Criticism of “Legal Marxism”

Lenin exposed and criticized their distortion of Marxism on the issues of dialectical materialism and Marxist political economy by “legal Marxism”.

At the end of the 19th century, the “legal Marxism” represented by Russian liberal bourgeois intellectuals such as Struve, Tugan-Baranovsky, Bulgakov and Berdyaev flaunted themselves as “representatives of the New Criticism” and slandered those who held true to the original meaning of Marxism as “orthodox people who treated Marxism dogmatically and simply.” Lenin pointed out that the major difference between “orthodox” and “legal” Marxism was that the former were staunch Marxists all the time who may develop the basic principles of Marxism according to the changing conditions and according to the unique characteristics of different countries, and strove to further study and develop Marx’s dialectical materialism and political economy theory; while the “legal” Marxism tended to abandon some important contents in Marx’s theory.

For example, philosophically, legal Marxist didn’t uphold dialectical materialism, but followed neo-Kantianism; politically, they were on the side of those insisting that some of Marx’s theories were “one-sided” and “obsolete”.

Lenin exposed the attempt of “legal Marxism” to replace dialectical materialism and historical materialism with neo-Kantianism and objectivism, pointing out that “legal Marxism” is not true Marxism. In view of erroneous viewpoints of “legal Marxist”, including objectivism, denying of the class theory, claiming to be devoid of party spirit, exaggerating the spontaneity of historical process and advocating social fatalism, Lenin pointed out the principle difference between objectivism and materialism, “Objectivists talk about the inevitability of the existing historical process, while materialists definitely affirm exactly the existence of the current economic formation of society, and the confrontational relationship it produces.” Objectivism defends the existing capitalist system, while materialism exposes the internal contradictions within the capitalist system. Materialism itself contains party spirit and requires a person to openly consider from the perspective of a certain social group when making any comments on things. In fact, when Struve and others attacked Marxism as a tendentious theory rather than an objective truth, they showed a tendency to defend the interests of the bourgeoisie, and could not conceal their distinctive bourgeois party spirit.

Lenin revealed the misinterpretation of “legal Marxists” on Marx’s Capital. In response to “legal Marxist” holding that Capital contradicted itself in Volume 2 and 3 on the theory of realisation and the market theory, Lenin fought back in articles such as “A Note on the Question of the Market Theory”, “Once More on the Theory of Realisation” and “Capitalism in Agriculture”. He pointed out that Marx’s conclusion of “the contradiction between the restricted consumption of the masses and the tendency of the capitalists to keep expanding production indefinitely was a contradiction inherent in capitalism” in Capital was not to deny the inevitability and progressiveness of capitalism but was to make people clearly recognize the historical temporality of capitalism as well as the conditions and reasons for its inevitable transition to a better form. Lenin pointed out that for Struve to call Marx’s theory of realisation as “the theory of proportional distribution” was erred.

Marx’s theory of realisation is an abstract theory explaining how the reproduction and circulation of the total social capital proceed. It abstracts foreign trade, i.e., foreign markets, but it’s not intended to mean that no foreign trade is involved in capitalism; it assumes that the products among capitalist production departments are distributed in proportion, but it’s not intended to say that in a real capitalist society, products are always distributed in proportion. It’s just like the theory of value which assumes that supply and demand are balanced but does not deny that such a balance sometimes may not occur in a capitalist society. Struve distorted Marx’s theory of realisation into a theory of proportional distribution to claim the rationality of capitalism, thus eliminating the historical mission of the proletariat to transform the existing society and making the capitalist system last forever. This obviously did not conform to the laws of historical development, nor suited the actual situation and social progress in Russia.

Lenin wrote a series of important works on criticizing the attacks and misinterpretations of populists and “legal Marxist” on Marxism, clarifying rights and wrongs in their theories, upheld and defended Marxism, and expounded important theoretical propositions, thus guiding people to understand the historical stages of Russia’s development, Marxist philosophy and the theory of political economy, thus guided the labor movements of Russia with scientific theories.