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On the Marxian Theory of Social Control: A Reply to HorwitzAuthor(s): Steven SpitzerSource: Social Problems, Vol. 24, No. 3 (Feb., 1977), pp. 364-366Published by: on behalf of theOxford University Press Society for the Study of SocialProblemsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/800088Accessed: 31-05-2015 15:49 UTC

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ON THE MARXIAN HEORY OF SOCIAL CONTROL:A REPLY O HORWITZ

STEVEN SPITZERUniversity of Pennsylvania

Alan Horwitz 's criticism of my essay rests on a partial, and therefore distorted characteri-zation of the causal structure underlying he theory. ' Specifically, he chooses to isolateone component in the process of deviance production (the self-generated needs of thecontrollers) and argue as if that component comprised the whole of the theoretical system.By truncating and telescoping the theory, Horwitz not only removes the decisive causalelement from the explanation (the historically-based development of contradictions n classsociety), he also creates an impression of tautology where none exists.

There is a functional proposition within the theory: within class societies the system ofsocial control will tend to take the form which best insures the maintenance and extensionof class rule. But to analyze this proposition n a vacuum and ignore ts contingent characteris to do serious violence to the Marxian model. Because control arrangements re ultimatelya response o structurally enerated and historically contingent problems of class society, theessential cause of deviance processing systems cannot be discovered n either the interactionbetween the rulers and the ruled, or the specific needs of the ruling class. It must befound in the distinctive forms of socio-economic organization (e.g. slavery, feudalism,capitalism, state socialism) that call into being specific forms of social control at particularpoints in their development. To infer from Marxian heory that whichever social controlsystem is actually adopted becomes the one which best stabilizes ruling class dominance(Horwitz, 1977), would be to deny the foundations of Marx's historical materialism. Itwould rip the relationship between the problems of class society and control from the his-torical context in which it is imbedded and, in so doing, posit an empty, ahistorical and self-replicating process.

It is precisely the historical nature of the theory that enables us to distinguish whichforms of control are likely to be used at a given point in the development of a system ofclass rule. If we limit ourselves o the needs of the ruling class to explain, for example,why capital punishment was favored in 18th century England and whipping n the slave-owners' South, and why community-treatment s popular in contemporary America, wewould remove from consideration the conditions basic to Marxian nterpretation. It is onlywhen these historical conditions are ignored that the theory becomes untestable or

unfalsifiable. According to Hemple (1966:31) a scientific hypothesis normally yieldstest implications only when combined with suitable auxillary assumptions. When theseassumptions (in this case the assumption of dialectical development) are suspended, theimpression hat a theory cannot be tested may be erroneously ustained.

In deciphering he causes of control it is clear that ruling classes do not simply choose

1As i thought I made clear in the original article, my intention was only to offer a prolegomenato a theory, not a theory in the strict sense of the word. The presumption that a theory of deviance

could be developed and presented within the space of a journal article reveals important differencesbetween Positivist and Marxist conceptions of what theory is and how it is created. For anyone work-ing with the Marxian tradition it would be foolish to call a few interrelated propositions a theory, orto expect that theories can be developed simply by first grinding out testable propositions like pre-packaged sausage and then playing erector games with those propositions in the task of theory construc-tion. Although I disagree with the assumptions underlying his reasoning and definitions of what theoryis, I fully agree with Horwitz's observation that I have not proffered a true theory of deviance: I neverintended or pretended to do so.






Communication 365

whatever works, they choose from standpoints, views and propensities that do not formanother set of independent data but are themselves molded by the objective set (Schumpe-ter, 1962:12). Rulers thus select or countenance modalities of control which appear o them

to be most consistent with their historically-defined lass intersts.2 Not only are they some-times ill-advised or clumsy in their selection and application of control measures: hey mayactually behave irrationally n that their attempts to achieve control produce an oppositeeffect. Of course, this irrationality s not a measure of the ineffectiveness or ineptitude ofany given set of rulers; it is a reflection of the contradictions nherent in the class systemitself. Given the significance of this type of irrationality or Marx's conception of socialchange, it is ironic that Horwitz imputes a rationality to the ruling class-a rationalitywhich not only anthropomorphizes he control system, but also contradicts he basic premisesof Marxian heory.

In contrast to Parsonsian heories of law, with which my analysis was compared, here is

no equilibrium assumption within the Marxian model. Instead, the theory assumes anessential disequilibrium and instability, a continuous movement of systems of dominationtoward their own dissolution. To follow Horwitz's advice and predict n advance hat onedeviance processing system from a range of possibilities will be adopted because it mosteffectively stabilizes the rule of the capitalist class, we would have to assume that thecharacteristics of these systems are exclusively determined by the imperatives of control,and that changes in these systems are only a reflection of tendencies toward equilibrium.We would have, n other words, a theory much closer to the formulations f Michels 1962) andPareto (1967) than those of Marx.

I regret that my essay did not distinguish more clearly between Marxian, unctional andelite theories. But whatever the merits of my original argument, t is clear that theoreticalinsights are not always rendered more intelligible when they are reduced to the slenderproportions of a causal formula. While theories should always be stated in terms that makethem susceptible of proof, the development of true heory will suffer whenever we becomepreoccupied with the form of a relationship o the exclusion of its substance.

REFERENCES

Hemple, Carl G.1966 Philosophy of Natural Science. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall.

Horwitz, Allan1977 Marxist theories of deviance and teleology: A critique of Spitzer. Social Problems, This issue.

Michels, Robert1962 Political Parties. New York: Collier Books.

2 The causal structure of Marxian theory is easily misconstrued by those of empiricist leanings becauseempiricism has always been hostile to the notion of a purpose or tendency which can supposedly be

identified separately from the conscious desires of the being concerned (Taylor, 1966:241). The crucialdistinction is that for Marxian theory individuals can be influenced by social structure without having aclear conception of what is at stake. As Taylor (1966:241-242 notes, in talking of the structural eventsof history, such as the rise of classes, as though they fell in the realm of human action, even though theydid not represent the goal of any individual agent, they (the Marxists) seem to be setting alongside the

ordinary explanation through individual agents onewhich

makes appealto entities with wills distinct

from that of their members. For Marxism of course, the will of, say, the bourgeoisie is nothing mysterious,but is simply the commonly accepted aims of the bourgeois as seen in the historical context... This willnot be perhaps the will of the bourgeois as they would recognize it. But this is not surprising, for they areonly aware of the ends they seek in a distorted 'ideological' form. If, however, one wishes to maintainthat a will can only have the content that it is conscious of having, that this type of 'interpretation,'therefore, is without meaning, then, indeed, the will of a class becomes something mysterious added on tohistory, as it were, from the outside. The theory appears to be an odd kind of supernatural holism.






366 HORWITZ AND SPITZER

Pareto, Vilfredo1967 Sociological Writings. S. E. Finer (ed.). New York: Praeger.

Schumpeter, Joseph A.1962 Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. New York: Harper Torchbooks.

Taylor, Charles1966 Marxism and empiricism. in Bernard Williams and Alan Montefiore (eds.), British Analytical

Philosophy. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.




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