From: Jurriaan Bendien (adsl675281@TISCALI.NL)
Date: Sat May 27 2006 - 09:03:46 EDT
I think I would go along with most of what you say about the publishing situation, Jerry. Of course, theoretical political economy is mostly remote of the real problems of business practice. As regards the intellectual origins of Marxism, authors such as Z.A. Jordan (The evolution of dialectical materialism) and J.D. White (Karl Marx and the Intellectual Origins of Dialectical Materialism) have shown in fine detail the process by which the interpretations of Marx & Engels were welded by intellectuals into a "world view", a "doctrine", a "philosophy of history" and indeed a "cosmology" with a pseudo-religious status. This set the scene for problems of "orthodoxy", "tradition", "dogmatism" and "intellectual security", because then we had a closed theoretical system which only the high priests of Marxism were allowed to modify or render consistent. In reality of course, Marx & Engels did not propose any fixed theoretical systems - their views continued to evolve and progress - and if anything they challenged intellectuals to do some real research that would validate their interpretations. If we study Marx's real interactions with the labour movement (e.g. in the context of the First International), it is remarkable how cautious he really was in introducing his own views. Yet he also mooted many ideas the implications of which he did not think through to the end, or which remained unpublished. As I briefly indicated in my contribution to a wiki article on historical materialism, I think at least from the 1870s the pressure towards the doctrinalisation of Marx's views became increasingly strong, because: (1) Marx & Engels did aim to increase their own political influence in the labor movement and socialist movement, and for this they needed a popular ideology or doctrine which people could easily understand and act upon. Both men were quite capable of splendid political rhetoric and, occasionally, of making sweeping generalisations. (2) Attacks by critics, academics and competitors in the socialist movement also forced them to systematise their ideas; generalisations from experience and research demanded a more explicit coherent theoretical framework. (3) Christian religious and moral doctrine was still very influential among the working classes, who mostly lacked access to a scientific education, and this created the political need or pressure to articulate a complete "alternative belief system" or "scientific world outlook". Thus, Engels already sought to distinguish explicitly between a religious-utopian and a practical-scientific socialism. In addition, if we study Lenin, we see a clear propagandistic preference to distill a Marxism as an easy-to-understand, popular doctrine which could be communicated even among ordinary workers and peasants with a limited reading ability. As revolutionist and modernizer in the early 20th century, Lenin was very aware that the role of theoretical ideas was different for the intellectuals and for workers, and that to pursue a political policy you needed definite ideas and simple slogans - but in addition, he aimed also to prove that all his own ideas were completely grounded in what Marx & Engels said. That of course was impossible, because the situation of the Russian Empire was rather unique, and required major political innovations, and anyway a large part of Marx & Engels's (unpublished) writings remained unknown. Lenin's approach continued in the writings of Stalin, Bukharin, Trotsky and Mao. Probably the best statement of the status of Marxism from a positive Marxist point of view was given by Lenin: "The history of philosophy and the history of social science show with perfect clarity that there is nothing resembling "sectarianism" in Marxism, in the sense of its being a hidebound, petrified doctrine, a doctrine which arose away from the high road of the development of world civilisation. On the contrary, the genius of Marx consists precisely in his having furnished answers to questions already raised by the foremost minds of mankind. His doctrine emerged as the direct and immediate continuation of the teachings of the greatest representatives of philosophy, political economy and socialism. The Marxist doctrine is omnipotent because it is true. It is comprehensive and harmonious, and provides men with an integral world outlook irreconcilable with any form of superstition, reaction, or defence of bourgeois oppression. It is the legitimate successor to the best that man produced in the nineteenth century, as represented by German philosophy, English political economy and French socialism." http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/mar/x01.htm This interpretation however suggests at least five problems: 1) "the high road of the development of world civilisation" is an open, unfinished and unending road from which people might stray, or return to. 2) "the best that people produced" includes more than German philosophy, English political economy and French socialism, and extends to all countries of the world. 3) the world changes, and therefore the requirements of an "integral world outlook" (insofar as it is at all possible) also change. 4) the alleged "omnipotence" concerns an apriori belief, not a proof - it is not unlike a catholic canon of faith, which precisely, is conducive to sectarianism. 5) if Marxism is the "legitimate successor" (rather than, say, an illegitimate child) a closure/schism has already been effected to what came before it and what exists beside it. The fact is that Marx & Engels, beyond indicating their own preferences and making specific political interventions, never finally resolved - theoretically - the problems of: - the relation between science, theory and ideology - the relation between the intellectuals and the workers - the psychological and spiritual effects of upholding a secular belief "system" like Marxism - the relation between ethical theory, politics and lived morality. Quite likely they could not do so, since these problems would present themselves in a different way in different historical situations. And indeed they have been resolved by different Marxist currents in different ways, for good or for ill. The young Gyorgy Lukacs pronounced in 1910 that "It would seem that socialism lacks that religious force capable of taking possession of man's entire soul, as was the case with primitive Christianity" (cited by Meszaros in Georg Lukacs: Festschrift zum 80e Geburtstag, p. 193). An interesting question is, why would that be? George Lichtheim writes in his critique of Lukacs's doctrinairism that "If rationalism is conceived as the standpoint of whatever class happens to be revolutionary or at least in opposition to the status quo (the bourgeoisie in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the proletariat in the nineteenth) then the distinction between theory and ideology goes by the board. For why must it be supposed that only a 'rising class' is able to sustain a realistic view of the world? The fact that a social order has been thrown on the defensive does not preclude the possibility of a disillusioned insight into the nature of the historical process. In point of fact, Marx and Engels consistently praised Balzac - a Catholic, a Royalist and thus a reactionary - for his accurate portrayal of bourgeois society, and Lukacs (in The Historical Novel and elsewhere) fully subscribes to this judgement. He never tires of impressing upon the reader the profundity of Balzac's insight into what he himself calls 'the necessity of the historical process': a formulation that would not have made much of an appeal to Balzac, who was no philosopher and for good measure an opponent of Saint-Simonian socialists who did have such notions. It appears, then, that being on the 'wrong' side politically does not necessarily cloud one's vision (Lukacs's other hero in "The Historical Novel" is the Tory Walter Scott)." (G. Lichtheim, Lukacs. Fontana, 1970, p. 114). Jurriaan
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