6/13/49(?)
Dear Rae
These are some general ideas. First, Being is pre-bourgeois society, the logical essence of the pre-bourgeois society.
Essence is the distillation of bourgeois society.
Notion is the subjective mastery of bourgeois and future society. But Hegel could only do this subjectively, intellectually, for a few.
Hegel summed up and completed all previous thought.
Hegel, Ricardo, Shelley, Beethoven, Savigny, all between 1816-1820, stated the fundamental problems of bourgeois society. It is a terrible pity that we have nobody to do Shelley - as a poet. But with patience will get that done too. All the tendencies of bourgeois society were at that time stated abstractly, but the contradictions were there, in all their work.
The fact that Hegel summed up is what makes him so important, today. He stood to the Fr. Rev. as we stand to the Rus. Rev. Now.
The method he worked out for the elite, the few, is what we have to work out for the masses. That is why the Absolute Idea is so important for us. We have to work out the Abs. Idea for the exact opposite of that for which he worked it out. Engels said Essence was the most important. Correct. But for him, not for us (1949).
NB always that the logic is "without concretion of sense". It is nothing in particular. It expresses everything.
For example, Being I can see as the purely economic analysis of society. Essence, however, the sociological analysis, leaps out of it. Both objective logic. Subjective Logic, Notion, deals with, expresses man's subjective determination, need, necessity, to master nature, society, himself. The "real history of humanity" is being worked out in Notion. When the masses, not a few philosophers, grasp the dialectic, the logic, the unity of theoretical, practical, methodological, we have reached the Absolute Idea of society, i.e., social man. There begins the development of human power for its own sake.
Again:
The logic is "without concretion of sense". It expresses the Absolute or an Absolute in many absolutes. The history of society is an Absolute; but one can make a special absolute of a special society, capitalism. Then Being = the growth of the prerequisites, the elementary economic relations of capitalism; essence = capitalism as we see it in Marx's Capital; Notion = the growth of the proletariat which is expressed by its subjective, i.e., its political organizations. Today, 1949, we are faced with the dialectic of the party. We have to trace its growth, development, how it perishes, must perish. Lenin came at the climax of capitalism; and beginning with the Rev. experience, he transferred it to world-cap'm.; and emerged with State & Rev. He posed the prol. "to a man" and yet had to pose the party in opposition to it, abstractly in S&R, and then, with bitter concreteness in 1920; the unions versus the party. That opposition we have now to resolve. Note that there is no other problem in the world today - all problems revolve around the "one party state". If that can be solved, there is no obstacle to the irresistible victory of international socialism. It is the last ideological defence of the bourgeois and its satellites; it preoccupies all thinking workers, it dominates the petty-bourgeoisie.
In 1914-1923 Lenin did several things, but they can be boiled down and worked out only by rigid historical, factual investigation, shaped by dialectic.
| They | Lenin | We |
|---|---|---|
| pre-1914 capitalism | Cap--ism, 1914-1920 | 1940 |
| free competition and some monopoly, | Monopoly, Monopoly, Monopoly, going into state capitalism, state-cap., state-cap. | state-cap. going into int'l. reorganization. |
| Orderly organisation of imperialism, or Rosa L'g. At the height of monopoly it will collapse back into free competition | redivision of world, increase of antagonisms | No redivision but unification of the world |
| -- | 1923 clearest perception of A few western nations against Ger., Rus., & many hundreds of millions in the East | Incredible increase of antagonisms |
| Pre-1914 | Lenin 1914-1923 | We |
|---|---|---|
Must keep the party. "Movement everything". Work out everything by "democracy". Even the rev. Socialism = what we have in Britain carried to extreme complete nationalisation; no confiscation; parliament; democracy; PLAN |
The economic structure of monopoly cap. demands that this become state cap. in (Rus.) and around workers take over acc't'g & control all over the world which, in advanced countries, is state-capitalistic. NB. For world mkt. & free competition |
Motive power of cap. MUST BE substituted a new motive power: I cannot over-emphasize importance of this. Party must organize for this. |
--- |
--- |
Complete over-coming of all opposites, politics & economics, nat'l & int'l; party & mass. |
| They | Lenin | We |
|---|---|---|
| Pure Kantianism, degenerated: A mixture of uncritical idealism & uncritical postivism pre-1914 | Unity of opposites | |
Stages of Transition, Transition, Transition, Transition,
(Something new for him) which is governed by the solution of a concrete problem, and conflict between the bourgeoisie or petty-bourgeoisie authoritarian way and the proletarian creative way.
Each stage of transition arises from the previous stage, and expresses the basic contradictions in a new and more acute form. |
Owing to vast extension of state cap. and its consequences and the objective situation (Mass resistance - mass strikes in the US - inter-relations of economy, etc. etc.) pose whole prol. against all parties which = bureaucracy | |
| But inside and outside Russia still poses rev. party as opposite to reformist party: has to owing to great mass of semi-proletarians and petty bourgeoisie. |
Now you have some idea of what I mean. (Grace will write to you also) I do not swear by all I say in the chart, but that is the method. The great error is to believe that L and the European Mensheviks had the same policy but they betrayed. No such thing. They had a different method on everything. L thought his ideas were specifically Russian. In 1914 we had to transfer these profoundly dialectical conceptions of his to world cap.; the international etc.
If, concretely, we draw the line between him and them in 1914 and as he developed it; and between him and them and all shades, LT; Bukh., Rosa; if we do this with the utmost concreteness and formal tabulation and as sharply as possible we shall have done a tremendous historical service,1 and cleared the way for us politically. On the whole I see Lenin in essence aware, of the new role of the prol., but compelled to pose it in terms of parties: the objective situations compels us to pose in terms of the prol. i.e., organized labor as a whole, the rev. prol. That is the new dialectical stage. But first and foremost to drive home, sharpen, even more than he did the differences between L and the 2nd Int. of 1914. Rosa L., LT, etc. Bukharin etc. are to be seen in relation to this struggle.
G will write as I say. Compare the two. This work must begin. I am sure that in the work and in the concrete changes we shall understand what L saw in the Logic and not vice versa. The Logic will help us, but the truth lies in the concrete. And do not, I would say, jump to the trade union discussion, etc. I think the thing is to get Imp., State & Rev., and state-capitalism (this is difficult for some of the 2nd Int. played with it) to get this clear. 1914 - up to the report and discussion to the Bol. conference after L's return; skip from here to State & Rev.
One little example of what I mean by concrete. To oblige me make a little list of what is taught as to the basis of L's change in April. There is plenty here; but what is never said is what L said in the [...]2 and many other places. Heavy Industry in Russia has reached the stage of nationalization and nat'n. calls for either bur. control or workers' control. The economic basis has been completely lost. I think I have written enough. If you do not like the method & the ideas, let me know, and I am ready to try another way. But I have been gnawing at this for weeks - it has, along with my poor health - prevented me from doing anything else, and now I am sure that this is the way to what we want.
J.
Let me add something else that is to me v. imp. in all directions. Lenin made the aphorism on Capital in the midst of a discussion about the Syllogism.
If you add to this the longish passage on Dial., 1915, Vol. XI, you will see that he sees very clearly that every single statement, i.e., the tree is green, contains opposition and the possibility of development to further contradictions. Now every stage of capital, and of Capital in fact and in theory, contains the elements of transition to another stage in which the contradiction (unity of opposites) appear at a higher stage.
Grace should first work out this section on the Syllogism very carefully; as logic first; (then later as applied to capital and Capital and what not - there we can have a free for all); but it should be done as logic first.
This means that you, Rae, must concretise every stage of capital and what was thought about it at the time (briefly of course) particularly in 1914. Note that while some may have talked about monopoly, etc. we will be able to show up what they thought by contrast with Lenin.
1 The word is overwritten on the original manuscript. 'service' is the editor's best guess at the word that CLR James used.
2 There is a blank space in the text at this point.
