The matter of “manifestos” in Marxist tradition

Abstract

Among the various attempts to reformulate the Marxist analysis of society and the Capitalist mode of production after the Cold War, it seems impossible not to highlight the work of Antonio Negri either alone or together with Michael Hardt. Said work tries to complement Marx’s work itself by addressing a seemingly missing dimension: the production of subjectivity. Without avoiding the structural approach (i.e. the technical-productive innovations as well as the network of social relations), Negri especially focuses on the superstructural constitution of domination, on the configuration of culture and on the resulting subjective element. Thus Empire (2000), which seems to be his most relevant work, is an ambitious project to revive Marxism by adapting it to the new social conditions that are defined as postmodern. In said work the aspiration to find an individual capable of reorienting such developments towards human emancipation is also present. In short, Negri’s work apparently intends to be a new Manifesto that will provide said individual (if such individual should exist) with updated theoretical grounds to implement it. Even so, in the end the, author is reluctant to grant such nature to his remarkable work. In this article we aim to unravel the reasons behind such reluctance, which will lead us to revising the tradition of Manifestos.