Sorel, Georges

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SOREL, GEORGES

SOREL, GEORGES (1847–1922), French political and social philosopher.

Georges Eugène Sorel was best known for his condemnation of bourgeois society, his critical interpretations of Marxism, and his emphasis on the power of myth and direct action. While his concern for the moral decadence of European society and the prospects for moral renewal represent consistent themes in Sorel's work, many scholars have emphasized his shifting, sometimes inconsistent, political opinions. Some have claimed that Sorel's work was influential in the ideological development of both communism and fascism.

Sorel was born in Cherbourg in Normandy on 2 November 1847 to a bourgeois family. Upon graduating from the École Polytechnique with an engineering degree in 1866, he joined the French government's Department of Bridges and Roads. He retired in 1891 at the age of forty-four, after his mother died, leaving him a small legacy. He and his wife moved to the Parisian suburb of Boulognesur-Seine, where he spent the remainder of his life as an independent scholar.

Sorel's critique of European society revolved around the idea that Europe had become a morally decadent culture in which people were motivated only by the desire for individual economic and political gain. For Sorel, a moral society was one in which rewards were commensurate with effort and in which people acted virtuously out of a sense of duty and conviction. Sorel's moral concerns were evident in his first two books, both published in 1889. One of these was a textual interpretation of the Bible. The other was an analysis of the trial of Socrates, which concluded that, while Socrates may have been innocent of the specific charges leveled against him, his teachings did lead to a decline in respect for Athenian institutions and thus helped to bring about the downfall of Athenian democracy. Another essay, written in 1894, held the rise of Christianity responsible for the decline of the Roman Empire.

Sorel apparently discovered Marx around 1892, shortly after moving to Paris. The Marxism to which he was first exposed was the orthodox "Scientific Marxism" of Jules Guesde and Paul Lafargue, and his early Marxist writings, mostly book reviews and review essays, reflected this orientation. Beginning around 1897, however, as Sorel's knowledge of Marxism grew deeper, he became critical of several elements of Marxist orthodoxy, including its schematic conception of history, its determinism, its failure to pay sufficient attention to moral and legal issues, and its belief in the inevitability of a successful proletarian revolution.

For Sorel, the key question for Marxism was the question of the moral preparation of the proletariat. He thought the fall of capitalism could be expected to lead to a more just society only if the workers could acquire a superior level of moral culture. For a brief time (1897–1898), Sorel harbored the hope that participation in democratic institutions might be able to produce free producers of the future. Starting around 1898, as he came to see democratic institutions as hopelessly mediocre and corrupting, he began to look to Syndicalism with its ideology of direct action on the part of workers as the best chance for fostering the moral development of the proletariat. His most famous work is his sympathetic analysis of Syndicalism, Réflexions sur la violence (Reflections on violence), first published in 1908. This period also saw the publication of Illusions du progrès (1908; The illusions of progress), an animated critique of the idea of progress in Western culture, and of a book on the work of the French historian Ernest Renan.

It must be pointed out that Sorel was never involved in a practical way with the Syndicalist movement, nor did he have much influence on the ideology or strategies of Syndicalist leaders. Rather, Syndicalism and the enthusiasm generated by the Syndicalist idea of the general strike influenced Sorel to theorize about the morally rejuvenating power of myth and direct action. Sorel's ideas about the power of myth to stir people to heroic action are his best-known intellectual contribution and the reason he is sometimes seen as an intellectual precursor to both Soviet communism and fascism.

As Syndicalism's successes declined after 1907, Sorel became disillusioned with it and began searching for other sources of moral renewal. In the period from 1910 to 1914, he became associated with leaders of the Action Française, a conservative, nationalist group. Beginning around 1914, Sorel was frequently ill and began writing much less. As of 1918, Sorel began to express an interest in Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution. His last book, published in 1921, was an appreciative analysis of pragmatism.

See alsoMarx, Karl; Socialism; Syndicalism.

bibliography

Primary Sources

Sorel, Georges. Reflections on Violence. Edited by Jeremy Jennings. Cambridge, U.K., and New York, 1999. Translation of Réflexions sur la violence (1908).

——. From Georges Sorel: Essays in Socialism and Philosophy. Edited by John L. Stanley. Translated by John and Charlotte Stanley. New Brunswick, N.J., 1987.