Oppression, violence, emancipation: Benjamin, Marcuse and the right of resistance

Abstract

Marcuse's reading of Benjamin's Critique of Violence forms a fundamental basis for his understanding of current society and emancipation movements. In the afterword written to the edition of this work, Marcuse points out that the center of Benjamin's argument lies in his distinction between impure, or positive violence, as the basis of the power structure of the rule of law, and pure, or negative violence, a power legitimately present in the liberation movements. Both criticize the positive violence that sustains the existing power and justice. For Marcuse, there is a right of resistance for the oppressed translated into a “violence” as counter-power. This is linked to an alternative social, political, cultural, legal order, still to be realized, which results not from a vision of the future, but from the vision of the past and its continuum to be interrupted. Its basis “is not found in the dreams of the liberated grandchildren”, but in criticizing and overcoming the horrors of the ancestors.

Keywords
Benjamin; Marcuse; Right to resistance; Violence; Repressive continuum.