Post-Marxism has two related, but different uses: (i) the socio-economic circumstances of Eastern Europe, especially in the ex-soviet republics after the Soviet Union's end; and (ii) the extrapolations of the philosophers and social theorists basing their postulations upon Karl Marx's writings and Marxism proper, thus, passing orthodox Marxism. Philosophically, post-Marxism counters derivationism and essentialism (e.g. the State is not an instrument that ‘functions’ unambiguously and autonomously in behalf of a given class' interests).[1] Recent overviews of post-Marxism are provided by Ernesto Screpanti[2], Göran Therborn,[3] and Gregory Meyerson.[4] For a study of the major post-Marxist theorists Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, see Warren Breckman.[5]
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Post-Marxism dates from the late 1960s. Its development was influenced by several trends and events of that period. The weakness of the Russian Communist soviet paradigm became evident beyond Russia. This happened concurrently with the international student riots in 1968, rise of Maoist theory, and the advent of commercial television, which covered in its broadcasts the Vietnam War.
When Roland Barthes began his sustained critique of mass culture via semiology — the science of signs — and the book Mythologies, some Marxist philosophers based their social criticism upon linguistics, semiotics, and discourse. Basing himself upon Barthes' work, Baudrillard's For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign criticized contemporary Marxism for ignoring the sign value of their philosophic discourse.
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