Herbert Marcuse was born in Berlin in 1898 and lived until 1979. He studied at Humboldt University and then later at Freidberg University where he received his PhD. He was a German-American philosopher, sociologist and political theorist and in his written works he criticised capitalism, modern technology, historical materialism and entertainment culture arguing that they represent new forms of social control. I guess I am drawn to thinkers such as Marcuse for their insight into our society and his criticism of aspects of our lives that I feel are not serving us as humanity, or the earth, very well.

He worked for the US Government Office of Strategic Services (the predecessor of the CIA) from 1943 to 1950 where he criticised the ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in the book published in 1958 called ‘Soviet Marxism: A Critical Analysis’. After his studies in the 1960’s and 1970’s he became known as the pre-eminent theorist of the New Left and for the student movements of West Germany, France and the US and he has inspired many radical intellectuals and political activists. Some consider him the ‘father of the New Left’. His best known works are ‘Eros and Civilisation’ published in 1955 and ‘One Dimensional Man’ published in 1964.

Marcuses famous concept ‘repression desublimation’ refers to his argument that post-war mass culture, with its abundance of sexual provocations, serves to reinforce political repression. He argues that if people are preoccupied with inauthentic sexual stimulation, their political energy will be ‘desublimated’ instead of acting constructively to change the world so they remain repressed and uncritical. He advanced the pre-war thinking of critical theory toward a critical account of the ‘one dimensional’ nature of bourgeois life in Europe and America.

Two aspects of Marcuses work of particular importance include his use of language that was more familiar from the critique of Soviet and Nazi regimes that he used to characterise developments in the advanced industrial world and secondly his grounding of critical theory in a particular use of psychoanalytic thought. Both of these features of his thinking have often been misunderstood .

During his time at Freiburg he wrote a number of essays exploring the possibility of synthesising Marxism and Heidegger’s fundamental ontology. His early interest in Heidegger followed Marcuses demand for ‘concrete philosophy’ which he declared ‘concerns itself with the truth of contemporaneous human existence’. These words were directed against the neo-Kantianism of the mainstream and against the revisionist and orthodox Marxism alternatives in which the subjectivity of the individual played little role. Marcuse did distance himself from Heidegger following Heidegger’s endorsement of Nazism. Neo-Kantianism is the revival of the 17th century philosophy of Immanuel Kant and opposed mid 19th century materialism and ideology.

Marcuses analysis of capitalism derives in part from one of Karl Marx’s main concepts, objectification, which under capitalism becomes alienation. Marx believed that capitalism was exploiting humans and that by producing objects of a certain character labourers became alienated and ultimately dehumanised into functional objects themselves. Marcuse took this belief and expanded it by arguing that capitalism and industrialisation pushed labourers so hard that they then began to see themselves as extensions of the objects they were producing. Marcuse wrote, ‘The people recognise themselves in their commodities; find their soul in their automobile, hi-fi set, split level home, kitchen equipment’ meaning that under the consumer society of capitalism humans become extensions of the commodities they buy therefore making commodities extensions of peoples minds and bodies. He argues that affluent mass technological societies are totalled controlled and manipulated. In our society based on mass production and mass distribution the individual worker has become merely a consumer of its commodities and an entire commodified way of life. Modern capitalism has created false needs and false consciousness geared to consumption of commodities locking us into a one dimensional society producing the need for us to recognise ourselves through our commodities. I guess this is manifest through people ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ that we see throughout our society and our predilection for buying stuff for the sake of status and prestige and not need. Perhaps the Black Friday sales that have just occurred is an example of how this is evident in our society.

The very mechanism that ties the individual to society has changed and social control is anchord in the new needs which it has produced. Most importantly of all, Marcuse identifies that the pressure of consumerism has led to the total integration of the working class into the capitalist system. It’s political parties and trade unions have become thoroughly bureaucratised and the power of negative thinking or critical reflection has rapidly declined. I see this through our current political discourse and the ineptitude of the current federal Labor Party who seem to have lost their base and point of difference from the Liberal Party. Furthermore, instead of critical reflection we are want to just react and are attuned to sound bites and memes and not take the time to consider an issue with any depth. We are also rushing to extremes and recruiting to our own perspectives and not being willing to listen and learn from those with differing opinions or even worst, discounting the opinions and knowledge from expects in their field and instead relying on populist opinion and/or promoting ignorance as a preferred epistemology. This is why the likes of Trump,are elected

Marcuse saw the working class as no longer a potentially subversive force capable of bringing revolutionary change. As a result, rather than looking towards the workers as a revolutionary force as it was during the French Revolution or through some of the political action through unions that brought improved working conditions such as the 36 hour working week, Marcuse instead puts his faith in an alliance between radical intellectuals and those groups not yet integrated into the one dimensional society, the socially marginalised, the substratum of the outcasts and the outsiders, the exploited and persecuted of other ethnicities, the unemployed and the unemployable. He believes these are the people whose standards of living demand the ending of intolerable conditions and institutions and whose resistance to one dimensional society would not be diverted by the system.

Our current system has marginalised many groups and I guess I have some similar beliefs to Marcuse in this regard and believe the way we treat the ‘other’ and the ‘marginalised’ is a key aspect to creating a world in which we all feel we can participate in and feel valued. I have been interested to follow Jimblah’s stance on behalf of the indigenous people of our nation and feel that for the sustainable future of our nation, these voices must be heard, listened to and learned from. Perhaps we have become so ‘one dimensional’, selfish and desublimated that we need our radical, marginalised and outsiders to have more of a voice to balance the current mainstream political and social discourse. However it is obvious our governments of all persuasions are doing their best to ensure this does not occur.

I have hope that our ‘silent majority’ are people who still value egalitarianism who need to find a voice so that the marginalised and persecuted can find theirs. The ‘me too’ movement is a good example of us finding our voice against sexual harassment, let’s hope we can do similar in a political and social sense and find an alternative so we can ensure a society and humanity that can prosper while not destroying the planet.

I think Marcuse was onto a few things that we need to think more deeply about and he inspires me to do so.