The Frankfurt School fundamentally transformed Marxist ideology in post-war Western Europe, and its ideology continues to influence contemporary politics, according to an editorial from Polish news outlet Do Rzeczy.
The Frankfurt School, a group of neo-Marxist intellectuals, significantly revised Marxist ideology after World War II, shifting its focus from economic to cultural issues. Their “critical theory” aimed to challenge and transform Western society by deconstructing its cultural norms and values. The creators of the theory see “progress” in the deconstruction and destabilization of the system.
This approach laid the groundwork for the “march through the institutions” strategy, which sought to infiltrate and influence key societal structures. In Western Europe, this strategy has been pursued by progressive forces, including the New Left and the Frankfurt School’s intellectuals, who sought to advance a Marxist agenda through cultural and institutional change rather than direct confrontation. This has included efforts to centralize European governance, implement climate policies, and reshape immigration policies.
Ursula von der Leyen’s reelection as president of the European Commission reflects the continuation of this strategy, with ongoing efforts to strengthen European integration and implement policies aligned with the Frankfurt School’s vision of societal transformation.
Despite the historical association of communism with significant human rights abuses, Western European left-wing circles have often been sympathetic to Marxist ideas, viewing the spread of communism as an inevitable historical process. This has allowed various currents of Marxism, including the Frankfurt School’s neo-Marxism, to gain influence in European politics.
After World War II, progressive forces in Europe sought ways to spread communism. In the West, communism met with considerable tolerance, and in some left-wing circles, it even enjoyed sympathy or official support. It might seem that declared lovers of democracy would absolutely condemn and reject this murderous ideology, especially given that its consequences included tens of millions of innocent victims of the communist terror apparatus and the Red Army.
However, while condemning these crimes, many often opposed attitudes hostile to communism. The prevailing view was that the march of communism actually stemmed from the natural course of history, an inevitable and irreversible process. This peculiar phenomenon remains a constant element of the European political landscape, which was full of communist sympathizers. Therefore, Western communist parties, subservient to Moscow’s central authority and adhering to the classic doctrine of Marxism-Leninism, freely operated in Europe.
However, unlike the Soviet bloc, other currents of Marxism also developed there. The most important of these were the Federalists, the so-called New Left, and the revisionist anti-cultural Marxism represented by the intellectuals of the so-called Frankfurt School. Trotskyism was also present, although it did not gain as much influence in Europe as it did in the United States.
Neo-Marxism took root in Germany, specifically based on the thought of the Frankfurt School, which was established in the interwar period by a group of scientists associated with the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research at Goethe University. These young, ideologically driven revisionists of Marxism, including Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse, Erich Fromm, and Theodor Adorno, founded the institute in 1923, modeling it after the Marx-Engels Institute. It became the first and, as it turned out, the most important incubator of mutating Marxism. Over time, it served as a true ideological catalyst for revolution in the West. Its intellectual legacy inspired subsequent neo-Marxist leftist movements.
The Frankfurt School played a crucial role in shifting Marxism from economic issues to cultural ones. Setting aside economic issues along with the traditional conflict between exploited proletarians and their exploiting bourgeoisie, it replaced them with a new conflict and designated a “new proletariat”: the youth.
However, their far-reaching goals were much more ambitious. Marxism, as an ideological project, concerns a comprehensive vision of future society based on a “new type of man.” In the neo-Marxist version, this is a person with a critical attitude — freed from the shackles of “oppressive” culture. This individual is incapable of functioning in the current order of Western civilization, hence a revolutionary path is necessary to create a new reality for them to navigate.
