Himry of Europpan Ideat. Vol. 12, No. 2. pp. 271-275, 1990 0191-6s99/90 %3.00+0.00 Printed in Great Britain @ 1990 Pcrgamon press plc

REVIEWS

HEGEL’S PHILOSOPHY OF LAW IN THE SOVIET UNION

IsRAsL IDALOVICHI*

Hegel’s philosophical and ideological metamorphosis in the Soviet Union is a very i~ter~ti~g case study and a very problematic matter. As one of the philosophies vital for the purposes of the ‘communist fathers’, especially Marx and Lenin, Hegel’s thought has been interpreted in a very controversial manner and adapted to the different socialist and communist dogmas. It is quite difftcult, therefore to analyse such a phenomenon without reflecting on the historical background of each stage in the history of Soviet Union.

P. G, Diet1 has studied the different interpretations and theoretical implications of Hegefs ‘~~htsphilosophie’ -Philosophy of Law-in the Soviet Union, from the post-revolutio~a~ stage of the early twenties up to the early eighties. Using the various philosophical and non-philosophi~l sources, the author analyses the synthesis of Hegelian dialectic and philosophical concepts with marxist concepts of society and thought. The author examines the scholarly attitude to Hegel’s thought in the Soviet Union according to the general historical schema of ideologicai and political developmen in the country. The

a? analysis of marxist ideology together with Hegelian ide ism, results in a very interesting hermeneutical study: in the Soviet Union, a specific philosophical thought could not be analysed by the socialist philosophers and theorists separately and independently, but only according to the attributes of man derived from different societies, as they vary from one historical stage to the next. Such a philosophical interpretation seeks a high level of coherence between ph~osophical thought and ideology. Man in nontemporal society can be compared with man in past or present societies and even in future society, according to marxist teleo-determinism. Such a teleological approach has been applied not only to living beings, but also to Hegel’s philosophical thought.

The doctrine of the progressive development of human society and the integration between nature and society has been accepted as a ‘necessity of natura1 law’ by socialist dogma. Therefore, the Hegelian phenomenology has been interpreted from the marxist point of view as an ontological dogma. Such a dogma maintains that progress in the consciousness of freedom and the general laws of progress are both derived from Hegelian sources. However, the Marxist-~enin~t philosophy ‘corrects’ Hegelian self-determination of the ‘Idea’ in a systematic teleological process. This process is grounded in a basically

*Department of General Studies, Technion- Israel Israel.

Institute of Technology, Haifa,

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optimistic, interpretation of world history, whose consequences have been analysed as natural ontology.

Diet1 does not give hermeneutical sources other than those of his special study to prove the thesis that Hegel’s Philosophy of Law is based first of all on civil rights. It is a well known thesis that Hegel’s Philosophy of Law is part of German Idealism, which logically conceived the concepts of freedom, person and private property in a single essential context. Socialist theoreticians try to prove that these theoretical mistakes were a part of the ‘class-consciousness’ and partially ‘wrong’ historical perspective of Hegel. That is the difference between the Hegelian Philosophy of Law, which has been made part of the socialist ‘present’ and its ideology, and their historical-temporal ‘non-valid’ consequences. However, the theoretical problems of civil rights and their historical consequences still remain difficult for the socialist doctrine.

Another great and complex moral, social and political problem arises within the framework of the ‘historical perspective’, as seen by people living in the present. For the sake of the future of great ideas or ideals, people are asked to make material sacrifices and sometimes even to give up their lives. The productivist socialist attitude demands a very high price of people ‘for the sake of the future’. A decidedly eschatological ideology spoke of present sacrifice which will allow ‘coming generations’ to live happily. Such a theoretical point of view, which has imposing practical and moral consequences, requires a very high standard of validity, which it attempts to get from various philosophical and scientific sources. Hegel’s thought permeates the whole of socialist ideology and its roots are to be found in every historical and social analysis. Therefore, his Philosophy of Law should give theoretical and historical support for the communist substructure.

In communist ideology, the historical and moral perspective are presented as ‘scientific’, in order to ‘prove’ that there is no viable alternative to this view. The social-moral imperative is a ‘historic commandment’ that people must accept in good spirit. Civil law must therefore be changed according to revolutionary law and ideology. The leadership of these communities sees itself in historical terms, i.e. as obliged to report its achievements to ‘history’ and not only to people living in the limited framework of the present. Moral and physical sacrifice in the present take on the significance of creativity and construction within that historic perspective. Society is separated into various groups according to the moral values of this historic commandment: (a) Those who are accused of having ‘individual’ character, who demand a better life, personal freedom and civil rights immediately; (b) Those who live and think in accordance to the ‘new’ moral code, the ‘productivists’, with the vision that allowed them to examine present distress with a future perspective. They reject freedom and many other moral values that have to be attained in the present in order that ‘tomorrow’s freedom’ be attained at a higher level.

Such a conceptual and practical attitude towards the individual and society as a whole could find a hermeneutical basis, if we looked for evidence in the Hegelian theory of law and of the state. The socialist moral code, which can be realised by an elitist concept of society, could prove its ideas with the ‘help’ of Hegelian tools. This hermeneuticai method was used by Lenin and later theorists, who point out that an elitist, avant-garde, the Communist Party, must

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guide and lead the working class. However, it is the working class which will direct and lead society as a whole. Thus functionai hierarchy is based on the Hegelian concept of ‘self-awareness’. The Communist Party, which leads by virtue of its knowledge of the ‘true self-awareness’ of the working class, will instruct the proletariat in such a way that it will know its true interests in historical perspective. In the course of the revolutionary process the proletariat will ‘know itself’ from this point of view, and will carry out the socialist revolution with full awareness.

Diet1 proves from different texts that this general attitude towards Hegel’s Philosophy of Law changed from anti-German and anti-Ideal~tic inte~retations in the thirties and forties to a more moderate and less socialist-dogmatic ideological influence in the sixties and seventies. Moreover, in the seventies and eighties the Hegelian ideas which support freedom of the individuai, his right to achieve self-cons~io~n~s as an individual in society and his civil rights, find a wide support in Soviet society and influence its official ideology. For example, supporters of the cooperative idea as a solution to the problem of the in~vidual and society in its modern context must defend themselves against accusations of longing for societies whose time has passed. The relevance of a collectivist ethic must be part of thinking on technological progress. These values must look forward to the future to avoid being a conservative, nostalgic view of past history. Therefore, the ‘new’ moral code is not defined according to teleological ethics, but on the basis of planning and organising, when the team, not the individual, assumes new importance.

The economic problems and the reform of planning in the Soviet system in the sixties could be seen as the main reasons for change in the attitude to Hegel’s Philosophy of Law. In 1970, Bogolov wrote that in Hegelian thought, human beings have objective status as the highest telos of each society (p. 223). These social-economic changes in Soviet society must reflect themselves in socialist ideology, because there are dialectical relationships between theory and practice Therefore, the attitude toward Hegel’s Philosophy of Law, which is part of the Marxist sub-structure, must integrate these new ideological tendencies. Soviet society must focus itself on civil rights, allowing more subjectivity and not only material objectivity.

The author offers many examples to demonstrate that every interpretation of Hegel’s philosophy in the Soviet Union has been carried out in accordance with Marxist-Leninist dogma. For example, in ‘Bol’saja Sovetskaja Enciklopedija’, 1971, Hegel’s philosophy of history is described as follows: ‘History is for Hegel not simple alteration, but a progress in the consciousness of freedom, where the old stage serves as a necessary basis for the new one’ @. 33). Or another example, as it appears in the ‘Filosofskaja Enciklopedija’, 1960: the definition of Hegel’s Philosophy of Law is based precisely on the meaning of his ‘reactionary’ thought, because it maintains that the best educator of youth is the Prussian state, which was certainly one of the most reactionary societies (p. 148). Hegel’s is based on the assumption that the Prussian state was ‘terra firma’, grounded in the concept of reason, which is the highest stage of his phenomenolo~. Such an argument is unacceptable to socialist dogma. Therefore, Hegel’s philosophy should be understood in the light of ‘the revolutionary method’, where theoretical criteria should be admitted together with practice. This synthesis incorporates valid rules

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for the development of human beings and society as a whole. The fact that the human personality is shaped by society and vice versa is based

on the materialist-dialectical link between the individual and society, which is one of the fundamental principles of Marx’s and Lenin’s ideological thought. There is no free place for distinction between the ‘essence’ of Man and ‘man’ as shaped within the framework of a specific society. Man and society form a unity in any society in the world. If a society possesses certain structures which shape man, how is it possible that Hegel has a revolutionary world view? Lenin describes Hegel as a revolutionary because he believes in human reason, even if he was a professor at the University of Berlin, under the absolute Prussian regime. Hegel is described as a theorist of civil rights, which means that he ‘fought’ against absolutism and feudalism, which was the war for freedom of the bourgeoisie, a war for civil rights. These ‘facts’ explain why Hegel’s revolutionary ideas had such a strong influence on his young revolutionary students. The fact that Hegel’s ideas inspired the young Hegelians, the fathers of socialist thought, and especially of Marxist philosophical and political thought, is for Lenin the best justication for his attitude toward the class revolution.

In the area of epistemology, practice restores the subject-object relationship.

Subject and object in Hegelian thought do not relate to each other only in an external relation, but also in an internal one, by way of which the subject builds the object. The subject has been built from his own activity in relations to the object. The subject is always a subjective object to the degree that the object is always an objective subject. The subject-object contradiction finds its dialectical unity in the practice, but if this unity does not occur, then human activities, their forms of creativity or self-expression, their freedom or their functional relationship in society are expressions of a high degree of alienation and a split in socialist society itself. The split between state and society, between politics and social activity, ‘progressive thought’ and civil rights must be cancelled in a new form. Historical developments in the Soviet Union are once again the source for a new hermeneutical insight into Hegel’s Philosophy of Law that will give a more adequate explanation of the essence of existing conflicts.

Hegel’s concept of the ‘true’ state is grounded in the idea of ‘communitas communitatum’, rather than in a civic aggregation of individuals. This picture of the state is not far from the contemporary socialist idea of the state. Since Hegel, the modern idea of a state and the relationships of individuals in their community have become paradigmatic, but not necessarily as centralist socialism with its ruling power. In current Soviet reality fragments of autonomy remain, but these fragments have been legalised on the basis of certain civil rights. Such a new direction of Hegel’s critical reconstruction in the Soviet Union also occurs under the influence of external ‘forces’, such as the Frankfurter Schule, the French philosophical combination between existentialism and marxism, and the scientific and technological revolution. P.G. Diet1 has only partially explained the influence of T. Adomo and E. Bloch, but not the other external sources that have affected the attitude towards Hegel’s philosophy in the Soviet Union.

Approval and criticism have together, through varied perspectives, brought new evidence, even by opposition, for the claim to universal validity that Hegel intended for his Philosophy of Law and State. At all events, the controversy surrounding Hegel’s interpretations and prescriptions in the Soviet Union has

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been clearly demonstrated by P.G. Dietl, who describes not only the different texts, but reveals many presuppositions and consequences which are concerned with fundamental questions of the Philosophy of Law, ideology and practical philosophy. Dietl’s book is clear, articulate and comprehensive and serves as a useful introduction to a subject which certainly provokes long and lively discussions in the Soviet Union. The coming years will show how vital the dialectic relationships are between Hegelian philosophy and different socialist ideologies.

Technion-Israel Institute of Technology Israel Idalovichi