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As a student of society, Marx had a fatal limitation: his central insistence that all history and all human motivation could be reduced to materialist factors. Modern sociology, psychology and history have a more sophisticated view. Indeed, Marx's theory of man-as-economic-animal is regularly disproved by countless eruptions of nationalism, tribalism and just plain human cussedness that can hardly be explained through economic motives. It is a striking irony that the New Left, which often uses Marxist sticks to belabor capitalist society, tries to reach beyond Marx for spiritual values and a kind of community (neo-tribalism) that Marx, the materialist, would have considered sentimental and atavistic.
Despite these limitations, the Marxist vision remains pervasive. It has already drawn into its influence some who started as New Leftists and have gradually become Marxists. In addition, Marxism's most interesting area of opportunity lies among highly educated people in advanced countries, notably the U.S. The slogans of their rebellion against various social evils assert that they wish to change society. But underneath the surface, what is being resisted is often change itself, change that has no obvious meaning and no clearly understood direction. As the U.S. enters the "postindustrial age," the bitter questions about the future, the nostalgia for the past—all the 19th century symptoms seem to be returning. Perhaps tomorrow will see men longing for the rigidities of the industrial century, as previous generations clung to the stabilities of their rural past. Extreme alienation from tomorrow's more complex society may well provoke the anarchist syndrome.
In any age, the anarchist thrust—though it can be destructively powerful—leads nowhere. Some rebels sensing this, will look around for a more constructive vision. When they look, there will be the bearded prophet with his peculiar mix of scientism and moral passion, his peculiar way of linking yesterday-today-tomorrow, his peculiar kind of oversimplification and exaggeration, his peculiar kind of hope.
So the attraction of the Marxist vision may persist until modern society finds a more effective way of explaining itself and its direction. And that could be a long, long time.