2025.02.14 : View this Review Online | View Recent NDPR Reviews
Philip Kain, Marx, Revolution and Social Democracy, Oxford University Press, 2023, 249pp., $97.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780197667187.
Reviewed by Geoff M. Boucher, Deakin University
Philip Kain’s Marx, Revolution and Social Democracy presents the case for a social-democratic reading of Marx. The central intention of the book is to convince the reader that market socialism is consistent with a democratic interpretation of Marx. Furthermore, Kain argues, a parliamentary democratic Marx requires neither a specifically socialist state nor public ownership of the means of production. Kain criticizes the Leninist vision of political revolution as a punctual transformation, resulting in state socialism, nationalized economies, centralized planning and so forth, as an authoritarian misrepresentation of Marx (66–75). Instead, Kain proposes, socialism—now understood as democratic planning that frames market regulation, welfare measures, majoritarian democracy and social rights—has been advancing throughout the twentieth century. He argues for seeing socialism as the result of a democratically-instigated,…
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