The critique of culture in the late work of Herbert Marcuse concerns the substantiation of the subjugation of social consciousness in advanced capitalist societies.

At the same time, and conversely, by tracing the dizzying development of the capitalist mode of production, he identifies open possibilities for emancipation from oppression, which can be utilized within the framework of a critical political program. 

These possibilities fall within the framework of a critique of social consciousness, which has objective characteristics, as derived from the analysis of Western culture in the 1950s and 1960s. 

By insisting on the questioning of the problem of oppression, it becomes evident that the development of the material conditions of capitalist society can indeed produce a form of total domination, but at the same time it also provides the possibility to imagine society without its oppressive mechanisms. 

This does not mean that because the productive forces have developed, emancipation will necessarily follow.