"The framework of the journal is Marxist in the broadest sense of the term." So begins the second paragraph of the "Prospectus" for Social Text 1 (1979). Framed like this, a reflection on Marxism and Social Text thirty years later seems to have a lot to answer for. Indeed, John Brenkman tries to answer for that framework in his entry for Social Text 100 on the "Prospectus" that he helped to draft. Writes Brenkman, in this issue: "Why at the moment that Social Text was founded did Marx seem so relevant and liberalism so bankrupt, whereas today -- a scant thirty years later -- Marxism might reasonably be thought to be dead, while the fundamental elements of liberalism are in need of vigorous defense?" Brenkman's effort to answer for Social Text's Marxist framework leads him to repeat the familiar old and new American left plot of nostalgic reflection (on well-meaning but misguided origins), decisive renunciation (of Marxism as an inevitable "illiberalism"), and sober adoption of former foes ("embrace the ordeal of liberalism," he advises). Rather than "answer for" Marxism in Social Text -- as if it were an accusation, an original sin, or a silly delusion of one's juvenilia -- I'll treat Marxism as, well, a social text.