Journal of the History of Philosophy

Fichte, Lask, and Lukfics's Hegelian Marxism TOM ROCKMORE WITHKARLKORSCH,Georg LukAcs is widely known as one of the two founders of Hegelian Marxism. Although Luk~ics is one of the most significant students of Hegel in this century, Marxist or otherwise, and although his Marxism is partially based on his reading of Hegel's position, it is an error to consider his Marxism as basically Hegelian for two reasons. First, LukAcs's reading of classical German philosophy depends crucially on his creative extension of Kant's problem of the thing-in-itself to all of classical German philosophy from Kant to Hegel. Second, Luk~ics argues in detail that classical German philosophy is unable to resolve the problem of the thing-in-itself, but that the latter is resolved by Marx. Luk/ics's reading of Marx's solution of the Kantian problem, which he extends to all of classical German philosophy, depends on his appropriation of Fichte's position. My intention here is to discuss the nature and significance of Fichte's role, both directly and through the intermediary of Emil Lask, in the constitution of George Luk~ics's distinctive form of Marxism. Since Fichte is the greatest of all Kantians and Lask is a neo-Kantian, I will show that Lukfics's Marxism is not only Hegelian, but Kantian, Fichtean, and neo-Kantian as well. l. Discussion of the influence of one thinker on another can have different ends in view. One common aim is a simple exercise in historical scholarship. In this way the links between different views are elucidated in a filling out of the historical record, perhaps through the presentation of information which has recently been discovered, or which has not yet been thoroughly discussed, or through the development of a new, or at least significantlydifferent, interpretation . Another aim consists in an effort to change the way in which we view a thinker, or that thinker's theory, by uncovering or reinterpreting the relation of a view to previous thought. This in turn often brings about a change, even a [557] 558 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 30:4 OCTOBER 1992 basic change, in our way of understanding the position, as is perhaps the case here. The importance of a change in the understanding of the link between a given theory and other theories clearly influences the way that theory is understood . To take a well-known example, Kant's transcendental turn is intended to provide a new approach to knowledge made necessary by the claimed failure of all previous epistemology., The justification of the Copernican Revolution lies precisely in Kant's assertion that he is able to do in his thought what no other writer has yet accomplished. More precisely, through his methodological innovation Kant proposes to solve the epistemological problem which, because of the supposed failure of prior views, remains on the intellectual agenda. Obviously, Kant's claim to provide a viable approach to the unsolved problem of knowledge is central to the understanding of his achievement. The interest of the critical philosophy is not limited to the fact that Kant is its author, merely to Kant's view as such, in isolation from the philosophical tradition. Although one should not minimize the interest of Kant's theory, the theory itself is important, perhaps even mainly important, in terms of the truth of Kant's own understanding of the relation of his view to prior thought. If it were to turn out that Kant was wrong in his claim that all prior theories of knowledge have failed and that his own Copernican Revolution is a possibly true view of knowledge, then clearly his position, although interesting on any number of grounds, would be less interesting than it would otherwise have been. This point concerning the link between Kant's position and prior thought applies to other writers as well. In this respect, Kant is not an exception since many, perhaps most thinkers base their assertions for the importance of their own views on the manner in which they allegedly relate to the surrounding tradition. It is, hence, not surprising that attention, even great attention, is devoted to preparing and defending...