Eros and Revolution

Javier Sethness Castro, MSc. (2008), London School of Economics, is the author of Imperiled Life: Revolution against Climate Catastrophe (Institute for Anarchist Studies/AK Press, 2012) and For a Free Nature: Critical Theory, Social Ecology, and Post-Developmentalism (Lambert Academic Press, 2013). He contributed to Multidimensional Marcuse: Radical Thought/Action Today (Palgrave-MacMillan, forthcoming) and has participated in several International Herbert Marcuse Society conferences.

• Acknowledgements1. Introduction: Marcuse, the UtopianIdealism, Materialism, Romanticism, and JudaismMarcuse's Importance for Radical Politics TodayPART I: MARCUSE'S LIFE, 1898-19792. Early Years: Childhood and Youth, War and Revolution, Romanticism, Utopian Socialism, Hegel, Marx, and HeideggerChildhood and Youth, War and RevolutionPost-War Investigations: Aesthetics, German Romanticism, and HegelFriedrich Schiller and Charles Fourier: Utopian SocialismMarcuse's Torturous Relationship with HeideggerHeideggerian MarxismHegel's Ontology and the Theory of Historicity (1932)Hitler's Accession and Flight of the Marcuse Family and the Frankfurt School3. Militant Theorizing in Resistance to Fascism, 1933-1945Negations (1934-1938)Studies on Authority and FamilyMarcuse's Direct Investigations of NazismEarly Theories of Social ChangeThe Progression of Marcuse's Thought on Art's Functions Under FascismReason and Revolution (1941)4. State, Freud, and Orphic Marxism: 1945-1960Post-War Studies: “33 Theses,” Francis Bacon, Lukács, Goethe, Friedrich Hölderin, and ErasmusContinued Investigations of Historical Progress, Russian Studies, and the Trajectory of Communism and Reason during the Early Cold WarCommunism and Reason during the Early Cold WarOn Sartre's ExistentialismOrphic Marxism and the Struggle of Eros against ThanatosLectures on Freedom and Progress in Freud's Theory of the InstinctsMarcuse's Debate with Fromm on Freud, Therapy, and AdjustmentSoviet Marxism: A Critical Analysis (1958)The Ideology of Death5. Radical Struggle in the 1960sMarcuse on CubaContinued Engagement with Critical Theorists and Lecture on WeberHumanism, Feminism, and RevolutionCritical Reflections on Science and TechnologyOne-Dimensional Humanity: Diagnosis, Reflections, and RecommendationsMarcuse on Marx, Louis Napoleon, and BenjaminJustification of Revolutionary Praxis: “Repressive Tolerance,” “Ethics and Revolution,” Guerrilla Warfare, “The Question of Revolution,” and “Thoughts on the Defense of Gracchus Babeuf”Psychoanalytical InterventionsActivism against the Vietnam WarSummer 1967 Lectures before the German SDS and Congress of the Dialectics of Liberation: On Utopia, Radical Opposition, and Violence1968: A New Dawn for Humanity?An Essay on Liberation (1969)Other Interventions from 1969: On Student Protest, “The Relevance of Reality,” Qualitative Change, and Self-DeterminationThe 1969 Debate with Adorno on Theory and PraxisRevisiting “Repressive Tolerance” and Civil Rights with the ACLU and Fred Schwarz of the Christian Anti-Communist Crusade“Marxism and the New Humanity: An Unfinished Revolution”“Freedom and the Historical Imperative”6. Marcuse's Final Decade: Continuities, Discontinuities, and Intensification (1970-1979)Marcuse's Assessment of the State of the Radical Opposition in the Early 1970s: “Cultural Revolution,” “The Movement in a New Age of Repression,” and “A Revolution in Values”Revolution or Reform? Marcuse's Debate with PopperCounterrevolution and Revolt (1972)Marcuse's Late Championing of FeminismInternational Relations: Vietnam and Israel/PalestineContinued Engagement with Aesthetics“It is Right to Revolt” and “Theory and Politics”: Late Discussions with Sartre and HabermasMarcuse's Final Interventions in Life: On Political Violence, the New Left, the U.S.Bicentennial, “The Reification of the Proletariat,” Rudolf Bahro, Technology, and EcologyThe Aesthetic Dimension (1978)PART II: REFLECTIONS ON MARCUSE7. Nature and RevolutionNature, Evolution, and Morality“Repressive Tolerance” and Radical Struggle for Animal and Earth Liberation TodayConclusion8. Critique of MarcuseThe Limits to IntegrationThe Problem of Sources: Political Philosophy and EmpiricsMarcuse the EdelkommunistMarcuse the Zionist?Feminism, Gender, ErosConflicts with Poststructuralism and PostmodernismMarcuse on Authority and the Transition: Between Jacobinism and AnarchismPART III: CONCLUSION9. Marcusean Politics in the Twenty-First CenturyRadical Ecological PoliticsFeminist Socialism and Anarcha-FeminismThe “World Mind” in International Relations: Global Anti-AuthoritarianismMeans and Ends: The Question of Counter-ViolenceClose: Eros and RevolutionReferencesIndex

"Javier Sethness Castro's Eros and Revolution is a broadly comprehensive and highly detailed study of Marcuse's thought that will be invaluable not only to students of that philosopher, but to anyone who is interested in critical and dialectical thought and its contemporary relevance...Sethness Castro's highly illuminating work shows conclusively that Marcuse's thought can be a vital source of inspiration and guidance today. The very title of the book epitomizes its important message. Marcuse's concept of Eros expresses a utopian vision of hope, reconciliation, and communal fulfillment that is desperately needed in an age of growing resignation and nihilism. "—John Clark, Capitalism Nature Socialism"No brief review can do [Eros and Revolutin] justice. Let me just say that those of us who have found special value in [Herbert] Marcuse's major philosophical accomplishments will delight in revisiting them under Sethness Castro's distinctive guidance, and will find special enjoyment in his focus on Marcuse's less well-known pieces in a manner that elaborates and enhances familiar theses and arguments...The scholarly care and political mindfulness of Javier Sethness Castro's study may stimulate a return to Marcuse. The reward that awaits is more than insight into Marcuse's ideas and humanity: it may help us become more fully acquainted with our own historical-political context and our own emancipatory potential today."—Charles Reitz, Radical Philosophy Review