Between Communist Internationalism and a ‘New Humanism’: Episodes in the Intellectual History of Twentieth Century Anticolonialism

Abstract

This project is principally an investigation into how the concept of “humanism” has been engaged by different radical thinkers, and encompasses critical examinations of the works of Karl Marx, the Indian communist turned “radical humanist,” M.N. Roy, and the Martinican revolutionary, Frantz Fanon. This project examines how these thinkers understood the relationship between national, anticolonial movements and the international class struggle against capitalism. Humanism is a theme worth investigating not only because all these thinkers used it in different moments, but also because the concept is often taken to signify a kind of internationalism in its own right and is likewise often treated as a theme that unites the concerns of twentieth century Marxism and anticolonialism. Drawing on the methodological tools of intellectual history, I argue that humanism is an extremely mutable concept that should be approached with a sensitivity to its use in specific contexts. In the first three chapters of this dissertation, I point to significant differences in how each of these thinkers understood the concept and seek to draw lessons from their respective critical engagements with it: from Marx we can take a wariness of humanism’s depoliticizing potential, from Roy a staunch critique of nationalism, and from Fanon a creative, revolutionary appeal to a “new” humanity. The fourth chapter turns to the exhaustion of the “national liberation sequence,” in which I draw attention to the shifts in political possibilities that followed the achievement of national independence. Considering selected works by David Scott, Michael Neocosmos, Nandita Sharma, Salar Mohandesi and others, I argue that while this historical trajectory represents the defeat of a “Fanonian” or “Leninist” aspiration to transcend the nation by deepening nationalism, defending the subjective novelty captured in Fanon’s call to “invent” a new human being is both a viable possibility and urgent necessity. Cautioning against both uncritical embraces or sweeping rejections of humanism in the fields of political theory and philosophy, I argue that the humanist thematic is best approached with close attention to the context or conjuncture of its articulation, and with equally close attention to those other commitments that necessarily accompany any appeal to humanism.