Classical Marxism illegitimately generalizes European developmental forms to other societies

Evidence

As Stuart notes, this approach alerts us to the importance of refusing classical Marxism’s Euro-centeredness “based as it is on extrapolating to other social formations forms of development peculiar to—and illegitimately generalised from—European cases.” Here we see the roots of Stuart’s later analysis of the specificities of racial and ethnic dynamics in colonial and postcolonial societies, in the Caribbean and elsewhere—which are also indicated here both in his references to Ernesto Laclau’s critique of Andre Gunder Frank’s ahistorical Marxism and to the important work of Eugene Genovese on the “troublesome case” of plantation slavery. — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 37

Categorization

• XREF: The Eurocentrism critique is the methodological precondition for postcolonial and Islamophobia scholarship that follows Hall. — connects to: Marxism itself varies by the socio-economic system it reflects — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 27; In Europe Marxism was an unavoidable philosophical presence, unlike in America — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 4817; Global Marxism’s failures stem from imposing Marx’s Eurocentric scenario worldwide. — Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean, The Spivak Reader: Selected Works of…, 1148 (+2 more)