Humanism

Kevin B. Anderson

Chapter 32 in Research Handbook on Critical Theory, 2026, pp 365-376 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Marxist and other forms of radical humanism came to the fore in the 1950s and 1960s. The work of Erich Fromm connected Marxist humanism to the Frankfurt School. In addition to Fromm, this chapter traces the Marxist and radical humanist tradition in the work of French existential humanists Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, African socialist humanists Léopold Senghor and Frantz Fanon, East European Marxist humanists Karel Kosík and Ivan Sviták, and the US-Russian Marxist humanist Raya Dunayevskaya. While humanists are often accused of a type of abstract universalism that fails to take up social differences, especially those around race and gender, this is off the mark. Instead, what most distinguishes the radical humanist tradition from its poststructuralist and other critics is its conceptualisation of an emancipatory future beyond the capitalist order as a real possibility. For this reason, Marxist humanism continues as a living thread of emancipatory theory and practice.

Keywords: Marxist Humanism; Socialist Humanism; Young Marx; African Humanism; Existential Humanism; Real Human Emancipation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781800373754
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