Is Marxism Compatible with Pragmatism?

[¿Que?]

Just wondering what people think about this. I'm of the opinion that it is, for the most part. From what I know of Marxism and from what I understand of pragmatism, I don't see them as mutually exclusive philosophies.

A quick summary of pragmatist thought can be found here:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/pragmati/

Pragmatism has been criticized as one of the relativist philosophies, and is closely associated with postmodernism, some like Richard Rorty, falling into both camps (pragmatism and postmodernism).

But pragmatism is different from postmodernism it seems to me in one crucial way. Whereas pragmatists see truth as contingent on the applicability of a certain theory, proposition, point of view or whatever, postmodernists, I think hold that all points of view are equally valid. I may be oversimplifying things, but you get the idea.

Now I will say that what I am proposing is not full on pragmatism (at least not yet). What I am suggesting is metaphysical pragmatism, or the notion that the utility of a particular stance on metaphysical questions determines its truth value. So for example, I'm not saying that the truth value of a statement like, "the moon is made of cheese" rests on how useful that statement is, because that is not a metaphysical question, rather, it is an empirical one. On the other hand, questions like do we have free will, is there objective morality, or even the skeptical concern that we can never know anything, are metaphysical concerns that can only be resolved through pragmatism. In any case, pragmatism has been the best answer I've ever heard in response to these questions.

As for Marxism, since Marxists don't concern themselves too much with metaphysics (correct me if I'm wrong), they simply presuppose an external material world that is determinant of the historical process, I don't really see how either philosophy contradicts the other, indeed they seem to compliment each other and, well, all joking aside, pragmatism could be useful for the dissemination of Marxist principles.

Of course, there is one tiny little snag. I believe Marx did make a distinction between theory and practice, whereas pragmatists don't recognize such a distinction. Thus:

According to Dewey, once philosophers give up these time-honoured distinctions—between appearance and reality, theory and practice, knowledge and action, fact and value—they will see through the ill-posed problems of traditional epistemology and metaphysics. Instead of trying to survey the world sub specie aeternitatis, Deweyan philosophers are content to keep their feet planted on terra firma and address “the problems of men.”So, anyone wanna pat me on the back for being so original and innovative. Or maybe you want to scold me for being so far off the mark. Or maybe you just want to shut me up, because you've heard it all before.

I welcome your comments!

[Ostrinski]

bump, interested

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

I think pragmatism has been rightly pilloried as anti-dialectical approach to reality. In the US, pragmatism has a major cred. Where it usually goes is to abandoning revolutionary politics, which, after all, are not practical:rolleyes:. In fact it is only when you have a situation that is almost revolutionary where Marxist politics makes sense. Pragmatism usually hews to formal logic -- which is fine, but not enough to properly analyze most historical situations.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

I don't think Marxism and pragmatism can ultimately be reconciled, despite the qualities that they share. For me pragmatism constitutes the essence of a tremendous problem that confronts all workers of the world: An excessive willingness to adapt to reality. Pragmatism is not alone in this, of course, but I believe it is nevertheless guilty. I would recommend this paper that sort of outlines the conflicts between the two. It's main point is that the SEP leadership has done nothing at all to combat pragmatism: http://www.permanent-revolution.org/polemics/mwhh_ch04.pdf

I guess those are my thoughts in a nutshell. I wish you luck in your philosophical endeavors. And just as an aside, I don't think Marxists can afford to completely neglect metaphysics. In order to do battle against a philosophy one has to study it vigorously. Those who simply "presuppose an external material world that is determinant of the historical process" runs the risk of falling into the trap of reductionism.

[Rafiq]

Pragmaticism, I think, can be of more help in regards to revolutionary strategy, than Marxist theory.

[Desperado]

I think they are more than compatible. David McLellan puts forwards the idea that Marx is an instrumentalist. There's a quote somewhere about Marx talking about "materialism" (in the sense he actually meant it) saying it's an irrelevant "scholarly question" as to whether phenomena actually exist or are a part of our mind. Quite a traditional pragmatist way of transcending irrelevant "realist"/"non-realist" metaphysics, showing that theories on it aren't useful and don't expand our understanding of the world and so are unimportant. The same idea of theories for a use is expressed in his idea that "philosophers have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it".

I think there is good grounds to see him Marx as an instrumentalist then, with much in common with pragmatism.

[blake 3:17]

To the OP I think so, and the more the better.

[¿Que?]

I don't think Marxism and pragmatism can ultimately be reconciled, despite the qualities that they share. For me pragmatism constitutes the essence of a tremendous problem that confronts all workers of the world: An excessive willingness to adapt to reality. Pragmatism is not alone in this, of course, but I believe it is nevertheless guilty. I would recommend this paper that sort of outlines the conflicts between the two. It's main point is that the SEP leadership has done nothing at all to combat pragmatism: http://www.permanent-revolution.org/polemics/mwhh_ch04.pdf

I guess those are my thoughts in a nutshell. I wish you luck in your philosophical endeavors. And just as an aside, I don't think Marxists can afford to completely neglect metaphysics. In order to do battle against a philosophy one has to study it vigorously. Those who simply "presuppose an external material world that is determinant of the historical process" runs the risk of falling into the trap of reductionism.
I read the paper you linked, and I found it interesting. For one thing, I was surprised at how closely American Marxism, particularly of the Trotskyist variety, was linked to pragmatism. And by this, I am pointing out an historical fact outlined in the article of the overlap between members of certain schools of pragmatist thought, and Marxists closely aligned with Trotsky and the SWP. But it is also of note is how many of these same philosophers eventually turned into some of the most reactionary advocates of liberal reformist politics. I've actually read some of Sydney Hooks Cold War era works, and was pretty taken aback by its often spurious and seemingly misrepresentative attacks on Marxism. I found the paper's focus on the social, cultural and political context in which pragmatism took root quite useful and elucidating.

That said, I took issue with the article in that it takes for granted the issue of dialectics. I understand that it was a chapter in a book, that may or may not at other points expand further on the issue of dialectics, but as a person who is not totally convinced on the issue, I found it rather unhelpful. Similar was its treatment of Trotsky, as if stating that Trotsky was against pragmatism or that pragmatism is incompatible with the dialectic method was enough argument to convince someone outside of these traditions. As someone who fits this description, I can tell you that it was not.

Further, I did not feel that the question I originally posed was sufficiently answered, for the very reasons I described above. As edifying as the historical context in which pragmatism developed is, I would have been much more satisfied if the paper had focused on, and elaborated on this particular point:

Samson’s and Lloyd’s historical approach clarifies the common misconception that sees a
similarity between pragmatism, particularly its Peirceian/Deweyan variant, and many of
the fundamental tenets of Marxism. The tentative nature of scientific knowledge, the
repudiation of dogma and formalism, the rejection of rigid dichotomies between fact and
value, the recognition of the social construction and class origins of ideology, and the
placing of social practice at the center of the theory of knowledge are all trends that over
the years have impressed some into theorizing a convergence between Marxism and
pragmatism.10 Yet history shows that this supposed convergence was largely a
misunderstanding, resulting on the one hand from the low level of theoretical
development of the early American Marxist and socialist movement, where pragmatism
largely filled the void, and on the other hand the temporary alliance between the working
class and a section of the petty bourgeoisie and intelligentsia who rebelled against the
harsh consequences of American capitalism and the horrors of an unbridled
imperialism.11
Indeed, there is something to be said about the individuals who espouse a certain philosophy, also how that philosophy is put into practice, and even the historical context in which the philosophy developed, but there still needs to be a coherent argument against the ideas expressed in the philosophy itself. I found the article's lack of engagement with the ideas of pragmatism somewhat lacking. Thus, the only real objections to pragmatism that I gathered from the article were simply, Trotsky didn't like it and it is anti-dialectic. As to why Trotsky was opposed to it, and how it was anti-dialectics (let alone, why I should accept dialectics in the first place) was not adequately treated in the paper sufficiently in my opinion.

That is not to say that the article completely ignored these issues. It does raise the point that pragmatism is a philosophy that stresses adaptation to existing conditions. The point is made clearest when it describes layman pragmatism with academic pragmatism and draws a connection to the two. In essence, pragmatism opposes principles, that we should focus on what can be achieved, not what should be achieved. This is a valid criticism in my opinion, one that I am not unfamiliar with, and in fact I am currently grappling with such a problem in my own local organizing, with an organization whose leadership has a particularly reactionary political stance, openly aligning itself with aspects of the liberty movement (google it if you're unfamiliar with it), but whose work involves a direct challenge against certain forms of political authority that I also find problematic. Their open, unsectarian, almost apolitical way of presenting themselves has invited contributions and sometimes praise from a few people whom I regard as highly advanced theoretically and in practice, through their organizing efforts, and indeed, these individuals have expressed similar concerns. So I am not unfamiliar with the conflict of pragmatism versus principles, both intellectually and from experience.

Yet the question I posed dealt specifically with pragmatism as an answer to metaphysical questions. It seems to me, from the above quoted passage, and Desperado's comments, which I am not unfamiliar with, but which didn't occur to me until it was brought up, that there is some convergence between Marxism and pragmatism, at least when answering questions of this sort. And thus, even after having read all 28 pages of that paper, I feel as though my question remains unanswered.

I appreciate your contribution nonetheless.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

I don't think Marxism and pragmatism can ultimately be reconciled, despite the qualities that they share. For me pragmatism constitutes the essence of a tremendous problem that confronts all workers of the world: An excessive willingness to adapt to reality. Pragmatism is not alone in this, of course, but I believe it is nevertheless guilty. I would recommend this paper that sort of outlines the conflicts between the two. It's main point is that the SEP leadership has done nothing at all to combat pragmatism: http://www.permanent-revolution.org/polemics/mwhh_ch04.pdf

I guess those are my thoughts in a nutshell. I wish you luck in your philosophical endeavors. And just as an aside, I don't think Marxists can afford to completely neglect metaphysics. In order to do battle against a philosophy one has to study it vigorously. Those who simply "presuppose an external material world that is determinant of the historical process" runs the risk of falling into the trap of reductionism.
The SEP and it's predecessor the Worker's League, as part of Healy's IC, made a weird fetish of "dialectics" and waged war against "pragmatism." In their hands, this amounted to vapid and remarkably obtuse arguments, always leading back to the idea that Healy himself was the only fount of true dialectics. Pragmatism became something to tar opponents with, basically just an epithet. It never really had much to do with actually promoting dialectical materialism nor combating pragmatism.

If you want to do some interesting reading about pragmatism, Trotsky's In Defense of Marxism contains material on the fight in the SWP, then Trotskyist, between Trotsky/Cannon and an opposition that could be characterized as deeply "Pragmatic."

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

The SEP and it's predecessor the Worker's League, as part of Healy's IC, made a weird fetish of "dialectics" and waged war against "pragmatism." In their hands, this amounted to vapid and remarkably obtuse arguments, always leading back to the idea that Healy himself was the only fount of true dialectics. Pragmatism became something to tar opponents with, basically just an epithet. It never really had much to do with actually promoting dialectical materialism nor combating pragmatism.

If you want to do some interesting reading about pragmatism, Trotsky's In Defense of Marxism contains material on the fight in the SWP, then Trotskyist, between Trotsky/Cannon and an opposition that could be characterized as deeply "Pragmatic."
I do not know very much about the Worker's League. But the point of the article I linked is that the SEP completely abandoned the issue of pragmatism altogether. The authors were in a polemic with the SEP. I am aware of what Healy had done and I can tell you that Steiner and Brenner (the writers of that book chapter) do not reside in the same camp as him at all. Throughout the entire work, they derive a lot of their arguments from Trotsky's In Defense of Marxism (which I have read already). I only tell you all this because it sounds like you're dismissing what I linked out of hand, and lumping in the authors with Healy and his "fetishization" of dialectics. I could be misunderstanding you yet again, though. If so, I'm sorry.

@Que: I am very glad that you read the article, though I am disappointed (in the paper, not you) that it did not satisfy you in the end. I agree with your noted points of weakness regarding the dialectic in the chapter, though I would recommend chapter 6 as a possible antidote to them. You may encounter the same problems, though, I don't know. Really, I would read the whole thing, but since you're looking for something specific it may end up doing more harm than good. And I agree that there should have been more engagement with the ideas of pragmatism, though I must say the "willingness to adapt to reality" and "no principles" is always what I run up against. I admit that I need to read more regarding pragmatism. I wish that I knew more so that I could properly engage with what you have posted.

[Desperado]

In essence, pragmatism opposes principles, that we should focus on what can be achieved, not what should be achieved.


Could you expand on that? As far as epistemological pragmatism goes I don't follow you. Obviously there's the apparent conflict between political pragmatism and principle, although for me that's really resolved in that I am convinced demanding the impossible, world revolution etc etc. is the only practical answer - they're not just lofty utopian principles. (I don't claim they will be achieved, but if change is to happen I see that as the only way.) It can't completely resolve the tension we feel between the way the world is and the way it ought to be, but nothing can. It focuses on what we can change (although in no way denies or ignores the sadness of that we can't). There will always be "bad" in the world which we can't correct and will have to live with, even in a world where we have the full potential of our labour unleashed.

Pragmatism is lacking on this moral plain, the "should", the purpose. It judges things through use, results, achieving - but leaves blank to what use, to what ends. Even on the simple plain of natural science for example, my instrumentalism and pragmatism can't tell me why I should be trying to understand the world. I see it as a method or a tool, but you need to already have some other idea of end goal or purpose to use it. Again, I see similarities in Marx - he rarely talked about purpose, or the "should" - he wrote science (in the broadest sense) not ethics. I don't think you can negatively judge pragmatism (or Marx) on this, although it's clearly not an all encompassing complete philosophy which will give you the meaning of life and resolve everything.

I personally try to fill this empty patch with existentialist philosophy and a lot of strife, but don't think if it can ever really be definitely resolved.

[¿Que?]

Desperado, when we are talking about epistemological pragmatism, I think it deals with the problem of a lack of an archemedian point of certainty. This lack of absolute certainty poses a lot of epistemological problems, but I will deal with the problem of skepticism to make my point. The skeptic argues that we can never know anything. The entirety of our experience, notably among them the methods we use for verification, could all be illusions of some form or another. It is my view that the problem of skepticism cannot be adequately resolved through any means, since they necessitate a process of verifying that itself may be flawed, illusory. Thus, in principle, I would very much like to know for certain specific things like, this is a hand in front of me or I am not a brain in a vat being programmed my experiences through a computer, however, since it is impossible to verify these claims with absolute certainty, a pragmatist argument might say that the methods of verification available to us are the only way to arrive at any sense of truth.

[Luís Henrique]

Where it usually goes is to abandoning revolutionary politics

This supposes that pragmatism would have had anything to do with revolutionary politics first place, which is patently false. No pragmatical philosophers evolved from revolutionary positions into reformist or liberal ones; they always started as non-revolutionaries.

Luís Henrique

[Mr. Natural]

Indeed, pragmatism always works within the present system and its established values and is inherently conservative.

For a paradigmatic pragmatic personality, how about Barack Obama? He has made it his lifework to bring persons and groups to the center, which is way over on the right in the US.

Marxism must be pragmatic in the sense that it must begin with the established reality, but it must then find the seeds of the new, revolutionary reality within the old society and grow them. Marx and Engels saw these "seeds" as the social relations and organization capitalism engendered among its workers. The proletariat is to grow these social seeds into the grassroots-democratic socio-economic system of communism.

What the hell, let's do it! My red-green best.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

I do not know very much about the Worker's League. But the point of the article I linked is that the SEP completely abandoned the issue of pragmatism altogether. The authors were in a polemic with the SEP. I am aware of what Healy had done and I can tell you that Steiner and Brenner (the writers of that book chapter) do not reside in the same camp as him at all. Throughout the entire work, they derive a lot of their arguments from Trotsky's In Defense of Marxism (which I have read already). I only tell you all this because it sounds like you're dismissing what I linked out of hand, and lumping in the authors with Healy and his "fetishization" of dialectics. I could be misunderstanding you yet again, though. If so, I'm sorry.

@Que: I am very glad that you read the article, though I am disappointed (in the paper, not you) that it did not satisfy you in the end. I agree with your noted points of weakness regarding the dialectic in the chapter, though I would recommend chapter 6 as a possible antidote to them. You may encounter the same problems, though, I don't know. Really, I would read the whole thing, but since you're looking for something specific it may end up doing more harm than good. And I agree that there should have been more engagement with the ideas of pragmatism, though I must say the "willingness to adapt to reality" and "no principles" is always what I run up against. I admit that I need to read more regarding pragmatism. I wish that I knew more so that I could properly engage with what you have posted.
I think you are right that I was dismissive of the article -- I only read a bit of it and it looked like a lot of the shit being produced by the IC in the 70s and 80s. The thing about IDOM, is that the fight around pragmatism vs. dialectics, is actually centered around ongoing significant events, and not some abstract bloodless theoretical argument. I will try to actually read most of the article when time permits. Apologies for spouting off.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

I think you are right that I was dismissive of the article -- I only read a bit of it and it looked like a lot of the shit being produced by the IC in the 70s and 80s. The thing about IDOM, is that the fight around pragmatism vs. dialectics, is actually centered around ongoing significant events, and not some abstract bloodless theoretical argument. I will try to actually read most of the article when time permits. Apologies for spouting off.
It's perfectly okay. I hope you are able to read it soon. Just for future reference, the article is merely a chapter of the polemic. Another focuses on their coverage of the Iraq war, and later Healy's bastardization of the dialectic is discussed at length and is compared with North's obfuscation of it. They actually have a very nice document (http://permanent-revolution.org/archives/charlatan_exposed.pdf) on their website by former party member David Bruce, written in the thick of the fight against Healy. I recommend it highly.

I also do not think that IDOM is necessarily "centered" on the "significant events", but on the methods used to treat them; I've never seen theory as being significantly divorced from practice. Thus, Trotsky's struggle against pragmatism was concerned first and foremost with keeping the party's theoretical health in check, lest they shift towards the right as the Comintern did. We both know what the SWP's neglect of these issues led to. This is why I find Trotsky's "gangrene" remark to be so important. For that reason I do not think that theoretical concerns should be looked at as "bloodless" or "abstract". If that was really the case, then the causes of the SEP's degeneration would be utterly inexplicable. Denouncing their political line is one thing. Taking a hard look at what shaped it is quite another.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

This supposes that pragmatism would have had anything to do with revolutionary politics first place, which is patently false. No pragmatical philosophers evolved from revolutionary positions into reformist or liberal ones; they always started as non-revolutionaries.

Luís Henrique
Well, yes, taken out of context. There have been fights in revolutionary organizations around this issue, however. In this case I mean the SWP US in 1939-1941. It was a revolutionary organization, but there was an opposition led by James Burnham, Max Shachtman and Marty Abern that basically came out against dialectics and in favor of pragmatism. It is worthwhile to read about -- Not only in Trotsky's In Defense of Marxism, but also James Cannon's Struggle for a Proletarian Party. Burnham went over to the bourgeoisie very quickly. Shachtman took his time, about twenty years to go all the way over. Abern died in the late 40s.

[A Marxist Historian]

I read the paper you linked, and I found it interesting. For one thing, I was surprised at how closely American Marxism, particularly of the Trotskyist variety, was linked to pragmatism. And by this, I am pointing out an historical fact outlined in the article of the overlap between members of certain schools of pragmatist thought, and Marxists closely aligned with Trotsky and the SWP. But it is also of note is how many of these same philosophers eventually turned into some of the most reactionary advocates of liberal reformist politics. I've actually read some of Sydney Hooks Cold War era works, and was pretty taken aback by its often spurious and seemingly misrepresentative attacks on Marxism. I found the paper's focus on the social, cultural and political context in which pragmatism took root quite useful and elucidating.

There was a direct connection between Trotsky and pragmatism, in that John Dewey, the great pragmatist, indeed pretty much the founder of pragmatism as a philosophical school, was also the head of the Dewey Commission, which exonerated Trotsky of the charge that he was an agent of Hitler made by the Stalinists. So naturally you had some very direct connections between Trotskyists and pragmatists.

Which led to much philosophical butting of heads, with Dewey attacking Trotsky's concept of revolutionary politics, which he saw as basically not so much wrong as impractical, pragmatist that he was, and Trotsky attacking Dewey's philosophical ideas, which he saw as very dangerous for the American Trotskyists.

Which, from a pragmatic perspective, turned out to be absolutely true, as pointed out above.;)


That said, I took issue with the article in that it takes for granted the issue of dialectics. I understand that it was a chapter in a book, that may or may not at other points expand further on the issue of dialectics, but as a person who is not totally convinced on the issue, I found it rather unhelpful. Similar was its treatment of Trotsky, as if stating that Trotsky was against pragmatism or that pragmatism is incompatible with the dialectic method was enough argument to convince someone outside of these traditions. As someone who fits this description, I can tell you that it was not.

So, that Trotsky disagreed with Dewey ought not by itself to convince anyone other than a Trotsky cultist such as, well, the SEP. But Trotsky's arguments vs. pragmatism, in In Defense of Marxism and Their Morals and Ours, that's another matter.Especially the latter pamphlet, which is part of a direct debate between Trotsky and Dewey. In fact, the copy I own includes Dewey's answer to Trotsky. So folks interested in Marxism and pragmatism should go there first.

Here's Trotsky's pamphlet

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/morals/morals.htm

And here's Dewey's answer, which was first published in the American Trotskyist journal.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/morals/morals.htm

So, what then is Trotsky's basic problem with pragmatism? This he goes into at some length in In Defense of Marxism, in the chapter entitled A Petty-Bourgeois Opposition in the Socialist Workers Party.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/idom/dm/09-pbopp.htm

Here's the core of Trotsky's argument:

***************************************

It was absolutely necessary to explain why the American “radical” intellectuals accept Marxism without the dialectic (a clock without a spring). The secret is simple. In no other country has there been such rejection of the class struggle as in the land of “unlimited opportunity.” The denial of social contradictions as the moving force of development led to the denial of the dialectic as the logic of contradictions in the domain of theoretical thought. Just as in the sphere of politics it was thought possible everybody could be convinced of the correctness of a “just” program by means of clever syllogisms and society could be reconstructed through “rational” measures. ‘so in the sphere of theory it was accepted as proved that Aristotelian logic, lowered to the level of ‘common sense,” was sufficient for the solution of all questions.

Pragmatism, a mixture of rationalism and empiricism, became the national philosophy of the United States. The theoretical methodology of Max Eastman is not fundamentally different from the methodology of Henry Ford – both regard living society from the point of view of an “engineer” (Eastman – platonically). Historically the present disdainful attitude toward the dialectic is explained simply by the fact that the grandfathers and great-grandmothers of Max Eastman and others did not need the dialectic in order to conquer territory and enrich themselves. But times have changed and the philosophy of pragmatism has entered a period of bankruptcy just as has American capitalism.

************************************************

He goes on to give an excellent pithy summary of just what this dialectics stuff is all about--and then goes on to link it up to just what the argument in the SWP was all about, namely the nature of the Soviet Union.

Briefly, he argues that the Soviet Union is a contradictory phenomenon, and therefore cannot be understood without dialectical logic, that formal logic combined with empiricist unwillingness to look beyond the end of one's nose--i.e. pragmatism, makes it impossible to understand that walking contradiction, the USSR under Stalin.

Now, Healyites such as the SEP and Megaman turn this all into some sort of abstract idealist battle of Marxist philosophy vs. pragmatism and other isms, in intellectual outer space.

Failing to remember Lenin's mantra which he picked up from Hegel, expounded in Lenin's famous Philosophical Notebooks, namely "truth is concrete."

-M.H.-


Further, I did not feel that the question I originally posed was sufficiently answered, for the very reasons I described above. As edifying as the historical context in which pragmatism developed is, I would have been much more satisfied if the paper had focused on, and elaborated on this particular point:

Indeed, there is something to be said about the individuals who espouse a certain philosophy, also how that philosophy is put into practice, and even the historical context in which the philosophy developed, but there still needs to be a coherent argument against the ideas expressed in the philosophy itself. I found the article's lack of engagement with the ideas of pragmatism somewhat lacking. Thus, the only real objections to pragmatism that I gathered from the article were simply, Trotsky didn't like it and it is anti-dialectic. As to why Trotsky was opposed to it, and how it was anti-dialectics (let alone, why I should accept dialectics in the first place) was not adequately treated in the paper sufficiently in my opinion.

That is not to say that the article completely ignored these issues. It does raise the point that pragmatism is a philosophy that stresses adaptation to existing conditions. The point is made clearest when it describes layman pragmatism with academic pragmatism and draws a connection to the two. In essence, pragmatism opposes principles, that we should focus on what can be achieved, not what should be achieved. This is a valid criticism in my opinion, one that I am not unfamiliar with, and in fact I am currently grappling with such a problem in my own local organizing, with an organization whose leadership has a particularly reactionary political stance, openly aligning itself with aspects of the liberty movement (google it if you're unfamiliar with it), but whose work involves a direct challenge against certain forms of political authority that I also find problematic. Their open, unsectarian, almost apolitical way of presenting themselves has invited contributions and sometimes praise from a few people whom I regard as highly advanced theoretically and in practice, through their organizing efforts, and indeed, these individuals have expressed similar concerns. So I am not unfamiliar with the conflict of pragmatism versus principles, both intellectually and from experience.

Yet the question I posed dealt specifically with pragmatism as an answer to metaphysical questions. It seems to me, from the above quoted passage, and Desperado's comments, which I am not unfamiliar with, but which didn't occur to me until it was brought up, that there is some convergence between Marxism and pragmatism, at least when answering questions of this sort. And thus, even after having read all 28 pages of that paper, I feel as though my question remains unanswered.

I appreciate your contribution nonetheless.

[A Marxist Historian]

It's perfectly okay. I hope you are able to read it soon. Just for future reference, the article is merely a chapter of the polemic. Another focuses on their coverage of the Iraq war, and later Healy's bastardization of the dialectic is discussed at length and is compared with North's obfuscation of it. They actually have a very nice document (http://permanent-revolution.org/archives/charlatan_exposed.pdf) on their website by former party member David Bruce, written in the thick of the fight against Healy. I recommend it highly.

I also do not think that IDOM is necessarily "centered" on the "significant events", but on the methods used to treat them; I've never seen theory as being significantly divorced from practice. Thus, Trotsky's struggle against pragmatism was concerned first and foremost with keeping the party's theoretical health in check, lest they shift towards the right as the Comintern did. We both know what the SWP's neglect of these issues led to. This is why I find Trotsky's "gangrene" remark to be so important. For that reason I do not think that theoretical concerns should be looked at as "bloodless" or "abstract". If that was really the case, then the causes of the SEP's degeneration would be utterly inexplicable. Denouncing their political line is one thing. Taking a hard look at what shaped it is quite another.

The SEP's degeneration, which began long before the WL changed its name, has absolutely nothing to do with Healy or North's tortured ultraformalist and obscurantist philosophical maunderings.

It is material. It has to do with who financed it. "Follow the money" as they said in the Watergate days.

And here I'm not even referring to that Detroit printing press. Way back in the '70s, when Healy was taking money from Saddam Hussein, Qaddafi, etc. etc., and in return doing stuff like photographic Iraqi dissidents for the benefit of the Iraqi secret police kidnapping, torturing and murdering them, did North raise any objections? Why yes--after Healy got caught in a sex scandal and his WRP exploded and the WL was no longer getting financed by Healy. Not before!

The WL and now the SEP are simply political bandits, whose politics is detemined by where they get their money.

When the WRP and WL were financed by Saddam and Qaddafi, as far as North's WL was concerned they were the vanguard of the Arab Revolution, and anyone who criticized them was a counterrevolutionary. Now that North's SEP is financed by his non-union Detroit printing company, unions are counterrevolutionary.

It really is just that simple.

-M.H.-

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

The SEP's degeneration, which began long before the WL changed its name, has absolutely nothing to do with Healy or North's tortured ultraformalist and obscurantist philosophical maunderings.

It is material. It has to do with who financed it. "Follow the money" as they said in the Watergate days.

And here I'm not even referring to that Detroit printing press. Way back in the '70s, when Healy was taking money from Saddam Hussein, Qaddafi, etc. etc., and in return doing stuff like photographic Iraqi dissidents for the benefit of the Iraqi secret police kidnapping, torturing and murdering them, did North raise any objections? Why yes--after Healy got caught in a sex scandal and his WRP exploded and the WL was no longer getting financed by Healy. Not before!

The WL and now the SEP are simply political bandits, whose politics is detemined by where they get their money.

When the WRP and WL were financed by Saddam and Qaddafi, as far as North's WL was concerned they were the vanguard of the Arab Revolution, and anyone who criticized them was a counterrevolutionary. Now that North's SEP is financed by his non-union Detroit printing company, unions are counterrevolutionary.

It really is just that simple.

-M.H.-
"Just that simple"? I couldn't disagree more. While I agree that "following the money" is not without value, doing so is insufficient by itself. In assessing a party's degeneration, focusing only on who funds them or who is being funded by them does not help advance Marxist criticism or theory. Following such a path runs the risk of succumbing to reductionism, especially if we do not confront the very serious philosophical issues that are involved with the SEP's degeneration. I don’t believe your approach helps us understand it any better.

Objectivism, North’s philosophical outlook, in part involved an olive branch to pragmatism. If you really regard the issue of the abandonment of the study of dialectics--which is at the heart of Steiner and Brenner's critique of the SEP--as "having nothing to do" with the "material", then you are already in solidarity with North. He too said that we should simply pay attention to the “political line” along with "practical" and "material" matters (money, in this case). And an examination of the possible philosophical implications in all of this? Nothing more than a red herring. Or, as you said, “has absolutely nothing to do with .” According to you, North and Healy are simply reactionary because of their personal corruption and disrespect for orthodoxy, and that’s it. I find this to be an incredibly threadbare argument against philosophical concerns.

The political outlook of a party or an individual is not an island, nor does it simply rest in who they get their money from; I regard that thinking otherwise is vulgar economic determinism. Their outlook also rests in their ability to assimilate, or break from, (or more importantly, carefully examine) the ruling ideologies of their time. Every political position stems in some way from philosophy. Hence Paul Ryan and Ron Paul’s infatuation with Ayn Rand, or Hitler with Count Gobineau. Marxism is no different in this sense, except it can allow us the ability to learn from the mistakes of our predecessors—as well as provide us with a plan to action. I find this to be the chief strength of [I]In Defense of Marxism.

But unfortunately you do not seem to have any interest in this kind of analysis; the language you used regarding the philosophical implications of the SEP’s degeneration was, in my opinion, highly toxic and bordering on caricature: “ultraformalist and obscurantist philosophical maunderings”. Honestly, they come off as inflammatory rather than accurate. Do you truly regard the work S&B have done as useless to future generations? Should we throw caution to the wind and simply “follow the money”? If we do this I believe that in the long run we will assist in the burial in Marxist criticism and theory, rather than its advance. As I said before, “If this was really the case, then the causes of the SEP's degeneration would be utterly inexplicable. Denouncing their political line is one thing. Taking a hard look at what shaped it is quite another.”

[Luís Henrique]

Well, yes, taken out of context. There have been fights in revolutionary organizations around this issue, however. In this case I mean the SWP US in 1939-1941. It was a revolutionary organization, but there was an opposition led by James Burnham, Max Shachtman and Marty Abern that basically came out against dialectics and in favor of pragmatism. It is worthwhile to read about -- Not only in Trotsky's In Defense of Marxism, but also James Cannon's Struggle for a Proletarian Party. Burnham went over to the bourgeoisie very quickly. Shachtman took his time, about twenty years to go all the way over. Abern died in the late 40s.

Leftist organisations often debate the issue of "pragmatism" - but what they call "pragmatism" has little to do with philosophical pragmatism, which is, first and foremost, an epistemological position.

Evidently, all attempts at eliminating the dialectical aspect of Marxism cannot fail to produce reformist or outright reactionary political positions in the long term - but were Burnham, Schachtman and (or) Abern efforts really related to Dewey, James, or Peirce? And, even if so, would such relation be one of direct causation? In other words, did Burnham and Schachtman go over to the bourgeoisie because they read (and acritically agreed with) Peirce, James, or Dewey? Or is it the other way round, that they used philosophic pragmatism as an instrument of their already ongoing change of sides?

Luís Henrique

[A Marxist Historian]

"Just that simple"? I couldn't disagree more. While I agree that "following the money" is not without value, doing so is insufficient by itself. In assessing a party's degeneration, focusing only on who funds them or who is being funded by them does not help advance Marxist criticism or theory. Following such a path runs the risk of succumbing to reductionism, especially if we do not confront the very serious philosophical issues that are involved with the SEP's degeneration. I don’t believe your approach helps us understand it any better.

Objectivism, North’s philosophical outlook, in part involved an olive branch to pragmatism. If you really regard the issue of the abandonment of the study of dialectics--which is at the heart of Steiner and Brenner's critique of the SEP--as "having nothing to do" with the "material", then you are already in solidarity with North. He too said that we should simply pay attention to the “political line” along with "practical" and "material" matters (money, in this case). And an examination of the possible philosophical implications in all of this? Nothing more than a red herring. Or, as you said, “has absolutely nothing to do with .” According to you, North and Healy are simply reactionary because of their personal corruption and disrespect for orthodoxy, and that’s it. I find this to be an incredibly threadbare argument against philosophical concerns.

The political outlook of a party or an individual is not an island, nor does it simply rest in who they get their money from; I regard that thinking otherwise is vulgar economic determinism. Their outlook also rests in their ability to assimilate, or break from, (or more importantly, carefully examine) the ruling ideologies of their time. Every political position stems in some way from philosophy. Hence Paul Ryan and Ron Paul’s infatuation with Ayn Rand, or Hitler with Count Gobineau. Marxism is no different in this sense, except it can allow us the ability to learn from the mistakes of our predecessors—as well as provide us with a plan to action. I find this to be the chief strength of [I]In Defense of Marxism.

But unfortunately you do not seem to have any interest in this kind of analysis; the language you used regarding the philosophical implications of the SEP’s degeneration was, in my opinion, highly toxic and bordering on caricature: “ultraformalist and obscurantist philosophical maunderings”. Honestly, they come off as inflammatory rather than accurate. Do you truly regard the work S&B have done as useless to future generations? Should we throw caution to the wind and simply “follow the money”? If we do this I believe that in the long run we will assist in the burial in Marxist criticism and theory, rather than its advance. As I said before, “If this was really the case, then the causes of the SEP's degeneration would be utterly inexplicable. Denouncing their political line is one thing. Taking a hard look at what shaped it is quite another.”

As a general proposition, you are more or less correct, pragmatically speaking at any rate. However, in the particular case of Healyism and Northism, you are not. Plain ordinary Beardian economic determinism is quite adequate to understand political bandits with no real principles.

But on the philosophical plane that you prefer to inhabit, you are dead wrong. You write:

"Every political position stems in some way from philosophy."

That is anti-Marxist philosophical idealism. All philosophical or political positions have material roots. As Trotsky points out in IDOM in the chapter on philosophy, very significantly titled "a petty bourgeois opposition in the Socialist Workers Party." Though rarely are those material roots so crude, so obvious, and so little mediated by ideological superstructures as in the case of Healy and North.

More interestingly, what were the roots of the idealist Healyite obsession with philosophical questions divorced from material reality, which you share? Unlike the overall nature of the IC, WRP and SEP, it cannot be mechanically reduced to the economic roots. The intellectual sphere, the superstructure, usually has a fair amount of autonomy from the material base, though always ultimately dependent on it.

They relate essentially to maneuverings on the English left, metastasized into an obsession due to the cultist nature of first Healy and then North's organizations.

Essentially, due to Healy's one great political success, recruiting a bevy of excellent Marxist activists, intellectuals and philosophers in the 1950s from the British Communist Party. Most of whom left rapidly or were kicked out, except I suppose for Slaughter, a bright fellow in his own way.

Notably Peter Fryer. His brilliant article on dialectics was written in refutation of E. P. Thompson, whose revisionist "cultural Marxism" has played such a negative role in academia, providing the main path for the rejection of class analysis and substitution of "culture" in recent decades.

All of Healy and his imitators' philosophical maunderings are poor dogmatic mechanical imitations of Fryer's work, after Healy kicked Fryer out of the SLL, motivated by the desire to somehow maintain Healy's credibility among Marxist academics nonetheless.

Here is Fryer's classic dialectics article, probably the best exposition of dialectics written in the last half century.

http://www.icl-fi.org/english/esp/62/fryer.html

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

Leftist organisations often debate the issue of "pragmatism" - but what they call "pragmatism" has little to do with philosophical pragmatism, which is, first and foremost, an epistemological position.

Evidently, all attempts at eliminating the dialectical aspect of Marxism cannot fail to produce reformist or outright reactionary political positions in the long term - but were Burnham, Schachtman and (or) Abern efforts really related to Dewey, James, or Peirce? And, even if so, would such relation be one of direct causation? In other words, did Burnham and Schachtman go over to the bourgeoisie because they read (and acritically agreed with) Peirce, James, or Dewey? Or is it the other way round, that they used philosophic pragmatism as an instrument of their already ongoing change of sides?

Luís Henrique

Definitely, the other way around. What Megaman fails to understand.

-M.H.-

[blake 3:17]

Oy! Why is nobody talking about Cornel West?

I'd agree with MH's comments but would add that Healy was psychopath who abused women in the WRP.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

@A Marxist Historian: You have crudely mischaracterized my position based on one line that I have written and that I will continue to stand by, because nowhere did I imply that “philosophical questions [are] divorced from material reality”, nor did I deny that philosophical and political positions have material roots or that they are not dependant on the material base. In fact, I was complaining that this was what you were doing, in reverse, when you had said that philosophical questions (questions of superstructure) have “nothing to do” with the SEP’s degeneration; I had argued that this was what North himself was doing, and that by taking this position you are in solidarity with him. Yet now, to deflect from this fact, you lump me in with Healy’s “sensationalism” (as David Bruce aptly described his philosophy) and accuse me of sharing his faults! I simply said that “following the money” is insufficient by itself. Your accusation therefore has no basis, and no substance.

I believe you are wrong to suggest that “Beardian economic determinism” has any merit in assessing the path the SEP has followed. I do not think that economic determinism, of whatever variety, can be anything but a caricature of Marxism’s theoretical and explanatory power. It will not allow us to grasp at a full explanation of the downfall of these parties. Moreover, your claim lacks consistency. Here is what you had said earlier: “It is material. It has to do with who financed it. "Follow the money" as they said in the Watergate days.”; “The WL and now the SEP are simply political bandits, whose politics is detemined by where they get their money.”

Then you also claim in your latest argument that the SEP cannot be “mechanically reduced to the economic roots”. But you have been doing this the entire time! So which is it? Do Beardian methods appreciate, in Trotsky’s words, “the internal connection between philosophy and the material development of society?” Because up until this point, you have not addressed it at all; your citing of that “dialectics” article, which I do not have time to read, comes as an abject surprise. I do not know anything about Peter Fryer, but I highly doubt that Healy’s mistakes can be fully understood by reading that one document. For now, I believe that Steiner and Brenner’s critique have helped me understand the issue quite well.

The methods that presumed “Marxists” use to analyze both philosophical questions and contemporary events must be examined. This is, at root, what I’ve been trying to argue for this whole time. It is a position you have strangely resisted, since it is completely consistent with IDOM, and in the very section you claim opposes me. Here is how Trotsky summarizes Schachtman and Burnham’s position at one point: “What is the meaning of this thoroughly astonishing reasoning? Inasmuch as some people through a bad method sometimes reach correct conclusions, and inasmuch as some people through a correct method not infrequently reach incorrect conclusions, therefore ... the method is not of great importance.” Trotsky does not simply engage pragmatism’s material roots, he also engages it as a philosophical method using his own: Dialectical materialism. But you don’t think it goes further than where the party gets its money or what it is spent on. It seems to me that, in a distorted form, your approach has far more in common with this “petty-bourgeois opposition” than I do. The SEP’s and Healy’s degeneration is not qualitatively different from any other party or individual degeneration in that money matters are…all that matter.

One final point. You have a nasty habit of throwing around inflammatory labels without the slightest basis. Rarely are they correct, and they do not often explain anything. Examples: “Anti-Marxist philosophical idealism,” “idealist Healyite obsession”, “cultist”, et cetera. I think you should try toning down your language, especially when you are in danger of misreading an argument as you have just done. And “pragmatically” speaking I am more or less correct? Really? So now I endorse pragmatism as well? Either I misunderstood you, or you are all over the place.

[A Marxist Historian]

@A Marxist Historian: You have crudely mischaracterized my position based on one line that I have written and that I will continue to stand by, because nowhere did I imply that “philosophical questions [are] divorced from material reality”, nor did I deny that philosophical and political positions have material roots or that they are not dependant on the material base.

No, but you did say, and now you say you "continue to stand by," the proposition that "Every political position stems in some way from philosophy." That is simply a disguised version of the same thing, effectively denying material causation.

Sometimes, political positions do stem from philosophical, but much more usually it is the other way around, and in any case the material substratum is rarely buried deeply--least of all in this case.


In fact, I was complaining that this was what you were doing, in reverse, when you had said that philosophical questions (questions of superstructure) have “nothing to do” with the SEP’s degeneration; I had argued that this was what North himself was doing, and that by taking this position you are in solidarity with him. Yet now, to deflect from this fact, you lump me in with Healy’s “sensationalism” (as David Bruce aptly described his philosophy) and accuse me of sharing his faults! I simply said that “following the money” is insufficient by itself. Your accusation therefore has no basis, and no substance.

Just because dialectical logic is superior to formal logic, does not mean one should commit elementary logical fallacies, as you do in the previous paragraph.

Did David North ever state that philosophy had nothing to do with the SEP's degeneration? Well, since he does not believe it has degenerated, that would be odd indeed.

That I suppose is mere sloppiness on your part, but you commit a deeper logical fallacy, when, from the proposition I put forward that the SEP's degeneration had nothing to do with philosophy, you seem to derive the conclusion that I believe, as apparently you think North now believes, that philosophical errors are unimportant and irrelevant in general. There is a technical term for the logical fallacy you committed, but I'm forgetting the phrase for it right now.

If North were to wax philosophical, as I hear from you he no longer does, then no doubt he would commit errors, and no doubt in some fashion or other they would reflect the degeneration of his organization, as was certainly true for the Healyites, and for North during most of his career. But, as I have already pointed out, you have the arrow of causation backwards.

As for Healy's "sensationalism," that is certainly an excellent description of his journalistic habits, but a poor description of his philosophical habits, better described as philosophical idealism of the Hegelian species, though much cruder than Hegel's subtle insights, and rendered internally inconsistent by his attempts to make it look like Marxian materialism.


I believe you are wrong to suggest that “Beardian economic determinism” has any merit in assessing the path the SEP has followed. I do not think that economic determinism, of whatever variety, can be anything but a caricature of Marxism’s theoretical and explanatory power. It will not allow us to grasp at a full explanation of the downfall of these parties. Moreover, your claim lacks consistency. Here is what you had said earlier: “It is material. It has to do with who financed it. "Follow the money" as they said in the Watergate days.”; “The WL and now the SEP are simply political bandits, whose politics is detemined by where they get their money.”

As a general proposition, "follow the money" is usually inadequate by itself. Beardian economic determinism is often, indeed usually, an oversimplification of complex phenomena. Certainly it is just a caricature of the theoretical power of Marxism, but when dealing with a caricatural organization, such as the WRP or the WL or the SEP, a caricature of Marxism is quite sufficient for explanatory purposes.



Then you also claim in your latest argument that the SEP cannot be “mechanically reduced to the economic roots”. But you have been doing this the entire time! So which is it? Do Beardian methods appreciate, in Trotsky’s words, “the internal connection between philosophy and the material development of society?” Because up until this point, you have not addressed it at all; your citing of that “dialectics” article, which I do not have time to read, comes as an abject surprise. I do not know anything about Peter Fryer, but I highly doubt that Healy’s mistakes can be fully understood by reading that one document. For now, I believe that Steiner and Brenner’s critique have helped me understand the issue quite well.

Here you are simply misreading what I said altogether. Learn to read more carefully. I did not say that the nature of the WRP or WL or SEP cannot be simply deduced from its material roots--indeed "roots" is here the wrong metaphor altogether, as that implies they grew out of said "roots," rather the Healyites have traditionally attached themselves to financiers and fed off them in a parasitical fashion.

Rather, what I said was that the philosophical errors of Healyism cannot be deduced directly in an unmediated fashion from material Healyite reality. That is a totally different question.

As for Fryer, there is nothing whatsoever in that document that will tell you anything about Healy's mistakes, for the simple reason that it was written before Healy kicked him out of the SLL, and Fryer was a supporter of Healy at the time. Rather, insofar as there is anything of value whatsoever in the entire corpus of Healyite philosophy--a category in which I include the musings of Steiner and Brenner, which are almost as unreadable as Healy's--it is simply crumbs snatched from under the table of Fryer's brilliance.



The methods that presumed “Marxists” use to analyze both philosophical questions and contemporary events must be examined. This is, at root, what I’ve been trying to argue for this whole time. It is a position you have strangely resisted, since it is completely consistent with IDOM, and in the very section you claim opposes me. Here is how Trotsky summarizes Schachtman and Burnham’s position at one point: “What is the meaning of this thoroughly astonishing reasoning? Inasmuch as some people through a bad method sometimes reach correct conclusions, and inasmuch as some people through a correct method not infrequently reach incorrect conclusions, therefore ... the method is not of great importance.” Trotsky does not simply engage pragmatism’s material roots, he also engages it as a philosophical method using his own: Dialectical materialism. But you don’t think it goes further than where the party gets its money or what it is spent on. It seems to me that, in a distorted form, your approach has far more in common with this “petty-bourgeois opposition” than I do. The SEP’s and Healy’s degeneration is not qualitatively different from any other party or individual degeneration in that money matters are…all that matter.

Here you are committing the same logical fallacy I touched on above, in even clearer form here.

From Trotsky's argument that in the particular case of Shachtman and Burnham, philosophical pragmatism played a major part in their theoretical errors, you draw the conclusion that always and everywhere, philosophical errors lie behind political errors, even in the case of Healy and North.

That does not follow. Famous classical logical fallacy. What do they call it?



One final point. You have a nasty habit of throwing around inflammatory labels without the slightest basis. Rarely are they correct, and they do not often explain anything. Examples: “Anti-Marxist philosophical idealism,” “idealist Healyite obsession”, “cultist”, et cetera. I think you should try toning down your language, especially when you are in danger of misreading an argument as you have just done. And “pragmatically” speaking I am more or less correct? Really? So now I endorse pragmatism as well? Either I misunderstood you, or you are all over the place.

Describing Healyism as philosophical idealism is not exactly a revelation to anyone outside of Healyland--a land from which you, Steiner and Brenner have not escaped, as your postings here illustrate.

And describing the WRP as cultist is simply common knowledge of the Left. Healy's WRP was one of the most utterly cultist organizations in left history outside the world of Stalinism. That is simply well-known historical fact. Healy had a personality cult to put Mao's to shame.

As for your "pragmatism," yes, as Luis noted, it's a good pragmatic rule of thumb that those who reject dialectics for pragmatism always turn out to have rotten politics. Always seems to happen that way, whether or not this conception is solidly founded philosophically. So in that sense, you are a good pragmatist. If you think that means that I am "accusing you of pragmatism," I am compelled to point out that the world is a contradictory place, and you need to understand things a bit more dialectically.

Developing a sense of humor might help too. Same difference, as we dialecticians like to say.

-M.H.-

[¿Que?]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasty_generalization

In any case, this is an interesting discussion, although a bit hard to follow. I haven't gotten through all the links yet, either.

It does certainly seem like a dialectical problem between economic and philosophical things. Which is fine, I've pretty much accepted the dialectic interpretation in social matters anyway. This is basic academic indoctrination and it's pretty solid in my book. It seems to stem from the dialectic problem of being both the observer and at least in part, the phenomenon being observed (social processes). This is basically historical materialism, yes?

I am less convinced of dialectics in a naturalist context, to explain things like say, genetic mutations, natural selection, geology, and to sort of go out on a limb here, not so much science as a social activity, but science as an epistemology. Would this be where dialectical materialism comes in?

I also might not comment so much because I'm trying to keep up with the links, so I may lag behind a bit, but this does not mean I've lost interest (if that even matters ;))

[Mr. Natural]

Like Que, I've been doing much reading and have much more to go, although I was unable to access the link Megamantrotsky provided. I always have much to learn whenever a thread moves into academic philosophical areas.

I do have some corrections to make in the left's general understanding of metaphysics and dialectics, though, for Marx and Engels saw them differently.

Whereas we think of metaphysics in terms of existential, spiritual, philosophy-as-divorced-from-materiality considerations, Engels (and Marx?) understood "metaphysics" in the sense that we now use "vulgar reductionist." Here is Engels in Anti-Duhring, which he wrote jointly with Marx:
"This method of work [metaphysics] has also left us as legacy the habit of observing natural objects and processes in isolation, apart from their connection with the vast whole; of observing them in repose, not in motion; as constants, not as essentially variables; in their death, not in their life. And when this way of looking at things was transferred by Bacon and Locke from natural science to philosophy, it begot the narrow, l mode of metaphysical mode of thought peculiar to the preceding centuries.
"To the metaphysician, things and their mental reflexes, ideas, are isolated, are to be considered one after the other and apart from each other, are objects of investigation fixed, rigid, given once for all. He thinks in absolutely irreconcilable antitheses."

Helena Sheehan's excellent Marxism and the Philosophy of Science (1993) comments on this perplexingl use of the term "metaphysics," and enabled me to much better understand Marx's and Engels' personal and professional relations, especially as regards their understanding of the materialist dialectic.

As regards that dialectic, it is really wrong for Marxists to dismiss it or confine it to the human social realm. Marx and Engels would object. They defined the dialectic as "the science of the general laws of the motion and development of nature, human society, and thought." (Anti-Duhring) Thus the dialectic applies to most everything, and that this is so has been conclusively (imo) investigated and revealed by Bertell Ollman, most notably in his Dance of the Dialectic (2003). Ollman shows that the young Marx gained his view of life and society as organic, systemic processes from the Hegelian philosophy of internal relations (world as internally related whole composed of other such "worlds") and Hegelian dialectical categories, and then turned Hegelianisms on their head to materially root them and the materialist dialectic was born. Marx internalized this dialectic and it deeply informed his subsequent research and writing. The materialist dialectic brought the living processes of nature, human society, and thought to life in his mind.

So Engels (surely Marx, too?) thought of metaphysics as reductionism, and the materialist dialectic provided Marx and Engels with a sense of the motion and development of life and society as organic, systemic processes. Thus capitalism was seen as a systemic process whose development would create two inherently opposed classes that would fight it out. Then in a further dialectical development the sociality of production created by capitalism was to be extended to all and capitalism's private ownership of the means of production ended. Humans would consciously produce together in community for community and a realized social individuality.

Marx didn't completely neglect "metaphysics" in the existential sense, though. His early motivations and investigations were quite existential, and then he settled into materialism and stressed human production and creation of our material existence.

My red-green best.

[blake 3:17]

I would be very very wary of making a huge deal about a few American Trotskyists who moved to the Right as some kind of proof of the Dialectic and a discrediting of pragmatism. The criminalization of revolutionary socialism in the United States was very successful in harming the development of a creative intellectual Left and what there was got dispersed and destroyed.

There's no reason to think that dialectical thinkers, from Heraclitus and Lao Tse on, have had a monopoly on truth or useful ideas. I've had recent reasons to re-examine Cartesian dualism, and it is much more robust than most Marxists would think.

[Mr. Natural]

I'm doing a lot of reading, but still do not know what the hell philosophical pragmatism is. It seems each pragmatist has a different version. Does a comrade have a brief definition of pragmatism, such as Marx's and Engels' definition of the dialectic as "the science of the general laws of the motion and development of nature, human society, and thought"?

I do know that the materialist dialectic addresses both the "things" of life and society and their organizational relations, while it appears pragmatism ignores the relations by which "things" come to life.

The unity of theory and practice characteristic of pragmatism is in accord with an important principle of Marxism, though.

As for Gerry Healy, he appears to be a louse of a person. What was his actual position on dialectics?

My red-green best.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

@AMH: Let us look at these “logical fallacies”. It is true that I misread some aspects of your argument, and I made parts of my own unclear.

First, while North has of course never acknowledged that the SEP has degenerated, he shirks philosophy and dialectics when making “Marxist” analyses. You are in solidarity with North on this issue because you are adopting a similar method to analyze his party. For North, dialectics is just a byproduct of history, and his understanding of philosophical history is terrible; this is obvious from any perusal of his participation in the polemic. Now, it seems that you do not condone economic determinism, but that the SEP is an exception. For you, it is nothing more than a “caricatural organization”, unworthy of a full analysis; here, a “caricature of Marxism is quite sufficient for explanatory purposes”. So in essence your argument is that the materialist dialectic should be applied to some aspects of our world, or some things, as opposed to others.

I find this position ridiculous. The dialectic must be applied consistently, not selectively. Reductionism is inadequate for any situation. Even if it’s true that the SEP was always a caricature, why does that exclude the party from a serious analysis? One of the gaping flaws in economic determinism is its denial of consciousness, that is, human agency. By only concentrating on the economic, we are not allowed to see how North and the SEP became vulnerable to bourgeois prejudices, or how or why they ultimately succumbed to them, or how they themselves aided the process. So there are theoretical and practical risks in applying reductionism even to “caricatures”. The Stalinist Comintern, for instance, refused to recognize sociopolitical distinctions when they reduced Social Democracy to a wing of fascism, and the Nazis to big business lackeys. They regarded Nazi rule as a “joke”, as a rickety bridge that would collapse in a week. Need I go on? That you would adopt this sort of approach at all is disturbing for a self-titled “historian”.

And I would argue that the history of the International Committee is far more complex than you allege. I won’t get into it here, but Steiner and Brenner have shown that the degeneration was rooted in far more than just money, and they covered a wide range of topics besides philosophy. Perhaps you too may have come to this conclusion—if you actually, carefully, read what they had to say. Que provided his input earlier, even a critique. But you think S&B are “unreadable”. I question whether you even tried.

Next, I believe you are incorrect in your assessment of Healyism (which happens to be identical to North’s). In my opinion Healy is not so much guilty of “Hegelian idealism” than he is of “sensationalism” (that is, “the doctrine that all knowledge is derived from sensations”). This is more in line with empiricism than with Hegel. David Bruce shows that Healy actually had a poor understanding of Hegel, though he used Hegelian phraseology to make it seem otherwise (link in an earlier post if you are interested). To paraphrase Bruce, the IC wasn’t facing idealism, but the degeneration of thought—right in the heart of Trotskyism. Considering this, it is hardly proper to lump me and S&B in with Healy. In fact, we have nothing in common with Healy at all. You have no real grounding for that accusation other than your own bile.

Now for the line that has gotten your gout—that “every political position stems in some way from philosophy.” I still defend that statement, if only because you misunderstood and blew it out of proportion. I do believe that philosophical errors often lie behind political ones, but you made it seem as though I meant it as a categorical maxim. It was just a general statement. If I said that political errors stem only and completely from philosophy, you’d have a point. I should have said, “in part” instead. But it was self-explanatory in the context of that paragraph. So again, I hold that your charge has no basis. You’re blowing smoke; you merely seized upon a phrase that you found objectionable and threw “Healyism” around to fill the void.

For the last time, I agree (…again…) that philosophy has material roots. It does not lie apart from materialism. But while philosophy and politics are derived from material reality, they aren’t indistinct from that reality; they do have lives of their own, though it was material reality that birthed them. That is how I look at philosophy; it is not “divorced” from material reality. Granted, I have a lot to learn and my view is far from perfect. But I do not see anything problematic about it. If you still do, then whatever. I think my posts speak for themselves. I’m done with you on this issue.

Finally, about getting causation “backwards”. I don’t regard it as something so simple as an arrow. For me knowledge in general is akin to the intricacy of a spider’s web. It is likewise for causation, and I think Marxism is no less similar. The question is, which aspect of Marxism is more important: Theory or political practice? Currently I am convinced theoretical study is more important, and I admit that this view isn’t flawless. But it isn’t usually “politics first”, it is method; without the dialectical method to guide its practice, Marxism would hardly be different than anarchism or bourgeois liberalism. And there are plenty of historical examples that showcase its supreme importance. There’s Lenin’s study of Hegel in his Philosophical Notebooks after Social Democracy’s betrayal; Trotsky’s own study of Hegel while preparing In Defense of Marxism; Cliff Slaughter’s 1965 paper Opportunism and Empiricism, which protested the reunification with Pablo, and began with a critique of pragmatism and empiricism (Joseph Hanson’s method at the time) as opposed to the political line over Cuba. And why? Because they understood that politics alone isn’t enough. The concern was with the underlying theoretical question of the Marxist method. Now let’s compare this approach with yours. Your position cannot explain why our predecessors went back to a reexamination of dialectics at crucial junctures in their respective parties:

“Sometimes, political positions do stem from philosophical, but much more usually it is the other way around, and in any case the material substratum is rarely buried deeply--least of all in this case.”

In conclusion, I believe that it is your approach to sociopolitical matters that is far more worthy of the title “idealist”. Your reductionism, even if it is selective, makes your patronizing jibe on “thinking dialectically” pretty absurd. Bearing this in mind, can you really call yourself a dialectician with a straight face? You certainly haven’t argued like one, because I’ve spent most of this response combing through your egregious distortions, blanket statements, and misunderstandings; you can understand why I’ve lost my “sense of humor”. I don’t know at this point whether you are just a pseudo-intellectual or a hack. I’m leaning towards the latter.

Now can we get back to pragmatism? If you have anything else to add, you can PM me from now on.

[A Marxist Historian]

I'm doing a lot of reading, but still do not know what the hell philosophical pragmatism is. It seems each pragmatist has a different version. Does a comrade have a brief definition of pragmatism, such as Marx's and Engels' definition of the dialectic as "the science of the general laws of the motion and development of nature, human society, and thought"?

I do know that the materialist dialectic addresses both the "things" of life and society and their organizational relations, while it appears pragmatism ignores the relations by which "things" come to life.

The unity of theory and practice characteristic of pragmatism is in accord with an important principle of Marxism, though.

As for Gerry Healy, he appears to be a louse of a person. What was his actual position on dialectics?

My red-green best.

Pragmatism as a philosophical school, despite the abstruseness and opacity of the writings of many philosophical pragmatists, really matches everyday understandings of ordinary people of what it means when you call somebody pragmatic or a pragmatist quite nicely.

As for Healy on philosophy, I'll allow Megaman to expound on that if he wishes. I don't wanna barf.

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

@AMH: Let us look at these “logical fallacies”. It is true that I misread some aspects of your argument, and I made parts of my own unclear.

First, while North has of course never acknowledged that the SEP has degenerated, he shirks philosophy and dialectics when making “Marxist” analyses. You are in solidarity with North on this issue because you are adopting a similar method to analyze his party. For North, dialectics is just a byproduct of history, and his understanding of philosophical history is terrible; this is obvious from any perusal of his participation in the polemic. Now, it seems that you do not condone economic determinism, but that the SEP is an exception. For you, it is nothing more than a “caricatural organization”, unworthy of a full analysis; here, a “caricature of Marxism is quite sufficient for explanatory purposes”. So in essence your argument is that the materialist dialectic should be applied to some aspects of our world, or some things, as opposed to others.

I find this position ridiculous. The dialectic must be applied consistently, not selectively. Reductionism is inadequate for any situation. Even if it’s true that the SEP was always a caricature, why does that exclude the party from a serious analysis? One of the gaping flaws in economic determinism is its denial of consciousness, that is, human agency. By only concentrating on the economic, we are not allowed to see how North and the SEP became vulnerable to bourgeois prejudices, or how or why they ultimately succumbed to them, or how they themselves aided the process. So there are theoretical and practical risks in applying reductionism even to “caricatures”. The Stalinist Comintern, for instance, refused to recognize sociopolitical distinctions when they reduced Social Democracy to a wing of fascism, and the Nazis to big business lackeys. They regarded Nazi rule as a “joke”, as a rickety bridge that would collapse in a week. Need I go on? That you would adopt this sort of approach at all is disturbing for a self-titled “historian”.

And I would argue that the history of the International Committee is far more complex than you allege. I won’t get into it here, but Steiner and Brenner have shown that the degeneration was rooted in far more than just money, and they covered a wide range of topics besides philosophy. Perhaps you too may have come to this conclusion—if you actually, carefully, read what they had to say. Que provided his input earlier, even a critique. But you think S&B are “unreadable”. I question whether you even tried.

Next, I believe you are incorrect in your assessment of Healyism (which happens to be identical to North’s). In my opinion Healy is not so much guilty of “Hegelian idealism” than he is of “sensationalism” (that is, “the doctrine that all knowledge is derived from sensations”). This is more in line with empiricism than with Hegel. David Bruce shows that Healy actually had a poor understanding of Hegel, though he used Hegelian phraseology to make it seem otherwise (link in an earlier post if you are interested). To paraphrase Bruce, the IC wasn’t facing idealism, but the degeneration of thought—right in the heart of Trotskyism. Considering this, it is hardly proper to lump me and S&B in with Healy. In fact, we have nothing in common with Healy at all. You have no real grounding for that accusation other than your own bile.

Now for the line that has gotten your gout—that “every political position stems in some way from philosophy.” I still defend that statement, if only because you misunderstood and blew it out of proportion. I do believe that philosophical errors often lie behind political ones, but you made it seem as though I meant it as a categorical maxim. It was just a general statement. If I said that political errors stem only and completely from philosophy, you’d have a point. I should have said, “in part” instead. But it was self-explanatory in the context of that paragraph. So again, I hold that your charge has no basis. You’re blowing smoke; you merely seized upon a phrase that you found objectionable and threw “Healyism” around to fill the void.

For the last time, I agree (…again…) that philosophy has material roots. It does not lie apart from materialism. But while philosophy and politics are derived from material reality, they aren’t indistinct from that reality; they do have lives of their own, though it was material reality that birthed them. That is how I look at philosophy; it is not “divorced” from material reality. Granted, I have a lot to learn and my view is far from perfect. But I do not see anything problematic about it. If you still do, then whatever. I think my posts speak for themselves. I’m done with you on this issue.

Finally, about getting causation “backwards”. I don’t regard it as something so simple as an arrow. For me knowledge in general is akin to the intricacy of a spider’s web. It is likewise for causation, and I think Marxism is no less similar. The question is, which aspect of Marxism is more important: Theory or political practice? Currently I am convinced theoretical study is more important, and I admit that this view isn’t flawless. But it isn’t usually “politics first”, it is method; without the dialectical method to guide its practice, Marxism would hardly be different than anarchism or bourgeois liberalism. And there are plenty of historical examples that showcase its supreme importance. There’s Lenin’s study of Hegel in his Philosophical Notebooks after Social Democracy’s betrayal; Trotsky’s own study of Hegel while preparing In Defense of Marxism; Cliff Slaughter’s 1965 paper Opportunism and Empiricism, which protested the reunification with Pablo, and began with a critique of pragmatism and empiricism (Joseph Hanson’s method at the time) as opposed to the political line over Cuba. And why? Because they understood that politics alone isn’t enough. The concern was with the underlying theoretical question of the Marxist method. Now let’s compare this approach with yours. Your position cannot explain why our predecessors went back to a reexamination of dialectics at crucial junctures in their respective parties:

“Sometimes, political positions do stem from philosophical, but much more usually it is the other way around, and in any case the material substratum is rarely buried deeply--least of all in this case.”

In conclusion, I believe that it is your approach to sociopolitical matters that is far more worthy of the title “idealist”. Your reductionism, even if it is selective, makes your patronizing jibe on “thinking dialectically” pretty absurd. Bearing this in mind, can you really call yourself a dialectician with a straight face? You certainly haven’t argued like one, because I’ve spent most of this response combing through your egregious distortions, blanket statements, and misunderstandings; you can understand why I’ve lost my “sense of humor”. I don’t know at this point whether you are just a pseudo-intellectual or a hack. I’m leaning towards the latter.

Now can we get back to pragmatism? If you have anything else to add, you can PM me from now on.

As for pragmatism, I think I've said all that I have to say that is worth saying--and posted the link to what Trotsky has to say about it, better than anything I could do anyway.

Now, as to Healyite history, yes, the Healyites had a very complex evolution to the status of mere political bandits that they acquired by the 1970s, indeed at one point, in the late 1950s, they looked from the outside like an awfully fine organization. If my analysis of the Healyites is "reductionist," that is only because the Healyites reduced themselves to a caricature of a left political organization.

But no, I don't think Healy's philosophical errors had much to do with this really, they were merely symptomatic.

Healy, unlike Shachtman or Burnham or certainly John Dewey, was not a middle class intellectual by class background. He had a thoroughly proletarian background, a major part of why James P. Cannon made the mistake of favoring him.

His philosophical notions are unimportant, in the last analysis, as they had little or nothing to do with his actual political ideas and practice. In reality, Healy was very much of a pragmatist in the everyday sense, out after the main chance. Which led him gradually to, quite simply, selling out to whoever would provide him with finances.

The material root of the Healyite degeneration into mercenary political banditry was his grandiose overblown conception of just how powerful and influential his WRP actually was. I think Healy really believed that, if he could manage to produce a daily newspaper, that he could organize the working class to overthrow the ruling class.

But, to be able to produce that paper, he needed money. So...

As to S and B, I have read some of their stuff, what they have to say about the history of the IC, what they know so well as they were involved in it, is interesting if IMHO wrongheaded. What I have to say about that I said in the Trotsky group thread.

But when I tried to read their philosophical musings my eyes glazed over instantly, just more boring Healy style Hegelian idealism. Indeed S and B are, philosophically, IMHO the only consistent Healyites around, and I am sure they do a nice job at pinpointing the weaknesses and internal contradictions of his maunderings--as if anyone else cared these days.

Finally as to Slaughter, yup, opportunism and empiricism had a lot to do with Hansen and Pablo and Mandel's convergence on hailing Castro as an "unconscious Trotskyist."

But Slaughter was compelled to focus on their philosophical errors, as if he spent too much time talking about Cuba, the basis of the reunification of the FI, it would be obvious to everyone that, if anything, his conception of Cuba as "capitalist" was even falser than the Hansen-Mandel-Pablo notion that Fidel was an "unconscious Trotskyist."

And indeed, from a philosophical standpoint, Healy and Slaughter were simply repeating Shachtman and Burnham's error about the USSR with respect for Cuba, almost word for word. Unable to think dialectically, Slaughter simply could not grasp that a deformed workers state could be created by a revolution in which the proletariat was not involved, as that went against the rules of formal logic. And Healy, the pragmatic politician, decided that Slaughter's formalistic pseudo-dialectics was ... a useful tool for the WRP in general.

Actually, come to think of it, here we have hit on the basis of the Healyite obsession with abstract philosophy. It was to hide that over Cuba, which Hansen rightly described as "the acid test," the IC was utterly divorced from reality.

-M.H.-

[Luís Henrique]

philosophical pragmatism, which is, first and foremost, an epistemological position.

And, as an epistemological position, it is summed up in words that much resemble Marxist epistemology. One says to us that we should believe things that are practical are true, the other that the way to truth is trough practice.

But the superficial resemblance is misleading. Take religion, for instance: pragmatists would say that if religion x is useful for society, then its tenets are true. Marxists would hold a completely different view: that the truth of religion x should be discussed on the basis of whether its tenets are appliable to everyday practice. If religion x mandates belief in an afterlife, pragmatists demand that such belief is demonstrably beneficial to society. Marxists would ask how is an afterlife related to people's practices (and would question, evidently, the notion of "society", posited a-historically, as pragmatists would evidently posit it).

Luís Henrique

[Marxaveli]

I've always thought Pragmatism was very much compatible with Marxism, but it seems a lot of people here think otherwise. But perhaps I am understanding Pragmatism in a different way?

I've always simply thought it was the medium between Universalism and Relativism - Universalism holding that there are strict principles and ethics or morality that must always be upheld, and Relativism basically is anything goes. The former is desirable but impossible, and the latter is simply reactionary and ultimately destructive.

It is my understanding that Pragmatism does lean towards Universalism, but realizes that circumstances may sometimes force or necessitate universal laws to be broken. The danger of course, is that if this is done often enough, that Pragmatism can slip into Relativism. But think about it - it is a universal law for example may be honesty. Whenever possible, we want to know the truth and uphold it, and that lying is usually undesirable and to be avoided. But sometimes it is necessary. If someone who wants to kill your whole family comes to you and asks where they are at, are you going to be honest with them? I think not. That is Pragmatism as I've understood it - there are universal laws, but material circumstances sometimes necessitate that they must be broken if the result of not doing so manifests worse consequences by upholding that law. In relation to Marxism, we deplore war, state violence, and other vices of the Capitalist system, but we also understand that violence, to at least some extent, will be necessary in the form of revolution to end ruling class hegemony. Is that not pragmatic in itself?

[feather canyons]

William James himself was a bourgeois conformist tool. But pragmatism could be extrapolated to be compatible with Marxism, I think, even though James was very critical of Hegel.

[BolshevikBabe]

I'm going to take the classic Leninist position on this one and say I think Marxism (and indeed materialism in general) are difficult if not impossible to reconcile with pragmatism. Pragmatism sets its criterion of truth as practice which might make it look similiar to Marxism at first, but whereas Marxism sees truth as being confirmed in social practice, pragmatism tends to be based in a methodological individualism and empiricism that fail to grasp the importance of abstraction, the possibility of objective truth outside the subject etc.


Perhaps the “latest fashion” in the latest American philosophy is “pragmatism” (from the Greek word “pragma”—action; that is, a philosophy of action). The philosophical journals perhaps speak more of pragmatism than of anything else. Pragmatism ridicules the metaphysics both of idealism and materialism, acclaims expericnce and only experience, recognises practice as the only criterion, refers to the positivist movement in general, especially turns for support to Ostwald, Mach, Pearson, Poincaré and Duhem for the belief that science is not an “absolute copy of reality” and . . . successfully deduces from all this a God for practical purposes, and only for practical purposes, without any metaphysics, and without transcending the bounds of experience (cf. William James, Pragmatism. A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking, New York and London, 1907, pp. 57 and 106 especially). From the standpoint of materialism the difference between Machism and pragmatism is as insignificant and unimportant as the difference between empirio-criticism and empirio-monism. Compare, for example, Bogdanov’s definition of truth with the pragmatist definition of truth, which is: “Truth for a pragmatist becomes a class-name for all sorts of definite working values in experience”

V.I. Lenin. Materialism and Empirio-Criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy. (1972). Foreign Languages Press. p.414

[neola]

As what I understand between marxism and pragmatism. Those two philosophy are totally not compatible. For, Marxism is concerned in both theoretical and practical critique meaning political critique while pragmatism is only practical philosophy that is there is no such thing as objective reality or permanent truth.

[Kaysone]

I certainly hope so. Pragmatism, or at least coming to terms that the real world doesn't always follow the patterns in theoretical books. The left has faced many setbacks, but I believe that a pragmatic Marxist/leftist or whatever would try to work around those issues, not be held back by wanting to remain "ideologically pure", or, upon realizing that something simply isn't working, to try something else.

[Hit The North]

I certainly hope so. Pragmatism, or at least coming to terms that the real world doesn't always follow the patterns in theoretical books. The left has faced many setbacks, but I believe that a pragmatic Marxist/leftist or whatever would try to work around those issues, not be held back by wanting to remain "ideologically pure", or, upon realizing that something simply isn't working, to try something else.

There's a difference between acting pragmatically and Pragmatism as a philosophy. Lenin, after all, is a good example of a pragmatic political operator despite his objections to Pragmatism as a theory of truth.