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In 1939, Erich Fromm argued that capitalist culture imbues the pursuit of economic advantage with moral tensions that harm self and psyche. Since this time, the inner implications of such tensions have been somewhat overlooked by theorists, and not without seemingly good reasons. By many accounts, social and technological developments in the later decades of the 20th century have ostensibly reduced the cultural tensions surrounding profit making and mitigated their inner effects. This article, however, presents a different account. Drawing from literature on culture, self, and subjectivity in the neoliberal era, it argues that the tensions Fromm identified have actually been recreated in new, sometimes more elusive ways that bear substantial inner costs. Moreover, focusing on economic elites, this article analytically explores the agentic implications of these inner costs. It argues that the moral tensions that haunt profit making ironically stand at the basis of capitalist agency, shaping its materialistic default through processes rooted in self.
As social theorists seek to understand the contemporary challenges of radical populism, we would do well to reconsider the febrile insights of the psychoanalytic social theorist Erich Fromm. It was Fromm who, at the beginning of the 1930s, conceptualized the emotional and sociological roots of a new ‘authoritarian character’ who was meek in the face of great power above and ruthless to the powerless below. It was Fromm, in the 1950s, who argued that societies, not only individuals, could be sick. This essay traces the intertwining of psychoanalytic and sociological methods that allowed Fromm to create such new ideas. At the same time, it highlights how Fromm’s sociology was hampered by an economistic Marxist approach to the institutions and culture of democratic capitalist societies. Such theoretical restriction prevented Fromm from conceptualizing how institutions like democracy, science, and psychotherapy can provide resources for widespread emotional recuperation and civil repair.
[Chinese abstract not available.] Erich Fromm was a famous American psychologist, philosopher and one of the most influential thinkers in the 20th century. His consumption alienation theory provides a theoretical perspective to analyze the crisis of human nature development in capitalist society. He used Freudian psychoanalysis to analyze Marx’s theory of alienation, and combined the two theories to analyze the social contradictions of capitalism, especially the spiritual crisis and the crisis of human nature, which enriched the social psychology content of Marx’s critical theory of capital. Avoiding consumption alienation is not only conducive to promoting the harmonious development of our society and economy, but also conducive to reducing the pressure on resources and environment. Here, based on Marx’s theory of labor alienation, the perspective of contemporary Chinese Marxist theory to the thought of Fromm’s consumption alienation from Fromm, but is not limited to Fromm’s economic philosophy interpretation, it can be seen that Fromm adopted Freud to the unconscious mental analysis method, (1)analysis of the capitalist society inevitably causes of consumption alienation, namely to boost consumption is to alleviate the crisis of overproduction of capitalism;(2)From the perspective of social psychology, this paper analyzes the negative effects of con¬sumption alienation on human beings, which means that human beings lose their rational and loving ability and are reduced to >robots< under the control of capital logic. (3)It predicts the bleak prospect of the collapse of the logic of capital. Consumption alienation has brought about a negative effect on the capitalist society, leading to the crisis of human nature and natural ecology, and finally the collapse of the capitalist society. (4)Finally, the author gives a utopian plan of >sound society< to cure capitalist group neurosis from three aspects of economy, politics and culture. Sublation of Fromm’s thought of consumption alienation, in under the guidance of Marxist theory, social psychology on the basis of critique of capital and the consumption object, subject, consumption process in the dual economic philosophy and social psychology, aiming at the current situation and existing problems of consumer, to evade the potential consumption alienation, put forward the corresponding countermeasures. Therefore, it will be discussed from the following five aspects. The first chapter aims to clarify the philosophical and psychological origins of Fromm’s idea of consumption alienation. Fromm’s alienation of consumption is the derivation theory of Marx’s alienation of labor. The focus of contemporary capital logic is shifted from the field of production to the field of consumption, which leads to the transformation of alienation of labor to alienation of consumption. Consumption alienation also includes the ideological control of capitalism, which is unconscious. Freud’s individual unconscious can be extended to Fromm’s collective unconscious, which can reveal the social psychological manipulation mechanism behind consumption alienation. The second chapter discusses the variation of the relationship between consumer object and human in the consumption alienation from the theoretical level, which is an abstract analysis, and analyzes the philosophical and psychological reasons of consumption alienation. In the alienation of consumption, people pay more attention to the symbolic value and non-functional attribute of goods, and people’s >false demand< is stimulated. This further leads to the variation of human relationships, including the lack of human initiative, the materialization of human relationships, and human’s demand for nature. Although these are not conducive to the development of human nature, they are conducive to the logic of infinite capital appreciation, which means the inherent irreconcilable conflict between >humanism< and >capital<. The third chapter discusses the internal destruction of human nature caused by consumption alienation, the illusion of happiness deliberately created, and the inevitable ecological crisis. This is an empirical analysis, which analyzes the multiple serious consequences brought by consumption alienation. In the alienated consumption, human beings do not establish their subjectivity, but become >robots< of unconscious consumption. The happiness gained through consumption is based on >false satisfaction< and can only be illusory happiness. Excessive consumption stimulates the expansion of production, which surpasses the carrying capacity of natural resources and ecology, and inevitably leads to ecological crisis.
The fourth chapter discusses the way of sublating consumption alienation from the socialist market economy. The foothold is to sublating the logic of capital and establish the primacy of >people-oriented< rather than >capital<. At the individual level, we should establish human subjectivity through creative labor, emphasize fraternity and cooperation, and realize human’s free and comprehensive development. At the social level, based on the character cultivation of the productive society, we should discard the logic of capital appreciation, establish a green consumption culture, and promote the construction of a harmonious society in economic, cultural and political aspects. The fifth chapter discusses the limitations of Fromm’s criticism of consumption alienation. Fromm’s critique of consumption alienation is a profound revelation of the social contradictions of contemporary capitalism, which is characterized by social psychological deconstruction. However, Fromm overstated the influence of psychological factors, and his >healthy society< program was Utopian in nature, which deviated from the Marxist standpoint to a certain extent. On the whole, (1)Based on Marx’s criticism of political economy, this paper analyzes Fromm’s idea of consumption alienation in both philosophy and social psychology, and this reinterpretation undoubtedly has the background of Marxism in contemporary China. (2)To reveal the >conscious< and >unconscious< control of the whole society by the capital logic behind consumption alienation, especially its suppression of human nature in both physical and mental dimensions;(3)Let people see the real mask of consumerism in the ideological control and economic expansion in the capitalist society, as well as the inherent paradox and inevitable collapse trend of the logic of capital;(4)The criticism of Fromm’s criticism of consumption alienation is for the purpose of >the West serves China<, so as to strengthen the Marxist view of green consumption with Chinese characteristics and promote the healthy and orderly development of China’s socialist economy. [Translation: www.cnki.net, 9/2021]
Since the 1990s, urban literature has risen and become the most important literary landscape. As an important part of urban literature, urban poetry has been gradually developing in the middle and late 1980s. With its constantly spring-up, the research on urban poetry has gradually increased. In the early days, most of the research and discussion of related concepts. After the 1990s, along with the introduction of Western urban poetry theories, urban poetry research showed a diversified research trend as well as achieved a fruitful result. The Chinese cities after the 1990 s have striking similarities with Baudelaire’s Paris described by Benjamin. Therefore, based on the texts of Chinese urban poetry after the 1990s and took reference of Western multidisciplinary urban studies, this thesis analyzes the writing of urban poetry in this period and its modern urban consciousness in a comparative perspective, and demonstrates the urban development and human spiritual dilemma of universal significance in the process of urbanization. The first chapter of the thesis mainly analyzes the urban landscape as imagery. Based on the research ideas of Roland Bart’s semiotics and Kevin Lynch’s urban planning, it draws and studies the formal characteristics and semantic structure in Chinese urban poetry after the 1990 s, which applied the related concepts and methods of urban space theory and architectural phenomenology, using basic units such as city streets, nodes, landmarks to combine urban architecture and the space. Dense streets are a typical feature of urban space, which also present the most authentic people’s life. In poetry, abstract and conceptual streets often symbol the urban space, representing fastness or congestion. The specific streets with clear directivity become the memory carrier or the emotional projection in the poet’s narration. The constantly demolished old streets are regarded as the epitome of urban culture. Typical urban nodes are like squares with the nature of gathering points as well as railways and stations with the nature of connecting points. The connotation of city squares in poetry has gone from a space with rich political accommodation or ideal accommodation to a huge public entertainment function. The urban railway is not only a symbol of modern civilization, but also a metaphor of time, and a symbol of the ideal love of urban people. The station with a strong spirit is not only a place for strangers and nostalgia, but also the maternal symbol of the initiator of era and nurturing new life. As the symbol and unique characteristic of a city, tall buildings transcend reality and enters the imaginary level in poets’ writing from symbolizing power and rebirth to squeezing, siege and becoming an ancient behemoth. To get rid of the invisible majesty and pressure brought by the shape of tall buildings, poets choose to take the top or glass windows, curtain walls of tall buildings to determine their position and perceive the shape of the city. The second chapter shows the modern crowds wandering in the city. It divides into three types, i. e. wanderers, aliens and margins, defined by Benjamin, Simmel, and Robert Parker on the role of urban people combining the poet’s subjective life experience, urban vision, and self-identity. Wanders are further divided into wandering meditators, lonely garbage pickers, and angry critics. Wandering meditators walk through the streets to achieve a complex relationship among the city and urban people; lonely garbage pickers observe the people and objects in the city as a >garbage picker< in Baudelaire’s pen to collect his own poetry; angry critics take the angle to stand on the opposite side of the city, revealing the deformed development of the city in a manner that is incompatible with the city, and the ecological crisis and human survival crisis. There are two types of aliens. Some of them can >dwells on this earth poetically< in the city. They eagerly present and examine the city’s unique mundane feelings with their own original vision and take a proactive attitude toward the city. Another part are people ran back and forth between the countryside and the city. They were >dual-aliens< between the countryside and the city. Marginal people mainly include those who have a real-world marginal situation and those who have a >self-marginal< mentality. The marginalized people with realistic marginal situations often have rural growth backgrounds, and most of them still live in small towns. By showing the urban life and living conditions of urban fringe people, they express the filth and greatness, lofty and despicableness of the city on the one hand, and on the other hand the aspect also completed the identification of the marginal identity of the self, and realized the comfort and salvation of the self. Although marginalized people with a self-marginal mentality live in cities, they all have long or short experiences in rural life. They are particularly aware of the sadness, bitterness, and heaviness of life. They express the hidden worries and sorrows in the process of urban modernization by writing about the lives of people on the periphery of the city. The third chapter presents the alienated modern urban spirit. It takes on Simmel’s sociological theory, Fromm’s theory of human nature, and Jungian personality analysis psychology to illustrate the alienated urban spirit in modern cities. Modern cities continue to throw people into new experiences, new environments, and new crowds. When these new stimuli make city people feeling the threat, they will use their rationality and then produces indifferent. Indifference makes people form reserved interpersonal relationships. Indifferent individuals are forced to enter various relationships, so personality masks are caused and lead to constant splits in personality. Finally, indifferent modern people seek psychological balance, occasionally reveals his sincere emotions, creating a stranger’s emotional penetration. The biggest impact of indifference on modern urbanites is to make individuals suffer from loneliness. The loneliness with multiple faces has become a common mental state of modern people. It originated from the poet’s attitude of self-estrangement and the decline of the physical home (country) and the nowhere to put the spiritual home in the process of urbanization. Facing loneliness, different poets have different attitudes, which reflect the different moods of the poets. In addition, the rise of a consumer society, the expansion of material desires, and the pressure of survival forced poets to change their attitude towards commodities and strive to approach poetry in the material flood. The objects of modern civilization will gradually be degenerated with the passage of time and the changing environments. The meaning and value of money will continue to collapse, and people will never be able to achieve a poetic dwelling. Finally, the expansion of body desires is a typical symptom of modern society. Cities are full of erotic desires, and sexual desire has become the >top priority< of modern society. Herein, love is no longer a pure spiritual pursuit, but a vain term tied to material needs and even equates to prostitution. He inspires individual passions and desires, and at the same time turns individuals into puppets controlled by passions and desires. [Translation: www. cnki.net, 4/2023]
Franz Kafka is known as one of the forerunners of western modernist fiction. As a representative of Chinese avant-garde fiction writer, Can Xue, with her creation influenced by Kafka, has been called >Chinese Kafka< by the Nobel Prize judge Göran Malmqvist. The two writers have both created alienated mother images in their works. Therefore, taking the >mother image< as the penetration point, the thesis endeavors to study the similarities and dissimilarities of the mother images in Kafka’s >The Metamorphosis< and Can Xue’s >Old Floating Cloud<, and to explore the causes behind the alienated mother images as well as the significance of the representation of them. In addition to the introduction and conclusion, the thesis is composed of three chapters. The introduction part begins with a close analysis of the related theme and clarifies this study’s significance and methodology.– Based on close reading, chapter one analyzes the evil mother images in >The Metamorphosis< and >Old Floating Cloud< and points out that neither of them possess traditional mothers’ virtues, but the two authors present the images of alienated mothers in different ways. Under Kafka’s depiction, the mother image in >The Metamorphosis< undergoes a dynamic change, while Can Xue puts the mother images in a static structure, presenting the inherent catastrophe within the motherhood.– Chapter two examines the causes for alienated mother images in the two works from the perspective of patriarchy and modernity crisis. Using Simon Beauvoir’s theory of >The Other Sex< and Fromm’s theory of >alienation<. this thesis demonstrates that the mothers in both books are both victims and accomplices of the patriarchy. Meanwhile, the mother in >The Metamorphosis< has lost love for her son because of her excessive pursuit of capital under the sway of modernity. The mothers in >Old Floating Cloud< are caught in the spiritual predicament in modern society, which also alienates their relationship with their children.– Chapter three discusses the significance of the representation of the alienated mother images by Can Xue and Kafka in terms of the books’ cultural and social background as well as the writers’ own experiences. Although the two writers have different focuses, they both express criticism of patriarchy and offer reflection on the crisis of modernity. Comparing the alienated mother images in >The Metamorphosis< and >Old Floating Cloud< provides a different angle in the comparative study between Can Xue and Kafka. The mothers in the two works are alienated under the influence of patriarchy and modernity crisis, which, in a practical sense, reminds us that we need to pay more attention to the identity of mothers and the spiritual plight of modern people. [English: www.cnki.net, 4/2022]
西方马克思主义是新中国初期对西方文论展开批判性接受的重要一环,涉及的范围包括以卢卡奇的批判现实主义、布莱希特的现代主义戏剧理论、加洛蒂等人的>无边的现实主义<等为代表的西马现实主义维度,以列斐伏尔、萨特、梅洛-庞蒂、考德威尔、弗洛姆等为代表的西马美学维度以及卢森堡、葛兰西、东欧新马克思主义等。西方马克思主义与马克思主义的学术渊源,以及其身处的发达资本主义时代的学术语境,导致新中国初期在对西方马克思主义接受过程中采取>资产阶级文艺思想<和>马克思主义在20世纪的新发展<的双重视域,形成了批判性接受的特点。新中国初期对西方马克思主义的批判性接受为改革开放之后重新接续对西方马克思主义文论的接受做了铺垫。
Several Fables in >Zhuangzi< from the Perspective of Western Power Theories [西方权力理论视阈下的几则《庄子》寓言]
(2021)
本文借助福柯、弗洛伊德、马克思等人的权力理论分析《庄子》中儒生入仕、伯乐治马、不材之木、哑雁命薄等几则寓言。颜回、颜阖等儒生的仕途危机暗讽臣子才德只能迎合滥施酷刑的君主权力,其抑制君权的忠义仁孝等灵魂技术也类同于弗洛姆诊断的权威主义。相应地,孔子教导的心斋并非入仕之法,而是消解以尘世大他者欲望和法则为核心的自我理想,将知识分子引向不得已为之的机械化状态,从而破坏整个封建圣人之治抑或>大他者集体<,进入拉康的拓扑第四环>圣症<。庄子继而通过伯乐对野马的治理隐喻以古代人种学为基础的规训权力和生命权力,揭示圣人之治实则是煽动智巧竞赛和利欲争斗的人性堕落>集中营<,这同样预警当今资本权力以生产利润指标鲸吞人性和自然的危机。在对这世俗权力的揭批和自我理想的湮灭之上,庄子以实体即主体(天人合一)的思维,在大他者空缺中为知识分子指出了不材之木的人生道路,暗示他们必须如坏木、神木、毒木那般>不才权力<才能逃脱权力的规训和惩罚,但同时他也借哑雁被宰杀的故事担忧材与不材之间的艰难抉择,并指出天道的超时空拯救力。
Erich Fromm(1900.03 – 1980.03)is not only a famous psychologist, philosopher and sociologist in the 20th century, but also a Western Marxist and one of the main representatives of Frankfurt school. He has made great achievements in many disciplines. Although his thought is broad, humanism is the core and an important symbol of his thinking system. China today has built a well-off society in an all-round way, and people’s livelihood is still the focus of attention. Fromm’s humanistic thought can also bring enlightenment for the Chinese government to improve public services and better meet the needs of the people. At the same time, in order to realize a harmonious society, we must enrich Marx’s thought of >human<, because it can promote the Sinicization of Marxism and implement the requirements of >people centered<. Fromm’s detailed description of the situation of people in the capitalist society makes us more aware of the real state of people in the capitalist society, which can not only resist the unhealthy trend of thought, but also make the development of Chinese society more stable. The study of Fromm’s humanism still has a certain reference value for us to study today’s capitalist society, especially the modern western society with highly developed commodity economy. Therefore, Fromm’s theory still has profound theoretical value and practical significance today, which is worth learning. This paper studies Fromm’s humanistic thought from the following four aspects: The first part is about the formation and development of Fromm’s humanism. We mainly discuss from two aspects, namely, the formation background and the theoretical source. The first angle is the theoretical background of Fromm’s humanistic thought, mainly including the collision of the three trends of thought and Fromm’s choice of thought; the second angle is Fromm’s personal experience. We introduce his family experience and academic experience, and discuss the influence of his personal background on his thoughts. We mainly discuss Fromm’s humanism from four aspects: how to inherit Marx’s humanism, how to carry forward Freud’s humanism, how to develop Maslow’s humanism and Frankfurt School’s humanism. This part summarizes and combs Fromm’s humanistic thought. This paper explores Fromm’s ideological system from three perspectives: the view of existence, the view of human nature and the view of freedom. Based on the analysis of Fromm’s works, this paper tries to restore the whole picture of Fromm’s humanistic ideological system. The third part focuses on the theoretical characteristics of Fromm’s humanistic thought. Taking >human< as the fundamental is the logical starting point of Fromm’s humanistic thought. Fromm describes the general nature and sociality of human, because human is always his most concerned problem. At the same time, Fromm also has a common characteristic of Frankfurt School scholars, he is also very good at using criticism to construct theory. He criticized from two dimensions of human and society. Most importantly, his value pursuit of human liberation makes his theory full of humanism and humanistic care. Finally, from the perspective of Marxism, this paper examines and analyzes Fromm’s humanistic thought. This paper affirms the constructiveness of Fromm’s humanistic thought in many fields, such as human nature theory, capitalist research, and the healing of society and human beings. On the other hand, it also finds its limitations by digging deeply into Fromm’s humanistic thought. The main mistake lies in the misinterpretation and deviation of some theories from Marxism. In addition, it also discusses the Contemporary Enlightenment of Fromm’s humanistic thought, that is, to reasonably enrich Marx’s >human< thought, to strengthen the direction of guiding social construction, and to continue to care about the living situation and mental health of modern people. [Translation: www.cnki.net, 1/2023]