科亨和他的分析的马克思主义专业英语

G.A. Cohen and his Analytical Marxism

Louis Proyect

G .A. Cohen's Marxism is a curious business. He tries to restore Marxism to its "orthodox" roots but his project ends up as a defense of a "stagist" conception rather than of anything Marx had in mind. Once he establishes this rather bogus "orthodoxy", he speculates on the political consequences. His speculations have very little to do with the actual history and dynamic of the revolutionary movement.

科亨的马克思主义是一个很奇特的东西。他试图对马克思主义正本清源，但他的设想结果却是一个“阶级主义着”观念的辩护人，而根本不是马克思原来的构想，他一建立起这个十分虚假的“正统学派”，就对其政治结果进行了构想。他的构想与革命运动的发展以及现实历史几乎没有关系。

In "Karl Marx's Theory of History", Cohen singles out a paragraph from Marx's Critique of Political Economy that serves a guide to the sort of Marxism that Cohen endorses:

在《马克思的历史理论》中，科亨从马克思的《政治经济学批判》这本用老作为他所认同的那种马克思主义的指导思想的书中挑选了一段话：

"In the social production of their life, men enter into definite relations that are indispensable and independent of their will, relations of production which correspond to a definite stage of their development of their material productive forces. The sum total of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of their material life conditions the social, political and intellectual life process in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of their development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production, or -- what is but a legal expression for the same thing -- with the property relations within which they have been at work hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an epoch of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundations the entire immense superstructure is more or less rapidly transformed."

在人们的日常社会生产中，人总是处于一定的关系之中，这些关系是必不可少的，同时也不以人的意志为转移。他们对应于人们物质生产力发展的一定阶段。生产关系的总和构成社会的经济结构，即由此建立起法律和政治的上层建筑的现实基础，它反映着一定的社会意识形态。人们物质生活的生产方式通常制约着社会政治和精神生活的过程。不是人们的社会意识决定人们的社会存在，相反的，是人们的社会存在决定人们的社会意识。在发展的一定阶段上，社会的物质生产与现有的社会生产关系发生冲突，或者与它们（生产力）至今一直在起作用的财产关系发生冲突。这只不过是一个法律上的表达，其实是同一回事。这些关系由生产力的发展形式变成它们的枷锁，于是开始一个社会变革的新时代。随着经济基础的变化，

整个庞大的上层建筑或迟或早的会发生变化。

If one attempts to build a Marxism around this rather abstract set of ideas, it is entirely possible to go off in the wrong direction, especially on the question of how one stage of development supersedes another. Is it the case that one stage replaces another when the previous one is a "fetter" on the means of production?

如果一个人试图以这一套非常抽象的思想为核心建立起马克思主义，那就完全有可能误入歧途，尤其是在一个发展阶段如何超越另一个发展阶段的问题上。这难道真的是这样吗？当前一个阶段对生产方式构成“束缚”时。它就要被另一个阶段所取代吗？

If Marxists posit a capitalist class that becomes "decadent" in the way that the feudal aristocracy had became decadent and an impediment to further productive growth, then one runs into a big problem when confronted with the real capitalist world.

如果马克思假定资产阶级变得腐朽没落就和封建贵族变味生产力进一步发展的障碍一样，那么在面对真正的资本主义社会是这就变成了一个大问题。

For instance, Lenin's "Imperialism--the Latest Stage of Capitalism" which reflects this "fettering" notion is a poor guide to understanding the explosive and *dynamic* growth of capitalism over the last 50 years or so. China's embrace of capitalist property relations and its phenomenal growth-rate over the last 10 years or so should tell you that the "fettering" concept does not exactly describe the current stage of capitalism. What is more is that the whole notion of stages -- feudalism, capitalism and socialism -- might have to be seen in a more subtle manner. The 3 stages might not only coexist in the same society, but there is no ruling out the possibility of going backwards from socialism to capitalism, or from capitalism to feudalism.

例如，列宁的反映了这种束缚观点的“帝国主义—资本主义的最后阶段”理论，对于理解近五十年来资本主义富有活力的惊人的发展则是一种误导。中国对资本主义生产关系的接受，以及它在近十年来非同寻常的增长率也将告诉你这样的束缚概念并不能欠当的描述资本主义的现有阶段。更要指出的是，所有各个阶段的概念也许都得用一种更微妙的方式来看待。这三个阶段也许不仅能在同一社会中共存，但不排除从社会主义社会倒退回资本主义社会或者从资本主义社会倒退回封建社会。

Cohen lacks this type of dialectical insight and goes whole hog into the embrace of the crudest sort of stagism. This falls within the general rubric of what he calls the "Development Thesis", namely that productive or technological forces develop in history and revolutions occur when one mode of production can not sustain the further growth of productive or technological forces.

科亨缺乏这种辩证的眼光，而一头扎进最原始简单的那种阶段主义怀抱，这就掉入了他所称作的发展命题的陈词滥调的俗套。即生产的或技术的力量随着历史的发展而发展，当一种生产模式不能适应生产和技术力量的进一步发展中时，革命就要发生了。

This amounts to a form of teleological progress that is a caricature of what Marx had in mind. In "History, Labor and Freedom", Cohen defends this thesis in the following manner:

这就构成了目的论的发展方式，是对马克思原来意思的一种讽刺。在《历史、劳动和自由》一书中，科亨用以下方式为这一命题辩护：

"In the global presentation of the Development Thesis, there may be no society which develops the forces from their initial rudiments to the consummation of abundance. There may, instead, be what Ernest Gellner has called a 'torch-relay' pattern of development: having brought the forces up to a certain level, an erstwhile pioneering society retires in favour of another one, which it has influenced..."

在发展命题受到全世界关注的同时，也许没有一个社会可将生产力从最原始的状态发展到最成熟的状态（阶段）。与此相反，也许存在Ernest Gellner所说的“火炬接力”的发展模式：生产力发展到一定水平，前一个社会形态就要隐退，让位给另一个社会形态，前一个社会形态影响着后一个社会形态。

History is not a relay-race. In a relay-race there is a goal: to get to the finish-line. One is always moving forward. In real history, capitalism can not be analogized to a relay-race since this assumes that one can detect the finish-line after a certain number of laps. Looking back in history, you would be tempted to assign the mid-1700s as the last lap for feudalism, even if this is arguable. Can one find such a last lap for capitalism?

历史并不是接力赛。接力赛有一个目标，即到达终点。人们总是要向前冲。在现实历史中，不能把资本主义类比为火炬接力，因为这假定人们在跑了若干圈以后就可以发现终点线。回顾历史，你会把18世纪中叶看做封建主义的最后一圈，尽管这是有争议的。可是你能发现资本主义有这样的最后一圈吗?

By Cohen's own criteria, this would be very difficult indeed. Capitalism was a very dynamic system in Marx's era and remains so. The problem with capitalism has never been that it will run out of steam, but rather that it will destroy the underlying productive forces including labor and nature before it runs out of steam. Capitalism is not a "fetter" on the means of production in China today. It is freeing up labor and land and natural resources in a way that the socialist means of production never could have. In the process China is turning into a formidable industrial power while destroying rivers and forests and throwing the countryside population into chaos and desperation while making some winners. In other words it is functioning exactly the way it did in the 1800s in Manchester. Once again when we turn to Marx's writings on the actual class struggle as opposed to abstract constructions such as the kind that G .A. Cohen attaches himself to there is little evidence of such crude "stagism". For example, in the "Address of the Central Committee to the Communist League", Marx and Engels point to the very likely event that feudalism will be replaced by socialism in Germany, and not by the logical next stage of capitalism. They have no interest in seeing Germany go through a prolonged stage of bourgeois-democracy.

按照科亨自己的标准，这确实是十分困难的。在马克思的时代，资本主义是一个非常有活力的制度，现在仍然如此。资本主义的问题绝不是它将寿终正寝，而是在它寿终正寝之前，它

将摧毁包括人和自然在内的基本生产力。资本主义在今天的中国并不是生产方式的束缚，它以一种社会主义生产方式从未能够做到的方式，正在解放自然资源、土地和劳动力。在这一进程中，中国正在摇身变为强大的工业国的同时，另一方面也在破坏河流、森林，在制造出一些赢家的同时也把农村人口推进骚乱和绝望之中。换言之，它正在起到的作用正像19世纪曼彻斯特所起到的作用一样。当我们再次好好研究马克思的关于阶级斗争的著作，而不是例如科亨所致力构建的这种抽象理论时，我们就会发现其中几乎没有什么诸如此类的原始简单的“阶级主义”痕迹、例如，在《中央委员会给共产主义同盟的致辞》中，马克思和恩格斯指出，“在德国封建主义被社会主义取代时很有可能的，而不是其逻辑的下一个阶段——资本主义。他们没有兴趣看到德国还要经历一个延长的资产阶级民主阶段。

"[The workers] must drive the proposals of the democrats, who in any case will not act in a revolutionary manner but in a merely reformist manner, to the extreme and transform them into direct attacks upon private property; thus, for example, if the petty bourgeois propose purchase of the railways and factories, the workers must demand that these railways and factories be simply confiscated by the state without compensation as being the property of reactionaries...

民主主义者在任何时候都不会以革命的方式行动，而以一种仅仅是改良的方式行动。【工人】必须将民主主义的主张推进到极端，把它们变为对私有财产的直接进攻。因此，例如，如果小资产阶级提出购买铁路和工人，工人们必须要求这些铁路和工厂由国家简单的没收而无须加以补偿，因为它们是反动分子的财产。。

If the German workers are not able to attain power and achieve their own class interests without going through a lengthy revolutionary development, they at least know for a certainty this time that the first act of this approaching revolutionary drama will coincide with the direct victory of their own class in France and will be very much accelerated by it.

即使德国工人没有经历一个长期的革命发展而不能获得政权，实现他们自身的阶级利益，至少他们也能在某种程度上确信无疑的知道，这一即将到来的革命戏剧的第一幕将与他们阶级在法国的胜利有很多共同之处，并将会受到后者的极大鼓舞。

But they themselves must do the utmost for their final victory by clarifying their minds as to what their class interests are, by taking up their position as an independent party as soon as possible and by not allowing themselves to be seduced by a single moment by the hypocritical phrases of the democratic petty bourgeois into refraining from the independent organization of the proletariat. Their battle cry must be: The Revolution in Permanence."

但是，他们必须通过以下方式尽最大的努力争取他们最后的胜利，明确他们的思想，以便知道他们的阶级利益是什么，尽可能快的取得一个独立政党的地位。不要让自己片刻受到民主的小资产阶级虚假言辞的诱惑而不去实现无产阶级的组织独立。他们的战斗口号必须是：不断革命。

There is little evidence of a "relay race" conception here. Marx and Engels did not urge the workers to turn the baton over to the capitalist class since it was their job to carry it for the next 500 yards or

so. They instead urged the workers to carry the baton themselves and overturn *both* feudal and capitalist property relations at the same time.

这里几乎没有什么“接力赛“概念的意思。马克思和恩格斯并没有因为资产阶级的职责就是拿着棒跑完接下来的500余码而要求工人们把接力赛棒交给资产阶级。与此相反，他们要求工人们自己拿着接力棒同时推翻封建的记忆资本主义的生产关系。

Another example should drive the point home. In the article "On Social Relations in Russia", Engels was against the "stagist" who everybody loves to hate nowadays polemicizes aga inst Pyotr Tkachov who thought that socialism was precluded in Russia since "we have no urban proletariat" and "we also have no bourgeoisie". Engels' reply is to simply state that socialism might arise out of *pre-capitalist* formations, the rural communal ownership of land. He says, "It is clear that communal ownership in Russia is long past its period of florescence and to all appearances is moving toward its disintegration. Nevertheless, the possibility undeniably exists of raising this form of society to a higher one, if it should last until circumstances are ripe for that, and if it shows itself capable of development in such manner that the peasants no longer cultivate the land separately, but collectively; of raising it to this higher form without it being necessary for the Russian peasants to go through the intermediate stage of bourgeois small holdings."

另一个例子将能透彻的说明这一观点。在“论俄国的社会关系”一文中，恩格斯不同于阶级论者的观点。他们很讨厌今天针对Pyotr Tkachov 的争论，Pyotr 认为，社会主义不会再俄国实现，因为“我们没有城市无产阶级”“我们也没有资产阶级”。恩格斯的回答简单的表明了社会主义可能出现在“前资本主义形式，即土地的乡村公有制”。他说，“显然，俄国的公有制经历很长时间的繁荣，就其所有迹象而言正趋向于瓦解。然而，这种社会形势提升到更高社会形势的可能性毫无疑问是存在的，即使这种可能性将一直延续到条件成熟的时候，即使这种可能性表明它的自身能够以这样一种方式发展。农民不再是分散耕种土地，而是集体耕种土地，它将提升到这一更高层次的社会形势而不需让俄国农民经历资产阶级小财东的中间阶段，这种可能性事存在的。

The Russian peasants do not have to go through the intermediate stage just as the German workers did not. There is little engagement in Cohen's writings with actual history since he is preoccupied with a theory of history rather than real societies placed in time. This accounts for his inability to see the contradictory aspects not only of 19th century Germany and Russia, but contemporary society as well. His work, like Elster's, is preoccupied with theory rather than the messy details of real life. 俄国农民并不一定要经历这种中间阶段，正如德国工人也一定要这样，在 科亨的著作中，他很少关注现实的历史。因为他的全部精力都集中在历史的理论而不是特定时候的现实社会。正因如此，他不仅不能看到19世纪的德国和俄国的矛盾的方方面面，而且也看不到当代社会矛盾的方方面面。他的研究，如同Elster 的一样，关注的是理论而不是现实生活中的细节。 In the twentieth century a "stagist" conception of Marxism drawn from the same sources that so enchant G . A. Cohen became the common wisdom of the 2nd and 3rd International. Trotsky's

conception of Permanent Revolution was a departure from this and is influenced not only by the political ideas but even the language of Marx and Engels in this particular article. Cohen's desire to return Marxism to some sort of "orthodoxy" is a misbegotten project. It is based first of all on a misunderstanding of Marx's ideas on history and, worse, it is tied to a particularly odd, if not outright bugged-out, notion of what it means to be a socialist revolutionary.

在二十世纪，一个出自同样来源的马克思主义的“阶段论者”的概念，引起科亨的极大的兴趣，成为第二和第三国际的共同智慧。托洛斯基不断革命的概念则与之完全不同。它不仅受到马克思和恩格斯政治理论的影响，而且甚至受到这篇文章语言的影响。科亨希望对马克思主义进行某种正本清源，这并没有得到人们的认可。它首先是基于对马克思主义历史观的错误理解。并且更糟糕的是，它与关于作为一个社会主义革命者讲意味着什么的概念联系在一起。如果这个概念不是完全让人不能接受的，它也是非常古怪的。

The question of *why* one should be a socialist revolutionary is in Cohen's eyes a major problem since Marx and Engels said in the Communist Manifesto that the "fall [of the bourgeoisie] and the victory of the proletariat are inevitable." Cohen is thrown into a profound political and spiritual crisis by this conundrum. He raises his eyes to the heavens and cries out, "But, if the advent of socialism is inevitable, then why should Marx and Engels, and those who they hoped to activate, strive to achieve socialism?"

为什么应该是一个社会主义者的问题在科亨的眼中是十分重要的问题。因为马克思在《宣言》中说， “资产阶级的失败和无产阶级的胜利是必然的”。科亨因为这个难题而陷入了深刻的政治和净胜危机。他抬眼望着天空大喊：“可是，如果社会主义的到来是不可避免的，那么为什么马克思以及那些希望行动起来的人们，还要努力的去实现社会主义呢？”

Is this not the silliest question you have ever heard in your life? How in the world did Cohen get such a first-class reputation among socialists? I can understand how he might impress a don or two at Oxford but this is just very dumb. There was nothing "inevitable" about socialism in the eyes of Marx and Engels.

这难道不是你在一生中听到的嘴愚蠢的问题吗？科亨究竟怎样在社会主义者中获得如此一流的声誉呢？他怎样给牛津大学的一两个导师留下深刻的印象我都可以理解。但这什么也说明不了。在马克思和恩格斯的眼里关于社会主义没有什么是不可避免的

The direct testimony of Marx and Engels' lives should tell you how little they believed in "inevitability." Nearly every moment was consumed with building socialist parties and the First International. In their polemics with anarchists and utopian socialists, they made it very clear that politics and correct strategy would ensure success and nothing else. If a revolutionary socialist party was not at the head of the worker's movement, then defeat was inevitable.

马克思和恩格斯生活中的直接的证据将会告诉你，他们是怎样的不相信“不可避免”。他们的毕生都是用来建设社会主义政党和第一国际。在他们跟无政府主义者和空想社会主义者论战中，他们非常清晰的表明，政治和正确的策略将确保成功，而不是别的东西。如果一个革命

的社会主义政党不能站在工人运动的前头，那么失败就是必然的。

Cohen is not that interested in politics. The question of revolutionary politics becomes one of trying to decide what to do with one's life in the face of the "inevitability" of socialism. Why go out and pass out leaflets if the revolution is inevitable? Y ou might as well stay at home and wait for the inevitable. As incredible as it may seem, Cohen is preoccupied with how to answer this concern. He argues that one has an *obligation* to be a revolutionary since more revolutionaries than fewer will hasten the "inevitable".

科亨对政治并不那么感兴趣，革命的政治问题成为这样一个问题，面对社会主义的不可避免，要以自己的毕生精力尝试决定做些什么。如果革命是不可避免的，那么为什么还要出去发传单呢？你也可以呆在家里等待这种不可避免。这看起来也同样难以置信，科亨竭尽全力思考如何如何回答这一个人们所关注的问题。他论证到：每一个人都有责任和义务成为一个革命者，因为多一些革命者讲比少一些革命者能加快这种“必然性的到来”。

He comes up with the bright idea that "although it is inevitable that a socialist revolution will come, it is not inevitable how long it will take for it to come. It is therefore rational for us to dedicate ourselves to the revolutionary movement, in order to make socialism come sooner rather than later. The sooner socialism comes, the smaller will be the amount of suffering imposed on people by continuing capitalist oppression."

他最后得出这样一个引人注目的观点：尽管社会主义革命的到来是不可避免的，然而它多久才能到来则不是必然的。因此，为了让社会主义到来的更快点而不是更慢点，把我们自己贡献给革命运动对于我们来说则是明智的，社会主义来的越快，连绵不断的资本主义压迫所强加给人民的痛苦就越小。

Anybody accustomed to the hard work of building revolutionary parties will read stuff like this and rub their eyes in disbelief. What in the world is Cohen talking about? People join revolutionary parties not because these are *rational choices* but because they are moved by a hatred for capitalism. Furthermore, we understand that there is nothing "inevitable" about socialism. If anything the entire evidence of twentieth century history shows that capitalism has much more inevitability attached to it than socialism.

对于建立革命政党的艰苦工作很了解的人都将能读到像这样的材料，并觉得难以置信。科亨到底在说什么？人们加入革命政党不是因为这事理性的选择，而是因为他们仇恨资本主义的动机。进一步而言，按我们的理解，社会主义也并不是不可避免，或许甚至可以这样说，整个20世纪的历史事实表明，资本主义的不可避免性比社会主义多得多。

The reason that Cohen is speculating on such manners is that he feels the need to defend the socialist project from the challenge presented by bourgeois political and ethical philosophy. Liberals like John Rawls and conservatives like Robert Nozick have written a number of books that attempt to defend just societies and the forms of political action necessary to achieve them. They also have a great deal of credence in the academic circles Cohen travels in.

科亨以这种方式思考问题的理由，是他觉得有必要为社会主义的构想提出辩护，以应对来自资产阶级政治和伦理哲学的挑战。像John Rawls这样的自由主义者和Robert Nozick这样的保守主义者也写了一些书，试图为公正社会和实现公正社会所必须的政治行动方式进行辩护，他们也在科亨所在的学术圈里赢得了很多人的信任。

Cohen wants to make socialism appear as a rational choice in the face of their challenges but he ends up conceding much too much to them. The worst concession is that he conceives of political action as the role of the individual rather than classes. While he does not share Elster's outright hostility to the notion of classes, the overall tendency in Cohen's work is to wrestle with issues of the class struggle as they appear in the guise of moral dilemmas to individuals.

科亨想让社会主义的出现被看成面对挑战的一种理性选择，但他最终对此却退让的太多太多。最糟糕的妥协和让步则是把政治行动看成是个人的作用而不是阶级的作用。科亨不像Elster 那样，完全不赞同阶级的概念，可科亨研究中的一个总倾向则是尽量把阶级斗争问题看成是以个人的道德两难形式出现的。

For example, in chapter 12 of "History, Labor and Freedom" he takes up the question, "Are Disadvantaged Workers who Take Hazardous Jobs Forced to Take Hazardous Jobs." What a peculiar subject for an "orthodox" Marxist to be tackling. One would think that Cohen would have had much more interest in class struggle type issues in 1988 when the book was written. Issues such as the approaching civil war in Yugoslavia do not seem to engage his interest.

例如，在《历史、自由和劳动》一书中的第十二章，他提出，“从事危险工作的处境不佳的工人是被强迫从事危险工作的吗？”对于一个正统的马克思主义者所要探讨的问题而言，这事一个多么奇特的问题。人们会想，在写这本书时，科亨本来应该对1988年的阶级斗争的类型问题有更多的兴趣。可是例如南斯拉夫即将到来的内战，这样的问题却似乎没有引起他的兴趣。

Most of the chapter is involved with consideration of the choices before an "imaginary worker in an imaginary situation." "He is one of the 7,000 unemployed people in the town of Hazelton, Pennsylvania (population 33,000), to which the Beryllium Corporation came in 1956, offering hazardous jobs." "Our worker, whom I shall call John, took one. He was confronted with a choice between employment and health, and he chose the former. Was he forced to take the health-endangering job? did he, in taking it, contract freely?"

该章的大部分是对摆在“某个虚拟的情景中的虚拟工人”面前的选择进行了思考，“他是宾夕法尼亚州Hazelton 城（人口33000）7000多失业人口中的一员。Beryllium 公司1956年来此开办，提供的是危险的工作。”“我们工人，我称它为约翰，接受了一份工作，他面临着就业和健康的选择，他选择了前者。他是被迫从事这种危害健康工作的吗？他这样的时候是自由地签合同的吗？”

Of course the question of the "contractual" basis of justice lies at the heart of John Rawls' liberalism and one could write at length about how preposterous this notion is and how pointless it is to engage

Rawls' thinking on his own terms.

当然，该合同的公正基础问题是John Rawls 自由主义的核心问题。人们最终可以指出这个概念是如何的荒谬。用Rawls 的思维方式去思考他的这些术语是那么的没有意义。

I will rather conclude with several obvious conclusions. To begin with, the study of individuals and their moral problems is not the subject-matter of Marxism. Marxism studies classes. A proper use of a Marxist's time would be to study *actual* rather than *imaginary* workers in identical situations. It would be useful to explore how capitalism tends to threaten the job safety of the working-class even in the expansionary period of 1956 or 1997 for that matter. It would then consider how the ruling-class parties share in the creation of a legal fabric that allows such plants to be kept going. It would conclude with recommendations about how to abolish such oppressive conditions. This is not to be found in Cohen's work.

我更喜欢推导出几个显而易见的结论。首先，对个人和他们的道德研究并不是马克思主义研究的主题。马克思主义研究阶级，马克思主义者把时间主要用在研究现实的而不是在相同情形中的虚拟工人。探讨资本主义如何总会威胁到工人阶级的工人安全，即使在1956年或1997年的扩张时期也如此，这将是有益的。因此安全考虑统治阶级各方如何共同建立允许这些工人继续开办的法律制度，因此将会得到如何消除，这种压迫条件的建议，而这并没有在科亨的研究中发现。

Next week I will wind up with an examination of Jon Roemer's work. I am particularly interested to see how his concept of market socialism flows from his Analytical Marxist preconceptions. .

下周我将最后考虑Jon Roemer 的研究，看看他的市场社会主义概念是如何从他的分析马克思主义的先入为主的构想中推导出来的，我对此特别感兴趣。