Young Marx Vs Old Marx??

[Akshay!]

Is there a difference between Young Marx and Old Marx?
If yes, what is it?

[Brutus]

Try this. (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Marx)

And this has already been asked on rev left (http://www.revleft.com/vb/old-marx-vs-t61558/index.html)

:)

[Akshay!]

Thanks, I read that discussion but it's pretty short and doesn't completely answer my question. What's your view about it? Is there a difference between young marx and old marx? If yes, what is it? if not, why do people refer to "young marx", etc..? and what do they mean?

[Comrade #138672]

The young Marx was more liberal than the old Marx (not an actual liberal, though). This is why bourgeois liberals love the young Marx but reject the old Marx. They want to confuse the issue and claim Marx for their own cause.

[Lucretia]

Is there a difference between Young Marx and Old Marx?
If yes, what is it?

Old Marx's beard was gray. Young Marx's beard wasn't.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

The young Marx was more liberal than the old Marx (not an actual liberal, though). This is why bourgeois liberals love the young Marx but reject the old Marx. They want to confuse the issue and claim Marx for their own cause.

They were? I was under the impression that Marx's first political opponents were liberals by the term we know today - known then as 'Yellow Socialists' or 'Nationalist Socialists' (NOTHING TO DO WITH HITLER AND HIS NAZIS- The party coined it out of opportunism and there is even a quote by Hitler claiming that Marx and socialism were part of a zionist conspiracy).

[ed miliband]

The young Marx was more liberal than the old Marx (not an actual liberal, though). This is why bourgeois liberals love the young Marx but reject the old Marx. They want to confuse the issue and claim Marx for their own cause.

right, and what bourgeois liberals do that? none. no bourgeois liberals try to claim the marx of the 'economic and philosophical manuscripts of 1844' as their own, nor do they 'love' him. if they do speak of the young marx, is only with reference to 'on the jewish question', in order to call him an anti-semite.

[TheEmancipator]

Young Marxists resemble Young Hegelians and are generally referred to as Marxist-Humanists. They are idealist wannabe philosophers who prefer to mix with anarchists. ;)1 They are a rarity these days.

Old Marxists are Das Kapital-reading religiously materialist and orthodox. They declare their crusades on revisionism and anybody who is an adherent to Hegelian thought is a bourgeois idealist.

I wish the two could get over their differences :grin:

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

Young Marxists resemble Young Hegelians and are generally referred to as Marxist-Humanists. They are idealist wannabe philosophers who prefer to mix with anarchists. ;)1 They are a rarity these days.

Old Marxists are Das Kapital-reading religiously materialist and orthodox. They declare their crusades on revisionism and anybody who is an adherent to Hegelian thought is a bourgeois idealist.

I wish the two could get over their differences :grin:

And collaborate with you bourgeois-fascist-revisionists? Never!

LONG LIVE THE PROLETARIAT!
LONG LIVE MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM, PRINCIPALLY MAOISM!
LONG LIVE THE PEOPLE'S WAR!
LONG LIVE THE WORLD PEOPLE'S WAR!
PEOPLE'S WAR UNTIL COMMUNISM!
CRUSH IMPERIALISM, REVISIONISM AND WORLD REACTION!

[Comrade #138672]

right, and what bourgeois liberals do that? none. no bourgeois liberals try to claim the marx of the 'economic and philosophical manuscripts of 1844' as their own, nor do they 'love' him. if they do speak of the young marx, is only with reference to 'on the jewish question', in order to call him an anti-semite.What about these liberals?

JF7Dq91GL3I

[Hit The North]

What about these liberals?

JF7Dq91GL3I

She quotes liberally (sic) from Das Kapital, a work of the 'mature' Marx, in this documentary and her narrative is that of an economic historian not a bourgeois liberal.

[Aurora]

No there aren't really any differences, the same people who try to draw a line between 'young' and 'old' Marx are those who try to divide Engels from Marx, that is, revisionists and opportunists who need to discredit a particular theory or sterilize Marxism.

[Akshay!]

bourgeois liberals love the young Marx but reject the old Marx. They want to confuse the issue and claim Marx for their own cause.

I quite agree with you. I've observed this in at least 3 liberals - namely, Chomsky, Russell, and Tucker. Here's the Chomsky vid (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2QPBmbnpLU). Russell talks about it in his History of Western Philosophy book, and Tucker repeatedly talks about it in the "The Marxian Revolutionary Idea". The documentary that you posted is another example.

Also, imho, almost ALL anarchists (with zero exceptions so far) like the young marx more than the old.

[Brutus]

Young Marxists resemble Young Hegelians and are generally referred to as Marxist-Humanists. They are idealist wannabe philosophers who prefer to mix with anarchists. ;)1 They are a rarity these days.

Old Marxists are Das Kapital-reading religiously materialist and orthodox. They declare their crusades on revisionism and anybody who is an adherent to Hegelian thought is a bourgeois idealist.

I wish the two could get over their differences :grin:

You're a wannabe idealist philosopher?

[Flying Purple People Eater]

Young Marxists resemble Young Hegelians and are generally referred to as Marxist-Humanists.

I don't know where you're coming from with this information. I've never heard someone brand themselves a 'marxist-humanist' before (what's even the point? why not just 'marxist'?).

I'd like to be a Marxist-Sundae please.

They are idealist wannabe philosophers
I can just as easily broadbrush every communist as a Kim Jong Il supporter with this kind of slander.

Why are 'Marxist-Humanists' (of which you identify with) idealists, or 'wannabe philosophers'?




Old Marxists are Das Kapital-reading religiously materialist and orthodox. They declare their crusades on revisionism and anybody who is an adherent to Hegelian thought is a bourgeois idealist.

EDIT: Didn't read properly. Still, charicatures everywhere.

I've never met a single person who prefers the younger Marx over the older Marx - anarchist or not.

[Hit The North]

I quite agree with you (at least on the "bourgeois liberals love the younr Marx but reject the old Marx" even though I'm not sure if there's a real difference between the 2).

I've observed this in at least 3 liberals - namely, Chomsky, Russell, and Tucker. Here's the Chomsky vid (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2QPBmbnpLU). Russell talks about it in his History of Western Philosophy book, and Tucker repeatedly talks about it in the "The Marxian Revolutionary Idea". The documentary that you posted is another example.


In what way are any of these three persons 'bourgeois liberals'? Chomsky is an anarchist, Russell was a Fabian socialist and Tucker was a humanist Marxist. This makes all them, irrespective of their divergence from Marx, essentially collectivists in their politics, not bourgeois liberals.


Also, imho, almost ALL anarchists (with zero exceptions so far) like the young marx more than the old.


So what do you think are the differences between Young Marx and Old Marx?

[goalkeeper]

The young Marx was more liberal than the old Marx (not an actual liberal, though). This is why bourgeois liberals love the young Marx but reject the old Marx. They want to confuse the issue and claim Marx for their own cause.

Please, do direct me to Marx renouncing his more liberal writings on stuff such as the free press etc in his old age?

Just because dude sat down to objectively study capitalism "scientifically" or whatever does not mean he lost his more humanist pretensions.

[TheEmancipator]

I don't know where you're coming from with this information. I've never heard someone brand themselves a 'marxist-humanist' before (what's even the point? why not just 'marxist'?).

I'd like to be a Marxist-Sundae please.

I can just as easily broadbrush every communist as a Kim Jong Il supporter with this kind of slander.

Why are 'Marxist-Humanists' (of which you identify with) idealists, or 'wannabe philosophers'?





EDIT: Didn't read properly. Still, charicatures everywhere.


It was half-serious.


I've never met a single person who prefers the younger Marx over the older Marx - anarchist or not.Now you have.


You're a wannabe idealist philosopher?

Apparently. last time we had a conversation on Marxist-Humanism we were called bourgeois idealists.

I get called bourgeois idealist by a lot of bourgeois idealists though. :(

[Flying Purple People Eater]

Now you have.

So you're a hegelian?




Apparently. last time we had a conversation on Marxist-Humanism we were called bourgeois idealists.

I get called bourgeois idealist by a lot of bourgeois idealists though. :

Well bourgeois is pretty common slander but I don't believe you can get more idealist than Hegel.

[Lord Hargreaves]

The young Marx is seen as a Hegelian and a humanist, concerned with more "philosophical" issues (here you will find most of his thoughts on community, political democracy, religion, alienation, etc.) The older Marx is seen as a strict materialist, concerned solely with the study of economics and the scientific understanding of capitalism.

French philosopher Louis Althusser claimed that Marxism was a distinct philosophy that only fully emerged in the later writings of Marx.

As a science of history, Althusser believed Marxism excluded historicism (the belief that certain ideas are only relevant to a certain historical milleu, or only understandable within a certain historical context, etc.) excluded Hegelianism (the belief that history was the teleological unfolding of Humanity's progression from unfreedom to freedom - humanity as the subject-substance of history) and excluded humanism (the belief that Marxism was a belief that started with the subject, Man, and was concerned with how he should transverse and transform his world).

Thus Marxism-proper constituted an "epistemological break" from the early concerns of Marx. The claim was not that early Marxist writings were irrelevant, or were not good or not inspirational, but that they were not scientific and not therefore strictly Marxism (understood in this highly restrictive sense).

Althusser later repudiated these ideas, but he is still predominately famous for advocating them. People still use the signifiers Young Marx and Old Marx, but usually without any of the above Althusserian connotations.

[Old Bolshie]

Also, imho, almost ALL anarchists (with zero exceptions so far) like the young marx more than the old.

That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune.

[Akshay!]

In what way are any of these three persons 'bourgeois liberals'? Chomsky is an anarchist, Russell was a Fabian socialist and Tucker was a humanist Marxist. This makes all them, irrespective of their divergence from Marx, essentially collectivists in their politics, not bourgeois liberals.


If you think Chomsky, Russell, and Rucker aren't liberals then we have a Really different conception of "liberal", "socialist" and the difference between them.


So what do you think are the differences between Young Marx and Old Marx?

I haven't read enough to comment on that question (which is why I asked it in the first place) but I'm pretty sure that the difference is kinda exaggerated. It's probably like the difference between the philosophy of any other person when he is 65 from when he is 25.




Also, imho, almost ALL anarchists (with zero exceptions so far) like the young marx more than the old.

That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune.

Yes, exactly!

[Lucretia]

In what way are any of these three persons 'bourgeois liberals'? Chomsky is an anarchist, Russell was a Fabian socialist and Tucker was a humanist Marxist. This makes all them, irrespective of their divergence from Marx, essentially collectivists in their politics, not bourgeois liberals.



So what do you think are the differences between Young Marx and Old Marx?

Chomsky identifies as an anarchist. He is objectively reformist/social democratic -- as virtually every anarchist is in terms of the logical consequences of their objective programs.

[Lucretia]

That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune.

Your evidence for this "more authoritarian stance" is...? Your evidence that the Marx did not see the necessity of creating a revolutionary working-class organization in 1844 (when he wrote the Paris Manuscripts) is...? The idea that the Paris Commune could have survived if it used "more authoritarian methods" is a bit silly, by the way, as is the claim that Marx turned to "authoritarianism" as a result of witnessing it.

I'm seeing a lot of sweeping claims about Marx in this thread, but not a lot of argumentation to back it up.

Cool. I just noticed I have a reputation of 1844. Tell me that isn't a striking coincidence.

[Luís Henrique]

"Young Marx" is often an interesting excuse to pass our own absurds as "more Marxist than Marx himself (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1058202&postcount=16)"...

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Cool. I just noticed I have a reputation of 1844. Tell me that isn't a striking coincidence.

Now it's 1848. Highly suspicious.

If the next time I look it is 1867, I fear David Icke's theories will have been proved.

Luís Henrique

[Old Bolshie]

Your evidence for this "more authoritarian stance" is...?


It seems the Parisians are succumbing. It is their own fault, but a fault which was in fact due to their too great decency. The Central Committee and later the Commune gave Thiers, that mischievous dwarf, time to concentrate the hostile forces, firstly because they rather foolishly did not want to start a civil war—as if Thiers had not already started it by his attempt at the forcible disarming of Paris, as if the National Assembly, summoned for the sole purpose of deciding the question of war or peace with the Prussians, had not immediately declared war on the Republic! Secondly, in order that the appearance of having usurped power should not attach to them they lost precious moments (it was imperative to advance on Versailles immediately after the defeat (Place Vendôme) of the reactionaries in Paris) by the election of the Commune, the organization of which, etc., cost yet more time.

Karl Marx, Letter to Wilhelm Liebknecht, April 6, 1871

Your evidence that the Marx did not see the necessity of creating a revolutionary working-class organization in 1844 (when he wrote the Paris Manuscripts) is...? If someone needs to show that Marx wrote about the necessity of creation of a working class political party in 1844 is you since you are the one disagreeing with me.


The idea that the Paris Commune could have survived if it used "more authoritarian methods" is a bit silly, by the way, as is the claim that Marx turned to "authoritarianism" as a result of witnessing it.
Silly and ignorant was your commentary. Take a good reading:



"Why do the anti-authoritarians not confine themselves to crying out against political authority, the state? All Socialists are agreed that the political state, and with it political authority, will disappear as a result of the coming social revolution, that is, that public functions will lose their political character and will be transformed into the simple administrative functions of watching over the true interests of society. But the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means, if such there be at all; and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionists. Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if it had not made use of this authority of the armed people against the bourgeois? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach it for not having used it freely enough?"

Frederich Engels, On Authority.And since you are a Trot I thought that you might wanna hear from Lenin as well:


But two mistakes destroyed the fruits of the splendid victory. The proletariat stopped half-way: instead of setting about “expropriating the expropriators”, it allowed itself to be led astray by dreams of establishing a higher justice in the country united by a common national task; such institutions as the banks, for example, were not taken over, and Proudhonist theories about a “just exchange”, etc., still prevailed among the socialists. The second mistake was excessive magnanimity on the part of the proletariat: instead of destroying its enemies it sought to exert moral influence on them; it underestimated the significance of direct military operations in civil war, and instead of launching a resolute offensive against Versailles that would have crowned its victory in Paris, it tarried and gave the Versailles government time to gather the dark forces and prepare for the blood-soaked week of May.

Lenin: Lessons of the Commune

I'm seeing a lot of sweeping claims about Marx in this thread, but not a lot of argumentation to back it up.If someone showed that certainly doesn't know too much of Marx or Marxism in this thread was you.

[Lucretia]

If someone needs to show that Marx wrote about the necessity of creation of a working class political party in 1844 is you since you are the one disagreeing with me.

Silly and ignorant was your commentary. Take a good reading:

And since you are a Trot I thought that you might wanna hear from Lenin as well:

If someone showed that certainly doesn't know too much of Marx or Marxism in this thread was you.

Providing quotes of Lenin and Marx and Engels saying that the Paris Commune demonstrated the need for workers to attempt to consolidate political authority by organizing their own state is NOT the same thing as showing that this episode convinced Marx to adopt some sort of new, more "authoritarian" approach to revolution.

And even if it did, which you haven't demonstrated at all, this would have nothing to do with the young-vs-old-Marx debate, as "old Marx" is understood to be, at the very latest, the Marx who wrote Das Kapital (vol. 1), which was completed before the Paris Commune failed.

So check your snarky comments and attitude, and try again. I stand by my comment about your referring to "authoritarian methods" being the root cause of the failure of the commune. To call it an issue of "authoriatarian methods," especially in light of the connotation of the word "authoritarian," completely trivializes the root issue -- which was that the politics were not premised upon a theoretically informed grasp of the tasks confronting the working class, namely the need to overcome capital as a totality. The Lenin quote, which you somehow seem to think proves your point, actually shows this very clearly, and is a discussion about the failure of the Commune to generalize its struggle against the state by undermining its economic supports.

[ed miliband]

they can be (are?) a bit mad, but i think the marxist-humanists (as in, followers of dunayevskaya) have the most interesting approach to the body of marx's work:


The totality of Marx’s Marxism, as developed from 1841 to 1883, provides the foundation for working this out. In particular, we stand on the philosophical new beginnings articulated in Marx’s 1844 Humanist Essays, especially the “dialectic of negativity as a moving and creating principle,” as well as on the whole of his critique of political economy and of the value form of production—from the Communist Manifesto (1848), to the Grundrisse (1857-1858), to Capital (1867-1872). We also base ourselves on the multicultural writings of the late Marx on gender and non-European societies, especially the Ethnological Notebooks (1879-1882). We see Marx’s vision of a new society in the Critique of the Gotha Program (1875), Capital and The Civil War in France (1871) as philosophical foundations for the non-statist, liberated society of the future, and as indications of how to get there. Inseparable from this, we consider Marx’s organizational practice and principles, especially in the Critique of the Gotha Program, as important ground for organization today.

[Old Bolshie]

Providing quotes of Lenin and Marx and Engels saying that the Paris Commune demonstrated the need for workers to attempt to consolidate political authority by organizing their own state is NOT the same thing as showing that this episode convinced Marx to adopt some sort of new, more "authoritarian" approach to revolution.

Consolidate political authority by organizing their own state? No. They are talking about the lessons drawn from the failure of the Commune including not adopting a more authoritarian stance. Marx even condemned the communards for wasting "precious" time in organizing elections.

I don't know where I said new, only more authoritarian stance which Marx saw as one of the faults of the communards.

I didn't show Engels and Lenin quotes to prove anything about Marx but merely to answer your "The idea that the Paris Commune could have survived if it used "more authoritarian methods" is a bit silly, by the way".



And even if it did, which you haven't demonstrated at all, this would have nothing to do with the young-vs-old-Marx debate, as "old Marx" is understood to be, at the very latest, the Marx who wrote Das Kapital (vol. 1), which was completed before the Paris Commune failed.

So the Marx who wrote about the Paris Commune in 1871 was the "young" Marx?


So check your snarky comments and attitude, and try again. I stand by my comment about your referring to "authoritarian methods" being the root cause of the failure of the commune. It wasn't about "methods" (authoritarian or otherwise), which I think completely trivializes the root issue -- which was that the politics was not one premised upon a theoretically informed grasp of the tasks confronting the working class to overcome capital as a totality. The Lenin quote, which you somehow seem to think proves your point, actually shows this very clearly, and is a discussion about the failure of the Commune to generalize its struggle against the state by undermining its economic supports.

Once again: "Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if it had not made use of this authority of the armed people against the bourgeois? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach it for not having used it freely enough?"

"The second mistake was excessive magnanimity on the part of the proletariat: instead of destroying its enemies it sought to exert moral influence on them; it underestimated the significance of direct military operations in civil war, and instead of launching a resolute offensive against Versailles that would have crowned its victory in Paris, it tarried and gave the Versailles government time to gather the dark forces and prepare for the blood-soaked week of May"


I think this is pretty clear about how both men viewed the lack of authoritarianism as a cause of the failure of the Commune.

[Akshay!]

Chomsky identifies as an anarchist. He is objectively reformist/social democratic -- as virtually every anarchist is in terms of the logical consequences of their objective programs.

I don't know about the other things. But I totally agree with this as I mentioned here - http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2613612&postcount=24


In what way are any of these three persons 'bourgeois liberals'? Chomsky is an anarchist, Russell was a Fabian socialist and Tucker was a humanist Marxist. This makes all them, irrespective of their divergence from Marx, essentially collectivists in their politics, not bourgeois liberals.


Ok, Chomsky is down, now let me examine this claim that Russell is not a liberal but a "Fabian socialist". Here's something I found -


The Fabian Society is a British "socialist" organization whose purpose is to advance the principles of socialism via gradualist and reformist, rather than revolutionary, means. In the early 1900s Fabian Society members advocated the ideal of a scientifically planned society and supported eugenics by way of sterilization. This is credited to the passage of the Half-Caste Act, and its subsequent implementation in Australia, where children were systematically and forcibly removed from their parents, so that the British colonial regime could "protect" the Aborigine children from their parents. In an article published in The Guardian on 14 February 2008, (following the apology offered by Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd to the "stolen generations"), Geoffrey Robertson criticised Fabian socialists for providing the intellectual justification for the eugenics policy that led to the stolen generations scandal. Such views on socialism, inequality and eugenics in early 20th century Fabians were not limited to one individual, but were widely shared in Fabian Society.

[Lucretia]

Consolidate political authority by organizing their own state? No. They are talking about the lessons drawn from the failure of the Commune including not adopting a more authoritarian stance. Marx even condemned the communards for wasting "precious" time in organizing elections.

I don't know where I said new, only more authoritarian stance which Marx saw as one of the faults of the communards.

I didn't show Engels and Lenin quotes to prove anything about Marx but merely to answer your "The idea that the Paris Commune could have survived if it used "more authoritarian methods" is a bit silly, by the way".




So the Marx who wrote about the Paris Commune in 1871 was the "young" Marx?



Once again: "Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if it had not made use of this authority of the armed people against the bourgeois? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach it for not having used it freely enough?"

"The second mistake was excessive magnanimity on the part of the proletariat: instead of destroying its enemies it sought to exert moral influence on them; it underestimated the significance of direct military operations in civil war, and instead of launching a resolute offensive against Versailles that would have crowned its victory in Paris, it tarried and gave the Versailles government time to gather the dark forces and prepare for the blood-soaked week of May"


I think this is pretty clear about how both men viewed the lack of authoritarianism as a cause of the failure of the Commune.

You miss my point entirely. This thread is about the argument of young versus old Marx, and whether or not Marx's thought transformed from a young humanism-oriented approach to communism in his writings of the 1840s to a more structural "scientific" approach by the 1850s and 1860s. Why bring up the Paris Commune at all? It has nothing to do with an argued division between young and old Marx. It came near the end of Marx's literary and political career. How you came to think I am claiming that the Marx of the Paris Commune is the "young Marx" is beyond me. You brought up on the Paris Commune in the context of some as-yet-unsubstantiated claim that Marx had formerly been against authority until the Paris Commune, at which point he became the "authoritarian" Old Marx. None of this makes any sense at all. Nobody I have ever read tries to claim a division between young and old Marx centered around the events of the Paris Commune. You were talking out of your ass, and are now trying to deflect with word games and silly questions.

You also omit important parts of the Lenin quote in your latest post, such as the part where he says the Commune "allowed itself to be led astray by dreams of establishing a higher justice in the country united by a common national task; such institutions as the banks, for example, were not taken over, and Proudhonist theories about a “just exchange”, etc., still prevailed among the socialists."

Lenin talks about "authoritarianism," but this is contained within a much broader commentary on the theoretical limitations of the political goals and strategy of the Commune. This is also the point Engels is making in his remarks about the foolishness of attempting to abolish all authority with "one stroke" in his On Authority. It's the point I make time and again when debating with anarchists on this forum about their inability to disentangle various forms of political power on the basis of the source of that power, who is wielding it, and for what purpose.
Using the word "authoritarianism" does not capture these elements at all, and with all its present-day connotations of Stalinist autocracy, using the word without a lengthy proviso explaining what they actually meant -- which was NOT just that the Commune were a bunch of pacifists or something -- seems to be somewhere in the neighborhood of silly.

[Luís Henrique]

they can be (are?) a bit mad, but i think the marxist-humanists (as in, followers of dunayevskaya) have the most interesting approach to the body of marx's work:

They may be a bit, or a whole lot, mad - or not at all -, and they may or may not have the most interesting approach to Marx's work, but they obviously talk a lot about the "old" Marx:


... Capital (1867-1872) ... the Ethnological Notebooks (1879-1882) ... the Critique of the Gotha Program (1875) ... The Civil War in France (1871)

So I really think the discussion about humanist vs anti-humanist Marxism is a different discussion than Young Marx vs Old Marx.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Ok, Chomsky is down, now let me examine this claim that Russell is not a liberal but a "Fabian socialist". Here's something I found -

That seems to point to Fabian socialists being rather "authoritarian" than liberal.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

Using the word "authoritarianism" does not capture these elements at all, and with all its present-day connotations of Stalinist autocracy, using the word without a lengthy proviso explaining what they actually meant -- which was NOT just that the Commune were a bunch of pacifists or something -- seems to be somewhere in the neighborhood of silly.

Indeed. Words have a history of themselves, and what Marx or Engels, or even Lenin, meant by "authority" or "authoritarian" is quite certainly very different from what modern partisans of "workers' paradises" mean.

(And, further, the word "liberal" is even worse, not only varying in history but also in geography; while in the US it means semi-hippie "anti-authoritarian" petty bourgeois people, in the rest of the world it means bourgeois adepts of a minimal State.)

Luís Henrique

[TheEmancipator]

They may be a bit, or a whole lot, mad - or not at all -, and they may or may not have the most interesting approach to Marx's work, but they obviously talk a lot about the "old" Marx:



So I really think the discussion about humanist vs anti-humanist Marxism is a different discussion than Young Marx vs Old Marx.

Luís Henrique

Not really, the reason Marxist-Humanists talk about Old Marx a lot is because they do not disagree with him in regards to what he said about capitalism, dialectal materialism, etc. The only place they disagree is the condemnation of Hegel's work and the way most Marxist-Leninists ignore the very foundation of Marxist thought - to be found in his early works, not his late.

Marxist-Humanists are not anti-Das Kapital, anti-authoritarian (to an extent) or whatever others want to portray them as.

[Old Bolshie]

You miss my point entirely. This thread is about the argument of young versus old Marx, and whether or not Marx's thought transformed from a young humanism-oriented approach to communism in his writings of the 1840s to a more structural "scientific" approach by the 1850s and 1860s. Why bring up the Paris Commune at all? It has nothing to do with an argued division between young and old Marx. It came near the end of Marx's literary and political career. How you came to think I am claiming that the Marx of the Paris Commune is the "young Marx" is beyond me. You brought up on the Paris Commune in the context of some as-yet-unsubstantiated claim that Marx had formerly been against authority until the Paris Commune, at which point he became the "authoritarian" Old Marx. None of this makes any sense at all. Nobody I have ever read tries to claim a division between young and old Marx centered around the events of the Paris Commune. You were talking out of your ass, and are now trying to deflect with word games and silly questions.

If someone is clearly talking out of the ass with some pretty foolish remarks is you.

Firstly, I never claimed that Marx had been against authority before the Paris Commune. I said that Marx saw the necessity of adoption of a more authoritarian stance by the proletariat after seeing the lack of authoritarianism as one of the faults of the Communards.

Now, my commentary was a response to a remark made by the user Akshay which said: "Also, imho, almost ALL anarchists (with zero exceptions so far) like the young marx more than the old." Since the issue of authority was one of the causes of the schism between anarchists and marxists in the I International after the failure of the Commune I pointed it out since the anarchists disagreed with Marx's conclusion.

And of course it has anything to do with this thread.




You also omit important parts of the Lenin quote in your latest post, such as the part where he says the Commune "allowed itself to be led astray by dreams of establishing a higher justice in the country united by a common national task; such institutions as the banks, for example, were not taken over, and Proudhonist theories about a “just exchange”, etc., still prevailed among the socialists."

Lenin talks about "authoritarianism," but this is contained within a much broader commentary on the theoretical limitations of the political goals and strategy of the Commune. This is also the point Engels is making in his remarks about the foolishness of attempting to abolish all authority with "one stroke" in his On Authority. It's the point I make time and again when debating with anarchists on this forum about their inability to disentangle various forms of political power on the basis of the source of that power, who is wielding it, and for what purpose.
Using the word "authoritarianism" does not capture these elements at all, and with all its present-day connotations of Stalinist autocracy, using the word without a lengthy proviso explaining what they actually meant -- which was NOT just that the Commune were a bunch of pacifists or something -- seems to be somewhere in the neighborhood of silly.

And yet you assume that I was referring to authoritarianism with the reactionary connotations of Stalinist autocracy which clearly was never my intention at all and I doubt that any of the people who red it thought about it as such. Of course that is a difference between the revolutionary authoritarianism against the bourgeoisie which Engels refers to and the reactionary authoritarianism of the Stalinist bureaucracy against the proletariat itself.

[Lucretia]

If someone is clearly talking out of the ass with some pretty foolish remarks is you.

Firstly, I never claimed that Marx had been against authority before the Paris Commune. I said that Marx saw the necessity of adoption of a more authoritarian stance by the proletariat after seeing the lack of authoritarianism as one of the faults of the Communards.

Here is what you said: "That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune."

In so doing you attributed a shift from young Marx to old Marx to the failure of the Commune. Again, no author I have ever read who has even obliquely commented on the debate of old-vs-young Marx has mentioned the Paris Commune as any kind of turning point. The Commune came well after any purported transition. You mentioning in the Commune in the context of this thread makes literally NO sense at all, and shows you aren't even vaguely familiar with the debate. Claiming that you were responding to something Akshay said about authority doesn't alter this fact at all. But nice try.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Marx's views evolved over time. He took in what was happening in Europe in the 19th century and drew some conclusions. The young/old Marx dichotomy is not dissimilar to the Marx/Lenin dichotomy that liberal/reformist historians and writers tend to make. They want to reduce his status to philospher/economist. We elevate his status to Revolutionary.

[Old Bolshie]

Here is what you said: "That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune."

In so doing you attributed a shift from young Marx to old Marx to the failure of the Commune. Again, no author I have ever read who has even obliquely commented on the debate of old-vs-young Marx has mentioned the Paris Commune as any kind of turning point. The Commune came well after any purported transition. You mentioning in the Commune in the context of this thread makes literally NO sense at all, and shows you aren't even vaguely familiar with the debate. Claiming that you were responding to something Akshay said about authority doesn't alter this fact at all. But nice try.

Yes it does matter what Akshay said. I only mentioned the Paris Commune because it was around its aftermath that anarchists and Marxists had their schism and just to highlight how a more pragmatic ("old") Marx was not pleasant for anarchist views. This is the fact that you didn't get it in first place.
I never said that the Paris Commune was the turning point between the young and the old Marx. You were the one assuming that.

[Lucretia]

Yes it does matter what Akshay said. I only mentioned the Paris Commune because it was around its aftermath that anarchists and Marxists had their schism and just to highlight how a more pragmatic ("old") Marx was not pleasant for anarchist views. This is the fact that you didn't get it in first place.
I never said that the Paris Commune was the turning point between the young and the old Marx. You were the one assuming that.

Ok, you and I have a clear disagreement about what you meant when you said "That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune."

You now seem to think that this doesn't attribute to the failure of the Paris Commune any causal significance in terms of Marx's thought. I think it does (why else mention "after the failure of the Paris Commune" if Marx had the same ideas before the failure on the Paris Commune?). Further, I think that you're now backtracking on what you intended to say because I brought to your attention that debates about young-vs-old Marx fixated on the late 1840s and early 1850s as the turning point in Marx's approach to thinking and writing about politics.

But since, now at least, it appears that we do not have any disagreement in terms of the relationship of the Paris Commune to any supposed break between young and old Marx (by agreeing that there was no such causal relationship), perhaps it is better we get back to discussing the topic at hand.

I feel that the break in Marx's career came in 1844 with the Paris Manuscripts, and that what he wrote in those manuscripts was the first of his writings from a historical-materialist perspective, even though at the time he was still heavily borrowing terms and expressions from the young Hegelians as well as Hegel himself. The following year, with the German Ideology, Marx fashioned a new vocabulary to fit the theory he had already been working out in 1844. (But even then, it should be note, "alienation" and similar terms continued to pop up in Marx's so-called "mature" writings.) As his career developed, Marx sharpened the perspective laid out in 1844 by fleshing out the various structures by which capitalism functioned (and malfunctioned) historically, so in terms of focus there was definitely a change in tone and emphasis away from philosophical-anthropological premises. But those were the premises he used to write Capital, and to engage in all the political work he continued until his death. He also, as Lev mentioned above, learned a lot through participation in the workers' movement that helped him clarify the specifics of revolutionary organization. But, in my opinion, there was no change in fundamental substance that might be characterized as a "break" from or disavowal of what he wrote in 1844, as it is perfectly consistent with the idea of vanguard organizing, etc.

[Old Bolshie]

Ok, you and I have a clear disagreement about what you meant when you said "That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune."

You now seem to think that this doesn't attribute to the failure of the Paris Commune any causal significance in terms of Marx's thought. I think it does (why else mention "after the failure of the Paris Commune" if Marx had the same ideas before the failure on the Paris Commune?). Further, I think that you're now backtracking on what you intended to say because I brought to your attention that debates about young-vs-old Marx fixated on the late 1840s and early 1850s as the turning point in Marx's approach to thinking and writing about politics.


I'm not backtracking in anything. You were the one taking wrong conclusions from what I've said and I already said why I mentioned the Commune. Of course, I think the Commune had significance in Marx's thought not only on the party and authority issues but also on the need of smashing the bourgeois state. However, it was never my point to highlight the Paris Commune as the turning point between the young and the old Marx.

[Lucretia]

I'm not backtracking in anything. You were the one taking wrong conclusions from what I've said and I already said why I mentioned the Commune. Of course, I think the Commune had significance in Marx's thought not only on the party and authority issues but also on the need of smashing the bourgeois state. However, it was never my point to highlight the Paris Commune as the turning point between the young and the old Marx.

My conclusions about your ideas on this topic may have been inaccurate in terms of what you intended to convey, but I think I am stating the obvious when I say that my interpretation of what you wrote is far more reasonable than yours. I have explained why, and don't see anything in your latest post to convince me otherwise. So I will just leave it at that. Feel free to have the final word.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Well, just to throw in my two cents, I think the events of the Paris Commune did help to crystallize some of Marx's view regarding the necessity of smashing the bourgeois state. My guess is that Lenin read that piece verrrry carefully. But I tend to agree with Lucretia, here. After 1844, there is no definitive "break" in Marx's theory. He developed much after that, obviously, and some of his ideas shifted and evolved (influenced by the events in Europe, no doubt, like the revolutions of 1848). The real deal for us should be to fight any tendency to neuter Marxism so as to make a "harmless" philosphy. It is the greatest tool that modern revolutionaries can wield.

[TheEmancipator]

Well, just to throw in my two cents, I think the events of the Paris Commune did help to crystallize some of Marx's view regarding the necessity of smashing the bourgeois state. My guess is that Lenin read that piece verrrry carefully. But I tend to agree with Lucretia, here. After 1844, there is no definitive "break" in Marx's theory. He developed much after that, obviously, and some of his ideas shifted and evolved (influenced by the events in Europe, no doubt, like the revolutions of 1848). The real deal for us should be to fight any tendency to neuter Marxism so as to make a "harmless" philosphy. It is the greatest tool that modern revolutionaries can wield.

Anybody who associates Marxist thought automatically with violence like you do here is not a Marxist.

If the revolution can be done peacefully, then it is to be done peacefully. If not, then it must be done violently.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Anybody who associates Marxist though automatically with violence like you do here is not a Marxist.

If the revolution can be done peacefully, then it is to be done peacefully. If not, then it must be done violently.
I don't know why my quote has to do with this. Marxist revolutionaries should be in the business of overthrowing capitalism. Obviously it would be better to do this with an absolute minimum of violence and destruction. We want to build a better world starting from the highest points that capitalism has achieved, not on its ashes. That being said, it is supremely naive to believe that capitalism and the bourgeoisie are going to go down without a brutal fight. If you've been paying attention to the history of the past 150 years or so that is the way it works. And those on the left that decry violence per se usually wind up serving the interests of the bourgeoisie. Revolutions are dirty, bloody things. The seizure of power in Petrograd was relatively bloodless. However, the Civil War that followed. . . .

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Anybody who associates Marxist thought automatically with violence like you do here is not a Marxist.

I would say that the opposite is true; that anyone who thinks revolutions can be peaceful has either not understood that the revolution is the destruction of the old society, or has not understood the Marxist theory of the state as an instrument of class dictatorship. Of course it would be best if most of the infrastructure, factories etc. are preserved, but the revolution as an ongoing process necessitates the use of violence in order to smash the bourgeoisie and their remnants after the revolution.

[Luís Henrique]

I find it extremely disagreeable that a discussion about Young Marx vs Old Marx degenerates into a discussion about the necessity of violence within a revolution or otherwise. Certainly the young Marx wasn't a naïve pacifist, just like the old Marx certainly wasn't a supporter of violence for the sake of violence. And not the other way round either.

So let's keep the discussion on topic, and leave the issue of violence and revolution for another thread.

Luís Henrique

[Lucretia]

I find it extremely disagreeable that a discussion about Young Marx vs Old Marx degenerates into a discussion about the necessity of violence within a revolution or otherwise. Certainly the young Marx wasn't a naïve pacifist, just like the old Marx certainly wasn't a supporter of violence for the sake of violence. And not the other way round either.

So let's keep the discussion on topic, and leave the issue of violence and revolution for another thread.

Luís Henrique

I actually think two questions are being conflated: whether the bourgeois state needed to be "smashed" (replaced by a different form of state), and whether violence was necessary to accomplish this. Anyhow, anybody who thinks that Marx didn't think force was necessary to achieve revolutionary aims before 1870, or 1860, or even 1850, hasn't read Marx at all (see the "forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions" comment in the Manifesto, for instance). I would also note that M&E were clear on the need of a new form of state well before the Paris Commune. Again, see his discussion of "definite form[s] of state" in the German Ideology.

But yes, I tend to agree, there wasn't a shift on this issue with Marx, so why it has come up in a discussion on young-vs-old Marx is puzzling.

[TheEmancipator]

I would say that the opposite is true; that anyone who thinks revolutions can be peaceful has either not understood that the revolution is the destruction of the old society, or has not understood the Marxist theory of the state as an instrument of class dictatorship. Of course it would be best if most of the infrastructure, factories etc. are preserved, but the revolution as an ongoing process necessitates the use of violence in order to smash the bourgeoisie and their remnants after the revolution.

If you could point out where Young or Old Marx advocate violence as a main tactic for revolution I would love to see it. He wishes the liquidation of the bourgeois class, that is its disappearance. It does not have to come down to mass murder of the bourgeois class. Imprisonment, perhaps, and if they resist violently then execution.


I find it extremely disagreeable that a discussion about Young Marx vs Old Marx degenerates into a discussion about the necessity of violence within a revolution or otherwise. Certainly the young Marx wasn't a naïve pacifist, just like the old Marx certainly wasn't a supporter of violence for the sake of violence. And not the other way round either.

So let's keep the discussion on topic, and leave the issue of violence and revolution for another thread.

Luís Henrique

Understood, Luis Henrique, but there is a reason why Marxist-Humanists are called Marxist Humanists, they are ultimately supportive of the idea that revolution is a tool for human emancipation and not some kind of war of revenge from the proletariat towards the bourgeoisie.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

If you could point out where Young or Old Marx advocate violence as a main tactic for revolution I would love to see it. He wishes the liquidation of the bourgeois class, that is its disappearance. It does not have to come down to mass murder of the bourgeois class. Imprisonment, perhaps, and if they resist violently then execution.

You seem to be arguing against figments of your imagination. Who exactly has claimed that "mass murder of the bourgeois class" is a good tactic? Pol Pot? As far as I know, he doesn't post on these forums. Violence is not necessarily "murder", much less "mass murder". I would have thought that was plain as day. As for violence, I am horribly lazy, so I will quote a paragraph that Lenin cites in The State and the Revolution:

"To Herr Dühring force is the absolute evil; the first act of force is to him the original sin; his whole exposition is a jeremiad on the contamination of all subsequent history consummated by this original sin; a jeremiad on the shameful perversion of all natural and social laws by this diabolical power, force. That force, however, plays yet another role in history, a revolutionary role; that, in the words of Marx, it is the midwife of every old society pregnant with a new one, that it is the instrument with the aid of which social movement forces its way through and shatters the dead, fossilised political forms—of this there is not a word in Herr Dühring. It is only with sighs and groans that he admits the possibility that force will perhaps be necessary for the overthrow of an economic system of exploitation—unfortunately, because all use of force demoralises the person who uses it. And this in spite of the immense moral and spiritual impetus which has been given by every victorious revolution! And this in Germany, where a violent collision—which may, after all, be forced on the people—would at least have the advantage of wiping out the servility which has penetrated the nation's mentality following the humiliation of the Thirty Years' War. And this parson's mode of thought — dull, insipid and impotent—presumes to impose itself on the most revolutionary party that history has known! " - Engels, Anti-Duehring

[Akshay!]

Anybody who associates Marxist thought automatically with violence like you do here is not a Marxist.

If the revolution can be done peacefully, then it is to be done peacefully. If not, then it must be done violently.

With all due respect, I don't think you've ever read a word of Marx. This is not that dissimilar from the other guy who was asking "where did Marx mention that one even needs a revolution? Why can't we just democratically elect a socialist party?" It shows such height of ignorance that I won't even waste my time responding.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

With all due respect, I don't think you've ever read a word of Marx. This is not that dissimilar from the other guy who was asking "where did Marx mention that one even needs a revolution? Why can't we just democratically elect a socialist party?" It shows such height of ignorance that I won't even waste my time responding.
There is a point here, to contrast with some more bloodthirsty armchair revolutionaries. We do seek the minimum of violence possible during the revolution. We are humanists. However, the idea that Marx was a pacifist does suggest an impressive level of ignorance. Revolutionary terror is often a necessary tool of the revolution. Marx knew this. Did you ever read his writings condemning the Great Terror after the French Revolution? Neither did anyone else because he never wrote anything of the kind.

[Old Bolshie]

Well, just to throw in my two cents, I think the events of the Paris Commune did help to crystallize some of Marx's view regarding the necessity of smashing the bourgeois state. My guess is that Lenin read that piece verrrry carefully. But I tend to agree with Lucretia, here. After 1844, there is no definitive "break" in Marx's theory. He developed much after that, obviously, and some of his ideas shifted and evolved (influenced by the events in Europe, no doubt, like the revolutions of 1848). The real deal for us should be to fight any tendency to neuter Marxism so as to make a "harmless" philosphy. It is the greatest tool that modern revolutionaries can wield.

The issue here is that I never claimed that there was a break between the young and the old Marx after the Paris Commune as you can check my posts in this thread. I was answering specifically to a point with was related with anarchists and as everybody knows that event was at the center of the break between marxists and anarchists. That is the only reason why I referred to the Paris Commune. Not because I though that there was a break.


I actually think two questions are being conflated: whether the bourgeois state needed to be "smashed" (replaced by a different form of state), and whether violence was necessary to accomplish this. Anyhow, anybody who thinks that Marx didn't think force was necessary to achieve revolutionary aims before 1870, or 1860, or even 1850, hasn't read Marx at all (see the "forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions" comment in the Manifesto, for instance). I would also note that M&E were clear on the need of a new form of state well before the Paris Commune. Again, see his discussion of "definite form[s] of state" in the German Ideology.

But yes, I tend to agree, there wasn't a shift on this issue with Marx, so why it has come up in a discussion on young-vs-old Marx is puzzling.

How many fucking times I have to explain to you why I referred to the Commune?

And where I ever said that Marx didn't think force was necessary to achieve revolutionary aims???

As far as the state goes and the importance of the Commune in Marx's thought, two quotes:


The multiplicity of interpretations to which the Commune has been subjected, and the multiplicity of interests which construed it in their favor, show that it was a thoroughly expansive political form, while all the previous forms of government had been emphatically repressive. Its true secret was this:
It was essentially a working class government, the product of the struggle of the producing against the appropriating class, the political form at last discovered under which to work out the economical emancipation of labor.

Karl Marx, The Civil War in France


One thing especially was proved by the Commune, viz., that “the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes.”

Karl Marx and Frederich Engels, Preface of the 1872 German Edition of the Communist Manifesto.Again, if someone is showing not knowing too much of Marx's thought is you.

[TheEmancipator]

You seem to be arguing against figments of your imagination. Who exactly has claimed that "mass murder of the bourgeois class" is a good tactic? Pol Pot? As far as I know, he doesn't post on these forums. Violence is not necessarily "murder", much less "mass murder". I would have thought that was plain as day. As for violence, I am horribly lazy, so I will quote a paragraph that Lenin cites in The State and the Revolution:

"To Herr Dühring force is the absolute evil; the first act of force is to him the original sin; his whole exposition is a jeremiad on the contamination of all subsequent history consummated by this original sin; a jeremiad on the shameful perversion of all natural and social laws by this diabolical power, force. That force, however, plays yet another role in history, a revolutionary role; that, in the words of Marx, it is the midwife of every old society pregnant with a new one, that it is the instrument with the aid of which social movement forces its way through and shatters the dead, fossilised political forms—of this there is not a word in Herr Dühring. It is only with sighs and groans that he admits the possibility that force will perhaps be necessary for the overthrow of an economic system of exploitation—unfortunately, because all use of force demoralises the person who uses it. And this in spite of the immense moral and spiritual impetus which has been given by every victorious revolution! And this in Germany, where a violent collision—which may, after all, be forced on the people—would at least have the advantage of wiping out the servility which has penetrated the nation's mentality following the humiliation of the Thirty Years' War. And this parson's mode of thought — dull, insipid and impotent—presumes to impose itself on the most revolutionary party that history has known! " - Engels, Anti-Duehring

Lenin and Engels are exactly the kind of people who Marxist-Humanists would say are traitors to the true Marxist cause, more intent on either some kind of revenge war on the bourgeoisie and glorification of the proletariat as if the two were factions instead of economic classes (in the case of Engels) or in the case of Lenin, a hypocritical form of bourgeois romanticism in his quest to free the proletariat and become some kind of demi-god.

So stop quoting Lenin and Engels to back up Marx's view on whether violence is a necessity or not please.


With all due respect, I don't think you've ever read a word of Marx. This is not that dissimilar from the other guy who was asking "where did Marx mention that one even needs a revolution? Why can't we just democratically elect a socialist party?" It shows such height of ignorance that I won't even waste my time responding.

So you've got no quotes of Marx saying violence is a necessity then? Thought not.


There is a point here, to contrast with some more bloodthirsty armchair revolutionaries. We do seek the minimum of violence possible during the revolution. We are humanists. However, the idea that Marx was a pacifist does suggest an impressive level of ignorance. Revolutionary terror is often a necessary tool of the revolution. Marx knew this. Did you ever read his writings condemning the Great Terror after the French Revolution? Neither did anyone else because he never wrote anything of the kind.

Source precisely where I said that? I never said that.

[Lucretia]

The issue here is that I never claimed that there was a break between the young and the old Marx after the Paris Commune as you can check my posts in this thread. I was answering specifically to a point with was related with anarchists and as everybody knows that event was at the center of the break between marxists and anarchists. That is the only reason why I referred to the Paris Commune. Not because I though that there was a break.



How many fucking times I have to explain to you why I referred to the Commune?

And where I ever said that Marx didn't think force was necessary to achieve revolutionary aims???

As far as the state goes and the importance of the Commune in Marx's thought, two quotes:

Again, if someone is showing not knowing too much of Marx's thought is you.

You are aware of that this thread contains many other posters besides you, and that just because I may choose to respond to some of your posts does not mean that every single thing I write in the thread after that point is a directed at you, or suggests a relationship to something you specifically have said, especially when I am not quoting you. So please step back from your keyboard, take a deep breath, count to ten, and realize that my comments about the direction the thread has turned was not an indictment of you.

The rest of what you said really doesn't merit much of a response, as I get the impression I'm responding to one of those people who simply digs in and will move the goal posts back if his argument begins to weaken. You keep yammering on about "why" you said certain things. My point, to state it for a second time in the hope that it might actually sink in this time, was that people on the forum cannot take a sneak peek inside your head and divine your intentions. We have only the printed word you publish here when you click the "submit reply" button. And the text we've gone round and round about strongly suggests that you pinpoint the Paris Commune was some dramatic turning point in Marx's thinking, presumably between young and old Marx -- since you reference those specific terms in your response.

I find it hilarious you troll for a couple of quotes about Marx on the Paris Commune, mangle them, then use your misinterpretations as ammunition for attacking people for their alleged ignorance of Marxism. One quote features Marx saying of the Commune: "It was essentially a working class government, the product of the struggle of the producing against the appropriating class, the political form at last discovered under which to work out the economical emancipation of labor."

You talk about this as though Marx made the discovery. Marx's point is that the COMMUNE made the discovery. Lev Bronsteinovich is certainly correct to suggest that the experiences of the Commune "crystallized" Marx's thinking about what the form of proletarian state power would look like, but there's nothing here to suggest the kind of difference you earlier indicated in that quote you keep wanting to walk back: a difference between an idealistic young Marx and a pragmatic hard-nosed old Marx. There's not even anything here to suggest what you seem to be getting at with your second quote, that the Commune somehow helped Marx realize for the first time that the bourgeois state had to be smashed. All the second quote says is that the experiences of the Commune PROVED, not helped him to discover, that the working-class can just become the new managers of a bourgeois state. As I showed in my previous post with a quote from the German Ideology, Marx was aware as far back as 1845 that different ruling classes presiding over different social relations of production required different forms of state power -- even if the workers by that time had not discovered, and helped Marx to crystallize his understanding of, what that state power would look like in terms of proletarian hegemony.

[Lucretia]

Lenin and Engels are exactly the kind of people who Marxist-Humanists would say are traitors to the true Marxist cause, more intent on either some kind of revenge war on the bourgeoisie and glorification of the proletariat as if the two were factions instead of economic classes (in the case of Engels) or in the case of Lenin, a hypocritical form of bourgeois romanticism in his quest to free the proletariat and become some kind of demi-god.

So stop quoting Lenin and Engels to back up Marx's view on whether violence is a necessity or not please.



So you've got no quotes of Marx saying violence is a necessity then? Thought not.



Source precisely where I said that? I never said that.

When Marx says in the Communist Manifesto that the proletarian revolution represents the "forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions," what do you think he is referring to? A cocktail party?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Lenin and Engels are exactly the kind of people who Marxist-Humanists would say are traitors to the true Marxist cause, more intent on either some kind of revenge war on the bourgeoisie and glorification of the proletariat as if the two were factions instead of economic classes (in the case of Engels) or in the case of Lenin, a hypocritical form of bourgeois romanticism in his quest to free the proletariat and become some kind of demi-god.

So stop quoting Lenin and Engels to back up Marx's view on whether violence is a necessity or not please.

In fact, the "traitor" Engels wrote "Anti-Dühring" at the suggestion of Marx, using in part Marx's notes on Dühring and Most, and the resulting text was often used by the First International. As for Marx, on the occasion of the counterrevolution in Vienna, he claimed that:

"But developments will not wait for the bills of exchange drawn by the European states on European society to expire. The crushing counter-blow of the June revolution will be struck in Paris. With the victory of the "red republic" in Paris, armies will be rushed from the interior of their countries to the frontiers and across them, and the real strength of the fighting parties will become evident. We shall then remember this June and this October and we too shall exclaim:

Vae victis!

The purposeless massacres perpetrated since the June and October events, the tedious offering of sacrifices since February and March, the very cannibalism of the counterrevolution will convince the nations that there is only one way in which the murderous death agonies of the old society and the bloody birth throes of the new society can be shortened, simplified and concentrated, and that way is revolutionary terror."

As for Lenin - bourgeois romanticism in service of a quest to become a demi-god? Are you at all familiar with Lenin's biography?

[TheEmancipator]

In fact, the "traitor" Engels wrote "Anti-Dühring" at the suggestion of Marx, using in part Marx's notes on Dühring and Most, and the resulting text was often used by the First International. As for Marx, on the occasion of the counterrevolution in Vienna, he claimed that:

"But developments will not wait for the bills of exchange drawn by the European states on European society to expire. The crushing counter-blow of the June revolution will be struck in Paris. With the victory of the "red republic" in Paris, armies will be rushed from the interior of their countries to the frontiers and across them, and the real strength of the fighting parties will become evident. We shall then remember this June and this October and we too shall exclaim:

Vae victis!

The purposeless massacres perpetrated since the June and October events, the tedious offering of sacrifices since February and March, the very cannibalism of the counterrevolution will convince the nations that there is only one way in which the murderous death agonies of the old society and the bloody birth throes of the new society can be shortened, simplified and concentrated, and that way is revolutionary terror."


Here Marx analyses the European scene at the time when democracy was not existent and some countries hadn't even gone through a bourgeois revolution yet and were under the tyranny of the old aristocracy. He does not make a frozen rule of revolution. I need evidence of Marx stating that violence in all revolutions in necessary. You can't seem to provide this...

Of course we must deal with counter revolutionaries by force, but the idea that the Revolution will be some kind of bloodthirsty war in Europe today is far fetched at best.

As for Lenin - bourgeois romanticism in service of a quest to become a demi-god? Are you at all familiar with Lenin's biography?What when he implemented bourgeois nationalist reforms to Soviet Russia, hijacking the Soviet revolution, and paving the way for an all too powerful "Vanguard" and one-man dictatorships around the world.

Actions speak louder than words, and I have already stated my admiration for Lenin as a theorist. But he remains to me the kind of person people like you condemn today. Careerists with little interest in the proletariat. But you prefer to condemn me for actually caring about proletarians existing instead of defending brutal regimes with hammer and sickle in the flag which makes them imune to criticism it seems.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Lenin and Engels are exactly the kind of people who Marxist-Humanists would say are traitors to the true Marxist cause, more intent on either some kind of revenge war on the bourgeoisie and glorification of the proletariat as if the two were factions instead of economic classes (in the case of Engels) or in the case of Lenin, a hypocritical form of bourgeois romanticism in his quest to free the proletariat and become some kind of demi-god.

So stop quoting Lenin and Engels to back up Marx's view on whether violence is a necessity or not please.



So you've got no quotes of Marx saying violence is a necessity then? Thought not.



Source precisely where I said that? I never said that.
No you merely suggested that Marxists are opposed to violence. Yes, and per comrade Lucretia, see the Communist Manifesto, for Marx's general view on violence.

Dude, you exist in a parallel universe if you think Lenin was some kind of bourgeois romantic. Splitting Marx from Lenin is bad enough, but Marx from Engels? That's just silly. Lenin and Engels and Marx all favored Revolutionary violence where necessary. Turns out it is too often necessary.

[Lev Bronsteinovich]

Cripes. Marx did say something to the effect that a proletarian revolution might be possible through the ballot box in the US -- but this was before the consolidation of the US bourgeoisie and also, I think during the period of Reconstruction. In any case he thought this would be the exception rather than the rule.

Lenin "hijacked" the Russian Revolution? lmfao. Maybe I should be less contentious and say this: I agree that violence should only be used as necessary in the proletarian revolution. We are not out to punish the bourgeoisie but to create a new and far better society. The term Marxist/Humanist is redundant. And who on Earth here says that Marx=Violence?

Most folks that love Marx and hate Lenin are at bottom against revolution.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Oh god, I'm not nearly drunk enough for this.


Here Marx analyses the European scene at the time when democracy was not existent and some countries hadn't even gone through a bourgeois revolution yet and were under the tyranny of the old aristocracy. He does not make a frozen rule of revolution.

In fact, Marx was talking about the possibility of a "red republic" being established in Paris. And in any case, given that bourgeois revolutions merely transfer ownership of the state apparatus to a new ruling class, whereas the proletarian revolution, in main, smashes that apparatus, it is clear that proletarian revolutions are more violent. The act of smashing the old state apparatus requires violence - armies, chancelleries and ministries can not be dissolved with strongly-worded parliamentary resolutions.


I need evidence of Marx stating that violence in all revolutions in necessary. You can't seem to provide this...

I cited Engels, whose work was based on Marx and who has the full confidence of Marx and the First International. Lucretia cited the Manifesto. And furthermore, it is plain that the smashing of the old state apparatus can only be violent.


Of course we must deal with counter revolutionaries by force, but the idea that the Revolution will be some kind of bloodthirsty war in Europe today is far fetched at best.

Again, you're fighting figments of your own imagination. Violent revolution does not mean "bloodthirsty war", though in many cases one leads to the other.


What when he implemented bourgeois nationalist reforms to Soviet Russia,[...]

What "bourgeois nationalist reforms"? Granting oppressed nationalities self-determination? How horrible that the Bolshevik government did not continue the feudal policy of Great-Russian chauvinism.


hijacking the Soviet revolution, and paving the way for an all too powerful "Vanguard" and one-man dictatorships around the world.

Do you even know what a vanguard party is? It is the party of the most advanced element of the proletariat. A vanguard, an advanced detachment, not a stavka, a central command.


Actions speak louder than words, and I have already stated my admiration for Lenin as a theorist. But he remains to me the kind of person people like you condemn today. Careerists with little interest in the proletariat.

Lenin made a killing, of course, constantly hiding from the police and fearing for his life and security. Such a careerist.

Good grief.

[Old Bolshie]

You are aware of that this thread contains many other posters besides you, and that just because I may choose to respond to some of your posts does not mean that every single thing I write in the thread after that point is a directed at you, or suggests a relationship to something you specifically have said, especially when I am not quoting you. So please step back from your keyboard, take a deep breath, count to ten, and realize that my comments about the direction the thread has turned was not an indictment of you.

The rest of what you said really doesn't merit much of a response, as I get the impression I'm responding to one of those people who simply digs in and will move the goal posts back if his argument begins to weaken. You keep yammering on about "why" you said certain things. My point, to state it for a second time in the hope that it might actually sink in this time, was that people on the forum cannot take a sneak peek inside your head and divine your intentions. We have only the printed word you publish here when you click the "submit reply" button. And the text we've gone round and round about strongly suggests that you pinpoint the Paris Commune was some dramatic turning point in Marx's thinking, presumably between young and old Marx -- since you reference those specific terms in your response.

Now you say "presumably between young and old". Some posts ago you were taking this as a fact and it was the base of your argument against me. That's already a progress. I already explained to you a million of times why I referred specifically to the Commune. I didn't move anything. You are the one refusing to admit that you took a wrong conclusion from my comment.

My intention was always to show why a old Marx (more pragmatic and less idealistic) wasn't pleasant for anarchists by highlighting the issue that led to the schism between anarchists and marxists. That's so hard to understand it??? I really don't see how you can conclude that I was saying that the Paris Commune was the turning point between the young and the old Marx from what I've said.



I find it hilarious you troll for a couple of quotes about Marx on the Paris Commune, mangle them, then use your misinterpretations as ammunition for attacking people for their alleged ignorance of Marxism. One quote features Marx saying of the Commune: "It was essentially a working class government, the product of the struggle of the producing against the appropriating class, the political form at last discovered under which to work out the economical emancipation of labor."

You talk about this as though Marx made the discovery. Marx's point is that the COMMUNE made the discovery. Lev Bronsteinovich is certainly correct to suggest that the experiences of the Commune "crystallized" Marx's thinking about what the form of proletarian state power would look like, but there's nothing here to suggest the kind of difference you earlier indicated in that quote you keep wanting to walk back: a difference between an idealistic young Marx and a pragmatic hard-nosed old Marx. There's not even anything here to suggest what you seem to be getting at with your second quote, that the Commune somehow helped Marx realize for the first time that the bourgeois state had to be smashed. All the second quote says is that the experiences of the Commune PROVED, not helped him to discover, that the working-class can just become the new managers of a bourgeois state. As I showed in my previous post with a quote from the German Ideology, Marx was aware as far back as 1845 that different ruling classes presiding over different social relations of production required different forms of state power -- even if the workers by that time had not discovered, and helped Marx to crystallize his understanding of, what that state power would look like in terms of proletarian hegemony.

And yet here are you again completely distorting what I said, ONCE AGAIN. Where I said that it was Marx who discovered the political form??? I was showing to you the great significance and impact of the Commune in Marx that you try so hard to depreciate. It's really annoying to argue with someone who keeps distorting what one says.

[Lucretia]

Now you say "presumably between young and old". Some posts ago you were taking this as a fact and it was the base of your argument against me. That's already a progress. I already explained to you a million of times why I referred specifically to the Commune. I didn't move anything. You are the one refusing to admit that you took a wrong conclusion from my comment.

My intention was always to show why a old Marx (more pragmatic and less idealistic) wasn't pleasant for anarchists by highlighting the issue that led to the schism between anarchists and marxists. That's so hard to understand it??? I really don't see how you can conclude that I was saying that the Paris Commune was the turning point between the young and the old Marx from what I've said.



And yet here are you again completely distorting what I said, ONCE AGAIN. Where I said that it was Marx who discovered the political form??? I was showing to you the great significance and impact of the Commune in Marx that you try so hard to depreciate. It's really annoying to argue with someone who keeps distorting what one says.

It would beat a dead horse to explain for the third time now that my response to your statement about the Paris Commune in relation to young-vs-old Marx IS an interpretation of what you wrote (not a "fact" and not a divination of your intentions), and in my view the only PLAUSIBLE interpretation in light of how you phrased your contention, so I won't bother with yet another iteration. Just keep repeating the same thing over and over again about how I supposedly misconstrued what you wrote (not what you intended to write) without showing how.

As for your new claim that I "distorted" your quotes by Marx, you have more heavy lifting to do. How did I distort the quotes you presented? By assuming that your point in showing them was to make some sort of point about how the Paris Commune changed what Marx thought? Well, in case you have been too busy shifting goal posts around, let me remind that the evolution of Marx's thought is what this thread is about. So the only point I can see you trying to make with the quotes was how witnessing the failure of the Paris Commune somehow changed Marx's ideas on revolution -- leading HIM to make some sort of discovery, or to realize something he hadn't known before. You claim it shows the "significance" of the event on this thought, but what you mean by that is unclear. Significant in that it confirmed something he already theorized but hadn't seen? Significant because he won a 10,000-franc bet with Engels on whether the Commune would succeed or fail? To repeat: I assumed your intention was to show how the Paris Commune was "significant" in terms of the topic of young-vs-old Marx.

I can already hear you fulminating over my admission that I made an assumption. But before post with another ridiculously inappropriate snark about how I jump to conclusions, I ask you: if that wasn't your point, why the fuck post the quotes? To compete with Ismail to see which revleft poster can flood the board with the most random quotes without elaborating on why you're posting them? My assumption actually does you the favor of crediting you with a desire to post something on-topic in this thread. Are you going to tell me that was wrong?

In fact, apart from a ridiculous statement about idealism-vs-pragmatism you've been litigating into the dirt through two pages of damage control, you haven't really added anything substantive to the discussion of old-vs-young Marx at all. Would you care to elaborate on your view that the young Marx was "idealistic"? How did you arrive at this conclusion? What texts of his strike you as "idealistic"? When did that "idealism" change, and why?

[Old Bolshie]

It would beat a dead horse to explain for the third time now that my response to your statement about the Paris Commune in relation to young-vs-old Marx IS an interpretation of what you wrote (not a "fact" and not a divination of your intentions), and in my view the only PLAUSIBLE interpretation in light of how you phrased your contention, so I won't bother with yet another iteration. Just keep repeating the same thing over and over again about how I supposedly misconstrued what you wrote (not what you intended to write) without showing how.

I already explained to you why I mentioned the Commune. What more do you want?


As for your new claim that I "distorted" your quotes by Marx, you have more heavy lifting to do. How did I distort the quotes you presented? By assuming that your point in showing them was to make some sort of point about how the Paris Commune changed what Marx thought? Well, in case you have been too busy shifting goal posts around, let me remind that the evolution of Marx's thought is what this thread is about. So the only point I can see you trying to make with the quotes was how witnessing the failure of the Paris Commune somehow changed Marx's ideas on revolution -- leading HIM to make some sort of discovery, or to realize something he hadn't known before. You claim it shows the "significance" of the event on this thought, but what you mean by that is unclear. Significant in that it confirmed something he already theorized but hadn't seen? Significant because he won a 10,000-franc bet with Engels on whether the Commune would succeed or fail? To repeat: I assumed your intention was to show how the Paris Commune was "significant" in terms of the topic of young-vs-old Marx.No. My intention was to show how the Paris Commune was significant in terms of the topic "anarchists and Marx" because as I already told you I was answering a specific remark about anarchists.


I can already hear you fulminating over my admission that I made an assumption. But before post with another ridiculously inappropriate snark about how I jump to conclusions, I ask you: if that wasn't your point, why the fuck post the quotes? To compete with Ismail to see which revleft poster can flood the board with the most random quotes without elaborating on why you're posting them? My assumption actually does you the favor of crediting you with a desire to post something on-topic in this thread. Are you going to tell me that was wrong?What quotes are you fucking referring to? The last ones were to show you the importance of the Commune in Marx and the first ones were to answer your stupid remarks about authoritarianism.


In fact, apart from a ridiculous statement about idealism-vs-pragmatism you've been litigating into the dirt through two pages of damage control, you haven't really added anything substantive to the discussion of old-vs-young Marx at all. Would you care to elaborate on your view that the young Marx was "idealistic"? How did you arrive at this conclusion? What texts of his strike you as "idealistic"?It is idealistic because his early works were heavily influenced by Hegelianism when he was still part of the Left (or Young) Hegelians. For instance, during this period you can see a emphasis placed on the human aspect in his works that you won't see in his later works.


When did that "idealism" change, and why? Although Marx had already showed signs of moving away from Idealism before I consider the German Ideology to be the definitive break of Marx with German Idealism and the Young Hegelians.

[TheEmancipator]

Again, you're fighting figments of your own imagination. Violent revolution does not mean "bloodthirsty war", though in many cases one leads to the other.

I think this is where we differ then. While I can accept the actions of revolutionary violence to topple the bourgeois state, I certainly do not accept this Maoist perspective of bloodthirsty war.

I still maintain violence is unnecessary in a revolution, or to be more precise, the revolution will not be defined by violence but by a change of ownership in the factors of production, as its only use in Marx's time was to liquidate the bourgeois authoritarian state which has been considerably weakened these days.


What "bourgeois nationalist reforms"? Granting oppressed nationalities self-determination? How horrible that the Bolshevik government did not continue the feudal policy of Great-Russian chauvinism.

You're kidding right? The Bolshevist USSR completely centralised its governance and crushed any attempts at federalism with its firmly anti-platformist agenda. And it is my view that Bolsheviks were far more nationalist that Makhno's gang, before you play the ukrainian nationalism card.

We'll also ignore Finland, Poland, Hungary, who were all de facto placed under the rule of the Moscow state in the name of social-imperialism.


Do you even know what a vanguard party is? It is the party of the most advanced element of the proletariat. A vanguard, an advanced detachment, not a stavka, a central command.

It is my view that the "vanguard" Lenin and the Bolsheviks created was only a replacement of the real vanguards (who incidentally did not call themselves that) around the country who organised collectives and were at the front line of the Revolution.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I think this is where we differ then. While I can accept the actions of revolutionary violence to topple the bourgeois state, I certainly do not accept this Maoist perspective of bloodthirsty war.

No one, not Maoists, not Trotskyists, no one on the communist left thinks that wars are jolly good fun and that we should start wars for the hell of it. But if the revolutionary situation develops into a war - and this happened in most revolutions, to be honest - then this moralistic pacifism will obstruct the arming or the proletariat, allowing the revolution to be defeated by imperialism. Do you value human lives? Then don't urge the proletariat to oppose wars against imperialist and counterrevolutionary aggression.


I still maintain violence is unnecessary in a revolution, or to be more precise, the revolution will not be defined by violence but by a change of ownership in the factors of production[...]

And how will that ownership change place, if not through violence? Do you think the bourgeoisie can be expropriated with speeches? I will grant you that listening to pacifist speeches can cause suicidal ideations, but using this to get rid of the bourgeoisie would be unnecessarily cruel.


[...]as its only use in Marx's time was to liquidate the bourgeois authoritarian state which has been considerably weakened these days.

Considerably weakened? How?


You're kidding right? The Bolshevist USSR completely centralised its governance and crushed any attempts at federalism with its firmly anti-platformist agenda. And it is my view that Bolsheviks were far more nationalist that Makhno's gang, before you play the ukrainian nationalism card.

They were also sorcerers, apparently, since they were against platformism before that tendency existed. And how were the Bolsheviks nationalist? You do realise that the Bolshevik government was the only side in the civil war that consistently respected the national autonomy of its constituent nations?


We'll also ignore Finland, Poland, Hungary, who were all de facto placed under the rule of the Moscow state in the name of social-imperialism.

The Bolshevik government evacuated Finland and Poland, and Hungary underwent an independent revolution. The Red Army advanced into Poland only after the Polish army invaded Bolshevik territory. Again, I have no idea what you're talking about.


It is my view that the "vanguard" Lenin and the Bolsheviks created was only a replacement of the real vanguards (who incidentally did not call themselves that) around the country who organised collectives and were at the front line of the Revolution.

What collectives? The peasant collectives that Makhno established in four or five villages in the Makhnovist territory? Or do you mean the nationalised factories and so on, who consistently elected Bolshevik deputies (alongside a minor Menshevik and Internationalist element)?

[Lucretia]

I already explained to you why I mentioned the Commune. What more do you want?

I never asked you why you mentioned it. For several posts now I have repeatedly commented on how why you mention something is not the same thing as what you write. What you actually wrote clearly indicated the idea that the Paris Commune was some kind of turning point between young and old Marx, whatever your intentions were in writing it. This can be gleaned from your mentioning a Marx before the Commune, and a Marx "after the Paris Commune." Is your monitor having some sort of issues displaying my text, or are you literally not reading a damn thing I'm writing? Or do you not understand the difference between somebody's intentions behind writing something, and the meaning of what they actually write? If not, please let me know, and I will try very calmly and systematically to explain it to you. I love nothing more than giving remedial lessons.


It is idealistic because his early works were heavily influenced by Hegelianism when he was still part of the Left (or Young) Hegelians. For instance, during this period you can see a emphasis placed on the human aspect in his works that you won't see in his later works.

Although Marx had already showed signs of moving away from Idealism before I consider the German Ideology to be the definitive break of Marx with German Idealism and the Young Hegelians.You are conflating philosophical idealism -- the belief that ideas abstracted from material context are the forces that drive history, which is what you're referring to here when you talk about a break from "idealism" and toward materialism -- with the common usage of idealism as a naively hopeful exuberance, which is what your earlier use of the word contrasted with hard-nosed "pragmatism" in your original post. I can already see you initiating another excruciating 3-page argument about how I am misconstruing your initial use of "idealistic," so I will just note that the meaning of your usage was clearly conveyed by your contrasting "idealist" to "authoritarian" and politically practical/pragmatic. At the philosophical level, idealist positions are very much compatible with, and not contrasted to, political "authoritarianism" (in fact, Hegel's idealist philosophy was basically a prop for the Prussian bureaucracy and many of his acolytes subsequently and pragmatically exploited it to acquire cushy positions within the state intelligentsia).

[Old Bolshie]

I never asked you why you mentioned it. For several posts now I have repeatedly commented on how why you mention something is not the same thing as what you write. What you actually wrote clearly indicated the idea that the Paris Commune was some kind of turning point between young and old Marx, whatever your intentions were in writing it. This can be gleaned from your mentioning a Marx before the Commune, and a Marx "after the Paris Commune." Is your monitor having some sort of issues displaying my text, or are you literally not reading a damn thing I'm writing? Or do you not understand the difference between somebody's intentions behind writing something, and the meaning of what they actually write? If not, please let me know, and I will try very calmly and systematically to explain it to you. I love nothing more than giving remedial lessons.

Show me where I said that there was a before and a after Paris Commune Marx.



You are conflating philosophical idealism -- the belief that ideas abstracted from material context are the forces that drive history, which is what you're referring to here when you talk about a break from "idealism" and toward materialism -- with the common usage of idealism as a naively hopeful exuberance, which is what your earlier use of the word contrasted with hard-nosed "pragmatism" in your original post. I can already see you initiating another excruciating 3-page argument about how I am misconstruing your initial use of "idealistic," so I will just note that the meaning of your usage was clearly conveyed by your contrasting "idealist" to "authoritarian" and politically practical/pragmatic. At the philosophical level, idealist positions are very much compatible with, and not contrasted to, political "authoritarianism" (in fact, Hegel's idealist philosophy was basically a prop for the Prussian bureaucracy and many of his acolytes subsequently and pragmatically exploited it to acquire cushy positions within the state intelligentsia).No I am not conflating anything. The young Marx was definitively more idealist (not that I mean that he was a naive hopeful exuberant as you tried to imply) than the old Marx also in political terms. This is clear in his early work about freedom and censorship.

[MarxArchist]

Young Marx idealist late Marx materialist (in a nut shell).

[Blake's Baby]

MarxArchist wrong Marx not wrong (in a nutshell).

[Lucretia]

Show me where I said that there was a before and a after Paris Commune Marx.

I have done this. Your initial post here said: "That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune."

Your statement clearly indicates something notably different about Marx's views about working class party-building and "authoritarian stances" after the failure of the Paris Commune, distinguishing it (implicitly) from what came before the failure of the Paris Commune. As I said before, there is no other plausible interpretation of this quote. To claim that you didn't want to attribute any kind of causal significance to seeing the failure of the Paris Commune makes nonsense of your deliberate insertion of that event as a chronological marker. How many times do I have to repeat this before you stop asking me where you have done this?


No I am not conflating anything. The young Marx was definitively more idealist (not that I mean that he was a naive hopeful exuberant as you tried to imply) than the old Marx also in political terms. This is clear in his early work about freedom and censorship.Read your own quote against: you even use the word "idealistic" (which is NOT the same as philosophically being an "idealist"), and counterpose it to "pragmatic" and "authoritarian."

You can claim all you want to that you weren't conflating the two senses of idealism, but what you wrote says otherwise.

[Old Bolshie]

I have done this. Your initial post here said: "That's because the "old" Marx (more pragmatic/materialist and less idealistic than the "young") saw the necessity of creating a working class party and adopting more authoritarian stances once the proletariat conquers the political power after the failure of the Paris Commune."

Your statement clearly indicates something notably different about Marx's views about working class party-building and "authoritarian stances" after the failure of the Paris Commune, distinguishing it (implicitly) from what came before the failure of the Paris Commune. As I said before, there is no other plausible interpretation of this quote. To claim that you didn't want to attribute any kind of causal significance to seeing the failure of the Paris Commune makes nonsense of your deliberate insertion of that event as a chronological marker. How many times do I have to repeat this before you stop asking me where you have done this?

Ok, I will give a final explanation on this and that's it. In the aftermath of the Paris of Commune there was conflict between anarchists and marxists over the issues of political party and authoritarianism. This conflict marked the break between the anarchists and Karl Marx. Since I was answering to a remark about anarchists views about Marx and how they preferred the Young over the Old I referred to that break which happened in the aftermath of the Commune.


Read your own quote against: you even use the word "idealistic" (which is NOT the same as philosophically being an "idealist"), and counterpose it to "pragmatic" and "authoritarian."

You can claim all you want to that you weren't conflating the two senses of idealism, but what you wrote says otherwise.

I said idealistic but never in the sense that you put it. The Young Marx had definitely more concern about issues that the Old Marx relativized in his materialistic analysis.

[Lucretia]

Ok, I will give a final explanation on this and that's it. In the aftermath of the Paris of Commune there was conflict between anarchists and marxists over the issues of political party and authoritarianism. This conflict marked the break between the anarchists and Karl Marx. Since I was answering to a remark about anarchists views about Marx and how they preferred the Young over the Old I referred to that break which happened in the aftermath of the Commune.

So now, after pages of claiming that you didn't say "that there was a before and a after Paris Commune Marx," and being shown repeatedly that you did make such a claim, you are now finally prepared to admit that you pinpoint the Paris Commune as a political turning point marking a break between Marx and the anarchists on the question of party-building. You then follow this up by repeating your claim that this break is somehow tied to why anarchists prefer the "young Marx" over the "old Marx." Tell me again, exactly, how this differs at all from precisely what I have been saying about your statement the entire time, which is that you claim the Paris Commune was a break distinguishing a "young Marx" ("idealistic" enough for the anarchists to like) and the "old Marx" ("pragmatist").


I said idealistic but never in the sense that you put it. The Young Marx had definitely more concern about issues that the Old Marx relativized in his materialistic analysis.You claim you didn't use it in that sense, and I think you did. Readers can look at the post, read your juxtaposition of "idealistic" and "pragmatic," see how it was paired with an observation about how the Paris Commune supposedly led Marx to see the need for "authority" in a revolution, and draw their own conclusions about what meaning(s) you were attributing to "idealistic." I think it is as likely that you meant "idealistic" in a strictly philosophical sense as you meant "pragmatist" in a strictly philosophical sense.

You also keep bandying about these terms "young Marx" and "old Marx" as if they were transparent in meaning. But apart from a vague statement about how one was "idealist" and the other "pragmatic" and "materialist," you've still yet to provide any kind of detailed explanation for when you think this break occurred and why you think it did. Was it in 1842? 1843? 1844? 1854? 1871? Without giving us more information, we have no idea what specifically you mean when use these terms. All we still have to go by is your walked-back statement about Marx before and after the Paris Commune.

[Old Bolshie]

So now, after pages of claiming that you didn't say "that there was a before and a after Paris Commune Marx," and being shown repeatedly that you did make such a claim, you are now finally prepared to admit that you pinpoint the Paris Commune as a political turning point marking a break between Marx and the anarchists on the question of party-building. You then follow this up by repeating your claim that this break is somehow tied to why anarchists prefer the "young Marx" over the "old Marx." Tell me again, exactly, how this differs at all from precisely what I have been saying about your statement the entire time, which is that you claim the Paris Commune was a break distinguishing a "young Marx" ("idealistic" enough for the anarchists to like) and the "old Marx" ("pragmatist").

Yes, I pinpoint the Paris Commune as a turning point between Marx and the anarchists, not between the Young and the Old Marx as you have been claiming during all this discussion. That was always my point.


You claim you didn't use it in that sense, and I think you did. Readers can look at the post, read your juxtaposition of "idealistic" and "pragmatic," see how it was paired with an observation about how the Paris Commune supposedly led Marx to see the need for "authority" in a revolution, and draw their own conclusions about what meaning(s) you were attributing to "idealistic." I think it is as likely that you meant "idealistic" in a strictly philosophical sense as you meant "pragmatist" in a strictly philosophical sense.

No, I said that Marx saw the necessity of using a more authoritarian stance by the proletariat in the aftermath of the Commune which the anarchists pretty much disagreed and hence the conflict over authoritarianism.



You also keep bandying about these terms "young Marx" and "old Marx" as if they were transparent in meaning. But apart from a vague statement about how one was "idealist" and the other "pragmatic" and "materialist," you've still yet to provide any kind of detailed explanation for when you think this break occurred and why you think it did. Was it in 1842? 1843? 1844? 1854? 1871? Without giving us more information, we have no idea what specifically you mean when use these terms. All we still have to go by is your walked-back statement about Marx before and after the Paris Commune.

I had already answered you on this.




Although Marx had already showed signs of moving away from Idealism before I consider the German Ideology to be the definitive break of Marx with German Idealism and the Young Hegelians.

[Hit The North]

I had already answered you on this.




Originally Posted by Old Bolshie http://www.revleft.com/vb/revleft/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showthread.php?p=2630225#post2630225)

Although Marx had already showed signs of moving away from Idealism before I consider the German Ideology to be the definitive break of Marx with German Idealism and the Young Hegelians.


Except this is wrong. In the 1844 Manuscripts, Marx is working out a political economy. He is attempting to grapple with material relations. He has already given himself over to Feuerbach's materialism, as he spells out in the final manuscript entitled Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy in General (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/hegel.htm).

If there is a break between the 1844 Manuscripts and the German Ideology it is Marx finally breaking from Feuerbach's materialism and not from Hegel's idealism.

[Old Bolshie]

Except this is wrong. In the 1844 Manuscripts, Marx is working out a political economy. He is attempting to grapple with material relations. He has already given himself over to Feuerbach's materialism, as he spells out in the final manuscript entitled Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy in General (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/hegel.htm).

If there is a break between the 1844 Manuscripts and the German Ideology it is Marx finally breaking from Feuerbach's materialism and not from Hegel's idealism.




No, it's not wrong like I am not going to say that you are wrong. This is a very subjective theme. There are different interpretations of when there was a break between the Young and the Old Marx. For instance, for Lenin there is a break only in 1847 with The Poverty of Philosophy. For the french philosopher Louis Althusser the break is with The German Ideology. For Nicolai Lapine the break appears sooner in 1843.

[Hit The North]

No, it's not wrong like I am not going to say that you are wrong. This is a very subjective theme. There are different interpretations of when there was a break between the Young and the Old Marx. For instance, for Lenin there is a break only in 1847 with The Poverty of Philosophy. For the french philosopher Louis Althusser the break is with The German Ideology. For Nicolai Lapine the break appears sooner in 1843.

If it's just a matter of subjective interpretation then this is a hollow exercise. personally, I prefer to go on the textual evidence. If you believe that Marx was under the spell of Hegelian idealism when he sketched out his ideas in the 1844 manuscripts, then you need to show it.

Obviously, when it comes to Marx breaking with the Hegelian dialectic then Lapine is correct. I haven't even read his argument but there is clear textual evidence in the shape of the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/index.htm), written in 1843 and where he attacks the abstractions of Hegel's work on the State through an an analysis which employs the notion of material social relations; not to mention Marx's own comment on the status of this work in his intellectual development in the 1859 Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface-abs.htm) - to whit:


Originally written by Marx
My inquiry led me to the conclusion that neither legal relations nor political forms could be comprehended either by themselves or on the basis of a so-called general development of the human mind, but that on the contrary they originate in the material conditions of life, the totality of which Hegel, following the example of English and French thinkers of the eighteenth century, embraces within the term ‘civil society'; that the anatomy of this civil society, however, has to be sought in political economy. [emphasis added]

[Brutus]

Young Marx idealist late Marx materialist (in a nut shell).

In 1845 Marx and Engels attacked Hegellian idealism in The Holy Family, and Marx, following Engels, adopted a materialist attitude.
If young Marx becomes old Marx at 26/27, then you are correct. Ha.

[Lucretia]

I will reiterate that by the Paris Manuscripts Marx is already operating from a materialist, not idealist perspective, and as such was fashioning a theory that differed dramatically from Feuerbach's idealist perspective. His different conceptions of "man," etc., are still bundled in Hegelian and Feuerbachian language (as I said before, it was only in the German Ideology that Marx began developing his own vocabulary), so it is easy to mistake this matter of style, like using the term "species being," for a substantive agreement with Feuerbach. However, whereas Feuerbach was discussing god as being an alienated projection of man's true human nature, fixed throughout all history and therefore a static and contemplative ideal, Marx even in 1844 was going well beyond Feuerbach's philosophical (and idealist) method, by demonstrating that "species being" is not just some static and abstract idea - or as he says in the Paris Manuscripts, "It is precisely in the manipulation and transformation of the objective world that man proves himself to be genuinely a species being.... We see how the history of industry and the objective existence of the development of industry is the open book of human essential powers." Species-being is dialectically interpenatrated with doing, with acting on the world, and as such develops historically in tandem with what man has done to nature, with the industry he has developed.

Marx would later summarize this difference from Feuerbach, already developed in the Paris Manuscripts, as the theses that "Feuerbach resolves the religious essence into the human essence. But the human essence is no abstraction inherent in each single individual. In its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations. ... [T]he abstract individual whom he [Feuerbach] analyses belongs to a particular form of society....[because] all social life is "sensuous human activity." Or, even more pointedly, in the German Ideology, Marx (and Engels) really boil things down to the crux of their problem with Feuerbach: "As far as Feuerbach is a materialist he does not deal with history, and as far as he considers history he is not a materialist."

Marx was not and could never be a Feuerbachian because Marx was still, as Hegel was, very interested in questions of history that Feuerbach jettisoned in his one-sided critique of Hegel. So even when Marx is at the point in his career where he is most influenced by Feuerbach, in 1844, he is effectively wedding Feuerbach's critique of Hegel with a Hegelian-historicist critique of Feuerbach.

The product, as we all know, was historical materialism.

[Old Bolshie]

If it's just a matter of subjective interpretation then this is a hollow exercise. personally, I prefer to go on the textual evidence. If you believe that Marx was under the spell of Hegelian idealism when he sketched out his ideas in the 1844 manuscripts, then you need to show it.

Obviously, when it comes to Marx breaking with the Hegelian dialectic then Lapine is correct. I haven't even read his argument but there is clear textual evidence in the shape of the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/index.htm), written in 1843 and where he attacks the abstractions of Hegel's work on the State through an an analysis which employs the notion of material social relations; not to mention Marx's own comment on the status of this work in his intellectual development in the 1859 Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface-abs.htm) - to whit:






As I said Marx was already moving away from Hegel's idealism before the German Ideology but his definitive break comes with it in my opinion. Marx didn't turn materialist in one day. It was a maturation process of his thought which took its time certainly more than a single year. The polish philosopher Adam Schaff places the break even sooner in 1841.