The style is informal yet oracular, gnomic yet windy, rather like a
compound of '50's Sartre and opaque Marcuse laced with
social-scientific jargon (Lefebvre is a Marxist sociologist). Some
defects may stem from translation. But the contents offer no
analytic description of the actual events and political alignments
of May. Lefebvre does not ask "Why France, not Italy? why 1968?"
The Common Market and the gold crisis are "for specialists to
examine." Lefebvre thinks that "The advanced countries have
overcome scarcity" and "the state's economic base" is "secure."
"New contradictions" exist, like over-organization and urban
discontinuities. The notion of spontaneity provides the chief link
between May and Lefebvre's general view. He complacently abjures
dogma. But his "revisions" lack definition. He posits the merits of
"revolutionary reformism" toward "a third way between" capitalism
and state socialism. He begs colossal issues, calling a socialist
economy's task "control of the market," invoking a "new working
class" with unspecified composition. The strikers' failure to take
state power simply doesn't arise for Lefebvre. His strategic
perspective parallels a major current in the American new left:
"radical critiques of superstructures," "disruption,"
"base-organizing" of "groups," with "self-management" as the
long-range goal; and the book will certainly be sought by all ages
and species of leftists, as well as others attracted by Lefebvre's
topic and his professional stature. (Kirkus Reviews)
Explores the full sweep of Marxist thinking on social change in
the light of the 1968 French explosion.
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