Engels’ Several Contributions To Historical Materialism In His Later Years And The Enlightenment

In the later years of Friedrich Engels,the social economic and political situation underwent great changes,the historical materialism not only survived from bourgeois scholars and the school of “New Youth”,but also the theory itself presented some limitations along with the progress of the times and the change of the situation,making the development of its theoretical system as a realistic demand.Under the influence of these dual factors,Engels carried out a series of perfect and innovation of historical materialism in his old years so as to promote the development of the theory of historical materialism,thus having made great contributions to historical materialism.Firstly,his contributions reflected in his stern refuting the vulgar folk thoughts of the reactionary trend,in the process of indexes of falsehood Engels greatly propelled the development of historical materialism theory system;Secondly,his contributions also reflected in his insistence and defending the monism of the historical materialism,in the process of the stick to defending the monism of historical materialism.Engels’ insistence effectively maintained the truthfulness and the scientificity of the historical materialism;Thirdly,his contributions additionally reflected in his enriching and developing the theoretical system of the historical materialism creatively under the new situation of economy,society and politics,in the process of his richness and development of the theoretical system he successfully maintained the vitality of historical materialism.Engels’ contribution to historical materialism in his later years was the result of the combination of practice development,theoretical struggle and Engels’ own efforts.It was both a continuation of his earlier historical materialism and Marx’s own logical innovation and We should study the quality of Engels,both to defend the Marxist ideology in the field of dominance,but also with the times,according to changes in the situation of the times,to promote the contemporary Marxism is the innovation and development of the theoretical system of socialism with Chinese characteristics.This article tries to analyze Engels’ criticism of the doctrine of vulgarization,adhere to and defend the monistic theory of historical materialism,enrich and develop the theory of historical materialism,combing and drawing lessons from historical materialism classics and based on the relevant research results at home and abroad,based on the attitude of seeking truth from facts,Engels in his later years of historical materialism contribution to the system of induction and research,thus revealing its contribution to the main content and core values.The full text is divided into three parts: The first part is the reason part,which mainly answers the question of “why Engels developed and perfected Marxism in his later years”.This part discusses the reason and necessity of Engels’ development and perfection of historical materialism in his later years from internal and external aspects.The second part is the core of this article,it mainly answers the issue of “what contributions Engels made in his later years to historical materialism”,in this part,a large number of references have been referred to the classic works of Marx and Engels to make sure Engels’ contributions the theoretical system of historical materialism.The third part is the enlightenment part,which mainly answers the question of“what is the inspiration of Engels’ contribution to historical materialism for us today”,this part is from the perseverance of Marxism’s leading position and the innovation of the theoretical system of socialism with Chinese characteristics.Through the in-depth discussion and research on Engels’ contribution to historical materialism in his later years,this paper mainly draws the following conclusions:Firstly,Engels’ contribution to historical materialism in his later years is the result of the ever-changing social practice and theoretical struggle,the key factor of which is the interaction among the economic foundation,superstructure,social practice and social consciousness in the process of historical development.Secondly,Engels’ greatest contribution to historical materialism was that while clarifying a series of fallacies,he made great connotation and denotation of historical materialism,which was able to develop it into a more complete and scientific system.What he did to historical materialism is development,not betrayal.Thirdly,as China’s economic and social development entering into the new normal and the social situation becoming increasingly complicated,on the one hand,we must strengthen the basic position of historical materialism to keep a clear mind and understand the nature and harm of all kinds of reactionary thoughts,and to clear the boundaries of historical materialism and historical nihilism.On the other hand,we must accurately grasp the national conditions and characteristics of our country and adhere to the people-oriented principles so as to stimulate the reform subjectivity of people,we should adhere to learning and innovating the “Two Production” theory and promote the coordinated development of population structure and economic structure to give full play of multi-parties and at speed up the process of building a well-off society.