Marxist philosophy- dialectics and materialism (2001)

Marxist Philosophy - dialectics and materialism (2001)

'Dialectical materialism' is a phrase coined by Engels in the 1890"s to describe Marx's approach to philosophy. However to understand Marxist philosophy it is better to approach the problem with the understanding that dialectics is an analytical method and historical materialism is a method of socio-economic analysis.

Marx learned dialectics from Hegel who discovered the method in his book, Logic. Dialectics is based on the theory of Subject, Predicate and Object. Like a sentence dialectics posits three component parts. Marx differed from Hegel in that he did not put the Idea at the centre of understanding Being. Marx maintained that the material world shapes consciousness, not vice versa. The theory of dialectics is that a subject is transformed by a new set of facts, ideas or circumstances into its opposite.

It is when we apply this method to history that we find the origin of dialectical materialism. Throughout history, material forces have arisen which gave rise to division in society e.g. classes have been formed by economic development such as the aristocracy and the middle class. When the aristocracy came up against the middle classes in seventeenth century England a process of conflict arose and a new state of affairs was created which synthesised the two contending classes. There was born a middle class government of capitalist farmers, merchants, bankers and the aristocracy.

From a working class point of view, this revolution was not satisfactory. The workers soon found themselves in opposition to the new rulers. Through the dialectical method, we can see a new process emerging of conflict between workers and the middle classes and aristocracy for political, social and economic power. This struggle has been ongoing since the nineteenth century in Britain.

Historical materialism identifies four stages in the development of history – primitive communism, feudalism, capitalism and socialism. In the first stage primitive communism, all property was held in common with others. In feudalism, property was owned by the lord, the church and the feudal hierarchy. Under capitalism, property is privately owned and under socialism, property is owned jointly. The process of expropriation at each stage of history is a revolutionary change and invariably involves civil war and violent upheavals. In Ireland, before the English conquest of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,property was held in common i.e. primitive communism. However in the Southern Pale, property was held by feudal owners. In the North feudalism had already begun with 'surrender and regrant' by the English Crown in 1579. After the English consolidated their power over Ireland through war, capitalist ownership of land became the norm. Land was the main object of value and was exploited for agricultural products which were sent to the English market .

If we refer back to the dialectical method, we see that the farmers and workers found themselves transformed into the opposite of the landlords. A process of violent interaction between the two classes developed which led to a new synthesis i.e. a native capitalist farmer class. The development of industry has led to a new area of conflict for rival classes. As the cities developed they drew in hundreds of thousands of workers who had been displaced by economic competition. Today, the dialectic is between the urban middle class and farmers and the working class of the towns and cities. Marx predicted that this conflict would end with the victory of the working class.

What is the key feature of successful change or revolution in society? Revolution occurs when the further development of the productive forces is no longer compatible with existing social relations. Social relations are the class system and the system of production that goes with it. Throughout history, the common theme is the development of the productive forces. When a society hinders this development, there is either revolution or barbarism. Society reverts to a barbaric state where the social forces which fulfil a revolutionary purpose are unsuccessful.

Whether a revolution is successful or not depends, not just on the balance of forces in one society but on a worldwide scale. The international division of labour is the feature of the world market which was created by the discovery of America in 1492. A revolution in one country does not last very long in historical terms if it is not accompanied by a world revolution. The last world revolution was the capitalist revolution of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries which opened up the world to capitalist exploitation.

How then do we analyse or theorise about the one great revolution of the last century - the Russian Revolution of 1917? In this Revolution the peasants and middle classes first came to power in February. The Bolsheviks found themselves in opposition to the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks. The conflict was mediated by the effects of the First World War which drained away Russia's productive capacity in terms of men and materials. The conflict was resolved only by the Bolshevik conquest of power and the limited peace which it brought with it. Afterwards the conflict between the old and the new dragged on for four years as the Imperialists intervened and the White Armies sought to crush the revolution. To revive the economy, limited private ownership was revived by the New Economic Policy. In the 1920's the world economy went into recession and world trade i.e. the influence of international economic developments declined steadily. In the 1930's there was a huge economic decline and the United States alone lost one quarter of its industrial production through recession. Meanwhile as world trade declined, Russia launched itself on the road to autarchy or self-sufficient national development. Only Russia or the United States could have followed this path in those years because both were self-sufficient in food, oil, coal, gold and iron ore.

The limits of national development were reached in the 1980's when there was no growth and living standards stagnated. World trade had picked up after the Second World War and had grown fivefold. To exist outside the international division of labour was no longer possible as Gorbachev and the reformers vainly struggled against the tide of history. The Russian empire was carried away by a deluge of popular opposition which sprang up in the countries it had captured after the Second World War. Stalinism found itself opposed by the world division of labour which had no place for Russia's low productivity and poor quality goods. Russia declined in the face of this inexorable pressure.

There is a solemn lesson for those who would change the world, think globally. Revolutions in one country alone are fore-destined to fail and those countries which do enjoy the brief respite afforded by revolution are inevitably assimilated back into the international order of things which is either monopoly capitalist, social democratic or state capitalist.