Marx and Weber in Relation to History: Materialism and Existential Idealism

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Karl Marx
Max Weber
Bibliography

Introduction

The difference in how Marx and Weber interpreted history, corresponds to the genetic makeup of both philosophers more than to the fact that Max and Weber had simply viewed historical processes from different points of view, as it is often being suggested nowadays. Marx was born in the family of Jewish rabbis; therefore, his interpretation of history corresponds to the theological doctrine of Judaism, which is materialistic, in its essence. Max Weber, on the other hand, was born in a family of German traditionalists, which is why his view of history is marked with a high degree of existential idealism. In this paper, we will briefly outline the basic subtleties of Marx and Weber’s views on history as such that are diametrically opposite, and will also come up with our assessment of such views.

Karl Marx

According to Marx, the particularities of the historical process, within a society, are being defined exclusively by economic factors. In his book “Capital”, Marx spends a great deal of time, while trying to substantiate such a point of view. “Society does not consist of individuals but expresses the sum of economic interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand” insists the bearded promoter of “workers’ cause”, while viewing every particular individual as nothing but the “tool of production”, whose existential necessities are limited to his need for food and water. Marx suggests that only a fraction of capitalists’ income is being spent on the expansion of production, with a bulk of capital being simply kept by them “under the pillow”. Therefore, he concludes that another form of social order needs to be established, which would economically benefit workers, by creating preconditions for the capital to be invested into the expansion and improvement of production facilities. In his utopian “classless” society, Marx reserves a special role for “communist intellectuals”, whose task would be to govern such society. If modern capitalist societies’ structure can be compared to the diamond, with rich and poor people on its extreme ends and with people representing a middle class in between, Marx’s communism corresponds to the form of the triangle, with the caste of communist functionaries at the top and countless slaves at the bottom, whose only task is to work for food. Just like Freud, Marx takes one of many individual traits (consumerism) and builds a universal theory around it, while denying other traits any significance whatsoever. Just as Freud, who idealized human sexuality, Marx idealized the economy and suggested that people’s actions are being always motivated by their class affiliation, even though that they often do not even realize this fact. The whole human history, according to Marx, is the history of antagonism between classes. The eventual outcome of this antagonism he sees is the physical elimination of representatives of the “oppressive” class. The social processes are defined by this struggle alone: “Thus capital presupposes wage-labor and wage-labor presupposes capital. They mutually condition one another; they mutually bring each other into existence and they also strive to dominate over each other… The increase of capital is, therefore, an increase of the proletariat, i.e. of the working class” (Marx, p. 567). Marx denies the existence of any other factors that might play role in shaping up social relations. People’s inequality is artificially created and maintained. The notions of common good, morality, and solidarity are nothing but chimeras. Marx’s sociology does not attach any significance to the role of the individual – it is only concerned with its social status. Marx promoted the idea of “dictatorship of the proletariat”, which was to ensure that other social classes would gradually cease to exist. As history shows, the practitioners of Marxism were often not patient enough to wait until it happens naturally (according to Marxist theory), so they would resort to the practice of mass executions to speed up the process. Marx anticipated a time when there would be no nation-states. His vision of the future resembles anarchist utopia, from a certain perspective. Yet, he also theorized that masses cannot effectively rule themselves, which is why he suggested that the ruling elite should be created out of hook-nosed “promoters of worker’s cause”, such as himself. The objective reality has long ago proven the sheer absurdity of Marx’s views on history, which is why it does not make a whole lot of sense that Marxism is still being regarded as a “humanist” philosophy in certain circles, even though it refers to people as merely working robots and despite Marxism’s close association with millions of people being murdered, simply because they happened to belong to the “wrong” social class.

Max Weber

As we have mentioned earlier, Max Weber’s mental affiliation with Western civilization was not merely formal, in its essence, as it was the case with Marx. Unlike Marx, who never held anything heavier than a pen in his hands, Weber liked participating in physical activities, which is why it would never occur to him that namely an indulgence in physical labor, which allowed apes to turn into homo sapiens, as it was being suggested by Karl Marx and by his boyfriend Friedrich Engel. Weber was perfectly aware that people’s social stratification could not possibly serve as the metaphysical foundation for history, as he was able to adopt a three-dimensional outlook on it, which in its turn, had prevented Weber from discussing people’s social inequality as a “thing in itself”. It is who people are, in the racial and cultural sense of this word, which defines their behavior more then anything else does. Weber’s most famous work “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism” contains factual evidence, which substantiates his vision of history as such that corresponds to the existential qualities of people, capable of pushing forward scientific and cultural progress: “A glance at the occupational statistics of any country of mixed religious composition brings to light with remarkable frequency a situation which has several times provoked discussion in the Catholic press and literature, and in Catholic congresses in Germany, namely, the fact that business leaders and owners of capital, as well as the higher grades of skilled labor, and even more the higher technically and commercially trained personnel of modern enterprises, are overwhelmingly Protestant” (Weber, p. 2). Why it was namely Germans and Anglo-Saxons embraced Protestantism as their religion? It is because of their inborn sense of idealism, which in its turn, corresponds to the fact that these people were the least affected by racial mixing, as compared to French or Italians, for example.

The emergence of Protestantism in Europe corresponded to the fact that, from the 16^th century onwards, many Europeans were realizing themselves as being fully capable of utilizing their sense of rationale, as the tool of gaining social prominence, rather than relying on “God’s graces”, as Catholics do. Weber suggests that Protestants do not need God as their ultimate benefactor, but rather as some distant authority that does not intervene in their lives actively. This is the reason why Protestants believe that it is when they are being fully self-reliant that makes God loves them. Weber implies that only biologically adequate people were capable of realizing this simple fact. Thus, it is rather Protestants’ inborn sense of idealism, and not simply the economic realities of the 19^th century (as suggested by Marx), which triggered the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the first place. In other words, it is people’s ideas that determine their history and not the other way around: “The people filled with the spirit of capitalism today tend to be indifferent, if not hostile, to the Church. The thought of the pious boredom of paradise has little attraction for their active natures; religion appears to them as a means of drawing people away from labor in this world” (Weber, p. 120). Why the members of many indigenous tribes in Africa, Australia, Asia, and South America were not able to evolve beyond the Stone Age, during millennia, as opposed to Europeans, who became an undisputed masters of the world by the end of the 19^th century? It is because subconsciously, White people know that they can never reach a state when they would become fully satisfied, economically or culturally, as such complete satisfaction (Communism), is nothing but a euphemism for death. After all, it implies the absence of flow of energy, in the social context of this word. Weber defines the spirit of capitalism as the universe’s tool for combating entropy and we can only agree with such a point of view. Capitalist worldview creates preconditions for people’s existential inequality to be even more clearly defined, which in its turn, corresponds to the process of people undergoing a biological transition from apes, through homo sapiens, into super-men. Unlike Marx, Weber was capable of understanding that White individual is not simply someone who is being preoccupied with how to fill their stomach with food permanently (as it is the case with representatives of “specialized” races, which can only advance through establishing close contacts with representatives of revolutionizing race), but a semi-God, who utilizes its ability to operate with highly abstract notions, to affect the objective reality, in accordance to its wishes. The recent groundbreaking discoveries in the field of genetics prove the validity of Weber’s outlook on history, which is why we choose to subscribe to his point of view, as opposed to the one of Marx.

Bibliography

Marx, Karl “Capital. A Critique of Political Economy” trans. by Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling. New York: Random House.1995.
Weber, Max “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”. London: Roxbury Publishing Company, 2001.

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