Norman Geras ( ; 25 August 1943 – 18 October 2013) was a

political theorist A political theorist is someone who engages in constructing or evaluating political theory, including political philosophy. Theorists may be academics or independent scholars. Ancient * Aristotle * Chanakya * Cicero * Confucius * Mencius * ...

and

Professor Emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retirement, retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". ...

of Politics at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

. He contributed to an analysis of the works of

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

in his book '' Marx and Human Nature'' and the article "The Controversy About Marx and Justice". His "Seven Types of Obloquy: Travesties of Marxism", appeared in the ''Socialist Register'' in 1990.

Biography

Geras was born in

Bulawayo Bulawayo (, ; ) is the second largest city in Zimbabwe, and the largest city in the country's Matabeleland region. The city's population is disputed; the 2022 census listed it at 665,940, while the Bulawayo City Council claimed it to be about ...

Southern Rhodesia Southern Rhodesia was a self-governing British Crown colony in Southern Africa, established in 1923 and consisting of British South Africa Company (BSAC) territories lying south of the Zambezi River. The region was informally known as South ...

, to a Jewish family. Arriving in the UK in 1962, he read

philosophy, politics and economics Philosophy, politics and economics, or politics, philosophy and economics (PPE), is an interdisciplinary undergraduate or postgraduate academic degree, degree which combines study from three disciplines. The first institution to offer degrees in P ...

Pembroke College, Oxford Pembroke College, a constituent college of the University of Oxford, is located on Pembroke Square, Oxford. The college was founded in 1624 by King James I of England and VI of Scotland, using in part the endowment of merchant Thomas Tesdale ...

, and graduated in 1965. He was a research student from 1965 to 1967 at

Nuffield College, Oxford Nuffield College () is one of the Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is a graduate college specialising in the social sciences, particularly economics, politics and sociology. N ...

, before joining the University of Manchester as a lecturer in 1967. He married the children's writer

Adèle Geras Adèle Daphne Geras (née Weston; born 15 March 1944) is an English writer for young children, teens and adults. Early life Geras was born in Jerusalem, British Mandatory Palestine to History of the Jews in the United Kingdom, British Jewish ...

(born

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, 1944) in 1967. One of their two daughters is Sophie Hannah, the poet and author. Connected with the Trotskyist

International Marxist Group The International Marxist Group (IMG) was a Trotskyist group in Britain between 1968 and 1982. It was the British Section of the Fourth International. It had around 1,000 members and supporters in the late 1970s. In 1980, it had 682 members; by ...

at the time of writing his study of

Rosa Luxemburg Rosa Luxemburg ( ; ; ; born Rozalia Luksenburg; 5 March 1871 – 15 January 1919) was a Polish and naturalised-German revolutionary and Marxist theorist. She was a key figure of the socialist movements in Poland and Germany in the early 20t ...

's political thought, ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' obituarist wrote of Geras' aim for the book: "He set out to defend (as he would then have seen it) Luxemburg’s Marxist orthodoxy. It may seem perverse to Geras’s later admirers across the political divide that he would then have regarded this as a point in Luxemburg’s favour, but the quality of his scholarship was undeniable. He showed that Luxemburg had largely shared Lenin’s own pre-1917 analysis of the revolutionaries’ task." Eustonmanifestolaunch

Geras was on the editorial board of ''

New Left Review The ''New Left Review'' is a British bimonthly journal, established in 1960, which analyses international politics, the global economy, social theory, and cultural topics from a leftist perspective. History Background As part of the emergin ...

'' from 1976 to 1992, and then on the editorial board of ''

Socialist Register The ''Socialist Register'' is an annual socialist publication. It was founded in 1964 by Ralph Miliband and John Saville. They had criticisms of the ''New Left Review'' (''NLR'') after Perry Anderson became editor of the ''NLR'' in 1962. Miliband ...

'' from 1995 to 2003. After retiring as a Professor in 2003, he wrote a

blog A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...

, which focused on political issues, such as the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which he supported, his academic interests, and a range of other topics, including popular music,

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

and films. In 2006, he was one of the principal authors of the

Euston Manifesto The Euston Manifesto ( ) is a 2006 declaration of principles signed by a group of academics, journalists and activists based in the United Kingdom, named after the Euston Road in London where it had its meetings. The statement was a reaction to ...

. Geras's 1989 essay "Our Morals: The Ethics of Revolution" was on the

University of Reading The University of Reading is a public research university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as the University Extension College, Reading, an extension college of Christchurch College, Oxford, and became University College, ...

's list of essential reading for the Justice and Injustice politics module in 2017, but the university warned students to read the essay only in a secure setting where it could not be seen by "those who are not prepared to view it", and not to read it on personal devices. This was after the essay was identified by the university as "sensitive" under the "Prevent" counter-terrorism programme. Geras rejected terrorism, but argued that violence could be justified in the case of grave social injustices.

Bibliography

* 1976: ''The Legacy of Rosa Luxemburg'' (1983 paperback: ) * 1983: '' Marx and Human Nature: Refutation of a Legend'' * 1986: ''Literature of Revolution: Essays on Marxism'' * 1990: ''Discourses of Extremity'' * 1995: ''Solidarity in the Conversation of Humankind: Ungroundable Liberalism of Richard Rorty'' * 1997: ''The Ashes '97: The View from the Boundary'' (with Ian Holliday and Tom Jenkins, Illustrator) * 1998: ''The Contract of Mutual Indifference: Political Philosophy After the Holocaust'' (1999 paperback: ) * 2000: ''Enlightenment and Modernity'' (edited by Geras and Robert Wokler) * 2002: ''Men of Waugh: Ashes 2001'' * 2005: "On the London Bombings". ''

Telos Telos (; ) is a term used by philosopher Aristotle to refer to the final cause of a natural organ or entity, or of human art. ''Telos'' is the root of the modern term teleology, the study of purposiveness or of objects with a view to their aims, ...

'' 132 (Fall 2005). New York
Telos Press
* 2011: ''Crimes against humanity: Birth of a concept'' * 2019: ''The Norman Geras Reader: What’s There Is There'' (Manchester University Press). co-editors: Eve Garrard and Ben Cohen.

References

External links

Normblog

Geras' Twitter page

1989

Imprints, 2002
Alibi AntisemitismFathom: For a deeper understanding of Israel and the region
29 January 2013
Obituary
in ''Socialist Review'' by Paul Blackledge {{DEFAULTSORT:Geras, Norman 1943 births 2013 deaths Academics of the University of Manchester Alumni of Nuffield College, Oxford Alumni of Pembroke College, Oxford British bloggers British Jews British Marxists Jewish socialists Marxist theorists British political philosophers People from Bulawayo Rhodesian Jews White Zimbabwean people Zimbabwean emigrants to the United Kingdom