Spectre of Communism The case for theory: why communists should study philosophy
“Do I really need to read long theoretical books to be a communist?” This is a common question among class fighters today. In our final episode of the season, we make the case that, in order to change the world, it is first necessary to understand it. And for that, we need a philosophy!
The American trade unionist Bill Haywood once said: “I’ve never read Marx's Capital, but I've got the marks of capital all over my body!” While it’s true that working people don’t need to pick up any books to understand through bitter experience the horrors of capitalism, is life experience enough?
After all, if the experience of exploitation was sufficient to bring about revolutionary change, surely capitalism would’ve been brought down long ago?
If we look at the bafflement of the liberals and cynicism of the reformists in the face of politics today, we see the consequences of failing to scratch the surface to the deeper truth of what is going on.
Just as a surgeon would not attempt to operate through intuition and guesswork alone, if we are serious about ending capitalism, we first need to diagnose why it is in crisis and determine what we can replace it with.
Marxist philosophy is the most powerful tool we have for this purpose. But Marxism is itself the culmination of millennia of philosophical development. It is no accident that Vladimir Lenin steeled himself, not only in Marx, but also the great German philosopher Hegel!
Leading communist and host of the Against the Stream podcast, Hamid Alizadeh takes us on a whistle-stop tour of the history of thought, from Plato to Marx, to illustrate the advantages of developing a philosophical outlook, rather than relying on mere ‘common sense’.
It was precisely the worked-out philosophical perspective of the leadership of the Bolshevik Party, Lenin and Trotsky in particular, that allowed them to understand the dynamics of history that gave rise to the Russian Revolution, and play a leading role in ensuring its victory. As Trotsky wrote:
“It is historical experience that the greatest revolution in all history was not led by the party which started out with bombs but by the party which started out with dialectical materialism.”
By the end of this video, we hope you will not only be convinced of the value of studying theory, but eagre to take it up!
As Marx once said: “ignorance never yet helped anybody!”
This is the final Spectre of Communism season four. We will be back later in the year for a new season! Please like, share and subscribe, and let us know in the comments what you thought about this season, all feedback is appreciated!
In the meantime, check out our sister show, Against the Stream, which provides rolling analysis of the world situation from a Marxist point of view every Thursday. See you soon!
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Sources:
Lenin Collected Works: Volume 38, (Philosophical Notebooks), https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/cw/volume38.htm
Anti-Dühring, Friedrich Engels, https://marxist.com/classics-anti-duehring.htm
Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy, Friedrich Engels, https://marxist.com/classics-ludwig-feuerbach-and-the-end-of-classical-german-philosophy.htm
‘How Lenin studied Hegel’, Hamid Alizadeh, https://marxist.com/how-lenin-studied-hegel.htm
‘Lenin in a Year: In Defence of Materialism’, Alan Woods, https://marxist.com/materialism-and-and-empirio-criticism-introduction-by-alan-woods.htm
‘In defence of theory — or ignorance never yet helped anybody’, Alan Woods, https://marxist.com/defence-theory-ignorance-never-helped.htm
‘Marxism versus postmodernism’, Daniel Morley and Hamid Alizadeh, https://marxist.com/marxism-versus-postmodernism.htm
‘Aristotle’s Metaphysics’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-metaphysics/
The Republic, Plato, https://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.html
‘An Open Letter to Comrade Burnham’, L. Trotsky, https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/idom/dm/14-burnham.htm