Abstract
Unlike the strategies identified in the two preceding chapters, substantialism is, in the social sciences, inextricably linked with one name: that of Marx. While it would be mistaken to assume that Marx is alone in adopting such a strategy or that Marxism, in all its various forms, is always predominantly substantialist, it suits the purpose in this chapter to confine the discussion to Marx and Marxists. First, however, we must briefly indicate the ways in which the substantialist strategy confronts the dilemmas of social reality and how we know it.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes and References
H. B. Acton, The Illusion of the Epoch (London, 1955) p. 271.
While this systematisation of the discussion to follow is presented as a series of stages having a chronological basis in Marx’s work, we would not wish to suggest that Marx’s development was as neatly progressive and clear-cut as the concept of stage suggests. He was constantly backtracking and redefining this position as well as failing to recognise the full implications of previously established solutions. The stages, therefore, should be taken as general shifts in emphasis associated with major problems confronted.
That this clear expression of a forthright materialism comes from Marx’s later work is an indication of the problems facing any attempt at periodization. See Capital, vol. 1 (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1976) p. 102.
This translation comes from Wal Suchting, ‘Marx’s Theses on Feuerbach: Notes Towards a Commentary (with a New Translation)’, in John Mepham and David-Hillel Ruben (eds), Issues in Marxist Philosophy (Brighton: Harvester Press, 1979) pp. 5–34.
For alternative translations see T. B. Bottomore and M. Rubel, Karl Marx: Selected Writings in Sociology and Social philosophy (London: Watts & Co., 1956);
Karl Marx, Early Writings (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1975) pp. 421–3.
Suchting, ‘Marx’s Thesis’, pp. 7–8.
Ibid, p. 12.
George Lukács, History and Class Consciousness (London: Merlin Press, 1971).
Karl Korsch, Marxism and Philosophy (London: New Left Books, 1970).
As well as Horkheimer the Frankfurt School included Theodore Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, Franz Neumann, Erich Fromm, and Jürgen Habermas. See David Held, Introduction to Critical Theory: Horkheimer to Habermas (London: Hutchinson, 1980).
Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of the European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology (Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 1970).
Of major importance were the ‘Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts’: see Marx, Early Writings, pp. 279–400.
For the phenomenological Marxism of Enzo Paci, see B. Smart, Sociology, Phenomenology and Marxian Analysis (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976).
For the existentialists Sartre and Merleau-Ponty, see James Miller, History and Human Existence (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979);
and Mark Poster, Existential Marxism in Post-WarFrance (Princeton: University Press, 1975). For critical Theory, see Held, Introduction to Critical Theory.
Enzo Paci, The Function of the Sciences and the Meaning of Man (Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 1972).
For a discussion of Marx’s usage here, see John McMurtry, The Structure of Marx’s World View (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978) ch. 7, ‘Economic Determinism’.
L. Easton and K. Guddat (eds), Writing of the Young Marx on Philosophy and Society (New York: Doubleday, 1967) p. 350.
Karl Marx, Capital, vol. 1 (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1976) p. 176.
Ibid.
See Nicos Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes (London: New Left Books, 1973) pp. 13–15.
See, for example, Percy Cohen, Modern Social Theory (London: Heinemann, 1968): ‘I am well aware that the views of the early, “romantic” Marx were rather different. But I hold to the opinion expressed by Raymond Aron in his unrivalled discussion of Marx that there is little in the early Marx of value to sociology as such.’ p. 79.
Marx, Early Writings, p. 355.
Ibid.
Karl Marx, Poverty of Philosophy (Moscow: Progress, 1976).
Karl Marx, Grundrisse (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973) p. 101.
For example, Karl Popper, The Poverty of Historicism (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965).
See ch. 1 of Martin Jay’s, The Dialectical Imagination: A History of the Frankfurt School and the Institute of Social Research 1923–50 (London: Heinemann, 1973).
Marx, Early Writings, p. 356.
Ibid, p. 209.
Marx, Capital, vol. III, p. 817.
Marx, Grundrisse.
The structuralist linguistics of Saussure and Jakobson have been influential in the work of Marxist structuralists such as Louis Althusser and Nicos Poulantzas.
See Colin Sumner, Reading Ideologies (London: Academic Press, 1979).
Letter to Engels, 27 June 1967, Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence (Moscow: Progress, 1975).
Marx, Capital, p. 75.
Copyright information
© 1984 Terry Johnson, Christopher Dandeker and Clive Ashworth
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Johnson, T., Dandeker, C., Ashworth, C. (1984). Substantialism. In: The Structure of Social Theory. Contemporary Social Theory. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17679-3_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17679-3_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave, London
Print ISBN: 978-0-333-30625-3
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-17679-3
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social & Cultural Studies CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)