Practicing the Good

"This ambitious work proposes to reveal how anti-capitalist critique and institutions of civil society ‘are in fact permeated by an unconscious form of capitalism and thus unwittingly affirm the capitalist condition.’"—The Russian Review

"A stimulating introduction into Soviet Marxism and a persuasive critique of contemporary anti-capitalism’s thirst for acceleration, atomization, and alienation... Practicing the Good is an invaluable read for anyone interested in how Soviet Marxism of the 1960-70s can re-evaluate our view on contemporary capitalism."—Marx & Philosophy

"It is to be counted as one of the most important publications for leftist self-criticism in recent years. "—Radical Philosophy

A philosophical consideration of Soviet Socialism that reveals the hidden desire for capitalism in contemporary anticapitalist discourse and theory 

This book, a philosophical consideration of Soviet socialism, is not meant simply to revisit the communist past; its aim, rather, is to witness certain zones where capitalism’s domination is resisted—the zones of countercapitalist critique, civil society agencies, and theoretical provisions of emancipation or progress—and to inquire to what extent those zones are in fact permeated by unconscious capitalism and thus unwittingly affirm the capitalist condition. 

By means of the philosophical and politico-economical consideration of Soviet socialism of the 1960 and 1970s, this book manages to reveal the hidden desire for capitalism in contemporaneous anticapitalist discourse and theory. The research is marked by a broad cross-disciplinary approach based on political economy, philosophy, art theory, and cultural theory that redefines old Cold War and Slavic studies’ views of the post-Stalinist years, as well as challenges the interpretations of this period of historical socialism in Western Marxist thought.

Keti Chukhrov is associate professor of cultural studies at the National Research University Higher School of Economics. She is author of To Be—To Perform: “Theatre” in Philosophic Critique of Art and Pound & £.