Morris on Harvey's Condition

Morris, M. 1992. The Man in the Mirror: David Harvey’s ‘Condition’ of Postmodernity. Theory Culture Society 9:253.

Morris takes a number of approaches in constructing her response to The Condition.
She notes early on that, through his failure to reference feminist works and ideas, Harvey’s text excludes, rather than dialogues with feminism. Morris charges Harvey with the lumping together of othernesses and analyses that differ from Marxism: “For Harvey can only analyse postmodernity by first rewriting as ‘the same’ all the differences that constitute it for him as a topic for debate in the first place” (258).

Morris outlines a set of conditions (of postmodernity and the ways in which it has been studied and conceived) that Harvey creates to allow himself to present the argument that he does. She first points to his portrayal and use of Lyotard’s The Postmodern Condition. Morris argues that Harvey treats Lyotard’s writing as a condition of post-modernism, using selections of the work to construct an opposition and support his argument. Meanwhile, Morris argues that Lyotard’s work is actually, itself, a criticism of postmodernity. While Lyotard actually agrees with Harvey on the continuity of modernism-postmodernism, Harvey chooses to invest and address this (invented) difference, rather than responding to other—perhaps more fundamental and challenging—differences (to do with theory, economics, totality, etc.). Morris claims that Harvey uses this manipulation, together with a lumping of otherness, to constructs a single opposition for himself to oppose.

On Aesthetics:

Morris proceeds to explore Harvey’s understanding of aesthetics. In general, she targets his failure to present (and, perhaps even see a need to) a coherent story of how to connect culture and economy. She accuses him of constructing a false dichotomy between the culture and theory, illusion and reality, and dismissing aesthetics as a useless and improper object (and tool?) of Marxist inquiry.

Harvey opposes (lumped) ‘otherness’ (joined as anti-enlightenment) to ‘rationality’ and treats culture/economy as parallel to place/space, local/global, tradition/modernity (more lumping).

Adopting Harvey’s use of mirror metaphors, Morris presents an image of Harvey’s two divided mirrors. One is the image, that masks reality (bad mirror, aesthetics), and the good mirror, able to reflect the reality behind the bad represents true, Marxist meta-theory. “One mirror commands the universal, the other is mired in the local; one ‘grasps’ (or ‘penetrates’), the other ‘masks’ (or ‘veils’); one wants to know reality, the other worships the fetish; one quests for truth, the other lives in illusion” (269).

On Change:

Morris points to Harvey’s use of language (facilitate, inhibit) as suggesting an approach to aesthetic forms as concerned with space over time and, as such, external to the process of social change. Here, Harvey fails to differentiate (within these spaces) the difference between cultural image and practice. She suggests that Harvey denies the role of representation in work and reproduction and, as such, fails to tell the difference between essentialist cultural politics and an identity politics that is produced culturally and historically from change.

Also, Morris states that by refusing to take images as serious forms of Marxist inquiry, by refusing to acknowledge aesthetic as in conversation with reality, rather than in imitation of reality, Harvey rejects the progressive aims of many projects of the imaginary.

On Meta-theory:

Harvey overlooks the need for an articulation of disjunction, difference (rather than lists that end in etc.) for the building of any sort of movement. Harvey sees these dialogues on difference as limiting (the attainment of a totality, solidarity, coherence), rather than necessary. Without undermining the importance of political economy, Morris argues for the reconciliation of culture and economy, accusing Harvey of failing to take seriously the material reality of representation. She argues against the solution of inclusion into meta-theory and established disciplines, suggesting the importance of freedom to imagine new ways of arranging thought and disciplines.

She also points to the assumed position of the meta-theorist as objective and outside the world – denying (in this case) the particularities of his own position. She concludes by wondering if perhaps Marxism is using this analysis of postmodernity to set up a depository for criticisms of a theory (meta-theory) that she believes is in crisis. In this sense, Morris asks if perhaps the book is more an examination of the social conditions (and limitations) of contemporary Marxism.