be eliminated.




There is not enough space here to examine each of these. One example
should suffice. It was shown earlier that the purpose of dialectical
or negative thinking was to reveal social contradictions and demand
the overcoming of those contradictions through social
change. One-dimensional thinking smoothes over these contradictions
and makes them invisible. A form of ideology is put in place where the
oppressed identifies with the oppressor. People feel a sense of unity
simply because they watch the same TV programs, or support the same
sport teams. In politics, vague terms are used such as "the American
people" or "the American way of life" to hide the very different ways
that people in America actually experience America. The American way
of life differs greatly between rich and poor Americans. 


 Another example of one-dimensional thinking is the subject of
Marcuse's famous and controversial essay "Repressive
Tolerance". Here, Marcuse shows how terms, ideas, or concepts
that have their origin in struggles for liberation can be co-opted and
used to legitimate oppression. The concept of tolerance was once used
as a critical concept by marginalized social groups. According to
Marcuse, the term is now used by the Establishment to legitimate its
own oppressive views and policies. It is the idea of pure tolerance or
tolerance for the sake of tolerance that ignores the real concrete
social conflict out of which the concept emerged. Rather than pure
tolerance, Marcuse calls for "discriminating tolerance"
(Marcuse 1968a: 123).


## 6. The Dialectic of Technology




In their famous book *Dialectic of Enlightenment*
Marcuse's colleagues Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno attempted
to demonstrate that the Enlightenment embodied a tension between its own
project of liberation and its own new mechanisms of oppression and
domination. For Marcuse, modern technology (a product of the
Enlightenment) embodies a similar tension. The question for him
was "what role does technology play in the project of human
emancipation?" The technological boom has been supported by
the idea that there is some fundamental connection between
technological development and the human quest for liberation and a
better life. However, we were disabused of this idea by Freud and
many others. The question now is "does technological
advance lead to more repression and domination?"


 Marcuse's critical theory is always dialectical, as he
examines forms of oppression and domination while also, at the same,
looking for the potential for liberation. In an essay entitled
"Some Social Implications of Modern Technology" written in
1941, Marcuse makes an important distinction between technology and
technics. He would continue to employ some version of this distinction
for the rest of his life when writing about technology. In this essay
he says:



> 
> 
> In this article, technology is taken as a social process in which
> technics proper (that is, the technical apparatus of industry,
> transportation, communication) is but a partial factor. We do not ask
> for the influence or effect of technology on human individuals. For
> they are themselves an integral part and factor of technology, not
> only as the men who invent or attend to machinery but also as the
> social groups which direct its application and
> utilization. Technology, as a mode of production, as the totality of
> instruments, devices and contrivances which characterize the machine
> age is thus at the same time a mode of organization and perpetuating
> (or changing) social relationships, a manifestation of prevalent
> thought and behavior patterns, an instrument for control and
> domination. Technics by itself can promote authoritarianism as well as
> liberty, scarcity as well as abundance, the extension as well as the
> abolition of toil. (Marcuse 1998) 
> 
> 



On the basis of the above passage it may sound as if technics is
neutral as it can promote either oppression or liberation. 
However, this is not the case. Marcuse makes this clear in
another essay entitled "The Problem of Social Change in the
Technological Society" written twenty years later. Also, in
a 1960 essay entitled "From Ontology to Technology", using
the term "technicity" instead of "technics" he
again rejects the neutrality of technics or technicity. By
"technics", Marcuse means the devices or instruments that
are used to transform nature in the service of human beings.



> 
> 
> Technics is the methodological negation of nature by human
> thought and action. In this negation, natural conditions and
> relations become instrumentalities for the preservation, enlargement,
> and refinement of human society. (Marcuse 2011: 45)
> 
> 
> 


 By "Technology", Marcuse means the mode of production
or the totality of instruments, devices, etc.



If technology refers to a mode of production or totality of
instruments, then as such it is situated within a certain ideological
structure, indeed, it is a form of ideology which determines the form
of machinery for a particular form of production as well as that form
of production itself. Here, "ideology" simply refers
to a belief system or a way of thinking which would include the
*telos* or purpose of all social thought and action.



At the level of technics, a machine can be considered neutral only
as pure matter, but in a technological society no such machine exists,
hence, technics is not neutral. Every machine is constituted
within a web of social, political, economic meaning, an ensemble of
social relations. Technics exists within a certain mode of
production as well as in certain relations of production. Every
technical item is given a mission and is to further the goals of the
present reality principle or capitalist performance principle. 
There is a dialectic involved here insofar as even if modern technology
has its origin in a repressive, oppressive, capitalist reality
principle, this same technology carries within itself other
possibilities. 



Marcuse believed that it was possible to conceive of technology
under an entirely new reality principle. In the capitalist
system, technics and its governing technological ideology is based on
the performance principle of competition and production and must serve
the goals set by this performance principle. Even if scarcity is
no longer a real problem, the idea and fear of scarcity are taken up
and put to work for the ideology of production for the sake of
production and competition for the sake of competition. We are
never told that at this moment we have the necessary resources to end
world hunger. Instead, we are told that more and more
technological progress will end the problem of scarcity. 



According to Marcuse, the use that is made of technology is
ideologically shaped by the present reality principle. It is this
oppressive/repressive reality principle that shapes the *telos*
of technological development. Hence, neither technology nor
technics can be neutral because the entire meaning and purpose of such
has its birth within a reality and performance principle that as
Marcuse has reminded us, does not have the liberation and happiness of
all human beings as its goal. The entire technological and
technical apparatus is given its form and mission by the ruling
class. 



According to Marcuse, a new sensibility, that is, a reshaping of
human relationships with each other as well as with nature would usher
in a new reality principle. With this new reality principle would
come a new mission or *telos* for technology. Under this
new reality principle it would be unthinkable to associate
technological progress with the building of bombs and more
sophisticated instruments of death. 


## 7. The Specter of Liberation: The Great Refusal and the New Sensibility




Although the form of critique in some of Marcuse's works and the
use of concepts such as one-dimensionality may cause one to read a bit
of pessimism into Marcuse's texts, nothing could be more
problematic than such a reading. The social reality in advanced
industrial societies is that very sophisticated systems of domination
are in place and they are capable of transforming themselves to meet
the challenge of any movement for liberation. However, as Marx and
Engels warned in *The Communist Manifesto*, "A specter is
haunting Europe--the specter of communism" (Marx and Engels
1848 [1964]: 55). For Marcuse, the specter of liberation haunted
advanced industrial societies. One might even say that Marcuse's
own critical theory was haunted by the specter of liberation. That is,
at one level Marcuse engaged in a critique of oppressive social
structures so that the door for revolution and liberation could be
opened. At another level, Marcuse modified his theory to make room for
various form of resistance that he saw developing in oppressive
societies. Marcuse was at once a teacher of revolutionary
consciousness and a student. 



Although he was called the guru of the student movements in the
1960s, he rejected this title because he was also learning from these
movements. The hope for revolution lay within individuals who in
their very being have grown weary with their own repression. The
student movements of the 60s were not based on class struggle, but
rather, a rejection of their own repression as well as a growing lack
of tolerance for war and waste. In the Preface to *An Essay on
Liberation* while reflecting on the student revolt of 1968, Marcuse
says:



> 
> 
> In proclaiming the "permanent challenge,"
> (*la contestation permanente*), the "permanent
> education," the Great Refusal, they recognized the mark of social
> repression, even in the most sublime manifestations of traditional
> culture, even in the most spectacular manifestations of technical
> progress. They have again raised a specter (and this time a
> specter which haunts not only the bourgeoisie but all exploitative
> bureaucracies): the specter of a revolution which subordinates the
> development of productive forces and higher standards of living to the
> requirements of creating solidarity for the human species, for
> abolishing poverty and misery beyond all national frontiers and spheres
> of interest, for the attainment of peace. (Marcuse 1969: ix-x)
> 
> 



The student protests of the 1960s were a form of Great Refusal, a
saying "NO" to multiple forms of repression and
domination. This Great Refusal demands a new/liberated
society. This new society requires what Marcuse calls the new
sensibility which is an ascension of the life instincts over the
aggressive instincts (Marcuse 1969: 23). This idea of a new
sensibility is yet another move beyond Marxism insofar as it requires
much more than new power relations. It requires the cultivation
of new forms of subjectivity. Human subjectivity in its present
form is the product of systems of domination. We rid society of
its systems of domination by ridding it of the forms of subjectivity
formed by those systems and replacing them with new forms of
subjectivity. This is why Marcuse was so interested in the
feminist movement. He saw in this movement the potential for
radical social change. The process of rethinking femininity and
masculinity could be the beginning of redefining male subjectivity so
that it develops in a way that males become less aggressive. 



The cultivation of a new sensibility would transform the
relationship between human beings and nature as well as the
relationships among human beings. The new sensibility is the
medium of social change that mediates between the political practice of
changing the world and one's own drive for personal liberation
(Marcuse 2007: 234).


## 8. Marcuse and Feminism




Marcuse's search for a form of radical subjectivity that could
serve as an impetus for revolution or social transformation led him
down a path not traveled by his Frankfurt School colleagues. 
Indeed, one of the criticisms of Marcuse is that he gave in to
pessimism and gave up on the working class as revolutionary
subject. For Marcuse, we must look to "the substratum of
the outcasts and outsiders, etc," for any social change
(MacIntyre 1970: 87). 


 One of the social movements that Marcuse turns to is the feminist
movement. On March 7, 1974 Marcuse gave a paper at Stanford University
entitled, "Marxism and Feminism". In it he states:



> 
>  I believe the women's liberation movement today is, perhaps
> the most important and potentially the most radical political movement
> that we have. (Marcuse 2005a: 165)
> 
> 
> 


 For Marcuse, the women's liberation movement was important
not only for the liberation of women, but also for the liberation of
all oppressed people in our society. His hope was that the struggle
for the liberation of women would create a new type of performance
principle and aid in the cultivation of a new sensibility. In short,
certain feminine qualities would replace brutish, violent, masculine
qualities. Marcuse actually advocated a form of androgyny. 


 One of the main criticisms of Marcuse's attitude toward
feminism is that he simply reinforces gendered stereotypes as he falls
back into essentialism. Nina Power has recently defended Marcuse
against this charge. Her argument is similar to the one that Marcuse
made in an interview with Brian Magee in 1978. Power and Marcuse both
argue that although so-called feminine categories are social
constructs, they still can be universalized in such a way that all
human beings develop a new sensibility. Power states that:



> 
> 
> Feminist socialism would universalize these so-called feminine
> characteristics so that they were no longer specifically
> "feminine" at all but would characterize all culture,
> culminating in androgyny. Residual aggression would be channeled into
> "the destruction of the ugly destructiveness of
> capitalism," in Marcuse's rather neat phrase. "Feminism
> is a revolt against decaying capitalism" and will ultimately
> have to develop its "own morality". (Power 2013: 79)
> 
> 



Feminists such as Jessica Benjamin and Nancy Chodorow have pointed
out a particular weakness in Marcuse's critical theory that was
never addressed by Marcuse himself. For both thinkers,
Marcuse's reliance on Freud's drive theory as that which
might produce the need for social change is inadequate because he fails
to account for the intersubjective development of the individual.