Translatorâs Introduction
From 1901 to 1906, the period in which he wrote the articles contained in the present work, Alexander Bogdanov (1873â1928) was a leading participant in the revolutionary Social-Democratic movement in Russia.
Bogdanov had declared himself to be a Marxist in 1896, but he was unable to participate in the formation of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party due to his arrest in November 1898 for âsocial propaganda among workersâ and subsequent five years of provincial exile. Even in exile, however, Bogdanov kept abreast of party matters. He was in communication with Iskra, the official journal of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), beginning in 1901, and when the Bolshevik-Menshevik split occurred in 1903, Bogdanov sympathised with the Bolshevik position. In the autumn of 1904, as soon as his exile was over, Bogdanov went to Geneva, Switzerland where Lenin, Krupskaya, and other Russian Social-Democratic leaders were living. In August 1904, he participated in the âConference of the 22â, the founding conference of the Bolshevik fraction, and he was elected to the Bureau of Committees of the Majority, the leading organ of the Bolsheviks.
Bogdanov returned to Russia during the 1905 Revolution where he wrote tactical leaflets about armed uprising, edited the Bolsheviksâ two periodicals, served on the Bolshevik bureau in St. Petersburg, and was in fact the most senior Bolshevik in Russia at the time.1 He was also a delegate to the Third Congress of the RSDLP in 1905, at which he was elected to the new Central Committee of the RSDLP. In the autumn, when the Revolution reached its height, Bogdanov was in St. Petersburg, deeply involved in party work and serving on the Executive Committee of the St. Petersburg Soviet of Workersâ Deputies. In December he was arrested, along with the entire Executive Committee, when the Soviet was suppressed. He remained in prison until May 1906, and, after his release, Bogdanov went abroad. It was in the years that followed that his famous split with Lenin occurred.2
Meanwhile, during this same period of political exile and revolutionary activity, Bogdanov pursued an ambitious intellectual agenda: to develop a comprehensive worldview that would explain all of nature â including human life â according to the principles of historical materialism. The many books and articles he wrote in this pursuit fall into two main groups: a positive, non-polemical exposition of his scientific philosophy and worldview; and a polemical struggle with Russiaâs Marxist revisionists in which he both dismantled their arguments against the principles of historical materialism and explained how his philosophy answered the objections that the revisionists raised, thus further developing his own worldview.
Bogdanovâs pursuit of a systematic, scientific philosophy began with Basic Elements of the Historical View of Nature (1899),3 in which he presented a picture of reality as a single, dynamic, interconnected flow of processes based on the monism of motion (or âenergyâ) as âone and eternalâ. He explained how nature, life, the individual human psyche, and human society are all parts of the same interconnected reality and are subject to the same laws of nature. He particularly emphasised the concept that all processes of the individual psyche, as well as those of whole societies, are determined by external influences of the natural world â i.e. that existence determines consciousness. Another notable feature of Basic Elements was Bogdanovâs replacement of the concept of dialectical change â development through contradiction or of the transformation of quantity to quality â with the concept of a dynamic equilibrium of forces and the notion that quantity and quality are entirely commensurable.
In his next book, Cognition from the Historical Point of View,4 Bogdanov focused specifically on the question of how the human psyche is conditioned by its environment. He explained how cognition âarises from non-cognitive processesâ and how phenomena both inside and outside the processes of cognition are part of a determinist system. In the course of doing so, Bogdanov denied Kantâs notion that the categories of cognition are inherent in the human mind and argued that such categories of thought as space, time, and causality are psychical forms â abstractions â that have been produced by humanity over its long history of cognitive activity and that are imparted to individuals by society. Thus, cognition is not an individual but a social process, and âcognition plays the same role in the life of the social whole as consciousness does in the life of the individualâ.5 Moreover, consistent with his Marxist outlook, Bogdanov asserted that âthe social labour struggle for existence, or the process of production, is the basis on which cognition arises and developsâ.6
It must have become clear to Bogdanov that âmotionâ or âenergyâ was as inadequate a basis for a monist outlook as metaphysical materialism, since the notion that some âthingâ is the cause of sensations (and so, ultimately, of cognition) leads inevitably to a dualism of exterior and interior, physical and psychical. Bogdanov found a solution to this problem in the neutral monism of being and cognition advanced by Ernst Mach and Richard Avenarius â the idea that the âphysicalâ and the âpsychicalâ are two sides of a single reality. As Mach put it, sense elements (of colour, sound, pressures, space, time, etc.) are the only reality. They are called âpsychicalâ when taken in relation to the physiology of a personâs sensory apparatus and âphysicalâ when they are taken in relation to complexes in the physical world.7
In a series of articles that became the first two volumes of Empiriomonism,8 Bogdanov applied this neutral monism to the worldview he had developed in Basic Elements of the Historical View of Nature. His continuing task was to explain how the operations of the human psyche are interconnected with the rest of nature and are ultimately caused by external stimuli, and he sought to âsystematically reduce all the gaps in our experience to the principle of continuityâ. These gaps included the gap between âspiritâ and âmatterâ, the gap between âconsciousnessâ and âphysiologyâ, and the gaps in the field of experiences that separate the individual from the universe and individuals from one another.
In the third volume of Empiriomonism, Bogdanov dealt with the question of how his scientific philosophy related to Marxism. He began by explaining the superiority of his empiriomonism to the outdated theory of knowledge of G.V. Plekhanov, the self-styled defender of âorthodoxâ âdialectical materialismâ.9 He went on to show how empiriomonism substantiates the basic principle of historical materialism, that a societyâs economic base determines its ideological superstructure. What Marx referred to as âthe material forces of productionâ Bogdanov called âthe technology of productive labourâ and what Marx referred to as âthe production of material lifeâ Bogdanov called âthe assimilation of energy from the environmentâ. For both Marx and Bogdanov, the process is the same: the mode of production determines social, political, and intellectual life. As Bogdanov put it, the technological process âis the genetically primary realm of social life and all social development can issue only from itâ.10
Bogdanov concluded by insisting that empiriomonism is a Marxist philosophy developed in a Marxian way. It is âthe ideologyâ, he said, âof the âproductive forcesâ of the technological processâ,11 and it was arrived at by abstracting the worldview of workers in machine production. In short, empiriomonism is the ideology of the industrial working class. Bogdanov further insisted that his âpoint of view, while not being âmaterialistâ in the narrow sense of this word, belongs to the same order as âmaterialistâ systemsâ.12
In the second group of works in this period (all of which are contained in this volume), Bogdanov used polemics with Russian Marxist revisionists as an opportunity to further elaborate his own philosophy.
Ironically, the starting point of the Russian revisionists â most notably Peter Struve, Nikolai Berdiaev, and Sergei Bulgakov â was the same as Bogdanovâs: the search for a scientific philosophy that would support the principles of historical materialism. However, whereas Bogdanov had begun with the neo-positivist, empiricist trend in contemporary scientific philosophy, the Russian revisionists adopted neo-Kantianism.13 And whereas the logic of Bogdanovâs radical empiricism led him to a rigorous and consistent monism, the logic of the Kantian outlook led the revisionists to dualism, idealism, and religion.14
This latter possibility was not in the least foreseen by Peter Struve, one of the intellectual leaders in Russian Marxism in the 1890s and a collaborator with G.V. Plekhanov and V.I. Lenin until the turn of the century. Struve became famous with his first book, Critical Remarks on Russiaâs Economic Development (1894), which was devoted to proving that Russia was on the path toward capitalism on the European model. In this work, Struve took what he thought was a thoroughly Marxian position, with one exception. âWe cannot but recogniseâ, he wrote, âthat a purely philosophical foundation of this doctrine [historical materialism] has not yet been givenâ.15 He then proposed to build that foundation with the help of the German neo-Kantian philosopher, Alois Riehl.
At the time, this did not seem unreasonable. As a scientific philosophy, Riehlâs variety of neo-Kantianism had a great deal in its favour. Riehl claimed to be a âcritical monistâ,16 and he was one of the few neo-Kantians to take the standpoint of materialism, in the sense of treating matter as the cause of sensations.17 Riehlâs philosophy must also have been attractive since it appeared to have much in common with radical empiricism; in Russia Riehl was often studied in connection with Richard Avenarius.18
Nikolai Berdiaev and Sergei Bulgakov, two rising stars in Russian Marxist circles, followed in Struveâs footsteps, and, from the mid-1890s to the end of the century, Struve, Berdiaev, and Bulgakov used arguments taken from Riehl and other neo-Kantian philosophers to develop their Marxist outlooks. What they did not realise, however, was that they were stepping onto a logical slippery slope toward idealism. They failed to appreciate that the metaphysical materialism of Kantâs Critique of Pure Reason inevitably brought with it the dualist idealism of his Critique of Practical Reason. If a âthing-in-itselfâ is the source of human perception, then it must be different from and independent of perception, and two realms of being must therefore exist: experience and transcendent being.
This, indeed, was Riehlâs position. Following Kant, he distinguished between the world of experience, in which science sought objective truths, and a transcendent world of free will and ethical reasoning. Riehl believed that epistemology could clarify how scientific truth is arrived at, but he did not think it could provide a philosophical outlook or a picture of the world. The realm of philosophy, he said, âis not the real but the possible, that which may be created by the will and the power of manâ.19 â[Philosophy] refutes the fatalistic meaning that is generally given to the conception of the universal reign of law in nature, and shows men how to assert and to extend their rule over natureâ.20 Thus, the same work â The Philosophy of Criticism â that the Russian neo-Kantian Marxists used to justify historical materialism could equally well have been quoted in order to refute it.
The slippery slope toward dualism (then idealism and ultimately religion) began with the question of morality and free will. Even as they continued to claim commitment to the Social-Democratic movement, the neo-Kantian Marxists began to adopt principles alien to historical materialism. By 1897, Struve defended Kantâs separation of the realm of experience, in which causality prevails, and the realm of subjective ideals, in which freedom rules. Ideals come from outside science, he said, and people have free will to pursue their ideals.21 In 1901, Berdiaev, even while asserting that the social ideal of Marxism was objectively necessary, insisted that it must also be subjectively desirable and objectively ethical, and ethics, Berdiaev said, âmust take Kantâs critique as its starting pointâ.22
Russiaâs neo-Kantian Marxists were soon swept up in the rising tide of idealism in Russian culture. The process began with their association with the Moscow Psychological Society, which had been taken over by neo-Kantian philosophers seeking a metaphysical alternative to the traditional positivist, materialistic, and scientistic outlook of the Russian intelligentsia.23 Its journal, Voprosy filosofii i psikhologii [Problems of Philosophy and Psychology] became a venue for articles by Struve, Berdiaev, and Bulgakov at the same time it was publishing articles by Christian philosopher Vladimir Solovev.
Solovev had sprung to fame in the 1870s as a bitter critic of European positivism,24 and by the late 1890s he had developed a religious philosophy that could hardly have been more hostile to the principles of historical materialism. He countered empiricism with intuition, materialism with idealism, determinism with freedom, and atheism with Christianity. Solovev celebrated the absolute value of the individual and combined idealism and liberalism in the notion of lichnost or personhood. âHuman personhoodâ, he said, âpossesses in principle unconditional dignity, on which is based its inalienable rights â¦â.25
Solovev inspired the ânew religious consciousnessâ in Russian culture at the turn of the century, which was manifested in the work of the symbolist poets of the âsilver age of Russian poetryâ, religious-philosophical societies that formed in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and various groups of self-styled âgod-seekersâ, mystical anarchists, etc.26 He exercised a profound influence, as well, over the Russian neo-Kantian Marxists, who enthusiastically adopted his notions of absolute values and the sanctity of individual personhood.
The watershed event in the rise of idealism in Russian culture was the publication in 1902 of the symposium, Problems of Idealism, which was organised and edited by Peter Struve but was sponsored and published by the Moscow Psychological Society. It was also a watershed moment for the Russian revisionists, since the contributions by Struve, Berdiaev, and Bulgakov to the symposium signified their final abandonment of historical materialism. Struve announced that he had âopenly passed to metaphysics, that is, having broken with positivism, in the philosophical sense, [he] ceased to be a Marxistâ.27 Berdiaev, too, stood âon the ground of philosophic idealismâ28 and argued that the struggle for human liberation was essentially an ethical task and not a natural necessity.29 Bulgakov declared that participation âin the current social struggleâ âwill be motivated not by egoistic class interest, but by religious duty, by an absolute order of the moral law, by a dictate of Godâ.30
Even though they had abandoned â and even argued against â the principles of historical materialism, however, the Russian revisionists continued to present themselves as Social Democrats, in the same way that the Bernsteinian revisionists remained within the German Social-Democratic Party. Although they argued that the contradictions of capitalism were being âbluntedâ and although they gave up Zusammenbruchstheorie â the idea that capitalism must inevitably collapse in socialist revolution, they claimed to still believe in the principles of socialism. Their difference from revolutionary Marxists was that they conceived of socialism as an ethical ideal and the path toward it as a moral endeavour. The difference between the Russian and German revisionists was that the Bernsteinians remained in the Social-Democratic movement, while Struve and his colleagues did not. After the 1905 Revolution, the Russian revisionists abandoned Social Democracy entirely. Until that time, Russiaâs revolutionary Marxists â Bogdanov included â bitterly condemned them as renegades. After 1905, when they no longer pretended to be Social Democrats, they were simply ignored.
Bogdanov makes rather contradictory claims in his introduction to On the Psychology of Society. He says that the âstruggle with theoretical âidealismâ ⦠provided the immediate occasion for the appearance of the articles that comprise this workâ but then asserts that âthe principal content of this work is not a critique of or a polemic with âidealismââ¯â.
That these articles are polemical is unquestionable. In them Bogdanov subjects articles by Berdiaev and Bulgakov to withering critiques. He ridicules the notion of absolute truth and absolute values and criticises the idealism of Immanuel Kant and Vladimir Solovev. On the other hand, the most important aspect of this polemic is that it provided Bogdanov the opportunity to elaborate and develop his own scientific philosophy. For example, one of the ways in which he discredits the idealists is through the application of his concept of sociomorphism31Â â the idea that methods of thinking of a given era reflect its methods of social production. Thus, Bogdanov debunks the notion that the idealists are pursuing eternal, absolute ideals by demonstrating that their way of thinking is not timeless and absolute but is the specific manifestation of their social and economic status. Idealism, he argues, is the ideology of an intelligentsia that hopes to serve as the spiritual leader of a society that is based on the exchange relationships of modern capitalism
Furthermore, Bogdanov not only criticises the ideology of the idealists, but responds to their critique of Marxism, and in the course of doing so he provides a more thorough explanation of how his historical view of nature and empiriomonist philosophy substantiate the principles of historical materialism. He pays particular attention to the relation of economic base and ideological superstructure and to the precise causal process through which changes in the relations of production produce changes in ideology.
The same considerations apply to the articles in New World. Bogdanovâs polemic against the idealists continued, but he now turns his attention to the future and a discussion of how his philosophy envisions future socialist society. Bogdanov first deals with extreme individualism, arguing that it is caused by the specialisation and social antagonisms of exchange society, and he explains, in empiriomonistic terms, how socialism will bring social fragmentation to an end â how the ânarrowness and incompleteness of human beings that has created inequality, heterogeneity, and the psychical disconnection of peopleâ will be overcome. Bogdanov then takes up the problem of moral norms. After explaining that compulsory norms of the present originated in the process of production and serve as conservative supports for the status quo, he argues that in the future norms will take on a scientific form. They will be goal-oriented or expedient: âif you want such and such, then you must do such and suchâ. Thus, since members of the working class will all share the same goals, they will voluntarily pursue them without compulsion. Finally, Bogdanov explains that questions regarding âthe meaning of lifeâ will become irrelevant to people who have taken charge of their destiny and who are using their knowledge to master the forces of nature. They will become âharmonious and whole people who have been freed from contradictions and compulsion in their practice and from fetishism in their knowledgeâ.
Bogdanov also attacked idealism in âLegal Society and Labour Societyâ (in Studies in the Realist Worldview), a review of Economy and Law by the neo-Kantian philosopher of law, Rudolf Stammler.32 In that work, Stammler had argued that society is created by laws and norms and is fundamentally moral. Law regulates the economy, he said; the economy does not determine the law. In his review, Bogdanov continues both to criticise the neo-Kantian outlook and to develop his own scientific philosophy. The essence of social life, he says, is the process of collective labour in peopleâs struggle for life and progress. Legal norms are only organising adaptations that are worked out in the labour process, and they have only conditional and temporary meaning.
The turn toward philosophical idealism was not the only deviation from historical materialism on the part of Russiaâs Marxist revisionists. Like the Bernsteinian revisionists in Germany at the same time, some Russian revisionists abandoned the labour theory of value and adopted the theory of marginal utility.
The theory of marginal utility, which takes the value of commodities to be a function not of the cost of production but of the effect of consumer demand on production, first appeared among neo-classical economists in the middle of the nineteenth century as an alternative to Adam Smithâs and David Ricardoâs labour theory of value. It did not become a problem for Marxists, however, until 1894 when volume 3 of Capital was published. Two years later, Eugen Böhm-Bawerk, an Austrian economist, published Karl Marx and the Close of his System33 in which he pointed out what he thought was a contradiction between Marxâs treatment of value in volumes 1 and 3 of Capital. He took Marxâs assertion in volume 1 that âall value is based on labour and labour alone, and that values of commodities [are] in proportion to the working time necessary for their productionâ and contrasted it with the statement in volume 3 that value is relative to the costs of production, that âindividual commodities do and must exchange with each other in a proportion different from that of the labour incorporated in them, and this not accidentally and temporarily, but of necessity and permanentlyâ.34
Struve and Bulgakov were the first Russian Marxists to address this issue. First, they defended the labour theory of value, then they accepted Böhm-Bawerkâs analysis but argued that marginalism is actually compatible with the labour theory of value, but they ultimately abandoned the labour theory of value completely and adopted marginalism. Marginalism was also adopted by two important Russian (former) Marxist economists, Semen Frank and Mikhail Tugan-Baranovsky.35
Bogdanov made specific rebuttals to Frankâs and Tugan-Baranovskyâs critiques of the labour theory of value,36 but he also defended the labour theory of value in general terms in âTechnology and Exchangeâ in Studies in the Realist Worldview. Bogdanov first explains how his own historical view of nature substantiates the labour theory of value and then dismantles Böhm-Bawerkâs arguments against it. Of particular note is Bogdanovâs expression of Marxâs conception of the labour theory of value in terms of the universal system he had established in Basic Elements of the Historical View of Nature, i.e. that production and distribution are social adaptations in the struggle of society to survive and that social labour should be considered as a specific aspect of the general expenditure of human energy. Moreover, Bogdanov introduces a new understanding of the âmaterialâ basis of society and social development. Whereas Marx treated the changing means of production and ownership of the means of production as the key to economic and social change, Bogdanov treats the changing technology of production and mastery of the technology of production as the basis of change.37
The Text and Translation
The first two sections of this volume consist of the contents of two books of collected articles, On the Psychology of Society38 and New World.39 New World appeared in three editions â 1905, 1918, and 1920 â and was published for a fourth time in the collection, On Proletarian Culture: Articles 1904â1924 (1925).40 I used the 1905 edition to be consistent with the time period in which all the other articles in this volume were written. However, I have compared the 1905 edition with the 1925 edition, and I make note of all revisions in footnotes.
The last section consists of two articles Bogdanov wrote for a collective work, intended as a response to Problems of Idealism, Studies in the Realist Worldview,41 which he edited. Studies in the Realist Worldview was published in 1904 and reissued in 1905. I have translated the 1905 edition, although I have not found any difference between them except for the foreword to the 1905 edition.
The order in which Bogdanov published these articles is as follows:
âWhat is Idealismâ (Bogdanov 1901b)
âThe Development of Life in Nature and in Societyâ (Bogdanov 1902c)
âA New Middle Ages: On Problems of Idealismâ (Bogdanov 1903a)
âAuthoritarian Thinkingâ (Bogdanov 1903b)
âIn the Field of Viewâ (Bogdanov 1903c)
âA New Middle Ages: On the Benefits of Knowledgeâ (Bogdanov 1904a)
âA New Middle Ages: Echoes of the Pastâ (Bogdanov 1904b)
âThe Integration of Humankindâ (Bogdanov 1904c)
âA New Middle Ages: A Philosophical Nightmareâ (Bogdanov 1904d)
âThe Accursed Questions of Philosophyâ (Bogdnaov 1904e)
âExchange and Technologyâ (Bogdanov 1904a)
âLegal Society and Labour Societyâ (Bogdanov 1904b)
âNorms and Goals of Lifeâ (Bogdanov 1905a)
âRevolution and Philosophyâ (Bogdanov 1906b)
In the introductions to my translations of Empiriomonism42 and The Philosophy of Living Experience,43 I have discussed in some detail my approach to translating Bogdanov and how I translate his key philosophical terms and concepts.
As far as the articles in this volume are concerned, there are several terms that I feel require a comment.
One is zakonomernost, which in ordinary usage means regularity, conformity to a pattern, obeying rules, etc. As a philosophical term, however, zakonomernost means âconformity to the laws of natureâ consistent with the idea that physical reality is governed by cause and effect. This, indeed, is what Bogdanov had in mind, except that, whereas he conceived of the processes of the universe as invariably subject to cause and effect, he understood âlaws of natureâ to be human formulations, the truth of which are relative to their time. Consequently, although I translate zakonomernost as âregularityâ, the reader should keep in mind that Bogdanov uses the term to mean that nothing occurs without a cause and every occurrence has a necessary consequence.
Moreover, zakonomernost was a particularly sharp point of contention between âmaterialistâ and âidealistâ Marxists because of its implication for the question of determinism versus free will. Bogdanovâs frequent use of the term would have been an obvious affront to the idealists, who specifically and emphatically denied that human beings were subject to zakonomernost. In his excellent translation of Problems of Idealism, Randall A. Poole has translated zakonomernost as âdeterminismâ, which is exactly what it meant both to the idealists and to Bogdanov.
Another term is lichnost, which in ordinary usage can mean person, personality, individual, individuality, etc. However, as noted above, Vladimir Solovev employed lichnost as a key concept of his philosophy, using it to refer to the sanctity of individual personhood, and it was adopted and celebrated by Nikolai Berdiaev, Sergei Bulgakov, and other Russian idealists. I have chosen not to translate Bogdanovâs usage of lichnost as âindividual personhoodâ, which would be quite awkward and not always relevant, but either as âhuman individualityâ or âthe human individualâ, and I leave it to readers to decide if in any given instance Bogdanov intends to contrast his usage of the term with that of the idealists.
The term sobiranie, which is of crucial importance in Chapter 10 â âSobiranie chelovekaâ, in Russian â does not have an agreed-upon translation. Robert C. Williams has translated it as âcollectivisingâ.44 In Biggart, Gloveli, and Yassourâs bibliography of Bogdanovâs works, it appears as âgatheringâ.45 And in his biography of Bogdanov,46 James D. White has translated it as âintegrationâ. Before I read Whiteâs book, I was leaning toward âcoming togetherâ, but White has convinced me that âintegrationâ is even better. The âcoming togetherâ of humankind that Bogdanov had in mind was the âgatheringâ of humanity into an integral whole, and the notion of integration â whether of an integral worldview or an integral personality â was an important one in Russian culture of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Translating sobiranie as âintegrationâ thus indicates Bogdanovâs connection with the culture of his time.
Finally, Bogdanov conceives of a society based on an exchange economy as one in which labour is divided between organizatory (singular: organizator) who organise production and ispolniteli (singular: isponitel) who carry out an organizatorâs directives, and he uses this concept to explain the dualistic thinking that is typical of exchange society. (It is this dualism, by the way, that will be overcome in the âintegration of humankindâ that socialism will accomplish.) Translating organizator as âorganiserâ makes obvious sense, and that is what I do. However, I feel it would be confusing to translate ispolniteli as âexecutorsâ or âexecutivesâ, which is the dictionary definition of the term. The notion of a society divided into âorganisersâ (who are very knowledgeable and have great responsibilities) and âexecutorsâ or âexecutivesâ (whose training is only sufficient for carrying out directives) would be at great variance with how these words are used today. I therefore translate ispolniteli as âimplementersâ not âexecutorsâ and ispolnitelskii as âimplementationalâ not âexecutiveâ.
I am once again indebted to Evgeni V. Pavlov, the real organizator of the Bogdanov Library, for his invaluable advice and encouragement.
White 2019a, p. 113.
For thorough coverage of Bogdanovâs life and thought, see James Whiteâs superb biography, White 2019b.
Bogdanov 1899a. It is Volume 1 of the Bogdanov Library.
Bogdanov 1902a.
Bogdanov 1902a, p. 135.
Bogdanov 1902a, p. 115.
Mach 1897, p. 15.
Bogdanov 2019.
The term âdialectical materialismâ was never used by Marx or Engels to designate their outlook. It was coined by Joseph Dietzgen and popularised by G.V. Plekhanov.
Bogdanov 2019, p. 328.
Ibid., p. 407.
Ibid.
For discussions of the quest for a scientific philosophy at the turn of the twentieth century, see Richardson 1997, 2008, and Howard 2004.
The most complete discussion of Struveâs intellectual development is in Pipes 1970. Struve, Bulgakov, and Berdiaev are discussed in Kindersley 1962 and Mendel 1961.
Struve 1894, p. 46.
Heidelberger 2006.
Heidelberger 2007, p. 29.
Vucinich 1970, p. 251.
Riehl 1894, p. 22.
Riehl 1894, p. 23.
Struve 1897.
Berdiaev 1901, p. 71.
Poole 1999.
Solovyov [Solovev] 1996.
Solovev 1896, p. 868.
See, for example, Rosenthal 1975 and Read 1979.
Poole 2003, p. 156.
Poole 2003, p. 162.
Poole 2003, p. 189.
Poole 2003, p. 118.
Bogdanov developed the concept in this time period, but he did not use the term âsociomorphismâ to refer to it. I am not aware that he used it before he wrote The Philosophy of Living Experience. See Bogdanov 2016, pp. 219â21.
Stammler 1896.
Böhm-Bawerk 1949.
Böhm-Bawerk 1949, pp. 29, 30.
Kindersley 1962, pp. 154â72.
Bogdanov 1899b, 1900, 1901a.
Bogdanov would expound this concept in greater detail in Chapter 9, âHistorical Materialismâ, in the third volume of Empiriomonism (Bogdanov 2019). What Marx refers to as âthe material forces of productionâ, Bogdanov calls âthe technology of productive labourâ and what Marx refers to as âthe production of material lifeâ, Bogdanov calls âassimilation of energy from the environmentâ. But for both Marx and Bogdanov, the process is the same: the mode of production conditions social, political, and intellectual life. As Bogdanov puts it, the technological process âis the genetically primary realm of social life and all social development can issue only from itâ (p. 328), and the purpose of the technological process is to produce an energetical balance â the preponderance of assimilation over expenditure of energy. The ideological process is genetically secondary or derivative, since its function is to remove contradictions from the technological process.
Bogdanov 1906a.
Bogdanov 1905e.
Bogdanov 1925.
Bogdanov 1905a.
Bogdanov 2019.
Bogdanov 2016.
Williams 1986, p. 39.
Biggart et al. 1998, p. 107.
White 2019b, p. 90.