Toward a Dialectic of Philosophy and Organization

Eugene Gogol is a Marxist-Humanist activist-writer. His books include The Concept of Other in Latin American Liberation and Raya Dunayevskaya: Philosopher of Marxist-Humanism.

"Gogol’s argument is urgent and single-minded, and his materials refreshingly original. [A] wonderful book." – Ben Watson, in: Radical Philosophy 182 (Nov/Dec 2013)"Toward a Dialectic ought to be taken as an important contribution to an on-going project to reveal the logic of the development of emancipatory organization." – Andy Blunden, in: Marx & Philosophy (31 January 2013)

• Introduction: Philosophy, Organization, and the Work of Raya DunayevskayaI. The Contradictory Reality of the Present Moment and Its Relation to a Dialectic of Philosophy and OrganizationII. The Project of Dunayevskaya: Dialectics of Organization and PhilosophyIII. The Form for the Present StudyPrologue: The Dialectic in Philosophy ItselfI. What Is Hegel’s Journey of Absolute Spirit?II. Why a Negation of the Negation?III. Can We See Hegel’s Absolutes, Not as a Closed Totality, but As New Beginning?PART I: ON SPONTANEOUS FORMS OF ORGANIZATION VS. VANGUARD PARTIES1: Marx’s Concept of Organization: From the Silesian Weavers’ Uprising to the First Years of the International Workingmen’s AssociationI. A Preliminary Note—Marx: Revolutionary Organization and the Organization of ThoughtII. 1843-52, Critique of Ideas/Tendencies—and the Movement of the WorkersIII. From the Early 1850s to the Early 1860s: A Brief Note on Marx’s Organization of Thought and the “Party” IV. A New Organizational Form: Marx and the International Working Men’s Association2: The Commune of Paris, 1871: Mass Spontaneity in Action and Thought; Responsibility of the Revolutionary Intellectual: The Two-War Road Between Marx and the CommuneI. A Non-State State: The Paris Commune as a Form of Workers’ Rule II. The Civil War in France— Drafts and Address, and the French Edition of CapitalIII. The Commune Deepens Marx’s Concept of Organization-- The First International After 1871Appendix: Marx excerpts from first and second drafts of The Civil War in France3: The Second International, The German Social Democracy, and Engels after Marx—Organization without Marx’s Organization of ThoughtI. A Preliminary Note on LassalleII. Fetishism of Organization: The Second International and the Germany Social DemocracyIII. Engels’ Relation to German Social Democracy and to Marx’s Marxism: What Tactics? What Theory? What Philosophy?Appendix: “The Interlude that Never Ended Organizationally”Forms of Organization and Struggle in Revolutionary Russia4: The 1905 Russian Revolution: Mass Proletarian Self-Activity and Its Relation to the Organizational Thought of Marxist RevolutionariesI. 1905 in Life and in Books: New Forms of Struggle; New Forms of OrganizationII. Lenin, Trotsky, Luxemburg: Attitudes Toward and Theoretical Ramifications of 1905, Particularly with Regard to Revolutionary Organization5: The Russian Revolution of 1917 and BeyondI. February-October, 1917: Forms of Organization From Below; Developments and Struggles Within BolshevismII. Russia post-October: Workers, Bolsheviks and the State—New Beginnings and Grave Contradictions in the Revolution6: Out of the Russia Revolution: Legacy and Critique—Luxemburg, Pannekoek, TrotskyI. Luxemburg and Two Revolutions—Russia, 1917-18; Germany, 1918-19II. Pannekoek’s Council CommunismIII. In Exile: A Brief Note on Trotsky’s Concept of Revolutionary Organization and View of Proletarian Subjectivity7: Organizational Forms from the Spanish RevolutionI. The Revolution Begins and DevelopsII. The Communist Party Works to Dismantle the Revolution8: The Hungarian Workers’ Councils in the Revolution: A Movement from Practice that Is a Form of Theory Prelude: East Germany, 1953 I. The First DaysII. The Turning PointIII. The Counter-Revolution and the Proletarian ResponseIV. Postscript: East Europe post-Hungary 1956—Resistance-in-Permanence; Contradictions WithinPART II: HEGEL AND MARX9: Can “Absolute Knowing” in Hegel’s Phenomenology Speak to a Dialectic of Organization and Philosophy?I. A Note on Hegel’s Method in Absolute KnowledgeII. Marx’s “Critique of the Hegelian Dialectic”III. Spirit’s Journey in Absolute Knowledge: Externalization (Entäusserung) and Recollection/Inwardization (Erinnerung)IV. The Dialectic in Philosophy Itself: Does It Bring Forth a Dialectic of Organization?—A Reading of Absolute Knowing from Dunayevskaya10: Rereading Marx’s Critique of the Gotha Program TodayAppendix: Marx on Necessity, Freedom, Time and LaborPART III: HEGEL AND LENIN11: Lenin and Hegel—The Profound Philosophic Breakthrough that Failed to Encompass Revolutionary OrganizationI. IntroductionII. A Preliminary Note on Lenin’s Philosophic Exploration of HegelIII. A Brief Survey of Dunayevskaya’s Explorations of Lenin’s Hegelian Vantage Point Prior to 1985-87.IV. Dunayevskaya’s ‘Changed Perception of Lenin Philosophic Ambivalence’: Fusing a mid-1980s Vantage Point with a 1953 Philosophic BreakthroughV. Organizational Ramifications12: Hegel’s Critique of the Third Attitude to Objectivity—Its Relation to OrganizationI. Introduction: The Three Attitudes to Objectivity II. Dunayevskaya’s 1961 Reading of the Third Attitude to ObjectivityIII. Dunayevskaya’s New 1986 Reading of the Third Attitude to ObjectivityPART IV: DIALECTICS OF ORGANIZATION AND PHILOSOPHY IN POST-WORLD WAR II WORLD: THE WORK OF RAYA DUNAYEVSKAYA13: Moments in the Development of Dunayevskaya's Marxist-HumanismI. A Preliminary Note on War and Revolution as Turning Points for Radical Thought: The Moment of the Theory of State-Capitalism as Needed Ground for Marxist-HumanismII. Dunayevskaya's Letters on Hegel's Absolutes, May 12 and 20 1953: “The Philosophic Moment of Marxist-Humanism”III. The Organization of Thought which Determines Organizational Life: Developing Marxist-Humanism and News and Letters CommitteesIV. Dunayevskaya’s Presentation on Dialectics of Organization and Philosophy, June 1, 1987—A New Philosophic Category and a Challenge for News and Letters PraxisAppendices: 1) Dunayevskaya Letter on Meeting a Cameroonian Revolutionary; 2) Andy Philips on Dunayevskaya's Participation in 1949-50 Miners' General Strike; 3. Preamble to the Original Constitution of News and Letters Committees, 1956PART V: CONCLUSION14: What Philosophic-Organizational Vantage Point Is Needed?I. Recent Challenges to Hegel’s Dialectics of NegativityII. What Is the Dialectic of Marx’s Capital?III. Once Again Hegel’s Dialectic of Negativity—Its Concretization/Praxis as Organizational Expression; Its Meaning for TodayBibliograhyIndex