Course: Social Theory–II (4670) ALLAMA IQBAL OPEN UNIVERSITY, ISLAMABAD (Department of Pakistan Studies) WARNING 1. PLAGIARISM OR HIRING OF GHOST WRITER(S) FOR SOLVING THE ASSIGNMENT(S) WILL DEBAR THE STUDENT FROM AWARD OF DEGREE/CERTIFICATE, IF FOUND AT ANY STAGE. 2. SUBMITTING ASSIGNMENTS BORROWED OR STOLEN FROM OTHER(S) AS ONE’S OWN WILL BE PENALIZED AS DEFINED IN “AIOU PLAGIARISM POLICY”. Course: Social Theory–II (4670) Semester: Spring, 2014 Level: M.Sc Total Marks: 100 Pass Marks: 40 ASSIGNMENT No. 1 Blocks One & Two (Units 1–3) Q.1 Baron De Montesquieu is the ideological co-founder of the American Constitution along with John Locke and one of the earliest theorists whose work initiated the movement known as Enlightenment and helped to bring about the French Revolution. Give an analysis of Montesquieu’ political theory of the “Best Government”. (50) Q.2 Jon Stuart Mill is regarded as the saint of liberalism and his views are of continuing significance and are generally recognized to be among the deepest and certainly the most effective defensed of empiricism and of a liberal political view of society and culture. Give a critical review of Mills’ ideas. (50) ASSIGNMENT No. 2 Blocks Three & Four (Units 4–9) Total Marks: 100 Pass Marks: 40 Q.1 Ibne-Khldun is considered the true historical source of his time and the unchallenged sociological and cultural interpreter of medieval North Africa and much of medieval and modern Arab Islamic culture. Discuss Ibne-Khaldun’s historical and sociological methods and conceptions. (25) Q.2 Give an account of Hegel’s philosophy of history focusing on the following themes; (25) • The Historical Method • A German State • Dialectic and Historical Necessity • Criticism of Dialectic • Freedom and Authority • The state and the Civil Society • The Late Significance of Hegelianism Q.3 Explore Marx’s Dialectical Materialism focusing on the following themes; (50) • The Proletarian Revolution • Dialectical Materialism • Economic Determinism • Ideology and the Class Struggle COURSE OUTLINE SOCIAL THEORY–II Code: 4670 Course Development Coordinator Dr. Lubna Saif 1. Structure of the Course Under the title of Social Theory, you will study two courses Social Theory–I (Code: 4669) and Social Theory–II (Code: 4670). Each course contains nine units and carries weight-age of three credit hours. This is Social Theory–II (Code: 4670). In this course you will study nine units which are arranged in four study blocks, but of unequal length. Ideally one unit is a student work of 12–16 hours. Since the course-work of one unit will be included studying the prescribed reading material and working on your Assignment, you have to calculate how much time you are required to spend on each unit and make your own timetable. We expect you to finish the work within the allocated time. For this course, ‘Fortnightly Tutorials’ are arranged in University’s Regional Study Centres. The provide facilities to meet with one another for mutual help and individual discussion with the ‘tutor’. These tutorials are not formal ‘lectures’ given in any formal university, rather these are meant for groups and individual discussion with the tutor to facilitate you to undertake part of your learning together. So, before going to attend a tutorial prepare your-self to discuss course material with your colleagues and the tutor. We recommend that you should regularly attend these tutorials for achieving good results. For this course, like other course, you will have to do Two Assignments, a set of these assignments is being sent to you in this mailing package. At the end of the semester and before the final written examination, your will have to attend the Course Workshop for 3 days which will be organized at the notified regional office. It is compulsory to attend the workshop. You will not be declared pass if you fail to attend the course workshop. 1.1 Assessment For each course the registered student will be assessed as following: (a) Assignments (continuous assessment). See details as given below. (b) Final Examination (a three-hour written examination will take place at the end of the semester. The conditions to qualify each component are given below: • A minimum of 40% in each assignment. (Total number of assignments for this course is 2) • A minimum of 40% of the final written examination. • An aggregate of 40% of both the components i.e. assignments and final examination. • To take final examination the students has to pass the assignment component. The grade will be determined as following: 40% - 49% D 50% - 59% C 60% - 69% B 70% - 79% A Above 80% A+ Assignments • Assignments are those written exercises, which you are required to complete at your own home or place of work after having studied different parts of the prescribed reading material within the scheduled period of study. (Please see the schedule.) For this course you will receive 2 assignments, which we expect you to complete within the scheduled period. • This is a compulsory course work and its successful completion will make you eligible to take final examination at the end of the semester. • To complete your work successfully, you are provided with tutorial support, so that you can discuss your academic problems in tutorial meetings. • After completing the assignment you will send it to the tutor/course guide, whose name is notified to you for assessment and necessary guidance. Your tutor/course guide will return it after marking and providing academic guidance and supervision. Note: The students are informed about the names of tutors and study centres in the beginning of the semester. If you do not receive such information, Please contact your Regional Office. 1.2 Course Workshops • The workshop of every course will be held at the end of each semester at Regional Campuses notified to you by your regional office. • It is compulsory to attend the workshop. You will not be declared pass if you fail to attend the workshop. A student who does not obtain more than 75% attendance in the workshop will be considered “Fail”. • The duration of the workshop for a three credit course is 3 days. • We expect you to fully participate in the workshop to gain the maximum benefit. Please come prepared for an interactive workshop. 2. Course Description 2.1 Objectives of the Course • This is the second part of the course on Social Theory. In the first part of this course, we have endeavoured to answer what is social theory? And in the process, we have introduced you to some of these ideas which have been the interest of philosophers since the Greek City State. Our aim is not only to trace the origin and evolution of these ideas but also to assess some of the most familiar theories which contain them. • In this course we will familiarize you with some of the most leading thinkers who have influenced the progress of social theory and in turn had an impact over the growth of the society-from a feudal society to today’s nation state. 2.2 Course Outline Block One–New Approach to Social Theory (Unit 1 & 2) Montesquieu (1689–1755) Block Two–Liberalism (Unit 3) John Stuart Mill (1806–1873) Block Three–Philosophy of History (Units 4 & 5) Ibn-e-Khaldun (1332–1405) (Units 6 & 7) G. W. Hegal (1770–1831) Block Four–Historical Materialism (Units 8 & 9) Karl Marx (1818–1883)2 2.3 Course Introduction There are nine units in this course which are arranged in four study blocks. The aim is to trace the development of social theory in relation to the advancement of modern human society focusing on the theorists of 18th and 19th centuries. In this course we will focus on New Approach to Social Theory, Philosophy of History and Historical Materialism. The 18th century began with a growing passion for science. By the end of the century, this passion for science was crystallised into a belief, that science was the key to understand not only the physical nature but man and society as well. Under the theme of new approach to social theory, Block One deals with the theory of Baron De Montesquieu (1689-1755). Montesquieu is the Ideological Co-Founder of the American Constitution along with John Locke. Charles Louis de Secondat was born in Bordeaux, France and was placed under the care of his uncle Baron De Montesquieu after his father’s death in 1713. The Baron died in 1716 and left de Secondat his fortune, his office as president of the Bordeaux Parliament, and his title of Baron De Montesquieu. Montesquieu became the member of French Academies of Science and studied science, history, laws and customs and governments of the countries of Europe. He gained fame in 1721 when he published his first work Persian Letters. In this work, through the device of letters written to and by two aristocratic Persian travellers in Europe, Montesquieu satirized contemporary French politics, social conditions, ecclesiastical matters, and literature. The book won immediate and wide popularity; it was one of the earliest works of the movement known as the Enlightenment, which, by its criticism of French institutions under the Bourbon monarchy, helped bring about the French Revolution. Montesquieu’s major work, the Spirit of Laws appeared in 1748 and it outlined his ideas on how government would best work. This book enormously influenced the political theorists and intellectuals all over the Europe. In the Spirit of Laws, Montesquieu argued that all things were made up of rules or laws that never changed. He set out to study these laws scientifically with the hope that knowledge of the laws of government would reduce that problems of society and improve human life. According to Montesquieu, there were three types of government: a monarchy (ruled by a king or queen), a republic (ruled by an elected leader), and a despotism (ruled by a dictator). Montesquieu proposed that a government that was elected by the people was the best form of government. He however, argued that the success of a democracy-a government in which the people have the power-depended upon maintaining the right balance of power. Montesquieu suggested that the best government would be one in which power was balanced among three groups of officials. He thought England-which divided power between the king (who interpreted laws) – was a good model of this. Montesquieu called the idea of dividing government power into three branches the “separation of powers.” He thought it most important to create separate branches of government with equal but different powers. That way, the government would avoid placing too much power with one individual or group of individuals. He wrote, “When the [law enforcement] powers are united in the same person... there can be no liberty.” According to Montesquieu, each branch of government could limit the power of the other two branches. Therefore, no branch of the government could threaten the freedom of the people. His ideas about separation of powers became the basis for the United States Constitution. Despite Montesquieu’s belief in the principles of a democracy, he did not feel that all people were equal. Montesquieu approved of slavery. He also thought that women were weaker than men and that they had to obey the commands of their husbands. However, he also felt that women did have the ability to govern. ‘It is against reason and against nature for women to be mistresses in the house... but not for them to govern an empire. In the first case, their weak state does not permit them to be preeminent; in the second, their very weakness gives them more gentleness and moderation, which, rather than the harsh and ferocious virtues, can make for a good environment.’ In this way, Montesquieu argued that women were too weak to be in control at home, but that there calmness and gentleness would be helpful qualities in making decisions in government. According to Raymond Aron, ‘On a higher level, histories of ideas rank Montesquieu in turn among the men of letters, among political theorists, among legal historians or among the eighteenth century ideologists’ who probed the foundations of French institutions and who prepared the way for the revolution’. 1 Montesquieu is important for his influence over intellectual thought and on the development of social sciences. The eighteenth century is considered as a turning point as well as a climax in the history of social science, since it produced a science of human behaviour and set such standards in methodology which profoundly influenced the succeeding generations. Movement of thought which flew throughout the 18th century culminated in the establishment of social sciences round about the time of French Revolution of 1848. The emerging national states produced new kinds of social theory; side by side with these kinds of national social theory qualitative kind of approach to the study of man and society emerged. The major characteristic of this new approach was a clear distinction between a scientific and moral theory. Rossides considered Montesquieu’s thought as a landmark in the history of social sciences. Ronald Fletcher writes that ‘the central and most distinguishing feature of Montesquies’s treatment was that he now used the idea of ‘natural law’ not in the old philosophical sense in which it had been used throughout European history, but in the new sense of a scientific law of nature.’ He now brought to the fore the idea that each society, each social system as an entirety has its own ‘natural law of development’ and that it should be the objective of the student of society to uncover and to establish satisfactory knowledge of this law’. 2 Raymond Aron observes the Montesquieu’s aim was to make history intelligible like Max Webber. Montesquies’s goal was to proceed from the meaningless fact to an intelligible order. Raymond raised certain questions like: How does one go about discovering an intelligible order? What will be the nature of this intelligible order? On what level and by what means does one discover the intelligible order? What are the instruments of this intelligibility? Raymond found two answers to these questions in Montesquieu’s works, which were not contradictory in Raymond’s opinion. The first answer is Montesquieu’s declaration that it is not chance which rules the world rather the underlying causes which account for the accidental cause of events needs to be considered and the second answer, Raymond says that ‘it is not that apparent accidents may be explained by underlying cause, but that one can organise the diversity of manners, customs and ideas into a small number of types between the infinite variety of customs and the absolute unity of an indeed society’. Therefore, ‘we must discover an intermediate term namely, a small number of social type... the diversity of laws may be explained, with the laws peculiar to each society being determined by certain causes which sometimes operate without our being aware of them’3. Ronald Fletcher argues that Montesquieu’s theory of society explained the development of social systems within their ecological settings and involved an entire psychological institutional and developmental analysis of the nature of these societies. Commenting on Montesquieu’s major works Rossides says that ‘his thought contained a matter of fact scepticism and relativism that separates him sharply from the main current of Enlightenment. His most important innovation was the rejection of the normative tradition of European social theory. Montesquieu not only raised the problem of human identity, but also strongly suggested that its solution was to be found in the actual expressions of him an nature. Implicit in his general approach was a fairly conscious separation of questions of truth, value, and fact’. Rossides observes that though Montesquieu never formulated this separation as a philosophical maxim that was left to his contemporary David Hume, it influenced his thought throughout his life. The method that affected his release from normative social theory, and from ethnocentrism in general, was the comparative or historical method, a tool of analysis that was to have far-reaching implications for western social theory’4. As discussed above, the 18th and 19th centuries are marked with a systematic effort to apply to the study of man those methods which Newton had applied to nature. The main concern of the theorist of the 18th and 19th centuries was the spiritual, intellectual and social freedom of individual men. In this post-French revolution era, thinkers were confronted with the major problems of the disruption of the old social order and their main pre-occupation was to find an adequate order for solving the new problems created by complex industrial ‘development’ and replacing the ‘traditional authority’ of religion and government by a new body of knowledge about man and society employing scientific method. In Block Two, you will study John Stuart Mill, (1806–1873), philosopher, economist, moral and political theorist, and administrator, who is regarded as ‘the saint of liberalism’ and one of the greatest thinkers of nineteenth century. John Stuart Mill was the most influential English-speaking philosopher and is notable for his contributions to ethics, political philosophy, economics and logic. His views are of continuing significance, and are generally recognized to be among the deepest and certainly the most effective defences of empiricism and of a liberal political view of society and culture. The overall aim of his philosophy is to develop a positive view of the universe and the place of humans in it, one which contributes to the progress of human knowledge, individual freedom and human well-being. His views are not entirely original, having their roots in the British empiricism of John Locke, George Berkeley and David Hume, and in the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham. But he gave them a new depth, and his formulations were sufficiently articulate to gain for them a continuing influence among a broad public. John Stuart Mill, the eldest son of the philosopher, James Mill, was born in London on 20th May, 1806. He was tutored at home by his father and by the time he had reached the age of twelve, John Stuart was familiar with the works of Aristotle, Hobbes, Plato, Jerry Bentham, Ricardo and Adam Smith. Mill was especially impressed by the work of Jerry Bentham. He agreed with Bentham when he argued in Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789), that the proper objective of all conduct and legislation is “the greatest happiness of the greatest number”. Mill was only seventeen when he formed a discussion group called the Utilitarian Society. Mill’s articles published in the Westminster Review, a journal founded by Jerry Bentham and James Mil to propagate Radical view. John Stuart Mill also wrote for other newspapers and journals including the Morning Chronicle and Parliamentary History and Review. Jeremy took an active role in the campaign for parliamentary reform, and was one of the firs to suggest that women should have the same political rights as men. In 1834 Mill founded the Radical journal, the London Review. Two proprietor of the Westminster Review, Mill used the journal to support those politicians, who were advocating further reform of the House of Commons. Mill and Harried Taylor were close friends and the two worked closely together for parliamentary reforms especially for women’s rights. They got married in 1849, after Harriet’s first husband’s death. A few months after the wedding the Westminster Review published The Enfranchisement of Women. The original writer of the article was Taylor, but is appeared under John Stuart Mill’s name. Many other works appeared under John Stuart Mill’s name were in fact written by Taylor who was reluctant to be described as joint author of Mill’s books and articles. Mill was the younger contemporary of Auguste Comte (the father of positivism) and the first English philosopher who appreciated Auguste Comte’s philosophy and made him popular in Britain. Like Comte, Mill’s major problem was the disruption of the ‘social order’. Fletcher writes that ‘unlike Comte, Mill did not even attempt a substantive theory of man in society. He was conscious of the fact that the human sciences were too little advanced, in his own time, for any complete statesmen. Instead, he undertook a logical clarification of the methods most properly to be employed in these sciences and the kinds of generalization and the degree of exactitude which it was reasonable to expect them to attains’.5 Illustrating this commonality between Comte and Mill, Aiken says that ‘despite the fact that he was subsequently disillusioned and repelled by the megalomania and religiosity of Comte’s later writings, Mill well understood how many philosophical commitments they shared in common. Comte construed Mill’s favourable notices of his ideas as coming from an English disciple who would help to carry the good news of the positive philosophy to the gentiles’. Aiken argues that ‘this was wholly Comte’s idea. Both by temperament and by conviction, Mill was not cut out to be the disciple of any man or the mere propagandist for any dispensation. He had not worked himself free, at great personal cost, from the rigid dogmas of the Benthamite utilitarianism into which he had been indoctrinated as a youth by his father, James Mill, in order to become a convert to Comte’s religion of humanity’. 6 In the introduction to Jermy Bentham, J S Mill says that ‘there are two men, recently deceased, to whom their country is indebted not only for the greater part of the important ideas which have been thrown into circulation among its thinking men in their time, but for a revolution in its general modes of thought and investigation’. Bentham was friend of James Mill, and took great interest in his son John Stuart’s education. J S Mill’s early life was spent in Bentham’s influence and guidance. Mill reacted against this rigid ‘utilitarian doctrine’ of Bentham and introduced new features. In M Wanock’s words, ‘Bentham’s life work, as he conceived it, was twofold; first he had to provide a secure foundation of theory for a any possible legal system; and secondly he had at the same time to criticise existing legal systems in the light of this theoretical foundation’. In Block Three, we will discuss philosophy of history focusing on two theorists, Ibn-e-Khaldun (1332–1406) and G. W. Hegel (1770–1831). Philosophy of history is an important field of philosophical enquiry, which differ from moral and political philosophy in the sense that philosophy of history gives ‘total account’ of the relationship of man and society in the context of the development of historical society. We will concentrate on the ideals of Ibn-e-Khaldun in Units 4 & 5. Hegel will be discussed in Units 6 & 7. Ibn-e-Khaldun is significant for three main reasons; first, he is regarded as a precursor of the science of society, second, like any other thinker, Khaldun is a child of his time, and his social theory is a product of a long series of the Islamic movements of thought, and third, Khaldun is taken as unchallenged sociological and cultural interpreter of medieval North Africa adn much of medieval and modern Arab Islamic Culture. According to Bali and Wardi7, there is a striking similarity between Khaldun’s ideas and of Machiavelli, Vico, Montesquieu, Adam Smith, Auguste Comte, Durkheim and even Marx. Aziz Al-Azmeh observes that Ibn-e-Khaldun is not only considered the true historical source of his time, he is also the unchallenged sociological and cultural interpreter of medieval north Africa and much of medieval and modern Arab Islamic culture as well. Aziz writes that ‘the validity of his discourse is considered to be so universal as to confer upon his ideas the status of progenitor-of, at the very best, anticipator-of a great variety of modern ideas’. Aziz asserts that ‘so unassailable this position has been occupied by Ibn-e-Khaldun’s thought that the general accepted description of his thought has gone unchallenged even by scholars who took the under modernization of his writings’. Even these scholars have accepted what is in fact an historical description of Ibn-e-Khaldun’s historical and sociological methods and conception... what has hitherto been considered axial to the study of Ibn-e-Khaldun-his supposed sociology, the ‘incompatibility,’ between reason and belief as the animating centre of the Muaqddimah, the scientificity of his historiography, and cognate topics of his imagination’. Analyzing Ibn-e-Khaldun’s social theory, our main objective is to find out: (i) Whether the evident similarities between many of the conclusions of Ibn-e-Khaldun’s investigation of history and society and those of modern social science and cultural history reflect a deeper similarity of view concerning the nature and function of science or philosophy. (ii) to investigate the important aces on which Ibn-e-Khaldun’s thought revolves. Baali and Wardi identify four topics which they believe are the most important axes. According to them these four topics have caused ‘existing controversies.’ These are: (i) Idelism vs Realism; (ii) Right vs Might. (iii) Reason vs Religion (iv) Islam vs Nomadism We have prescribed Ibn-e-Khaldun’s ‘THE MUQADDIMAH’ as basic reading of this block. The Muqaddimah is the introduction to history, in fact which is known as Ibn-e-Khaldun’s original preface and book-I of his most famous comprehensive history of the world, written in 1377, entitled kitabal-Ibar. Kitabal Ibar is considered as the earliest attempt to investigate a pattern in the changes that occur in man’s political and social organisation. In his intorudction to the English translated abridged edition of the Muqaddimah, N J DAWOOED has said: “Rational in its approach, analytical in its method, encyuclopaedc in detail, it represents and almost complete departure from traditional historiography, discarding conventional concepts and clichés and seeking, beyond the mere chronicle of events, an explanation and hence a philosophy of history” (PIX). Commenting on the Muqaddimah, Hugh Trevar Roper, in Sunday Times, observed: “This Muqaddimah is only part of Khaldun’s great work: it is the introduction to his history of the world. But it is by far the feature of his works for it contains his new science, his philosophy of history.” Arnold Toynbee, comments: ‘Ibn-e-Khaldun has succeeded in drawing conclusions which are of living elms, practical and theoretical. It would, indeed, be no exaggeration to say that his is the most comprehensive and illuminating analysis of how human affairs work that has been made anywhere (Observer).” The great period of rediscovery of Ibn-e-Khaldun started as early as the 16th century and gained momentum in the seventeenth century. The second theorist of this block is Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) who presents the most exiting account of a systematic ‘philosophy of history’. Along with J. G. Fichte and F. W. J. von Schelling, Hegel belongs to the period of “German idealism” in the decades following Kant. The most systematic of the post-Kantian idealists, Hegel attempted, throughout his published writings as well as in his lectures, to elaborate a comprehensive and systematic ontology from a “logical” starting point. He is perhaps most well-known for his teleological account of history, an account which was later taken over by Marx and “inverted” into a materialist theory of an historical development culminating in communism. For most of the twentieth century, the “logical” side of Hegels thought had been largely forgotten, but his political and social philosophy continued to find interest and support. However, since the 1970s, a degree of more general philosophical interest in Hegels systematic thought has also been revived. The main concern of Hegel’s philosophy is complete reconstruction of modern thought. He is considered as an idealist-philosopher who believes in the ‘primary of spirit or mind’ in the universe. According to Sabine, ‘Hegel’s problem was one that had been perennial in the modern thought from the beginning and that had grown steadily more acute with the progress of modern science, viz. the opposition between the order of nature as it must be conceived for scientific purposes and the conception of its implicit in the ethical and religious tradition of Christianity’. Hegel introduced a system for understanding the history of philosophy and the world itself, often called a dialectic- a progression in which each successive movement emerges as a solution to the contradictions inherent in the preceding movement. To specifically apply this model of Hegels view of world history, it represents the manner in which the Spirit - for Hegel a total reality that is an inherent unity of a mental or spiritual nature - develops gradually into its purest form, ultimately attaining unto its own essential freedom. To Hegel, world history is thus the unfolding of Spirit in time, as nature is the unfolding of the Idea in space. Hegel writes in his Introduction to the Philosophy of History that ‘Spirit does not toss itself about in the external play of chance occurrences; on the contrary, it is that which determines history absolutely, and it stands firm against the chance occurrences which it dominates and exploits for its own purpose.’ Although Hegels dialectic often appears broken up for convenience into three moments called thesis, antithesis, and synthesis, these terms were not original to or much used by Hegel himself. This classification was in fact developed earlier by Fichte in his loosely analogous account of the relation between the individual subject and the world. Without the active opposition of an antithesis working through the dialectic, Hegel asserts, existence is simply an empty task. Periods of happiness are empty pages in history, for they are the periods of harmony, times when the antithesis is missing. What is left to life is simply habit, activity without opposition. This then raises a crucial question: how can it be possible to have an end to history? If history ends in the ultimate realization of the Spirit, then all opposition apparently has been negated. Not only has the past already been completed, but the future is foreclosed to any further developments. What is left to life when the final synthesis has been achieved and nothing stands in opposition of the immediate present? Schools of thought influenced by Hegel tend see history as progressive, but also as a possibly painfully arrived at outcome of a dialectic in which factors working in opposite directions are over time reconciled. History was best seen as directed by a zeitgeist, or Spirit of the Age, and traces of the zeitgest could be seen by looking backward. Hegel has a rather notable disciple in Karl Marx who adapted Hegel’s Dialectic away from being related to the unfolding of Spirit and towards Marxs own Materialist Conception of History where the economic factors of human society and the associated social relations would critically determine the unfolding of human history and could only, for Marx, (Engels, Lenin, Trotsky and their millions of sometime ideological followers) result in the establishment of Socialism. In Block Four, we will explore Marx and Historical Materialism. Karl Marx (1818-1883) is best known not as a philosopher but as a revolutionary communist, whose works inspired the foundation of many communist regimes in the twentieth century. It is hard to think of many who have had as much influence in the creation of the modern world. Karl Marx was born on May 5, 1818 and died on March 14, 1883. He was a German economist, philosopher, and revolutionist whose writings form the basis of the body of ideas known as Marxism. With the aid of Friedrich Engels he produced much of the theory of modern socialism and communism. Marxs father, Heinrich, was a Jewish lawyer who had converted his family to Christianity partly in order to preserve his job in the Prussian state. Karl himself was baptized in the Evangelical church. As a student at the University of Berlin, young Marx was strongly influenced by the philosophy of Georg Hegel and by a radical group called Young Hegelians, who attempted to apply Hegelian ideas to the movement against organized religion and the Prussian autocracy. In 1841, Marx received a doctorate in philosophy. In 1842, Marx became editor of the Rheinische Zeitung in Cologne, a liberal democratic newspaper for which he wrote increasingly radical editorials on social and economic issues. The newspaper was banned by the Prussian government in 1843, and Marx left for Paris with his bride, Jenny von Westphalen. There he went further in his criticism of society, building on the Young Hegelian criticism of religion. Ludwig Feuerbach had written a book called The Essence of Christianity, arguing that God had been invented by humans as a projection of their own ideals. Feuerbach wrote that man, however, in creating God in his own image, had alienated himself from himself. He had created another being in contrast to himself, reducing himself to a lowly, evil creature who needed both church and government to guide and control him. If religion were abolished, Feuerbach claimed, human beings would overcome their alienation. Marx applied this idea of alienation to private property, which he said caused humans to work only for themselves, not for the good of their species. In his papers of this period, published as Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, he elaborated on the idea that alienation had an economic base. He called for a communist society to overcome the dehumanizing effect of private property. In 1845, Marx moved to Brussels, and in 1847 he went to London. He had previously made friends with Friedrich Engels, the son of a wealthy textile manufacturer who, like himself, had been a Young Hegelian. They collaborated on a book which was a criticism of some of their Young Hegelian friends for their stress on alienation. In 1845, Marx jotted down some notes, Theses on Feuerbach, which he and Engels enlarged into a book, The German Ideology, in which they developed their materialistic conception of history. They argued that human thought was determined by social and economic forces, particularly those related to the means of production. They developed a method of analysis they called dialectical materialism, in which the clash of historical forces leads to changes in society. In 1847 a London organization of workers invited Marx and Engels to prepare a program for them. It appeared in 1848 as The Communist Manifesto. In it they declared that all history was the history of class struggles. Under capitalism, the struggle between the working class and the business class would end in a new society, a communist one. The outbreak of the Revolutions of 1848 in Europe led Marx to return to Cologne, where he began publication of the Neue Rheinische Zeitung, but with the failure of the German liberal democratic movement he moved permanently, in 1849, to London. For many years he and his family lived in poverty, aided by small subventions from Engels and by bequests from the relatives of Marxs wife. From 1851 to 1862 he contributed articles and editorials to The New York Tribune, then edited by Horace Greeley. Most of his time, however, was spent in the British Museum, studying economic and social history and developing his theories. Marxs ideas began to influence a group of workers and German emigres in London, who established the International Workingmens Association in 1864, later known as the First International. By the time of the brief Commune of Paris in 1871, Marxs name had begun to be well known in European political circles. A struggle developed within the International between Marx and the Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin, whom Marx eventually defeated and expelled, at the cost of destroying the International. In 1867, Marx published the first volume of Das Kapital. The next two volumes, edited by Engels, were published after Marxs death. The fourth volume was edited by Karl Kautsky. Marxs last years were marked by illness and depression. Marx continued to write treatises on socialism, urging that his followers disdain soft hearted bourgeois tendencies. At Marxs funeral in Highgate Cemetery in London, Engels spoke of him as the best-hated and most-calumniated man of his time. The importance of Marxs thought, however, extends far beyond the revolutionary movements whose prophet he became. His writings on economics and sociology are still influential in academic circles and among many who do not share his political views. The main philosophical works of Karl Marx that are of interest to most students are the Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital. Trained as a philosopher, Marx turned away from philosophy in his mid-twenties, towards economics and politics. However, in addition to his overtly philosophical early work, his later writings have many points of contact with contemporary philosophical debates, especially in the philosophy of history and the social sciences, and in moral and political philosophy. Historical materialism — Marxs theory of history — is centered around the idea that forms of society rise and fall as they further and then impede the development of human productive power. Marx sees the historical process as proceeding through a necessary series of modes of production, culminating in communism. Marxs economic analysis of capitalism is based on his version of the labour theory of value, and includes the analysis of capitalist profit as the extraction of surplus value from the exploited proletariat. The analysis of history and economics come together in Marxs prediction of the inevitable economic breakdown of capitalism, to be replaced by communism. However Marx refused to speculate in detail about the nature of communism, arguing that it would arise through historical processes, and was not the realisation of a pre-determined moral ideal. Marx is symbol of revolutionary ideology. Marx was not a mere dialectician like Hegel, spinning out theses and antitheses a priori which prescribe how the course of human society must proceed rather his historical materialism was to provide a framework for a verifiable theory of the executive causes of social change-the ultimate destiny of mankind as a whole- the proletarian revolution and the eventual class-less society. Dialectical materialism occupies a place all its own in European philosophy. First of all it had very few exponents in academic circles outside the former Soviet Union and Communist China, where, by contrast, it was (Russia) and is (China) established as the official philosophy and consequently had privileges such as are enjoyed by no other contemporary school of philosophy. Besides, it is unique as the philosophy of a political party -- the Communists; on this account it is closely linked to the economic and political theories as well as to the practical activity of that party, for which it is the general theory. In Russia where the Communist party was in control, no one was permitted to teach any other philosophy than dialectical materialism, and even the exposition of its own classical philosophical texts was strictly supervised. This supervision -- in combination, it is true, with the Russian national character -- explains some of the odd features of dialectical-materialist publications; the latter are strikingly different from all others through their complete uniformity. All of their authors say exactly the same thing and make innumerable quotations from the classical authors, who are made to yield arguments for current theses at every turn. Perhaps this supervision is to be blamed also for the mediocrity of the philosophers in this school of philosophy; it is in any case responsible for the extreme dogmatism, chauvinism, and aggressiveness of the followers of Karl Marx and dialectical materialism. Even more significant, however, than these peculiarities, which could be accidental, is the reactionary character of the philosophy of Marx and its dialectical materialism, for this philosophy leads straight back to the mid-19th century and seeks to restore the intellectual situation of that time without the slightest alteration. The Russians regarded Karl Marx, with whom Friedrich Engels worked in close cooperation, as the founder of dialectical materialism. Marx belonged to the Hegelian school, which had split into a left and a right by the time Marx was studying at the University of Berlin. A prominent representative of the left was Ludwig Feuerbach who interpreted the Hegelian system in a materialistic sense and treated world history as the unfolding of matter and not of spirit. Marx firmly supported Feurerbach but simultaneously came under the influence of scientific materialism which was spreading at the time; this explains his enthusiasm for science, his profound and ingenious belief in progress, and his prejudice in favor of Darwinian evolutionism. In founding dialectical materialism, Marx linked the Hegelian dialectic to the materialism of his day. Marx himself was chiefly a political economist, sociologist, and social philosopher. He is the founder of historical materialism while the general philosophical foundation of the system, which is dialectical materialism, is essentially the work of Engels. Dialectical materialism constitutes a link between the Hegelian dialectic and 19th-century materialism. Source: The Radical Academy-Classic Philosophers Series Prescribed Readings: 1. A History of Political Theory by George H. Sabine 2. Main Currents in Sociological Thought by Raymond Aron 3. The History and Nature of Sociological Theory by Daniel W. Rossides 4. Ibne- Khaldun’s Muqadama.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Sep 2014 06:24:24 +0000
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