The postmodernist condition

Something that I have been thinking of for a long while was the connection between modernism, marxism and postmodernism. Many have said that socialism is a modernist ideology, with a belief in progress and history and so on. Others have accused the Left of obscurantism that belongs to the continental-postmodernist tradition. I believe that neither of these are right, just as modernism and postmodernism are ideologies in themselves, so marxism remains a Third Way alternative (and one that is less ideological than the two as well).

I recommend reading Lenin's Tomb on Baudrillard's recent death and postmodernism. It has a few interesting points, but I do believe that it is ultimately flawed. I do not believe that the hatred of postmodernism is only a hatred of the West's privilieged position. Why? Let me outline a few critical notes:

1) Postmodernism prevents individuals and groups from action. With it's defeatalist attitude it fosters inaction, navel-gazing and cynicism. Like certain 'moral' socialist ideologies in the past, it prevents the necessary action required to change society.
2) Postmodernism is modern (pardon the pun) philosophical idealism. It shares with it's earlier neighbour the same clouding of reality, the same call to inaction of previous mysticism that is my first criticism.
3) Postmodernism opens the door to obscurantist ideologies and praxis. Whether these are religious, political, social or a combination - anarchist vegan collectives eating from discarded garbage are in some sense a product of the postmodern ideology wherein this sort of confused action, really only meaningless and lame, grows.

With this said, postmodernism, like almost all ideologies, can teach us many valuable lessons. I do not share the same instinctive hatred that so many of my analytical colleagues do. I am in agreeance with Ian Hacking in that matter: it is not all so dangerous or obscurantist. The ideas of narratives, what it teaches us about construction of social differences and so on is very valuable and should not be discarded.

In my opinion, postmodernism is a product of a Left which collapsed ideologically after the Soviet Union and the confusion and panic that came after it. It is also a product of a society that is ever more alienated. Listen to what the postmodernists are talking about. Confusion. Chaos. Panic. "All that is solid melts into the air..." old Marx said, and it could be a slogan of the postmodern movement. I believe, however, that it is rather a suitable slogan for the postmodern condition.