A Study Of Marxist Social Theory Narratives

Marxist social theory is a social theory constructed by Marx and Engels and then developed by their students and successors.The social theory Marx and Engels formed with historical materialism as its kernel,determined its basic principles,methods,core content,and practice orientation;while the continuator contributed a lot to its development according to the characteristics of their times,social needs and revolutionary practice.Given this,the study focuses on the historical context and logic since the Second International,Soviet Russia and the early Western Marxist social theory narratives development,with the advancement of the social theory as its leading clue.The thesis consists of an introduction and five chapters.Based on a brief discussion of the necessity of Marxist social theory research,the introduction part leads into a comprehensive summary and analysis of the overall situation of social theory researches at home and abroad,starting by analyzing the historical occurrence of Marx and Engels' s social theory.Domestic researches mainly expound the basic status and difficulties in the study of Marxism in the Second International,Soviet Russia and especially in the West since the reform and opening up,highlighting the progress of social theory research and the change of the topics.Whereas overseas studies sort out the ideological context and logical progress of the social theories of early Western Marxism with Lukács as a representative,Western Marxism since the founding of Frankfurt School and foreign Marxism in the contemporary horizon.The first chapter employs the analysis of Marxism transforming into the social theory narratives multiple contexts in the second international period as a logical clue.It focuses on three aspects,namely,the heritage of Marx and Engels' s thoughts and theories faced by the Second International theorists,the era context in the Second International Period,and the practical context of the labor movement in the Second International Period.It clears the ideological history premise and platform of this theoretical narrative transformation,analyzes the subjective and objective factors and conditions of this transformation.Chapter ?,taking the understanding exploration and construction of the Second International theorists as the logical clue,mainly discusses the progress of the understanding and construction of Marx and Engels' s social theory by the main Second International theorists from three development paths.The first path,represented by Merlin,Paul Lafargue and Plekhanov,is to analyze and summarize Marx and Engels' s views of social history(i.e.,materialist historical view and historical materialism).In a sense,this path pertains to the mainstream of the Second International social theory,as it is a natural extension of history and logic in the process of theoretical development.The second path is about the great transformation of Marx and Engels' s social historical theory led by theorists such as Bernstein and Kautsky.They all started from different theoretical intentions and practical purposes,attempting to “fix” Marx and Engels' s thoughts with Non-Marxist ideas,which directly triggered major internal debates within the Second International.The last path takes Labriola,Luxembourg and Heinrich Wilhelm Karl Cunow as examples.They created new ways including practical philosophy and social philosophy,to understand Marx and Engels' s views of social history,which made a great difference for the later development.Chapter ?,based on the analysis of complex Marxist theory and practical factors of labor movement in the early 20 th century,takes Soviet Russian Marxism represented by Lenin as the research object.On the basis of a brief introduction of the overall condition of researches on Marxist social theory in the period of Soviet Russia,this thesis sheds a light on the progress of Bukharin and Lenin's social theory researches,attempting to find out new possibilities of social theory narrative logic during this development period.Chapter ? makes a concise analysis of the basic context of the occurrence of early western Marxist theory,and then discusses social theories of Lukács,Gramsci and Korsch respectively from three aspects,namely “totality and class consciousness”,“practical philosophy positioning of Marxism” and “Marxist philosophy and science”.The chapter focuses on how theorists on this overall path make a turn in the progress of Marxist social thoughts.In the fifth chapter(Chapter V),the thesis makes an attempt to study the original context and core connotation of Marx and Engels' s social theory from a contemporary perspective,as well as analyze the extension possibility of the primitive theory.On this basis,Chapter V analyzes and evaluates the logical arrangement and historical extension since the Second International social theories from multiple perspectives,and finally points out the theoretical and practical context,problems,visions and methods of contemporary development of Marxist social theory.