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it is quite right to sacrifice all the present generations to this goal.
Only in this sense does utopian thinking become malignant,
because utopia is a device at the service of tyranny. Nevertheless,
nobody can prevent us - and I don't believe it would be desirable
- from thinking in terms of values which cannot be fully im–
plemented. There is something natural in thinking of a better
world. It is natural and it is indispensable . After all, not much
could have been done in terms of progress if people had not
thought of things which could not have been implemented in their
time but which guided, so to say, their effort. In this sense utopia
is perhaps a permanent component of human life .
It
becomes
really dangerous when we start believing that we can institu–
tionalize human fraternity, that we can by violence and bureau–
cratic decrees, as all the Marxists believe, introduce a society of
perfect unity and happiness . But it is important to keep in mind
the idea of human fraternity , however impracticable it might be .
EK:
Do you think that the utopian element in Marx himself was, so
to say, essential?
LK:
It
is absolutely essential.
EK:
What about a strain ofJewish messianism? The mark of Moses
Hess whom Marx used to scorn?
.
LK:
Many people speculate on the Jewish element in Marx's
utopia. Marx himself had no real Jewish upbringing; as you
know, he was not interested in his Jewish origin, and he strongly
disliked being reminded of it. There was even a kind of anti–
Semitic strain in him. But apart from that, if there was an element
which ties Marx's utopia with Jewish messianism, it was not the
result of Marx's own Jewishness, but rather, as you just mentioned,
a result of the inspiration he got from Hess in whom Judaic mes–
sianic tradition blended with Rousseauist fantasies.
EK:
In an essay you once wrote on "taking ideas seriously," you said
one should not ask who is guilty and who is not, but instead what
were the elements in Marxism - it's ambiguities and con–
flicts - which led as it did to its development. It is an enormously
broad question, I understand. Let me put it in the usual way: how
does it relate to Leninism and Stalinism?
LK:
It is perfectly true that Marx never imagined communism or
socialism as a kind of concentration camp. Quite the contrary.
Nevertheless there is a kind of ideological logic which is indepen–
. dent of the conscious intentions of the writer, philosopher, or
prophet, and which we can follow in historical development. And
