Response #3: Huntington's "the Clash of Civilizations vs. Marxian political philosophy, as discussed in class

I found the dichotomy between Huntington's "The Clash of Civilizations" and King's Monday lecture on Marxian political philosophy very interesting for the way the two were so directly opposed to each other. Huntington's most basic arguments for why civilizations will clash rely on assumptions opposite to Marx’s historical materialism, and the compelling examples Huntington is able to provide (in comparison to Marx, who has no examples or empirical evidence) ultimately show the impracticality and inaccuracy of Marx's analysis of politics.

The concept of historical materialism, as advocated by Marx, maintains that all events throughout the entire course of human history have been driven by "material relations," defined as the struggle over "material power," defined as the "means of production," defined as the way in which people make a living. So everything that ever happened in history happened as a result of people competing over the way to make a living. "Culture" or "ideas" (about equality, self-determination, the will of God, etc) that aren't material objects, Marx believes, have no real power to direct events in the world.

Huntington cites the ephemeral ideas and feelings which Marx scorns as the causes of future concrete wars between civilizations. His first reason for civilizations' not being able to coexist peacefully is that differences are basic, but the differences he cites are not in production capabilities-they are in the "language, culture, tradition, and most important, religion [which Marx derided as "the opiate of the masses"]". There isn’t space to unpack the other ways in which Huntington describes how the power of ideas shapes conflicts, but it’s undeniable that Marx would disagree fairly strongly with him. Given the ways in which Huntington’s and Marx’s views have played out (consider 9/11, and the disaster of the former Soviet Union, among other examples), I would agree with Se-Jun that Marx’s political philosophies are somewhat less than useful and/or accurate.