Louis Althusser, an influential philosopher, combined structuralist linguistics and Freudian psychoanalysis to formulate a modern, scientific, and antihumanist Marxism. His work prioritized structures and processes over individual subjects in the explanation of historical events. This approach marked a significant shift in Marxist theory, emphasizing the role of ideology and societal structures.

Early Life

Born in Algeria, Louis Althusser was the son of a banker and a mother who had married after losing her first love, Althusser's uncle, in World War I. Growing up in a predominantly monarchist and religious environment, Althusser initially shared these conservative views. By 1937, he had become active in the Catholic Church's youth movement. His life took a dramatic turn during World War II when he was captured by German forces and detained in a prisoner-of-war camp until the conflict ended.

Post-war, Althusser engaged with the leftist worker-priest movement and in 1946, formed a complex relationship with Hélène Rytman, an anti-Nazi communist eight years his senior. Despite losing his Catholic faith, he joined the French Communist Party (PCF) in 1948, continuing his involvement with the worker-priest movement until it was dissolved. Althusser’s relationship with Rytman faced challenges due to her expulsion from the PCF for alleged treason, an expulsion that the party demanded he honor, a demand he defied.

He pursued his education at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, where he was profoundly influenced by philosophers of science such as Gaston Bachelard, Jean Cavailles, and Jules Canguileme. Under Bachelard's guidance, Althusser wrote his thesis on Hegel and secured second place in the rigorous agrégation de philosophie in 1948. His career as an educator then took root at the very institution where he had studied.

Life’s Work

During the 1950s, Althusser published sparingly. However, by the decade’s end, he produced Politics and History, delving into Montesquieu’s social philosophy and introducing his idea of history as devoid of a discernible goal or central subject. The early 1960s saw him dissect the nascent works of Karl Marx, culminating in the publication of For Marx in 1965 and the collaborative Reading Capital. These influential works coincided with a personal crisis that led to his hospitalization for severe depression.

In For Marx, Althusser posits that Marx’s early works were not authentically Marxist, arguing the true Marxist methodology emerged with The German Ideology. He charts a transition in Marx's works, aligning with orthodox views of Socialist and Soviet Communist doctrines, while countering the humanist interpretations of figures like Jean-Paul Sartre. Althusser contended that Marx's approach rejected humanism, culminating in a new way of analyzing history.

Althusser emphasizes that individuals are not central to Marx’s philosophy; rather, history unfolds as a process without a defined subject. He draws parallels to Bachelard’s concept of an epistemological break, likening it to Thomas S. Kuhn’s later idea of paradigm shifts. The shift from classical economic profit to Marx’s surplus value mirrors the scientific leap from phlogiston theories to modern chemistry.

Reading Capital sees Althusser examining Das Kapital through a psychoanalytic lens, identifying gaps and silences similar to how an analyst deciphers a patient’s discourse. Althusser argues that Marx's philosophical insights are embedded within his economic analysis rather than overtly stated. He refutes historicism, suggesting that societal structures account for historical processes, not a goal-oriented narrative.

Althusser introduces the concept of overdetermination, borrowing from Freud, to describe historical events as products of intersecting causes. He delineates societal evolution through modes of production, asserting that within any society, a dominant structure shapes its primary character. Even as political and ideological superstructures possess relative autonomy, they are ultimately governed by economic bases.

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