Description
Book SynopsisThis work takes as its starting point the question 'What Philosophic-Organizational Vantage Point is Needed for Revolutionary Transformation Today?' Gogol offers an answer by exploring organisational practices in the Paris Commune, the 2nd International, the Russian Revolutions and several other epochal struggles, as well as the theoretical-organisational concepts of such thinkers as Lenin, Trotsky and Luxemburg.
Trade Review"Toward a Dialectic ought to be taken as an important contribution to an on-going project to reveal the logic of the development of emancipatory organizations
for Marxists, the detailed tracing of the forms of working class organization from its inception up to today is a precondition for solving the deep conundrums facing emancipatory projects today. And for bringing this to our attention and making a first attempt, Gogol deserves considerable praise." Andy Blunden, Marx and Philosophy Review of Books
"Toward a Dialectic ought to be taken as an important contribution to an on-going project to reveal the logic of the development of emancipatory organizations … for Marxists, the detailed tracing of the forms of working class organization from its inception up to today is a precondition for solving the deep conundrums facing emancipatory projects today. And for bringing this to our attention and making a first attempt, Gogol deserves considerable praise." —Andy Blunden, Marx and Philosophy Review of Books
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Philosophy, Organization, and the Work of Raya Dunayevskaya I. The Contradictory Reality of the Present Moment and Its Relation to a Dialectic of Philosophy and Organization II. The Project of Dunayevskaya: Dialectics of Organization and Philosophy III. The Form for the Present Study Prologue: The Dialectic in Philosophy Itself I. What Is Hegel’s Journey of Absolute Spirit? II. Why a Negation of the Negation? III. Can We See Hegel’s Absolutes, Not as a Closed Totality, but As New Beginning? PART I: ON SPONTANEOUS FORMS OF ORGANIZATION VS. VANGUARD PARTIES 1: Marx’s Concept of Organization: From the Silesian Weavers’ Uprising to the First Years of the International Workingmen’s Association I. A Preliminary Note—Marx: Revolutionary Organization and the Organization of Thought II. 1843-52, Critique of Ideas/Tendencies—and the Movement of the Workers III. From the Early 1850s to the Early 1860s: A Brief Note on Marx’s Organization of Thought and the “Party” IV. A New Organizational Form: Marx and the International Working Men’s Association 2: The Commune of Paris, 1871: Mass Spontaneity in Action and Thought; Responsibility of the Revolutionary Intellectual: The Two-War Road Between Marx and the Commune I. A Non-State State: The Paris Commune as a Form of Workers’ Rule II. The Civil War in France— Drafts and Address, and the French Edition of Capital III. The Commune Deepens Marx’s Concept of Organization-- The First International After 1871 Appendix: Marx excerpts from first and second drafts of The Civil War in France 3: The Second International, The German Social Democracy, and Engels after Marx—Organization without Marx’s Organization of Thought I. A Preliminary Note on Lassalle II. Fetishism of Organization: The Second International and the Germany Social Democracy III. Engels’ Relation to German Social Democracy and to Marx’s Marxism: What Tactics? What Theory? What Philosophy? Appendix: “The Interlude that Never Ended Organizationally” Forms of Organization and Struggle in Revolutionary Russia 4: The 1905 Russian Revolution: Mass Proletarian Self-Activity and Its Relation to the Organizational Thought of Marxist Revolutionaries I. 1905 in Life and in Books: New Forms of Struggle; New Forms of Organization II. Lenin, Trotsky, Luxemburg: Attitudes Toward and Theoretical Ramifications of 1905, Particularly with Regard to Revolutionary Organization 5: The Russian Revolution of 1917 and Beyond I. February-October, 1917: Forms of Organization From Below; Developments and Struggles Within Bolshevism II. Russia post-October: Workers, Bolsheviks and the State—New Beginnings and Grave Contradictions in the Revolution 6: Out of the Russia Revolution: Legacy and Critique—Luxemburg, Pannekoek, Trotsky I. Luxemburg and Two Revolutions—Russia, 1917-18; Germany, 1918-19 II. Pannekoek’s Council Communism III. In Exile: A Brief Note on Trotsky’s Concept of Revolutionary Organization and View of Proletarian Subjectivity 7: Organizational Forms from the Spanish Revolution I. The Revolution Begins and Develops II. The Communist Party Works to Dismantle the Revolution 8: The Hungarian Workers’ Councils in the Revolution: A Movement from Practice that Is a Form of Theory Prelude: East Germany, 1953 I. The First Days II. The Turning Point III. The Counter-Revolution and the Proletarian Response IV. Postscript: East Europe post-Hungary 1956—Resistance-in-Permanence; Contradictions Within PART II: HEGEL AND MARX 9: Can “Absolute Knowing” in Hegel’s Phenomenology Speak to a Dialectic of Organization and Philosophy? I. A Note on Hegel’s Method in Absolute Knowledge II. Marx’s “Critique of the Hegelian Dialectic” III. Spirit’s Journey in Absolute Knowledge: Externalization (Entäusserung) and Recollection/Inwardization (Erinnerung) IV. The Dialectic in Philosophy Itself: Does It Bring Forth a Dialectic of Organization?—A Reading of Absolute Knowing from Dunayevskaya 10: Rereading Marx’s Critique of the Gotha Program Today Appendix: Marx on Necessity, Freedom, Time and Labor PART III: HEGEL AND LENIN 11: Lenin and Hegel—The Profound Philosophic Breakthrough that Failed to Encompass Revolutionary Organization I. Introduction II. A Preliminary Note on Lenin’s Philosophic Exploration of Hegel III. A Brief Survey of Dunayevskaya’s Explorations of Lenin’s Hegelian Vantage Point Prior to 1985-87. IV. Dunayevskaya’s ‘Changed Perception of Lenin Philosophic Ambivalence’: Fusing a mid-1980s Vantage Point with a 1953 Philosophic Breakthrough V. Organizational Ramifications 12: Hegel’s Critique of the Third Attitude to Objectivity—Its Relation to Organization I. Introduction: The Three Attitudes to Objectivity II. Dunayevskaya’s 1961 Reading of the Third Attitude to Objectivity III. Dunayevskaya’s New 1986 Reading of the Third Attitude to Objectivity PART IV: DIALECTICS OF ORGANIZATION AND PHILOSOPHY IN POST-WORLD WAR II WORLD: THE WORK OF RAYA DUNAYEVSKAYA 13: Moments in the Development of Dunayevskaya's Marxist-Humanism I. A Preliminary Note on War and Revolution as Turning Points for Radical Thought: The Moment of the Theory of State-Capitalism as Needed Ground for Marxist-Humanism II. Dunayevskaya's Letters on Hegel's Absolutes, May 12 and 20 1953: “The Philosophic Moment of Marxist-Humanism” III. The Organization of Thought which Determines Organizational Life: Developing Marxist-Humanism and News and Letters Committees IV. Dunayevskaya’s Presentation on Dialectics of Organization and Philosophy, June 1, 1987—A New Philosophic Category and a Challenge for News and Letters Praxis Appendices: 1) Dunayevskaya Letter on Meeting a Cameroonian Revolutionary; 2) Andy Philips on Dunayevskaya's Participation in 1949-50 Miners' General Strike; 3. Preamble to the Original Constitution of News and Letters Committees, 1956 PART V: CONCLUSION 14: What Philosophic-Organizational Vantage Point Is Needed? I. Recent Challenges to Hegel’s Dialectics of Negativity II. What Is the Dialectic of Marx’s Capital? III. Once Again Hegel’s Dialectic of Negativity—Its Concretization/Praxis as Organizational Expression; Its Meaning for Today Bibliograhy Index
