Marcuse returns to Marx: how freedoms give way

How could a republic give way to authoritarian rule? Marcuse approached that question through Marx’s account of the French Revolution of 1848 and the rise of Louis Bonaparte. His epilogue to a new German edition asked what that history could reveal after the experience of twentieth-century fascism.

Marcuse argued that the danger could develop within the social order itself. He read Marx’s account as showing a property-owning class turning away from liberal institutions when those institutions threatened its power. The promises of freedom and equality could reach beyond the limits their original supporters were willing to accept.

In Marcuse’s reading, political discussion did not stay inside parliament. It continued in the press and in public life. Rights won in earlier struggles could become demands for further change.

That was the problem he wanted readers to follow: institutions built to secure an existing order could also provide ways to challenge it. His account made the retreat from political freedom part of a conflict within that order.

Radical America printed the epilogue in its July–August 1969 issue, in an English translation credited to Arthur Mitzman. Readers encountered Marcuse applying Marx’s historical analysis to questions about power, freedom and repression in their own century.

At the close, Marcuse addressed young people and others resisting exploitation and repression. He argued that Marx’s text remained relevant to them. The reprint brought that argument into the journal; tracing what readers subsequently did with it is the next research step.