Political Experience and Philosophical Experience: Marx, Adorno and the Comprehension of Praxis

Abstract

In classical Marxism, the material determination of consciousness emphasizes the satisfaction of needs such as hunger and misery leading to a condition in which praxis is understood as political experience of paralysis, which is opposite to practical transformations. But this interpretation is a misunderstanding that assumes praxis as a false experience that results from the domination inherent to a commodified society. In his revision of Marx, as exposed in his Negative Dialectic, Adorno substitutes the classical determination of consciousness with the philosophical experience of a dialectical primacy of the object. The object of the satisfaction of human needs is also understood as “objectified” commodity. In Adorno?s view, the determination of consciousness must be understood at the level of the objective production of needs: hunger and misery are also results of the production of wealth. Adorno underlines that in a wealthy society where there is still hunger, the existing form of production ought to be changed. In political experience, there must be awareness of both dimensions of the philosophical experience exposed above: its “face” as the material needs and its “mask” as the commodity level of existing society. Consciousness is not reached directly from the level of the production of society and its needs to the level of production in society and its commodities. The mediation of philosophical experience is necessary to reach consciousness. It allows a perspective in which praxis is comprehended in commodified society as political experience of paralysis and critics.