Absolute Ethical Life - (Currencies: New Thinking for Financial Times) by Michael Lazarus

About the Book

"Karl Marx gave us not just a critique of the political economy of capital but a way of confronting the impoverished ethical quality of life we face under capitalism. Interpreting Marx anew as an ethical thinker, Absolute Ethical Life provides crucial resources for understanding how freedom and rational agency are impacted by a social world formed by value under capitalism, with consequences for philosophy today. Michael Lazarus situates Marx within a shared tradition of ethical inquiry, placing him in close dialogue with Aristotle and Hegel. Lazarus traces the ethical and political dimensions of Marx's work missed by Hannah Arendt and Alasdair MacIntyre, two of the most profound critics of modern politics and ethics. Ultimately, the book claims that Marx's value-form theory is both a continuation of Aristotelian and Hegelian themes and at the same time his most distinctive theoretical achievement. In this normative interpretation of Marx, Lazarus integrates recent moral philosophy with a historically specific analysis of capitalism as a social form of life. He challenges contemporary political and economic theory to insist that any conception of modern life needs to account for capitalism. With a robust critique of capitalism derived from the determinations of what Marx calls the "form of value," Lazarus argues for an ethical life beyond capital"-- Provided by publisher.

Book Synopsis

Karl Marx gave us not just a critique of the political economy of capital but a way of confronting the impoverished ethical quality of life we face under capitalism. Interpreting Marx anew as an ethical thinker, Absolute Ethical Life provides crucial resources for understanding how freedom and rational agency are impacted by a social world formed by value under capitalism, with consequences for philosophy today.

Michael Lazarus situates Marx within a shared tradition of ethical inquiry, placing him in close dialogue with Aristotle and Hegel. Lazarus traces the ethical and political dimensions of Marx's work missed by Hannah Arendt and Alasdair MacIntyre, two of the most profound critics of modern politics and ethics. Ultimately, the book claims that Marx's value-form theory is both a continuation of Aristotelian and Hegelian themes and at the same time his most distinctive theoretical achievement.

In this normative interpretation of Marx, Lazarus integrates recent moral philosophy with a historically specific analysis of capitalism as a social form of life. He challenges contemporary political and economic theory to insist that any conception of modern life needs to account for capitalism. With a robust critique of capitalism derived from the determinations of what Marx calls the "form of value," Lazarus argues for an ethical life beyond capital.

Review Quotes

"Absolute Ethical Life definitively puts to rest the always absurd sounding thesis that Marx's critique of political economy is a work of social science without morality. In this elegantly written and compellingly argued book, Michael Lazarus demonstrates that Marx's Capital is, in its own terms, through and through, an ethical argument. This is a reading of Marx for our times." --J.M. Bernstein, author of Adorno: Disenchantment and Ethics

"Absolute Ethical Life is both highly advanced and accessible, expansive and yet in-depth, philosophically patient and yet politically urgent. At a time when Marx is being revived, Lazarus is an exemplary guide." --Martin Hägglund, This Life: Secular Faith and Spiritual Freedom

"Bringing together Aristotle, Hegel, and Marx, Michael Lazarus's new book forcefully defends an expansive account of ethical life as a central concept for social and political theory. An important contribution to our understanding of Marx as an ethical thinker and essential reading for students and scholars of nineteenth-century philosophy." --Karen Ng, author of Hegel's Concept of Life

"Michael Lazarus has given us an up to date and systematic account of what a fully Hegelianized Marxism would look like. Marx remains Marx but now seen in a different light: An Aristotelianized Hegel becomes the key to an Aristotelianized Marx." --Terry Pinkard, author of Hegel's Phenomenology

"There is a long-standing discussion about the ethical aspects in Marx's critique of political economy. Michael Lazarus's book is the first contribution to link this debate directly to the value-form analysis. He shifts the debate to a new level. Only now it becomes really clear to what extent Marx was a theorist of the social. An enormously important book." --Michael Heinrich, author of Karl Marx and the Birth of Modern Society

"This book establishes that Marx's critique of political economy is not simply a theory of economics. No less than Aristotle and Hegel, Marx was concerned with the good of the political community, claiming that a social world subject to the reign of capital cannot adequately further the good. Lazarus's presentation and defense of Marx's arguments are clear and convincing. Readers of this work will gain a deeper appreciation of Marx's immense contribution to normative social philosophy." --Tony Smith, author of The Logic of Marx's Capital

About the Author

Michael Lazarus is a postdoctoral research fellow at Deakin University.