Bloch’s relationship to Marxism is more problematic. Like William Morris […] Bloch stands at the juncture of Marxism and Romanticism. His project can therefore be seen as an attempt to import into Marxism a concept of utopia deriving from a mixture of mysticism and the Romantic tradition and thus as a contamination or dilution of Marxism itself, or it can be seen in Bloch’s own terms as an attempt to reinstate Marx’s own intentions within Marxism through the fundamental but neglected Marxist concept of utopia. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 97

Bloch refuses the identification of utopia with a literary genre: "to limit the utopian to the Thomas More variety, or simply to orientate it in that direction, would be like trying to reduce electricity to the amber from which it gets its Greek name and in which it was first noticed. Indeed, the utopian coincides so little with the novel of an ideal state that the whole total of philosophy becomes necessary … to do justice to the content of that designated by utopia.” [Bloch The Principle of Hope, Basil Blackwell: Oxford 1986, p. 15.] Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 99

Bloch would agree with Mannheim that ‘wishful thinking has always figured in human affairs’ and that ‘myths, fairy-tales, other-worldly promises of religion, humanistic fantasies, romances, have been continually changing expressions of what was lacking in actual life’. He would agree too that they have a compensatory aspect and even that they are susceptible to manipulation: the mirror in which wishful images are reflected is ‘a beautifying mirror which often only reflects how the ruling class wishes the wishes of the weak to be’. However, the compensatory aspect of wishful thinking does not in itself mean that it operates, as Mannheim supposes, to sustain the status quo. It is not merely fictitious compensation for the discomforts of experienced reality, but a venturing beyond that reality which is essential to the inauguration of a transformed future. Utopia contains compensation, but also anticipation. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 100-101

The designation of utopia as ‘anticipatory consciousness’, which is the subtitle of part two of The Principle of Hope, depends upon Bloch’s central concept, the Not Yet. It has two aspects, the Not-Yet-Conscious and the Not-Yet-Become – its ideological and material, or subjective and objective aspects. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 101

The idea of the Not-Yet-Conscious is developed through a critique of Sigmund Freud. In Bloch’s view, Freud regarded the unconscious as a kind of rubbish bin of repressed material that was no longer conscious; this overly negative approach on Freud’s part disregarded the additional and countervailing characteristic of the unconscious, that of being a creative source of material on the verge of coming to consciousness. The unconscious is also the pre-conscious, is intrinsically creative and the source of the utopian impulse, which Bloch appears to regard as a fundamental human propensity. The expression of the Not-Yet-Conscious is of course subject to social determination and thus varies with individual and historical circumstance; hence the variation in utopian expression demonstrated in the rest of The Principle of Hope. The Not-Yet-Conscious is at its strongest in youth, is expressed par excellence in the creative arts and is intensely present in times of change, particularly revolutionary change. Thus ‘all times of change are filled with Not-Yet-Conscious, even overfilled; a Not-Yet-Conscious which is carried by a rising class’. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 101

What prevents the Not-Yet-Conscious from being a purely psychoanalytic or ontological category is that it is the subjective correlate of the Not-Yet-Become, a category which applies to material reality. It is fundamental to Bloch’s argument and to the concept of the Not-Yet-Become that the material world is essentially unfinished, the future is indeterminate and therefore that the future constitutes a realm of possibility. Once the world is seen as in a constant state of process, but a process whose direction and outcome is not predetermined, there are always many possible futures – futures which are real possibilities, rather than merely formal possibilities. Not all projected futures are real possibilities; there are of course constraints, and Bloch’s model is not one of pure voluntarism. Nor are all real possibilities desirable: they include ‘devastatingly, possible fascist Nothing’ as well as ‘finally feasible and overdue, socialism’. These possible futures must be seen as part of, rather than outside, reality despite the fact that the indeterminacy of the future means that there is no necessary development from potentiality to actuality, and despite the fact that not all real possibilities will in fact be realised. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 101-102

Anticipatory elements are identified with concrete utopia (and, as we shall see, Marxism), compensatory elements with abstract utopia; thus Bloch refers to ‘the power of anticipation, which we [call] concrete utopia … (as distinct from the utopistic and from merely abstract utopianizing)’. It is not a question of dividing the mass of material outlined above into concrete and abstract examples, as a division of sheep from goats. Just as Mannheim pointed out that ideology and utopia are ideal types and appear in reality interwoven with one another, so too Bloch sees abstract and concrete utopia, compensation and anticipation, as interwoven in the objects of his study. Unlike Mannheim, Bloch carries this to its logical conclusion: the task is to reveal and recover the anticipatory essence from the dross of contingent and compensatory elements in which utopia is dressed up in particular historical circumstances. Abstract utopia means that the derogatory sense of the term remains, and rightly so, but should not outweigh the positive sense that pertains to the function of concrete utopia: ‘the category of the Utopian, beside the usual, justifiably pejorative sense, possesses the other, in no way necessarily abstract or unworldly sense, much more centrally turned towards the world: of overtaking the natural course of events’. Bloch’s celebration of the anticipatory element present even in vestigial or contaminated forms across the range of human culture, and his simultaneously ruthless attitude to utopia’s abstract trappings, recall Engels’s response to utopian socialism; it is a celebration of the thoughts that break out through fantastic coverings, coupled with a rejection of the coverings themselves – and implying that it is a greater blindness to reject the former than to be deluded by the latter. Nevertheless, the distinction between abstract and concrete utopia is fundamental to Bloch’s project. The rehabilitation of utopia depends upon the removal of the abstract elements which clutter up the concrete core. Concrete utopia must be winnowed out, stripping wishful thinking of that which is purely fantastic, compensatory and escapist. The process entails: "knowledge and removal of the finished *utopistic element*, with knowledge and removal of abstract utopia. But what then remains: the unfinished forward dream, the docta spes which can only be discredited by the bourgeoisie – this seriously deserves the name utopia in carefully considered and carefully applied contrast to utopianism; in its brevity and new clarity, this expression then means the same as: *a methodical organ for the New, an objective aggregate state of what is coming up.*” [Bloch The Principle of Hope, Basil Blackwell: Oxford 1986, p. 157.] What can then happen is that the utopian function ‘tears the concerns of human culture away from … an idle bed of contemplation’ and ‘opens up, on truly attained summits, the ideologically unobstructed view of the content of human hope’ [Bloch The Principle of Hope, Basil Blackwell: Oxford 1986, p. 158.]. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 104-105

A large part of the substance of The Principle of Hope consists of Bloch’s attempt to demonstrate the core of concrete utopia in a range of cultural forms, including both religion and bourgeois culture. The reclamation of these as more than repressive ideology is justified by the idea of cultural surplus. Bloch does not dispute the view that the ruling ideas in any age are the ideas of the ruling class, or that ruling class ideologies justify social conditions by disguising their own economic roots and the system of economic exploitation. However, many cultural productions outlast the conditions that give rise to them: they ‘reproduce themselves in cultural consciousness even after the disappearance of their social bases’. This formulation is unsatisfactory in that it ignores the fact that cultural productions do not reproduce themselves, but are reproduced within historical contexts, even if these differ in some respects from those in which they originate. However, Bloch argues that ideology would be unable to carry out its most important function, ‘namely premature harmonization of social contradictions’, if it consisted only of deception and false consciousness; and those elements which are detachable from the immediate conditions of creation are designated cultural surplus. This surplus is differentially distributed between different cultural forms, being more prevalent in architecture than philosophy, and particularly so in music; it is this that creates continuing culture, and this which must be reclaimed. Cultural surplus is equated with concrete utopia: ‘it becomes clear that this very surplus is produced by nothing other than the effect of the utopian function in the ideological creations of the cultural side’. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 105-106

[Bloch] treats religion, and particularly the Judaeo-Christian tradition, with considerably more respect than is general among Marxists. It is the mystical rather than didactic elements of religion which appeal to him and he argues that the biblical tradition is the major source of utopian striving in the Western world. […] In Bloch’s view, this is not simply because the ideological supremacy of institutionalised Christianity made the Bible an available cultural resource which could be extensively drawn on by architects of the utopian tradition: in the third volume of The Principle of Hope Bloch makes far more radical claims about the importance of the Christian concept of the Kingdom of God. Bloch’s overall project has been described as an intention to fill the gap into which the Gods were imagined. He refuses to belittle the importance of the gap or to underestimate the richness of the way in which it has been filled by religion. Again, he denies that this involves any departure from Marx, who observed not only that religion was the opiate of the people but that it was the heart of a heartless world and the spirit of spiritless conditions. For Bloch it is also therefore an anticipation of a world no longer heartless, conditions no longer spiritless. Religion carried utopia as goal and as aspiration and would continue to do so as long as reality fell short of the conditions for a truly human existence. […] Bloch’s view of Marxism does not involve simply the assertion that the conditions for communism as a better mode of social organization exist, although this was part of his thesis. What is prefigured in all utopian traces is the overcoming of antagonism between humanity and the world – a state which begins to be really conceivable and approachable through Marxism, in communism. The resolution of antagonisms that is represented in the image of the Kingdom is more profound than could be imagined in any currently conceivable social state for it, like Brahms’s Requiem, involves the overcoming of death, the most profound problem of human existence and the most profound anti-utopia. What Bloch argues is that for religion to become unnecessary (for his is an atheistic position, if one that can only be misunderstood by merely describing it as atheistic), Marxism must absorb the field of hope represented by the Kingdom. Or, to put it another way, the idea of God must be separated from that of the Kingdom, and repossessed as at least a potential embodiment of true humanness, the *humanum*. The Marxist inheritance of religion involves the abolition of religion, but it also involves the affirmation of faith in a redeemed future which Bloch sees as religion’s positive aspect. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 114-116

In the end, there is no doubt that Bloch’s view of utopia rests on anthropological claims about the nature of human beings and human consciousness, embodied in the concept of the Not-Yet-Conscious, as well as on cosmological claims about the unfinishedness of the world and real possibility embodied in the Not-Yet-Become. These, as well as the political claim that Marxism makes concrete utopia a real possibility, are contestable, but there are other reasons why Bloch’s work has not had more impact outside the realms of theology. For most readers the problem of whether or not Bloch is orthodoxly Marxist is not a burning issue, and rightly so; the question of whether his position is right, or at least useful, is of much greater importance. Yet problems remain for Marxists and non-Marxists alike and Bloch remains difficult to assimilate to either a Marxist or a liberal-humanist tradition. For Marxists, there is a suspicion that Bloch’s Romanticism and mysticism render him fundamentally anti-materialist (although this judgement is far too simple). […] Further, within both Marxist and liberal-humanist traditions in the Anglo-American academic world the predominantly positivist orientation is at odds with the non-verifiable nature of the argument. If Bloch is not hopelessly mystical, he is at least irredeemably evaluative. From the point of view of both these traditions there are major weaknesses in Bloch’s argument: the positing of transcended alienation as a goal disconnected from the process of material production; the emphasis on subjective experience; the failure or refusal to provide clear or verifiable criteria for his distinctions; and a teleology which suggests that history has a goal rather than simply that human beings have purposes. These weaknesses make it difficult to assimilate Bloch’s strengths, which in the end may be more important. Besides the fact that Bloch brings into focus both the question of the function of utopia and the boundaries, if any, of the field of its subject matter, his work transcends the limits of purely intellectual enquiry. He reminds us that utopia involves fundamental questions about the human condition and its future, and he refuses to abandon faith in the possibilities of that future. His legacy is therefore too important to be left solely to theologians. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 121-122

Tillich opens with three assertions about the status of utopia. First, utopia ‘is rooted in the nature of man himself ’. Secondly, it is not possible to understand history without reference to utopia, since human consciousness and action are meaningless without reference to utopia as beginning and end. Thirdly, with clear dependence on Bloch, he argues that ‘all utopias strive to negate the negative … in human existence; it is the negative in that existence which makes the idea of utopia necessary’. Utopia has both positive and negative characteristics: it contains truth, in so far as it contains the telos, the goal and the purpose of existence; but it also contains untruth, in that it forgets that estrangement is a condition of human existence. Utopia is fruitful in that it opens up possibilities which would have been lost without utopian anticipation; but it is unfruitful in that it is in the nature of the wish to describe impossibilities as real possibilities. Utopia contains power, the power of transformation, and the ‘root of its power is the essential – the ontological – discontent of man in every direction of his being’; but utopia is also impotent in that its negative inevitably leads to failure and disillusion. This contradictory nature of utopia – again defined in terms of function and implicit content – calls for its transcendence. Tillich sees this as accomplished by reference to two orders, the horizontal and the vertical. The horizontal is that of the political and social, of immanent utopia. The vertical is that of radical transcendence, the divine, which continually breaks through. In this breaking through, the Kingdom of God actualizes itself in history; but it is always resisted and suppressed, so that fulfilment in the horizontal is only ever partial. Although Tillich’s debt to Bloch is obvious there is also a radical departure here. Bloch did not see estrangement as a necessary feature of the human condition, but as a contingent one. As we have seen, despite the suggestion that utopianising is a fundamental human propensity, Bloch denied the existence of a fixed human nature which would make it possible to posit estrangement as a necessary and universal condition. ‘There is’, he says, ‘no fixed generic essence of man … ; rather the entire course of human history is evidence of a progressive transformation of human nature’. Bloch saw in communism a way out of estrangement, so that utopia was a real possibility. Although there are similarities between Tillich’s notion of radical transcendence and Bloch’s discussion of the fulfilled moment, there is no doubt that Bloch believed more strongly in the possibility of the full actualisation of utopia – at least if the abstract content (which corresponds to Tillich’s negative aspects) were to be eliminated. Levitas, The Concept of Utopia, p. 120-121