Georg Luk??s's Philosophy of PRAXIS: From Neo-Kantianism to Marxism

Georg Luk?cs' early Marxist philosophy of the 1920s laid the foundations of Critical Theory. However the evaluation of Luk?cs' philosophical contribution has been largely determined by one-sided readings of eminent theorists like Adorno, Habermas, Honneth or even Luk?cs himself. This book offers a new reconstruction of Luk?cs' early Marxist work, capable of restoring its dialectical complexity by highlighting its roots in his neo-Kantian, 'pre-Marxist' period.

In his pre-Marxist work Luk?cs sought to articulate a critique of formalism from the standpoint of a dubious mystical ethics of revolutionary praxis. Consequently, Luk?cs discovered a more coherent and realistic answer to his philosophical dilemmas in Marxism. At the same time, he retained his neo-Kantian reservations about idealist dialectics. In his reading of historical materialism he combined non-idealist, non-systematic historical dialectics with an emphasis on conscious, collective, transformative praxis. Reformulated in this way Luk?cs' classical argument plays a central role within a radical Critical Theory.