In the class on base and superstructure, we saw how objective material changes make certain changes in society possible and, at the same time, how the direction and outcome of those changes isn't automatic. People fight out and determine the resolution of those objective changes. The class struggle is the struggle for the political power to determine the resolution of the material changes. In this sense, it is people who determine the shape and direction history takes.
The concept of the "role of the individual" defines the place of the individual within the objective, material processes going on in the world and identifies his or her active role in the process. The individual whose particular character offers what is required of a given stage or moment of history moves history forward, influences the forms it takes, and offers the context for the masses of people to play their role in the making of history.
Recognition of the role of the individual in history is a statement of responsibility. It calls on each individual to understand the material changes and the laws inherent in them, and it underlines the importance of consciousness in the revolutionary process. It calls on each of us to play our role in determining the direction and outcome of change.
Implications for Today
Appreciating how history is made and the role of the individual is especially important today, when society is in a profound leap from one material basis to another. In such a leap, the old material foundations for social relationships, institutions and people’s thinking are destroyed. But the outcome of this destruction – the construction of the new — depends on the consciousness and conscious action of people. Today, the development of labor-replacing methods of production is an antagonism to capitalist relations of production. It sets the basis for an objective movement whose actual – though not necessarily conscious – aim is the communist reconstruction of society. Developing the communist ideology of an objectively communist movement is the order of the day. Those revolutionaries with the understanding, inclination and passion to develop that communist ideology on a mass scale play the essential role in moving history forward.
Readings
- Institute for the Study of the Science of Society, "Revolutionaries – The Role of the Individual," Institute Resource Paper #5. http://www.scienceofsociety.org/inbox/res5.html
- Frederick Engels to Heinz Starkenburg, January 25, 1894. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894/letters/94_01_25.htm
- George Plekhanov, excerpt from The Materialist Conception of History. http://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/works/1890s/history/part1.htm
- George Plekhanov, "Section III" and "Section VIII," The Role of the Individual in History. http://art-bin.com/art/oplecheng.html (Find Sections III and VIII)
- George Plekhanov, "Man and Necessity in History," Fundamental Problems of Marxism, pp. 66-70. http://www.scienceofsociety.org/philo/texts/plekhanov1.pdf
- Frederick Engels, "Causality" and "Reciprocal Action," Dialectics of Nature, pp. 144-146. http://www.scienceofsociety.org/philo/texts/engels1.pdf
- Frederick Engels to Joseph Bloch, September 21, 1890. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_09_21.htm
Readings strongly suggested – at least for reports:
- Michio Kaku, Visions — How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century, Bantam Books, 1998, Chapter 1.
- Henry Mayer, "Preface," All on Fire – William Lloyd Garrison and the Abolition of Slavery, New York: St. Martins Griffen, 1998.
Discussion Questions
1. Discuss Engels' and Hegel's definition of "freedom."
2. What's the difference between "automatic" and "inevitable"?
3. The development of the productive forces is the underlying, general cause of the historical progress of humanity. What is the role of the individual in history? (For this question, have someone do a report on Henry Mayer, "Preface," All on Fire - William Lloyd Garrison and the Abolition of Slavery.)
4. Engels says that "freedom is also a product of historical development." What does that mean, and what kind of "freedom" is possible today? (For this question, have someone do a report on Michio Kaku, Visions — How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century, Chapter 1.)
5. Plekhanov says that the "history we make is the history of our own social relations." Discuss what that means.
