Counterrevolution and Repression in the Politics of Education by Walsh Sean Noah;

Author:Walsh, Sean Noah;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Lexington Books
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Consumer Consciousness

Marx noted that capitalism generates the workers who, once plunged into utter desperation, would have nothing to lose but the terms of their exploitation. The school, it appears, has responded in some measure to this contradiction. The requirement for creating work persists, but is buried beneath the primacy of consumption. Students may never become workers, but, by the fact of being students, they are always consumers. But how does the shift in emphasis from workers to consumers serve the interests of capitalism? How does it perpetuate class antagonisms to the benefit of those who own the means of production? My answer relies on tracing Marcuse’s views on counterrevolution back to the works of Georg Lukacs, the Hungarian Marxist who is also sometimes considered the first discernible critical theorist. Lukacs explains that consciousness consists of two distinct and autonomous dimensions, the subjective and the objective. The subjective dimension of consciousness can be understood as the attitudes and preferences, the opinions and aspirations of an individual or group. The objective dimension refers to the actual conditions of reality. When an individual or group examines its conditions relative to the totality of society it stands a better chance of understanding those objective exigencies, and, crucially, when the subjective dimension of thoughts and attitudes is properly aligned with the objective circumstances, then true or class consciousness has been achieved. As Lukacs states:

By relating consciousness to the whole of society it becomes possible to infer the thoughts and feelings which men would have in a particular situation if they were able to assess both it and the interests arising from it in their impact on immediate action and on the whole structure of society. That is to say, it would be possible to infer the thoughts and feelings appropriate to their objective situation. (Lukacs 1971, p. 51)

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