The Concept of Utopia by Ruth Levitas

Review by: Peter Stilllman

Utopian Studies, Vol. 2, No. 1/2 (1991), pp. 220-222
Published by: Penn State University Press
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220 UTOPIAN STUDIES

Ruth Levitas. The Concept of Utopia.

Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 1991. pp. x + 224.
Index and Bibliography. $34.95 cloth, $14.95 ppbk.
More than most academics,
scholars in Utopian studies suffer from a lack
of agreement and clarity on the central term of their subject-matter. No
definition, sets of definitions, or general characterizations of Utopia have
proved to be lucid, free from strikingproblems about inclusion (or exclusion),
and capable of winning relative consensus. To some extent, the variety of
definitions generates a rich and variegated plurality of voices, ideas, and
approaches to Utopia and Utopian thinking. That same definitional variety,
however, also produces a cacophony inwhich sustained dialogue isdifficult.
anyone who attempts to define Utopia quickly learns that
Moreover,
conundra, ambiguities, and ideological differences surface at every turn.
How descriptively complete must something be to be a Utopia? From whose
point of view is it to be evaluated as a "good" or "better" place? Must itbe
realizable (and, if so, on whose view of how theworld functions)? What is
the purpose of Utopia? These are only a few of themany immediate questions
that leavemost attempted definitions moribund, incomplete, or inadequate.
Ruth Levitas boldly forays into this desolate landscape. She offers a
sustained, intelligent, and critical examination of major definitions of
Utopia, bringing out clearly a wide range of important recurring issues that
trouble attempts at definition and yet that all definitions must implicitly or
explicitly confront. She also proposes an analytic definition thatmay focus
and guide Utopian studies.
The Concept of Utopia is clearly and coherently structured. After a
brief introduction, Levitas devotes seven of her eight chapters to analyzing
definitions of Utopia from the past two centuries. She first reviews six
famous Anglo-American mainstream studies of Utopia published before
1960, such as Lewis Mumford's Story of Utopia (1922), to discover typical
limits and problems of Utopian scholarship. Noting thatmost of theseworks
define Utopia in terms of its form?as a relatively complete, fictional, ideal
then turns to a different tradition, more European and
society?Levitas
sometimes Marxist, that characterizes Utopia in terms of its function: social
change.

So her next five chapters examine the views about Utopia held byMarx
and Engels, Mannheim and Sorel, Bloch, Morris, and Marcuse. Each chap
ter focuses on Utopia's function of social transformation. Each presents
further elements that constitute themeaning of Utopia for this tradition: for
instances, Levitas explores the linked concepts of "dreams," "desire," and
she examines the idea of "abstract" versus "concrete" Utopias;
"hope";
and she asks about estrangement and itsovercoming for each thinker.Each
chapter also criticizes the thinkers: for instance, most pay insufficient
attention to form. Finally, each is a valuable interpretive enterprise on its
own. She re-evaluates Marx and Engels, arguing that they object not to the

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Book Reviews

221

Utopians socialists' images of the future but to their ideas about the
transition to that future. She provides a clear catalogue of criticisms of
Mannheim's work on ideology and Utopia (and of Ricoeur's neo-Mann
heimian approach); she also notes how Mannheim and Sorel, ideological
opposites, are linked by their inabilities to integrate reason and passion, the
dichotomy on which somany of their core ideas are built. Merely to present
Bloch's Utopian ideas in English is a signal contribution; and Levitas also
proposes a novel interpretation of Morris's News from Nowhere and an
imaginative synthesis of Marcuse's evolving ideas about Utopia.
Levitas's penultimate chapter returns to Anglo-American definitions,
focusing on the strong scholarly work of the past decade or so, inwhich,
nonetheless, Utopia's definition remains sharply contested and problematic.
The final chapter explicitly pulls together the definitional issues from earlier
chapters in the book and tries to resolve them. How should students of
Utopia deal with the variety of definitions of Utopia and the historical vari
ability of Utopias? Is Utopia to be defined in terms of farm, function, or
content?Must itbe a possible world? Can arcadian, millennial, or cockaigne
like visions be considered Utopias? Is there a Utopian impulse or propensity?
Is Utopia currently in decline? Amidst these and other questions about the
content of any definition of Utopia, Levitas iswisely self-conscious about
the function and goal of defining Utopia. She settles on an analytic
definition (not a descriptive or normative one) that is consciously broad (in
order to allow for historical variability as well as to encourage scholarly
diversity), that tries to integrate reason and passions, and that does not
prejudge on ideological grounds any Utopias, Utopian scholarship, or active
pursuit of a Utopian vision: Utopias express "the desire for a better way of
living" and "being" (8, 191).
Just as a brief review can only indicate how Levitas weaves together all
the book's concerns to produce and enrich her definition, so too itsdifficul
ties or ambiguities can only be touched on. For those who wish clear and dis
tinctdefinitions that definitively demarcate the ins from the outs, Levitas's
last chapter will disappoint. But I think she has shown well the failure of
definitions that carefully delimit Utopia; so she ison the right track in seek
ing a broad definition. Whether "desire" suffices is less clear tome. On the
one hand, desire seems too broad, including as itdoes almost every particu
lar feeling of dissatisfaction each individual has; on the other hand, it seems
too narrow, downplaying reason too much and ignoring the dreaming and
play, the complex logic and intricately-articulated ideals, that can go into
creating an extensively-described model society.
Beyond its central critique and its definitional proposal, the book has
many strengths. Its approach to the problem of definition?to seek an ana
lyticaldefinition through a sociology-of-knowledge analysis of scholars and
activists who attempted to define Utopia?is unusual, and provides a novel
angle on the topic. So does Levitas's concern with social change, and her
insistence?when talking of human needs, for instance?that human char
acteristics are socially constructed. She is attuned to feminist concerns,

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222 UTOPIAN

STUDIES

briefly but incisively noting that those who contrast Bellamy and Morris
ignore their shared overlooking of the development of women and the status
of children, issues on which Gilman stands in contrast to both men (109).
She does not limit the Utopias she considers to the usual litany fromMore to
the present, but includes Utopias of theNew Right and of the neo-Marxist
left (i.e., Bloch, Marcuse). Finally, even when the concepts are complex, she
writes with clarity and grace. In sum, Levitas has written a strong and signif
icant book, a far-ranging, insightful, and incisive exploration of the concept
of Utopia.
Peter Stilllman
Vassar College

Harry Liebersohn. Fate and Utopia inGerman

Sociology, 1870-1923.
Cambridge, Massachusetts
x + 282 pp. $12.95.

and London,

England: MIT

Press,

1988.

At the risk of causing readers of Utopian Studies tomove on to the next

item immediately, this book is almost wholly about German sociology, not
about Utopia (or even fate). It does have relevance for Utopian studies, how
ever, although thatmay be in a rather different sense from that which the
author intended, the central thesis of the book is that there exists a Utopia in
German sociology, a Utopia of community, which informs both the personal
quests of the individuals discussed and their intellectual work. It is,more
over, a Utopia whose temporal location shifts from an unequivocal identifi
cation with thepast in the case of T?nnies, to the post-revolutionary future in
Luk?cs, via themore ambiguous positions of Troeltsch, Weber and Simmel.
The common problematic of these writers as described by Liebersohn is
essentially that of the characterization, criticism and eventual transcendence
ofmodernity, and particularly the relationship between self and society that
is entailed therein.All of them contrast traditional and modern society, and
all share the 'dissatisfaction with the fragmentation of modern society
[which] was a widespread feeling in pre-war Europe.'
Liebersohn's discussion has many merits. It is consistently readable,
interesting and thought-provoking. Some of the details both are illumi
nating about their historical subject-matter and connect up with issues of
current importance. For example, the account ofWeber's vain (perhaps in
both senses of the word) attempts to impose his idea of value-neutrality
upon the discussions of the German Sociological Society, especially on
issues of race, helps to explain Weber's insistence upon the principle. But
Liebersohn's comments on the debates are also important; the very insis
tence upon value-freedom allowed racial theories to gain respectability by

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