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Fall, 2004 |
Ernesto Verdeja |
[
Introduction
] [ Assignment ]
[ Essay Questions ]
The focus of this week's readings is Marx's theory of history, which we will refer to as the theory of historical materialism. The basic question which this theory is meant to answer is "how does social change occur?" This is a vital question for Marx because he believes that we are essentially historical creatures, and because he is trying to construct a theory of society that will help to bring about a revolution establishing communist society. There are several key concepts in his theory; as you do the readings for this week you should pay special attention to how these concepts are used. They include forces or mode of production, relations of production, class, ideology, bourgeoisie, proletariat, commodity, and state.
From our discussion and readings it should already be clear why the premise of Marx's theory is that labor – the productive interchange between humans and their environment – is the foundation of human society. The first few pages of the German Ideology state this premise quite clearly and provide a good bridge from Marx's earlier "philosophical writings" to his later writings in social theory. Marx argues that through labor humans create, satisfy and recreate their needs, and develop their capacities. This is why Marx concentrates on the "economic" aspects of social life in his account of historical change.
Marx also insists on the social character of human laboring. Every kind of productive activity requires a definite set of social relations without which it could not occur. Like Rousseau and Adam Smith, Marx sees the division of labor to be crucial, for it is with the development of the division of labor that people come to be differentiated into separate groups based upon their different roles in production. When the division of labor was very limited, people lived a fully communal existence in which there was little differentiation within society, and what division of labor existed was largely contained within a patriarchal family structure. Property was communal because private property in the means of production was practically nonexistent. With the growth of specialization came the development of new forms of property, and people came to be differentiated into distinct classes reflecting their relationships to the means of production. Because classes are the social forms through which production takes place, and because production is the crux of human society, Marx analyzes history in terms of the succession of "social formations" which are distinguished by their particular class structures and associated modes of production. In his most general formulation of this view (in the "Preface" to his Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy) he distinguishes four stages of development: the Asiatic, ancient, feudal, and modern bourgeois.
All of these social formations are forms of class society, where one class dominates another because it "owns" the means of production – although what it means to "own" something varies from society to society. Class society is always based upon a conflict of interest between dominant and subordinate classes; class society embodies an "antagonistic form of the social process of production" (p. 5). This antagonism does not mean that particular individuals from different classes cannot have friendly or warm relations with each other; rather, it arises "from the social conditions of life of the individuals." People in different classes find themselves in situations where their interests and aspirations are in deep conflict because of the very structure of the situation, irrespective of the goodwill they may feel towards members of other classes. Moreover, the dynamics of class conflict have a powerful impact on the overall pattern of development of a society. As Marx puts it in the Communist Manifesto, "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles" (p. 473).
In Marx's general theory, the fundamental contradiction in social formations may be said (though somewhat imprecisely) to develop between the forces of production and the relations of production. At the inception of a form of society the dominant relations of production complement and foster the development of the forces of production, but later on new forces of production, employed by new social groups or classes, may come into existence. The further development of these new forces, and the advancement of the interests of the new classes, will become inimical to the existing relations of production, and to the interests of the dominant class in the old structure. The prevailing relations of production increasingly become "fetters" on the forces of production, and conflict between the dominant class of the old society and the newly emerging class will intensify. As this contradiction becomes more severe, the society experiences a crisis. Eventually, the point is reached where the new class which has emerged in the interstices of the old society overthrows the existing political and legal institutions, establishes a new set of productive relations, and restores another (temporary) equilibrium.
Marx uses this model to explain the development of feudal society and how it gives way to capitalism. Feudal society was based on a mode of production in which the division of labor was very restricted, and where virtually all production was directed towards supplying the needs of particular individuals, who were generally members of same community as the producer. As trade over long distances developed and new techniques of production were discovered, new social groups came into being – particularly the bourgeoisie who lived in towns and made their living as merchants and later manufacturers. As the new mode of production developed and the bourgeoisie expanded its activities and power, feudal institutions and practices became greater and greater obstacles in the path of the bourgeoisie. Eventually, a revolutionary struggle ensued, and the bourgeoisie triumphed, at least in northern and western Europe. In Capital Marx applies this theory to the development and functioning of capitalist society.
One of the main purposes of Marx's theory is to answer such questions as what determines the way in which these struggles develop, and how does one kind of class structure evolve or change into another? Marx is often interpreted as having given a particularly rigid, mechanistic answer to these questions. According to this view, the mode of production, understood as the techniques of production (which involves the technical division of labor in productive activity), requires certain "relations of production." These relations involve certain forms of property and a particular class structure; the relations of production together with the mode of production are called the "economic base" of society. The economic base, according to the mechanistic interpretation of Marx, determines the "superstructure" of society, the political and legal structures, and the forms of consciousness (its art, philosophy, religion and other forms of culture). Thus, as the mode of production changes, the relations of production change, and these changes together cause the other aspects of the society to change in determinate ways. According to this view, history consists of a series of predetermined stages through which society passes on the road to communism. The texts most often used to support this interpretation include the German Ideology and the "Preface" to his Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, but there are passages in the Communist Manifesto and in other writings that support it as well. Engels' essay for this week offers a relatively "mechanistic" reading of historical materialism. You should be able to state this mechanistic model of historical materialism after having read this week's readings.
There are, however, many who argue that Marx's theory is not mechanistic and deterministic in this way. According to them, Marx does not claim that the forces of production mechanically determine the rest of social life (including both what people do and what they believe and value). Rather, they interpret Marx as seeing economic factors (and the model of society set out above) as the primary, but not the sole, causal elements in social life. Some would go so far as to argue that the forces of production can be affected by changes in the political or ideological sphere, so that the direction of causation is not simply one way. As you read you should ask yourself whether there is any evidence that Marx held this "dialectical" view of social change.
A great deal hinges on whether the "mechanistic" or "dialectical" version of the model is correct, because revolutionary strategy will be quite different depending on which version one accepts. If the mechanistic view is accepted, one would be likely to disregard the ideas people hold, concentrating instead on the economic arrangements of society. This could give rise to a fatalistic attitude, according to which there is little to be done until the necessary "objective conditions" for a revolution (i.e., the required changes in the economic base) have been realized. On the other hand, it may support a radical kind of activism, leading revolutionaries to try to seize power and impose socialism on the society once they have seen that the necessary “objective conditions” have developed. In either case, the crucial leadership role would fall to the (small) elite who had come to understand the laws of history and who therefore were uniquely qualified to decide what should be done. One might call this the instrumentalist or elitist view of social revolution, perhaps best represented in the writings and political activity of Lenin and Leninist parties.
A more dialectical account might support revolutionary strategies which placed great stress on educating people to the possibilities of social change in a humanizing or communist direction. In this model, the objective would be to enable the people themselves to alter their own organizations and activities in such a way as to bring about a communist revolution. This might be called the "educative" view of social revolution, a view often associated with the work of Rosa Luxemburg.
Marx was most interested in understanding the stage of human history which he thought was reaching its apogee as he was writing, the capitalist or bourgeois epoch. In the Communist Manifesto and in the selections from the Grundrisse, Marx details what he takes to be distinctive about capitalism. You should note the many laudatory things Marx has to say about capitalism; contrary to popular belief, Marx's view of capitalism was not purely negative, for the very good reason that he believed it to be necessary in order to create the basis for a communist society. Marx saw his work, including his theory of history and his life-long study of the dynamics of capitalist society, as a contribution to the revolutionary struggle to build a new, socialist society upon the achievements of capitalism.
Assignment: "Preface" to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, in Tucker, pp. 3 - 6.
"Theses on Feuerbach," in Tucker, pp. 143-5.
The German Ideology, Part I, in Tucker, pp. 146-200.
The Grundrisse, sections E and F, in Tucker, pp. 261-78.
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, in Tucker, pp. 683-717.
1. What does Marx mean when he says that "Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life"?
2. What is distinctive about capitalist society? Why does Marx think that a traditional economy, where there is a division of labor, where people exchange labor and products using money, and where artisans and landowners may hire workers to perform economic tasks, is not a capitalist economy?
3. What distinguishes a communist revolution from all past revolutions? Why does Marx expect a communist revolution to be distinctive?
Note:
For a contemporary statement, written from a Marxist perspective, of the difficulties of reconciling Marx's commitment to "materialism" and the primacy of the economic base in explaining social change, and the apparent role of ideational, cultural, and political factors in this process, see E. Laclau and C. Mouffe, Hegemony and Socialist Strategy.
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