Outline of a Marxist Commodity Theory of the Public Sphere
In: Historical MaterialismSearch for other papers by John Michael Roberts in
Current site
Google Scholar
In recent years, the public sphere, which represents a realm in civil society where people can debate and discuss a range of issues and common concerns important to them, has become a key area for research in the humanities and social sciences. Arguably, however, Marxist theory has yet to advance a theoretical account of the most abstract and simple ideological properties of the capitalist public sphere as these appear under universal commodity relationships. The paper therefore tentatively seeks to develop such an account. Specifically, the paper theoretically derives a peculiar public sphere under capitalism, which is mediated between at least two commodity owners who also possess distinctive personalities driven by desires to own commodities. The paper then explains in more detail how the social form of this public sphere develops through other elements of commodity relations and their contradictions.
Purchase
Buy instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Institutional Login
Log in with Open Athens, Shibboleth, or your institutional credentials
Personal login
Log in with your brill.com account
-
Abizadeh Arash , '‘On the Philosophy/Rhetoric Binaries: Or, is Habermasian Discourse Motivationally Impotent?’ ' (2007 ) 33 (4 ) Philosophy and Social Criticism : 445 -472 .
-
Adorno Theodor Ashton E.B. , Negative Dialectics , (Routledge , London 1990 ).
-
Adorno Theodor , J.M. Bernstein (ed), The Culture Industry: Selected Essays On Mass Culture , (Routledge , London 2001 ).
-
Albritton Robert , Economics Transformed: Discovering the Brilliance of Marx , (Pluto Press , London 2007 ).
-
Roberts Asen & Daniel C. Brouwer (eds), Counterpublics and the State , (The State University of New York Press , New York 2001 ).
-
Bakhtin Mikhail M. Emerson Caryl & Holquist Michael , Michael Holquist (ed), The Dialogic Imagination , (University of Texas Press , Austin 1981 ).
-
Bakhtin Mikhail M. Emerson Caryl , The Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics , (University of Minnesota Press , Minneapolis 1984 ).
-
Bakhtin Mikhail M. McGee V.W. , Caryl Emerson & Michael Holquist (eds), Speech Genres and Other Late Essays , (University of Texas Press , Austin 1986 ).
-
Bakhtin Mikhail M. Liapunov Vadim , Art and Answerability , (University of Texas Press , Austin 1990 ).
-
Bakhtin Mikhail M. Liapunov Vadim , Vadim Liapunov & M. Holquist (eds), Toward a Philosophy of the Act , (University of Texas Press , Austin 1993 ).
-
Bakhtin Mikhail M. & Medvedev Pavel N. Wehrle Albert J. , The Formal Method in Literary Scholarship , (Johns Hopkins University Press , Baltimore 1991 ).
-
Henrick Bang & Anders Esmark (eds), New Publics With/out Democracy , (Samfundslitteratur Press , Copenhagen 2007 ).
-
Barrett Jennifer , Museums and the Public Sphere , (Wiley-Blackwell , Oxford 2012 ).
-
Bonefeld Werner , '‘On Postone’s Courageous but Unsuccessful Attempt to Banish the Class Antagonism from the Critique of Political Economy’ ' (2004 ) 12 (3 ) Historical Materialism : 103 -124 .
-
Bonefeld Werner , '‘Abstract Labour: Against its Nature and on its Time’ ' (2010 ) 34 (2 ) Capital & Class : 257 -276 .
-
Bourdieu Pierre Nice Richard , Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste , (Routledge , London 1984 ).
-
Brown Andrew , '‘Reorienting Critical Realism: A System-wide Perspective on the Capitalist Economy’ ' (2007 ) 14 (4 ) Journal of Economic Methodology : 499 -519 .
-
Calhoun Craig , Critical Social Theory , (Blackwell , Oxford 1995 ).
-
Craig Calhoun (ed), Habermas and the Public Sphere , (The MIT Press , Cambridge, MA. 1992 ).
-
Clarke Simon , Marx, Marginalism and Modern Sociology: From Adam Smith to Max Weber , (Palgrave Macmillan , Basingstoke 1991 ).
-
Coleman Stephen & Ross Karen , The Media and the Public: ‘Them’ and ‘Us’ in Media Discourse , (Wiley-Blackwell , Oxford 2010 ).
-
Cook Deborah , Adorno, Habermas, and the Search for a Rational Society , (Routledge , London 2004 ).
-
Nick Crossley & John Michael Roberts (eds), After Habermas , (Blackwell , Oxford 2004 ).
-
Dean Jodi , '‘Communicative Capitalism: Circulation and the Foreclosure of Politics’ ' (2005 ) 1 (1 ) Cultural Politics : 51 -74 .
-
Deleuze Gilles Patton Paul , Difference and Repetition , (Athlone , London 1994 ).
-
Downey John & Fenton Natalie , '‘New Media, Counter Publicity and the Public Sphere’ ' (2003 ) 5 (2 ) New Media and Society : 185 -202 .
-
Eley Geoff , '‘Nations, Publics, and Political Cultures: Placing Habermas in the Nineteenth Century’ ' (1992 ) 1992 .
-
Emirbayer Mustafa & Sheller Mimi , '‘Publics in History’ ' (1998 ) 27 (6 ) Theory and Society : 727 -779 .
-
Fornäs Johan , Capitalism: A Companion to Marx’s Economy Critique , (Routledge , London 2013 ).
-
Franco Paul , Hegel’s Philosophy of Freedom , (Yale University Press , New Haven 1999 ).
-
Fraser Nancy , '‘Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy’ ' (1992 ) 1992 .
-
Fraser Nancy , '‘Politics, Culture, and the Public Sphere: Toward a Postmodern Conception’ ' (1995 ) 1995 .
-
Fraser Nancy , '‘Reframing Justice in a Globalizing World’ ' (2005 ) II (36 ) New Left Review : 69 -88 .
-
Fraser Nancy , '‘Transnationalizing the Public Sphere: On the Legitimacy and Efficacy of Public Opinion in a Post-Westphalian World’ ' (2014 ) 2014 .
-
Fuchs Christian , Social Media: A Critical Introduction , (Sage , London 2013 ).
-
Goode Luke , Jürgen Habermas: Democracy and the Public Sphere , (Pluto Press , London 2005 ).
-
Habermas Jürgen Burger Thomas & Lawrence Frederick , The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society , (Polity Press , Cambridge 1989 ).
-
Habermas Jürgen Rehg William , Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy , (Polity Press , Cambridge 1996 ).
-
Hadden Richard W. , On the Shoulders of Merchants: Exchange and the Mathematical Conception of Nature in Early Modern Europe , (The State University of New York Press , New York 1994 ).
-
Hall Cheryl , The Trouble with Passion: Political Theory Beyond the Reign of Reason , (Routledge , London 2005 ).
-
Hartley John , '‘That Way Habermadness Lies’ ' (1998 ) 89 Media International Australia: Culture and Policy : 125 -135 .
-
Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Nisbet Hugh B. , Alan W. Wood (ed), Elements of the Philosophy of Right , (Cambridge University Press , Cambridge 2000 ).
-
Henwood Doug , After the New Economy: The Binge . . . and the Hangover That Won’t Go Away , (The New Press , New York 2005 ).
-
Mike Hill & Warren Montag (eds), Masses, Classes and the Public Sphere , (Verso , London 2000 ).
-
Hollis Patricia , The Pauper Press: A Study in Working-Class Radicalism of the 1830s , (Oxford University Press , London 1970 ).
-
Johnson Pauline , Habermas: Rescuing the Public Sphere , (Routledge , London 2006 ).
-
Kay Geoffrey & Mott James , Political Order and the Law of Labour , (Macmillan , London 1982 ).
-
Kay Geoffrey & Mott James , '‘Notes on the Law of Capital’ ' (1984 ) 12 International Journal of the Sociology of Law : 261 -270 .
-
Keane John , Democracy and Civil Society , (Verso , London 1988 ).
-
Knops Andrew , '‘Agonism as Deliberation: On Mouffe’s Theory of Democracy’ ' (2007 ) 15 (1 ) Journal of Political Philosophy : 115 -126 .
-
Laclau Ernesto & Mouffe Chantal , Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics , (Verso , London 1985 ).
-
Larrain Jorge , Marxism and Ideology , (Macmillan , London 1983 ).
-
Marx Karl , Capital , (Progress Publishers , Moscow 1977 ).
-
Marx Karl Fowkes Ben , Capital: A Critique of Political Economy. Volume One , (Penguin , Harmondsworth 1988 ).
-
McNally David , Bodies of Meaning: Studies on Language, Labor, and Liberation , (The State University of New York Press , New York 2001 ).
-
Mitchell Don , The Right to the City: Social Justice and the Fight for Public Space , (The Guildford Press , New York 2003 ).
-
Mouffe Chantal , On the Political , (Routledge , London 2005 ).
-
Mouffe Chantal , Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically , (Verso , London 2013 ).
-
Kate Nash (ed), Transnationalizing the Public Sphere , (Polity Press , Cambridge 2014 ).
-
Negt Oskar & Kluge Alexander Labanyi Peter, Daniel Jamie Owen & Oksiloff Assenka , Public Sphere and Experience: Toward an Analysis of the Bourgeois and Proletarian Public Sphere , (University of Minnesota Press , Minneapolis 1993 ).
-
Linda Nicholson & Steven Seidman (eds), Social Postmodernism: Beyond Identity Politics , (Cambridge University Press , Cambridge 1995 ).
-
Pashukanis Evgeny V. Einhorn Barbara , Christopher Arthur (ed), Law and Marxism: A General Theory , (Pluto Press , London 1983 ).
-
Postone Moishe , Time, Labor and Social Domination: A Reinterpretation of Marx’s Critical Theory , (Cambridge University Press , Cambridge 1996 ).
-
Poulantzas Nicos Camiller Patrick , State, Power, Socialism , (Verso , London 2000 ).
-
Roberts John Michael , '‘From Populist to Political Dialogue in the Public Sphere: A Bakhtinian Approach to Understanding a Place for Radical Utterances in London, 1684–1812’ ' (2004 ) 18 (6 ) Cultural Studies : 884 -910 .
-
Roberts John Michael , '‘Discourse or Dialogue? Habermas, the Bakhtin Circle, and the Question of Concrete Utterances’ ' (2012 ) 41 (4 ) Theory and Society : 395 -419 .
-
Roberts John Michael , New Media and Public Activism: Neoliberalism, the State and Radical Protest in the Public Sphere , (Policy Press , Bristol 2014 ).
-
Sayer Andrew , The Moral Significance of Class , (Cambridge University Press , Cambridge 2005 ).
-
Scheuerman William E. , '‘Between Radicalism and Resignation: Democratic Theory in Habermas’s Between Facts and Norms’ ' (2002 ) 2002 .
-
Rene von Schomberg & Kenneth Baynes (eds), Discourse and Democracy: Essays on Habermas’s ‘Between Facts and Norms’ , (The State University of New York Press , New York 2002 ).
-
Smith Tony , Globalisation: A Systematic Marxian Account, Historical Materialism , (Brill , Leiden 2006 ).
-
Somers Margaret R. , '‘Citizenship and the Place of the Public Sphere: Law, Community, and Political Culture in the Transition to Democracy’ ' (1993 ) 58 (5 ) American Sociological Review : 587 -620 .
-
Somers Margaret R. , '‘What’s Political or Cultural about Political Culture and the Public Sphere? Toward an Historical Sociology of Concept Formation’ ' (1995 ) 13 (2 ) Sociological Theory : 113 -144 .
-
Thompson Noel , The People’s Science: The Popular Political Economy of Exploitation and Crisis 1816–34 , (Cambridge University Press , Cambridge 1984 ).
-
Tinker Tony , '‘The Withering of Criticism: A Review of Professional, Foucauldian, Ethnographic, and Epistemic Studies in Accounting’ ' () 18 (1 ) Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal : 100 -135 .
-
Villa Dana , '‘Postmodernism and the Public Sphere’ ' (1992 ) 86 American Political Science Review : 712 -721 .
-
Voloshinov Valentin N. Matejka L. & Titunik I.R. , Marxism and the Philosophy of Language , (Seminar Press , London 1973 ).
-
Warner Michael , '‘Publics and Counterpublics’ ' (2002 ) 88 (4 ) Quarterly Journal of Speech : 413 -425 .
-
Wood Ellen Meiksins , Democracy against Capitalism: Renewing Historical Materialism , (Cambridge University Press , Cambridge 1995 ).
-
Žižek Slavoj , The Plague of Fantasies , (Verso , London 1997 ).
-
Žižek Slavoj , Violence , (Profile Books , London 2008 ).
-
1
Emirbayer and Sheller 1998, p. 738, original emphasis.
-
2
Somers 1993, p. 589.
-
3
Coleman and Ross 2010, pp. 29–30.
-
4
Dean 2005, p. 62; see also Henwood 2005, p. 25; Žižek 1997, pp. 111–13; and Žižek 2008, pp. 11–12.
-
5
Marx 1988, p. 125.
-
6
Tinker 2005, pp. 113–14.
-
7
Marx 1988, p. 102.
-
8
See also Fornäs 2013, Chapter 2, for an extremely clear discussion of this Marxist method.
-
9
Eley 1992, p. 321.
-
10
See for example Fraser 1995.
-
11
Negt and Kluge 1993.
-
14
Keane 1988, p. 6.
-
15
Calhoun 1995.
-
16
Wood 1995, pp. 252–6.
-
17
Habermas 1989, originally published in 1962.
-
19
Somers 1995, p. 125, original emphasis. See also Bang and Esmark (eds.) 2007.
-
20
Habermas 1989, p. 46.
-
21
Habermas 1996, p. 360.
-
22
Habermas 1996, pp. 366–7.
-
23
Habermas 1996, p. 305.
-
24
Habermas 1996, pp. 118–19.
-
25
Habermas 1996, p. 444.
-
26
Habermas 1996, p. 133.
-
27
Abizadeh 2007.
-
28
Habermas 1996, p. 122.
-
29
Habermas 1996, p. 263.
-
30
Scheuerman 2002, p. 69; Smith 2006, pp. 338–9.
-
31
See Roberts 2012.
-
32
Fuchs 2013, p. 183.
-
33
Warner 2002, pp. 423–4. See also Asen and Brouwer (eds.) 2001.
-
34
Hartley 1998; Villa 1992.
-
35
Mitchell 2003.
-
36
Fraser 1992 and 1995.
-
37
Fraser 1995, p. 295.
-
38
Fraser 2014, p. 16.
-
39
Fraser 2014.
-
40
Fraser 2014, pp. 30–1.
-
41
Fraser 2005, p. 76, original emphasis.
-
42
Fraser 2005, p. 75.
-
44
Fraser 1995, p. 76.
-
46
Hollis 1970, pp. 221–2.
-
47
Cited in Thompson 1984, p. 137, original emphasis.
-
48
Fraser 1995, p. 85.
-
49
Smith 2006.
-
50
See Bonefeld 2010.
-
51
Albritton 2007, pp. 166–8.
-
52
Negt and Kluge 1993, p. 2.
-
53
Negt and Kluge 1993, p. 22.
-
54
Barrett 2012; Downey and Fenton 2003.
-
55
Negt and Kluge 1993, p. 60.
-
56
Negt and Kluge 1993, pp. 82–4.
-
57
Negt and Kluge 1993, p. 29.
-
58
Marx 1988, p. 130.
-
59
Clarke 1991, p. 101, original emphasis.
-
60
Marx 1988, p. 90.
-
61
Marx 1988, p. 125.
-
62
Brown 2007, p. 509.
-
63
Marx 1988, p. 899.
-
64
Bakhtin 1993, p. 31.
-
65
Bakhtin 1986, p. 87. See also Bakhtin 1981, p. 312; Voloshinov 1973, p. 20.
-
66
Bakhtin 1990, p. 118.
-
67
Adorno 1990, pp. 261–2.
-
68
Adorno 1990, p. 262.
-
69
Marx 1988, p. 178.
-
70
Franco 1999, p. 173.
-
71
Adorno 1990, p. 309.
-
72
Hegel 2000, §33A.
-
73
Pashukanis 1983, p. 118.
-
74
Kay and Mott 1984, p. 264.
-
75
Kay and Mott 1982, p. 4.
-
76
Hegel 2000, §45.
-
77
Kay and Mott 1982, p. 3.
-
78
Hegel 2000, §71R.
-
79
Voloshinov 1973, p. 79; see also McNally 2001, pp. 111–12.
-
80
See Bakhtin and Medvedev 1991.
-
81
See Bakhtin 1981, p. 291.
-
82
Bakhtin 1984, p. 91.
-
83
See Bakhtin 1990.
-
84
Marx 1988, pp. 164–5.
-
85
Adorno 2001, pp. 38–9.
-
86
Bakhtin 1984, p. 79.
-
87
Bakhtin and Medvedev 1991, p. 7. See also Deleuze 1994, p. 127; Žižek 1997, pp. 100–5.
-
88
Bakhtin 1984, p. 79. See also Bakhtin 1981, p. 342.
-
89
See Bourdieu 1984; Poulantzas 2000.
-
90
Hadden 1994, p. 137.
-
91
Adorno 1990, p. 172.
-
92
See also Cook 2004, Chapter 3.
-
93
Hall 2005, pp. 12–13.
-
94
Hall 2005, p. 24.
-
95
Sayer 2005, p. 161.
-
96
Sayer 2005, p. 152.
-
98
Bakhtin 1981, p. 342. See also Bakhtin 1990, pp. 65–6.
-
99
See Larrain 1983, p. 158.
-
100
See Larrain 1983, p. 125.
-
101
Mouffe 2005; 2013.
-
102
Mouffe 2013, p. 5.
-
103
Mouffe 2005, p. 30; Mouffe 2013, pp. 8–9. See also Laclau and Mouffe 1985, p. 105.
-
104
Mouffe 2013, p. 7.
-
105
Mouffe 2005, p. 20.
-
106
Mouffe 2005, p. 53.
-
107
Mouffe 2005, pp. 20–1.
-
108
See for example Knops 2007.
-
109
Marx 1977, p. 879.
-
110
Marx 1988, p. 274.
-
111
Marx 1988, p. 1017.
-
112
See Bonefeld 2004; Postone 1996.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 907 | 73 | 10 |
| Full Text Views | 360 | 13 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 189 | 30 | 2 |
Outline of a Marxist Commodity Theory of the Public Sphere
In: Historical MaterialismSearch for other papers by John Michael Roberts in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
In recent years, the public sphere, which represents a realm in civil society where people can debate and discuss a range of issues and common concerns important to them, has become a key area for research in the humanities and social sciences. Arguably, however, Marxist theory has yet to advance a theoretical account of the most abstract and simple ideological properties of the capitalist public sphere as these appear under universal commodity relationships. The paper therefore tentatively seeks to develop such an account. Specifically, the paper theoretically derives a peculiar public sphere under capitalism, which is mediated between at least two commodity owners who also possess distinctive personalities driven by desires to own commodities. The paper then explains in more detail how the social form of this public sphere develops through other elements of commodity relations and their contradictions.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 907 | 73 | 10 |
| Full Text Views | 360 | 13 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 189 | 30 | 2 |