Why the Hungarian philosopher István Mészáros argued that capital survives even without capitalism

Ideas & Philosophy · Published 3 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: István Mészáros was a prominent Marxist thinker who challenged the inevitability of the status quo. He famously distinguished between capitalism and capital, suggesting that the latter could persist even after the former was overthrown. His work remains a vital critique of modern power structures and the ideology of no alternative.

Born in Budapest in 1930, Mészáros developed a lifelong opposition to exploitation while working in an engine factory as a child. He became deeply involved with the Budapest School, a group influenced by György Lukács. Following the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, Mészáros fled the country, becoming an early critic of Stalinism. His intellectual journey took him through academic posts in Italy and the United Kingdom, eventually leading to his influential 1970 work, Marx's Theory of Alienation.

Central to his philosophy was the conceptual separation of capital from capitalism. Mészáros argued that capital is a command system focused on accumulation that existed thousands of years before capitalism emerged. He contended that even if a revolution removes the capitalist class, the power of capital can endure through hierarchical structures and the division of labor. This perspective allowed him to analyze the Soviet Union as a system that, while not capitalist in the Western sense, still functioned through the political extraction of surplus value.

Mészáros was a fierce critic of the pervasive idea that there is no alternative to the current order. He viewed this sentiment as a dangerous ideology adopted by everyone from conservative politicians like Margaret Thatcher to post-modernists and Communist leaders. He found a necessary counterpoint in Jean-Paul Sartre, whose existentialist focus on individual rebellion against the monstrous power of capital he deeply respected. In his later years, Mészáros continued this critique, notably in his 1995 major work, which analyzed the structural crisis of contemporary society.

His career was marked by both recognition and controversy. He received the Isaac Deutscher Memorial Prize in 1970 and the Venezuelan Libertador Prize for Critical Thinking in 2009. In 1973, he faced a significant hurdle when the Canadian government initially blocked his entry, labeling him a security risk and a potential spy. Despite these challenges, he remained a prolific writer until his death in 2017, leaving behind a legacy of rigorous, critical inquiry into the nature of historical change and social control.

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