"There is no question that the global recession on the back of the constant 'war on terror' has produced a radicalisation. Anti-capitalism is widespread. Evidence comes from the sheer scale of popular mobilisations over the last decade. Once, achieving a demonstration of 100,000 in Britain was regarded as an immense achievement. When grizzled lefties looked back on the demo of that size against the Vietnam War in October 1968, tears welled in their eyes. Now a London demo has to be counted in hundreds of thousands, to be a success. Yet this radicalisation, in Britain at least, has not been accompanied by the growth of any of the political currents which you would expect to benefit from this anti-capitalism. And I mean any, even those who reject the label 'Party'. The situation the left finds itself in is worse than when it entered the new century.... No other period of radicalisation in British history has experienced this lack of any formal political expression. It's not that people opposing austerity, war and much else are without politics. They are busy devouring articles, books, online videos and much else." [Quoted from here. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Paragraphs merged; bold emphasis added.]
"Capitalism is in crisis, but its opponents are writhing around in an even bigger mess. The largest far-left organisation in Britain, the Socialist Workers Party, is currently imploding in the aftermath of a shocking internal scandal. After a leading figure was accused of raping a member, the party set up a 'court' staffed with senior party members, which exonerated him. 'Creeping feminism' has been flung around as a political insult. Prominent members, such as authors China Miéville and Richard Seymour, have publicly assailed their party's leadership. Activists are reported to be in open rebellion at their autocratic leadership, or are simply deserting en masse. This might all sound parochial, the obscure goings-on out on the fringes of Britain's marginal revolutionary left. But the SWP has long punched above its weight. It formed the basis of the organisation behind the Stop The War Coalition, for example, which -- almost exactly a decade go -- mobilised up to two million people to take to the streets against the impending Iraqi bloodbath. Even as they repelled other activists with sectarianism and aggressive recruitment drives, they helped drive crucial movements such as Unite Against Fascism, which recently organised a huge demonstration in Walthamstow that humiliated the racist English Defence League. Thousands hungry for an alternative to the disaster of neo-liberalism have entered the SWP's ranks over the years -- many, sadly, to end up burnt out and demoralised....
"But the truth is that Britain urgently needs a movement uniting all those desperate for a coherent alternative to the tragedy of austerity, inflicted on this country without any proper mandate.... The history -- and failures -- of the radical left are imprinted on my own family, spanning four generations: my relatives had wages docked in the 1926 General Strike and joined failed projects ranging from the Independent Labour Party to the Communists. My parents met in the Trotskyist Militant Tendency in the late 1960s; my father became their South Yorkshire organiser, and striking miners babysat my brothers while he fought (unsuccessfully) for revolution.... Neither would I argue for yet another party of the left to be built, Leninist or not. Britons are becoming poorer with every passing year; the wealthy elite continues to boom -- the increase in the fortunes of the richest 1,000 since 2008 eclipses our annual deficit; and Labour's leaders are still to offer a genuine alternative to austerity. But parties challenging Labour for the mantle of the left languish, as they have almost always done, in political oblivion. In the by-election in Manchester Central back in November, for example, the catchily titled Trade Union and Socialist Coalition won an embarrassing 220 votes and was even beaten by the Pirate Party. If not now, comrades, then when?... But it is absurd that -- as we live through a Great Reverse of living standards and hard-won rights -- the opponents of austerity are scattered and fragmented. Even as their poison drives up debt, poverty and long-term unemployment alike, the High Priests of Austerity remain perversely united.
"Ugly forces are more than happy to benefit from a widespread mood of revulsion at the political establishment. Nigel Farage has benefited from a ubiquitous presence on our TV screens -- so much for a left-wing conspiracy at [the BBC] -- but Ukip is thriving too as a collective middle finger stuck up at our rulers. If the left cannot pull itself together half a decade after global capitalism started to totter, the populist right knows a vacuum when it sees one." [Owen Jones, The Independent, 20/01/2013. Several links added, and several paragraphs merged. In 2015, Jones was a prominent and vocal supporter of Jeremy Corbyn; in 2016, he performed a U-turn, and, during the Labour Leadership election campaign, lent his support to Owen Smith, a Labour MP, who, overnight, discovered he had a few left-wing ideas. Jones then became one of the more vocal anti-Corbyn critics. Could it be that his parents' Trotskyism taught Jones enough dialectics to enable him to 'justify' his 'contradictory' behaviour? Update September 2016: Jones now appears to have performed yet another U-turn! Update November 2019: UKIP have now all but vanished to be replaced by Nigel Farage's new, right-wing party, Brexit. Update July 2021: Brexit has also passed into oblivion, and Farage has been reduced to fronting adverts on YouTube. Update June 2024: Jones has now resigned from the Labour Party (largely because of that party's horrendous line over the genocide talking place in Gaza), and is promoting the Greens. Farage now leads the far right Reform Party.]
Update May 2024: The UK-SWP has just issued a delayed statement about what happened in 2012/13, eleven years too late. On that, see Appendix One.
Just when the most concerted, focused and vicious ruling-class attack on workers gains momentum -- aimed it their living standards and working conditions -- the world has witnessed in many generations, the far-left has shot itself in the head. At a time when the fascists are mobilising throughout much of the 'developed world', revolutionaries have fatally compromised their ability to resist and help organise a fight back! How many more self-inflicted wounds can our movement take? When are we going to start learning from history?
Are we just unlucky? Or just monumentally stupid?
Or, are there deeper structural and ideological reasons for our serial screw-ups, failures and set-backs? I was determined to find out.
[The results of that search form the bulk of Essay Nine Parts One and Two and Essay Ten Part One.]
So Many Questions -- So Few Answers
Several more questions soon forced themselves to the surface: Could it be that DM is indirectly, or even directly, connected with the tendency almost all revolutionary groups have of wanting to substitute themselves for the working-class --, or, at least, for excusing the substitution of other social forces for workers, for instance, the Red Army, Maoist guerrillas, 'the peasantry', the Central Committee, the 'Great Helmsman'/'Teacher', radicalised students, 'sympathetic'/'progressive' nationalist leaders, 'leftwing' MPs or even 'rainbow alliances'...? Indeed, has this theory/method been used to 'justify' and rationalise countless short-term, opportunistic and cynical tactical and strategic twists and turns (several of which literally took place overnight -- like the 180º flips performed by the CPSU and the CCP in the 1920s and 1930s), which helped destroy more than one revolution, demobilised workers' struggles, directly or indirectly leading to the death of millions of workers in the run up to, and during, WW2 --, or, indeed, in the many decades since?
[As we will see, in each case the answer to the above questions is, alas, unequivocally and demonstrably in the affirmative.]
Remarkably, there are still some on the revolutionary left who will scratch their heads and wonder why workers (particularly class conscious workers) all across the planet ignore, or even distrust, us!
It seemed to me that researching these and related topics might help explain why revolutionary socialism has been so spectacularly unsuccessful, and for so long. Indeed, if there are no fixed principles (according to the fixed DM-principle that there aren't fixed principles!), is it at all surprising that comrades treat one another -- and are treated in return -- in an unprincipled and manipulative way? Or, that many will happily use 'dialectics' to 'justify' or rationalise whatever is politically self-serving, expedient or opportune.
In that case, isn't DM just one more aspect of the "muck of ages" that Marx claimed humanity had to cast aside if a socialist society is successfully to be created?
If not, shouldn't it be?
Our monumental lack of success (lasting now for over one hundred and fifty years -- which means that this isn't simply a temporary, ephemeral or superficial feature of our movement) sits rather awkwardly with the emphasis dialecticians constantly place on practice as a test of truth. Despite their long history of almost complete failure, DM-theorists still declare Dialectical Marxism a success! This they say is because it has been "tested in practice" and hasn't been found wanting! Here is John Rees, for example:
"[H]ow are we to be sure that our theory is correct? The answer is that there is a point where the theory and the consciousness of the working class meet -- in practice." [Rees (1998), p.236. Bold emphases added.]
Rees is, of course, simply echoing Marx and Lenin:
"The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth -- i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice. The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question. The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it." [Theses on Feuerbach, in Marx (1968), pp.28, 30. Paragraphs merged; bold emphases alone added.]
"From living perception to abstract thought, and from this to practice, -- such is the dialectical path of the cognition of truth, of the cognition of objective reality." [Lenin (1961), p.171. Bold emphasis alone added.]
"Knowledge can be useful biologically, useful in human practice, useful for the preservation of life, for the preservation of the species, only when it reflects objective truth, truth which is independent of man. For the materialist the 'success' of human practice proves the correspondence between our ideas and the objective nature of the things we perceive. For the solipsist 'success' is everything needed by me in practice, which can be regarded separately from the theory of knowledge. If we include the criterion of practice in the foundation of the theory of knowledge we inevitably arrive at materialism, says the Marxist." [Lenin (1972), pp.157-58. Bold emphasis alone added. Quotation marks altered to conform with conventions adopted at this site.]
Here, too, is Mao:
"Marxists hold that man's social practice alone is the criterion of the truth of his knowledge of the external world. What actually happens is that man's knowledge is verified only when he achieves the anticipated results in the process of social practice (material production, class struggle or scientific experiment). If a man wants to succeed in his work, that is, to achieve the anticipated results, he must bring his ideas into correspondence with the laws of the objective external world; if they do not correspond, he will fail in his practice. After he fails, he draws his lessons, corrects his ideas to make them correspond to the laws of the external world, and can thus turn failure into success.... The dialectical-materialist theory of knowledge places practice in the primary position, holding that human knowledge can in no way be separated from practice and repudiating all the erroneous theories which deny the importance of practice or separate knowledge from practice. Thus Lenin said, 'Practice is higher than (theoretical) knowledge, for it has not only the dignity of universality, but also of immediate actuality.' [Mao is here quoting Lenin (1961), p.213 -- RL.] The Marxist philosophy of dialectical materialism has two outstanding characteristics. One is its class nature: it openly avows that dialectical materialism is in the service of the proletariat. The other is its practicality: it emphasizes the dependence of theory on practice, emphasizes that theory is based on practice and in turn serves practice. The truth of any knowledge or theory is determined not by subjective feelings, but by objective results in social practice. Only social practice can be the criterion of truth. The standpoint of practice is the primary and basic standpoint in the dialectical materialist theory of knowledge." [Mao (1964b), pp.295-96. Bold emphases alone added; quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site.]
But, practice has returned an unambiguous answer: judging by the long-term failure of Dialectical Marxism, by its own lights, its core theory stands refuted.
Naturally, Dialectical Marxist will, understandably, reject that rather crude inference. However, the various excuses (and deflections) they regularly come out with to try to deny the refutation history has roundly delivered on their theory have been covered in detail in Essay Ten Part One. Readers are directed there for more details.
Now, to ordinary observers, the crazy denials and implausible claims DM-fans throw up in response resemble a little too uncomfortably the refusal by the Black Knight in Monty Python And The Holy Grail to acknowledge that any damage had been done to him. No matter which body part this joker lost he still claimed he was winning:
Video Two: Monty Python's Black Knight,
'Punching Above His Weight'?
In fact, anyone who has ever attempted to convince the DM-faithful that Dialectical Marxism has been and still is an abject, long-term failure might just as well try to convince them Karl Marx was made of cream cheese for all the progress they will make. It won't even register, so deep in the sand has the collective dialectical head been inserted.
[Of course, the obverse of this is the widely held view (and not just by ex-Marxists) that Marxism itself has been an abject failure. Those advancing that claim fail to notice that the non-dialectical version hasn't been road tested yet! So, the failure of Dialectical Marxism in no way means Marxism itself has failed, even if the latter's name has been dragged through the mud for over a century.]
A compulsion to see the world as other than it really is, is something Marxists quite rightly lay at the door of our class-enemies -- especially those who hold religious beliefs. But, it now looks like that psychological defect has come home to roost and is perched comfortably on each dialectical shoulder.
Considerations like these clearly suggested that DM might actually insulate militant minds from reality, and that this might even form part of its appeal -- the role it occupies as an 'opiate', numbing critical faculties.
Indeed, the radically perverse nature of dialectics might help convince otherwise alert revolutionaries that even if what they can see with their eyes contradicts the abstract idea -- it certainly isn't concrete! -- that Marxism has been 'tested successfully in practice', this glaring disparity can be ignored since DM also teaches that appearances 'contradict underlying reality'! In that case, the incongruity that exists between repeated claims that DM has been successfully tested in practice and the long-term failure of parties that rely on that theory/method is only to be expected if you accept this way of thinking. Just like those who hold an irrational belief in some 'god' or other, DM-fans will completely ignore contrary evidence no matter how cogent it happens to be. And, perversely, even that incongruity only serves to confirm the theory! For example, we have already seen several comrades actually appeal to Engels's First 'Law', the transformation of 'Quantity into Quality', in order to argue that when their party loses a significant number of members (after a major split or large numbers have simply decamped), that must mean its quality has improved!
In a world supposedly full of 'contradictions', what else is to be expected of those who allow DM to control their reasoning?
Hence, no material fact (no matter how obvious, blatant or damning) is allowed to count against the fixed idea that Dialectical Marxism has been, still is, and always will be, a ringing success.
Apparently, this is one belief over which the infamous Heraclitean Flux has no jurisdiction. Quite the reverse: it appears to be the only belief that remains rock solid, locked in Parmenidean stasis, year in, year out.
Any who doubt this need only consult the up-beat, hyperventilated reports that appear in most revolutionary papers and on the vast majority of 'dialectical websites' (with few notable exceptions): everything is always coming up roses. Major set-backs are quietly ignored (or each one is re-configured as a triumph in disguise); the smallest successes are hyped out of all proportion, hailed as if they were of truly cosmic significance.
Figure Two: Great Moments On The Left -- 01
So, when a dozen or so hard-boiled, leather-necked, brick-faced Bolsheviks gather together in some 'god'-forsaken hotel or pub in the suburbs, we are regaled with the glad tidings that this marks a significant advance for the 'International Proletariat'! Except, of course, no one bothered to tell all five billion of them, and the latter happily returned the complement by totally ignoring these chest-beating egocentrics. A month or so later, what do we find? That 'party of the working-class' has split, with one half expelling the other -- and, as if to rub it in, even that is hailed as a major advance for the toiling masses (as, indeed, we saw above with the IMT and Gerry Healy)!
Figure Three: Great Moments On The Left -- 02
The situation in the USA, with respect to the ISO, seems to be typical in this respect, as one comrade recently pointed out:
"And there is, finally, the question of the group's size and impact. A lot of games have been played with the categories of 'quantitative' and 'qualitative' since Convention, as if these have nothing to do with one another. In particular, while it is now basically admitted that the ISO has shrunk over the last several years, the leadership faction claims that the group's 'quality' has improved. Now it is theoretically possible for a group to decline in numbers and grow in strength -- if, for example, ten 'random' comrades quit and we recruit five people in a single important workplace, we probably would be stronger -- but the implications of what comrades are saying in the concrete context are really quite chilling. That is, it is being argued that shedding cadre is neither bad nor even neutral, but a positive good. In truth, the ISO has declined quantitatively and qualitatively since 2008, just like the international left generally. The fact that this has happened to basically everyone indicates that powerful 'objective' factors are engaged; the decline in itself is arguably not a sin. What is a sin -- always and under any circumstances -- is lying to oneself about it." [Quoted from here; accessed 03/11/2014. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site; link in the original. Paragraphs merged. Bold emphases alone added. Just how much of an 'advance' this proved to be can be seen from the fact that, as noted above, the ISO has now imploded.]
As noted earlier, the conclusions drawn above are even more revealing given the additional fact that DM was used (again, in the shape of the 'law' of the transformation of "quantity and quality") to reconfigure each serious set-back as its opposite.
[Here is another excellent example of this 'contradictory' phenomenon.]
The reader is invited to check for herself the rabid optimism that (up until recently) swept, for example, through Respect, and then Respect Renewal (the 'breakaway' party), especially here (where even the cake that was served was described as "marvellous"!) --, and this after yet another split! Three hundred or so bedraggled comrades roll up a century-and-a-half after the Communist Manifesto was published and this is something to crow about or shout from the rooftops? Of course, this fervent optimism soon melted away, replaced by fragmentation and bitter recrimination -- currently being camouflaged behind illusions in a revived Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn. [That was written in 2017; that, too, has since drifted off into the ether.]
And, what is worse: comrades still refuse to be told.
Single-celled organisms learn faster!
To be sure, not everyone involved in the above split was a DM-acolyte (even though significant sections were); once again, the class-origin and current class-position of the vast majority of those involved were key factors, for it is in this petty-bourgeois soil that sectarianism festers -- aggravated, of course, by this mystical 'theory', DM.
[Again, these phenomena have been covered in much greater detail in Essay Nine Part Two.]
A hundred-and-fifty years of mismatch between theory and observation -- of this order of magnitude -- would sink any honest theory (i.e., a scientific theory), but not DM. One consequence of this theory/method is that the message delivered to the collective dialectical brain by such events is inverted into its opposite, becoming a powerful motivating force, re-confirming the very theory that tells believers to expect just such discrepancies, just such 'contradictions'! Theorists who proudly proclaim their materialist credentials blithely ignore material reality -- since it is merely an 'appearance', or even an 'abstraction' --, while clinging to the comforting theoretical idea that everything is hunky-dory and the tide of history is still on their side, moving their way.
The fact that dialecticians almost en masse have bought into this rosy view of reality suggests that something has gone badly wrong, something is misfiring inside these dialectically-compromised craniums.
Dialectical Myopia is, alas, a movement-wide syndrome. It afflicts Maoists and Stalinists, Orthodox Trotskyists and Libertarian Communists, Non-Orthodox Trotskyists, Left Communists, 'Green' Marxists and Academic Marxists alike. In fact, the deep, sectarian divisions that have split the movement from top to bottom, from one side to the other, and for generations, unfortunately haven't succeeded in dividing opinion over the following two factors:
(i) While every tendency/party views every other party/tendency as a failure, a 'traitor to the cause' even, the members of an such judgemental tendency/party happily declare themselves to be success incarnate; and,
(ii) DM has absolutely nothing to do with what few, if any, failures Dialectical Marxists even care to acknowledge. Perish the thought...
If true, it would mean the only two things in the entire universe that aren't inter-connected are DM and the long-term failure of Dialectical Marxism!
In a world governed by topsy-turvy logic like this, fantasy is substituted for fact, reality replaced by wish-fulfilment, critical thought elbowed aside by gullibility.
The almost total, universal and long-term rejection of Dialectical Marxism by practically every section of the working-class can thus be flipped upside down so that it becomes the source of its strongest support! If workers disdain Marxism, then the theory that inverted this material fact -- transforming it into the opposite idea that workers don't really do this (since they are blinded by "false consciousness", have been 'bought-off' by imperialist super-profits, or have been transfixed by 'commodity fetishism', 'commonsense' or 'formal thinking') -- at one stroke becomes both cause and consequence of the failure of revolutionary politics to "seize the masses". That is because hard-core fantasy like this prevents its dialectical-victims from facing up to the profound problems that confront our entire movement.
After all, if there are zero problems with the core theory (DM), then, plainly, none need be addressed!
Why fix something that isn't broken?
So, the theory that helps keep Dialectical Marxism unsuccessful is the very same theory that tells those held in its thrall that the opposite is in fact the case, and that nothing need be done about it --, even as it insulates militant minds from a recalcitrant reality that tells a different story.
This means that the DM-inspired negators of material reality can now safely ignore the fact that, in return, it universally negates their theory. As a result, 'reality' has to be rotated through 180º in order to conform with the idea that whatever happens will always be a victory for 'dialectics' -- at least in the long term..., or..., er..., someday soon..., er..., anyway, the movement is..., er..., building..., anger is..., um..., growing..., er..., the crisis is..., um..., deepening... Well, things can't be that bad, we had a whopping 200 at our last World Conference, comrade! The room was rammed! The cake was marvellous!
This represents a contradiction of such prodigious proportions that only those who "understand" dialectics are capable of "grasping" it!
Ironically enough for a theory ostensively concocted by hard-nosed Bolsheviks, the Ideal now stands proudly on its feet, the material world having been unceremoniously up-ended. No wonder Lenin said he preferred 'intelligent' Idealists to 'crude' materialists:
"Intelligent idealism is closer to intelligent materialism than stupid materialism. Dialectical idealism instead of intelligent; (sic) metaphysical, undeveloped, dead, crude, rigid instead of stupid." [Lenin (1961), p.274.]
No wonder, too, that DM-theorists agree with Hegel (and Berkeley) that matter is just an "abstraction":
"If abstraction is made from every determination, from all form of anything, what is left over is indeterminate matter. Matter is a sheer abstraction. (Matter cannot be seen, felt, and so on -- what is seen, felt, is a determinate matter, that is, a unity of matter and form). This abstraction from which matter proceeds is, however, not merely an external removal and sublating of form, rather does form, as we have seen, spontaneously reduce itself to this simple identity." [Hegel (1999), pp.450-51, §979. Bold emphasis alone added. (Typos in the on-line version corrected.)]
"Matter as such is a pure creation of thought and an abstraction. We leave out of account the qualitative differences of things in lumping them together as corporeally existing things under the concept matter. Hence matter as such, as distinct from definite existing pieces of matter, is not anything sensuously existing." [Engels (1954), p.255. Bold emphases added. I have dealt with this issue in much more detail, here.]
"If abstraction is made from every determination and Form of a Something, indeterminate Matter remains. Matter is a pure abstract. (-- Matter cannot be seen or felt, etc. -- what is seen or felt is a determinate Matter, that is, a unity of Matter and Form)." [Lenin (1961), pp.144-45. Bold emphasis alone added. I have also quoted other DM-fans who say much the same as Berkeley, Hegel, Engels and Lenin in Essay Thirteen Part One. See also Note 54a, Note 56a, Note 57 and Note 65a of the same Essay for other DM-theorists who also claim matter is an 'abstraction'!]
But, if a core tenet of Idealism -- and, indeed, if anything that happens -- can be made to agree with this 'theory', if matter can be ditched quite so effortlessly, if decades of defeats, set-backs, splits and disasters count for nothing, how can it reasonably be maintained that DM is a materialist theory, or even that practice serves a test of truth? What exactly is being tested if matter and history are so easily sidelined? If DM can't fail whatever happens, why bother with this empty charade? Why call your movement materialist when you openly admit that matter is just a 'creation of the mind', an 'abstraction':
"The premises from which we begin are not arbitrary ones, not dogmas, but real premises from which abstraction can only be made in the imagination. They are the real individuals, their activity and the material conditions under which they live, both those which they find already existing and those produced by their activity. These premises can thus be verified in a purely empirical way." [Marx and Engels (1976), p.31. Bold emphasis added.]
"The mystery of critical presentation…is the mystery of speculative, of Hegelian construction.… If from real apples, pears, strawberries and almonds I form the general idea 'Fruit', if I go further and imagine that my abstract idea 'Fruit', derived from real fruit, is an entity existing outside me, is indeed the true essence of the pear, the apple, etc., then -- in the language of speculative philosophy –- I am declaring that 'Fruit' is the 'Substance' of the pear, the apple, the almond, etc. I am saying, therefore, that to be an apple is not essential to the apple; that what is essential to these things is not their real existence, perceptible to the senses, but the essence that I have abstracted from them and then foisted on them, the essence of my idea -- 'Fruit'…. Particular real fruits are no more than semblances whose true essence is 'the substance' -- 'Fruit'…. Having reduced the different real fruits to the one 'fruit' of abstraction -- 'the Fruit', speculation must, in order to attain some semblance of real content, try somehow to find its way back from 'the Fruit', from the Substance to the diverse, ordinary real fruits, the pear, the apple, the almond etc. It is as hard to produce real fruits from the abstract idea 'the Fruit' as it is easy to produce this abstract idea from real fruits. Indeed, it is impossible to arrive at the opposite of an abstraction without relinquishing the abstraction….
"The main interest for the speculative philosopher is therefore to produce the existence of the real ordinary fruits and to say in some mysterious way that there are apples, pears, almonds and raisins. But the apples, pears, almonds and raisins that we rediscover in the speculative world are nothing but semblances of apples, semblances of pears, semblances of almonds and semblances of raisins, for they are moments in the life of 'the Fruit', this abstract creation of the mind, and therefore themselves abstract creations of the mind…. When you return from the abstraction, the supernatural creation of the mind, 'the Fruit', to real natural fruits, you give on the contrary the natural fruits a supernatural significance and transform them into sheer abstractions. Your main interest is then to point out the unity of 'the Fruit' in all the manifestations of its life…that is, to show the mystical interconnection between these fruits, how in each of them 'the Fruit' realizes itself by degrees and necessarily progresses, for instance, from its existence as a raisin to its existence as an almond. Hence the value of the ordinary fruits no longer consists in their natural qualities, but in their speculative quality, which gives each of them a definite place in the life-process of 'the Absolute Fruit'.
"The ordinary man does not think he is saying anything extraordinary when he states that there are apples and pears. But when the philosopher expresses their existence in the speculative way he says something extraordinary. He performs a miracle by producing the real natural objects, the apple, the pear, etc., out of the unreal creation of the mind 'the Fruit'…. It goes without saying that the speculative philosopher accomplishes this continuous creation only by presenting universally known qualities of the apple, the pear, etc., which exist in reality, as determining features invented by him, by giving the names of the real things to what abstract reason alone can create, to abstract formulas of reason, finally, by declaring his own activity, by which he passes from the idea of an apple to the idea of a pear, to be the self-activity of the Absolute Subject, 'the Fruit.' In the speculative way of speaking, this operation is called comprehending Substance as Subject, as an inner process, as an Absolute Person, and this comprehension constitutes the essential character of Hegel's method." [Marx and Engels (1975), pp.72-75. Bold emphases alone added. Several paragraphs merged.]
"It seems to be correct to begin with the real and the concrete, with the real precondition, thus to begin, in economics, with e.g. the population, which is the foundation and the subject of the entire social act of production. However, on closer examination this proves false. The population is an abstraction if I leave out, for example, the classes of which it is composed. These classes in turn are an empty phrase if I am not familiar with the elements on which they rest. E.g. wage labour, capital, etc. These latter in turn presuppose exchange, division of labour, prices, etc. For example, capital is nothing without wage labour, without value, money, price etc. Thus, if I were to begin with the population, this would be a chaotic conception of the whole, and I would then, by means of further determination, move analytically towards ever more simple concepts, from the imagined concrete towards ever thinner abstractions until I had arrived at the simplest determinations. From there the journey would have to be retraced until I had finally arrived at the population again, but this time not as the chaotic conception of a whole, but as a rich totality of many determinations and relations. The former is the path historically followed by economics at the time of its origins. The economists of the seventeenth century, e.g., always begin with the living whole, with population, nation, state, several states, etc.; but they always conclude by discovering through analysis a small number of determinant, abstract, general relations such as division of labour, money, value, etc. As soon as these individual moments had been more or less firmly established and abstracted, there began the economic systems, which ascended from the simple relations, such as labour, division of labour, need, exchange value, to the level of the state, exchange between nations and the world market. The latter is obviously the scientifically correct method. The concrete is concrete because it is the concentration of many determinations, hence unity of the diverse. It appears in the process of thinking, therefore, as a process of concentration, as a result, not as a point of departure, even though it is the point of departure in reality and hence also the point of departure for observation and conception. Along the first path the full conception was evaporated to yield an abstract determination; along the second, the abstract determinations lead towards a reproduction of the concrete by way of thought. In this way Hegel fell into the illusion of conceiving the real as the product of thought concentrating itself, probing its own depths, and unfolding itself out of itself, by itself, whereas the method of rising from the abstract to the concrete is only the way in which thought appropriates the concrete, reproduces it as the concrete in the mind. But this is by no means the process by which the concrete itself comes into being. For example, the simplest economic category, say e.g. exchange value, presupposes population, moreover a population producing in specific relations; as well as a certain kind of family, or commune, or state, etc. It can never exist other than as an abstract, one-sided relation within an already given, concrete, living whole. As a category, by contrast, exchange value leads an antediluvian existence. Therefore, to the kind of consciousness -- and this is characteristic of the philosophical consciousness -- for which conceptual thinking is the real human being, and for which the conceptual world as such is thus the only reality, the movement of the categories appears as the real act of production -- which only, unfortunately, receives a jolt from the outside -- whose product is the world; and -- but this is again a tautology -- this is correct in so far as the concrete totality is a totality of thoughts, concrete in thought, in fact a product of thinking and comprehending; but not in any way a product of the concept which thinks and generates itself outside or above observation and conception; a product, rather, of the working-up of observation and conception into concepts. The totality as it appears in the head, as a totality of thoughts, is a product of a thinking head, which appropriates the world in the only way it can, a way different from the artistic, religious, practical and mental appropriation of this world. The real subject retains its autonomous existence outside the head just as before; namely as long as the head's conduct is merely speculative, merely theoretical. Hence, in the theoretical method, too, the subject, society, must always be kept in mind as the presupposition." [Marx (1986), pp.37-39. Bold emphases alone added. The on-line translation has been quoted here -- i.e., Marx (1973) -- while the page numbers are those found in the MECW edition -- i.e., Marx (1986) -- which translates the above words slightly differently but in a way that still makes the same points. I have linked to both versions so readers can check this for themselves. Paragraphs merged.]
"The approach of the (human) mind to a particular thing, the taking of a copy (= a concept) of it is not a simple, immediate act, a dead mirroring, but one which is complex, split into two, zig-zag-like, which includes in it the possibility of the flight of fantasy from life; more than that: the possibility of the transformation (moreover, an unnoticeable transformation, of which man is unaware) of the abstract concept, idea, into a fantasy.... For even in the simplest generalisation, in the most elementary general idea ('table' in general), there is a certain bit of fantasy. (Vice versa: it would be stupid to deny the role of fantasy, even in the strictest science...." [Lenin (1961), pp.370-71. All but one instance of bold emphasis added. Italics in the original. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site.]
"Thought proceeding from the concrete to the abstract -- provided it is correct (NB)… -- does not get away from the truth but comes closer to it. The abstraction of matter, the law of nature, the abstraction of value, etc., in short all scientific (correct, serious, not absurd) abstractions reflect nature more deeply, truly and completely. From living perception to abstract thought, and from this to practice, -- such is the dialectical path of cognition of truth, of the cognition of objective reality." [Ibid., p.171. Bold emphases alone added.]
While Lenin might claim that these 'abstractions' "reflect nature", they are still abstractions, 'creations of the mind' -- a result with which few Idealists would disagree. What these 'abstractions' actually correspond with in the physical world is still a mystery, and one that Lenin consistently failed to explain. [On this, see here. Other DM-theorists who say the same have been quoted here.]
In relation to practice, the short answer to many of the above questions is, of course, that practice has never been used to test the truth of DM -- despite what the official 'dialectical-brochure' might try to tell us. Had it been, there would be no DM-supporters left to question that impertinent allegation, since they would have seen Dialectical Marxism for what it is, failure writ large, refuting a theory writ small, and decamped long ago.
If one hundred-and-fifty years of defeat, retreat, disaster and debacle are anything to go by, we can safely conclude one or more of the following:
(a) If practice is a criterion of truth, Dialectical Marxism stands refuted;
(b) If practice is a criterion of truth, it hasn't yet been applied to Dialectical Marxism itself; or,
(c) Practice isn't a reliable test of truth.
Should allegations like these ever drift anywhere near the truth it would seem reasonable to conclude that an adherence to DM possesses other noxious implications and side-effects, which its adherents might prefer to ignore, or which they can be expected to try to invert in like manner. In that case, perhaps this theory has helped intensify or even magnify the following (obnoxious) 'dialectical-traits':
(i) Mean-spirited intolerance and small-minded disdain shown by members of one party/group toward those of practically all others in the revolutionary movement;
(ii) Sectarian in-fighting focussed around minor theoretical differences in the interpretation of this or that vanishingly small 'dialectical thesis';
(iii) Personality cults;
(iv) Substitutionist tendencies exhibited by almost all 'professional' revolutionaries;
(v) The anti-democratic promulgation of dogmatic theories concocted by cabal-like Central Committees or guru-esque 'leaders';
(vi) The casuistical rationalisation of hierarchical and dictatorial internal party structures;
(vii) Inconsistent tactical manoeuvres based on the adoption of openly contradictory 'principles', flipped to their opposites overnight at opportune moments;
(viii) The megalomaniacal idea that a handful of militants gathered together in, say, a tiny flat in Camden, are authorised to issue demands on behalf of the "International Proletariat";
(ix) An irrational devotion to quasi-mystical ideas -- involving, among other things:
(a) A belief in the 'infinite';
(b) A commitment to the idea that nature is a unified whole where everything is inter-connected; and,
(c) The brazenly animistic doctrine that the universe is involved in what can only be described as an endless 'argument' with itself -- evidenced by the alleged fact that there exist real "contradictions" in nature and society --; and, finally,
(x) The tendency practically all dialecticians have for quoting (or paraphrasing) Holy Writ in answer to any and all objections -- and this from comrades who are otherwise proud of their independence of mind!
In what follows at this site, all of these can and will be attributed in part or whole to (i) an acceptance of the 'dialectic', and (ii) the class position or class origin of the DM-classicists and subsequent leaders of the movement. The ubiquity and prevalence of such faults and foibles is hardly surprising given the fact that the philosophical principles underlying DM (upside down or 'the right way up') can be traced back to the ideas and opinions of ancient and early modern Mystics, whose theories both mirrored and expressed well-entrenched ruling-class priorities and forms-of-thought.
However, at this point it is worth adding the following remarks (taken from here):
It is important to emphasise that the following isn't my argument:
"Dialectical Marxism has failed, therefore DM is false."
It is this:
"DM is far too vague and confused for anyone to be able to decide whether or not it is true, so no wonder it has failed us for so long."
I certainly don't believe that truth is tested in practice -- why that is so is explained in detail in Essay Ten Part One, but more briefly below....
Once more: I not blaming all our problems on this theory!
Nevertheless, as I also argue below, it must take some of the blame.
[The above remarks have been and will be substantiated in the following Essays: Nine Parts One and Two, Twelve Parts Two and Three, and Fourteen Part One -- summaries here, here and here -- I have linked to summaries since the latter three Essays haven't been published yet.]
The unity, self-discipline and grass-roots democracy that the class war progressively imposes on workers stands in stark contrast to the petty sectarian divisiveness found in all known revolutionary parties. Amazingly, comrades can still be found who will argue that on the one hand workers must organise collectively to defend themselves, while on the other they will tell anyone who will listen that voting to expel this or that faction from that or this party will "historically" advance the cause of the working class!
Yet another 'unity of opposites' for bemused readers to ponder.
The fact that dialecticians can't even see the incongruity here speaks volumes in itself. Of course, such splits are often driven by an almost obsessive desire to maintain 'doctrinal purity', which, of course, implicates dialectics all the more. It is only because the DM-classics are generally treated as Holy Writ that the notion of 'doctrinal purity' makes any sense. Indeed, just like the Bible, the fathomless obscurity of Hegel's Logic works admirably well in this regard, too. Of course, that syndrome has been further compounded by the growth of an entire corpus of highly repetitive, 'lesser' DM-clones that feed off the Mystical Motherlode like hungry piglets around a sow:
Video Three: Feeding Time On
Planet Dialectics?
The number of 'DM-videos' on YouTube that attempt to reveal the fundamental secrets of the universe in less than ten minutes(!) has increase alarmingly over the last fifteen years -- practically all of them saying more-or-less the same, while none of them even mention, let alone tackle, the profound problems their theory/method faces.
[That is no longer strictly true. A rather confused Marxist-Leninist posted two highly repetitive and barely coherent videos that made a rather weak attempt to reply to parts of the Basic Introductory Essay to this site; both failed miserably, as I have shown in detail, here -- where a link to those videos can be accessed.]
The class origin of professional and semi-professional revolutionaries -- coupled with the ideologically-compromised theory they have appropriated -- certainly helps account for the radical mis-match between the political and economic interests of the working-class and the irrelevant philosophical ideas spouted by these self-appointed 'class-warriors' -- erstwhile 'tribunes' of the people. In fact, many Dialectical Marxists have lost touch with the working class, organisationally and ideologically -- indeed, as Noam Chomsky pointed out:
"A final point, something I've written about elsewhere.... There has been a striking change in the behaviour of the intellectual class in recent years. The left intellectuals who 60 years ago would have been teaching in working class schools, writing books like 'mathematics for the millions' (which made mathematics intelligible to millions of people), participating in and speaking for popular organizations, etc., are now largely disengaged from such activities, and although quick to tell us that they are far more radical than thou, are not to be found, it seems, when there is such an obvious and growing need and even explicit request for the work they could do out there in the world of people with live problems and concerns. That's not a small problem. This country, right now, is in a very strange and ominous state. People are frightened, angry, disillusioned, sceptical, confused. That's an organizer's dream, as I once heard Mike say. It's also fertile ground for demagogues and fanatics, who can (and in fact already do) rally substantial popular support with messages that are not unfamiliar from their predecessors in somewhat similar circumstances. We know where it has led in the past; it could again. There's a huge gap that once was at least partially filled by left intellectuals willing to engage with the general public and their problems. It has ominous implications, in my opinion...." [Quoted from here. Spelling adjusted to agree with UK English, formatting and quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Bold emphases added. I have re-posted the entire passage, here.]
The differential effect on workers and revolutionaries of the above factors is instructive in itself: while the class war forces workers to combine, it drives revolutionaries apart.
It has also alienated Marxist 'intellectuals' from the proletariat, who now speak a totally different language.
[For more on this specific point, see Essay Nine Part Two, here and here.]
This rather odd state-of-affairs needs explaining -- and it has been, once again: in the above two Essays.
As a result of the action of well-known economic and social forces, working people have had to unite to defend their livelihood and working conditions, maybe the fragmentation witnessed in our 'movement' can be explained as the result of other, less well-appreciated social and ideological forces -- those inherent perhaps in the class origin and current class position of leading revolutionaries. As Marx noted:
"It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness."
"Social being" might very well 'determine' the ideological predilections of leading Marxists, none of whom were beamed down to this planet fully-formed, DM-pre-installed. As members of the human race, dialecticians are surely not above the material pressures that shape the rest of us. But it wouldn't be possible to draw that conclusion (solely) by examining the inflated view they have of themselves. As far as they are concerned, social forces have completely by-passed the formation of their ideas.
[The accusation that this is just "crude reductionism" has been neutralised here.]
The only other alternative is: it must be a sheer coincidence that leading Dialectical Marxists (and many DM-fans) share most of their core ideas and attitudes with practically every mystic who has ever walked the earth --, who, as bad luck would have it, also occupied analogous class positions and hence had a commensurate need for some form of consolation. It must also be entirely 'coincidental' that Dialectical Marxism shares with all known mystical belief-systems the same propensity to fragment and split into competing sects.
Is it beyond the realms of possibility that the historical forces -- which originally helped shape class society and which also gave birth to the ideas of those who still benefit from class division --, have played their own part this glaring antinomy?
To those who disagree with the above and who perhaps reject it out-of-hand need go no further.
I have no desire to wake you from your dogmatic slumber.
The rest of my readers should consider this possibility: if it can be shown that DM was derived from, and belongs to, an ancient, well-entrenched, divisive philosophical tradition, which developed alongside and was nurtured by class conflict (as indeed it can be shown), that might help explain why Dialectical Marxism has witnessed little other than fragmentation, sectarian division and unremitting failure almost from its inception. If DM is indeed part of a theoretical tradition that owes its life to ruling-class patterns-of-thought, and its leading figures and theorists came from the same class (i.e., were/are all petty bourgeois or déclassé), its tendency to foment, and then exacerbate, division and discord will have a materialist explanation.
As I have explained elsewhere:
This ancient tradition taught that behind appearances there lies a hidden world -- populated by the 'gods', assorted 'spirits' and mysterious 'essences' -- a 'world' that is more real than the material universe we see around us, accessible to thought alone. Theology was openly and brazenly built on this premise; so, too, was Traditional Philosophy.
This way of viewing the world was
concocted by ruling-class ideologues. These "prize-fighters" (as
Marx called them) ensured that the
majority were educated, or, rather, were indoctrinated so that they saw things the same way.
These
ideologues invented this 'world-view' because if you belong to,
benefit from, or help run a society that is based on gross inequality,
oppression and exploitation, you can keep order in a number of ways.
The first and most obvious is through violence. This will work for a time,
but it is not only fraught with danger, it is costly and it stifles innovation
(among other things).
Another is to persuade the majority (or a significant section of
'opinion formers'/'influencers' -- philosophers, administrators, editors,
clergymen, educators,
'intellectuals', and these days 'bloggers', etc.)
that the present order either (a) works for their benefit, (b) is ordained of the
'gods', (c) defends 'civilised values', or (d) is 'natural' and hence cannot be fought
against, reformed or negotiated
with.
These theories were then imposed on reality -- plainly, since they can't be read from it.
Hence, a 'world-view' is necessary for the ruling-class to carry on ruling "in the same old way". While the content of this ruling ideology might have altered with each change in the mode of production, its form has remained largely the same for thousands of years: Ultimate Truth is ascertainable by thought alone and can therefore be dogmatically imposed on reality.
So, the non-worker founders of our movement -- who had been educated from an early age to believe there was just such a 'hidden world' lying behind 'appearances' and which governed everything in existence -- when they became revolutionaries automatically looked for 'logical' principles relating to this 'abstract world' that now told them that change and development were inevitable, part of the cosmic order. Enter 'dialectics', courtesy of the dogmatic ideas of that ruling-class mystic, Hegel. Hence, the dialectical classicists latched onto this theory, which they were already predisposed to accept and then impose on the world (upside down or the "right way up"), because of their socialisation it seemed quite natural for them to do so. After all that is how 'genuine' philosophers have always behaved -- or so they had been led to believe.
Indeed, we find an echo of this idea in the Communist Manifesto:
"[O]ne fact is common to all past ages, viz., the exploitation of one part of society by the other. No wonder, then, that the social consciousness of past ages, despite all the multiplicity and variety it displays, moves within certain common forms, or general ideas, which cannot completely vanish except with the total disappearance of class antagonisms. The Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional property relations; no wonder that its development involved the most radical rupture with traditional ideas." [Marx and Engels (1848), p.52. Bold emphases added.]
As well as this famous passage:
"The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance. The individuals composing the ruling class possess among other things consciousness, and therefore think. Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch...." [Marx and Engels (1970), pp.64-65, quoted from here. Bold emphases added.]
The ruling elite and their ideological 'prize fighters' have sculptured a long-established, deep rooted tradition that protects and promotes their interests. The founders of DM had these ideas forced down their throats even before they went to school; it was part of their religious indoctrination, which every single one of them in their class had to endure. All they did when they became revolutionaries was throw away the religious outer husk and -- thanks to that Christian Mystic, Hegel -- re-cast this ruling-class tradition with a thin veneer of 'dialectical language' (papering over the distortion they thereby inflicted even on Hegel's system itself). For them, the hidden world of 'essences' remained more real than the material world we see around us, a hidden, 'abstract' world accessed by thought alone. That helps account for the dogmatic, a priori nature of DM. After all, why would truths about a world we can all access need to be imposed, in the first place? [On that, see Essay Two.]
Is this not the political, social, historical and ideological source of the deeply engrained sectarian and substitutionist thinking in our movement?
It certainly is.
Even better -- it is possible to show it is.
It thus became clear to me that if these 'less than comradely vices' were to be eliminated from our movement, revolutionaries must abandon DM.
Of course, as noted earlier, this isn't to suggest that DM is the only reason for the legendary failure of Marxist ideas to "seize the masses", but it certainly helps explain not just why revolutionary parties tend to be embarrassingly small but also why they are steadfastly suspicious (if not neurotically paranoid), religiously sectarian, routinely authoritarian, studiously insular, worryingly substitutionist, profoundly unreasonable, consistently inconsistent and monumentally unsuccessful.
On the contrary, had such 'vices' led to success, that would need explaining!
A supporter of this site raised several of the above issues at a national gathering of the UK-SWP in London in July 1990; the reception he received from one large meeting suggested two things -- that:
(i) There were more than a few comrades in and around the Party (at that time) who thought like him, but had no real focus for their views; and,
(ii) The party leadership would resist any attempt to challenge their commitment to the Sacred Dialectic.
For personal (not political) reasons I let my membership of the Party lapse in the early 1990s, and, although I have been active around several issues since then (for example, in connection with the massive demonstrations in support of the NUM in the early 1990s and those in opposition to US/UK/Israeli aggression in Iraq, Afghanistan, Gaza, and Lebanon between 2003-14), my links with the UK-SWP have since been merely formal.
It is worth noting that I still have no theoretical differences with this party -- i.e., other than those involving an acceptance of 'dialectics' and their indefensible stance on women's rights. Hence, it is now important to add that the 'deal-breaking' problem I have with the UK-SWP centres on their disastrous handling of recent rape allegations. As I noted earlier:
Even though I left the UK-SWP in the early 1990s, I continued to identify with it politically until at least 2012. The self-inflicted crisis that engulfed the party later that year -- concerning the cover up of serious allegations of rape levelled against a leading member... -- meant that I could no longer associate myself with that party, at any level.
Nevertheless, in 1998 John Rees published TAR. This awoke me from my non-dogmatic slumbers and prompted me into writing a detailed response, since, for me, this book symbolised much that was wrong with Marxist Philosophy. Despite its obvious strengths (not the least of which is its clear and unambiguous commitment to the revolutionary transformation of society by its working population), TAR is a stark reminder that the very best of socialists can have their thinking seriously clouded by this Dialectical Mist.
And yet TAR isn't the worst offender in this regard; in fact, it is an unorthodox DM-text! 'Orthodox dialecticians' will, I am sure, abhor it. They will accuse it of this or that heinous crime against 'the dialectic': that it is a "revisionist" tract; that it is too "concrete"; that it isn't "concrete" enough; that it is too "abstract"; that it isn't "abstract" enough; that it underplays theoretical issues and is thereby superficial (I have already seen that one on the Internet -- but, see below); that it is too theoretical; that it takes a "subjectivist" view of this or that; that it takes an "objectivist" view of that or this; that it is "eclectic"; that it isn't "all-rounded", and is too "one-sided"; that it is the work of a "sophist"; that it has been hobbled by "formalism"; that it isn't "formal" enough; that it is far too "empiricist"; that it isn't empirical enough; that it is a "rehash" (this is a popular word among the DM-faithful) of such and such, or of so and so; that it is little more than "warmed-over" (another popular dialectical buzzword) reformism, or X-,Y-, or Z-ism; that it is Idealist or even "elitist"; that it is "positivist"; that it ignores "materialist dialectics"(!); that it fails to consider "systematic dialectics"; that it is "workerist"; that it forgets that "matter precedes motion" (or is it the other way round?), etc., etc....
Indeed as Paul LeBlanc points out:
"It is truly unfortunate that -- far from being widely recognized as the valuable contribution it is -- this book has had little publicity in Marxist and left-wing journals. Perhaps Rees's involvement in the British Socialist Workers Party is seen as sufficient reason by some for ignoring him, but this is hardly a narrow 'party' tract. It is a book of enduring value. One of the few reviews to appear so far, in the important Marxist journal Historical Materialism, distorts what Rees says in order to make him look foolish and dismiss his work. The reviewer (who is capable of much better) counts among the author's 'sins' the fact that he finds important philosophical contributions in the work of Frederick Engels, Rosa Luxemburg, V.I. Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Georg Lukacs -- and that Rees is critical of one of the reviewer's favourite thinkers, the late Raya Dunayevskaya, who engaged in interesting Hegel and Marx scholarship and headed a still-existing 'Marxist-Humanist' current. Rees makes positive reference to her work but criticizes what he sees as her attempt 'to more or less apply Hegel's categories to the modern world' in a manner that results in an over-abundance of 'abstract generalization' (p.108). In his opinion, Hegel's version of dialectics is vitally important, but also fundamentally flawed; his method had to be re-worked to be effectively utilized by Marx and others to advance revolutionary analysis and struggle. Some might respond that he is too critical of Hegel, while others might complain that he gives the German philosopher too much credit." [Quoted from here, accessed 30/11/2017. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Spelling modified to agree with UK English; paragraphs merged.]
In fact, TAR will be dismissed simply because that is how the 'orthodox' respond to practically everything they themselves haven't written.
[Since the above comment by comrade LeBlanc was posted on-line, it is now even clearer that Rees's book has been almost totally ignored by the 'orthodox defenders of the faith', contrary to my prediction that it would be heavily criticised. Damned not by faint praise, but by being completely ignored -- rather like my work, too (but for different reasons!).]
Sectarianism like this has blighted all known religions, but reproducing that noxious defect within its ranks has done Dialectical Marxism few favours. Revolutionaries can't tap into the religious alienation that guarantees the oppressed will often turn to Bishops, Priests and Imams for 'illumination', guidance, and consolation.
Nevertheless, this universally sectarian character defect (displayed by most dialectically-distracted comrades, and, indeed, parties), suggests that as far as party size is concerned, small isn't just beautiful, it is as inevitable as it is desirable.
After all, the smaller the party the easier it is to control.
Hence, despite all the effort that has gone into "building the party" on the Trotskyist left over the last seventy or eighty years, for instance, few such parties can boast membership rolls that rise much above the risible. None of them has ever "seized the masses". On the Communist or Stalinist 'left', this has also been the case, at least for the last fifty or sixty years. Nor, of late, has either wing of Dialectical Marxism (Trotskyist or Communist) even looked like they are about to lightly hug the working class, never mind seize it. In fact, for several generations the relationship with the class has been more like an almost totally ignored/rejected light tap on the shoulder.
But, hey, why change an unsuccessful strategy or failed theory?
Why indeed would anyone who accepts the idea that reality is in the grip of a universal flux want to do anything as crazy as change a single thing?
Universal Change Meets Dialectical Stasis
Change!? That close to home? Are you mad?! Have you been hit around the head?!
Ironically, once again, it seems that this is one abstract principle (i.e., lack of change) to which the 'Orthodox' fondly adhere and stoutly defend.
But, dialecticians are supposed to be inconsistent; it's in their DNA. If DM-fans still hope to act in ways consistent with their belief in 'universal contradiction', they will continue to preach unity while practicing division.
Indeed, we can expect them to continue sanctifying this failed strategy, employing of a battery of familiar-sounding, shop-worn rationalisations -- such as, it represents a defence of 'orthodoxy', 'tradition', doctrinal 'purity', and repudiates 'Revisionism' -- even though Lenin argued that all scientific theories need constant revision!
"Dialectical materialism insists on the approximate, relative character of every scientific theory of the structure of matter and its properties; it insists on the absence of absolute boundaries in nature, on the transformation of moving matter from one state into another." [Lenin (1972), p.312. Bold emphasis added.]
Trotsky concurred:
"Dialectic materialism is not of course an eternal and immutable philosophy. To think otherwise is to contradict the spirit of the dialectic. Further development of scientific thought will undoubtedly create a more profound doctrine into which dialectic materialism will enter merely as structural material." [Trotsky (1971), pp.96-97. Bold emphasis added.]
Which idea was underlined by Engels himself:
"Just as the bourgeoisie by large-scale industry, competition, and the world market dissolves in practice all stable time-honoured institutions, so this dialectical philosophy dissolves all conceptions of final, absolute truth and of absolute states of humanity corresponding to it. For it [dialectical philosophy], nothing is final, absolute, sacred. It reveals the transitory character of everything and in everything; nothing can endure before it except the uninterrupted process of becoming and of passing away, of endless ascendancy from the lower to the higher. And dialectical philosophy itself is nothing more than the mere reflection of this process in the thinking brain. It has, of course, also a conservative side; it recognizes that definite stages of knowledge and society are justified for their time and circumstances; but only so far. The conservatism of this mode of outlook is relative; its revolutionary character is absolute -- the only absolute dialectical philosophy admits." [Engels (1968), p.588. Bold emphasis added; spelling modified to agree with UK English.]
Given the approach adopted by contemporary defenders of 'the sacred flame', the above would, of course, mean that Engels, Lenin and Trotsky were -- Shock! Horror! -- 'Revisionists!'
Dialectical Marxists have yet to take the above quoted words seriously -- except, of course, they apply them to everything but their own theory and their own behaviour!
It could be countered that Lenin also said this:
"To analyse Machism and at the same time to ignore this connection -- as Plekhanov does -- is to scoff at the spirit of dialectical materialism, i.e., to sacrifice the method of Engels to the letter of Engels. Engels says explicitly that 'with each epoch making discovery even in the sphere of natural science ["not to speak of the history of mankind"], materialism has to change its form'.... Hence, a revision of the 'form' of Engels' materialism, a revision of his natural-philosophical propositions is not only not 'revisionism,' in the accepted meaning of the term, but, on the contrary, is demanded by Marxism. We criticise the Machians not for making such a revision, but for their purely revisionist trick of betraying the essence of materialism under the guise of criticising its form and of adopting the fundamental precepts of reactionary bourgeois philosophy without making the slightest attempt to deal directly, frankly and definitely with assertions of Engels' which are unquestionably extremely important to the given question, as, for example, his assertion that '...motion without matter is unthinkable'." [Lenin (1972), pp.299-300. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Italic emphases in the original.]
That clearly represents Lenin's attempt to draw a limit on what can and what can't be criticised, which must mean that Marxism, as he elsewhere described it, can't be a science!
However, if Marxism (in the shape of HM) is to provide the ideas, strategy and organisation necessary for a successful working-class revolution (as I believe it can), and if I am right about the negative impact DM has had on our movement, then the future of the human race partly depends on just this theoretical struggle.
That is how important this issue is.
We have no choice -- we can't allow DM to stand for Dead Marxism.
[I have returned to this topic again, below.]
Comrades, you have nothing to lose but your small and steadily shrinking pond!
Some might wonder how I can possibly claim to be both a Leninist and a Trotskyist given the highly critical things I have to say about the philosophical ideas that have formed an integral part of those two revolutionary traditions from their inception. An analogy might help allay that concern: we can surely be highly critical of Newton's mystical ideas even while accepting the scientific status of his other work. The same applies here.
[And no, I am not comparing myself to Newton!]
I count myself as a Marxist, a Leninist and a Trotskyist since I fully accept, not just HM (providing Hegel's influence has been completely excised), but the political ideas and practice associated with the life, work and revolutionary activity of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Luxemburg, and Trotsky.
Some might argue that a rejection of DM automatically disqualifies anyone from being a Marxist, but that would be the case only if Marxism were a religion of some sort, where dialectics becomes an unquestioned and unquestionable dogma.
Nevertheless, in the Essays posted at this site I have mainly focused on key ideas promoted by Dialectical Marxists, among which are the following: the DM-theory of knowledge, the profligate use of, and ubiquitous reference to, 'the process of abstraction' (and its supposed results), the idea that truth is "tested in practice", the nebulous Totality (alongside the obscure idea that everything is 'inter-connected'), the "mediated" relation between whole and part, universal flux, 'determinism' versus 'freedom', the three so-called "Laws of Dialectics" ("the transformation of quantity into quality", the "interpenetration of opposites" (involving "change through internal contradiction"), the "negation of the negation"), the (alleged) relation between opposing forces and 'contradictions', the 'contradictory' nature of motion, Lenin and the status of matter, the supposed limitations of Formal Logic and the 'Law of Identity', the relation between DM and change.
In addition, I have also examined the class-compromised origin of the ideas dialecticians have imported into Marxism -- alongside issues connected with the damaging affect this has had on our movement almost from the beginning, and why workers will always ignore this vague and confused theory. I also analyse the nature of science, language, cognition, and 'mind', as well as Hegel's egregious logical and philosophical blunders (in so far as they impact on other issues under scrutiny at this site).
Nothing To See Here -- Move On!
However, one of the first major problems that confronts any aspiring critic is that it is virtually impossible to determine what the above DM-theories actually amount to, especially if reliance is placed solely on what dialecticians themselves have had to say about them. That isn't because little has been written on these topics -- far from it, the opposite is in fact the case --, it is because what has been published is hopelessly vague, mind-numbingly repetitive, alarmingly superficial, profoundly confused, if not totally incomprehensible (as this series of Essays will amply demonstrate).
This has meant that in every single case it has been necessary for me to attempt to clarify key aspects of DM before criticism can even begin! Of course, in endeavouring to do just that I am acutely aware that I might very well have misrepresented this or that DM-thesis --, or, indeed, every single one of them! If that is the case, then any DM-supporters reading this (and/or my other Essays), who conclude that my attempt to rephrase or clarify their theory is unsatisfactory (or perhaps worse!), are invited to contact me, correcting any errors they think they have found, and say clearly -- for the first time ever -- what their core ideas actually amount to and what they really mean. Over the last forty years I have genuinely struggled long and hard to that end -- and in extensive detail since at least 1998, when this project began -- as these Essays will confirm.
However, even though I have studied logic and philosophy to PhD level, and have a mathematics degree, I still can't make any sense of DM.
Unfortunately, there is little prospect that the above DM-clarification will ever happen -- that is, if it is left to Dialectical Marxists themselves to undertake it.
That is so for at least two reasons:
(1) Dialectical Marxists appear to be incapable of even entertaining -- for one second -- the idea that there might possibly be anything remotely wrong with their core theory, DM. In fact, what I alleged above (i.e., that it is impossible to determine with any clarity what this theory/method actually amounts to) will itself be met with total incredulity (indeed, as it did, for example, here), followed by knee-jerk rejection and aggressive hostility (mainly from those who openly refuse to read a single one of my Essays!). However, anyone who examines the material published at this site will soon see why I have (correctly) described DM in the above way.
There are several reasons for such Parmenidean, dialectical complacency ("Parmenidean" in the sense that DM-theories never change -- nor do its supporters), which have been examined in detail in Essay Nine Part Two. But, whatever its cause, this closed-minded stance seriously affects the way that criticisms are already handled by the faithful. Invariably, detractors are labelled as 'enemies of Marxism'; they are misrepresented, misquoted, ridiculed or abused, their motives questioned, with spurious allegations concocted in order to character assassinate each of them. [On that, see here and here. A recent (January 2014) example can be found here (in the comments section).] Disconfirming facts, contrary argument and evidence are invariably ignored. Either that, or critics (like me) are dismissed as latter-day reincarnations of Peter Struve, Max Eastman or James Burnham (which is, of course, the dialectical equivalent of guilt by association).01
Dark warnings are then issued concerning the dire consequences facing those who even so much as question Holy Dialectical Writ (indeed, John Rees blocked me on Twitter for doing just that!) --, along the lines that such foolishness will lead anyone who ignores this advice away from 'the true faith' -- with the names James Burnham and Max Eastman once again thrown into the mix, who now function as bogeymen.
Fear isn't a tactic employed solely by Conservatives.
Of course, fellow Trotskyists who argue along these lines forget that far more of those they themselves count as counter-revolutionaries actually accept DM than those they count as fellow revolutionaries -- namely, the Stalinists and the Maoists. [The latter, of course, will just have to ignore that comment! Except, perhaps, they can apply the same point in reverse to us Trotskyists!] Just as one and all will fail to notice that Plekhanov, a DM-theorist par excellence, was a Menshevik (as were both of the Axelrods); even Max Shachtman was a dialectician after he split with Trotsky. And, Gramsci wasn't an avid supporter of any attempt to apply dialectics to nature.
Hence, there turn out to be far more counter-revolutionary-, than there are revolutionary-, fans-DM.
Moreover, in universities and colleges, Systematic Dialectics and Academic Marxism are surely the source of much that is non-revolutionary in Marxism. [While those particular strains of Dialectical Marxism are vastly more sophisticated than much else that passes for coherent thought in this overall tradition, they are nevertheless completely useless, distant cousins of the hardy perennial known as 'revolutionary dialectics'.] In which case, that particular subspecies of 'dialectics' is already non-revolutionary.
[The above link leads to an automatically downloadable RTF document.]
This is also quite apart from the fact that countless thousands have been repelled by Dialectical Marxism because of its many foul-ups and disasters, like those highlighted here.
Hence, and contrary to what many DM-fans would have us believe, an acceptance of 'the dialectic' isn't surgically-attached to an unshakable commitment to revolutionary politics, nor is it connected with successful revolutionary practice -- and, surprising though this might seem to many, that includes the October 1917 Revolution. Indeed, since Dialectical Marxism has itself been a long-term stranger-to-success, and has played a part in more than its fair share of failed revolutions and monumental screw-ups, not only are its adherents in no position to point fingers, they have no legitimate fingers to point!
[Despite this, dialectically-distracted comrades will be the very last to process and accept the above points, so we are highly likely to witness the same ignorant, knee-jerk dismissal of these Essays from such benighted comrades -- i.e., the allegation that anyone reading these Essays is in mortal danger of being hoodwinked and led astray!]
This tactic is standard practice; one could even call it a cliché. A perusal of Internet sites where I have 'debated' DM with assorted dialecticians, from all wings of Marxism, will amply confirm that apparently cynical indictment. [I have listed most of them here.]
One reason for this knee-jerk response is the assumption that because DM is unassailably true (despite Lenin having said that no theory is final and complete), criticism of it can only arise from the suspect ideological or political motives -- or, indeed, the personal failings -- of its opponents. Which is why, when I have debated this with dialecticians, almost all of them focus on me, not my arguments.
As Tony Collins noted (but not in connection with DM):
"The problem is, there is a certain way of seeing any discussion of the far-left that's started by someone who isn't a part of it. He must by definition be an enemy and we must therefore believe he's trying to destroy the left.... That's what happens on the far-left. We sort of have these instinctive reactions. You can see glimpses of this all over the net right now, with SWP members openly attacking each other, something I've not seen ever. There's a cult-like hatred of people who used to be allies." [Quoted from here; accessed 14/01/2013. Bold emphases added; paragraphs merged.]
The same can be said with equal force and validity about the reception of the ideas of those of us on the far-left who criticise DM.
Thus, if detractors are branded from the start as insincere or duplicitous (even if there is no evidence to suggest they are), or maybe even that they are surreptitious enemies of Marxism --, or are possibly cops in disguise (I have been accused of that several times!) --, then its 'open season', which means they can be misrepresented, vilified, abused and then totally ignored. Naturally, this is about as sensible as ignoring the first signs of cancer, or attacking anyone who diagnoses its presence and warns of its consequences. We might even call this the Fauci-ification of anti-dialectics.
Unquestionably, these particular theoretical waters have been well-and-truly muddied by the detritus stirred up by ideological currents openly hostile to revolutionary socialism. Marxists are right to be wary of the underhand tactics employed by the class enemy. However, this reactive stance means revolutionaries are repeatedly being forced onto the defensive; over time this in turn means they have adopted a siege-like mentality. So, from these circled wagons there seem to be only two ways to shoot: in or out. This 'friend or foe' approach to theory (which, ironically enough, violates the DM-principle that 'there are no hard and fast dichotomies'!) has meant that critics -- even if they turn out to be fellow comrades committed to revolutionary socialism and HM, as I am -- will never be given a fair hearing (or any at all) for fear that this might aid and assist the class enemy.1 Even though this state of semi-permanent paranoia is understandable (given the above considerations), it only serves to perpetuate the myth that DM is without fault, above criticism and is therefore unassailably true.
[However, as is often the case in politics, there are deeper and more sinister motives at work here -- again, they have been forced into the open in Essay Nine Part Two.]
Naturally, an impregnable redoubt like this can only be secured at the cost of rendering Marxism unscientific. There is no science that is immune from error or beyond revision. Indeed, there are none whatsoever that flatly refuse to take any criticism.
In light of what Lenin himself said about the approximate nature of knowledge, Leninists should be the first to see this point. The fact that they aren't in general prepared do so, and do not, cannot or will not even countenance the remote possibility of error (with respect to DM) suggests that, for them, this theory is neither approximately true nor is it scientific. It has indeed become a dogma requiring continuous acts of devotion, genuflection and pusillanimous expressions of faith -- defended with the same over-the-top irrationality displayed by the genuine 'god'-botherers among us in defence of their own brand of obscurantist mysticism.
However, one thing is clear: dialecticians are creatures of tradition. In relation to DM, that is perhaps their most powerful and enduring trait. If readers follow the links posted here, they will see that DM-fans with whom I have 'debated' this doctrine often make the same general point (explicitly, or implicitly): "Who are you, Ms Lichtenstein, to question the likes of Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mao...?"
Of course, that itself ignores what Mao himself had to say:
"Inner-Party criticism is a weapon for strengthening the Party organization and increasing its fighting capacity." [Quoted from here.]
Just as it disregards what Marx himself said:
"[I]t is all the more clear
what we have to accomplish at present: I am referring to ruthless criticism
of all that exists...." [Quoted from
here.
Italic emphasis in the original.]
In fact, such comrades appear to have forgotten that the progress of science is predicated on just such questioning, just such criticism. Had these characters, these DM-fans, lived centuries ago one can almost imagine them arguing: "Who are you, Galileo, to question Aristotle and the Church?"; "Who are you, Hegel, to question Kant?"; "Who are you, Feuerbach, to question Hegel?"; "Who are you, Herr Marx, to question Ricardo?"
And even when this is put to them, it sails right over their heads, so compromised and ossified have their critical faculties become. Small wonder then that in Essay Nine Part Two I have likened them to religious obscurantists.
(2) The second reason for this theoretically moribund state of affairs isn't unconnected with the first: DM-supporters invariably regard any attempt to examine dialectics critically as an attack on Marxism itself -- even where (as here) that isn't the case. This defensive posture has evidently been motivated by the suspicion that any attempt to clarify the core theory -- i.e., any that advances beyond yet another paraphrase or regurgitation of the 'classics', or that isn't yet another 'Introduction to the Basics' -- might encourage the idea that the dogmas enshrined therein are less than perfect. Otherwise, why 'clarify' them? After all, do Fundamentalist Christians try to 'clarify' the Gospels or even try to improve them?2
One unfortunate consequence of this reactive stance is that DM has remained trapped in a theoretical time-warp now lasting well over a century. An almost permanent doctrinal ossification has descended upon it. Despite their eagle-eyed capacity to spot change everywhere else, DM-fans fail to notice this example of semi-permanent stasis in their own back yard.2a Clearly, the faithful prefer this (almost mummified) state of affairs to one that might suggest DM is defective in any shape or form, and hence might need to be re-examined. This, never mind what Lenin himself said must be the case with any theory that claimed to be scientific. TAR at least attempts to approach this subject from a fresh angle, but even that book in the end settles for yet another re-working of the classics (i.e., if we include in that category the work of György Lukács).
A theory steeped in formalin, it seems, can't rot any further, but it is still dead for all that.
Beyond trivialities, this means that DM hasn't advanced theoretically in over a century (and possibly far longer if we recall that Lenin's work was largely a re-tailing of Hegel's 'Logic', minus its overtly mystical content and intentions). That is how "vibrant" this theory is. Indeed, Tutankhamen looks positively sprightly and full of vigour in comparison.
[Of course, DM-fans will dispute that claim, but beyond the addition of several layers of obscure jargon -- of the sort we find in Raya Dunayevskaya's unintelligible work (Dunayevskaya (1982) and (2002)), Roy Bhaskar's unreadable tome, Dialectic The Pulse Of Freedom (Bhaskar (1993)), or in Slavoj Zizek's two recent and impenetrable books on the subject (Zizek (2012) and (2015)) -- nothing substantially new has been added since Lenin inflicted his 'philosophical' ideas on the DM-faithful a century ago. And, once more, even that was a rehash of Hegel!]
This backward-facing orientation (unique, except perhaps for a somewhat similar approach adopted by Fundamentalist 'God'-Botherers) helps explain why Lenin, for example, imagined he could advance dialectics by re-interpreting he found in Hegel's 'logic', obsolete ideas that had first seen the light of day a good century earlier still!3
It is instructive to contrast this conservative approach to 'knowledge' with the way that genuine science develops. It is difficult to imagine someone like, say, Niels Bohr referring to Newton's ideas, copying them out and commenting on them in detail -- and doing nothing else -- in order to advance Physics. Difficult, perhaps, but it would be impossible to believe that scientists since Bohr's day would be happy doing exactly the same, paraphrasing or re-packaging the classics, also doing little else. Yet this is how the vast majority of DM-theorists conduct themselves. As noted above, TAR is itself a recent example of this conservative mind-set, an approach which seems content merely to regurgitate the 'truths' handed down to them from the 'dialectical worthies', dogmas that adorn this decaying corpse like a wreath of wilted lillies.3a
Ironically therefore, the theory that posits change everywhere else can find no place for it at home. As already noted -- perhaps fittingly --, this situation isn't likely to change.4 Hence, DM -- the erstwhile theory of universal development -- is living disproof of its own stated commitment to it. In the 2020s, for goodness sake, Dialectical Marxists are still promoting the same philosophical nostrums that have remained frozen in time for over a century! Hegel's system (even "the right way up") has been cemented in place; the abstract now set in concrete.5
Another consequence of this backward-facing and doctrinaire stance is that the vast majority of dialecticians are almost totally ignorant of the fundamental developments that have totally changed Modern Formal Logic [MFL] and the effect this has had on Analytic Philosophy (having branded both 'bourgeois', 'ideological' or even 'trivial').
This means, of course, that anyone not quite so educationally-challenged, who tries 'debating' with DM-acolytes, will find they are doubly handicapped.
First of all, they will face accusations of being a "bourgeois apologist", one of their "dupes"/"stooges", or they will be branded an "elitist" (a term popular among OTs and ultra-lefts) for having taken the trouble to acquaint themselves with Analytic Philosophy and MFL before passing opinions about both. That DM-response is, of course, about as rational a criticism of MFL and Philosophy as those advanced by Creationists against Evolution and Modern Biology. In fact, less so -- since those who claim to be Marxists should know better!
[OT = Orthodox Trotskyist; MFL = Modern Formal Logic.]
Second, but connected with the first point above, it is virtually impossible to help correct the thoughts of comrades who are so deeply mired in logical error, and who are blithely unaware of the extent, or even the profundity, of their own ignorance; still less those happy to wallow in such a state of profound nescience. Since the vast majority DM-fans are almost totally ignorant of logic (ancient or modern), not only are they incapable of recognising for themselves the serious logical blunders Hegel committed (summary here), they are similarly incapable of even following an explanation how and why that Christian Mystic committed them, or how and why the DM-classicists are themselves in no position to assess Hegel's ideas critically (and for the same reason). Or, for that matter, how and why they have blithely swallowed such a glaringly defective and ill-supported theory.
Thirty or more years experience 'debating' DM' with its adherents has taught me that the majority of them are content to remain in a state of almost total ignorance of MFL and Analytic Philosophy (even while they will happily fill their boots with the myriad confusions and obscurities that litter 'Continental Philosophy'). But such blissful ignorance doesn't stop them pontificating about both as if they were world-renowned experts -- which is yet another trait they share with Creationists.
This is, of course, the 'dialectical' equivalent of the now notorious, Dunning-Kruger Effect:
"Psychological research suggests that people, in general, suffer from what has become known as the Dunning-Kruger Effect. They have little insight about the cracks and holes in their expertise. In studies in my research lab, people with severe gaps in knowledge and expertise typically fail to recognize how little they know and how badly they perform. To sum it up, the knowledge and intelligence that are required to be good at a task are often the same qualities needed to recognize that one is not good at that task -- and if one lacks such knowledge and intelligence, one remains ignorant that one is not good at that task. This includes political judgment. We have found this pattern in logical reasoning, grammar, emotional intelligence, financial literacy, numeracy, firearm care and safety, debate skill, and college coursework. Others have found a similar lack of insight among poor chess players, unskilled medical lab technicians, medical students unsuccessfully completing an obstetrics/gynaecology rotation, and people failing a test on performing CPR." [David Dunning, quoted from here. Accessed 28/05/2017. Paragraphs merged; spelling adjusted to agree with UK English.]
There is now no excuse for such self-imposed ignorance since there are numerous sites on the Internet that make MFL reasonably accessible to those willing to put in the effort. Of course, it is entirely possible to be an excellent revolutionary while knowing nothing about Logic -- or, indeed, Analytic Philosophy. But if DM-fans want to criticise either or both of these two disciplines, ignorance most definitely isn't bliss, nor is it a virtue.
In that case, a good many of the criticisms advanced at this site will sail right over most dialectical heads. In order to minimise that possibility, I have endeavoured to present the ideas and methods I have imported from Analytic Philosophy and MFL in as accessible a form as I could manage --, even at the risk of being accused of over-simplification.
In these Essays, therefore, I am not in general addressing academics (Marxist or non-Marxist), but comrades who have fallen badly behind, and who are thus totally unaware of the advances made in these two disciplines over the last century, and who are also unaware how badly out-of-touch they have become.5a
In addition, I have linked to other sites --, and I have also cited (academic and non-academic) books and articles --, where the above methods and ideas have been explained more extensively, and perhaps with greater sophistication for the benefit of those who want more detail and complexity.
Heads Back In The Sand, Comrades!
Nevertheless, for all their avowed love of "contradictions", DM-theorists do not like to be contradicted, especially "internally", as it were, by someone in the movement. In fact, they reject (and will continue to reject, for reasons set out in Essay Nine Part Two) all such attempts, which is odd given their commitment to the doctrine that progress can only occur in this way, through contradiction!
This now presents us with a rather ironic conundrum: If all progress and change does indeed result from "internal contradictions", then the Essays published at this site, which highlight the many contradictions that lie at the heart of dialectics, should be warmly welcomed by the DM-faithful. Indeed, if improvement and development can come about in no other way (according to them!), these Essays ought to be well-received by those who are genuinely committed to 'dialectical' change.
The fact that they most definitely won't be welcomed should thereby count as one of the opening 'contradictions' exposed at this site: DM stands refuted as much by its own unwillingness to be contradicted as it is by the fact that this situation isn't likely to change.
Ok, Ms Lichtenstein, What Is Your Theory, Then?
It is worth emphasising at the start that unless otherwise stated I have confined my criticisms to the so-called 'Dialectics of Nature'. The extrapolation of that theory/method into areas covered by HM has largely been avoided, except where it might impact on topics relevant to the demolition of DM itself, or where (in my view) the use of 'dialectical concepts' (and associated jargon) either threatens the credibility of HM or undermines its validity.
For instance, that would involve instances where, say, the word "contradiction" is employed in order to analyse, and hence understand, Capitalism, or where dialecticians use that word indiscriminately to describe anything and everything that happens in Capitalism (i.e., as a "contradiction"). As we will see, when they are asked to explain what this specific word means in such contexts they either refuse to answer, or they find they can't actually explain what it means. Indeed, when supporters of this site (including myself) have sent letters to Socialist Worker and other publications, or have posted comments on various websites and discussion forums/boards asking DM-fans to explain why they keep using "contradiction" in this way, they have received either no effective response, or, and far more often, none at all. Even where some attempt (however feeble) has been made to justify the use of this word, it is often accompanied by the usual, standard issue -- and, by now, expected -- diversionary tactics, laced with no little vitriol and personal/scatological abuse.
[On the indiscriminate and profligate use of "contradiction" in DM-circles, see here, here, here and here; on my many attempts to elicit a response from DM-fans see, for instance, here, here, here and here. It is worth adding that my attempt to find out what Dialectical Marxists think they mean when they use the term "dialectical contradiction" isn't merely an academic exercise; there are important political reasons for asking such questions. On that, see Essay Nine Part Two.]
This isn't to say that I accept the validity of the dialectical jargon that has, over the years, bled into HM. The opposite is in fact the case. However, since the point of these Essays is to stem the flow of poison at source, I have almost exclusively targeted DM.6
Throughout this work HM has been sharply distinguished from DM -- which most of its supporters regard as an entirely bogus, if not a completely perverse, distinction. However, no Marxist of any intelligence would use slogans drawn exclusively from DM to agitate and propagandise workers. Consider, for example, the following: "The Law of Identity is true only within certain limits and the struggle against US Imperialism!" Or, "Change in quantity leads to change in quality (and vice versa) and the campaign to keep hospital HH open!" Or even, "Being is identical with but at the same time different from Nothing, the contradiction resolved in Becoming, and the fight against fascism!"
Slogans like these would be employed by militants of uncommon stupidity and legendary ineffectiveness. In sharp contrast, when communicating with workers, active revolutionaries employ ideas drawn exclusively from HM (albeit applied to the current state of the class war, or the balance of class forces, etc., etc.). The best papers on the revolutionary left, for instance, use ordinary language augmented by concepts drawn from HM to educate, agitate and propagandise. Rarely, if ever, do they employ DM-phraseology to that end. Only deeply sectarian 'revolutionary' papers of exemplary unpopularity and impressive lack of impact use jargon lifted from 'dialectics' to further their impact on the class struggle. Newsline, the paper of the old WRP, was a notable example in this respect -- which helps explain its irrelevance, terminal decline and why, in the end, it had to be financed by Middle Eastern, ruling-class money.
So, the distinction underlined here is drawn every day by militants, in practice. The present work merely systematises what they already do!
[Objections to the above line-of-argument have been neutralised in Essay Nine Part One. See also here.]
In what follows at this site, no attempt will be made to defend HM; that scientific theory will be taken for granted. Hence, any non-Marxists reading this material would be well-advised to go no further. These Essays aren't addressed to, nor are they meant for, them.
Should any Professional Philosophers stray onto this site, they will find that in many places the material published here only scratches the surface of the philosophical issues raised. In a site such as this, which isn't aimed at academics, unnecessary detail and complexity would be inappropriate. However, in every one of my Essays I have referenced numerous books and articles that develop or substantiate topics that have only been touched upon, or which have simply been skated over.7
Several other features of these Essays will strike the reader as rather odd:
(i) Their almost exclusively negative, if not unremittingly hostile, tone;
(ii) Their quasi-dialectical structure (where the word "dialectical" is to be understood in its older, classical, pre-Hegelian sense);
(iii) The total absence of an alternative philosophical theory;
(iv) Their extraordinary length;
and finally,
(v) Their analytic, if not uncompromisingly relentless, style.
The first two items mentioned above aren't unrelated. Although I have endeavoured to construct as comprehensive a case against DM as possible, I have also sought to raise objections to my own criticisms at nearly every stage. While that strategy has been adopted to test my ideas to the limit, it has also been of considerable benefit when trying (where possible!) to make sense of DM, or (again, where possible!) render it a little clearer and hence even slightly comprehensible.
To that end, the reader will find that many issues have been raised at this site for the very first time ever, anywhere, in the entire history of our movement. Core DM-theses have been examined in unprecedented detail; most of them from a completely novel angle. It is a sad reflection on the mental paralysis induced in those who -- in Max Eastman's words -- "suffer from dialectics", that DM-dogma has escaped such detailed scrutiny for well over a hundred years by a fellow Marxist. Those might be difficult words for some to process, but they are nevertheless both accurate and pertinent for all that.
Even if it should turn out that this project is misconceived in some way -- in whole or in part -- it succeeds in breaking entirely new ground, as readers will soon discover. [For instance, much of the material presented in Essays Five and Eleven Part One, to take just two examples, is completely new, and I defy anyone to show otherwise.] In fact, should DM-supporters engage fairly with the content of the Essays published at this site -- even if they remain unconvinced by the end --, they will find that their own ideas will emerge clarified and strengthened because of the entirely original, and profound, challenges advanced in this work.8
As noted earlier, it is the opinion of the present author that DM has contributed (in its own not insignificant way) to the spectacular lack of success that has plagued Dialectical Marxism for well over a century. It is an alarming fact that of all the major political ideologies or movements in human history, Dialectical Marxism is among the least successful, ever.8a The role that DM has played in helping engineer this disastrous state of affairs partly accounts for the persistently negative, if not openly hostile tone adopted at this site.8b
If revolutionaries genuinely wish to change the world by assisting in a successful working-class revolution (and I certainly count myself among those who do), then the sooner this alien-class ideology (DM) is jettisoned the better.
In that case, if the ideas presented here are valid, it is clear that DM has helped cripple the revolutionary movement almost from the beginning. Because of that, those who insist on clinging to this regressive theory/method (for whatever reason) risk extending that abysmal record of failure, defeat and debacle well into this new century, and perhaps even beyond.
Unfortunately, it is far from certain whether humanity -- or even Planet Earth -- can take another hundred years of Capitalism. One more protracted cycle of DM-inspired failures could (but, more likely, will) help guarantee that even fewer workers will take Marxism seriously --, or, and what roughly amounts to the same thing, live to tell the tale in anything remotely resembling a civilised society.
Items (iii) and (v) in the above list are rather different, though.
As far as (iii) is concerned, from time to time readers will find themselves asking the following question of the author: "Well, what's your theory, then?" The answer is: no alternative philosophical theory will be advanced here -- or anywhere else for that matter. This tactic hasn't been adopted out of cussedness -- or even out of diffidence --, but because it is a key aspect of Wittgenstein's method (adopted at this site) not to advance philosophical theories of any sort. His approach in fact means that no philosophical theory makes the slightest sense.
[Exactly why that is so has been explained at length in Essay Twelve Part One. A brief summary of its core idea has now been posted here. Objections coming in from the left concerning the use of Wittgenstein's method have been neutralised here.]
As far as (v) is concerned, those unfamiliar with Analytic Philosophy might find the overall style of these Essays somewhat daunting, if not completely disconcerting. That is because they challenge the overblown pretentions, not just of Traditional Philosophy, but also of DM. Moreover, these Essays adopt a similar approach to the shared assumptions upon which both traditions have been predicated -- for example, the idea that fundamental truths about reality, valid for all of space and time, can be derived from thought/language alone, and which can then be dogmatically imposed on nature and society. In the end they succeed in showing that such "ruling ideas" have been founded on little more than linguistic confusion and systematic distortion (indeed, as Marx himself pointed out).
Nevertheless, the analytic method is much to be preferred since it tends to produce clear results. Anyone who takes exception to this way of doing Philosophy can simply log-away from this site. I have no wish to wake you up.
Figure Four: Dialectical Alertness?
Item (iv) also needs some explanation. The extraordinary length of these Essays has been determined by at least two factors:
(a) The nature of DM itself; and,
(b) The recalcitrant attitude of its supporters.
All of the major, and the vast majority of the relatively minor, DM-theories have been subjected to extensive and destructive criticism throughout this site. Because of its totalising, inter-connected approach to knowledge DM can be tackled in no other way. Had a single theory/'law' been left with only superficial wounds -- and not fatally injured -- its supporters could easily imagine it might be revised and then revived. Had even one of its core ideas been left intact, because of the alleged inter-connections that exist between each of its parts, the temptation would have been to conclude that if one element is viable, the rest must be, too. Just like Japanese Knotweed, DM would then grow back as if nothing had happened. Hence, the excessive length of each of the main Essays is partly the result the holistic nature of DM and partly because few of its supporters have ever bothered to analyse their theory in detail or even to any great extent -- certainly not the unprecedented scale adopted at this site.
[I return to the above points later in the Essay.]
Those who still think these Essays are too long should compare them with the writings of Hegel, Marx or Lenin, whose work easily dwarfs my own. Nevertheless, I have attempted to summarise the main criticisms advanced at this site in three Introductory Essays, each of decreasing length, difficulty and complexity: here, here and here.
Finally, even though many of the arguments presented here are in my view definitive, genuine knock-down arguments in Philosophy are exceedingly rare. In that case, readers will have to make up their own minds whether or not I am alone in judging my Essays as in any way definitive.9
In researching the material published at this site I have endeavoured to consult as much of the DM-literature as is physically possible. That includes all the DM-classics, the vast majority of the more important secondary works, alongside countless minor and subsidiary books and articles in English (and several other languages).
For reasons explained on the opening page, these Essays were originally published on the Internet (in 2005) when they were less than half-complete. In that case, over the next decade or so I will continue adding new material as I factor in the notes I have been making of the content of the (countlessly many) DM-works I have studied, but which haven't yet been referenced or fully referenced in the Essays that have already been published. In most cases, each Essay will end up approximately twice the length it is now. I expect to be working on this project for at least another fifteen or twenty years!
All being well, that should take me into the 2040s.
However, since most DM-texts simply repeat, almost verbatim, what the classics have to say (quoting, regurgitating or paraphrasing Hegel, Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, etc.,) -- often using the same ideas, phrases and even the very same words and examples; e.g., "Boiling/freezing water", "The rose is red", "John is a man" and "cherries", with little attempt to clarify them or amplify their content -- much of this research in fact turned out to be exceedingly repetitive. Indeed, on many occasions it felt as if the same book or article was being read, over and over. That, of course, is just one of the problems with DM. In fact, it might be more accurate to rename it 'Dialectical Mantra', so repetitive has it become.
[Any who doubt this should check out the hundreds of DM-texts I have quoted in Essay Two -- especially those in Appendix Three. The reason why DM is so neurotically repetitive is explained in Essay Nine Part Two, as is the ideological significance of the parrot-like behaviour adopted by its supporters, a serious character-defect that DM-fans have apparently failed to notice in themselves. That is yet another trait they share with open and honest mystics.]
Despite this, my lack of Russian (in which language much of the secondary literature on DM has been written) prevents me from consulting Stalinist, post-, and pre-Stalinist works, except where they have been translated into English (or which can now be translated -- rather badly -- by Google Translator).10 Although Trotskyists argue that the "lifeless and wooden" 'dialectic' found in Stalinist texts contrasts rather unfavourably with their own 'lively and vibrant strain', a dispassionate, less partisan examination of both traditions reveals a rather different story. While there certainly are clear differences between Stalinist, Maoist, Libertarian Marxist, and Trotskyist applications of 'Materialist Dialectics' to class society, as far as their commitment to the 'dialectics of nature' is concerned all four are virtually indistinguishable. Hence, with respect to DM these four main currents in Dialectical Marxism are genetic (and somatic) Siamese Quintuplets, philosophically joined at the head.
Again, any who doubt this easily confirmed fact will find it amply substantiated in Essays Two and Nine Part Two.11
However, it is quite clear that there are STDs (both Russian and Chinese) who display a far more nuanced and sophisticated understanding of "the dialectic" than many OTs -- Lukacs, Ilyenkov and Oizerman come to mind here.
[STD = Stalinist Dialectician; OT = Orthodox Trotskyist.]
[Another four exceptions to the 'wooden and lifeless' jibe include (a) Alexander Spirkin's analysis of the Part/Whole relation, outlined here; (b) Yurkovets's discussion of "quality", (c) Bettelheim's analysis of 'principal' versus 'secondary contradictions'; and (d) James Lawler's attempt to make the term "dialectical contradiction" comprehensible, which has been examined in detail in Essay Eight Part Three.]
Of course, the doctrinaire nature of DM certainly didn't prevent it becoming the Official State Philosophy of the former 'socialist' states of the old 'Communist Block', where this character trait (that surfaces as entitled, dogmatic bombast, which, if manifested by an individual, that person would be diagnosed suffering from a Narcissistic Personality Disorder) was magnified ten-fold. But, DM is no less of a dogma for OTs. And yet, because of their even less successful revolutionary history, there isn't a single 'Trotskyist' state (degenerated, deformed or whatever) anywhere on earth where they can impose their very own preferred set of Dialectical Shibboleths.
As far as can be ascertained, and with respect to DM (but not HM), that is the only relevant difference.
[However, readers should take note of the political caveat I have registered here about "the wall of blood" that separates Trotskyism from Stalinism. In relation to the International Revolution and the self-emancipation of the working class, the two couldn't be more different.]
Another preliminary point worth making is the following: readers will find no overall summary of DM at this site (except, for a very brief précis, here). While scores of DM-texts are quoted (as noted earlier, sometimes at length), and are analysed in painstaking detail, other than the one just mentioned, I have made no effort to outline the general shape and content of this theory. Had that been attempted it would have served no purpose and would probably have been counter-productive.
It would have served no purpose because there are countless summaries of DM available to those who (inexplicably) want yet one another -- all of which read very much the same, anyway.
It would have been counter-productive since, as these pages show, there is no settled interpretation of DM even among its acolytes. They all disagree with one another over minutiae -- while they all give lip-service to the broad strokes of its core ideas, which they repeat endlessly and which are then put to almost Machiavellian, sectarian use. Hence, one more attempt to summarise DM would surely have been a total waste of time and effort.
Hardcore DM-theorists would have responded to yet another such summary of their theory (had one been attempted) in the way I have no doubt they have already received TAR: they would object to practically every single word, syllable and punctuation mark. That is what they do; that is all they do. Dialectical Moaners don't change, which is, of course, yet another suitably ironic punishment the Parmenidean 'Deity' has mischievously inflicted upon these back-sliding Heracliteans.
So, despite what Heraclitus said, it is all too easy to step into the same river of DM-abuse, misrepresentation and vitriol time and again -- especially on the Internet.
Readers should also make note of the fact that, in what follows, if certain philosophical theories (or even DM-principles) are criticised, that doesn't mean I accept or give credence to their presumed opposite. Hence, if, say, I debunk the idea that reality is rational, no one should conclude that I believe that reality is irrational. In fact, in this specific case, I can make no sense of either alternative. Take another example: if I criticise the use of the word "objective" (when it is employed metaphysically, or, indeed, employed by DM-theorists), that doesn't mean I am a relativist (which I am not), or that I question the validity of scientific knowledge (which I do not). In fact, I reject this entire way of talking about 'reality', 'objectivity', and scientific knowledge (for reasons aired in Essay Thirteen Part One).12
In connection with the above, it is worth making a more general point: readers shouldn't conclude from my use of jargon drawn from Traditional Philosophy that I think any of it makes sense. I am merely utilising it in order to assist in its demise.
[Some have wondered how it is possible to criticise a certain use of language if none of it makes sense. However, that query itself is based on a misunderstanding of my use of the word "sense". The reader is directed here for further clarification.]
~~~~~~oOo~~~~~~
I began this project in July 1998. Since then the Internet has transformed a researcher's capacity to work from home, and, of course, publicise their views. It is now possible to access all of the Marxist Classics on-line, and much else besides. Because of this I have been able to obtain literally hundreds of obscure books and articles from all around the world, which would otherwise have been very difficult, if not impossible, to access a generation or so ago. In addition, the Internet has also allowed me to link to sites where many of the ideas and technical terms I have employed are clarified or expanded upon.10a This is especially useful for those who are new to this 'debate' and aren't familiar with specific topics or the use of certain jargonised expressions. In addition, it has been possible to communicate with other Marxists who have also expressed serious doubts about DM, or who have aired (relevant) critical remarks on discussion boards, or who have attempted to 'debate' this theory/method with those still held in its grip. Finally, it has also allowed comrades from all over the world to read my work (thus giving it a far wider circulation than would have been possible had it only been published in hard copy). As a result many of the latter have emailed their appreciation of, and support for, my forthright stance. Up until quite recently, hardly a week went by without someone contacting me either to offer their thanks, ask me a few questions or invite me to clarify a certain point.
Some on-line have complained that my use of Wikipedia completely undermines the credibility of my Essays. When I launched this project on the Internet in 2005, there was very little material easily available on-line to which I could link for the vast majority of topics other than Wikipedia. In the intervening years much more authoritative, and often peer-reviewed, sites have become available (for example, the excellent Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy and several other encyclopaedias). So I have been progressively replacing the vast majority of Wikipedia links with links to these and other sources. Having said that, I haven't always done so for links to Wikipedia articles about geographical, historical, scientific, biographical (etc.) topics, where the areas concerned aren't controversial, at least among fellow Marxists, unless there was good reason not to. In every instance, I have endeavoured to avoid linking to Wikipedia articles connected with key areas of my case against DM so that at no point will my criticism of that 'theory'/'method' depend exclusively on such links -- unless (i) there was nothing else available on-line, and/or (ii) there was another peer reviewed source (also cited or quoted) that agreed with it. Even then, I have also been progressively replacing many such links when I have become aware of more acceptable and reliable alternatives.
If any of my readers know of any better sources, I'd appreciate it if they let me know so I can use them instead.
In addition to the above (as readers will soon see if they consult the Bibliography attached to each Essay), I have provided copious references to published academic and non-academic books and articles (posted on-line or available in hard copy) in the End Notes to each Essay, which further develop or substantiate anything I argue, claim, allege or propose.
Unfortunately, experience on the Internet has underlined just how resistant the DM-fraternity are to any challenges to their theory/method. It has also highlighted how unreasonable many of them are -- hence the 'scare' quotes around the word "debate" above. Quite apart from the fact that DM-apologists seem incapable of reading my Essays with due care (let alone with any accuracy -- that is, what few even bother to do so), or, indeed, with any honesty (a particularly egregious example of which can be found here), the responses I have posted on various Marxist or revolutionary discussion boards reveal how lamentably weak the objections are that DM-fans (so far) have managed to level against my criticisms.
In general, DM-fans tend to oscillate between the twin extremes of abuse and incredulity, anger and disdain, hostility and condescension. Some seem content merely to regurgitate 'Holy DM-Writ' (i.e., the quotation of selected passages from the 'dialectical classics'), others rehearse the by-now-familiar, tired old dogmas -- as if reading the same hackneyed material for the thousandth time will do the trick and 'put me straight' when the previous nine hundred and ninety-nine somehow had failed. To a man, woman and 'robot', one and all seem unable, unwilling or incapable of arguing with any cogency, let alone coherency, in support of the ideologically-compromised philosophical theory our forebears imported into Marxism. It turns out that the intellectual incapacity demonstrated by dialectically-distracted comrades appears to be in direct proportion to their propensity to quote Dialectical Scripture, and in inverse proportion to their ability to read with any care or accuracy what I have argued in response.13
[FL = Formal Logic.]
Their general reaction supports the prediction made earlier that Dialectical Marxists will never abandon DM whatever dire consequences that this might hold out for the entire movement. In line with other failed theories that humanity has had to endure (and sometimes reject), it seems that an entire older generation of acolytes will have to pass away before there is a chance this ideological cancer is flushed out of Marxism for good.
Of course, that might never happen; subsequent generations of revolutionaries intent on initiating this long-overdue 'ideological spring clean' might consistently fail to appear. Indeed, Marx's own assessment -- that the class struggle could lead to the common ruin of the contending classes -- may very well come to pass, assisted in no small measure by his erstwhile followers and their unswerving attachment to this regressive 'theory'/'method':
"Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes." [The Communist Manifesto.]
If an existential disaster like that is finally visited on this planet, the revolutionary movement will surely have been shackled by the contradictory theory at its heart as much as it will have been neutralised by the class-enemy at the gate.
If one specific analysis aired at this site is correct, then this misbegotten theory/method has been shaped by ideological currents created long ago by a well-focussed class enemy. The latter -- or, rather, their 'prize fighters' -- of course, did this to further their own interests and/or those of their patrons, but oblivious of the use to which their ideas would one day be put by 'Marxist dialecticians'. This ancient, ruling-class approach to philosophy (which gave birth to DM) was imported into revolutionary socialism by theorists who weren't workers. The founders of Dialectical Marxism were clearly influenced far more by the ideas they inherited from Traditional Thought than they were by their (supposed) commitment to philosophical radicalism.
However, it is clear that the pernicious influence exercised by these "ruling ideas" -- which were smuggled into our movement long before the proletariat could provide them with an effective, materialist counter-weight -- is now seriously impeding the scientific development of Marxism.
That itself is partly a result of the fact that:
(a) These alien-class doctrines have been ossified into what has come to be known as 'The Real Marxist Tradition'; and,
(b) Its adherents are either blithely unaware of, or they don't really care about, the link that exists between the ruling-class thought-forms ossified in DM and the long-term failure of Dialectical Marxism.
Even worse, the vast majority of DM-supporters plainly feel they can turn a blind eye to the class-compromised origin of this theory -- even while they inconsistently chide yours truly for my alleged reliance on 'bourgeois logic' and 'reactionary' (i.e., Analytic) Philosophy --, in the erroneous belief they are actually defending a radical tradition when they are in effect promoting an ancient, Hermetic and Neoplatonic world-view.
[There is more on this in Essay Fourteen Part One (summary here).]
However, as is clear to all those who aren't blindfolded, our movement is slowly dying.
Not only is DM partly responsible, it helps prevent anything being done about it. Dialectical Marxism thus contains the seeds of its own demise; its core 'theory'/'method' not only motivates its fragmentation (exactly how that happens is one of the main topics of Essay Nine Part Two), it convinces those held in its thrall that nothing need be done about it. That is because they regard the movement as 'success incarnate' -- since DM has been "tested in practice", despite the fact that practice itself tells a completely different story. All the while, the real "gravediggers of Capitalism" (i.e., workers) have shown they want nothing to do with it, or with us.
Another neat unity of opposites for readers to ponder.
That fact, too, is buried deep in the same sands into which far too many dialectical heads have been inserted.
Figure Five: Dialectics 101 -- The Search For 'Clarity' Proceeds Apace
Tragedy and farce rolled into one...
Appendix One -- SWP's Crocodile Tears
Here is the May 2024 statement issued by the UK-SWP's Central Committee concerning the 'Comrade Delta' debacle:
"The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) is opposed to all forms of sexism and oppression, and we have zero tolerance for abuse or harassment. However, decisions made by the SWP in 2013 damaged our record -- and the current leadership acknowledges the party's mistakes and is committed to learning from them. We were wrong in how we responded to the two cases described below and we unreservedly apologise. Accusations of 'rape apologism' directed against the SWP arise from a case that was discussed at our party conference in January 2013. The case involved a woman alleging rape by someone who was then a member of the elected leadership of the party [in fact he was a leading member of the Central Committee, which was part of the problem -- RL]. A second woman also came forward to allege sexual harassment by the same member of the leadership. The women making the allegations chose not to take them to the police, an entirely understandable decision, given the lack of seriousness with which the police treat such cases. Instead, they sought to pursue their allegations through the party's 'disputes committee', an elected body of the SWP.
"As we subsequently recognised, the process we had in place at that time was entirely inadequate and we handled the two cases badly. Among other mistakes we made, the composition of the panel that heard the first case contained people who had worked closely with the person accused [in fact, several were his friends! -- RL]. Following the procedures in place at that time, the panel sought to pass judgement on matters of fact about which it could not meaningfully establish the truth. Our 2013 procedures were also insufficiently mindful of or sensitive to the challenges women face when they bring forward serious accusations of sexual misconduct. [An admission that the UK judicial system was to the left of the SWP at the time on this specific issue! -- RL] They also did not do enough to acknowledge potential imbalances of power due to gender, seniority in an organisation and age differences. [In this, they ignored those who pointed this out to them, back then -- RL] For clarity, the person against whom the allegations were directed has not been a member of the SWP since 2013. [He resigned in order to avoid further investigation, but he received significant support from within the party, right up to the end -- RL] We are sorry for failing the two women. We also apologise to all those in the wider movement who, like us, consider women's oppression in general, and rape in particular, to be abhorrent, including former members of the SWP who supported the two women.
"Because of the inadequacies in the handling of these allegations, in 2013 we immediately changed how we deal with such cases and have continued to review and update these procedures since. Our current procedures and expected behaviour are on our website. We make sure any new member of the SWP engages with these, and we make every effort to ensure they are taken seriously. Under our current procedures, anyone accused of rape or harassment is suspended from SWP membership while an investigation is taking place. If a member of the SWP's elected leadership body is subject to an accusation that needs to be investigated, no member of that same leadership body – or former member of the leadership who worked with them – will be on the panel looking into the case. It will also be ensured that the person bringing the allegation is happy with the nature and membership of the panel overseeing the case before it begins.
"Our new procedures also reaffirm that those bringing such accusations should be supported, whether they decide to go to the SWP's disputes committee, the elected body that handles such matters, or to seek to use legal avenues, such as the police and courts. We should always proactively take measures to protect women who come forward with accusations. When holding hearings over cases of sexual misconduct, we now, in common with many other organisations on the left, seek to apply the guidelines drawn up by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission. We were and remain absolutely opposed to rape-apologism. We are now confident our procedures are robust, helping us maintain our zero-tolerance approach to abuse and harassment. We hope that the measures we have taken will help to reassure those in the wider movement that we do not tolerate rape in our organisation or downplay its seriousness. We do not assume that we have all the answers, and we welcome advice from those outside the SWP who have expertise in these matters. We feel we have learnt both from our own mistakes in 2013 and from our engagement in wider movements over questions of oppression since then. We will strive to continue to learn and develop our practice in future. Statement from the Central Committee of the SWP, May 2024." [Quoted from here; accessed 26/05/2024. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site; one link added. Several paragraphs merged.]
I can do no better than quote remarks taken from two detailed responses to the above; the first is from rs21, which originally formed a decade or so ago around many who broke away from the SWP over this issue:
"The SWP's Central Committee recently issued a statement and apology for their party's 2013 crisis, when the SWP defended a Central Committee member accused of rape and drove out of their organisation those who supported the women complaining about his behaviour. rs21 was launched by many of those who decided the SWP had so betrayed socialist politics that it was necessary to start again. The apology sounds positive, but the rs21 Steering Group argues that it is inadequate. The crisis in 2013 seriously harmed the women who complained about the behaviour of Martin Smith, also known as 'Comrade Delta', who was a Central Committee member at the time. It harmed all those who upheld socialist and feminist principles. It ruined lives, destroyed trust and friendships, and people are still living with trauma now. It also harmed the SWP and the whole left. So it might seem that the statement from the SWP Central Committee could mark the beginning of a process of addressing the issues, but there are good reasons to think otherwise.
"If you are unfamiliar with the crisis, one of the many summaries is here. There are masses of documents here and public articles from the time in the rs21 archive.
"We have to ask why this statement has come now, 11 years after the crisis. Right up until this statement came out, SWP activists were still claiming that the crisis was history, they had changed their procedures long ago, and that it was an issue only raised now by their political opponents for point scoring. The statement isn't the result of internal debate or a political reckoning inside the SWP -- many members had no idea it was coming. The statement presents itself as an apology to the two women who brought complaints, and to the wider movement, including former members of the SWP who supported the women. Yet the statement is well hidden on the Socialist Worker website, the SWP has not shared the statement on its social media and we haven't seen a single SWP member share it publicly. Rather than a genuine shift in the politics of the SWP, this looks more like a document that members can share with those who raise the issues in the hope that the organisation can rehabilitate itself and recruit and retain young people without genuinely changing. We don't know about debates inside the SWP Central Committee, which are secret even from their own members. What we do know is that the majority of the SWP's Central Committee is still made up of those who were heavily involved in defending the rapist. It still includes the person who argued that raising the issues just gives ammunition to the right-wing press. It still includes the person who refused one of the women who complained permission to attend the conference session where her 'case' was discussed. None of these individuals have shared the statement on their Facebook accounts.
"The statement does acknowledge that the SWP's response to the cases in 2013 was wrong, and apologises. It also recognises some of what they did wrong:
(1) Having a panel containing (an understatement) people who had worked closely with Smith.
(2) Trying to pass judgement on matters of fact about which it could not meaningfully establish the truth.
(3) Being insufficiently mindful of or sensitive to the challenges women face when they bring forward serious accusations of sexual misconduct.
(4) Not doing enough to acknowledge potential imbalances of power due to gender, seniority in an organisation and age differences. [I have replaced the bullet points in the original with numbers -- RL.]
"This is the SWP's first public acknowledgement that there were political problems with how they responded to the complaints, rather than merely procedural ones. But the statement only scratches the surface. The main article on the subject published in the International Socialism Journal (ISJ), the SWP's theoretical journal, was by Charlie Kimber and Alex Callinicos, who remain on the Central Committee. This argued that the opposition wasn't really a challenge to their mis-handling of a rape allegation so much as 'giving up on the organised working class' and 'movementism'. The SWP has produced no new analysis of what happened since.
"We think the SWP still has a lot of learning to do. The statement still plays down what happened in 2013. It asserts that the SWP was opposed to rape apologism in 2013, not acknowledging that the majority of SWP members went along with rape apologist arguments. It treats the crisis of 2013 as if it was an isolated incident, when we have since seen other allegations against SWP members and complaints from a young trans activist just last year that the organisation was 'institutionally abusive, exploitative, and transphobic'. [However, I find that allegation hard to believe; the SWP is currently a leading promoter of what has since come to be called "trans activist ideology" on the far left and regularly supports protests against feminists and other socialists defending women's rights, as does rs21 -- RL.] rs21 has had quite a journey from being founded by people who left the SWP over the crisis. This isn't just about the fact that most of our current members (and of our Steering Group) were never in the SWP. It has been a political journey too. We had to answer the question of why the bulk of SWP members could be so wrong, not just the leadership or the disputes committee. This led us to examine both gender politics and questions of organisation.... Our feminism has practical consequences. Just look at the difference between the SWP's current Terms of Reference and Procedures for the SWP Disputes Committee and rs21's Guidelines on sexual violence and domestic abuse. We recognise that the pervasive nature of sexism and the obstacles women face when challenging sexual violence mean that it is not appropriate to use the same guidelines to deal with sexual violence as for someone stealing money from a local branch. The SWP are still following an essentially 'investigatory' and pseudo-judicial approach. rs21 seeks to prioritise the safety and empowerment of the survivor, of other members and of those we work with in the movement. We reject the idea that these should be subordinated or counterposed to the interests of a political group.
"There is no indication what lessons, if any, the SWP has yet learned from the crisis in relation to questions of organisation. We believe that, as well as sexist politics, part of the reason that the majority of SWP members closed ranks around a rapist arises from the way they organise. SWP members refer to their organisation as 'the' party. None of our organisations can claim to be 'the' party. We think much more work needs to be done to develop revolutionary ideas, build mass movements and revolutionary currents within them before a party can be established in Britain. We are an organisation contributing to that work. The SWP's delusions of grandeur have consequences. If you believe your organisation is the magic ingredient necessary to save the world from climate catastrophe and imperialist war, then defending the SWP becomes a duty above all others -- even at the expense of your principles. In the SWP, which has a huge paid apparatus for an organisation of its size, there is an overreliance on paid officials and a leadership that has been broadly unchanged for years. It means that defending the party easily becomes defending key leaders of the party, who are seen as indispensable. It also meant the leadership could deploy the paid apparatus, lies and smears to crush opposition.
"The power of the apparatus is central to the lack of meaningful democracy in the SWP. In practice, the Central Committee is self-selecting, with just three (unsuccessful) challenges in half a century. The fact that the Central Committee still has ten members who were there in 2013 shows the SWP's failure to encourage members to lead. The discouragement of dissent also contributed to the defence of the leaders in 2013 and there is no evidence this has changed. Ironically, the very issuing of this statement without internal political debate illustrates the top-down nature of the SWP and gives no confidence that members have really changed their views. Democracy isn't a luxury for the left, it is the best way to take decisions about what an organisation does in the movement and how we correct mistakes. [I have covered questions about the lack of democracy in the SWP in more detail in Essay Nine Part Two -- RL.] [Quoted from here and re-formatted to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Accessed 02/06/2024. Several paragraphs merged. Other than those in my interpolated comments, links are in the original. Bold emphases added.]
The second is taken from Weekly Worker:
"Quite out of the blue, the Socialist Workers Party has issued a press release on its mishandling of rape and sexual harassment allegations in 2013. It is not clear what has led the SWP to make this move. Certainly the statement does not shed any light on the matter, though unspecified 'accusations of "rape apologism"' are mentioned. The comrades are, of course, busy little bees at the moment, enthusiastically participating in the mass movement against the Gaza war, as well they might be. They are presumably recruiting this way. Perhaps prospective members are raising this as an obstacle to joining; but then, by retreading this territory, they risk giving it wider publicity, when one has rather got the impression over the years that they would prefer never again to speak of the whole sorry episode.
"Publicly addressing this question at all is, thus, in some sense admirable. The SWP at least acknowledges that it screwed up, and offers some reasons to suppose that it will not do so again. Unfortunately, what it acknowledges is only a very partial list of the sins committed; and the reasons offered are not so reassuring on closer examination. In fact, these two points are connected. What do they think happened?
'The case involved a woman alleging rape by someone who was then a member of the elected leadership of the party. A second woman also came forward to allege sexual harassment by the same member of the leadership. The women making the allegations chose not to take them to the police…given the lack of seriousness with which the police treat such cases. Instead, they sought to pursue their allegations through the party's 'disputes committee' [DC].'
"This leading member was Martin Smith, then national organiser and de facto top dog. This was a serious matter for the overall leadership. But 'the process we had in place at that time was entirely inadequate and we handled the two cases badly'. The DC panel examining the case 'contained people who had worked closely with the person accused'. It 'sought to pass judgement on matters of fact about which it could not meaningfully establish the truth'. Furthermore,
'Our 2013 procedures were also insufficiently mindful of or sensitive to the challenges women face when they bring forward serious accusations of sexual misconduct. They also did not do enough to acknowledge potential imbalances of power due to gender, seniority in an organisation and age differences.'
"That is more or less all the statement has to say about the actual events. We then move on to apologies:
'We are sorry for failing the two women. We also apologise to all those in the wider movement who, like us, consider women's oppression in general, and rape in particular, to be abhorrent, including former members of the SWP who supported the two women.'
"That reference to 'former members of the SWP' is the only hint of the internal crisis that all this unleashed. It is the most spectacular omission in a very partial account, and we will get to that in a moment. However, we need to start at the beginning. As we noted, Smith was briefly national organiser, effectively leading the SWP in day-to-day matters after the old leadership around John Rees and Lindsey German was sidelined (their supporters later broke away to form Counterfire). This all took place in 2007-09, and coincided with the outbreak of the global financial crisis, from which the SWP, like most far-left groups, expected to draw renewed energy and purpose, and balloon in size. The reality was stagnation, and within a couple of years it was Smith's turn to be demoted. At around this time -- 2009 or 2010 -- allegations of sexual harassment were circulated anonymously against him, including to the Weekly Worker. We chose not to publish, having no way to verify the claims and supposing them to be part of the 'knives out for Martin' court politics then ongoing. Smith did, however, address them at an SWP conference in what witnesses described as an incomprehensible, elliptical speech, after which somebody in the crowd got up a 'The workers united will never be defeated!' chant, and the whole affair was presumed to be put to bed.
"It was late in 2012 when the whole thing started to unravel. The complainant had re-examined her own memories of her interactions with Smith, and come to the conclusion that she had been the victim of rape. The DC panel was convened and, exhibiting all the shortcomings the SWP now owns up to, dismissed the case against Smith. This immediately led to clandestine oppositions forming (there are, for practical purposes, no other kinds of oppositions in the SWP). Four members were expelled on the basis of leaked Facebook chat logs -- which, of course, had the effect of drawing more attention to the matter. At the SWP's conference early in 2013, things came to a head in the vote on whether to accept the DC's annual report, which covered the Smith case; the loyalists just edged to victory, but it was to prove extremely costly. The full transcript of the debate was anonymously leaked to the wider movement and rapidly published. One member in attendance, Tom Walker, used the pages of the Weekly Worker to give his scathing account of the goings on -- as far as I am aware, the most widely read article we have published as long as I have been writing here. The bourgeois press then got hold of it, and the SWP's usual disciplinary mechanisms simply ceased functioning. Hundreds went into open rebellion, with the full support of almost the whole of the wider movement.
"The leadership had a choice at that point -- between the olive branch and the truncheon. They chose the truncheon. All who courageously and rightly rebelled against this scandalous failure were denounced as wreckers, anarchists, liberals, agents of 'creeping feminism', and so forth. Two factions arose, one -- more militant -- around Richard Seymour, and including the 'Facebook Four'; and another, more conciliatory outfit that included many long-standing and respected SWP loyalists and intellectuals, including Ian Birchall and Neil Davidson. The militants chose to resign early on, under very heavy manners and likely to be expelled en masse anyway. The 'moderates' fought on under the name, 'In Defence of our Party', attempting to split ordinary-Joe comrades from the ultra-hardliners in the leadership (who somebody drolly nicknamed 'In defence of our Martin'). They, too, were defeated and driven out. By the end of 2013, the SWP was in such terrible shape that it was almost possible to imagine it just winking out of existence -- as indeed its former sister party, the US International Socialist Organization, would a few years later. The SWP had lost more or less half of its active membership, including something like 95% of its student membership. Its reputation in the wider movement -- always a little uneven -- was completely shredded. It was banned from several student unions as a 'threat to women', and attempts were made to do the same in trade unions as well. On more than one occasion, SWP literature was ritually burned by angry students.
"Is this what the SWP is apologising to its former members for? We have little doubt that the leadership now regrets the course it took in 2013 to some extent: how could it not, given the calamitous consequences of that choice? Yet in the context of this document, it seems otherwise. The organisation owns up to having had inadequate disputes procedures, but not to the fanaticism with which its leadership set out to drive out all who saw those procedures as inadequate at the time. It self-criticises for being blind to the power differential between a leading member and a young recruit, in the manner of a liberal 'age-gap discourse' think-piece, but, so far as we can tell, the ultra-centralist 'command and control' structure, which amplifies that differential, remains in place. If members were found considering their options for protesting a new Martin Smith-type case that was mishandled, it is quite certain that they would be expelled all over again. Unsurprisingly then, according to the SWP's account of what it learned from this episode, it was more or less entirely procedural. In today's SWP, we are told,
'anyone accused of rape or harassment is suspended from SWP membership, while an investigation is taking place. If a member of the SWP's elected leadership body is subject to an accusation that needs to be investigated, no member of that same leadership body -- or former member of the leadership who worked with them -- will be on the panel looking into the case. It will also be ensured that the person bringing the allegation is happy with the nature and membership of the panel overseeing the case before it begins. Our new procedures also reaffirm that those bringing such accusations should be supported, whether they decide to go to the SWP's disputes committee, the elected body that handles such matters, or to seek to use legal avenues, such as the police and courts. We should always proactively take measures to protect women who come forward with accusations. When holding hearings over cases of sexual misconduct, we now, in common with many other organisations on the left, seek to apply the guidelines drawn up by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission. [EHRC]
"Much of this is reasonable, and indeed addresses some of the more glaring injustices in the Martin Smith case. It is telling, however, that the reader is referred to the EHRC guidance on such matters, drawn up to help employers deal with workplace disputes of this nature. I use the phrase, 'to help employers', deliberately. As with the common run of such guidance, the target audience is human-resources people, whose fundamental job is to protect the employer from reputational damage and expensive litigation. It is well known, for example, that the 'diversity, equity and inclusion' training industry -- which is so much the occasion of rightwing culture warlordism today, especially in the United States -- has the perverse bottom-line effect of making it harder for aggrieved employees to pursue legal remedies from their bosses for discrimination. The company lawyers can tell the courts: 'We make everyone take a class in how not to be racist -- what more can we do?' The EHRC guidance, specifically, mandates confidentiality in formal proceedings. This is just great for a bureaucratic corporation, since it ensures that everything has to go through 'official channels'; The HR [Human Resources -- RL] department are the only people who even know who is involved. It is spectacularly unsuited to a small left group with an politically homogenous leadership caste, because -- no matter how much effort is to be expended -- the 'HR department' will always be colleagues of the accused leader. The general effect even in corporate life, however, is that the top people get away with it, with only the lower-level creeps facing the music. For the masses, sunlight is the best disinfectant. It was only by exposing the scandal, after all, that the SWP rebels managed to impose any consequences on the SWP leadership." [Quoted from here; accessed 02/06/2024. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Several paragraphs merged. Bold emphases and one link alone added.]
001. Of course, this isn't just a problem for Trotskyists. The BBC had the following to say about a recent UK criminal case that involved three individuals who had been imprisoned and treated like slaves -- some of whom had also been sexually abused for over thirty years -- by a cabal of quasi-Maoists:
"The couple accused of holding three women as slaves for more than 30 years were activists in a Maoist group in London. It was a period when the UK had a plethora of small left-wing collectives and communes. Aravindan Balakrishnan, known as Comrade Bala, and his wife Chanda ran a bookshop and commune from a large building in Brixton. Balakrishnan had been a member of the Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) in the early 1970s but split and formed his own collective in 1974 -- the Workers' Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought. It comprised about 25 people.
"The group was not unusual. There were about 20 Maoist groups active in the UK in the 1970s, says Michel Hockx, director of the SOAS China Institute at SOAS, University of London. All followed the ideology of Chinese communist leader, Mao Zedong, who put industry under state ownership, collectivised farming and ruthlessly suppressed opposition.
'All [the UK groups] considered themselves Maoists, but they fought against each other about who was in possession of the right ideology.... Some were fairly militant, they would actively promote overthrowing the capitalist systems and class systems. Others practised communal living, equality as a group.'
"In some of the groups work would be collectively organised, people took meals together, shared possessions and would take part in political planning together.... It wasn't just Maoists, there was a great deal of other radical activism at the time.
'There was general ferment in society. In terms of radical politics people were very engaged by the war in Vietnam, significant numbers of young people were protesting about that,' says Prof Dennis Tourish, author of The Dark Side of Transformational Leadership. 'It was also the three-day week, the collapse of Franco in Spain, the 1968 Paris riots, there had been the assassination of Kennedy and Martin Luther King. There was a mood of radicalisation. Many people were drawn to far-left causes at one time or another.'
"Robert Griffiths, general secretary of the Communist Party of Britain, has described Balakrishnan's Maoist sect as the 'breakaway of a breakaway of a breakaway'. The term used was 'splittist'. Groups would part company and suspend members who did not toe the party line or presented a different view of the same ideology. Fringe groups would then form, often creating angry rivalries with their former comrades.
'Each spilt had its own pope, its divine leader, but they were all trying to colonise the same belief systems,' adds Tourish.
"Left-wing groups were active across the UK, but in Brixton in south London, there was a ready supply of short-term empty houses in neighbourhoods that Lambeth Council was gradually clearing for its housing programmes. It provided ample choice for people looking to set up squats and communes.
'There were also plenty of empty or under-used small shop premises, like that at Acre Lane, which has been linked with the Mao Zedong Memorial Trust,' says Alan Piper, of the Brixton Society. 'Some of these groups took a closer interest in local affairs, and went on to organise squats or housing co-ops or print workshops, or even to contest local council elections. Others were more oriented to national or international causes, so had a lower profile in the immediate area,' he adds.
"Not all of the fringe groups were based around communes. The Workers' Revolutionary Party encouraged their members to share accommodation, according to Tourish, but it was not mandatory.
'They had a number of other techniques to draw in members and reinforce their commitment.... It was only a small party -- at its peak it had around 1,000 people -- but for example they put huge effort into producing a daily newspaper which they would then spend their days trying to sell, and being ignored and ridiculed for it. That effort raised their commitment, and gave the members a very powerful group identity....'" [Quoted from here; accessed 27/11/2013. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site; many paragraphs merged. Several links and italics added.]
This cult's leader was finally found guilty in December 2015:
"Det Sgt Paul Wiggett said the cult leader's daughter was scared of her father and that she 'genuinely believed the day she left the house she was going to explode ' that her life would come to an end'.... Balakrishnan came to the UK from Singapore in 1963 and enrolled at the London School of Economics. By the 1970s he was heading a Maoist group known as the Workers Institute, based in Acre Lane, Brixton, and had gained several followers. But over the years this group dwindled to six women and was transformed into a 'cult of Bala', where his followers were only allowed to read left-wing texts and were sexually assaulted and beaten. Giving evidence, Balakrishnan denied sex assault allegations and insisted two victims in the commune had 'pushed' him to have sex and competed for his attentions, even with the mother of his daughter. He said his views were grounded in the teachings of the Chinese revolutionary leader Chairman Mao which 'meant almost everything to him'...." [Quoted from here; quotation marks altered to conform with conventions adopted at this site. Several paragraphs merged.]
Balakrishnan passed away, and no doubt went to meet The Great Negation In The Sky, in April 2022.
I return to this theme (i.e., widespread sexual abuse on the far left) in Essay Nine Part Two. [See also here and here.]
001a. The following updates were moved here from the main body of the Essay in order to allow it to flow more smoothly.
Update January 2013: As one ex-UK-SWP-er, Tony Collins, noted in relation to the latest crisis in the UK-SWP (quoted earlier):
"The problem is, there is a certain way of seeing any discussion of the far-left that's started by someone who isn't a part of it. He must by definition be an enemy and we must therefore believe he's trying to destroy the left.... That's what happens on the far-left. We sort of have these instinctive reactions. You can see glimpses of this all over the net right now, with SWP members openly attacking each other, something I've not seen ever. There's a cult-like hatred of people who used to be allies." [Quoted from here; accessed 14/01/2013. Bold emphasis added. Paragraphs merged.]
Of course, vitriol like this isn't confined to Marxist circles; it is also be found in rancorous exchanges between feminists, and has been the case for years -- especially now in relation to transgender ideology and 'Intersectionality':
"Yet even as online feminism has proved itself a real force for change, many of the most avid digital feminists will tell you that it's become toxic. Indeed, there's a nascent genre of essays by people who feel emotionally savaged by their involvement in it -- not because of sexist trolls, but because of the slashing righteousness of other feminists. On January 3, for example, Katherine Cross, a Puerto Rican trans woman working on a PhD at the CUNY Graduate Centre, wrote about how often she hesitates to publish articles or blog posts out of fear of inadvertently stepping on an ideological land mine and bringing down the wrath of the online enforcers. 'I fear being cast suddenly as one of the "bad guys" for being insufficiently radical, too nuanced or too forgiving, or for simply writing something whose offensive dimensions would be unknown to me at the time of publication,' she wrote....
"Further, as Cross says, 'this goes to the heart of the efficacy of radical movements.' After all, this is hardly the first time that feminism -- to say nothing of other left-wing movements -- has been racked by furious contentions over ideological purity. Many second-wave feminist groups tore themselves apart by denouncing and ostracizing members who demonstrated too much ambition or presumed to act as leaders. As the radical second-waver Ti-Grace Atkinson famously put it: 'Sisterhood is powerful. It kills. Mostly sisters.' In 'Trashing: The Dark Side of Sisterhood,' a 1976 Ms. magazine article, Jo Freeman described how feminists of her generation destroyed one another. Trashing, she wrote, is 'accomplished by making you feel that your very existence is inimical to the Movement and that nothing can change this short of ceasing to exist. These feelings are reinforced when you are isolated from your friends as they become convinced that their association with you is similarly inimical to the Movement and to themselves. Any support of you will taint them…. You are reduced to a mere parody of your previous self.'
"Like the authors of #Femfuture, Freeman was trashed for presuming to represent feminism without explicit sanction, in this case of the group she'd founded with Shulamith Firestone. It began, she told me, when the left-wing magazine Ramparts published a neck-down picture of a woman in a leotard with a button hanging from one breast. The group decided to write a letter to the editor. Four members drafted one without Freeman's knowledge, and when they presented it to the rest of the group, she realized it was too long and would never be printed. Freeman had magazine experience, and she decided to write a pithier letter of her own under her movement name, Joreen. When Ramparts published it but not the other one, the women in her group were apoplectic, and Freeman was excoriated at their next meeting. 'That was a public trashing,' she says. 'I was horrible, disloyal, a traitor.' It went beyond mere criticism: 'There's a difference between trashing someone and challenging them. You can challenge someone's idea. When you're trashing someone, you're essentially saying they're a bad person.'
"For feminists today, knowing that others have been through similar things is not necessarily comforting. 'Some of it is the product of new technologies that create more shallow relationships, and some of it feels like this age-old conundrum within feminism,' Martin [this is feminist activist, Courtney Martin, mentioned near the beginning of this article -- RL] says. 'How do we disentangle what part is about social media and what part is about the way women interact with one another? If there's something inherent about the way women work within movements that makes us assholes to each other, that is incredibly sad.'" [Michelle Goldberg, quoted from here; accessed 30/01/2014. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site; some links added. Spelling adjusted to agree with UK-English; bold emphases added.]
[As noted above, more-or-less the same can be said about the extreme vitriol and threats of violence now apparent on the left surrounding the 'debate' over LGBTQ gender identity -- although, the intimidation, threats and physical violence are coming from one side only, which is why "debate" has been put in 'scare quotes'. In relation to this, it is difficult to see how those who complain that 'trans women' have been told they aren't 'real women' can possibly argue consistently when they also claim that there are no 'real women' anyway.]
Naturally, in this specific case DM is hardly to blame -- although, as I have pointed out, wherever DM shows its divisive face, it only succeeds in making a bad situation worse. The class origin and current class position of certain feminists is, however, a much more significant factor -- as it is in relation to Dialectical Marxism.
Also as noted above, acrimonious verbal exchanges have taken place, and are still ongoing, in connection with 'Intersectionality' (on that, see, for example, here and here).
Update July 2013: The crisis in the UK-SWP seems to be building again, where the level of vitriol, acrimony and back-biting has been cranked up to eleven:
"Symptomatic of this, the atmosphere in the SWP is becoming fractious and poisonous. Accusations of the hacking of opposition email accounts and epithets like 'malignant tumour' and 'systematic liar' are thick in the air. The responsibility for this criminal, sectarian vandalism lies exclusively with the leadership; the comrades of the opposition, whatever our disagreements with them, are rebelling against a crass bureaucratic regime of an unaccountable, apparatus power. They deserve the solidarity of all partisans of the workers movement." [Quoted from here. I have no way of knowing whether or not these allegations are true, but if they are, it wouldn't surprise me; 'defending our tradition' in such a climate amounts to doing whatever it takes to rubbish, demean, misrepresent or trash 'the opposition'. We saw something similar in the 2016 Labour Party Leadership Election.]
Several more examples of what almost amounts to hate-speech coupled with personal abuse directed at UK-SWP-ers by fellow SWP-ers (and ex-members) can be accessed here, in the main article and in the comments section.
Update October 2013: The leadership of the UK-SWP have just published a 'defence of their conduct (on that, see here). For a response, check this out.
Update December 2013: The UK-SWP held their 2014 Annual Conference several weeks early because of the growing crisis in the party. From Twitter feeds it looks like at least another fifty members have resigned (including one long-standing member, Ian Birchall -- check out his carefully measured resignation letter --, along with several others: Dave Renton, Jonathan Neale, Charlie Hore, Pat Stack, Neil Davidson, and Colin Wilson). These individuals resigned partly as a result of what had been said from the platform about this controversy, and partly because of several related motions that were passed. It is now highly likely that several hundred more members will soon follow them out of the door.
Perhaps more shocking, the following was reported to have been said (from the front) at the conference:
"We aren't rape apologists unless we believe that women always tell the truth -- and guess what, some women and children lie." [Quoted from here. Several other sources on Twitter confirmed this allegation.]
What is even worse still, that comment received a round of applause!
Update 30/12/2013: Indeed, there has now been a mass resignation of 165 members from the SWP.
01. Reactions From Dialecticians
[This forms part of Note 01.]
In response to my trenchant criticisms of DM the main tactic adopted by Dialectical Marxists is to ban me from posting on their discussion boards -- RevLeft, RedMarx and the Association of Musical Marxists(!!) being among the latest to censor me. That would appear to be because I am far too effective at challenging DM (although they will deny this accusation!). In fact, the last two of these sites banned me within a couple of weeks of my first post there (as many Reddit pages have also done). Other sites banned me even when I posted nothing about DM, but simply about science, politics or antitheism -- which I now freely engage in on Quora -- without being banned.
Readers can judge for themselves the extent and depth of my unprincipled and heinous thought crimes and ideological depravity from this thread. [RedMarx has since closed, so this link is now as dead as the ideas it promoted. Revleft is now defunct, too. Update November 2019: RedMarx has now been revived, but I am still banned even before they know what I am going to post!]
This tactic has also been adopted by the break-away UK-SWP site, the International Socialist Network [ISN], clearly bringing their own brand of incipient Stalinism along with them after they exited the UK-SWP.
Yet another 'dialectical success story'?
Update July 11, 2021: John Rees has just blocked me on Twitter! When will I learn not to question the 'sacred dialectic'!? When will these DM-snowflakes toughen up?!
[This also forms part of Note 01.]
Another favourite reaction is for dialectically-distracted comrades to claim that these Essays contain "nothing new", or, that they have been "plagiarised". This is just the latest example of that slur (my reply can be found here).
However, anyone who bothers to check (hopefully with their sectarian and partisan blinders left in the bin) will soon discover that much of the material in my Essays is entirely original. When I have borrowed from others I have invariably acknowledged that fact and given its source.
[If anyone disagrees, please email me with the details and I will not only apologise I will openly and gladly acknowledge the debt.]
However, when those who advance the above accusations are challenged to reveal where these "plagiarised" ideas have ever appeared before, not one of them has responded with the details. Either they can't provide the information or they simply enjoy being enigmatic. I suspect other motives.
One deeply disturbed dialectical dunderhead (if you follow that link, it is the10th post down --, and, again, here) even claimed I hadn't actually written these Essays! Exactly who he imagines is their real author he mysteriously kept to himself, even after being asked.
[Unfortunately, the first two of the above three links are now dead!]
As noted earlier, others claim that I quote the dialectical classics "out of context" (for example, here and here), but when they are asked to provide and/or explain the 'right context' they all fall suspiciously silent.
In fact, in many places I endeavour to quote the entire context (for example, here), but even where I don't, it isn't easy to defend Engels, for instance, from the charge of blatant inconsistency, especially when he tells us the following in one breath:
"Finally, for me there could be no question of superimposing the laws of dialectics on nature but of discovering them in it and developing them from it." [Engels (1976), p.13. Bold emphasis added.]
But then, in the next he says something like this:
"Motion is the mode of existence of matter. Never anywhere has there been matter without motion, nor can there be…. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself; as the older philosophy (Descartes) expressed it, the quantity of motion existing in the world is always the same. Motion therefore cannot be created; it can only be transmitted…. A motionless state of matter therefore proves to be one of the most empty and nonsensical of ideas…." [Ibid., p.74. Bold emphases added. Paragraphs merged.]
[There are in fact scores dogmatic pronouncements like this in Engels's work alone; they have been reproduced here, alongside similar passages from close to a hundred other DM-theorists/authors drawn from all wings of Dialectical Marxism.]
But do we really need much context to appreciate the glaring inconsistency in the above examples? Especially since Engels adopted a traditional approach to Philosophy, one that has been practiced for well over two thousand years, and one that all dialecticians have also adopted (another claim substantiated at length in Essay Two)?
Still other (beleaguered) dialecticians claim they are "too busy" to work their way through these Essays (or even respond to them), a rather odd excuse that doesn't prevent them from advancing baseless accusations about me and my work, copying egregious and glaring errors off one another without having read a single one of my Essays, or, indeed, without checking their facts. [An excellent example of this ignorant response can be found here; a more recent one, here (in the comments section).]
To be sure, no one has to read a single word I write, but any who refuse to read my work will only make fools of themselves if they then post comments on material about which they are totally ignorant.
[Perhaps the worst offender in this regard (a fellow Trotskyist, too!), who posted under the name "Volkov", can be found fabulating away here (alas, that link is now dead -- the entire site was shut down since I was opposing DM rather too effectively!) and at RevLeft under the name "Axel1917". This comrade was an 'expert' in everything I have ever said about DM even though he openly admitted he hadn't read any of my Essays. In addition, he never tired of telling others to avoid my site and avert their tender eyes from my work lest their highly sensitive DM-brains were irreparably harmed by anything I wrote!]
Another excuse often thrown up by the DM-Faithful is that my work is far too long -- a 'fault' that doesn't prevent them wading through hundreds and hundreds of pages of Hegel's 'Logic', or, indeed, Das Kapital. But, once again, that doesn't stop them dismissing my work as a "rant" (another favourite term of abuse), or a "screed" (ditto), even while they continue to pass judgement on the content of my Essays from a position of total ignorance. They even refuse to read the short summaries I have published, and, like the individual mentioned above, regularly warn others to 'stay away' from my site!
Nevertheless, when I post short articles they simply accuse them of being "superficial", and when I post much longer, detailed and carefully-worded Essays, they are deemed "too long", or they are written off as "tedious" and "boring". In fact, dialecticians already "know the truth" --, and it has "set them free" (i.e., "free" from the need to read anything that might challenge their pet theory or disturb their dialectical daydreams).
Continuing with a theme mentioned earlier, because of the highly sectarian nature of Dialectical Marxism, another recent ploy is for DM-fans to argue that while I might have examined the ideas of dialecticians A, B and C, I should rather have focused instead on X, Y and Z. Another will then complain that while I might have studied A, B and X, I should instead have concentrated on C, D, and Z! Yet another will then advise me to confine my attention to A, D, and W..., and so on.
Hence, Trotskyists complain if I quote Stalin or Mao's work; Maoists and Stalinists moan if I do likewise with Trotsky's (or even with "Brezhnev era revisionists"). Non-Leninist Marxists will bemoan the fact that I haven't confined my remarks to Marx's work or Hegel's, advising me to ignore the confused, or even "simplistic", ideas to be found in Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, Stalin, Mao or Trotsky's writings on 'dialectics'!
This is the 'dialectical equivalent' of Whack-A-Mole; just as soon as I criticise DM-theorist A, X pops up and is forced into the discussion followed soon after by W, then Z...
Video Four: 'Whack-A-Dialectician'
Of course, because these most DM-fans haven't read my work, none of them know that I have in fact dealt with A, B, C, D,..., W, X, Y and Z (and that includes Marx and Hegel -- as well as DM-theorists many of my critics have never even heard of!). In fact, since most of the material dialecticians produce is highly repetitive (check out Essay Two for scores of examples!), it often means that reading A's work is tantamount to reading almost everyone else's!
However, the most common complaint on the Internet (especially coming in from academic, or quasi-academic, Marxists) is that I have ignored much more substantive theorists -- such as Lukacs, Marcuse, Adorno, Habermas, Žižek, Ollman, and the like. [I have explained why I have done this, for example, here.] The work of several of these HCD-theorists will be examined in later stages of this project.
[Indeed, significant parts of Ollman's work have already been examined -- as have Marcuse's and Žižek's.]
[This forms part of Note 1.]
This 'friend-or-foe' reaction is rather odd in view of what Engels had to say about rigid dichotomies:
"For a stage in the outlook on nature where all differences become merged in intermediate steps, and all opposites pass into one another through intermediate links, the old metaphysical method of thought no longer suffices. Dialectics, which likewise knows no hard and fast lines, no unconditional, universally valid 'either-or' and which bridges the fixed metaphysical differences, and besides 'either-or' recognises also in the right place 'both this-and that' and reconciles the opposites, is the sole method of thought appropriate in the highest degree to this stage. Of course, for everyday use, for the small change of science, the metaphysical categories retain their validity." [Engels (1954), pp.212-13. Bold emphasis added. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site.]
This "You-are-either-with-us-or-you-are-against-us" mentality plainly runs counter to the above ex cathedra pronouncement, an approach echoed by countless DM-supporters who also endorse this rigid dichotomy. The moral of this tale is that anyone who expects consistency from these characters hasn't been paying attention.
Nevertheless, other than those listed above, the most common reactions to my work (from comrades with whom I have 'debated' this 'theory' on the Internet, or elsewhere) are the following:
(1) The expression of total incredulity that there could possibly be a single genuine Marxist -- let alone a Trotskyist! -- who would think to question this dearly-beloved doctrine, or who claims (as I do) that Philosophy in its entirety is a completely bogus discipline. [Here is a recent example of this frame-of-mind at work on Reddit.] Reactions like this are often accompanied by a parallel accusation that anyone foolish enough to question DM can't be a Marxist, even though Marx himself rejected Philosophy and encouraged others to do likewise!
Naturally, the above response would mean that a definition is what decides who is or who isn't a Marxist (and it is a rather narrow definition, too: i.e., "Only those who don't question tradition are genuine Marxists", an odd attitude for avowed anti-traditionalists to adopt) -- and, incidentally, a 'definition' that totally ignores Lenin's argument that no scientific theory is above criticism.
(2) A claim that dialectics isn't "a royal road to truth", merely a "method". Those who respond this way have plainly failed to notice that it completely undermines its 'objectivity'.
"To be a materialist is to acknowledge objective truth, which is revealed to us by our sense-organs. To acknowledge objective truth, i.e., truth not dependent upon man and mankind, is, in one way or another, to recognise absolute truth." [Lenin (1972), p.148. Bold emphasis added.]
"Knowledge can be useful biologically, useful in human practice, useful for the preservation of life, for the preservation of the species, only when it reflects objective truth, truth which is independent of man." [Ibid., p.157. Bold emphasis added.]
(3) The production of page-after-page of bluster, mis-direction, deflection, (extreme) abuse and misrepresentation.
Indeed, as noted earlier, one leading Marxist Professor of Economics -- Andrew Kliman no less -- told me in an email exchange to "Eat sh*t and die!", either that, or quaff some Hemlock, just because I had the temerity to ask him to explain what a "dialectical contradiction" is, especially when I pointed out that his 'explanation' was defective!
Scatological abuse is, alas, almost de rigueur from such comrades. Here is one of the latest (incoherent) examples. [Unfortunately that link is now dead!] Here is another.
Naturally, thirty years or more of having to face vilification like this would make anyone (other than a 'saint') rather tetchy, if not downright aggressive, in response.
[Once more, I hasten to add that I am not complaining. I expect such dishonest and abusive responses, and for reasons highlighted in Essay Nine Part Two.]
Indeed, on this page the reader will see that my forthright and robust reaction to their underhanded attacks is something DM-fans themselves can't stomach, the poor lambs. Sure, they are 'allowed' to post endless abuse -- and lie about me and my ideas --, but I am supposed to take it lying down and be all sweetness and light in return.
(4) The posing of bemused questions like the following: "What other theories or concepts are there that could possibly account for change?"
The apparent obviousness of the reply that these comrades hope to elicit (viz.: "You're right, there are none, so dialectics must be correct. How foolish have I been!?") is itself a direct result of the conceptual void that DM has created inside each dialectical skull.
As will soon become apparent to anyone who reads the Essays posted at this site (but especially this one), there are in fact countless words and phrases in the vernacular (for instance, nearly every verb and adverb), as indeed there are in the sciences, that enable change of every conceivable kind, variety or complexity to be depicted, studied and thus explained -- and in limitless detail, too. In fact, ordinary words achieve this incomparably better than the lifeless and obscure jargon Hegel concocted in order to fix something that wasn't broken. Every single one of these ordinary terms can be appropriated with ease and used in HM. The vast majority of revolutionary papers already do this. They have to if they want to communicate with workers!
That is, of course, quite apart from the ironic fact that dialectics can't itself explain change!
(5) The hurling of the usual time-honoured slurs in my general direction -- e.g., "hysterical", "mad", "anti-Marxist", "positivist", "sophist", "logic-chopper", "naïve realist", "revisionist", "eclectic", "relativist", "post modernist", "bourgeois stooge", "pedant", "absolutist", "elitist", "empiricist"..., -- to name just a few.
But, when DM-fans are described as "mystics" in return they wax indignant and complain about "name-calling". Once more, they are allowed to dish it out -- but not very well --, while they plainly can't take it in return, poor dears.
(6) The attribution (to me) of ideas I do not hold and which can't reasonably be inferred from anything I have said or written -- e.g., that I am a "postmodernist" (which I am not), an "empiricist" (same comment), a "positivist" (ditto!), a "Popperian" (I am in fact an anti-Popperian), that I am a "sceptic" (that slur cast simply because I challenge accepted dogma, when Marx himself said we should subject everything to ruthless criticism and Lenin declared that all knowledge is provisional), that I am an "anti-realist" (when I am in fact neither a realist nor an anti-realist -- with respect to philosophical theories I am in fact a "nothing-at-all-ist" -- which mustn't be confused with Nihilism, I simply reject all philosophical theories, not 99.9%, but 100%, as incoherent non-sense), that I am a "reformist" (when I am the exact opposite), or that I am a "revisionist" (when Lenin enjoined us all to question accepted theory, and Mao himself, apparently, rejected the NON).
This is just the latest slur levelled on these lines, where a desperate DM-fan alleges that I promote "the sophist confusions of Wittgenstein, as if this is going to lead to the emancipation of the working class" -- even though my signature: "The emancipation of the working class will be an act of the workers themselves" was facing him on the very same page where he posted that comment. Naturally, this comrade predictably failed to inform us what these "sophist confusions" are. [On Wittgenstein, see here.]
Once more, these accusations and allegations are often advanced by comrades who haven't read any of my Essays -- but that doesn't prevent them from being 'experts' about me and my work, still less does it inhibit them from making things up about me. Either that or they have simply skim-read a few random, isolated paragraphs lifted from my work. Naturally, they would be the first to complain if anyone were to do likewise with the writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Mao or Stalin.
[This is just one of the latest examples; here is another.]
Indeed, Engels himself waxed indignant with Dühring over precisely this point:
"In connection with Herr Dühring's examination of the Darwin case, we have already got to know his habit, 'in the interests of complete truth' and because of his 'duty to the public which is free from the bonds of the guilds', of quoting incorrectly. It becomes more and more evident that this habit is an inner necessity of the philosophy of reality, and it is certainly a very 'summary treatment'. Not to mention the fact that Herr Dühring further makes Marx speak of any kind of 'advance' whatsoever, whereas Marx only refers to an advance made in the form of raw materials, instruments of labour, and wages; and that in doing this Herr Dühring succeeds in making Marx speak pure nonsense. And then he has the cheek to describe as comic the nonsense which he himself has fabricated. Just as he built up a Darwin of his own fantasy in order to try out his strength against him, so here he builds up a fantastic Marx. 'Historical depiction in the grand style', indeed!" [Engels (1976), p.159. Bold emphases added. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site.]
While Dühring was rightly pilloried for this, apparently it is perfectly OK for dialecticians to do the same to yours truly!
Here, too, is the late John Molyneux:
"Marxist materialism is repeatedly attacked by the method of oversimplifying and caricaturing it to the point where it is obviously false...." [Molyneux (2012), p.36.]
And yet, that is precisely what he and other DM-fans regularly do when they attempt to summarise, discuss or criticise FL -- or, indeed, my work.
In many cases, the standard displayed by DM-fans who are even prepared to debate DM often sinks to the embarrassing levels regularly plumbed by Creationists -- for instance, here (which was written by a rather benighted Christian Fundamentalist). Alas, this is especially true of the reaction I receive from fellow Trotskyists; here, here, here and here are excellent examples of the crass responses coming in from UK-Trotskyists, who seem quite incapable of defending their 'theory' without resorting to prevarication, deflection, invective, lies and abuse. Indeed, they frequently become highly emotional, irrational, sometimes even childish, and seem content merely to post supercilious remarks in order to deflect from their obvious incapacity to defend DM effectively, or at all. [Rather like Trotsky himself, in fact.]
A recent comment by Owen Jones could very well apply to many of the above comrades:
"Thing is, it always comes across as though they're rattled, rather than proving hurtful, which I suspect is the partial aim. Above all, it's a convenient way of avoiding having to engage with my arguments -- just make it about me and my real motives, and they think their work is done." [Quoted from here; accessed 12/07/2015. Italic emphasis in the original.]
Having said that, there is a major difference between DM-fans and the Creationists alluded to above: the former are far more abusive!
Here, here and here are particularly good examples of abuse from one particular Marxist-Leninist [M-L] comrade -- a serious defect further compounded by this individual's insecure grasp even of DM, a failing only exceeded by his rather tenuous grip on rationality.
[Once again, I'm not complaining about this, I expect it. I am merely highlighting it in order to expose the intellectual bankruptcy displayed by DM-fans.]
Finally, here is a video that severely criticises an Introductory Essay of mine, posted on YouTube in 2015 by another M-L:
Video Five: A Largely Incoherent 'Defence' Of DM
Although the personal attacks on me in this video are few and far between, it is peppered with sarcasm, condescension, distortion, falsehoods and blatant lies --, and, just like the benighted comrade mentioned a few paragraphs back, this M-L clearly doesn't know his own theory too well. For example, he openly admitted he had never heard of 'external contradictions' -- he even implied that I had invented the term(!) -- and this despite the fact that his heroes, Stalin and Mao, used it many times! I have responded to him here, here and here, where I have exposed his frequent errors, his woeful ignorance (even of his own theory!), and his downright lies.
This benighted M-L then published a second, even longer, but highly repetitive and largely incoherent video, to which I have also responded here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here. [I have posted this many responses since the video in question is over an hour long and this M-L doesn't like to read long replies. I have now collated all my responses to him and posted them all here.]
(7) A rejection of the "bourgeois logic" (i.e., modern Fregean and post-Fregean Logic) supposedly used in my work.
This is perhaps one of the oddest responses to my Essays mainly because (i) I use very little FL in my Essays, and (ii) DM-fans who react this way invariably know absolutely no MFL (and, in most cases, they are equally ignorant of AFL!), even while they uncritically swallow the sub-Aristotelian 'logic' permeating Hegel's work.
[FL = Formal Logic; MFL = Modern FL; AFL = Aristotelian FL.]
Hence, for such individuals a lack of specialist knowledge ironically makes each of them an expert logician, which is another 'dialectical' conundrum for readers to ponder.
[A supporter of this site even told John Rees this, to his face, at a UK-SWP public meeting back in 1990. That accusation had no obvious effect on the book he published a few years later --TAR.]
As noted earlier, psychologists have now given this syndrome a name: The Dunning-Kruger Effect -- whereby those who know very little about a given subject are at the same time in the grip of the delusion that they are in fact experts in that very subject! [Although, the evidence supporting that 'effect' is now being subjected to criticism, itself!] Apparently, it also helps explain why so many voted for that serial incompetent and ignorant buffoon, Donald J Trump! By parity of reasoning, this would make George W Bush a leading Theoretical Physicist and the late Ronald Reagan a world-renowned brain surgeon.
Some DM-fans complain even when this is pointed out to them. Here is an excellent example.
In addition, these 'dialectically-debilitating' quirks are often accompanied by ill-informed and misguided comments that malign Wittgenstein as a "bourgeois" apologist, or even a mystic -- as if Hegel himself were a "horny-handed proletarian"!
[On this particular issue, see my Additional Essay, Was Wittgenstein a Leftist? -- the content of which was summarised in an article of mine published by The North Star, here (unfortunately that link is now dead!). However, a version of that article can be accessed here.]
Of course, it is possible to be a totally effective revolutionary socialist while knowing little or no MFL, but if comrades are going to pontificate about it (or even about AFL), they should at least have the decency to learn a little first!
(8) Of late (and as pointed out at the top of this page), desperate defenders of the dialectic have adopted one or more of the following tactics (especially when the ridiculous nature and the absurd consequences of their core belief system have been exposed by yours truly):
(a) They deny that the DM-classics actually say the things alleged of them;
(b) They try to argue that the decidedly odd things we find in the Dialectical Grimoire mustn't be taken literally (they're merely "metaphorical", "hypothetical" or even "whimsical");
(c) They claim that Engels, Plekhanov, Trotsky, Lenin, and Mao aren't DM-authorities. [Yes, they are that desperate!]
They even try to maintain (a) and (b) in the face of chapter and verse (quoted from the DM-classics) that tell a different story (recent examples of this desperate dialectical dodge can be found here, here, here and here). This they do despite the fact that it has been pointed out to them more than once that similar tactics have been adopted by Christians in relation to the ridiculous things we find in The Bible and exposed by the advance of scientific knowledge. To that end, these more open and honest (Christian) mystics then try to sell us the idea that the Book Of Genesis, for instance, is "metaphorical", or 'poetically true'.
In relation to (c), exactly who is to be counted as the authority in matters dialectical the above individuals steadfastly refused to say, even when asked!
So, it seems that DM-supporters will say anything, pull any dodge, try any ploy, invent, lie, twist and turn beyond even the knotted pretzel stage, rather than allow the theory that history has already refuted, even to be slightly questioned.
[An excellent recent example of such dialectical mendacity can be found in the warped logic and frenetic special-pleading found here (posted by one "Gilhyle").]
Figure Six: Dialectical 'Reasoning' -- But Only
After It Has Been Straightened-Out A Little!
Indeed, bourgeois 'spin doctors' seem straight-forward, open, honest and true, in comparison!
(9) Finally, dialectically-distracted comrades more often than not either:
(i) Refuse to respond to the vast majority of my criticisms; they simply ignore them;
(ii) Brand them "nonsense", but refuse to explain why; or,
(iii) Claim that many of my arguments target "strawmen". That accusation, which they always fail to substantiate when challenged, 'allows' them to brush aside the serious difficulties their theory faces, exposed at this site, and then retreat into a protracted dialectical sulk.
[An excellent recent example of option (ii) above can be found here. The individual concerned, who posts under the name "Jochebed 1", said he had read my Essays and then decided they were "unsystematic nonsense". When I pointed out to him that, somewhat miraculously, he had managed to read, in less than an afternoon, all 2.1 million words posted at this site, he went rather quiet. An example of box (iii) idiocy has been posted below. (That 2.1 million word figure is now, of course, badly out of date; the number of words currently exceeds 5.5 million.)]
In fact, the above considerations are reminiscent of the rather pathetic responses extracted during the cross examination of William Jennings Bryan by Clarence Darrow, the defence lawyer in the infamous "Scopes Monkey Trial", held in Tennessee, July 10th to 25th, 1925, summarised for us in the following book review by James Morone:
"But there is also an embarrassing side to Bryan: the 'great commoner' was a Bible-banging fundamentalist. When officials in Dayton, Tennessee decided to roast John Scopes for teaching evolution in 1925, they called in the ageing Bryan to prosecute. The week-long trial became a national sensation and reached its climax when the defence attorney, Clarence Darrow, called Bryan to the stand and eviscerated his Biblical verities. 'Do you believe Joshua made the sun stand still?' Darrow asked sarcastically. 'Do you believe a whale swallowed Jonah? Will you tell us the exact date of the great flood?' Bryan tried to swat away the swarm of contradictions. 'I do not think about things I don't think about,' he said. The New York Times called it an 'absurdly pathetic performance', reducing a famous American to the 'butt of a crowd's rude laughter'. This paunchy, sweaty figure went down as an icon of the cranky right. Today, most Americans encounter the Scopes trial and Bryan himself in a play called Inherit the Wind. I once played the role of Bryan and the director kept saying: 'More pompous Morone. Make him more pompous.'" [James Morone, London Review of Books, 21/02/2008. Italics in the original; links added.]
If my experience is anything to go by, the vast majority of DM-supporters "do not think about things they don't think about", either. An excellent recent series of examples, courtesy of one wing of The Dialectical Know-Nothing Tendency, was kindly provided for us by a comrade operating under the pseudonym "Futurehuman" in The Guardian's comments section -- see, for example, here, here, here, here, here and here. This comrade regularly inflicts on his readers obsolete, confused and dogmatic ideas he encountered as he stumbled through Hegel and Engels's work, all the while, except on one occasion, steadfastly refusing to defend them in the face of my criticism.
[It should be obvious that I have posted there under the pseudonym "RosaL001". Interested readers will need to use the search function in their browsers to locate both sets of comments. At the first of the above links, however, this comrade did initially attempt to post a weak defence of his ideas, but subsequently he seemed content merely to sink into a by-now-familiar dialectical sulk. This comrade is also the author of Malek (2012), about which book I will be commenting in a later re-write of Essay Seven Part One. (By the way, I am not 'doxing' this comrade; in the aforementioned comments pages he openly acknowledges he was the author of the said book. His latest bout of sulking can be found here.]
DM-fans react more-or-less the same way to the numerous fatal defects in their theory highlighted in the Essays published at this site. For example, when confronted with the fact that not all changes in 'quality' are sudden (or, indeed, proceed in "leaps", to use the buzzword) -- e.g., melting metal, glass, rock, plastic, butter, resin, toffee, tar, and chocolate -- DM-fans either ignore them, or they are brushed aside, often for no stated reason. This was indeed the response advanced by one of the leading theorists of the CPGB, with whom I debated this theory/method a few years ago. He seemed to think it a minor point that almost every metal in the universe disobeys Engels's First 'Law' (as, indeed, do all amorphous solids, none of which has a distinct melting point). Moreover, when asked to define the length of a dialectical "node", without fail every single DM-fan I have ever encountered becomes evasive -- either that, or they rapidly change the subject, and then attempt to distract attention from this major hole in their theory -- by focussing on me. A recent example of this well-rehearsed ploy can be found here (in the replies of one, 'redmaterialist').
[There is more on this, here, here and here.]
Any who still doubt these tactics are employed by DM-fans should perhaps consult:
(a) The numerous passages reproduced in the Essays posted at this site;
(b) The material churned-out by any randomly-selected DM-fan; or,
(c) The many discussion boards and Marxist sites that have sprung up on the Internet (for example, this one).
[However, in relation to (b) above, readers should also consult the comments I have added to the end of Note 11, below. (c) Is now out-of-date since most revolutionary discussion boards have closed down. Dialectical success stories everywhere we look, eh, comrades?]
Update 23/03/2010: Perhaps the most desperate slur levelled against me over the last thirty years was the accusation that I am a cop!
2. As is the case with those who spread the message supposedly in that other 'holy book', The Bible, the DM-faithful seem to think that only heretics, or even sworn enemies, would want to alter, revise, or add to the content of the sacred 'dialectical canon'. One can well imagine a Christian (or even Muslim) Fundamentalist saying something like the following: "Why clarify the Word of God? Who are you to presume to know better than the Lord and His Holy Prophets? You can't improve on perfection...", etc., etc.
While dialecticians certainly give some thought to DM, and endeavour to debate it among themselves, internal dialogue is heavily constrained by social, organisational and psychological factors analysed elsewhere at this site (for example, in Essay Nine Part Two).
However, this at least helps explain why:
(i) DM-literature, almost in its entirety, is extremely repetitive;
(ii) DM-supporters en masse tend to employ almost exactly the same phrases and rhetorical flourishes (which more often than not simply amount to lengthy, almost word-for-word, quotes and paraphrases of Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, or Mao), which, they hope, openly advertises their 'orthodoxy'; and why,
(iii) The entire DM-canon covers an extremely narrow range of topics (which also helps explain item (i) above).
For instance, the vast majority of DM-fans illustrate Engels's 'Three Laws' with the same hackneyed examples (boiling water, balding heads, plants negating seeds, Mendeleyev's Table, the link between North and South poles of a magnet, wave-particle duality -- and, of course, those pesky Mamelukes), despite the fact that it is relatively easy to show that those 'Laws' fail to work even there!
In addition, we are informed by one and all of the "limitations" of FL (and this by comrades who can't even get Aristotle right!), that "internal contradictions" motivate every instance of change throughout the entire universe, for all of time, while, in the same breath, DM-fans will swear blind they haven't "imposed" dialectics on nature! Hoary old DM-clichés like these are dusted off, year-in-year-out, as if they are still cutting edge science/philosophy, when they are more accurately to be described as Mickey Mouse Science and Minnie Mouse Philosophy -- and rightly so.
[Apologies for those mixed metaphors!]
It also helps explain why DM-fans refuse to confront ideas they can't handle, or why they pretend that there are no genuine problems with their theory. Any such 'difficulties' (where they are even so much as reluctantly or partially acknowledged) are almost invariably rejected out-of-hand, and for no good reason -- other than, of course, to point out that since these 'difficulties' are incompatible with the edicts promulgated by the Dialectical Founding Fathers, they must be false. End of story. Move on. Nothing to see here...
[The knee-jerk responses from this comrade serve as an excellent example of the above impregnable (but imaginary) 'dialectical redoubt'.]
Or, as noted earlier, it is also assumed -- without any evidence -- that every DM-critic must have questionable, if not sinister, ulterior motives. This has perhaps been one of the most frequent reactions to my work. [It certainly motivates the vast majority of the responses listed here.] Failing that, spurious reasons are invented in order to explain why dialectics "hasn't been disproved" by my Essays. [Three excellent recent examples of this type of reaction can be accessed here, here and here -- with a least a dozen such in the comment section under this video in response to my remarks.]
2a. Some might question the assertion that DM hasn't changed much in over 150 years, arguing on the contrary that DM is a vibrant, changing, developing theory/method. [An excellent recent example of this counter-claim can be found here.] Admittedly, there have been a few peripheral tweaks and minor changes, but when even these are examined closely they merely amount to minor, insignificant elaborations of the 'eternal truths' laid down by Hegel, Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin and Mao. Where there have been what appear to be more significant changes (for example, when the NON has been binned by this or that dialectician), those responsible such ideological treachery are anathematised with accusations of "Revisionism!" by The Guardians Of The Sacred Dialectical Flame.
[This topic has been discussed in greater detail in several Essays at this site, particularly Essay Thirteen Part One. See also Note 5, below.]
Academic Marxism [AM] is, of course, an entirely different matter, but since that Dialectical Dead End is irrelevant, both to revolutionary socialism and the class war, I have largely ignored it. In order to appreciate just how useless a discipline AM is, readers should check out a 'debate' I had with a fan of 'Systematic Dialectics' in 2019-20. Failing that, they might like to struggle through Zizek (2012, 2015) and Bhaskar (1993). A bottle of Jack Daniels might help.
3. In general, it is far from easy for dialecticians to accept (or process) the accusation that DM is a dogmatic, backward-looking theory, even after it has been pointed out to them and substantiated with a veritable mountain of evidence. In fact, it is nigh on impossible for them to acknowledge that easily demonstrated fact -- nor yet appreciate its significance. That is partly related to:
(a) The dogmatic and a priori style of reasoning adopted by every single DM-theorist (which means it has become the norm and so doesn't stand out); and,
(b) The fact that, after 2400+ years of Traditional Thought (where this dogmatic approach to Philosophy is de rigueur), this style of reasoning has become part of the philosophical furniture, as it were. In fact, this approach has been with us for so long that few notice it or recognise it for what it is (even though Kant highlighted its pernicious influence over two centuries ago (Kant (1953)). A priori dogmatism thus seems quite normal, natural and uncontroversial in the opinion of most DM-fans, and, of course, in the eyes of Traditional Thinkers. In this way, the ideas of the ruling-class, alongside the a priori methods invented and used to great effect by their "prize fighters", percolated into Dialectical Marxism, with no one in the movement batting an eye!
Quite the reverse in fact; ruling-class forms-of-thought have found some of their most enthusiastic and determined supporters/defenders among the DM-faithful. [This is especially the case with respect to those who hail from the HCD-Tendency -- i.e., by-and-large AM's.]
The above allegations are relatively easy to explain, too, in view of the class origin or current class position of the overwhelming majority of Dialectical Marxism's leaders and most important theorists. A recent example of this can be found here (more specifically here, and in the ensuing discussion), as well as here. A more pernicious and insidious set of examples of this malaise can be accessed here, here and here.
As far as (a) above is concerned, while DM-supporters never tire of telling us that they most definitely do not impose their ideas on nature and society (adding that DM isn't a "master key" capable of unlocking the deepest secrets of the universe), that isn't what they actually do. Dialecticians en masse readily foist their theory on nature and society. [That allegation has been fully substantiated in Essay Two.]
For instance, DM-apologists don't usually regard Lenin's philosophical work as an example of dogmatic reasoning. On the contrary, they see it as a genuine contribution to science -- or at least to philosophy and revolutionary theory.
But, that is despite the fact that Lenin didn't even attempt to marshal any supporting evidence for the things he so boldly asserted (for example, in his Philosophical Notebooks [PN]), and in spite of the fact that he affirmed the truth of numerous universal, all-embracing 'propositions', which he confidently declared were applicable to all of reality, for all of time, when it is clear that no amount of evidence would prove sufficient to substantiate claims like that. It can be seen, too, when Lenin claimed, for instance, that dialectics reflects the "eternal development of the world". [PN, p.110.] He even contradicted the usual DM-claim that dialectics isn't a "master-key" capable of unlocking the door to universal, a priori knowledge when he said this:
"The identity of opposites…is the recognition…of the contradictory, mutually exclusive, opposite tendencies in all phenomena and processes of nature…. The condition for the knowledge of all processes of the world in their 'self-movement', in their spontaneous development, in their real life, is the knowledge of them as a unity of opposites. Development is the 'struggle' of opposites…. [This] alone furnishes the key to the self-movement of everything existing…." [Lenin (1961), pp.357-58. Bold emphasis alone added.]
A key that unlocks universal secrets like the above is different from a "master key" in name alone. As should seem clear, these are the sorts of things that only a deity could possibly know.
In fact, as noted earlier, dialecticians can still be found who will read the following passage from Engels and will fail to notice (or they will even deny!) that it is as good an example of a priori dogmatics, imposed on the world, as one could wish to find:
"Never anywhere has there been matter without motion, nor can there be…. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself…." [Engels (1976), p.74. Bold emphases added.]
A few pages later Engels even added the following:
"Finally, for me there could be no question of building the laws of dialectics on nature but of discovering them in it and developing them from it." [Ibid., p.13. Bold emphasis added.]
So, even Engels was oblivious of what he was doing!
Nor will they view the following comment of Trotsky's in this way, as a priori dogmatics:
"[A]ll bodies change uninterruptedly in size, weight, colour etc. They are never equal to themselves…. [T]he axiom 'A' is equal to 'A' signifies that a thing is equal to itself if it does not change, that is, if it does not exist…. For concepts there also exists 'tolerance' which is established not by formal logic…, but by the dialectical logic issuing from the axiom that everything is always changing…. Hegel in his Logic established a series of laws: change of quantity into quality, development through contradiction, conflict and form, interruption of continuity, change of possibility into inevitability, etc…." [Trotsky (1971), pp.64-66. Bold emphases added.]
Of course, Hegel 'established' no such thing. He, too, derived this 'law' from a superficial consideration of what water supposedly does when it is heated or cooled, and from that 'truly impressive array of evidence' he extrapolated this idea across the entire universe, for all of time. Trotsky simply took Hegel at his word and failed to subject that Christian mystic's Mickey Mouse Science to the sort of critical scrutiny he applied, for example, to reformism and Stalinism.
Or, this from Mao:
"The law of contradiction in things, that is, the law of the unity of opposites, is the basic law of materialist dialectics.... As opposed to the metaphysical world outlook, the world outlook of materialist dialectics holds that in order to understand the development of a thing we should study it internally and in its relations with other things; in other words, the development of things should be seen as their internal and necessary self-movement, while each thing in its movement is interrelated with and interacts on the things around it. The fundamental cause of the development of a thing is not external but internal; it lies in the contradictoriness within the thing. There is internal contradiction in every single thing, hence its motion and development.... The universality or absoluteness of contradiction has a twofold meaning. One is that contradiction exists in the process of development of all things, and the other is that in the process of development of each thing a movement of opposites exists from beginning to end.... There is nothing that does not contain contradictions; without contradiction nothing would exist.... Thus it is already clear that contradiction exists universally and is in all processes, whether in the simple or in the complex forms of motion, whether in objective phenomena or ideological phenomena.... Contradiction is universal and absolute, it is present in the process of the development of all things and permeates every process from beginning to end...." [Mao (1964c), pp.311-18. Bold emphases added; paragraphs merged.]
Subsequent DM-fans have simply continued in the same vein; there are in fact countless examples of a priori dogmatics like this in both the Dialectical Classics and the writings of 'lesser' DM-luminaries.
The above ideas weren't discovered by scientists, either, and neither were they derived from the evidence available even in Hegel's day; the same is still the case with the greatly increased body of scientific knowledge now available. On the contrary, they were all concocted by ancient and early modern mystics (like Heraclitus, who effortlessly 'derived' a universal thesis, true for all of space and time, from a "thought experiment" about stepping into a river!). They too did this before there was any evidence to speak of. Naturally, this means that there is no DM-'Law' that represents a 'summary of the evidence', as is often claimed. How, for example, could Engels's pronouncements about matter and motion have been derived from what was known in the 19th century? Or, for that matter, even from contemporary science?
"Never anywhere has there been matter without motion, nor can there be…. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself…." [Engels (1976), p.74. Bold emphases added.]
Worse still, it turns out that what little evidence DM-theorists have scraped-together in support of their hyper-bold, universalist claims, actually fails to support their theory (as my Essays have shown -- particularly Essay Seven Part One).
If Lenin's philosophical dogmatism is now contrasted with his other, more tempered claims -- where he insists that science is only ever partially true and is always revisable -- the above examples of hyperbolic dialectical exaggeration are all the more reprehensible.
"…[the] basis of philosophical materialism and the distinction between metaphysical materialism and dialectical materialism. The recognition of immutable elements…and so forth, is not materialism, but metaphysical, i.e., anti-dialectical, materialism…. Dialectical materialism insists on the approximate, relative character of every scientific theory of the structure of matter and its properties; it insists on the absence of absolute boundaries in nature, on the transformation of moving matter from one state into another." [Lenin (1972), p.312. Bold emphasis added. Several more DM-passages that say the same sort of thing have been posted here.]
Hence, it is difficult to see how Lenin could possibly have asserted (with such confidence) the universal and omnitemporal validity of DM-precepts while at the same time maintaining the belief that DM hasn't been imposed on reality -- and while holding the idea that knowledge in general is only ever partial, approximate and relative. Especially when he also said things like the following:
"What Marx and Engels criticise most sharply in British and American socialism is its isolation from the working-class movement. The burden of all their numerous comments on the Social-Democratic Federation in Britain and on the American socialists is the accusation that they have reduced Marxism to a dogma, to 'rigid orthodoxy', that they consider it 'a credo and not a guide to action'." [Lenin, 'Preface to the Russian Translation of Letters by Johannes Becker, Joseph Dietzgen, Frederick Engels, Karl Marx, and Others to Friedrich Sorge and Others', 1907, quoted from here. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site. Bold emphasis and link added. Italic emphases in the original.]
"[Marxism is] [a]bsolutely hostile to all abstract formulas and to all doctrinaire recipes...." [Lenin, quoted from here. Bold emphasis added.]
A point echoed by George Novack:
"A consistent materialism can't proceed from principles which are validated by appeal to abstract reason, intuition, self-evidence or some other subjective or purely theoretical source. Idealisms may do this. But the materialist philosophy has to be based upon evidence taken from objective material sources and verified by demonstration in practice...." [Novack (1965), p.17. Bold emphases added.]
Contrast the above with the following:
"In the first conception of motion, self-movement, its driving force, its source, its motive, remains in the shade (or this source is made external -- God, subject, etc.). In the second conception the chief attention is directed precisely to knowledge of the source of 'self'-movement. The first conception is lifeless, pale and dry. The second is living. The second alone furnishes the key to the 'self-movement' of everything existing; it alone furnishes the key to the 'leaps,' to the 'break in continuity,' to the 'transformation into the opposite,' to the destruction of the old and the emergence of the new. The unity (coincidence, identity, equal action) of opposites is conditional, temporary, transitory, relative. The struggle of mutually exclusive opposites is absolute, just as development and motion are absolute." [Lenin (1961), pp.357-58. Bold emphases alone added. Paragraphs merged. Quotation marks altered to conform with the conventions adopted at this site.]
None of this looks at all "relative" and non-dogmatic --, especially the items Lenin calls "absolute". All have been derived from "principles which are validated by appeal to abstract reason, intuition, self-evidence or some other subjective or purely theoretical source".
So, when it comes to DM, it is open season and everyone has a licence to impose their ideas on nature and society even though they have been derived in the above way. As we will see, in relation to dialectics, Lenin was quite capable of dogmatising alongside the best, imposing the results on 'reality'. So was Novack.
It could be objected that revision doesn't mean abandonment of the theoretical gains of the past; scientific development builds on the advances achieved by previous generations. It spirals in on the truth.
Or so it could be argued...
The picture is in fact far more complex than that, as will be argued in Essay Thirteen Part Two, and yet the truth is that if anyone tries to argue with the DM-faithful that their theory/method can be, or should be, even so much as slightly revised -- in line with Lenin's advice, even with respect to the minutest of details -- they risk being assailed with what is perhaps the most powerful word in the DM-book-of-tricks: "Revisionist!", and the DM-Inquisition will be on their case. [On whether science 'spirals' in on the truth', see Essay Ten Part One.]
Dialecticians manifestly pay lip-service to Lenin's more modest claims (as, indeed, he did, too!). Clearly, what he said applies to everyone else, not DM-apologists; to every other theory, not theirs. Perish the thought!
In fact, no amount of evidence could substantiate the sort of universal claims Lenin, Engels, Plekhanov, Dietzgen, Stalin, Mao and Trotsky repeatedly asserted about all of reality, for all of time.
In this regard, it is instructive to contrast dogmatic dialectical discourse like this with, say, the much more measured, genuinely scientific approach found, for example, in Darwin's careful, empirically-based classic, On The Origin Of Species.
Admittedly, PN wasn't meant for publication, but this quasi-theological aspect of dialectics is present in, and actually dominates, every single published DM-text (including MEC), as Essay Two has shown (and that includes the countless pro-DM articles one can find these days on-line).
More recently, this a priori dogmatic approach to knowledge is especially to be found in the dialectical musings of Gerry Healy, CLR James, and Raya Dunayevskaya. It seems that among HCD practitioners of 'Systematic Dialectics' and AMs (e.g., Tony Smith, Chris Arthur, Bertell Ollman, Slavoj Žižek, etc., etc.) dogmatism is still as mandatory as it is unquestioned.
In fact, it is impossible to find a single DM-text that doesn't slip into priori dogmatics mode at the drop of a (radical) principle.
[And I challenge any of my readers to show otherwise; and who think they can should email me with their best shot. Option (b) from earlier is dissected in more detail in Essay Twelve Part One.]
3a. Although it was published nearly forty years ago, Gollobin's book is a long, detailed, first rate example of this supine approach to Holy DM-Writ. RIRE is another example of this futile attempt to breath life into this moribund theory. More-or-less the same can be said of John Molyneux's recent, but mercifully much shorter, contribution -- as well as this article of his, and this reply to it.
In fact, and in direct response to several recent posts of mine, this site thought it timely to publish yet another rendition of The Dialectical Catechism for the faithful to meditate upon, perhaps as a prophylactic measure to ward off my evil influence -- indeed, as I pointed out at the time:
I can only think that you are publishing all this material on dialectics as some sort of response to my recent demolition of one of its core ideas -- that is, I have been able to show that if this 'theory' were true, change would be impossible. So reproducing the above material is no more of an effective response than it would be for Christian Fundamentalists to publish passages from the Book of Genesis on-line in response to Darwin. This 'theory' has been thoroughly demolished at my site. Get over it. [Paragraphs merged.]
4. Again, experience on the Internet suggests that not only are DM-acolytes impervious to argument, they are living disproof of their claim that everything is always changing. They never do and apparently never will. It looks like a whole generation of DM-supporters might have to 'join their ancestors' before fresh theoretical air is allowed to filter into Marxism.
However, I, for one, will not be holding my breath waiting for that to happen. [No pun intended.]
5. As noted above, the accusation that DM hasn't changed significantly in over a hundred years will be substantiated in Essay Thirteen Part One.
This rather bold and controversial claim is often contested by DM-apologists, who then point to examples drawn from the development of Marxist social, political and economic theory since the turn of the previous century. However, the above allegation was directed solely at DM, not HM, in which case appealing to advances in HM is hardly relevant.
Another aspect of the defensive approach adopted by dialecticians is the fact that few of them fail to point out that hostile critics of Dialectical Marxism always seem to attack 'the dialectic'. This then allows them to brand all such detractors as "bourgeois apologists", which in turn means that whatever the latter say can safely be ignored as, 'plainly', partisan and ideological.
[This is the DM-equivalent of the Roman Catholic Church's old Index of Forbidden Books.]
But, it has surely escaped their attention that the reason 'the dialectic' is attacked by friend and foe alike is that it is by far-and-away the weakest and most lamentably feeble area of traditional 'Marxist Philosophy'. Far from it being an "abomination" to the bourgeoisie (even though the State Capitalist rulers of Eastern Europe, the former USSR, Maoist China and North Korea are, or were, rather fond of it, as are those sections of the bourgeoisie that publish books and articles on dialectics, or, indeed, on 'Marxist Philosophy'), 'the dialectic' has in fact helped visit an abomination on revolutionary socialism.
So, our enemies attack dialectics precisely because they think they have found our Achilles Heel.
Whereas, revolutionaries (like the present writer) criticise it for the opposite reason: to rid Marxism of its Achilles Heel.
Admittedly, Trotsky tried to respond to general criticisms of 'the dialectic' coming in from former believers (for want of a better term), along the following lines:
"Anyone acquainted with the history of the struggles of tendencies within workers' parties knows that desertions to the camp of opportunism and even to the camp of bourgeois reaction began not infrequently with rejection of the dialectic. Petty-bourgeois intellectuals consider the dialectic the most vulnerable point in Marxism and at the same time they take advantage of the fact that it is much more difficult for workers to verify differences on the philosophical than on the political plane. This long known fact is backed by all the evidence of experience." [Trotsky (1971), p.94. Bold emphasis added.]
But, Trotsky's rebuttal works both ways, for if it is difficult for workers to verify the "differences" he mentions, then that clearly allows others (such as party leaders, party hacks and party theorists) to manipulate workers with ideas they don't understand (that isn't to disparage workers -- no one understands DM), or can't check. And, far from it being the case that only workers find it hard to defend this 'theory'/'method' -- or even understand it, for goodness sake(!) -- DM-theorists themselves have shown that they, too, don't understand it (as these Essays have also repeatedly demonstrated, particularly this one)! That isn't because it is a difficult theory to grasp; it is because it is based on incomprehensible Hegelian gobbledygook (upside down and the 'right way up').
However, as the Essays published at this site also show, there is now no good reason to cling to these vague and confused DM-fantasies, even though there are easily identifiable psychological and ideological motivating factors that help explain why they are, have been, and will continue to be embraced by the DM-faithful.
Hence, the conclusion is inescapable: petty-bourgeois and de-classé revolutionaries maintain their commitment to this misbegotten, mystical set of ideas for contingent psychological, opportunist and ideological reasons, and for no other. [Again, I have fully substantiated those accusations in Essay Nine Parts One and Two.]
[The "Ah, but what about 1917?" reply/defence has also been neutralised, here.]
The class origin and current class position of comrades like Trotsky works against them, as well. After all, they, too, aren't above (i.e., they aren't exempt from) Marx's declaration that:
"It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness." [Marx (1987), p.263.]
[The "Ah, but that's just crude reductionism!" riposte has also been neutralised, here.]
5a. Those who object to my alleged reliance on 'bourgeois thinkers', 'theory' and/or philosophy should read this and then perhaps think again.
There is a notable exception to this negative assessment (i.e., that DM-fans are woefully ignorant of MFL and Analytic Philosophy); one comrade has openly declared on the Internet that he is "learning logic" so that he can respond to, or even neutralise, my criticisms.
[That declaration can be found here, along with my reply, here (as well as in subsequent posts on the same page). In fact, the Maoists at that site were considerably more comradely toward me than most of my fellow Trotskyists have been!]
Update September 2024: Over seventeen years later and still no sign of this comrade with his newfound expertise in logic!
Not that it will do her/him much good; very little of my case against DM relies on FL!
6. Some readers might be surprised to find little or no discussion or analysis of AM at this site --, particularly the work of theorists like Lukács, Sartre, Althusser, Derrida, Žižek, and the 'Frankfurt School' -- or, indeed, the work of 'Continental Philosophers' in general --, or even much of what passes for 'Systematic Dialectics'.
That is because:
(a) The vast bulk of the above work relates to issues that are connected with, or are integral to, HM;
(b) Both revolutionary socialism and the class war have largely been unaffected by AM (whatever deleterious effect it might have had on the minds of highly educated and otherwise politically astute comrades); and,
(c) I can make little sense of much that passes for 'theory' in this genre. [On that, see Chomsky's comments, re-posted here.]
Indeed, most of the material that has so far emerged from this 'tradition' strikes me as little more than the systematic production of convoluted prose, impenetrable jargon, and then more of the same in order to 'explain', or comment on, the latest batch of gobbledygook produced earlier, or by others! This theoretical briar patch is littered with ideas and concepts that are about as comprehensible and transparent as the average theological treatise on the 'Incarnation' of Christ. This current in Marxism is in effect a sort of 'woollier-than-thou' approach to Theory.
Hume's bonfire has never been more sorely needed...
[Some have taken exception to that comment since it appears to resemble illiberal and intolerant attempts to burn books, but it shouldn't be taken literally. It amounts to little more than "Consign these works to the stack/basement area of the library to gather dust!" Or even "Leave them to the gnawing criticism of the mice."]
Marx likened Philosophy to masturbation (or, rather, he said that it stood to science as masturbation does to sexual love), which is why he advised anyone who will listen to "Leave philosophy aside" and "Leap out of it". Contrary to that, the above thinkers appear for all the world to be engaged in their own collective 'circle-jerk', which is probably why their influence on the class struggle has been close to zero, and will no doubt approach zero asymptotically as their writings become ever more prolix over time; and, of course, as the working-class continues to grow and continues to ignore them en masse.
Having said that, much of what is concluded in Essay Twelve (i.e., about the ruling-class origin of Traditional Thought) also applies to this highly insular body of 'Dialectical Marxist Theory', as well as those who seem determined to keep churning out yet more of it.
[A summary of the above Essay can be accessed here. In fact, Marx abandoned Philosophy, root-and-branch, by the late 1840s, and advised others to do likewise. On that see here and here.]
7. These Essays have been written from the perspective of a specific current in Analytic Philosophy -- and, it is worth adding, it represents a minority and highly unpopular viewpoint among Analytic Philosophers these days, too! However, since the vast majority of DM-fans, sadly, have virtually no background in this area, many of the points made at this site have had to be pitched at a very basic level. Professional Philosophers will, therefore, find much here somewhat superficial, and which might even irritate them. That, however, is their problem. As I have already pointed out, this site isn't aimed at them.
In addition, I have endeavoured to write much of this material with the following thought in mind: "If this or that passage isn't accessible to ordinary working people, re-write it!" Now, I don't think for one second that I have everywhere succeeded in achieving that level of clarity or directness, but most of the material at this site has been written and re-written well over fifty times (and that figure is no exaggeration!) with that goal in mind. This process will continue indefinitely. Naturally, it is for members of the target audience (i.e., working people, should they ever read these Essays!) to decide if I have succeeded or failed in achieving my stated aim.
Indeed, and in this respect, I am happy to be judged by them alone.
Even though the content of this site has been influenced by Frege and Wittgenstein's work, it also strives to remain consistent with HM. That will strike some readers as an impossible (if not a pointless) task. That misapprehension has also been addressed in another Essay published at this site.
8. There is virtually no chance that DM-fans will give the material published at this site a fair hearing -- or, in many cases, any at all! In fact, after over thirty-five years, and of the hundreds of DM-fans (again, no exaggeration!) with whom I have 'debated' this 'theory', I can count the number of comrades who have engaged fairly with me (that is, without them resorting to knee-jerk rejection, fabrication, abuse, lies or slander) on the fingers of a severely mutilated hand.
It is worth recalling that, according to DM, progress can only be made as a result of internally-generated contradictions -- i.e., in this case, contradictions exposed by someone inside the movement, one presumes. That is why a naive observer might be tempted to conclude that, because of such a theory of change, the DM-faithful would welcome these Essays. But, if there are any such observers, they will be sorely mistaken. Nevertheless, it is also why these Essays won't be favourably received. Not even DM-fans can afford to put their theory of 'change through contradiction' into practice by allowing their ideas to be contradicted themselves!
The problem with dialecticians (in this respect) is that they don't (or perhaps can't) recognize the glaring 'contradictions' in DM (or they brush them aside with what I have elsewhere called the "Nixon defence").
As far as change is concerned, this can only mean that:
(i) Their theory can't actually develop (that is, according to their own theory of change it can't do so if it has no 'internal contradictions'); or,
(ii) If they refuse to examine the glaring 'contradictions' I have exposed, their theory of change itself must be defective, since this must mean these 'internal contradictions' don't in fact change anything!
But, if their theory of change is misguided (i.e., if these 'internal contradictions' don't in the end cause change), then dialecticians can safely ignore any 'contradictions' I point out, including this one!
[Even that will sail over their heads!]
Of course, if DM can't change (presumably that will be because, for the first time in history, human beings have invented a perfect theory/method with no 'internal contradictions'!), it would imply DM is absolutely true, and Lenin's claim that all knowledge is relative and incomplete is itself mistaken!
Whichever way we turn, core DM-doctrines take hit after hit.
In that case, DM-theorists should welcome the many 'contradictions' I have exposed in their theory, even if only to save it from such easy refutation! Unfortunately, however, that particular outcome would sink their theory even faster!
[This rather ironic, but fatal, dilemma has been tweaked some more here and here.]
8a. Of course, that depends on how the word "successful" is understood. Unfortunately, however, on any reasonable interpretation of that term, this allegation (i.e., that of all the major political ideologies and/or movements in history, Dialectical Marxism is among the least successful) turns out to be true. [On that, see Essay Ten Part One.]
8b. It is worth underlining yet again that I am not blaming all our woes on dialectics. I have to keep repeating this caveat since comrades who read my Essays still persist in claiming -- deliberately, it now has to be concluded --, that I am blaming the failure of Dialectical Marxism solely on DM, no matter how many times they are told otherwise!
What I am doing is claiming that this 'theory' is partly responsible for the long-term failure of Dialectical Marxism.
[The extent to which I think this is the case is explained in Essays Nine Part Two and Ten Part One.]
9. Since beginning this project I have discovered a number of similar points raised in Eric Petersen's excellent, The Poverty Of Dialectical Materialism, which I first read in January 2005 -- although, having said that, readers should ignore what Petersen has to say about Philosophy in Chapter 2 and Logic in Appendix A. Apart from those two 'glitches', I can highly recommend his book.
Also, in early 2005, I happened across the work of Denis Tourish and Tim Wohlforth. Their invaluable study -- On The Edge: Political Cults Right And Left -- greatly amplifies many of the points I have made here about sectarianism, etc.
It needs adding, though, that I completely distance myself from what they have to say about Leninism.
[A summary of Tourish's ideas can be accessed here.]
10. However, DM itself still seems to be alive and well in China (boosted no doubt by its close affinity with Daoism). Because of that, I have consulted several books on 'Chinese Dialectics', which have been written or translated into English. [I have said more about this topic in Essays Thirteen Part Three and Three Part Two. A detailed survey of the close link there exists between Daoism and Maoist 'Dialectics' can now be accessed here.]
10a. This includes links to numerous Wikipedia articles -- however, many turn their noses up at material published by that on-line Encyclopedia. Despite this, where my own area of expertise is concerned, (i.e., Mathematics and Philosophy) Wikipedia, although superficial, is generally reliable. On the few occasions where I disagree with what it has to say I have explained why in one or two of my Essays, or in the relevant discussion section over at Wikipedia itself -- for example, here. In which case, I have no reason in general to question other pages where my expertise is lacking. Even so, there are no other sources on the Internet that are anywhere near as comprehensive or as accessible. Indeed, when this project began Wikipedia was virtually the only on-line source of this sort.
Nevertheless, as I have noted in the main body of this Essay, where possible I am progressively replacing Wikipedia links with those that connect to more widely acceptable or authoritative alternatives. If readers know of still others, I'd appreciate it if they informed me of them! Having said that, I have left Wikipedia links in that connect to articles that don't deal with controversial issues (or at least those that not even the most rabid DM-supporter would complain about). Fortunately, or unfortunately, Wikipedia pages are continually being altered, edited or revised. I have generally made a note of this wherever I have linked to such pages, and where I am aware of any substantive changes.
Finally, where possible or relevant I have linked to articles published by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy [SEP], the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy [IEP] and the Encyclopedia Britannica [EB]. in addition, I have also linked to specialist sites promoting MFL, Analytic Philosophy, the History of Philosophy and Contemporary Science. I have also linked to, or posted, dozens of (accredited) YouTube videos (in the majority of cases those that have been produced by qualified or famous scientists and/or philosophers). All this is in addition to referencing hundreds of books and articles that support what I have argued or which further develop any points I am trying to make.
11. That is, of course, why Trotskyist bookshops (such as Bookmarks in London) find they can sell works written by STDs and MISTs.
However, the comments in the main body of this Essay aren't meant to suggest that Trotskyism and Stalinism are literally Siamese twins. Far from it. At least as far as a consistent, determined commitment to international revolution and the self-emancipation of the working class are concerned (among many other issues!), the two couldn't be further apart. Nevertheless, in relation to their adherence to, and promotion of, DM it is difficult to slip a party card between them.
[That controversial claim has been substantiated in Essays Two and Nine Part Two.]
12. On Internet discussion boards this has perhaps been one of the hardest messages to get across, not least because comrades there tend to accept the traditional belief that Marxism actually needs a 'philosophy' of its own. Why that is so is seldom ever raised. [The few arguments that have been advanced in its favour are critically examined in Essay Twelve Part One.]
Nevertheless, it is often assumed that if I query a specific 'philosophical' theory I must therefore accept its opposite (which I never do -- I invariably reject both). In fact, we no more need Philosophy than we need Religion:
"Feuerbach's great achievement is.... The proof that philosophy is nothing else but religion rendered into thought and expounded by thought, i.e., another form and manner of existence of the estrangement of the essence of man; hence equally to be condemned...." [Marx (1975b), p.381. I have used the on-line version, here. Bold emphasis and link added.]
Moreover, the ubiquity of religious beliefs and philosophical theories (in class society) shouldn't fool us into thinking they are either inevitable or necessary to 'the human condition'.
Indeed, as Essay Twelve points out, because Traditional Thought represents and expresses ruling-class interests and Theology and Philosophy employ dogmatic theories of one sort or another -- which approach is in turn based on the unsupported belief that there is an underlying "rational" order accessible to thought alone -- both Theology and Philosophy are the result of what turn out to be analogous alienated social conditions. As Marx pointed out:
"We have shown that thoughts and ideas acquire an independent existence in consequence of the personal circumstances and relations of individuals acquiring independent existence. We have shown that exclusive, systematic occupation with these thoughts on the part of ideologists and philosophers, and hence the systematisation of these thoughts, is a consequence of division of labour, and that, in particular, German philosophy is a consequence of German petty-bourgeois conditions. The philosophers have only to dissolve their language into the ordinary language, from which it is abstracted, in order to recognise it, as the distorted language of the actual world, and to realise that neither thoughts nor language in themselves form a realm of their own, that they are only manifestations of actual life." [Marx and Engels (1970), p.118. Bold emphasis added.]
"The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance. The individuals composing the ruling class possess among other things consciousness, and therefore think. Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch.'" [Ibid., pp.64-65, quoted from here. Bold emphasis added.]
"In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or -- this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms -- with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure. In studying such transformations it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic or philosophic -- in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out. Just as one does not judge an individual by what he thinks about himself, so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by its consciousness, but, on the contrary, this consciousness must be explained from the contradictions of material life, from the conflict existing between the social forces of production and the relations of production." [Marx (1968), pp.181-82. Bold emphasis added.]
"...philosophy is nothing else but religion rendered into thought and expounded by thought, i.e., another form and manner of existence of the estrangement of the essence of man; hence equally to be condemned...." [Marx (1975b), p.381.]
"The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man -- state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d'honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion. Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo." [Marx (1975c), p.244. Bold emphases alone added. Paragraphs merged.]
Even more instructive: in Essay Nine Part Two I show that the quasi-religious devotion displayed by DM-fans to the 'dialectical world-view' is a consequence of the same alienating forces that also motivate theological myth-making among that other group of social victims, the religious and the superstitious. One cause, two parallel effects.
[That argument has now been summarised here. This topic will also be explored at greater length in Essay Twelve (summary here.)]
13. Two recent examples of this phenomenon can be accessed here and here (unfortunately, the first link no longer works; the second will take the reader to a post that was published just after I had intervened on the site in question) -- but there are many more just like them.
As noted earlier, the only other 'argumentative ploy' that DM-apologists seem to have available to them (in 'response' to my Essays) is to ignore totally whatever they don't like or can't answer. As noted above, these comrades appear to know little or no FL (many indeed proudly and openly boast about this rather un-edifying, self-imposed defect), but that doesn't stop them pontificating about it or informing the world of its many 'shortcomings'. In this they perhaps stand to MFL rather like the Pope does to any advice he cares to give concerning marriage and sex. Except, perhaps, the Pope has a decided edge here; he is, so we are told, of the male sex and hence, at a minimum, he at least knows something (even if that isn't much) about what he is talking about. The same can't be said of the vast majority of DM-fans in relation to what they regularly assert about FL.
[FL = Formal Logic; MFL = Modern Formal Logic.]
[These comments don't, of course, apply to the work of Graham Priest, a highly sophisticated philosopher and logician. Priest's ideas will be criticised in subsequent Essays. Until then, the reader is directed here and here for more details.]
However, whenever I attempt to reformulate my anti-DM arguments in plane and simple, basic terms so that an ordinary worker is able to follow, dialecticians lambaste them for their 'banality', or their 'superficiality'. On the other hand, when they are published in full, in all their complexity, they moan even more loudly and throw out insults like "elitist", "ivory tower", "academic", "pedantic", "semantics", or even "TL;DR". They then complain about "walls of text", or they grumble that they are being "talked down to". [The author of the videos mentioned earlier displayed several of these 'endearing' personality traits all rolled into one.]
Page-after-page of impenetrable Hegelian gobbledygook they happily down before breakfast; a few pages of clear argument from yours truly and they throw their toys out of the pram.
(1) Unlike the convention adopted in USA, when 'scare' quotes are employed at this site I use single, not double, quotation marks.
(2) When quoting a passage of text from another site, book, article or paper double quotes are employed. When those outside sources also use double quotes in the body of a quoted text, they have been replaced by single quotation marks. If that double-quoted text then employs single quotes to quote someone else, they in turn will be replaced by double quotes, and so on. For example, this body of text:
Professor NN once said "Anyone who quotes the first line of the Gettysburg Address, 'Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal' cannot consistently support racism...",
will be rendered as follows:
"Professor NN once said 'Anyone who quotes the first line of the Gettysburg Address, "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal" cannot consistently support racism...'."
(3) When directly mentioning a name, word or phrase as such (even if it isn't in the English Lexicon), double quotation marks will be used. For example:
The phrase "Karl Marx" is in fact a Proper Name, and so is "Trotsky"; but "BuBuBu" isn't even a word let alone a name.
(4) Single, 'scare quotes' will be used in relation to phrases regarded as suspect, controversial or of otherwise dubious import, such as, 'dialectical contradiction', 'quantity' passes into 'quality', 'abstraction', 'negation of the negation' and 'consciousness'.
[Why the last item in that list is deemed to be of dubious import is covered in Essay Thirteen Part Three; specifically, here and here, but also all the way through that specific Essay.]
Several of Marx and Engels's works listed below have been linked to the Marxist Internet Archive, but since Lawrence & Wishart threatened legal action over copyright infringement many no longer work.
However, all of their published work can now be accessed here.
Bhaskar, R. (1993), Dialectic. The Pulse Of Freedom (Verso Books).
Cohen, G. (1978), Karl Marx's Theory Of History: A Defence (Oxford University Press).
Dunayevskaya, R. (1982), Philosophy And Revolution (Humanities Press, 2nd ed.). [Several chapters of this book can be accessed here.]
--------, (2002), The Power Of Negativity. Selected Writings On The Dialectic In Hegel And Marx (Lexington Books).
Engels, F. (1954), Dialectics Of Nature (Progress Publishers).
--------, (1968), Ludwig Feuerbach And The End Of Classical German Philosophy, in Marx and Engels (1968), pp.584-622.
--------, (1976), Anti-Dühring (Foreign Languages Press).
Gollobin, I. (1986), Dialectical Materialism. Its Laws, Categories And Practice (Petras Press).
Hegel, G. (1999), Science Of Logic, translated by A. V. Miller (Humanity Books).
Kant, I. (1953), Prolegomena To Any Future Metaphysics That Will Be Able To Present Itself As A Science, edited and translated by P. G. Lucas (Manchester University Press).
Lenin, V. (1961), Philosophical Notebooks, Collected Works Volume 38 (Progress Publishers).
--------, (1972), Materialism And Empirio-Criticism (Foreign Languages Press).
Levins, R., and Lewontin, R. (1985), The Dialectical Biologist (Harvard University Press).
Lotz, C., and Feldman, P. (1994), Gerry Healy. A Revolutionary Life (Lupus Books). [The Forward and Introduction to this book can be accessed here.]
Malek, A. (2012), The Dialectical Universe -- Some Reflections On Cosmology (Agamee Prakashani).
Mao Tse-Tung, (1964a), Selected Works Volume One (Foreign Languages Press).
--------, (1964b), 'On Practice', in Mao (1964a), pp.295-309.
--------, (1964c), 'On Contradiction', in Mao (1964a), pp.311-47.
Marx, K. (1968), Preface To A Contribution To The Critique Of Political Economy, in Marx and Engels (1968), pp.180-84, and Marx and Engels (1987), pp.261-65.
--------, (1973), Grundrisse (Penguin Books).
--------, (1975a), Early Writings (Penguin Books).
--------, (1975b), Economical And Philosophical Manuscripts, in Marx (1975a), pp.279-400.
--------, (1975c), A Contribution To The Critique Of Hegel's Philosophy Of Right, in Marx (1975a), pp.243-57.
--------, (1986), Economic Manuscripts Of 1857-58, MECW Volume 28 (Lawrence & Wishart). [This is The Grundrisse.]
Marx, K., and Engels, F.
(1848), Manifesto Of The Communist Party, in Marx and Engels (1968), pp.31-63.
--------, (1968), Selected Works In One Volume (Lawrence & Wishart).
--------, (1970), The German Ideology, Students Edition, edited by Chris Arthur (Lawrence & Wishart).
--------, (1976), MECW Volume 5 (Lawrence & Wishart).
--------, (1987), MECW Volume 29 (Lawrence & Wishart).
Molyneux, J. (2012), The Point Is To Change It. An Introduction To Marxist Philosophy (Bookmarks).
Novack, G. (1965), The Origins Of Materialism (Pathfinder Press).
Petersen, E. (1994), The Poverty Of Dialectical Materialism (Red Door).
Rees, J. (1998), The Algebra Of Revolution (Routledge). [This links to a PDF.]
Seymour, R. (2012), 'A Comment On Greece And Syriza', International Socialism 136, Autumn 2012, pp.191-96.
--------, (2017), Corbyn. The Strange Rebirth Of Radical Politics (Verso, 2nd ed.).
Tourish, D., and Wohlforth, T. (2000), On The Edge. Political Cults Right And Left (M E Sharpe).
Trotsky, L. (1971), In Defense Of Marxism (New Park Publications).
Woods, A., and Grant, T. (1995/2007), Reason In Revolt. Marxism And Modern Science (Wellred Publications). [The on-line version now appears to be the second edition.]
Zizek, S. (2012), Less Than Nothing: Hegel And The Shadow Of Dialectical Materialism (Verso Books). [This links to a PDF.]
--------, (2015), Absolute Recoil. Towards A New Foundation Of Dialectical Materialism (Verso Books).
Abbreviations Used At This Site
AM: Academic Marxism/Marxist (depending on the context)
AD: Anti-Dühring (i.e., Engels (1976))
AFL: Aristotelian Formal Logic
BBT: Big Bang Theory
COT: Coherence Theory Of Truth
CTT: Correspondence Theory Of Truth
DB: The Dialectical Biologist (i.e., Levins and Lewontin (1985))
DL: Dialectical Logic
DM: Dialectical Materialism/Materialist (depending on the context)
DN: Dialectics Of Nature (i.e., Engels (1954))
fSU: Former Soviet Union
FL: Formal Logic
IDM: In Defense Of Marxism (i.e., Trotsky (1971))
IED: Identity-In-Difference
IO: Interpenetration Of Opposites
HM: Historical Materialism/Materialist (depending on the context)
LIE: Linguistic Idealism
LOI: Law Of Identity
MD: Materialist Dialectics
MEC: Materialism And Empirio-criticism (i.e., Lenin (1972))
MECW: Marx And Engels Collected Works
MIST: Maoist Dialectician
MFL: Modern Formal Logic
NOT: Non-Orthodox Trotskyist
OLP: Ordinary Language Philosophy
OT: Orthodox Trotskyist
OTG: Orthodox Trotskyist Group
OTT: Orthodox Trotskyist Theorist
PMT: Pragmatic Theory Of Truth
PN: Philosophical Notebooks (i.e., Lenin (1961))
Q↔Q: Quantity Turns Into Quality, and vice versa
RIRE: Reason In Revolt (i.e., Woods and Grant (1995/2007))
STD: Stalinist Dialectician
TAR: The Algebra Of Revolution (i.e., Rees (1998))
Word Count: 53,160
Latest Update: 04/03/25
This can also be said of the scores of videos about DM and 'Marxist Philosophy' that now festoon YouTube, all of which rehearse the same handful of basic ideas (almost as if no one had summarised them before). This is one of the latest -- check out my reply to it in the comments section, and make a note of its author's rather pathetic response:
Video Six: Night Of The Living-Dead-Theory