In this debate it cannot be so much a matter of criticising false assertions and replacing them with true statements. For Habermas' theses are principally a research programme, directed against certain other research programmes. For me, the dispute is still[1] on the same level as in 1969, which Renate Damus formulated as "confrontation ... of a Critical Theory which ... renounces a preoccupation with political economy and a position which, after being buried for decades, holds this preoccupation for most imperative".[2] The incompleteness of the attempts at a presentation within the rival research programmes admits of discussion only preparatory to systematic argumentation and in partial anticipation of results which have yet to be proven.
The question I address is what is to be understood under reconstruction of historical materialism and what programmatic direction is indicated by Habermas' reconstruction of historical materialism? In this connection it is important to explicitly distinguish two meanings of the term 'historical materialism'.
'Historical materialism' can be understood i) as designating that theory whose subject matter is the historically specific character of the present[3] form of material reproduction of life, to anticipate the capitalist form of society (Histomat1 is synchronic).
'Historical materialism' can be understood ii) as designating that theory which treats the history of the development of humankind as a chain of class societies (Histomat2 is diachronic).
Histomat1 and Histomat2 have the common characteristic that here theory is undertaken with the perspective of the practical dissolution of, to anticipate, class society. On Histomat2 on the history of development of class societies, there are only occasional asides from Marx, apart from the hitherto scarcely systematically evaluated excerpts on early history and ethnology from 1880-82. These asides, I claim, serve Marx mainly as contrasting illustrations for the capital-analysis. This function is probably also fulfilled by the remarks in the draft of a general introduction from 1857 to the text Zur Kritik der politischen Ökonomie, the first published book of the capital-analysis.
In the Preface to this work of 1858, he states:
"I suppress a general introduction which I had sketched, since, on closer consideration, to me any anticipation of results which have yet to be proven seems disturbing."
'Anticipated' results which have yet to be proven are strictly speaking, not a result of scientific argumentation.
Next I will try to demonstrate that precisely these favourite parts of the Preface which are used to support Histomat2 fall to the criticism of the above cited marxian self-critique of the suppressed 'general introduction'. (I do not shy away from establishing an inconsistency in Marx which has many later consequences.) My argumentation aims at the following: Jürgen Habermas treats as basic postulates of a universal theory of development (Histomat2) what Marx can only claim as 'results' of his analysis of the capitalist epoch and therefore related only to capitalism. It seems to me, firstly, that this analysis is precisely 'the point' and, secondly, that not only Habermas was led astray by marxian formulations which go beyond this.
Marx writes in the 1859 Preface with regard to his 'Critical Revision of the Hegelian Philosophy of Right':
"My investigation culminated in the result that relations of right, as well as forms of state, are neither to be conceptualised out of themselves, nor out of the so-called universal development of the human spirit, but rather are rooted in the material relations of life whose totality (Gesamtheit) Hegel, following the precedent of the English and the French in the 18th century, summarised under the name of 'bourgeois society' (bürgerliche Gesellschaft) that, however, the anatomy of bourgeois society is to be sought in political economy."
Against the transepochal marxian formulation ('relations of right as well as forms of state'), it is to be emphasised that here bourgeois society is the object of attention. For Marx mentions that, following on from bis critique of Hegel, he had studied the system of bourgeois economy. And regarding these studies he says: "The general result at which I arrived and, once won, served as guiding thread to my studies…": here Marx's studies of the anatomy of bourgeois society are again referred to. It is important to note that not only 'result' but also 'guiding thread' relate to the not yet completed research process.[4] Only after this prelude follows the 'classic' formulation, which is mostly cited in isolation: "In the social production of their life, humans enter ..."
I draw attention to the fact that this marxian formulation (relating generally to 'humans') stands in marked contrast to its prelude, where it is a matter of preoccupation with the capitalist epoch. The theme becomes, without notice, no longer the humans in bourgeois society, but generally related to various social formations and their change.
Thus it is explicitly and concisely said one page later:
"In crude outline, asiatic, antique, feudal and modern bourgeois modes of production can be designated as progressive epochs of the economic social formation."
To me, however, the continuation seems important since it gives the purpose of the quick marxian view over the history of human development. Immediately following on it reads:
"The bourgeois relations of production are the last antagonistic form of the social production process ... but the forces of production which develop in the womb of bourgeois society create at the same time the material conditions for the solution of this antagonism. With this social formation therefore, the prehistory of human society comes to a close."
The purpose which Marx has in referring to the precapitalist modes of production is the discussion of the solution of class antagonism. In this connection, the observation of the intimate bond between development of the productive forces and tendencies towards the changing of relations of production belongs to the discussion of bourgeois society, even though Marx's formulations are often inappropriately general. Asiatic, antique, feudal and capitalist modes of production appear as a chain of class societies from the perspective of Marx's analysis of capitalist society, which has tracked down the fundamental division of the working day of the immediate producer into the necessary labour time for his/her immediate individual reproduction and surplus labour time.[5] Only when this is presupposed as result, can one talk of class society. The non-materially producing class always appropriates the surplus product of the immediate producers. (This prevalent trait of Histomat2 - class society - is eliminated in Habermas' theses for reconstruction.)
I want to underline that also with regard to the central formulations of the 1859 Preface, it is a matter of 'anticipated results'. I think Marx sees himself forced to such an anticipation for, without reference to the final aim of his theory, to present the conditions for and resistances against the 'solution of class antagonism', the mediating steps to those results which have yet to be proven, as tiresome investigations of apparent 'economic minutae', threaten to meet with a lack of interest on the part of a politically motivated general public. Here one should think in particular about the time of publication of Zur Kritik der politischen Ökonomie and its content [6] (see below).
Now that I have indicated why Marx allows himself to go against his previous explicit attitude to the anticipation of results which have yet to be proven, I want to touch on what has to be done to prove them. The marxian anticipation of results can be understood in two contexts corresponding to the distinction between Histomat1 and Histomat2: i) in relation to capitalism (Histomat1); ii) in relation to the chain of class societies from the Asiatic via the antique and feudal to capitalist society (Histomat2).
The proof restricted to the bourgeois form of society and its genesis out of pre-industrial European feudal society as well as its transition into a fully industrial socialist society - this proof can only be carried out through the completed analysis of the bourgeois form of society. With the analysis of commodity and money which follows the Preface, Marx offers, when one views the entire analysis which has to be performed, only a tiny initial piece of the required proof in which, in particular, the specific capitalist productive forces of labour, the mechanical means of production and therefore also the base-superstructure thesis, the "dialectic of productive forces and relations of production", as well as the "unity of theory and practice" are not treated at all.[7] In relation to the analysis of bourgeois society, the base-superstructure passage of the Preface is therefore a claim which still has to be substantiated according to the architecture[8] indicated at the beginning of the Preface.
"I treat the system of bourgeois economy in the order: capital, landed property, wage-labour, state, foreign trade, world market."
With 'capital, landed property, wage-labour', the three revenue sources are mentioned whose investigation completes the analysis of 'capital in general' available in the three systematic volumes of Capital. As a detailed draft[9] by Marx, it can sensibly be taken as the object of efforts at reconstruction. In the last decade, such attempts have been published in West Germany by the Frankfurt theoreticians Alfred Schmidt, Hans-Georg Backhaus, Hans-Jürgen Krahl, Helmut Reichelt; by the Konstanz Research Project[10] in which I have worked; the Berlin Group Project around Joachim Bischoff; Jürgen Ritsert (Frankfurt); the Marxistische Gruppe (Arbeitskonferenz) in Munich; and Wolfgang Fritz Haug (Berlin).[11] In relation to bourgeois society, the base-superstructure thesis, which is treated as the kernel of historical materialism, can only be substantiated through the reconstruction of the general capital-analysis and its continuation in a theory of the superstructural forms which is grounded on the capital-analysis.[12]
The present state of research into Histomat1 in my view, offers grounds for optimism regarding the scientific demonstration of the results anticipated by Marx with respect to our capitalist society. The marxian anticipation in programmatic phrases, when explicitly demonstrated as result, can be grasped in a less misunderstandable way and with well defined area and grounds of validity.
With this I have done nothing more than to express an expectation. That isn't much. I want to draw attention to the fact that Jürgen Habermas' theses have implicitly the contrary expectation as their point of departure. I don't believe that Habermas has for this alternative assessment, an argument at his disposal which I don't have. The matter can only be settled by a convincing working out of the capital-analysis. One way or the other. To be consistent, Habermas would have to work out the capital-analysis "as a subtheory" of historical materialism in the sense reconstructed by him.[13]
The background of our opposed expectations, however, is differerent. Habermas and Wellmer have already criticized [14] the marxian value theory several years ago. They have not yet taken a position on the answer given in 1969 to this critique. On the other hand, they have not followed the attempts at reconstruction of Capital undertaken since 1971, at least not directly and without having explicitly taken an attitude towards them.
Now to the marxian anticipation of results when one understands it in its second context. There is a striking difference: in relation to Histomat2, there is nothing following up the hints and claims strewn by Marx in various places which could be conceived even provisionally as an outline of a systematic presentation. (On this point Habermas has the same opinion[15].) The treatment of Histomat2 by Engels, Lenin and Stalin have in no way the same scientific status as Marx's Capital. They are in part quickly 'thrown together' (hingehauene) (Engels)[16] works of intervention or apologetics for a definite politics (Stalin).
Viewed with a scientific eye, these 'classic' texts on Histomat2 prove themselves to be in part internally inconsistent, and partly as standing in contradiction with the marxian postulate that the economic structure constitutes the basis. This holds not only for the ambitious Engelsian text, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, which earlier was much read by social democratic workers (Erhard Lucas has brought together material for its critique)[17] but also in particular for a publication by an official Party writers' collective under Stalin's leadership, On Dialectical and Historical Materialism[18](1938 distributed in an edition of 200 million), as the commentary by Iring Fetscher shows.
From the fact that Habermas does not take up anything substantive out of the classical texts of Engels and Stalin, I conclude that we agree in our low estimation of them. If that is so, then it is misleading with respect to the development of humankind when going backwards from the capitalist epoch to, in particular, the early historical[19] development of humankind, to represent the programme as a "reconstruction of historical materialism". For what is to be reconstructed? Not Marx and also not Stalin.
To summarise so far: Jürgen Habermas can support his programme for reconstruction on an inconsistency[20] which has eluded Marx. The point is to explicitly criticise this weakness in Marx by taking up Marx's systematic course of argumentation and not, following the model of the official marxist party orthodoxy, to make this weakness into the receptacle for a relatively capricious filling out of the empty formula Histomat2, be it in the form of reflections on mating groups and incest (as in Engels) or the compilation of learning-theoretical, developmental-psychological, communication-theoretical aspects of the development of humankind.
Thoughts on the history of humankind which have been stimulated by the occasional 'classical' statements by Marx cannot, in view of the totally shaky status of Histomat2, be served up as 'reconstruction'. It should by now have become questionable whether Habermas in fact undertakes a reconstruction of Marx. The next question is then, what is the relation between the habermasian research programme within Histomat2 and what can be called 'reconstruction of historical materialism1' (understood as a methodologically explicit[21] reconstruction (Nachkonstruktion) of the capital-analysis and the execution of the transition to the theory of the bourgeois state and private life[22]? I have the impression that at the end of the sixties, at the high point of the student movement, Habermas came to a dead end with his own attempts at reconstruction of the capital-analysis and that Habermas and Wellmer therefore formulated their results as a critique of Marx. However, they have not directly answered the anti-critique[23] of their critique nor the subsequent more recent attempts at reconstruction. Rather, Habermas now tries to get over the problem with his version of the development theory Histomat2.[24]
In conclusion I want to offer for discussion some thoughts on the relation of Jürgen Habermas' considerations to the marxian theory of emancipation from class society, which proceeds from the analysis of the capitalist form of social synthesis (Vergesellschaftung). Like the contemporary (positivist and anti-positivist) theory of science, Habermas obviously also wants to see a very extensive piece of theory come before the preoccupation with capitalist society. With the theoreticians in theory of science, this piece is a doctrine of scientific speech, abstracted altogether from the object of the theory of capitalist society. With 'Critical Theory' a la Habermas 1975, we have a development theory over epochs, a doctrine of human development in general. The capital-analysis remains in this universal development theory - and herein lies the parallel to the marxist orthodoxy - but only with the status of a "partial theory" (Habermas). Consequently, this partial theory would have to be newly formulated in the framework of the universal development theory Histomat2. And herein lies the real point: the ostensible efforts at reconstruction on closer inspection prove themselves to be a revision of the claim to autonomous validity made by Marx for the capital-analysis. For, the criterion for the testing of the validity of Capital in future is to be provided by the purportedly systematically prior universal development theory. Here too, the procedure has the same model as the 'reconstructions' of the positivist and anti-positivist[25] theory of science.
But is that a deficiency?[26] Does that constitute a knock-down argument against Habermas? I think that through such references connections can only be made to scientific, scientifico-political and political experiences which can be distinguished among the disputers. In particular, it depends on the degree of optimism held for the possibility of the reconstruction of the capital-analysis as an analysis of the boundary conditions of action for the emancipation from class society, whether the habermasian research programme, which diverges strongly from the marxian programme, should be pursued or not.
I personally see in Habermas' theses on a modified version of a development theory Histomat2 no occasion for interrupting or restructuring the work on the reconstruction[27] of Marx's analysis of the "anatomy of bourgeois society". If the reconstruction and completion of Histomat1, the systematic theory of bourgeois society, should actually succeed, the following questions can be posed. To what extent is it necessary to have a development theory alongside the systematic theory of our form of society, which contains the conditions for and resistances against the emancipation from class domination? What would this development theory look like, and why should we bother ourselves with it?
[*] Translated by Michael Eldred in consultation with the author from the original 'Mit Marx an Marx Vorbei? Histomat1 und Histomat2' in Ist Systematische Philosophie Möglich? Stuttgarter Hegel-Kongress, 1975, Dieter Henrich (ed.), Bonn, 1977. Habermas' essay 'Thesen zur Rekonstruktion des Historischen Materialismus' appears in the above volume and in Zur Rekonstruktion des Historischen Materialismus, Frankfurt a.M. 1976. An English translation is contained in Communication and the Evolution of Society, Ch.4, London 1979. Emphases in passages cited by the author have been changed or added without notice.
[1] Emilio Agazzi told me that "a deficit of the Frankfurt School inpolitical economy" was also expressed by American and Italian theorists at a colloquium on the reception of Critical Theory in the Starnberg Institute, December 1980.(Cf, also Iring Fetscher's foreword to Reichelt Zur logischen Struktur des Kapitalbegriffs bei Karl Marx, Frankfurt a.M.,1970, pp. 10f; "Subtle in the uncovering of hidden reaction in the representatives of the left bourgeois people's front, inventive in the discovery of secret protest in the apolitical artists of L'Art pour L'Art, Critical Theory remained deficient in the actualisation of the Marxian critique of the economy. Some of its representatives prematurely held this critique to be obsolete because they overlooked the necessary distance from the 'general concept of capital' to the apparent phenomena of the economic sphere. Unconsciously, feudalistic questions of status may have played a role in this neglect. 'Economics is dirty.' "
[2] Sozialistische Politik, 4, p. 23.
[3] Capitalism is also, with respect to those societies which understand themselves as socialist, in their connections to world trade and in a series of internal "birthmarks of the old society", a still-present reality.
[4] That the research process is not yet complete is expressed in the above formulation from the Preface: "That, however, the anatomy of bourgeois society is to be sought in political economy." This research process is, however, nothing other than a series of attempts at a presentation. The most important attempt at a presentation to which Marx can refer in 1859 are the Grundrisse der Kritik der politischen Ökonomie (Rohentwurf 1857-1858) first published Moscow, 1939.
[5] Today (1981), I would not formulate class exploitation in terms of periods independent of the value-form. Cf. Roth/ Kleiber/Hanlon/Eldred, Die gedoppelte Verdopplung: Zum Ausbau des Marxschen Systemfragments, forthcoming. Form-independent formulations are of importance for Histomat2, which strives to make its categories transepochal. Such formulations are central for an understanding of the fascination of the workers' movement with Histomat2 ("All previous history was a history of class struggles.").
[6] From the viewpoint of the politically interested reader, the political relevance was to become stark with the third chapter, 'Capital', which is not contained in the 1859 work Zur Kritik. "For with Chapter 3 the real battle begins." (Marx to Lassalle, 28.3.1859, in Briefe über 'Das Kapital', p. 99) On the other hand, Marx wanted to impress his bourgeois critics with his scientific achievement before letting "the kernel of the bourgeois shit" (Marx to Engels, 7.11.1859, Briefwechsel, Vol. II, Berlin 1949, p. 531) out of the bag: "... it appeared to me advisable not to horrify right from the beginning ..." (Marx to Lassalle, 28.3.1859, Briefe ..., loc.cit.). With this strategy of holding back "Chapter 3", Marx wanted to "force the dogs later to take my views on capital rather seriously" (Marx to Engels, c.13.1.1859, Briefe…, p. 94). The political content of Zur Kritik, which contains two chapters on Commodity and Money, is contained in the critique of "Proudhonian socialism, now fashionable in France, which wants to let private production stay, but organise the exchange of private products; which wants to have the commodity, but not money ... Communism must, above all, free itself from this 'false brother'." (Marx to Weydemeyer, 1.2.1859, Briefe..., p. 96) This critique, together with the analysis of "the commodity, of the specifically social, in no way absolute character of bourgeois production." (Marx to Engels, 22.7.1859, Briefe…, p. 100) is what Marx wanted Engels to bring out in a review of Zur Kritik (cf. ibid.).
Engels however, was far more impatient than Marx with regard to the political impact of Marx's theory: "The undelayed appearance of your second book (the continuation of Zur Kritik, tr.) is ... of course most important ... For once be a little less conscientious with your own work; it is still much too good for the lousy public. That the thing gets written and appears is the main thing; the weaknesses which occur to you won't be discovered by the asses in any case; and when troubled times start, what do you win from the fact that the whole thing becomes interrupted before you are ready with capital in general?" (Engels to Marx, 31.1.1860, Briefe…, pp. 100ff.) In his review of Zur Kritik published in 1859, Engels goes even further than Marx in the anticipation of results for the sake of political effect. The materialist postulate that being determines consciousness becomes a statement which "is so simple, that everybody must be able to understand it on its own", although, he is quick to add, "... it is plain as day that one cannot make anything out of the mere phrase". (MEW 13, pp. 470, 471.) For Engels, however, the proof of the results lies in "massive, critically viewed, completely mastered historical material". See Backhaus, 'Materialien zur Rekonstruktion der Marxschen Werttheorie 3', in Gesellschaft 11, 1978, for a discussion of 'logical' and 'logical-historical' modes of presentation, (tr.)
[7] Cf. J. Habermas, Zur Rekonstruktion des Historischen Materialismus, Frankfurt a.M., 1976, pp. 159, 144; Communication..., pp. 145, 130ff.
[8] On changes in architecture cf. the preface of the Marx-Engels institute, Moscov to the Grundrisse, and Roman Rosdolsky, The Making of Marx's 'Capital', London, 1977, pp. 10ff.
[9] The first volume of Capital (first and second editions) were prepared by Marx himself for the press. The third volume is taken from a draft of 1864-65. An examination of the manuscript in the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam reveals that, in his posthumous edition, Engels has stuck close to the single draft. For the second volume, there are over ten manuscripts. Engels comments on these in the Preface to the second volume. A careful investigation is contained in Ivan Glaser, Warum 'Das Kapital' ein Torso blieb (Why Capital Remained a Torso), Habilitationsschrift, Universität Konstanz, 1980. With regard to the second volume it is still an open question whether plausible alternatives to the engelsian edition could be given.
[10] Since the 1975 Hegel Congress, the author has spent a year in the Department of General Philosophy, Sydney University as a guest lecturer (1976), during which time a collaboration with the translator began. Since then, the research project has straddled the distance between Konstanz and Sydney, resulting in Eldred/Roth Guide To Marx's 'Capital', London 1978, and the forthcoming Roth et.al.
[11] Cf. Alfred Schmidt, Der Begriff der Natur in der Lehre von Marx (Dissertation 1960), Frankfurt a,M., 1962. In 1971, the revised, enlarged new edition, with an afterword, appeared; ditto, Geschichte und Struktur Munich 1971, H.-G. Backhaus, 'Zur Dialektik der Wertform' in Beiträge zur marxistischen Erkenntnistheorie, A. Schmidt (ed.), Frankfurt, 1969. English in Thesis Eleven, No. l, 1980; ditto, 'Materialen zur Rekonstruktion der Marxschen Werttheorie 1,2,3', in Gesellschaft: Beiträge zur Marxschen Theorie Nos. l,3 and 11; ditto, Marx und die marxistische Orthodoxie, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt a.M., forthcoming; Hans-Jürgen Krahl, Zur Wesenslogik der Marxschen Warenanalyse (reworked version of a paper given in an Adorno seminar in Winter Semester 1965/66) Published in Konstitution und Klassenkampf: Zur Historischen Dialektik von bürgerlicher Emanzipation end proletarischer Revolution, Frankfurt a.M. 1971; ditto, Bemerkungen zum Verhältnis von Kapital und Hegelscher Wesenslogik, Frankfurt a.M., 1970; Helmut Reichelt, ‚Anmerkungen zur Marxschen Werttheorie und deren Interpretation bei Werner Hoffmann' in Sozialistische Politik (SoPo) Organ kritischer Wissenschaft, edited in the Otto-Suhr Institut, West Berlin, Vol. 1 No. 2 (June 1969); ditto, Zur logischen Struktur des Kapitalbegriffs bei Karl Marx (reworked dissertation of 1969), Frankfurt a.M., 1970; Mike Roth, Kernstruktur unserer kapitalistischen Gesellschaft, Fragen, Thesen Kurzdarstellungen zum Aufbau des Anfangsstücks der Analyse des Kapitals im Allgemeinen, Frankfurt a.M., 1972; ditto, Kurzer Abriss der Kapitalanalyse; Lernmaterial für den ersten Durchgang durch Karl Marx, 'Das Kapital Band I-III, Erlangen, 1974; von Holt/ Pasero/Roth, Zur Wertformanalyse; Aspekte der Marxschen Theorie 2, Frankfurt a.M., 1974; the series ‚Interpretationen zum 'Kapital' in Verlag für das Studium der Arbeiterbewegung (VSA), West Berlin (from 1973 on); Jürgen Ritsert, Probleme politisch-ökonomischer Theoriebildung, Frankfurt, 1973; Resultate der Arbeitskonferenz, Theoretisches Organ der Marxistischen Gruppe (from 1974 on); Wolfgang Fritz Haug, Vorlesungen zur Einführung ins 'Kapital', Cologne 1974.
[12] Cf. Flatow/Huisken 'Zum Problem der Abeitung des bürgerlichen Staates' in Prokla, No. 7, West Berlin, 1973, Roth et.al., op.cit.; Projekt Klassenanalyse Oberfläche and Staat, West Berlin, July 1974; Resultate der Arbeitskonferenz, No. 1 and 3, Munich, 1974, 1979
[13] Communication ..., p. 130.
[14] In the meantime, the Konstanz-Sydney Project has also come to a critique of the labour theory of value which consists of separating a labour content theory from an analysis of the value-form. Cf. Roth et.al., and Eldred/ Hanlon, 'Reconstructing Value-Form Analysis', in Capital & Class, No. 13, London, 1981.
[15] Cf. Habermas, Communication and the Evolution of Society, London, 1979, pp. 130, 225, fns. l and 2.
[16] According to Erhard Lucas, Engels wrote the text The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State in two months. In addition, the visit of friends took place.
[17] Cf. Erhard Lucas, 'Die Rezeption Lewis H. Morgans durch Marx und Engels' and 'Marx Studien zur Frühgeschichte und Ethnologie 1880-82 nach unveröffentlichten Exzerpten' in Saeculum 15, 1964, pp. 153-176, 327-343. These excerpts, which Lucas has inspected in the IISG Archive in Amsterdam, have been published in the meantime; cf. Lawrence Krader, The Ethnological Notebooks of Karl Marx, second edition, Assen 1974. Lucas has written an extensive critical review of Krader's editorial work and his commentary: 'Der späte Marx und die Ethnologie, Zu Lawrence Kraders edition der Exzerpte 1880-1882' in Saeculum 26, 1975.
[18] Stalin Über dialektischen und Historischen Materialismus, complete text and commentary by Iring Fetscher, 7th edition, Frankfurt/Berlin/Bonn, 1961, pp. 11ff.
[19] Habermas' jump from Marx to Engels/Stalin may disguise the fact that in the marxian listing of "progressive epochs" in the 1859 Preface, the "primitive community" does not appear, in his extensive text for the preparation of the colloquium, essential parts of Habermas' considerations relate precisely to the "neolithic revolution" and earlier epochs of the development of humankind. Habermas does not go explicitly either into the relation of the capital-analysis (Histomat1) to his own reflections on the theory of development (Histomat2), nor does he treat the relation of Engels' text, The Origin… ., which is taken to be a classic of Histomat2, to Marx's excerpts, on which Engels presumably bases himself. The way in which this happens has been represented in a flattering light by Krader, to whom Habermas refers, and in an unflattering way by Lucas, who obviously is unknown to Habermas. Cf. fn. 6.
[20] An inconsistency insofar as it says that to Marx, "on closer consideration, every anticipation of results which have yet to be proven seems disturbing". Above, I have indicated why Marx, in spite of this, lets himself be moved to an anticipation.
[21] Here, the way of argumentation which, in the analysis, leads to the various contents should always be given in discussing these contents. Cf. Eldred/Roth Guide, pp. 9ff, and Eldred, 'Material Dialectics and Socialist Polities', Thesis Eleven, 2.
[22] Cf. footnote 10, but note that the references given there (apart from Roth et.al.) have no analysis of the private sphere.
[23] Important points are made in some of the contributions to the polemic Die Linke antwortet Jürgen Habermas, Frankfurt a.M., 1968. Extended and unanswered anti-critiques have been published in the first numbers of the journal Sozialistische Politik: Wolfgang Müller, 'Habermas und die Anwendbarkeit der Arbeitswerttheorie', SoPo, 1; Renate Damus, 'Habermas und der "heimliche Positivismus" bei Marx', SoPo, 4; Claus Rolschausen, 'Technik und Wissenschaft als Ideologie', SoPo, 4.
[24] Cf. also the appendix on basic assumptions of historical materialism, 'Exkurs über Grundannahmen des Historischen Materialismus' in Habermas/Luhmann, Frankfurt, 1971.
[25] There is today in West Germany a flowering school, referred to as 'logical constructivism' (in contrast to logical positivism). Cf. Jürgen Mittelstrass (ed.), Methodologische Probleme einer normativ-kritischen Gesellschaftstheorie, Frankfurt, 1975; and Paul Lorenzen, Normative Logic and Ethics, (1967 John Locke Lectures, Oxford), Mannheim, 1969.
[26] In such 'systematically prior' preludes, it is a matter of the separation of 'dialectical method' from dialectical theory. It seems that Habermas and Wellmer still represented Adorno's position in Der Positivismusstreit in der deutschen Soziologie, Maus/Fürstenberg (eds.), Neuwied and Berlin, 1970. See Adorno's introduction. On the occasion of the awarding of the Adorno Prize to Habermas on September 11, 1980, Michael Theunissen remarked (it seems not without irony): "On the way, Habermas has distanced himself from Adorno, and the oeuvre on which he can today already look back on owes its richness more to the emancipation from the common heritage than to faithfulness to him. It's true that he has thought of his teacher several times. But since, on such occasions, he speaks a different language, to a certain extent, than usual, the estrangement is revealed. The differences in the language games which the teacher and his former pupil have practised, point to a difference in the respective representative works. Adorno, the emigrant, was to the last at home in German philosophy, whose language participates in the formation of his thought. Habermas, still in the country in spite of all the animosities, has opened himself to the Anglo-Saxon spirit and thereby to a language which passes on finished thoughts in the most precise way. In any case, always ready to work over something new and, apparently, almost limitless in his learning capacity, he is particularly receptive to this spirit, thanks to the analytical sharpness of his own thinking. His great insights are based on distinctions such as in behaviour theory between purposeful/rational and communicative action, labour and interaction, the differentiation of purposeful/rational action into instrumental and strategic, the marking off of all action from discourse. To the thought of Adorno, however, such analytics is just as alien as is the contructivist tinge which in Habermas' development, to this point, has come forward ever more strongly. As the starting point of the path on which Habermas has won more and more distance from Adorno, we can view, in this simple presentation, his contribution to the positivism dispute in German sociology. Habermas still fights on Adorno's side against Popper and his school. There he represents a dialectical theory of society as totality. Born out of the spirit of Adorno, this social theory is firstly dialectical, secondly, knowledge of the totality, and thirdly, above all, a diagnosis of the contemporary social formation. Just how much this theory frees itself from its heritage in its progression can be read in its increasing de-dialectification (Entdialektisierung) for which it is telling that its author silently takes back the once rejected separation of is from ought." This trend is presently on the increase; cf. Honneth/Jaeggi, Arbeit, Handlung, Normativität: Theorien des Historischen Materialismus, 2, Frankfurt, 1980.
[27] Cf. footnote 11.