Thumbnail is Marx’s manuscript for The German Ideology. Summary below is a compilation of my notes I wrote when reading Materialism and the Dialectical Method by Maurice Cornforth, along with general knowledge from reading various Marxist authors.
Often times, Marxists use the term “material conditions,” and “dialectics.” What does this mean? Why do Marxists care so much about material conditions? The answer is that Marxists seek materialist explanations for observed processes as opposed to idealist, and do so dialectically, as opposed to metaphysically. In other words, Marxists apply dialectical analysis to find materialist explanations for phenomena. Dialectical materialism is the world outlook of the proletariat as a class, and serves as the most vital ideological tool for overthrowing capitalism.
In order to understand dialectical materialism, we need to understand its component parts, materialism and dialectics, and their historical predecessors, idealism and metaphysics.
Idealism
Idealism is, in short, to put ideas prior to matter. Idealism has been used by feudal lords to justify their position above the serfs, forming the ideological basis for feudalism. The 3 major assertions of idealism are as follows:
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Idealism asserts that the material world is dependent on the spiritual
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Idealism asserts that spirit, or mind, or idea, can and does exist in separation from matter. (The most extreme form of this assertion is subjective idealism, which asserts that matter does not exist at all but is pure illusion.)
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Idealism asserts that there exists a realm of the mysterious and unknowable, “above,” or “beyond,” or “behind” what can be ascertained and known by perception, experience, and science.
Early Materialism
Common idealist arguments are appealing to a supernatural “human nature,” or “good vs. evil” explanations for processes. Materialism arose over time, as people grew to understand the world more deeply, and especially as a tool to overthrow the feudal aristocracy that justified its existence via the church. In other words, materialism rose to help the bourgeoisie. The 3 basic teachings of materialism as counterposed to idealism are:
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Materialism teaches that the world is by its very nature material, that everything which exists comes into being on the basis of material causes, arises and develops in accordance with the laws of motion of matter.
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Materialism teaches that matter is objective reality existing outside and independent of the mind; and that far from the mental existing in separation from the material, everything mental or spiritual is a product of material processes.
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Materialism teaches that the world and its laws are fully knowable, and that while much may not be known there is nothing which is by nature unknowable.
Shortcomings of Metaphysical Materialism
The type of materialism that overthrew the feudal lords was still underdeveloped, and metaphysical. The bourgeoisie needed an explanation for why the feudal lords were illegitimate, but still needed to support their own static, permanent rule. This was called mechanistic materialism, for the bourgeois scientists saw the world as a grand machine repeating simple motions forever. Mechanistic materialism, therefore, makes certain dogmatic assumptions:
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That the world consists of permanent and stable things or particles, with definite, fixed properties;
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That the particles of matter are by nature inert and no change ever happens except by the action of some external cause;
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That all motion, all change can be reduced to the mechanical interaction of the separate particles of matter;
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That each particle has its own fixed nature independent of everything else, and that the relationships between separate things are merely external relationships.
Moving from Metaphysics to Dialectics
This, of course, has proven false. History did not end with the dissolution of the USSR, despite what modern mechanistic materialists claim. Mechanistic materialism relies on metaphysics, seeing everything as a static abstraction, devoid of its context. It has no explanation for how new qualities emerge, and ultimately fell to idealism to explain the “first mover,” ie “God.” Dialectical materialism holds instead:
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The world is not a complex of things but of processes;
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That matter is inseperable from motion;
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That the motion of matter comprehends an infinite diversity of forms which arise one from another and pass into one another;
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That things exist not as separate individual units but in essential relation and interconnection.
Dialectical Materialism
This became remarkable for the proletariat, as it sees nothing as static, and therefore marks the eventual downfall of the bourgeoisie. Putting it all together, we get the following:
- Dialectical materialism understands the world, not as a complex of ready-made things, but as a complex of processes, in which all things go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away.
In other words, when analyzing events and contextualizing them, we must always viee them as a struggle between the rising and the falling, the old and the new, for example the concentration of capital in markets and the rise in socialize labor.
- Dialectical materialism considers that matter is always in motion, that motion is the mode of existence of matter, so that there can no more be matter without motion than motion without matter. Motion does not have to be impressed upon matter by some outside force, but above all it is necessary to look for the inner impulses of development, the self-motion, inherent in all processes.
In other words, all movement is a result of contradiction. Your foot presses on the Earth, and the Earth presses back on you.
- Dialectical materialism understands the motion of matter as comprehending all changes and processes in the universe, from mere changes of place right to thinking. It recognizes, therefore, the infinite diversity of the forms of motion of matter from the simple to the complex, from the lower to the higher.
In other words, dialectical materialism recognizes that development exists as a change of quantity into quality. Addition or subtraction gives way to qualitative change. A balloon is filled with air, until at a given point it pops due to pressure buildup. Water goes from liquid to gas at its boiling point, and back into liquid when cooling down to said point.
- Dialectical materialism considers that, in the manifold processes taking place in the universe, things come into being, change and pass out of being, not as separate individual units, but in essential relation and interconnection, so that they cannot be understood each separately and by itself but only in their relation and interconnection.
In other words, everything is connected, and must be analyzed in context to truly understand it. A worker isn’t just an individual, but instead part of a social class of many workers. Wages are not something invented brand new every time, but instead are set by societal standards, controlled by the ruling capitalist class.
Conclusion
Karl Marx created dialectical materialism by turning Hegel’s idealist dialectic into a materialist one. Then, he applied it to the progression of society, creating historical materialism. By analyzing social structures and progress as a dialectical process based in materialism, we can learn from history and analyze where it’s going. This is scientific socialism in progress. Human thought is shaped by our social experience, forming class consciousness and ideology. How we produce and distribute determines our ways of thinking.
Socialism and communism also have their own contradictions as well, and just because we progress on to socialism does not mean we cannot fall back to capitalism. The dialectical materialist world outlook understands that nothing is static, and there is always new contradiction and new movement from that.
If you keep these in mind, you can do your own dialectical materialist analysis. Always seek explanations based on the material, not the ideal, and always do so by contextualizing the processes, analyzing their contradictions, the unity and struggle of opposing tendencies. Quantitative changes lead to qualitative development, and progresses as a result of the conflict or struggle of opposite tendencies. There’s much more to dialectical materialism, but this should help serve as a simple overview!
I’d read more Russian authors if more were translated into English. Sadly, it’s hard to come by, and for the purposes of debunking anticommunist claims, Statesian authors tend to make westerners less skeptical.
As for the person I am replying to, it’s really unimportant. Just a western anticommunist.
Finally, Comrade, you understand what I’ve been trying to explain to you for so long.
You tell me I’m subjective, basing my statements solely on my own experience, and I tell you it’s because you haven’t read the books I’ve read, nothing more.
And as we’ve already noted, the books I’ve read are somewhat different from the ones you’ve read, judging by your reaction to them. That’s why I kept saying that everything here is somehow different, seemingly in its place, but somehow different…
I highly recommend you read the works of this modern historian.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Zhukov_(historian)
Here’s his book, which explains the fatal mistake the Bolsheviks made by not listening to Stalin.
The book is called: Stalin’s First Defeat. 1917-1922
In Brief:
This book recounts the early political career of the future leader of the Soviet Union. It tells how, during the years of revolution and civil war, he tried to preserve Russia’s unity, preventing its disintegration or fragmentation into national republics. It also explores who opposed him in this effort, and why Stalin was ultimately unable to achieve victory in such a brutal and uncompromising struggle. Based on unique archival documents, most of which have only recently been declassified, the book offers a completely new perspective on the events of those turbulent years. It provides a fresh perspective on questions that remain extremely sensitive today, convincingly proving the seemingly unbelievable: the views of Stalin—the third-largest figure in the Bolshevik Party in 1917—and Milyukov—the leader of the Cadet Party and ideologist of the “White movement”—were completely aligned on the question of what the country should be. The disintegration of Russia, as early as the spring of 1917, was initiated by the separatist aspirations of the Ukrainian Central Rada. In the spring of 1919, Stalin was removed from Moscow, barring him from participating in the leadership of the party and state until the end of the civil war; in 1920, there were no serious grounds for recognizing the independence of the Baltic republics; the USSR, in the constitutional form approved in December 1922 and which remained in effect until December 1991, was created over Stalin’s objections, in favor of the left-wing radical utopias championed by Lenin, Kamenev, Zinoviev, and Trotsky.
He wrote many books, I recommend him to you. His first book was published in 1995; he was the first to publish it.
Regarding the “Holodomor”: I have a question for this anti-communist. What possible motive would Stalin have had for exterminating Ukrainian peasants, given that they were the ones producing the most grain in the USSR? I would only believe such a claim if it were on par with Putin blowing up the Nord Stream pipeline.
Such an act would be the behavior of a mentally unstable madman. It would imply that Stalin killed Ukrainians purely for pleasure—even at the cost of incurring economic losses. There is absolutely no common sense or logic in such actions. Why would he do it?
Incidentally, the Holodomor was not confined solely to Ukraine; that summer was marked by a severe drought.
That year, famine struck the Volga region as well, and affected several Eastern European nations—Poland, Hungary, and Romania, if I recall correctly.
As for the repressions and Stalin’s personal involvement in them: the peak of the purges occurred between the summer of 1937 and the autumn of 1938. During this period, the NKVD was headed by Yezhov. Following Yezhov’s arrest, he was succeeded by Beria, who—in an incredibly short span of time—ordered the release of a million people from prison.
Subsequently, a major public trial was organized to prosecute the very NKVD officials who had issued unlawful orders. The entire foreign diplomatic corps, as well as representatives of the international press, were invited to attend this trial. The court transcripts were published in the press.
This raises a pertinent question: what possible benefit could Stalin have derived from this entire spectacle?
Zhukov posits that the repressions were triggered by the “Stalin Constitution,” which envisaged free elections for local Party leadership positions. Fearing the loss of their posts, local Party officials began eliminating their rivals or engaging in excessive zeal to curry favor with their superiors.
Another significant contributing factor was the looming threat of a major war; the domestic political climate had become strained to the breaking point, and people began to view everyone around them as a potential Trotskyist or German spy. Furthermore, it can now be stated with certainty that a conspiracy was brewing among the military elite to oust Stalin from power.
Yet, at the very same time:
GDP growth during the 1930s stood at 14% per year.
By 1930, the USSR had already emerged as a global power.
The 1939 Census: According to the census results, the population of the USSR totaled 167 million people. Over the entire decade, the total population growth amounted to approximately 15 million people.
I appreciate the recommendation, comrade, though unfortunately I can’t find it in English (yet). You can see my frustration, given that most books written by communists are not available in English, be they Chinese, Russian, etc.
As for the 1930s famine, indeed. The liberal narrative is that “Stalin targeted Ukrainian nationalists in a terror-famine,” but of course this runs counter to the fact that the USSR needed grain both to industrialize and feed its people.
Interesting commentary on the purges, I had not seen that theory before.
Specifically for our conversation, I would like to briefly introduce you—in outline form—to the contents of Yuri Nikolayevich Zhukov’s book, The Flip Side of NEP (Обратная Сторона НЭПа):
Crisis Phenomena: According to the researcher, the partial return to market mechanisms did not lead to the long-awaited economic boom; instead, it triggered a protracted economic crisis.
Political Struggle: The transition to the NEP (New Economic Policy) exacerbated latent conflicts within the USSR’s party elite (during the 1923–1925 period), resulting in a fierce struggle for power.
Social Stratification: Economic liberalization led to the rapid enrichment of a narrow social stratum—the “NEPmen”—a situation that stood in stark contrast to the dire plight of the majority of workers and peasants.
As you can see, there exists a radically different perspective on the events of that era. Zhukov is an archivist; his work relies primarily on archival documents. In his books, every claim is substantiated by the figures and statistical indicators of those years, which form the core of the economic analysis within his work. The political struggle is evidenced in the minutes of party meetings, while social stratification is clearly visible in criminal police reports. One such report, for instance, describes the formation of a student gang in Moscow that specialized in robbing NEPmen. A great number of such motley gangs sprang up, triggering a rampant surge in crime.
Indeed, we know that between 1919 and 1921, “War Communism” was implemented at the behest of Trotsky. Both Trotsky and Lenin indulged in fantasies of a global revolution; they fully expected that a wave of socialist revolutions would erupt across Europe at any moment, and that the Red Army would immediately rush to their aid. Consequently, the army was effectively transformed into a “labor army.”
It was a truly terrible time for the workers and peasants. Soldiers were not demobilized from the army; instead, they remained under barracks conditions, working in factories and receiving no wages—only food and clothing. Yet, even these basic necessities the state was unable to provide in sufficient quantities. As the situation deteriorated, unrest and strikes began to erupt in the factories; workers refused to work. Measures had to be taken. To breathe some fresh life into the economy, War Communism was abolished and the NEP was introduced; however, as it turned out, this dawn was short-lived. As for the notion that the NEP was actually effective in the USSR—that was a myth later inflated by Gorbachev in order to push through his own hare-brained ideas.
The NEP did achieve its desired effect of socializing the means of production and centralizing them. This is why it was employed. Of course, it also came with new stratification and new problems, but so too did collectivization. Further, we can see in China that the NEP-style socialist market economy is remarkably effective at developing the productive forces.
Is the NEP the only way? No. Is planned economy from the outset the only way? Also no.
I already told you that I completely agree with this. If it hadn’t been for the NEP, civil war would have broken out again. The factories were then partially returned to the hands of their former owners. And what’s most interesting is that many of these owners, after the NEP was abolished, remained at the factories, not as owners, but as directors. Many small entrepreneurs emerged, and the workers were pacified.
As for the peasants, problems began immediately. Peasants in the USSR at that time were divided into three categories: “poor peasants,” “middle peasants,” and “kulaks.” The kulaks immediately seized the initiative, began exploiting the poor, and engaged in usury. They felt like local princes in the villages. The poor were their farmhands, the middle peasants their debtors. “Kulak” in English means fist. This person holds the entire peasant community in his fist. This term emerged after Stolypin’s reforms.
Kulaks and middle peasants refused to sell grain to the state because the market price was much higher than the state price. Italian barges were docked in Crimea, transporting grain to Europe.
I observed something similar during perestroika, when the market price was several times higher than the state price. When store shelves were empty, but the market was a paradise of abundance.
You probably remember those students who robbed the NEPmen in the 1920s. You’re talking to one of them now, but I’m from the 1990s, when, as a university student, I was underfed, starving, and didn’t even always have enough money for public transportation. I didn’t have decent clothes. For the first time in my life, I understood what hunger was.
Every morning, looking out the tram window at the luxurious boutique windows and expensive cars, I was filled with hatred for these people! Fierce hatred!!! I turned to crime. That fucking NEP ruined my entire life, because it all ended with me going to prison. And you can’t imagine how many millions of lives like mine have been ruined! Just like that, in an instant!
Just like in the 1920s and 1990s in the USSR, both NEPs smoothly transitioned from the intelligentsia into criminals, and from traders and speculators into the ruling class, so now we’re smoothly transitioning from dialectics to Freudian psychoanalysis. For me, the NEP isn’t the New Economic Policy; for me, the NEP is childhood trauma.
Yes, this is a subjective opinion, of course. It’s my opinion and that of many millions of others like me. Those who rebelled against injustice. Rebelled in a strange way, but rebelled! Probably because I was hungry.
We are now talking about the dark side of the NEP, no matter what the NEP is, red, white or green, the side effect of the NEP is the same everywhere.
The NEP in the 1920s is not the same as the 90s Shock Doctrine. The former was a progressive move towards socialism, under a dictatorship of the proletariat. The latter was a regressive move to abolish socialism, under a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. These are from entirely different contexts, and equating them is metaphysical, not dialectical, as the results are entirely different due to existing in entirely different contexts.
Yes, that is exactly what I was talking about!
Yes, I did speak about different contexts as well. But the result is the same—regardless of which “NEP” it happens to be, and no matter what it is called: Perestroika, Glasnost, or “Pepsi and McDonald’s.” The Shock Doctrine is what it is called now; back then, Gorbachev dubbed it the New NEP.
A chasm is forming between the classes—one that widens with every passing year. What we are currently witnessing in China is the consequence of the NEP.
You claim that the process in China is now reversing. Okay—I won’t dispute that; I will simply observe.
I will reply to your other posts later.
It must be said that Gorbachev comparing the destruction of socialism and adoption of mass liberalization is not the same as the NEP. With China, we can see that while problems do arise, so too has massive expansion in industrial capacity, quality of life, and an undermining of imperialism. All either of us can do is watch, and try to change our own countries to socialism.
Furr actually uses Zhukov in his “Stalin and the Struggle for Democratic Reform” (part one | part two) with something very like what Sedan is saying about the constitution (although I only started on part one, barely got a few pages in, curse of wanting to check the sources)
I don’t think there is any reason to doubt his data. If he were distorting the facts, it would have come to light long ago—he has been publishing on this subject since 1995.
He is currently the most authoritative and widely recognized expert in Russia regarding the Stalin era—and beyond—at least within certain progressive circles. In these circles, everything has long since been double-checked.
Oh, neat! Thanks for checking! Sedan has a lot of intriguing information that I’m upset isn’t available in English (even if the Moon landing claims make me skeptical of other claims).
This is far from being just my opinion here.
I’m aware others believe this too, but it’s not really taken seriously around the world.
I sent my last post to the wrong place.
I’m not talking about the whole world; I’m talking about Russia. Here, people simply don’t trust Americans—especially in such a murky affair.
But I won’t be able to prove anything to you… and you won’t be able to prove anything to me, either.