Introduction

Evald Ilyenkov took Spinoza’s philosophy as the starting point for his own critique of positivism and mechanical materialism. While this assumed a strictly philosophical form, its political source was Ilyenkov’s profound conviction that a turn towards materialist dialectics was critical for the future of the Soviet Union.

Ilyenkov’s position as an “orthodox heretic” philosopher may help to explain why he identified so closely with Benedict Spinoza. Like Spinoza some 300 years earlier, he was a child of his time, but in equally deep conflict with proponents of dogma. In Spinoza’s case it was religious dogma, in both its Judaic and Christian forms. With Ilyenkov it was Marxist dogma turned into a state religion through Stalinism – and dogma’s ugly sister – the mechanistic positivist scientism which invaded Soviet philosophy during the 1960s. Ilyenkov championed those sides of the 17th century philosopher’s ideas which made a decisive impact in the late 18th century on Hölderlin and Hegel, and later on Feuerbach, Marx and Engels. He drew on Lenin to establish materialist dialectics once again as the theory of knowledge of Marxism. Like Lenin, Ilyenkov found himself swimming against the tide but was not deflected from his goals.

A renewed interest in Spinoza is blossoming internationally. Historical research is shedding light on Spinoza’s circles and the connection between the political-religious conflicts in the Dutch Republic and his role as “the philosopher of modernity”. The significance of Spinoza for political practice in the present conjuncture has become a rich and contentious arena in philosophy. A number of thinkers, in particular, theorisers of contemporary globalisation such as Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt, have based their ideas on aspects of Spinoza’s Ethics, his Theological Political Treatise and the Political Treatise.

Negri’s espousal of Spinoza has its critics. We will argue that Negri bases his theorising on Spinoza’s mystical and static aspects as part of his rejection of the dialectical and objective implications of Spinoza’s monism, which are precisely those sides which Ilyenkov championed and developed. While the post-structuralist critique of “Modernity” recognises and diagnoses the transformations of subjectivity, it idealises the possibility of contradiction-free transition. This results in an impoverished reading of Spinoza which tends to make resistance into a fixture within an eternal framework. Like the poor, resistance will always be with us.

The abjuring of the concepts of dialectical negation, transformation and the possibility of qualitative leaps leads to an eternalising, timeless “antagonism” thereby re-introducing the metaphysical duality which Spinoza resolved through his concept of substance. Spinozan-Ilyenkovian dialectics offers a path beyond the impasse of 21st century philosophy. Understanding the dialectics of contemporary globalisation and its crisis creates the ground for transforming the ideal into the real.

Spinoza, Ilyenkov & Western Marxism – meeting the challenges of the global crisis

Fuente: http://www.aworldtowin.net/