Overview

Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism? offers a crash course in the history of imperialist propaganda, as well as in the Marxist method for analyzing culture and ideology. Author Gabriel Rockhill demonstrates the explanatory and transformative superiority of a dialectical and historical materialist approach, while elucidating how the world of ideas is a crucial site of class struggle. He then engages in a meticulous counter-history of the Frankfurt School—which made a foundational contribution to Western Marxism—by situating it within the global relations of class struggle and the imperialist war on actually existing socialism. With the explicit and direct backing of powerful elements in the capitalist ruling class and the world’s leading imperialist state, the Frankfurt School developed a widely promoted form of compatible critical theory as an ersatz for dialectical and historical materialism. The volume concludes by bringing to the fore the positive project that serves as the guiding methodological framework for the work as a whole: a thoroughly anticolonial and anti-imperialist Marxism dedicated to building socialism in the real world. Drawing on extensive archival research to pull back the curtain on ruling class machinations, Rockhill’s book elucidates how the intellectual world war on the socialist alternative has sought to shore up and promote a “compatible left” intelligentsia while misrepresenting, maligning, and trying to destroy the revolutionary left.

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9781685901356

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Reviews

""Few on the left will not have been uneasily aware, whether from textual disingenuousness or from rumors about capitalist or secret service gravy trains, that there was something fishy about some Western Marxists' claims to be Marxists or socialists. Few will not have wondered how deeply and broadly this problem extends. Well, wonder no more. In this first book of a planned trilogy, Gabriel Rockhill begins his sensational root and branch exposé. He investigates the political pathology of the 'theory industry' dominating Western Marxism in terms of the 'international relations of intellectual production.' What emerges is a many-layered apparatus of intellectual counterrevolution. The state and its clandestine agencies such as the CIA or MI6 are its apex and they work through the big capitalist 'philanthropic' (really misanthropic) foundations, to wage it in universities, publishing houses, newspapers and magazines by recruiting thousands of scribblers, journalists, scholars, and academics to their service. For decades they have worked to hide the natural alliance of capitalism and fascism, to erase imperialism, to dismiss actually existing socialism and to discredit actually existing socialism and anti-imperialism with dishonest discourses that mislead those seeking ways out of an increasingly decrepit, desperate and destructive capitalism and its imperialism. This first volume deals with the Frankfurt School with volumes on French theory and twenty-first century developments to come. Rockhill must be commended for the sheer scale of his ambition, for taking on not just this book or that argument or the other thinker, but the entire universe of bourgeois 'Theory' in Marxist drag. It helps that the book, though it soberly sticks to the facts and arguments, nevertheless ends up, as it must, reading like an extended and particularly salacious gossip column. You won't be able to put it down!!!""--Radhika Desai, author of ""Capitalism, Coronavirus and War"" ""In his exposé of covert funding of critical theory, Gabriel Rockhill asks what the American century sought to hold up, beat down and split apart when it came to culture. Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism? is an illuminating, indispensable chapter expanding work on the CIA penetration--in its decades-long war on the left--of literature, student life, the symphony orchestra, feminism, black movements, and the world of modern art.""--Joel Whitney, author of ""Finks: How the CIA Tricked the World's Best Writers"" ""A valuable contribution that exposes the machinations of capital in perverting revolutionary theory. Given that the war of ideas is a key battleground in the class struggle, revealing how empire undermines revolutionary institutions becomes essential for grounding revolutionary organization on a more solid foundation. This book accomplishes precisely that, with the added strength of situating imperialist politics within its broader theoretical framework. It engages in a dialectical dance between observable reality and the dynamics of theory. Essential reading for anyone seeking to grasp the depths of socialism's ideological crisis.""--Ali Kadri, author of ""The Accumulation of Waste: A Political Economy of Systemic Destruction"" ""Any global citizen who cares about international affairs, especially intellectuals, must study and ponder the important information and incisive comments in this book if they truly wish to understand and accurately recognize the 'war in the world of knowledge, ' the 'truth about ideology, ' and 'Western Marxism'.""--Cheng Enfu, author of ""China's Economic Dialectic"" ""Concepts such as intellectual world war, imperial theory industry, empire of ideas, doctrinal warfare, class struggle in theory are not in common currency. Gabriel Rockhill shows why they should be. From a farm in Kansas, he went seeking enlightenment in Paris, becoming an acolyte of empire, until discovering it to be an imaginary la-la land, paralyzing explanation of actual historical events. From there, he set out to map the maze of knowledge production in which the military-industrial-academic complex has adopted a two-pronged strategy in relation to Marxism. Its preferred line of attack was to discredit it altogether. However, recognizing its attraction, it also promoted an anticommunist version of Marxism to reintegrate potentially insurgent forces into the orbit of the system. Seeing this as a conflict that forces us to take sides, Gabriel Rockhill is a frontline warrior in this intellectual world war. He marshals both philosophical argument and empirical archival research to make his case, revealing the extent to which such radical recuperators as the Frankfurt School have been directly funded and promoted by the capitalist state and its cultural apparatus. This, along with two further books in a trilogy, is essential reading for anyone serious about the historiography of Marxism within the political economy of knowledge of our times.""--Helena Sheehan, author of ""Until We Fall"" ""Gabriel Rockhill's illuminating and original work offers a crucial historical understanding of twentieth-century critical thought.""--Suchetana Chattopadhyay, author of 'Voices of Komagata Maru: Imperial Surveillance and Workers from Punjab in Bengal' ""In these times, where the objective conditions for revolution are excellent, the need to sharpen the ideological weapons of the subjective forces is urgent. Without the right tools to analyze the situation, there can be no correct strategy and effective praxis. Hence the importance of Gabriel Rockhill's ideological struggle against the Frankfurt School's and Western Marxism's anti-communism and their de facto support for imperialism--ideological struggles matter!""--Torkil Lausen, author of ""The Long Transition Towards Socialism and the End of Capitalism"" ""In his remarkable work, Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism, Gabriel Rockhill has taken Georg Lukács's famous criticism of the Western Marxist tradition for its ""residence in the Grand Hotel Abyss"" a step further, demonstrating that admission to the ""beautiful hotel...on the edge of the abyss, of nothing, of absurdity"" almost invariably came at a price. Although Rockwill's book is written in the spirit of critique, the intention is not the absolute rejection of Western Marxism, but the development of an indispensable self-critique within contemporary historical materialism aimed at the reconstruction of the philosophy of praxis for the twenty-first century. ""--John Bellamy Foster, editor, Monthly Review; author, ""Breaking the Bonds of Fate: Epicurus and Marx"" ""The Intellectual World War meticulously deconstructs the age-old myth that Western Marxism represents a radical departure from capitalism and imperialism. Instead, we are compelled to reckon with the painful reality that opportunistic Marxist academics are servants of Western imperialism posing no threat to the bourgeois order, but are cyphers of repression and conformity operating in the guise of scholarly respectability. Gabriel Rockhill's careful and detailed account compels us all to revisit more than fifty years of twisted Marxist prattle purveying unscientific stupor upon generations of sincere students who reproduce and sustain imperialism and capitalist exploitation under the pretense of Marxism.""--Immanuel Ness, author of ""Migration as Economic Imperialism: How International Labour Mobility Undermines Economic Development in Poor Countries"" ""The most important material history of ideas since The German Ideology.""--Aymeric Monville, author of ""Neocapitalism according to Michel Clouscard""

""A valuable contribution that exposes the machinations of capital in perverting revolutionary theory. Given that the war of ideas is a key battleground in the class struggle, revealing how empire undermines revolutionary institutions becomes essential for grounding revolutionary organization on a more solid foundation. This book accomplishes precisely that, with the added strength of situating imperialist politics within its broader theoretical framework. It engages in a dialectical dance between observable reality and the dynamics of theory. Essential reading for anyone seeking to grasp the depths of socialism's ideological crisis.""--Ali Kadri, author of ""The Accumulation of Waste: A Political Economy of Systemic Destruction"" ""Any global citizen who cares about international affairs, especially intellectuals, must study and ponder the important information and incisive comments in this book if they truly wish to understand and accurately recognize the 'war in the world of knowledge, ' the 'truth about ideology, ' and 'Western Marxism'.""--Cheng Enfu, author of ""China's Economic Dialectic"" ""Concepts such as intellectual world war, imperial theory industry, empire of ideas, doctrinal warfare, class struggle in theory are not in common currency. Gabriel Rockhill shows why they should be. From a farm in Kansas, he went seeking enlightenment in Paris, becoming an acolyte of empire, until discovering it to be an imaginary la-la land, paralyzing explanation of actual historical events. From there, he set out to map the maze of knowledge production in which the military-industrial-academic complex has adopted a two-pronged strategy in relation to Marxism. Its preferred line of attack was to discredit it altogether. However, recognizing its attraction, it also promoted an anticommunist version of Marxism to reintegrate potentially insurgent forces into the orbit of the system. Seeing this as a conflict that forces us to take sides, Gabriel Rockhill is a frontline warrior in this intellectual world war. He marshals both philosophical argument and empirical archival research to make his case, revealing the extent to which such radical recuperators as the Frankfurt School have been directly funded and promoted by the capitalist state and its cultural apparatus. This, along with two further books in a trilogy, is essential reading for anyone serious about the historiography of Marxism within the political economy of knowledge of our times.""--Helena Sheehan, author of ""Until We Fall"" ""Few on the left will not have been uneasily aware, whether from textual disingenuousness or from rumors about capitalist or secret service gravy trains, that there was something fishy about some Western Marxists' claims to be Marxists or socialists. Few will not have wondered how deeply and broadly this problem extends. Well, wonder no more. In this first book of a planned trilogy, Garbiel Rockhill begins his sensational root and branch exposé. He investigates the political pathology of the 'theory industry' dominating Western Marxism in terms of the 'international relations of intellectual production.' What emerges is a many-layered apparatus of intellectual counterrevolution. The state and its clandestine agencies such as the CIA or MI6 are its apex and they work through the big capitalist 'philanthropic' (really misanthropic) foundations, to wage it in universities, publishing houses, newspapers and magazines by recruiting thousands of scribblers, journalists, scholars, and academics to their service. For decades they have worked to hide the natural alliance of capitalism and fascism, to erase imperialism, to dismiss actually existing socialism and to discredit actually existing socialism and anti-imperialism with dishonest discourses that mislead those seeking ways out of an increasingly decrepit, desperate and destructive capitalism and its imperialism. This first volume deals with the Frankfurt School with volumes on French theory and twenty-first century developments to come. Rockhill must be commended for the sheer scale of his ambition, for taking on not just this book or that argument or the other thinker, but the entire universe of bourgeois 'Theory' in Marxist drag. It helps that the book, though it soberly sticks to the facts and arguments, nevertheless ends up, as it must, reading like an extended and particularly salacious gossip column. You won't be able to put it down!!!""--Radhika Desai, author of ""Capitalism, Coronavirus and War"" ""Gabriel Rockhill's illuminating and original work offers a crucial historical understanding of twentieth-century critical thought.""--Suchetana Chattopadhyay, author of 'Voices of Komagata Maru: Imperial Surveillance and Workers from Punjab in Bengal' ""In these times, where the objective conditions for revolution are excellent, the need to sharpen the ideological weapons of the subjective forces is urgent. Without the right tools to analyze the situation, there can be no correct strategy and effective praxis. Hence the importance of Gabriel Rockhill's ideological struggle against the Frankfurt School's and Western Marxism's anti-communism and their de facto support for imperialism--ideological struggles matter!""--Torkil Lausen, author of ""The Long Transition Towards Socialism and the End of Capitalism"" ""The Intellectual World War meticulously deconstructs the age-old myth that Western Marxism represents a radical departure from capitalism and imperialism. Instead, we are compelled to reckon with the painful reality that opportunistic Marxist academics are servants of Western imperialism posing no threat to the bourgeois order, but are cyphers of repression and conformity operating in the guise of scholarly respectability. Gabriel Rockhill's careful and detailed account compels us all to revisit more than fifty years of twisted Marxist prattle purveying unscientific stupor upon generations of sincere students who reproduce and sustain imperialism and capitalist exploitation under the pretense of Marxism.""--Immanuel Ness, author of ""Migration as Economic Imperialism: How International Labour Mobility Undermines Economic Development in Poor Countries"" ""In his remarkable work, Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism, Gabriel Rockhill has taken Georg Lukács's famous criticism of the Western Marxist tradition for its ""residence in the Grand Hotel Abyss"" a step further, demonstrating that admission to the ""beautiful hotel...on the edge of the abyss, of nothing, of absurdity"" almost invariably came at a price. Although Rockwill's book is written in the spirit of critique, the intention is not the absolute rejection of Western Marxism, but the development of an indispensable self-critique within contemporary historical materialism aimed at the reconstruction of the philosophy of praxis for the twenty-first century. ""--John Bellamy Foster, editor, Monthly Review; author, ""Breaking the Bonds of Fate: Epicurus and Marx"" (forthcoming, Monthly Review Press, 2026). ""The most important material history of ideas since The German Ideology.""--Aymeric Monville, author of ""Neocapitalism according to Michel Clouscard""

Author Information

Gabriel Rockhill is a philosopher and cultural critic who has published twelve books including, most recently, Requiem pour la French Theory with Aymeric Monville (forthcoming in English from Monthly Review Press) and Domenico Losurdo’s Western Marxism, which he edited for Monthly Review Press. He is the founding director of the Critical Theory Workshop and Professor of Philosophy and Global Interdisciplinary Studies at Villanova University. 

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