Product Description

First published in 1978, this book rapidly established itself as a classic of modern Marxism. Cohen's masterful application of advanced philosophical techniques in an uncompromising defence of historical materialism commanded widespread admiration. In the ensuing twenty years, the book has served as a flagship of a powerful intellectual movement - analytical Marxism. In this expanded edition Cohen offers his own account of the history, and the further promise, of analytical Marxism. He also expresses reservations about traditional historical materialism, in the light of which he reconstructs the theory, and he studies the implications for historical materialism of the demise of the Soviet Union.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #296166 in Books
• Published on: 2001-01-25
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 470 pages

Review
This is the perfect book for anyone wishing to get to grips with the type of systematized version of classical Marxism that has been developed in the Anglo-Saxon idealist tradition. It is also an important reference for anyone wishing to develop a critique of this version and to advance to a more creative, and less idealist, engagement with Marxist thought. (Years Work in Critical Cultural Theory )

From the Back Cover
"An admirable and formidable book." (E. J. Hobsbawm)

"Every sentence has the feel of having been deeply thought through over a long period of time." (Gareth Stedman Jones)

Customer Reviews

Flawed argument at the heart of a classic
Karl Marx's Theory of History has been rightly acclaimed as a classic of Marxism. Cohen's book has three aims. First, in distinction from Marxist philosophers such as Georg Lukács and Louis Althusser, Cohen wishes to set out what he considers to be Marx's view of historical materialism and not some revision of the theory. Second, by scouring Marx's texts, he wishes to represent Marx's theory in a logically consistent fashion. Thirdly, in representing the theory in this fashion he wants to refute its major critics. While Cohen achieves his first two aims in an impressive manner, he falls at the final hurdle.

The version of historical materialism Cohen defends, and which he convincingly demonstrates to be that held by Marx, is a form of technological determinism. Forms of society rise and fall, on this view, according to the level of development of the productive forces they possess. Adopting functional explanation, Cohen argues that the superstructure (the legal and political order of any class society) is as it is in order to support the relations of production (the way in which owners and producers relate to one another and the forces of production). The relations of production are as they are in order to promote the development of the productive forces. In other words, what drives the historical process according to Cohen, is the constant development of the productive forces.

As his critics have argued, how can we claim that there is constant development of the productive forces across societies when the historical record shows many instances of productive stagnation and even regression? Cohen argues, however, that there is no more than a tendency for the productive forces to develop. At the centre of the book is Cohen's claim that human beings are 'somewhat rational', and that when they are faced with the option of adopting more advanced productive forces that will reduce the burden of labour, they will tend to take that option. Ultimately then, we can say that Cohen's representation of Marx's theory turns around this crucial claim about the nature of human beings.

It is here where Cohen's argument falls down. There is plenty of evidence that people throughout history do not adopt more advanced productive forces, and make this decision on a 'rational' basis, that is by calculating the costs and benefits that would accrue from such a move. The remaining hunter-gatherer societies across the world have consciously chosen to forego agriculture because the initial costs (at least) of the transition would be too much to bear. What then, can we say of prehistory, when hunter-gatherer societies had not been forced into the more barren corners of the earth? Why would it be rational for people who, by and large, had plenty to eat and a great deal of 'leisure' time on their hands, to shift to agriculture when this demanded intense physical and psychological commitments?

Cohen's argument cannot help us here, because it places too much weight on the 'rational' decision of individuals at the cost of culture and social relations. Technological determinism is a reductionist theory that overlooks the independent force of culture and social relations in the shaping people's behaviour. People are rational only in so far as they make some of their decisions (and by no means all) by means of cost-benefit calculation. Costs, in this respect, can include things like not offending gods or ensuring that ones social status is maintained, and these can be considered perfectly rational reasons for rejecting more advanced productive forces. Crucially, what calculations we make are largely determined by the position we occupy in a network of social relations and the beliefs we share with others in the network. Although the state of technology undoubtedly plays a crucial role in many social calculation procedures, it certainly does not determine them in any strict sense.

If, then, we want to explain why the productive forces have developed for what is a relatively small part of human history, we cannot do so by resorting to the argument that people are 'somewhat rational' in the sense that Cohen had in mind when he originally made this claim. Instead, we need to turn to what other Marxists have described as the social relations of production, i.e. the specific way in which societies organise production. These relations tend to determine the level of development of the productive forces rather than vice-versa. If Marx's theory of history is as Cohen says it is (though other Marxologists would disagree) then, quite simply put, it is wrong.

The strength and weakness of Cohen's argument lies in its use of the principles of analytical philosophy to reconstruct historical materialism. Rigorous logical analysis and clarity of expression combine to produce a theory that is indeed consistent and transparent. But the cost of this approach is that we are left with a theory that fails to illuminate either the historical record or the political strategy of the left. The irony of this is thick when one considers that there was a very political, albeit implicit, aim to Cohen's book - that is, to defend a vision of a classless society where the division of labour has been abolished. Desirable as this goal might be, it is as far away today as it has ever been, and it is unlikely that logical analysis alone will make it any more obtainable.