Marxism and the Leap to the Kingdom of Freedom: The Rise and Fall of the Communist Utopia

Marxism and the Leap to the Kingdom of Freedom reconstructs Marx and Engels’ theory of freedom, and highlights its centrality to their vision of the communist society of the future. It traces the development of the theory of freedom in the history of Marxist thought (including Marxism-Leninism), and explains how it was transformed at the height of its influence into a legitimation of totalitarian practices. The author contributes to the explanation of the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe by showing the inherently utopian character of the idea of a marketless economy and by interpreting the Soviet communist experiment as a failed attempt to realize this utopia. Hence, he provides substantial arguments for the view that ‘really existing socialism’ has never been a viable, stable alternative to the market economies of the West.