Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1998 11:17:48 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ralph Dumain <rdumain-AT-igc.apc.org>
Subject: BOURDIEU & LUKACS?


I am wondering if Bourdieu substantively engaged the work of Lukacs in his
writing.  More specifically, I have a burning curiosity about his encounter
with Lukacs' THE DESTRUCTION OF REASON.  This work gets one footnote in
Bourdieu's THE POLITICAL ONTOLOGY OF MARTIN HEIDEGGER, without commentary.
(Whereas Adorno gets at least a little bit of commentary, not much, in the
text.)   I'm curious about this because a wonder of Bourdieu or someone
following in his footsteps might be able to pick up where Lukacs left off,
as Bourdieu himself vaguely suggests.

What do I mean?  I only read a chapter or two of THE DESTRUCTION OF REASON,
not recently, so I can't comment very much on the book directly, so I'll
have to go with a lot of the he-said-she-said.  Lukacs devotes a lot of
attention to the prevalence of an irrationalist cult of intitutionism in the
heritage of lebensphilosophie, so I think the book should be taken seriously
and studied for the intrinsic philosophical argument.  However, the book is
almost universally condemned, most of all by Marxists.  Lukacs' book is
often dismissed as Stalinist propaganda.  It was written during the period
in which he was hostage to Stalinism.  Adorno wrote that the book proved
only the destruction of Lukacs' reason.  (This in spite of Adorno's supreme
contempt for Heidegger and his ilk!)  Probably what most people object to is
the excessive political tendentiousness of Lukacs' arguments.  (I am taking
their word for it, since the chapters I read did not exhibit such excesses,
not that I remember, anyway.)  In other words, Lukacs short-circuits the
logic of his arguments by making political assertions, such as thinker X, Y,
and Z developed their thoughts in order to oppose Marxism, the workers'
movement, etc.  I would have to read the whole book to judge for myself.
Also, of course, intellectuals Marxist or otherwise have their own
sensitivities about certain issues.  They will defend thinkers they favor in
spite of the harm they've done--Nietzsche, Heidegger, etc.  We see such
sensitivity right here on this list.  So my advice is this: even if the
allegations of excessive politicization are true, there could still be some
good ideas in the book.  Moreover, even the political allegations, if
re-cast in a more sociologically sophisticated and less conspiratorial form,
may be well worth considering.  I believe there is relationship, apart from
conspiracy theory, between the bourgeois intellectual's lebensphilosophie
and the denial of the workers' movement.  And this is where Bourdieu and his
methods come in.
 

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