LINK: I've been reading Norm Geras for a long time. As I've mentioned in the past, The Contract of Mutual Indifference played a large part in both my becoming a political theorist at all, and in becoming the kind of theorist that I am. His work is generous and broad-minded, even while he maintains his political commitments. All of this to say today's reflection on the limits of Karl Marx is yet another example of all these exemplary tendencies.
One of the great virtues of philosophers, in my experience, is their recognition of the value of consistency: if they come to an argument which their political commitments would lead them to adopt, but their philosophical commitments suggest another position is better, they recognize the priority of their philosophical commitments and re-orient their politics. This is, of course, a very modern* approach to one's beliefs, but I think it has great virtue.
*One might also want to say 'and liberal,' but this position is available to those of a conservative disposition, depending on their definition of tradition.
"Thou shalt not extinguish thine anger, but shall master it,
that thy conscience may not be blunted by adjustment
to wrong causes."
-The Dutch Ten Commandments to Foil the Nazis
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