16 - Freedom as essence

Summary

In issuing a declaration of man's species character, Marx was drawn to portray life activity in communism, because only then does the individual develop into a complete species being, only then do the differences between man and the animal world become all that they can be. According to Marx, ‘The real active orientation of man to himself as a species being, or his manifestation as a real species being (i.e., as a human being), is only possible by his really bringing out of himself all the powers that are his as the species man.’ Elsewhere, he states explicitly that the individual living under capitalism is not a real species being and, again, that the work of this individual ‘has lost all semblance of life activity’. The fact is that by ‘species man’ Marx can refer to all men always as well as to communist men alone, but he most often uses this expression to refer to the latter. In this case, species life activity is what people are moving toward rather than what the people of all periods actually engage in.

On this interpretation, Marx's description of species life activity must be considered very incomplete. Besides being ‘free’ and ‘conscious’, this activity will also be willed, purposive, physically and mentally flexible, concentrated and social. However, as we have seen, man's social activity in communism is quite different from what goes by the same name in all earlier societies.