Lukács, Sartre and Fromm

[Lamanov]

I've read fragments of History and Class Counsciousness, mainly Lukács' critiques of Luxemburg, which I could not accept to the fullest. I found Lukács too overpowered by his own method that sometimes he fell into the usual Hegelean contradiction of dialectic for itself and by itself, so that at times he was very heavy and conservative in his conclusions. I developed an instinctive sub-counscious awareness of his idealism which were recently confirmed by Debord's retrospectives of Lukács and his work. (I've just recently started reading Society of The Spectacle)

Can someone explain the differences and philosophical conflicts between Georg Lukács and Jean Paul Sartre, roots and contradictions in their philosophical standpoints and methods. How does Erich Fromm fit in this "crossfire"?

P.S.

Soon as I finish what I'm reading now I'll turn my attention to Sartre and Fromm. Any suggestions or criticism?

[Monty Cantsin]

I found Lukács too overpowered by his own method that sometimes he fell into the usual Hegelean contradiction of dialectic for itself and by itself, so that at times he was very heavy and conservative in his conclusions. I developed an instinctive sub-counscious awareness of his idealism which were recently confirmed by Debord's retrospectives of Lukács and his work.

Could you explain to me what you think the difference is between Debord’s use of dialectics and Lukács use of the concept? Both thinkers laid stress on the point of dialecticism having validity. also how is dialectic for and by itself a hegelian contradition? you might dissagree with Hegel's philosophical system but whats the contradiction you see?

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by Monty Cantsin
Could you explain to me what you think the difference is between Debord’s use of dialectics and Lukács use of the concept? Both thinkers laid stress on the point of dialecticism having validity. also how is dialectic for and by itself a hegelian contradition? you might dissagree with Hegel's philosophical system but whats the contradiction you see?

Well, I concider idealist (Hegelian) dialectic to be the language of the triumphant bougeoisie. Hegel's philosophical system is exactly the philosophical justification and glorification of victorious civilian society at the peek of its enthusiasm. Its role was the most briliant explanation of itself by itself.

Hegelian logic delt with the abstract form of thought, while it was Marx who fliped it - making it materialist - so dialectical cathegories were used as a tool to the scientific goal he was trying to reach, as a systematization of actual rather than as an abstract goal for itself.

So what is the contradiction, you ask.

There's a fine line which devides ideology from theory itself, being that theory is the depiction of objective truth. Whilst theory is the product of tendency towards objective, ideology is the product of subjective tendency and position within totality, and as subjective can come into conflict with objective, ideology falls into contradiction from which it cannot undo itself.

Ideology, understood as such, is the contemplative voice of the actual material cause of contradiction, to which it serves as a justification.

It was precisely Lukács who fell into alot of ideological contradictions while he was trying to use dialectical cathegories to explain and confirm the unconfirmable. The greatest one I personally noticed whilst reading his writings was the one which Debord explains in his book:


"...When Lukács, in 1923, presented this same organizational form as the long-sought link between theory and practice, in which proletarians cease being mere “spectators” of the events that occur in their organization and begin consciously choosing and experiencing those events, he was describing as merits of the Bolshevik Party everything that that party was not. Despite his profound theoretical work, Lukács remained an ideologue, speaking in the name of the power that was most grossly alien to the proletarian movement, yet believing and pretending that he found himself completely at home with it. As subsequent events demonstrated how that power disavows and suppresses its lackeys, Lukács’s endless self-repudiations revealed with caricatural clarity that he had identified with the total opposite of himself and of everything he had argued for in History and Class Consciousness. No one better than Lukács illustrates the validity of the fundamental rule for assessing all the intellectuals of this century: What they respect is a precise gauge of their own degradation. Yet Lenin had hardly encouraged these sorts of illusions about his activities. On the contrary, he acknowledged that “a political party cannot examine its members to see if there are contradictions between their philosophy and the party program.” The party whose idealized portrait Lukács had so inopportunely drawn was in reality suited for only one very specific and limited task: the seizure of state power."

From Guy Debord, The Society of The Spectacle, thesis 112

Italics belong to Debord, bolds are mine.

[Lamanov]

P.S.

I've just read (last night) Jean Paul Sartre's article Marxism and Existentialism (From Critique de la Raison Dialectique, Paris 1960) and I have to admit that it is - in my opinion - very valuable peice of though.

He, as an existentialist, who came into - for his time - an original understanding of Marxism, made a quite refreshing Marxian self-criticism, as well as a very positive confirmation of it from a perspective of human existence to which he adheres so much.

I have to recommend this to everyone.

(Original bibliography: J.P.Sartre, Critique de la Raison Dialectique, copyright Librarie Gallimard, 1960)

[hoopla]

I will attempt a better description of dialectics than thesis-antithesis-synthesis.

Dialectics explain change.

Take a converstaion - in it there are changes as one person stops speaking and another starts. There are 3 rules to the changes that occur during a conversation.

Rule 1 - In all change their are two elements, what is changing and a force that changes that which is changing (Person A talking and the changing force of Person A running out of things to say).

Rule 2 - All changes occur by a gradual quantitative change of one side, followed by a leap to a new state (So in my example, Person A will gradually have less and less to say, until he has completely run out, and it is then that person B starts speaking).

Rule 3 - The changing force negates what is changing to produce a new situation (Person A running out of things to say negates Person A talking - to produce Person B talking). However this result is then negated by the original state, producing a new state (Person B talking is negated by Person A talking, producing a new state of Person A talking again but in a more advanced conversation).

All change follows these 3 rules. Try explaining a change using dialectics yourself!

[hoopla]

Maybe i posted that on the wrong thread.

[Lamanov]

It seems that you did. ^_^

[gilhyle]

It seems more interesting to ask what links Lukacs and Sartre rather than what divides them, to which I would answer an existentialist morality of self-creation which Sartre admitted and which Lukacs tried to hide - where Sartre made himself what he already was (a French intellectual), Lukacs tried to make himself what he never could be : a revolutionary Marxist.

[Vanguard1917]

It seems more interesting to ask what links Lukacs and Sartre rather than what divides them, to which I would answer an existentialist morality of self-creation which Sartre admitted and which Lukacs tried to hide - where Sartre made himself what he already was (a French intellectual), Lukacs tried to make himself what he never could be : a revolutionary Marxist.

Lukacs was an active member of the Hungarian Communist Party during the (short-lived) 1919 revolution in Hungary. During that time, he was an active revolutionary Marxist - i.e. he actually took part in a revolution.

But what is most revolutionary about the younger Lukacs (i.e. not the later Lukacs who sided with Stalin), in my opinion, is his defence of the need for a communist party. At a time when it was widespread in Marxist circles to degrade the role of subjective factors in the revolutionary process (so widespread that it influenced otherwise superb revolutionaries such as Rosa Luxemburg), Lukacs gave philosophical backing to Lenin's concept of the vanguard party. History and Class Consciousness is one of the major texts of the revolutionary Marxist tradition. Lukacs is the philosopher of the Russian Revolution; he is the philosopher of revolutionary Leninism.

Lukacs also wrote an "essay" (more like a short book) defending History and Class Consciousness against its critics - directly, Rudas...but it also contains arguments countering future criticisms, such as those by Debord. He wrote it in 1925 but it was only discovered many decades later and was translated into English in the 1990s. It's called Tailism and the Dialectic. It's a 'must read' text for anyone interested in the ideas of Lukacs - or revolutionary Leninism generally.

[gilhyle]

Certainly, Lukacs was a communist - but not, I think, a Marxist.

In saying this, I admit I am using a very narrow understanding of Marxism to put my point dramatically. And that may not be particularly helpful to debate - when the term Marxism is normally used in such a vague way.

But I think Arato & Breines book on the Young Lukacs shows well how Lukacs adopted communism as a resolution of a tragic/existentialist/romantic perspective, the values of which continued to underpin his views.

Philosophically he is arguably close to a kind of Schellingian position - certainly not a dialectical materialist. His communism is conceived as a moral leap into the stream of history to resolve the dilemmas of the individual.

I confess not to having read his Tailism and the Dialectic. BUt it is interesting in reading his book on Lenin (1924?) to see how different his positions are than Lenins - even as he tries to coopt Lenin for his own view.