Marxismus und axiologie

Summary Marxist philosophers are increasingly beginning to elaborate a philosophical axiology of their own, to articulate the meaning of socialism in axiological terms. Traditionally, Marxist doctrine has been very eager to present socialism and its motivation as a matter of scientific prediction rather than in terms of value judgments, wishes, or the proclamation of ideals. A more accurate analysis, however, shows that the Marxist undertanding of human social practice presupposes some active striving in relation to which all objects and circumstances of human life receive a positive or negative meaning. It is just this practical relation of human subjects to their world (and of their world to them) that is conceptually grasped by the notion of value.From the theoretical point of view, Marxist axiology is not oriented towards some realm of values all values and value relations are understood strictly in anthropological terms as components of human and social practice, as some particular aspects which objects and circumstances assume in relation to actively striving beings and their qualitatively determined self-affirmation on a definite historical level. Marxist axiology presents itself both as a theoretical analysis of these value qualities and relations, and at the same time as a doctrine of practical involvement whose aim is to clarify and strengthen the socialist value consciousness.The basis of all these value relations lies in the system of human needs. According to Marxism, this system proves to be multi-dimensional, encompassing as its fundament the complex of material needs which are to be satisfied through work. But equally important and urgent for human beings are those needs and requirements in relation to which all social relations are characterized as being worthy or unworthy of man (such judgments being in accordance with some historical standard of claims). Finally, there are also those peculiar needs basic to the aesthetic qualities of objects as well as to the free (not imposed by natural or social necessities) and purposeless activities of human play and self-realization. The desideratum of socialism is to bring about a harmoniously proportioned synthesis in the satisfaction of the totality of human needs for the totality of human beings. Socialism is not only necessary and predictable in a scientific sense but also valuable and desirable for people.Several Marxist (and especially Soviet) authors have worked out the outlines of a Marxist philosophical axiology (V. P. Tugarinov, O. M. Bakuradze, V. A. Vasilenko and others). The opponents of such an enterprise (O. G. Drobnickij and others) have more or less radically contested the value and legitimacy of such a theory of value, for they consider value consciousness as a part of a pre-scientific way of thought. On the theoretical level the abstract specification of such value relationships constitute an artificial separation of the theoretical-practical unity and totality of human relations to the world.The author finds these objections not convincing because the danger of hypostatizing and isolating the values, of presenting them as some kind of substantial eternal entities, can fully be overcome by anthropological integration and sociological concretization of the value aspect. In a Marxist philosophy of practice something is not valuable in itself but is either positively or negatively significant for human beings. Certainly this development of axiology in Marxism is an attempt to set up a counterweight to the traditional scientific objectivism of the Marxist doctrine by confirming the right of people to judge and act subjectively on certain issues.

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Professor V. P. Tugarinov, Leningrad, zum 70. Geburtstag.