The base-superstructure formula weakened Marxism by reducing ideas to mere reflections

Evidence

Raymond Williams has written: “[T]he reason for the … weakness in Marxism is not difficult to find: it lay in the received formula of base and superstructure, which in ordinary hands converted very quickly to an interpretation of superstructure a simple reflection, representation, ideological expression.” — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 1693

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s interest in the theoretical failure that preceded the Black radical tradition’s critique of classical Marxism. — connects to: Marxist theorists disagreed over dating ideology shifts but shared base-superstructure premises — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 130; Fromm saw psychoanalysis as filling Marxism’s missing link between ideology and economic base. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 329; Marx’s followers suppressed his conditional vision of unified science — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 1662 (+5 more)