Society is then conceptualized as a complex whole articulated in dominance by the economy where several social practices co-exist with a relative autonomy, introducing the concept overdetermination to characterize the levels of effectivity.

Except for its introduction, the chapters of For Marx first appeared as articles that were published in journals of the French Communist Party between 1960 and 1964.

[6] Together with Reading Capital (1965), the book drew Althusser to the attention of French intellectuals and attracted a significant international readership.

[8] The appearance of Reading Capital and For Marx in English translation influenced the development of Marxist thought in the Anglophone world throughout the 1970s.

[7] However, For Marx has attracted criticism from both anti-Marxists, such as the conservative philosopher Roger Scruton, and from Marxist theorists, such as the Marxian economist Harry Cleaver.

He also argues that it is doubtful that Althusser's interpretation of historical materialism is true to Marx's intentions, and that it does not deserve to be considered a coherent theory, that it effectively abandons the Marxian thesis that base determines superstructure, that it effectively abandons historical materialism itself, that it is irrefutable in the sense that no possible event would be inconsistent with it, and that it makes no useful predictions.