The Power of Negativity: Selected Writings on the Dialectic in Hegel and Marx (The Raya Dunayevskaya Series in Marxism and Humanism) [Paperback]

Raya Dunayevskaya (Author), Peter Hudis (Editor), Kevin B. Anderson (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0739102672 | ISBN-13: 978-0739102671 | Publication Date: January 15, 2002

Raya Dunayevskaya is hailed as the founder of Marxist-Humanism in the United States. In this new collection of her essays co-editors Peter Hudis and Kevin B. Anderson have crafted a work in which the true power and originality of Dunayevskaya's ideas are displayed. This extensive collection of writings on Hegel, Marx, and dialectics captures Dunayevskaya's central dictum that, contrary to the established views of Hegelians and Marxists, Hegel was of signal importance to the theory and practice of Marxism. The Power of Negativity sheds light not only on Marxist-Humanism and the rooting of Dunayevskaya's Marxist-Humanist theories in Hegel, but also on the life of one of America's most penetrating and provocative critical thinkers.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Dunayevskaya's brusque, unpretentious, and exclamatory epistolary style is exhilarating. (Radical Philosophy )

Dunayevskaya writes, particularly in the letters and talks, like a person "drunk" on Hegel. But rather than causing her to lose control, this drunkeness is a measure of her intellectual excitement, an infectious one that gets transferred to her readers. She is especially good in linking Hegel, Marx, and Lenin. Her varied attempts to explain the importance of Hegel's absolute idea and theory of negation for the traditions that followed, but also for the hoped-for revolution, are as clear and convincing as any I 've seen from her pen. It's a truly impressive display, and one that will delight as well as instruct most readers. (Ollman, Bertell )

With the writings of Raya Dunayevskaya, the continent of revolutionary thought underwent a seismic shift, the world-historical reverberations of which we are still feeling today and which continue to grow stronger in this new millennium as the crisis of world capitalism intensifies. Dunayevskaya is one of the great revolutionary thinkers of the last century and her work on the dialectics of philosophy is unsurpassed in the development of Marxist humanism. Expertly edited by Peter Hudis and Kevin B. Anderson, this volume is destined to become a classic. History bequeathes us few gifts, and it is up to the present generation of revolutionaries to take advantage of this opportunity to engage with Dunaveyskaya's most important ideas, condensed in this exceptional edited edition. (McLaren, Peter )

Brilliant theorist, committed activist, and passionate scholar, Raya Dunayevskaya was a role-model for my generation. We are fortunate to have her back in this wonderfully edited work that conveys the excitement of a time when, for Raya and her interlocutors (C.L.R James and Herbert Marcuse among others), philosophy and the struggle against social injustice were two sides of the same urgent endeavor. Her understanding of dialectics as a method whereby each generation has to discover its own revolutionary task, her insistence that Marxism means humanism in the most inclusive sense and that socialism means the social actualization of individual freedom — these are ideas that appear young and fresh against the weary and sophistic pessimism that dominates much theory in the academy today. And more: in contrast to the boring pap of commodified culture and political sound bites, Raya's interpretation makes the logic of Hegel's absolute idea a fascinating and compelling read. (Susan Buck-Morss )

As we enter a new millennium, critical and dialectical thinking is more important than ever in charting the vicissitudes of capital and political struggle. Raya Dunayevskaya's writings on Hegelian and Marxian dialectics are highly insightful and relevant to the theory and politics of the contemporary moment. Thus Peter Hudis and Kevin B. Anderson's collection of some of her most important writings provide access to a valuable theoretical and political legacy. (Kellner, Douglas )

The Power of Negativity provides material for a unique exegetical experience. Overall, this collection offers a very unusual and stimulating reading of Hegel's philosophy that while on the one hand may appear out of date, on the other should encourage us to approach the problems of our contemporary world in a new light, namely, with a fresher look at Hegel. (Hegel-Studien, September 2009 )

[This book] is the portrait of an exceptional mind at work, and a treasure trove of insights and provocative ideas. The matters Dunayevskaya brought forward remain of supreme historical importance. The editors have made this a labor of love, with fastidious footnoting, intertextual referencing, and a superb introduction. Dunayevskaya's courage and vitality shine through and through. (Joel Kovel )

The introduction by Peter Hudis and Kevin Anderson is a fine essay—so lucid and explicit yet sacrificing no complexity. It should be accessible to a range of people—students, or people recently stimulated to think about the nature of capitalism and the requirements of a different society, as well as longtime socialists who need the "placing" of Raya's thought as it's provided here. (Adrienne Rich On The Introduction )

Dunayevskaya is a unique thinker for the twentieth century. She combines an involvement in freedom struggles with a very dep commitment to philosophical ideas and exploration. . . For those who have never read Dunayevskaya, this volume provides an excellent introduction. For those who have read her work, this is a volume that presents her total thought as a process. (Review Of Metaphysics )

A thorough, clear, and accessible introduction, written by Peter Hudis and Kevin B. Anderson, explores the relationship of the dialectic to the nature of the present moment and the reationship of Dunayevskaya's work to contemporary issues in dialectical philosophy. . . This book makes a contribution to the clarification of theoretical issues that are central to the problem of transforming reality. (Capital and Class )

Dunayevshaya..adds that the historic movement's reach for that solidarity in the human community needs to be met with a projection of Hegel's dialectic in relations to our own time's spirit. (Clio )

For those already acquainted with Raya Dunayevskaya through one or more of her works, it provides fascinating background on the development of her thought. (Studies In Marxism )

About the Author

Peter Hudis is a Chicago-based independent scholar. He is the author of Harry McShane and the Scottish Roots of Marxist-Humanism (1995). Kevin B. Anderson is Professor of Sociology at Northern Illinois University. He is author of Lenin, Hegel, and Western Marxim: A Critical Study (1995).

Product Details

• Paperback: 432 pages
• Publisher: Lexington Books (January 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0739102672
• ISBN-13: 978-0739102671
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,153,356 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best books on dialectics, January 27, 2002

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Franklin (Memphis, TN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Power of Negativity: Selected Writings on the Dialectic in Hegel and Marx (The Raya Dunayevskaya Series in Marxism and Humanism) (Paperback)

Whether one is interested in Marxist theory or in a scholarly treatment of Hegelian philosophy, this new collection of Raya Dunayevskaya's writings on the dialectic in Hegel and Marx is a must-read. _The Power of Negativity_ is a truly compelling book for anyone who wants to delve into Hegel's thought, Marx's relation to dialectics, and the major debates on dialectical philosophy in 20th Century Marxism.

_The Power of Negativity_ illuminates all of this through a range of pieces, including detailed summaries and extensive commentaries on Hegel's most philosophically important works: the Phenomenology of Mind, the Science of Logic, the Encyclopedia Logic, and the Philosophy of Mind. It contains several expositions of Dunayevskaya's unique and thoughtful interpretation of Hegel, as well as of her analysis of "Marx's transformation of Hegel's revolution in philosophy into a philosophy of 'revolution in permanence,'" which presents her views on what is fundamental to a Marxist concept of a new society, from the breakdown of the division between mental and physical labor to the transformation of the relationship between women and men. It contains correspondence with such scholars as Herbert Marcuse, Erich Fromm, George Armstrong Kelly, Louis Dupre, Jonathan Spence, and C.L.R. James, as well as worker-thinkers Charles Denby and Harry McShane; and lectures to audiences as varied as Hegel scholars, African-American workers, and Japanese student radicals. It contains philosophic critiques and commentaries on major theoreticians such as Lukacs, Korsch, Adorno, Frantz Fanon, Engels, Rosa Luxemburg, Lenin, Trotsky, Bukharin, Mao, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty, as well as expositions of her own distinctive Marxist-Humanist philosophic standpoint.

Dunayevskaya came of age in the period when Stalin's counter-revolution, coming from within the revolutionary movement, succeeded in transforming what grew out of the Russian Revolution into its opposite, totalitarian state-capitalism that still called itself "Communism." She recognized the Russian Revolution's transformation into opposite as a fundamental challenge to revolutionary Marxism, and set about using Marx's economic categories and Russia's "five-year plan" statistics to prove that Russia had become a state-capitalist society. But she also saw that an economic/political answer was not sufficient and a re-creation of Marx's philosophy of revolution was required to meet the challenge of the age. This led to her founding of the philosophy of Marxist-Humanism, to which an "unchained" version of Hegel's dialectic of absolute negativity is central. As Dunayevskaya put it in one of the pieces in _The Power of Negativity_:

"...because Absolute Negativity signifies transformation of reality, the dialectic of contradiction and totality of crises, the dialectic of liberation, Hegel's thought comes to life at critical points of history, called by him 'birth-times of history.'"

A thorough, clear, and accessible introduction explores the relationship of the dialectic to the nature of the present moment and the relationship of Dunayevskaya's work to contemporary issues in dialectical philosophy. The introduction also gives an overview of her writings on dialectics as well as an overview of the book and its structure, after which the reader is well prepared to plunge into the rest of the book. This book makes a contribution to the clarification of theoretical issues that are central to the problem of transforming reality. One of its virtues is that it provides accessible discussions of some of Hegel and Marx's philosophic works, many in the form of lectures and informal discussions.