Research: Between criticism and crisis: the philosophical thought of Karl Korsch
The primary aim of this research is to provide a systematic study of Karl Korsch’s (1886–1961) theoretical project during his mature Marxist phase, with particular attention to the concepts of praxis, science, and the state, as well as to the problems of dialectics and socialization. The project seeks to show that Korsch was not merely one of the most insightful interpreters of Marx’s thought, but the author of an original conception of Marxism as a critical social science and as an autonomous revolutionary philosophy, developed in dialogue both with the Hegelian legacy and with the legal, epistemological, and political debates of early twentieth-century Germany. The research will reconstruct Korsch’s intellectual trajectory beginning with his legal and pre-Marxist training, his London experience, and the influence of empiricism, up to the theoretical and political
turning point marked by the First World War and the revolutionary years of 1918–1919. This period saw the emergence of the themes of Sozialisierung, council communism, and the radical democratization of the productive process. Particular emphasis will be placed on the problem of a Marxist theory of the state and on Korsch’s critical engagement with both Kautskyan social democracy and Soviet orthodoxy, as well as on his explicit and implicit dialogues with figures such as Pašukanis, Lenin, Lukács, and Kautsky.
A further axis of the investigation will concern Korsch’s conception of science and dialectics, understood not as metaphysical residues but as epistemological instruments of revolutionary praxis, developed in constant confrontation with Hegel, the Methodenstreit, and the tradition of German historicism. Within this framework, the study will analyze Korsch’s relationship with Antonio Labriola and the emerging tradition of Western Marxism, as well as his influence on the early formulations of Frankfurt School critical theory.
Finally, the research aims to reconstruct a comprehensive intellectual biography of Korsch, capable of restoring the originality of his theoretical and political contribution and of filling existing gaps in the historiography—particularly regarding his theory of the state, his conception of science, and the period of his American exile. The overarching goal is to demonstrate how Korsch’s thought constitutes a decisive node for understanding the transformations of twentieth-century Marxism, its theory of the state, and the theoretical foundations of contemporary social critique.