The term 'cultural Marxism' entered the Oxford English Dictionary in December 2021, marking its journey from fringe fascist publications to mainstream political discourse. In his new book The Cultural Marxism Conspiracy: Why the Right Blames the Frankfurt School for the Decline of the West, intellectual historian A.J.A. Woods provides a genealogy of this conspiracy theory, tracing its development from the 1960s to the present day.
Origins in the 1960s
Woods opens his account in 1969, with the heckling of Herbert Marcuse by Daniel Cohn-Bendit in Rome. Marcuse, a member of the Frankfurt School, was accused of being paid by the CIA—an allegation he dismissed alongside claims of being funded by the Kremlin, Beijing, and Wall Street. This moment encapsulates the shifting political terrain of the late 1960s, where the New Left's fragmentation and the expansion of higher education created fertile ground for conspiracy theories.
According to Woods, the cultural Marxism conspiracy theory emerged from right-wing efforts to resist the social changes of the 'long 1960s,' including antiwar activism, decolonisation, and the rise of identity politics. Rather than engaging with these developments as historical phenomena, the theory's proponents wove them into a narrative of ideological takeover, with the Frankfurt School as the scapegoat.
The Role of Lyndon LaRouche
A key figure in the theory's early development was Lyndon LaRouche, an American political activist who started on the radical left before building a cultish movement. Woods shows how LaRouche and his followers transformed the Frankfurt School into a convenient explanation for the social and cultural changes they deplored. By the 1970s, thinkers like Theodor Adorno were being blamed for everything from changing sexual mores to the rise of rock music—a striking irony given Adorno's lifelong critique of popular culture as a vehicle for standardisation and social control.
LaRouche established the basic contours of the theory, but it was paleoconservative William S. Lind who provided the language for wider circulation. In 1994, Lind coined the term 'cultural Marxism' in a journal article for the US Marine Corps, and a year later he identified the Frankfurt School as the driving force behind political correctness, which he claimed was transforming America into a totalitarian state.
From Tea Party to Today
The rise of the Tea Party in 2007 provided an ideal environment for the dissemination of cultural Marxism narratives. Woods describes the emergence of 'conjunctural intellectuals'—self-appointed patriots who used digital platforms to mobilise supporters and spread ideas, regardless of their truth. In this alternative information ecosystem, stories about cultural Marxism found a receptive audience through assaults on multiculturalism and social justice issues.
The final chapter brings the story into the present, tracing how older anti-Frankfurt School narratives were repackaged through campaigns against Critical Race Theory, 'gender ideology,' and 'wokeness.' The Black Lives Matter protests provided an important backdrop, with conservative activists reframing debates about racism and structural inequality through the language of ideological capture.
A Sobering Analysis
Woods refuses readers of a left-wing persuasion easy consolation. The book does not indulge the comforting fiction that these developments can be explained away by misinformation or manipulation, insisting that the shortcomings of the political left play a role. Nevertheless, the book eschews fatalism. 'The current moment,' Woods writes, 'is a terrain on which we are forced to organise and act.' If there is a note of hope, it lies in the insistence that political outcomes remain contingent rather than predetermined.
