Notes on:
Collier, A. (1978) 'In Defence of
Epistemology'. Radical Philosophy
20.
Dave Harris
Bhaskar's rejection of
epistemology evades the problems. What we
need is a new epistemology, which should be
materialist, rather than a new idealism which is
what you get in Bhaskar.
After the intervention of Althusser, the split
between theory and practice became both the
political and then epistemological issue.
For Althusser, seeing theoretical production as
practice, and seeing the unity of theory and
practice as a political rather than a general task
offered a solution. However, this need not
be seen as a rejection of epistemology.
Althusser's position moved towards internal
criteria to establish validity rather than
external, and this is acceptable because the
criteria clearly are different in different
sciences, because their objects differ—but they're
all doing the same task, trying to make a theory
correspond to its object. In this sense, we
need to establish general ways for science to
proceed [as an empirical issue] rather than
relativizing.
Althusser saw philosophy as a matter of class
struggle rather than some master discourse to
guide science, but philosophy cannot be seen as
the same as any social practice. It must be
partisan to defend objectivity avoid errors and
illusions. Althusser's Essays in Self
Criticism retracts the emphasis on
epistemology, but still argues that it is possible
to disentangle the ideological bits from the
scientific interests in, say, Darwin and
Marx. Science is not seen as relatively
autonomous in terms of other practices, but what
makes it genuinely different is its claim to
appropriate the real in objective knowledge.
If it is successful, it can escape its social
genesis [sounds very much like Popper], and it is
this that makes science universal [I prefer the
Habermas line that it is capitalist technology and
the spread of bourgeois interest that seems to
make science universal]. Science has to exist
somewhere beyond the social and the materialist
for Althusser, if we are not to equate it with
sociology or psychology.
Cutler et al develop a kantian/platonic line,
where discourse theory is used to launch a radical
critique of Marx. All that survives from
Marxism is the notion of classes as agents, and a
general anti humanism. This is an
abandonment rather than a revision, and it is
based on the view of Marx as essentialist.
Criticizing his rationalist epistemology leads
them to reject all epistemology. The
argument is seen best in criticisms of the labour
theory of value which are used to explain
circulation and equilibrium. This is
economist and functionalist for Cutler Et Al and
leads either to an orthodox crisis theory or some
teleological and functionalist notion of survival
of capitalism as a matter of reestablishing
equilibrium. However, for Collier, this
approach is too polarised and has no concept of
the dialectic. Further, the discussion of
reproduction is not teleological, and nor can
contradictions be equated with crisis.
Althusser will suffice to argue this.
Any notion of an expressive totality or
essentialism in Marx is based on the conception of
a 'trans historical subject', but Marx also says
that social structures have their own
dynamic. Cutler Et Al see no break between
young and mature Marx. Marx's notions of
politics as class struggle must be rejected,
because politics do not just simply represent
classes, but other connections are still possible,
for example when alliances are forged as a result
of class struggle, as in the analysis of the 18th
Brumaire and the state. The state is
also never simply a direct representation of class
interests, but some parties are closer to classes
at least than others [this touches on the old
discussions between Marx and Weber about the
connections between class and party].
Classical Marxism was never reductionist, since
economic classes were seen as not the same as
political ones, and making them so was a practical
matter rather than an effect of structure.
It is also possible to argue that social
structures produce ideology without being
functionalist about it—so that dysfunctional
ideologies are equally possible, including
bourgeois socialism. Overall, this reading
is too assertive. It is possible to have a
materialist analysis of subjectivity, and the
connections between Marxism and psychoanalysis
look promising.
Cutler Et Al assume that expressive totalities are
the only kind. They argue that there are
only two alternatives instead—rationalism or
holism, and empiricism, or atomism, and neither
require a particular interest in
epistemology. Marx never really introduced
new ideas of totality, but we can deny both
atomism and holism and opt for 'decentred
structures in dominance' as in Althusser.
There are other alternatives as well outlined in
Marx. For example the 1857
Introduction describes a 'rich
totality' and refers to the 'concentration
of many determinations', and argues that science
needs to be grounded in reality as a point of
departure, says that it is an illusion to regard
the real as a product of thought [or discourse]
and says that the real lies outside
concepts. The approach is not empiricist
because thought is needed, nor is it rationalist
because the real lies outside thought. It is
a kind of correspondence theory, suggesting that
the relation between concepts is adequate if it
corresponds to the complexity determinations found
in the real. The method of presentation
makes Marx look essentialist, perhaps, but it is
really are the result of a complex method of
enquiry, as in all science. There is never
simple link between subject and object.
Cutler Et Al have not dispensed with epistemology,
but rather have reverted to an earlier one of
idealism, when discourses become necessary for
knowledge, and this slides towards discourses as
the only source or type of knowledge. It is
important to look at language rather than ideas,
however, and Cutler does not deny the existence of
real objects—it is just that they are irrelevant
as a test. But this makes it kantian, says
Collier, operating with the old concept of things
in themselves, that we can know. They deny
that thought is merely a matter of a subject
grasping an object, but they also deny the
materialist principle that thought should
correspond to its object. For them, there is
no necessity in knowing the real world.
[Then a confused bit, which might even be similar
to Bhaskar] the real world is given is a
possibility to experience , So therefore it must
be knowable at least as a contingent
possibility. It is possible to see the real
world as the conception to produces an effect on
our imagination, but it is equally reasonable to
assume that the correspondence between experience
and the real world shows that there really is a
world like that. If we reject this notion,
the only criterion left is internal consistency of
discourses, and this will lead to problems are
relativism and choice, or perhaps anarchy [as in
Feyerabend]. The usefulness of scientific
discourse is particularly dubious if there is no
correspondence to the real world. We are
left only with establishing logical connections,
for example between concepts [the concept of base
and the concept of superstructure], with only an
accidental relation to reality. Or we can
assume idealism or essentialism.
Classical Marxism offers a much better
approach. Althusser spells it out in the
notion of the decentred structure in
dominance. This structure is not reducible
to its elements, and it is not teleological.
It does not constitute the elements, but rather
limits them. It does depend on the real
world if it is to be reproduced according to
'geological and biological laws'. There can be
accidents and floors, for example in the form of
class antagonisms. It is neither anatomist
nor a holist conception, neither the sum of
individual wills nor a single will. Marx
explains how the reproduction of the economic
system reproduces the whole structure, and how the
ideological level does as well, but not in terms
of functionalism: if there are no such mechanisms,
the 'mode of production could not be
instantiated'(18), and the ideology that assists
reproduction is selectively promoted [looks
awfully functionalist to me!]. To reject
such materialism for sociology means rejecting in
biology too. Modern biology shows how
reproduction is possible without teleology.
Epistemology in the human sciences.
Realism claims a privilege here, so is this
dogmatic? Possibly, but every science must
be realist. Science makes progress if it
'lets things speak for themselves' rather than
trying to bend them to our own needs. New
practices then become possible. Natural
science did appear as a 'mutation' and this 'had
something to do with the bourgeoisie' [!].
Can we see the emergence of human sciences in this
way? These sciences became concrete through
classification rather than developing law like
regularities. Human sciences remain
probabilistic. Marxism is both a concrete
and an abstract science for Collier, but these
relations needs clarification.
Most abstract sciences are tested independently of
their applications, for example in
experiments. Human sciences can't measure
[so they can still do abstract experiments?
Thought experiments?] so they are necessarily
imprecise, but this is still better than learning
by experience alone. There is a need to risk
concepts against practice, through systematic
testing. This led, for example, to ruling
out the parliamentary road to socialism [strange
way of thinking of this, as if it were just some
scientific experiment], since it was obvious that
the bourgeois state could not be captured, and
this led to Marxists testing theories whether the
state is neutral or has to be smashed. The
question is answered by observing the daily
runnings of bourgeois states, gathering 'all sorts
of empirical facts'. Liberals would see some
of these as only abuses.
Are Hindess and Hirst idealists?
They deny it, and agree that material objects are
still out there, but the relation to them is the
central question for Collier. Hindess and
Hirst might have no idealist ontology, but they
persist with an idealist epistemology, and
dangerous affects results, such as having to
eliminate large bits of Capital, and
developing dubious politics. If no relation
to reality is possible at all, why gain knowledge
at all?
back to marxist
controversies
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