Dialectical Materialism

The scientific philosophy, concerned basically with the general laws of development (evolution) of nature, society, and thought; the world view of international Marxism, created by Marx and Engels and developed further by Lenin and Stalin. This world view “is called dialectical materialism because its approach to the phenomena of nature, its method of studying and apprehending them is dialectical, while its interpretation of the phenomena of nature, its conception of these phenomena, its theory is materialistic.” (Stalin, Dialectical and Historical Materialism, p. 5.) The historical materialism of Marx and Engels is an application of dialectical materialism to the field of social phenomena, the evolution of human society, and represents an outstanding achievement of scientific thought. Dialectical and historical materialism constitute the theoretical foundation of communism. Marxism is “a complete world outlook, a system of philosophy from which the proletarian socialism of Marx logically ensues.” (Quoted by L. Beria, Stalin’s Early Writings and Activities, p. 99.) Dialectical materialism as a philosophy of the proletariat arose in the middle of the last century and developed in organic connection with the practice of the revolutionary labor movement. Working out this progressive philosophical world view, Marx and Engels based themselves on all that was of value in the preceding development of human thought. In particular, the work of Hegel and Feuerbach, critically approached, proved an abundant source of material. Marx and Engels extracted the “rational kernel” from Hegel’s dialectics, and, casting aside its idealistic shell, developed it in a scientific direction. Likewise, from Feuerbach’s materialism, which was metaphysical and inconsistent, Marx and Engels took the nucleus while rejecting the idealistic and religious wrappings and worked it into their scientifically oriented theory of materialism. Marx and Engels, and later Lenin and Stalin, applied the teachings of dialectical materialism to the political and tactical problems of the working class, to the practical activity of its party. “Just as philosophy finds in the proletariat its material weapon, so the proletariat finds in philosophy its spiritual weapon.” (Marx-Engels, Gesamtausgabe, Part I, Vol. I, Book I, p. 620.) Only the dialectical materialism of Marx, as Lenin emphasized, can show the proletariat the way out of the spiritual slavery by which all the exploited classes are blighted. Dialectical materialism is a living theory, constantly developing and growing richer by assimilating new discoveries of science and new experience in the class struggle. In such profoundly significant works as Lenin’s Materialism and Empirio-Criticism and Stalin’s Foundations of Leninism and Dialectical and Historical Materialism, Marx’s philosophy is concretely elaborated in terms of new problems and thereby enriched.