I am afraid that any attempt to discuss Derrida's _Specters_ won't satisfy
the demand that Tom Walker put on him: "if it had anything to say to
contemporary political conditions or if it was strictly an allusive,
illusive literary dissertation." Derrida is not an empirically minded
social scientist after all, but a philosopher, so we shouldn't ask to do
what he didn't set out to do. But I think there was something powerful in
someone whose work is considered to be anti-Marxist to argue that Marx is
today unavoidable, despite the rush to global liberal capitalism.
Here is a brief summary of some of the points Derrida makes in his
allusive, illusive way, which he does obviously by playing off Marx's great
love for Shakespeare, and Hamlet in particular.
However, it would be inappropriate, indeed impossible, to convey in summary
fashion the many specters that haunt the texts of Marx and, through him, of
Derrida. I merely wish to note that in his _Specters of Marx_ Derrida
takes his position for a certain spirit of Marxism, that "deconstruction,"
if there is such a thing, always already moves within a certain spirit of
Marx. It should also be noted that, for Derrida, in speaking in a certain
spirit of Marx "it is not in the first place in order to propose a
scholarly, philosophical discourse. It is first of all so as not to flee
from a responsibility. More precisely, it is in order to submit
for...discussion several hypotheses on the nature of such a responsibility.
What is ours? In what way is it historical? And what does it have to do
with so many specters?"
Specifically and telegraphically, at least four points emerge from
Derrida's Specters of Marx (1) The proper names "Marx" and/or "Marxism"
have always already been plural nouns, despite their grammatical form, and
despite the fact that they have been understood as if they were rigid
designators; (2) "communism" (in its own pluralities) is not the same as
"Marxism"; (3) both communism and Marxism are historically sited, situated,
inflected, mediated by particular traditions and histories; (4) the proper
name "Marx" is -- in a certain sense -- entirely uncircumventable.
Steve Cullenberg
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Stephen Cullenberg office: (909) 787-5037, ext. 1573
Department of Economics fax: (909) 787-5685
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