Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence

Front Cover
Clarendon Press, 2000 - History - 442 pages
First published in 1978, this book rapidly established itself as a classicof modern Marxism. Cohen's masterful application of advanced philosophicaltechniques in an uncompromising defence of historical materialism commandedwidespread admiration. In the ensuing twenty years, the book has served as aflagship of a powerful intellectual movement - analytical Marxism. In thisexpanded edition Cohen offers his own account of the history, and the furtherpromise, of analytical Marxism. He also expresses reservations abouttraditional historical materialism, in the light of which he reconstructs thetheory, and he studies the implications for historical materialism of the demiseof the Soviet Union.

From inside the book

Contents

IMAGES OF HISTORY IN HEGEL AND MARX
1
II
11
THE PRODUCTIVE FORCES AND CAPITALISM
17
1 Economic Structure and Productive Forces
28
III
55
IV
79
2 Matter and Form in the Labour Process
88
V
100
BASE AND SUPERSTRUCTURE POWERS AND RIGHTS
216
IX
249
IN MARXISM
278
USEVALUE EXCHANGEVALUE AND CONTEMPORARY
297
FETTERING
326
RECONSIDERING HISTORICAL MATERIALISM
341
RESTRICTED AND INCLUSIVE HISTORICAL
364
MARXISM AFTER THE COLLAPSE OF THE SOVIET
389

FETISHISM
115
4 Diagnosis of Capital Fetishism
121
125
142
2 The Capitalist Economic Structure and the Capitalist Mode
180
3 Capitalism and the Development of the Productive Forces
193
5 Capitalisms Mission and its Fate
201
7 Why are Classes Necessary?
207
Karl Marx and the Withering Away of Social Science
396
Some Definitions
415
LIST OF WORKS CITED
425
NAME INDEX
433
115
437
Copyright

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About the author (2000)

G. A. Cohen is at University of Oxford.