The book has received a mixture of praise and criticism from commentators.

Making Sense of Marx was praised as "sharp" and "hard-headed" by the political scientist David McLellan.

[1] The political philosopher Richard W. Miller called Elster's work "erudite".

[2] Conversely, the Marxist economist Ernest Mandel gave the work a negative review,[3] while the philosopher Jan Narveson wrote that the work was, "greeted with highly mixed feelings by those who had hoped the title meant that there was sense to be made" of Marx.

[4] This article about a philosophy-related book is a stub.