[Marxism] Dialectical and Historical Materialism

["Jurriaan Bendien" <andromeda246@xxxxxxxxx>]

Karl Marx himself never once used the specific term "historical
materialism", nor "dialectical materialism" for that matter. No scholar has
ever found even one locus. He talked only about a "materialistischen
Auffassung der Geschichte" (a materialist approach to, or outlook on, or
comprehension of history), considered as a guide or method to the study of
history. In his 1859 Preface to Contribution to the Critique of Political
Economy, he refers in fact to a "guiding thread" (Leitfaden) for his
studies.

More specifically, Marx rejected a general philosophy or theory of history -
he aimed for an historical science, a scientific approach to history based
on generalisations from real empirical research. He had nothing but contempt
for the German "system builders" who tried to extrapolate grand theories of
history and society from skimpy knowledge, and he cautioned against sweeping
inferences not supported by serious and substantive research. Similarly, in
a series of articles published in Vorwärts (January 3 1877-July 7 1878)
later published as "Anti-Duehring", Engels took Herr Duehring to task for
his "world schematism".

In a etter to the editor of the Otetchestvennye Zapisky, written at the end
of November 1877, Karl Marx commented: "{my critic] feels himself obliged to
metamorphose my historical sketch of the genesis of capitalism in Western
Europe into an historico-philosophic theory of the marche generale imposed
by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it
finds itself, in order that it may ultimately arrive at the form of economy
which will ensure, together with the greatest expansion of the productive
powers of social labour, the most complete development of man. But I beg his
pardon. (He is both honouring and shaming me too much.)".

In the introduction to the pamphlet Socialism: Utopian and Scientific,
Frederick Engels did accept the term "historical materialism", stating that
"This book defends what we call "historical materialism", and the word
materialism grates upon the ears of the immense majority of British
readers". But interestingly, the section devoted to "historical materialism"
only refers to the transition from medievalism to capitalism, and from
capitalism to socialism.

Engels's main aim in this pamphlet was in fact to argue that "The new
productive forces have already outgrown the capitalistic mode of using them.
And this conflict between productive forces and modes of production is not a
conflict engendered in the mind of man, like that between original sin and
divine justice. It exists, in fact, objectively, outside us, independently
of the will and actions even of the men that have brought it on. Modern
Socialism is nothing but the reflex, in thought, of this conflict in fact;
its ideal reflection in the minds, first, of the class directly suffering
under it, the working class."

So Engels does not in fact propound any general theory, or philosophy, about
the course of history either. He never published his speculative notes about
the dialectical properties of nature.

Insofar as he does attempt to advance such a theory, e.g. in "Origin of the
Family, Private Property and the State", he tries to synthesize the findings
of the latest available research. His argument was the Lewis Morgan was
ignored, because Morgan "filled the measure to overflowing by not merely
criticizing civilization, the society of commodity production, the basic
form of present-day society, in a manner reminiscent of Fourier, but also by
speaking of a future transformation of this society in words which Karl Marx
might have used."

The gradual doctrinalisation of historical and dialectical materialism, and
their conversion into a general cosmology counterposed to religious belief
is mainly a post-Engels development, as described by Z. A. Jordan in "The
Evolution of dialectical materialism" (London: Macmillan, 1967).

It was acknowledged by their contemporaries that Lenin wasn't much of a
philosopher (see e.g. Anton Pannekoek's "Lenin as a philosopher") and that
Stalin/Koba wasn't much of a theoretician. Nevertheless both men sought to
condense "Marxism" into a simple system readily understandable by any
peasant able to read. Lenin's point of view was that Marxism was both a
science and an ideology, leading to the notion of a "scientific ideology".
This concept however conflicts with Marx's own view - for Marx,
characteristic of ideology was that it is unscientific.

Stalin's pamphlet on Dialectical and Historial Materialism was published at
the height of the Great Terror. It announced that: "The basis of the
relations of production under the socialist system, which so far has been
established only in the U.S.S.R., is the social ownership of the means of
production. Here there are no longer exploiters and exploited." For anyone
aware of the realities of life in the USSR in 1938, this is patently
ridiculous, pure apologism.

Striking also is Stalin's productive force determinism, extolled as a
general principle of history: "The second feature of production is that its
changes and development always begin with changes and development of the
productive forces, and in the first place, with changes and development of
the instruments of production. (...)  First the productive forces of society
change and develop, and then, depending on these changes and in conformity
with them, men's relations of production, their economic relations, change."

In fact Karl Marx himself made no such claim at all. For Karl Marx, the
productive forces consisted not just of the material means of production
(tools, technology, materials, instruments, improved land) but also
centrally of living human labor-power itself, and the technical systems of
co-ordination or organisation of production.

For that reason, Stalin's claim about productive force determinism in
history, apart from being false, is also meaningless from the point of view
what Marx argued. Stalin's claim just signified an ideology justifying
forced industrialisation and an increased level of investment at the expense
of workers' consumption.

Jurriaan





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