Analysis of the Sartrean Notion of Collective Authenticity

Having established the possibility of collective authenticity in the previous article, the foregoing analysis shall focus on the question of whether or not Sartre was successful in his theoretical marriage of Existentialism and Marxism. Since the similarities between the two schools have already been previously pointed out, this subsection shall limit itself to an analysis of the claims that such a union did not and cannot take place.

Numerous books and essays have been written about the relationship between Existentialism and Marxism. However, most of them sing the same tune of denying the vaguest possibility of any union between the two schools for what authors consider as unavoidable conflicts in the fundamental theses of these schools. However, the multiplicity of such reasons can be synthesized into five different areas. Let us then commence to treat each of them analytically.

First, Sartrean critics say that Existentialism and Marxism cannot be reconciled for the reason that both reside at the extreme sides of the scientific spectrum. They claim that Existentialism considers the world as irrational and absurd. On the other hand, Marxism considers the world as lawful. The impossibility of science is thus denied in Existentialism while it is objectively warranted in Marxism.

This contention may be accepted if we first accept the assumption that all Existentialists say absolutely that the world is unintelligible. The latter assumption is unfair in such that while Sartrean Existentialism indeed considers the world as absurd, it nevertheless holds that the unintelligibility of the world is caused not by any a priori root but by the inability of man to give meaning to the world. Indeed, this researcher has quoted in the previous chapter a text whereby Sartre argues that unlike Kierkegaard, he does not consider the world as unintelligible; for him, we do not yet have the means of understanding it. We thus cannot but make a distinction as regards the first accusation. If we mean by Existentialism the one characterized by extreme subjectivism and espoused by Kierkegaard and Camus, then the accusation is valid. However, if we consider the Sartrean relative subjectivism, then such an accusation is unwarranted. Aware of such an indictment, Sartre explains in The Problem of Method:

We demand of general history that it restore to us the structures of the contemporary society, its conflicts, its profound contradictions, and the over-all movement which these determine.

While he did not altogether abandon his early tenet of the prevalence of ambiguity in man and in society, Sartre nevertheless proved the possibility of scientific knowledge in the intellectual framework he upheld. In fact, Sartre discusses in The Problem of Method the role of productive forces in society in scientific knowledge:

The development of productive forces conditions scientific knowledge, which in turn, conditions it. The relations of production, through this knowledge, outline the lineaments of a philosophy; the concrete and lived history gives birth to particular systems of ideas which, within the framework of this philosophy, express the real and practical attitudes of defined social groups.

Second, Sartrean critics observe the prevalence of an ineradicable ambiguity in Existentialism which cannot be found in Marxism. Such an ambiguity is rooted in the notorious claim of the precedence of existence over essence. If such is the case, then most Existentialists argue that the world is full of ambiguities and such ambiguities cannot be done with. On the other hand, Marxism teaches that such ambiguities are but provisional and can be thus eliminated through the perpetual employment of the dialectical method.

However, the same argument employed in the first accusation invalidates the current indictment. For one thing, Sartre does hold that by engaging in a project through human praxis, man can clarify his situation in the world and in so doing, render intelligible such ambiguities. Sartre was very much aware of this accusation in such that he says:

Recently an essayist, thinking to refute Existentialism, wrote: "It is not man who is profound; it is the world." He was perfectly right and we agree with him without reservation. Only we should add that the world is human, the profundity of man is the world; therefore profundity comes to the world through man.

Third, Sartrean critics claim that Sartre's gratuitous claim of absolute freedom cannot be reconciled with the Marxist conception of freedom as the knowledge of necessity. They say that Sartre absolutized the freedom of the individual and as such, negated the role of history, other people, and the world at large in human projects. On the other hand, Marxism teaches that it is only by understanding the functioning of nature that man can be free. Moreover, they accuse Sartre of propagating a libertarian morality where everybody does what he wishes. Meanwhile, Marxist class-oriented morality is one which has an objective basis in the needs, conditions, relations, and development of society and that while there are no absolute standards, such a morality must be evaluated in view of the way they serve the needs of society, class, and history.

While this consideration necessitates further research, this researcher asserts that there is basically no conflict in this regard for two major reasons. First, Sartrean morality is not necessarily libertarian in such that he argues that each human action must be done with due consideration of its effect to other men. Indeed, Sartre says that a man must act in such a way that his action must be the objective basis for the actions of other men. This mere consideration of others in Sartrean morality is enough to refute that his envisioned morality is not as deleteriously libertarian as his critics unfairly accuse him. Second, both Sartrean and Marxist moralities uphold that at the first instance, there is basically no objective norm of morality and it is man who is accursed to determine such basis. Still further, there is a need to point out that late Sartre modified his conception of freedom to mean "the irreducibility of the cultural order to the natural order."

Sartrean thought then evolved from the advocacy of absolute freedom to freedom with historical conditioning and from atemporal, immediate contingency to historical contingency. Since this analysis is limited to whether or not Sartre was successful in his initial attempt to incorporate existential thought to Marxism, the problem of the truth of the Sartrean and Marxist moralities will be reserved for future studies.

Fourth, Sartrean critics characterize Existentialism as a movement which considers ultimate despair and man's inability to go beyond such a despair as the very destiny of man. On the other hand, they emphasize that Marxism asserts the possibility of the victory of humanity over all the things that hinder it through the continuous progression of humanity brought about by dialectics.

This researcher holds that indeed, early Sartre is guilty of such an accusation especially when he remarked that man is a useless passion. However, Sartrean thought has since evolved so much so that he already considers the fact that man is very much capable of projecting himself to a more progressive life in view of his present predicament through human praxis. Still, such an evolution is not an abandonment of his early thesis so much so that man's being a useless passion is itself an occasion for man to continually negate himself to the point that he achieves his veritable humanity.

The final criticism is the most warranted of all and it concerns the relationship between the individual and his environment. Sartrean critics claim that there exists a fundamental difference between Existentialism and Marxism in this regard. On the one hand, they say that Existentialism upholds extreme subjectivism in such a way that it maintains the priority of man over nature. On the other hand, Marxism sees nature as an organic whole which is prior to and independent of man. Moreover, they claim that Existentialists are guilty of asserting that the world does not at all affect man and that it is man who is able to define nature.

It is true that early Sartre egregiously defended his thesis of the absolute freedom of the individual to define himself and his world. It is likewise true that early Sartre never considered the individual as existentially independent of nature. It is further true that early Sartre never considered the possibility of any significant influence of the environment in human praxis. However, Sartrean thought has since evolved to such a point that he emphasized the dialectical movement that exists between the individual and his environment. Moreover, Sartrean thought has since evolved to such a point that he submits that while it is man who defines the world, he himself becomes influenced by the work he created. Still further, Sartrean thought has since evolved so much so that he affirms that historico-economic factors do influence the way man engages himself in his relations. Sartre writes:

It is true that the individual is conditioned by the social environment and that he turns back upon it to condition it in turn; it is this - and nothing else - which makes his reality.

Moreover, Sartre clarified his position when he considered as inevitable an individual man's dealing with the group. We even find in the Critique of Dialectical Reason Sartre's discussion of the formation of the group from a seriality into a class. The late Sartrean man, then, is no longer the solitary wanderer who has nothing but himself to decide which way to go, but a pilgrim among pilgrims in search of the truth of his existence. Sartre writes about the role of the individual in the group:

For this role is not determined once and for all: it is the structure of the groups considered which determines it in each case. Thereby without entirely eliminating contingency, we restore to it its limits and its rationality. The group bestows its power and its efficacy upon the individuals whom it has made and who have made it in turn, whose irreducible particularity is one way of living universally. Through the individual the group looks back to itself and finds itself again in the particular opaqueness of life as well as in the universality of the struggle.

Without due prejudice to the section furnishing the conclusions of this paper, this researcher humbly submits that the solution to the problematic of the success of Sartre's envisioned incorporation of Existentialism to Marxism necessitates further distinction.

If we consider by Existentialism the one upheld by early Sartre - the Existentialism that worshiped irrationality and elevated man to the realm of the divine - then we have to concede that indeed such a project will never be successful considering certain irreconcilable tenets that both schools espouse, even in the theoretical level. However, if we consider by Existentialism the one clarified by late Sartre, especially in his The Problem of Method, then we have to grant that there is no theoretical restriction whatsoever that will nullify Sartre's prognosticated incorporation of Existentialism to Marxism.

In view of the disheartening vitriol imputed on Sartre by his critics who tend to evaluate the Sartrean project by concentrating on to his earlier writings, Hazel Barnes remarks:

If we want a philosopher to develop throughout his lifetime, the last thing to demand of him is that he fit his new thought to the measure of his own printed word.