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The Relativity of the Unity of Opposites

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The Relativity of the Unity of Opposites RELATIVITY OF THE UNITY OF OPPOSITES 185 essence of the doctrine and would open the door to mech­ anism, relativism, teleology, and modern neo-Hegelianism. Indeed the mechanists also, as we know, are ready to admit that" all flows, all changes." But" flows and changes" in CHAPTER V their understanding is only a quantitative process, the actual elements remaining unchanged. And the relativist not only admits that " all changes, all flows," but makes THE RELATIVITY OF THE such change absolute, including within it our own know­ UNITY OF OPPOSITES AND THE ledge. Thus every kind of stability in objective phenomena ABSOLUTENESS OF THEIR is swept away, becoming but a subjective appearance. Our knowledge is held to be limited and distorted in its very CONFLICT nature so that it does not even reflect truly the creative flow ofreality. The teleologically inclined bourgeois thinker also admits IN THE FOR E W 0 R D to the first volume of Capital Marx that" all flows, all changes." But he goes on to affirm wrote: that this flow, this change, is nothing else than the path to " In its rational form dialectic is a scandal and an the realization of ever more perfect forms, the tendency abomination to the bourgeoisie and its doctrinaire spokes­ towards which is deeply seated in life itself, that movement men because while supplying a positive understanding is determined by those ideal forms in which the imminent of th~ existin~state ofthings, it at the same time furni<;hes purposes of life reside. an understanding of the negation of that state of things, There are other eclectic points of view, as, for instance, and enables us to recognize that that state of things will the theory that history shows an alternation of stable and inevitably break up; it is an abomination to them be­ revolutionary epochs, the first characterized by definiteness, cause it regards every historically ?evdoped soci~ form stability and self-identity of the processes found in it, the as in fluid movement, as traDSlent; because It lets. second by indefiniteness, movement and change. Where nothing overawe it, but is in its very nature critical and there is definiteness there is no change; where there is revolutionary." movement, there is no definiteness-that is the essence of this eclectic wisdom ! Dialectic " in its rational form," materialistic dialectic, Only a conception ofdevelopment as a conflict ofinternal is a scandal and an abomination to the bourgeoisie because, contradictions at all stages of development, gives a pro­ as opposed to metaphysical views which stress the immuta­ found and adequate understanding ofactuality and arms us bility of existing forms or their ~low uninte~pted " evolu­ against mechanism, relativism, eclecticism and other bour­ tionary" change, it demonstrates the.revol~tlOnary ch~nge· geois revisionist" isms." This conception alone shows the of forms, the self-negation of everything exIStent, 10 VIrtue unity of the aspects of a process and their relative identity of the development of internal contradictions. not as an external form, not as a stage in a process, not as But whoever reduced Marx's thought, or the Marx-. a basic characteristic of a process, but as aform ofinternal Leninist doctrine of development in general, to the state­ contradiction, of conflict of internal opposites. This form ment "all flows, all changes," would distort the actual expresses the type of contradiction and is determined by 186 UNITY AND THE STRIFE OF OPPOSITES RELATIVITY OF THE UNITY OF OPPOSITES 187 it (the contradiction), emerges on its basis, develops and determines the character of the resolution of their con­ decays. There is nO'internal contradiction without a unity tradiction. Conflict makes their internal unity conditional of conflicting aspects within, without a general basis of temporal, transitional. Conflict leads to the final resolutio~ conflict which expresses itself in the relative identity of of the given contradictions, to their removal creates the opposites. But unity and identity, which are the necessary beginning o.f a D;ew process. In,a class society: every given fonn of the movement of the contradiction, are at the form .of SOCiety IS temporal and transitory, the change of same time conditioned by it as by the actual content ofthe any gwen form ofa class society and the abolition ofclasses development. Therefore, to regard unity, the identity of are acc.omplished by means of class struggle. On the opposites, as a "reconciliation of opposites" is a dir ?evelopmg basi~ o~ the contradiction ofcapitalist economy, perversion of Marxism. Yet we find this view expressed i I.e. ~e contr~di~~on between the social character of pro­ almost identical tenns by the mechanists, the reformis ductIOn and mdiVIdual appropriation, only the conflict of socialists and the Menshevist idealists. both mutually, exclusive opposites would lead to the Materialistic dialectic has nothing in common with th replacing of the original fonn of their unity and mutual point ofview of" reconciliation ofopposites" which subor pe.netration (out ofwhich they were developing into some­ dinates the conflict of opposites to a process of inevitab thin~ new) by anothe: form. The growing intensity of the and pre-determined reconciliation. Materialistic dialec . conflict ofthese OPpOSItes leads to the necessity oftheir final which is "in essence critical and revolutionary" (Marx resolution and liquidation. This conflict creates also all the understands the resolution ofcontradictions to be the replac necessary conditions and possibilities for it. ment ofone type of contradiction by another. This resol Out of the thorough understanding of this aspect of tion, in which " opposites" become identified" (Lenin~ diale~tic proceeds the policy ofour Party. The Party saw in expresses not the "reconciliation" but the resolution the different forms ofthe bond between th,e pn?letariat and their contradiction in a new contradiction, a new type the peasantry, at the various stages of N.E.P., not a form internal conflict. ofreconciliation ofthose opposites, but a form ofresolution This thought was also expressed by Lenin in his cel o~ the temporal, partial contradictions, characteristic ofthe brated proposition on the relativity of the unity ofopposi gIven ~tage, and at the same time, a step forward in the and the absoluteness of their conflict, which was neglect resolutIon of the basic contradiction of the transitional and not understood by the Menshevist idealists. L period-the contradiction between socialism and capital­ wrote: ISm. And so the Party did not make eternal the different forms ofthis bond between peasants and industrial workers " The unity (the coincidence, identity, resultant fo (for this would have meant that we were oblivious of the of opposites is conditional, temporary, transitory, a basic ~ontradictions of the transitional period-which was relative. The struggle of the mutually exclusive opposi the ~take of the ri?"ht deviation), nor did it regard the is absolute, as movement and evolution are."l changmg of slogans m relation to the peasantry as man­ ~uvr~s ~ed out by the situ~tion, allowing us to " gain For, as we see, the conflict of mutually exclusive opposi time until the final resolutIon of the contradiction in leads to a change in the character ofthat unity, coincid world socialism-which was how the Trotskyists viewed the and mutual penetration inwhich theyarefound; this co matter. 1 Lenin, vol. xiii, p. 324. • Stalin in a speech at the Fifteenth Congress said: 188 UNITY AND THE STRIFE OF OPPOSITES RELATIVITY OF THE UNITY OF OPPOSITES 18g " Our development proceeds, not by a smooth, un­ the course of their movement, of the course of preparation broken movement upwards. No, comrades, we have ofconditions and possibilities for their mastery and solution. classes we have contradictions inside the country, we Kaganovich, in a speech celebrating the tenth anniversary have a'past, a present and a future, and the contradicti~na of the Institute of Red Professors, said in describing this between these are still with us. We cannot therefore glide feature of Bolshevist practice: smoothly forward. Our course is one of struggle, of ev developing contracllctions and of their subsequen "What exactly does the unity of opposites mean in mastery, analysis and liquidation. Never, so long as th the ordinary language of our political party? The unity are classes, shall we be in the position to say: Well, tha of opposites in actuality means not to be afraid of diffi­ God now all is well. Never, comrades, shall we have tha culties. Not to be afraid of those contradictions of life stat: of affairs. Always in our experience something • which spring up on our journey, but instead to conquer dying out. But whatever it is, it d~es. not .like the ide them with Bolshevist energy and staunchness." of dying; it struggles to go on ~stmg, ~t d~ends 1 outworn activity. Always something new IS bemg bo A characteristic feature of our party is its struggle for in our life. But whatever it is, it is not just born, . tlIe victory of a determined tendency of development, for screams and cries, asserting its right to exist. ... Th tlIe victory of one of two opposite alternatives; it is a struggle between the old and the ne~, betwee~ what' struggle that excludes any haphazard drift. dying out and what is born-that IS the basIS of 0 The understanding of the absolute struggle of opposites movement." and of the relativity of their unity distinguishes Marx­ Leninism from the reformist parties. Not one theoretician Only in b,itter class struggle with the c:apitalist elem~ of social reformism, neither Kautsky nor Plekhanov, could and in their eventual suppression, only m the proletana rise to the comprehension of movement by means of the struggle for a socialist recasting of the small-individ .
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