[D66] The unbearable lightness of Slavoj Žižek’s communism

[Antid Oto]

http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/culture/2012/09/unbearable-lightness-slavoj-zizeks-communism

The unbearable lightness of Slavoj Žižek’s communism
The Year of Dreaming Dangerously - review.

The Year of Dreaming Dangerously
Slavoj Žižek
Verso, 142pp, £7.99

Marxism has always been, since the first collaborations of Marx and 
Engels, a thoroughgoing critique of capitalist society from the 
standpoint of a far less developed concept of socialism or communism. In 
this sense, its premise is a utopian conclusion never yet demonstrated – 
namely, that there can be a better form of modern society, based on a 
different regime of property, than one dominated by the accumulation of 
private capital. No one can in fairness require a detailed picture of 
this future condition but the vision has to enjoy some minimum 
plausibility. Otherwise, only a description of capitalism can be offered 
and some suggestions for reform but no fundamental critique.


Benjamin Kunkel is a founding co-editor of n+1 and the author of a 
novel, “Indecision” (Picador, £7.99)