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Political Studies (1983), XXXI, 284-294

Marx, Engels and Anti-DuhringGORDON ELTY

Wright State University, OhioThere is no reason t o suppose that Marxist scholarship should deviate from thecanons of philology. Those canons require initially the scientificestablishmen t ofa text. There must be a stemma of manuscripts and editions whereby variant textscan be identified, as well as a list of conjectured readings for corrupted passages,etc. Next, these canons require attribution of the textual passages to singleauthors, to joint authors, o r to some other hand. Where the com position periodwas brief, the temporal order of the several passages can be indicated; wherecomposition or publication was more protracted, the passages can be dated aswell. A third step (whichcan be omitted for certain purposes) is the interpretationof the established, attributed, and dated text in terms of themes, motives,intended audiences, etc. Finally, the philological app roac h includes an overallevaluation, with suggestions for further study .

IAn interesting and important topic of Marxist scholarship is the theoreticalaccord or divergence of Marxs and Engels thought. It has frequently beenasserted that they diverged substantially in the ir theoretical writings; as S hlomoAvineri has expressed it Marxsviews cannot be squared with Engels theories asdescribed in Anti-Diihring . . .But these assertions have not gone unchallenged;Stefan Angutlov among others has argued for the unity of Marx and Engelstheoretical contributions. Marx, far from being against Engels publishedphilosophical essays, entirely shared Engels concep tions; M arx revised Engelsmanuscript Anti-Diihring . . . etc.Since Anti-Diihring was intended to summarize and popularize the doctrinesof historical materialism, dialectics, and Marxian political economics, it hasbecome the focal point for much of this debate. If Marx and Engels agreed upon adivision of labour as Anguelov suggests, whereby Marx w as to concentrate onpolitical econom y while Engels concentrated on philosophical topics, then Anti-Diihring transcended that division by incorporating sections on politicaleconomy as well as natural philosophy. Thus the rather neat distinctions that

S. Avineri, The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx (Cambridge, Cambridge UniversityPress, 1968). p. 69; A nguelov, Reflection and Practice Philosophical Currents, 5 (1973). p. 76.Anguklov fol lows Lenin here; see V. I . Lenin Collected Works (Moscow, Progress Publishers, 1964),Vol. 21, p. 84 .On this divisionof labour,see Marxs testimony n Herr Vogr,K. Marx and F. Engels, CollecfedWorks (New York, nternational Publishers, 1975 n),Vol. 17, p. 114; and Engels in K . Marx andF . Engels, Selected Works (Moscow , Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1962). Vol. 1, p. 549.0032-3217/83/02/028411/%03.000 983 Polirical Studies

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Research Notes 287recognition on e thinks one deserves. The n, w hen the grea ter m an dies, the lessereasily gets overrated an d this seems to me t o be just my case at present.16 Th usthe Preface of 1886 can be imputed to Engels own well-known modesty an dsense of prop riety.

I1The resolution of these issues permits the consideration of ano the r point th at alsoinvolves the rather careful reading of th e text of Anti-Diihring. Engels defines thesubject matter of political economy a t the beginning of Pa rt I1 a s the science ofthe laws governing the production and exchange of the material means ofsubsistence in human society. urnin g from subject matter t o the method ofpolitical econom y, he con tinues it must first investigate the special laws of eachindividual stage in the evolution of production an d exchange, an d only when ithas completed this investigation will it be able t o establish the few quite generallaws which hold good fo r production an d exchange in general. Engels concludeswith the proviso t ha t the laws which ar e valid for definite modes of pro ductionand form s of exchange hold good for all historical periods in which these modesof production and forms of exchange prevail. This is surely a concise andintriguing formulation of the subject matter and method of political economy.On the one hand, i t suggests that the object of Marxs and Engels politicaleconomic studies was not limited to bourgeois society.On the other hand, it has been proposed that Engels characterization ofpolitical economy differs substantially from Marxs own. Lucio Colletti, forinstance, holds that the views of Engels and that of Marx represent twoprofoundly d ifferent ways of seeing things. Indicting Engels am on g others fora total lack of understanding of the relationship between the logical process andthe process of reality, Colletti charges that the logical categories of Capital I,namely commodities, money, capital, etc., have been applied historically (andthereby illicitly) to a succession of the various forms of society.Were these charges true, of course, they would evidence a serious mis-specification on Engels pa rt. When we tu rn t o Engels text, however, we findquite another set of categories than those of Capital I applied to the historicalcases.22For instance: comm unal property in land co rresponds to fairly equaldistribution of the labour product, while the dissolution of communitycorresponds to considerable inequality of distribution. (Indeed Marx hadaddressed with great brevity this inverse relationship of com mu nal prop erty an dimpoverishment, in his notebooks datin g from the late 1 8 5 0 ~ ) . ~ ~onsider an

I b See Engels letter to F . Mehring, 14 July 1893; Marx and Engels, Selected Correspondence,I Engels, Anti-Diihring, p. 203.I8 Engels, Anti-Diihring, p. 204.

p. 433.

cf. also G.Welty, The Materialist Science of Culture and the Critique of Ideology, QuarterlyJournal of Ideology, 5 (198 I) .l o L. Colletti, Marxism and Hegel (London, NLB, 1973). p. 132. I Colletti, Marxism and Hegel, p. 13Off. Engels, Anti-Diihring, pp. 2 0 4 5 . K . Marx, Pre-Capitalist Economic Formations (New York, International Publishers, 1965),p. 83 .

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288 Research Noteshistorical example. As the Israelite patriarchal communal form was dissolvingduring the n inth an d eighth centuries, the prophets reacted strongly to the everincreasing inequality among the popu lace. In Ephraim, A mos condem ned theextreme inequality manifested in debt-slavery (Amos2:6) and foretold alienationof the land, i.e. the complete dissolution of comm unal or redemptive property inland (Amos 7: 17); in Judah, Micah likewise condemned debt-slavery(Micah 2: 2) an d also anticipated alienation of the land (Micah 2: 4). For anotherinstance: agriculture on a large scale corresponds to a class-antagonistic socialstructure, while agriculture on a small scale corresponds t o the absence of suchclass antagonisms. (Later, Kau tsky and Lenin were to address the relationship ofthe scale of agricultural production and class antagonism; both ArthurStinchcombe and Jeffrey Paige have recently made extensive studies of thisr e l a t i o n ~ h i p . ) ~ ~s Engels continues, it becomes evident that the categories heutilizes in his general political economy not only are not simply those ofcommodities, money, capital, Engels are instead more general categories offorms of property, forms of appropriation of the labour product, forms of socialantagonism, etc.These categories may subsume those categories of Capital I; for example,capital is subsumed under the m ore general property or the category socialantagonism. (Similarly, Marxs categories of Capital I subsume those of CapitalIZI; for example, finance capital, industrial capital, an d landed capital aresubsumed under the more general category capital.) But Engels cannot beconvicted on this evidence of having confounded these several sets of categories.These more general categories give rise t o laws of their own which may benomothetically less satisfying than the laws of Capital (say that treating thetendency of the rate of profit to decline). But Engels adm its as much: politicaleconomy in this wider sense has still to be brought into being. Such economicscience as we possess up to the present is limited almost exclusively to the genesisand development of the capitalist mode of pr o d ~ c ti o n . ~ Thus Engels categories in Anti-Duhring are not vulgar misappropriations ofthose of Capital I; even so, the question remains whether Engels and Marxsunderstandings of the subject matter and method of political economy accord.This issue can be addressed rather directly, as M arx t oo has prepared a draftdiscussion of the topic. In the Introduction to the Critique ofPolitical Economy,Marx has three major sections.26The first section addresses Production and thesecond, the Interrelationship of Production, Distribution, Exchange, andConsumption. These sections indicate the subject matter of political economy.The third section addresses The Method of Political Economy. These threesections com prisea whole; the understanding of any single section depends uponthe comprehension of the whole.Marxs argument in the first section establishes that material production is

K. Kautsky, La Question Agraire (Paris, Maspero, 1970); V. 1. Lenin, The Deselopment ofCap italism in Russia (Moscow, Progress Publishers, 1964), esp . ch. 11; alsoA. Rochester, Lenin on theAgrarian Question (New York, International Publishers, 1942), esp. chs. I an d 111;A. L. Stinchcombe, Agricultural Enterprise and Rural Class Relations, American Journal ofSociology. 67 (1961); J . M. Paige, Agrarian Revolution (New York,Free Press, 1975). ch 2.Engels, Anti-Diihring, pp. 207-8.

26 K. Marx, Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (Moscow, Progress Publishers,1970). app., pp. 188-214.

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Research Notes 289socially determined production by individuals; this implicates production at adefinite stage of social development. Marx explicitly considers and rejectsdefining this stage in an historical account or by taking the stage in isolation.Both these analyses are based o n the unreflective standpo int of the individual.Instead, he points o ut tha t each stage includes the mom ent com mon t o severalstages of production in general as well as the m omen t of specific differences ofproduction between stages. By way of illustration, the stage of finance capitalismis understood to incorporate the mom ent of capitalist relations (i.e. the capitalistappropriation of surplus value) common to any bourgeois society, with themoment of imperialist relations (that is the metropolitan ap pro pria tion of super-profits) specific to this stage. This likewise suggests that Marxs politicaleconomic study was n ot to be restricted to bourgeois society. F urth er, each stageincludes the mo me nt ofparticularproductivesectors as well as th at of the totalityof production, the conjuncture of the set of particular sectors. Finally, thesemoments organically presuppose a definite social corpus or s o c i a l ~ u b j e c t . ~ Marxs argument thus moves from the abstract, the general mom ent, thro ug h theever more specific mom ents, t o th e concrete, the social corpu s. It moreover m ovesfrom the inchoate terms of individualism or an ahistorical analysis to thearticulated term s of the dialectic. (The logical form of this argum ent is explicatedin the third section of Marxs Introduction.) In sum, i t is thus th e social corpusthat is the object of analysis rath er than the process or mode of production whichis a characteristic (albeit a crucial characteristic) of the social form.

Marxs argument in the second section of the Introduction establishes theinterrelationship of production (in the narrow er sense), consum ption, distribu-tion, circulation a nd material exchange. Analysed superficially, M arx says, theseare related as a syllogism: production is the general term, consumption is theindividual term, distribution is the proportional middle term, and materialexchange is the pa rticu lar middle term . This superficial analysis restricts itself tothe distribution of the product.28M ore profoundly analysed, production is the presupposition of the momentsof consumption an d distribution of the products. Production, consum ption, anddistribution of the means of production are related a s content and form (orproduction, in the wider sense).29 Finally, circulation is bu t a mome nt ofmaterial exchange; both are determined by the moments of distribution andc o n s ~ m p t i o n . ~ ~ence, all these m om ents ar e related organically, comprising aconcrete unity (again the social corpus), with the mode of productiondetermining the processes or modes of consumption, distribution, etc. Noticehow the argum ent moves even more strikingly from the abstract form ulation t othe concrete. and from the inchoate to the dialectical.Marx, Introduction, pp. 188-91.* Marx, Introduction, pp. 1 9 3 4 cf. also G. Lukacs, The Ontology of Social Being, Pt . I , iv(London, Merlin Press, 1978). pp. 59-60.2 y This distinction anticipates that of Departments I and I1 in Capital 11. Cf . also Lukacs. TheOntology of Social Being, pp . 60-7.Marx, Introduction,pp . 195-204.

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290 Research NotesEngels too had discussed the interrelationships of production, distribution,and exchange in P art I1 of Anti-Duhring. Am plifying upon his defin ition of thesubject matter of political economy, that is the science of the laws governingproduction an d exchange, he argues tha t exchange (to the ex tent it has emerged

in a particular society) presupposes p r o d u ~ t i o n . ~ his of course accords withMarxs characterization, especially where he holds that the intensity ofexchange, its extent and nature, a re determined by the developm ent and structureof p rod ~c t ion .~ t likewise accords with M arx and Engels earlier formulationin the German Ideology where they had argued that a mode of production isalways combined with a mode of co-operation or co-ordination, a materialistconnectionof humans w ith one another.33Moreover, Engels argues that modesof production and exchange determine the mode of distribution of the product,while the mode of distribution (in the wider sense) determines the modes ofproduction and exchange. All this accords with Marxs analysis. Only thecategory of consumption is omitted from Engels discussion here, perhapsbecause that category implicates that of the Person.34IV

Two points follow from this accord of M arxs and Engels understanding of thesubject matter of political economy. These points can be illustrated in thewritings of Jurgen Habermas a t the one extreme and Jo hn Weeks a t the other.The present context permits little more than mention of these points.Habermas, as is well known, has faulted historical materialism for itsinstrumentalist (or technologistic) bias, its oversight of the sym bolic momentof comm unicative action. He identifies in this regard particularly Engels, GeorgiPlekhanov, and Josef Stalin.35 On the one hand, the specifics of M arx andEngels understanding of the subject matter of political economy give Haberm ascritique the appearance of being a m is-specification. Exchangeis indeed socialintercourse (Verkehr) which encom asses both moments of material exchangeand ideal forms of intera~tion.~ n the other hand, Habermas accountdifferentiating hum an social intercourse from comm unication is warranted onlyby Habermas history of the species. He differentiates anthropoids from

hominids, not in terms of hominid symbolic behaviour but in terms of hominiddevelopment of the hunting mode of produ~tion.~n evidentiary terms,Habermas notion of the proto-hum an a s hunter has been rejected by Engels as

2

Engels, Anti-Duhring, p. 203.Marx, Introduction, p. 204.33 K. Marxand F. Engels, Collected Works,Vol. 5 , p. 43. J . Weeks arguesthat this passage was thesource of the differences he finds between Marx and Engels; cf. his Capital and Exploitation(Princeton, Princeton University Press, 198 I ) , pp. 61-2.34 cf. K. Marx and F. Engels, Gesamtausgabe (Berlin, Dietz Verlag, 1976). 11. Abteilung, Bd. I ,Teil I, S. 26. . Habermas, Comm unication and the Evolutionof Society (Boston, Beacon Press, 1979), chs. 3and 4, esp. p. 145;also hisKnowledge and Hum an Interests (Boston, Beacon Press, 1971), chs. 2 and3. SeeT. McCarthy, The Crit ical Theory ofJurgen Habermas (Cambridge, Mass., MIT Press, 1978),chs. 1. 2 and 3. 5. 6 Marx and Engels, Collected Works, Vol. 5 , p. 32.37 Habermas, Comm unication and the Evolution of Society, p. 135.

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Research Notes 29 1well a s current anthropologist^.^^ In theoretical terms, Haberm as notion th atanthropoid behaviour was based on symbolically mediated interaction in[George Herbert] Meads sense must similarly be rejected.39 T hu s Hab ermasaccount of the emergence of t he hum an mode of life (Lebensweise) essentiallymis-specifies the problem. The proto-human was a gatherer who occasionallyhunted, thus a t one with the anthropoids; the proto-hum an was accultured, asymbol an d tool user, hence distinct from the anthropoids. When hum an socialintercourse is acknowledged to incorpora te com munication, Haberm as critiqueof historical materialism must in large part be set aside.Weeks, by contrast, has faulted Engels for his circulationist bias as well asoverlooking the role of force in societal transformations. Following Colletti,Weeks holds that Marx and Engels views on fundamental issues differeddiametr i~al ly .~ut Weeks faults E ngels precisely for what H aberm as considersto be a virtue.On the one hand, the circulationist theory of economic crises holds eitherinadequate aggregate demand or else the profit squeeze generate the ~ r i s i s . ~ neither case the understanding is that the crisis is located within the sphere ofcirculation; by contrast, the Marxian understanding is that it is located in thesphere of production. In Anti-Diihring, Engels explicitly defines an d analysescrises in terms of the overproduction of means of production, hence he ca nn ot becharacterized on this evidence as an underc~nsumptionist.~~e likewise holdsthat the proletarian standard of living is determined by the division of labourunder the regime of capital, hence Engels cann ot be accused of suppo sing th at thedistribution of factor income to wage fund (labours share) and profits is insome sense exogenous to the sphere of p r o d ~ c t i o n . ~ ~hu s Engels subscribed t oneither an underconsum ption theory n or a profit squeeze hypo thesis; hence he

K. Marx and F.Engels, Selected Works (Moscow , Foreign Languages Publishing House, 962).Vol. 11, p. 186; also K. M arx, The Ethnological Norebooks of Karl Ma rx (Assen, VanGo rcum, 1972),p. 99. SeeS. Slocum, Woman theG ath ere rin R. R. Reiter (ed.), Towardan AnthropologyofWomen(New York, M onthly Review Press, 1975). pp. 3 6 5 0 ; N. Tanner and A. Zihlman, Women inEvolution, Signs, Vol. 1 (1976) and Vol. 4 (1978); E. Leacock, Womens Status in EgalitarianSociety, Current Anthropo logy, 19 (1978). See also Charles W oolfson, The Labor Theory ofC ulture(London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982).39G.H.Mead, Philosophy of rhe Ac t (Chicago, Un iversity of Chica go Press, 1938), pp. 109-10: I tis only man who has entered into a social relation with his environment . . ..40 Weeks, Capital and Exploitation, chs. 1 and 2 [with appendix], esp. p. 51. Weeks inability ingeneral to give an intelligible reading o f Engels is beyond the scope o f this article. O ne illustrationmust suffice for now. W eeks supposes th at Geisr, when used by Werner Sombart, meant a mentalconstruct @. 14). In fact, this is precisely the opposite of what Sombart (or Engels) meant by the term;see Sombarts Die drei Nationulokonomien (Leipzig, Dun cker & Humblot, 1930)or Engels, Law ofValue and Ra te of Profit, Capital I l l , appen dix. Weeks discussion is thereafter a hopeless morass o fthe views of Conr ad Schm idt, M arx an d Engels, and a half dozen other writers.4 Weeks, Capiral and Exploitation. p. 9.42 Engels, Anti-Duhring, pp. 393-4. See also Michael Bleaney, Underconsumption Theories: AHistorical and Crirical Analysis (New York, In ternationa l P ublishers, 1976) for a n extensivediscussion.43 Engels, Anti-Duhring, p. 376. This profit-squeezehypothesis can be traced at least as far backas Pareto; see V. Pareto, Treatise on General Sociology (New York, Harcourt Brace, 1935)2203-36. I t is associated in Great Britain with Andrew Glyn and B. Sutcliffe, British Capitalism ,Workers andthe Profit Squeeze (London, Penguin B ooks, 1972) and in the United States with RafordBoddy and J. Cro tty, Class Conflict and Macro-Policy, Review of Radical Polirical Economics, 7(1975).

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292 Research N o t e scannot be identified with Paul Sweezy, Michael Kalecki, Sam ir Amin et al. ascirculationists.On the other hand, Weeks makes much out of Engels statement inAnti-Diihring tha t the whole process [of the developm ent of cap italism] can beexplained by purely econom ic causes; a t no po int w hatever are robbery, force,the state or political interference of any kind n e c e ~ s a r y . ~ ~eeks simply treatsthis passage apar t from its context. In the nineteenth (and even in the twentieth)century, some social theorists held that society was politically conflictual inessence. (These were no t necessarily social Darwinists). Eugen Duhring was animportant member of this tradition; Engels took pains to dissociate his andMarxs writings from this tr a d it i~ n .~ ngels, with considerable dialectical skill,showed in the Origin of the Family, Pritjate Property and the State how theearliest fundam ental (or generic) transformation of human society, that of theworld-historic overthrow of mother-right was to be explained withoutpresupposing the existence of conflict an d force, i.e. w ithout begging the questionof the emergence of the several institutions listed in the books title.46 Likewise,he shows in Anti-Duhring how subsequent generic transformations of societysuch as the rise of the sta te apparatus o r the emergence of dom estic and chattelslavery were to be explained without begging the q ~ e s t i o n . ~ When he turns to the capitalist transformation, it is thus not surprising thatEngels proceeds similarly. In Anti-Duhring he shows, dialectically (and in thisinstance echoing Capital 0, hat the necessity which underlay the earliertransformations of society was present in the development of capitalism aswell.48 This is no t t o say tha t chance has no significance in societaltransform ation, but that it is a determinate significance. Plekhanov, in reviewingjust this issue, pointed ou t tha t conquests, confiscations and m onopolies haveoccurred throughout recorded history. But, he continued, all these politicalevents, far from determining the direction of economic development were, onthe contrary, themselves determined by it in their forms and subsequent socialeffects.49Hence the appropriateness of Engels explanation of the developmentof cap italism in economic terms.Moreover, Weeks blatant confounding of the logical process of theaccum ulation of capital presented in P art VII of Capital I with the processes ofreality such as those of primitive accumulation described in Part VIII is preciselythe total lack of understanding castigated by Colletti. Marx himself indicates atthe beginning of Part VII that an exact analysis of the process [of accum ulation]demands that we . . . disregard all phenomena that hide the play of its inner

44 Engels, Anti-Duhring, p. 226; see also Weeks, Capital and Exploitation, p. 20, p. 57.45 Marx and Engels, Selected Works, Vol. I, p. 34, note b;also Engels, Anti-Duhring, p. 41(added in the 1882 edition: Socialism: Uiop ian and Scientific).46 Marx and Engels, Selected Works,Vol. 11, p. 217; again Engels follows Lewis H. Morgan, andMarx, The Ethnological Noteboo ks of Karl Marx, pp . 119-21. This line of discussion renders quitesuspect Habermas notion that the nuclear family initiated human society; cf. his Communication and

the Euolution of Society, p. 136. In support of Habermas, see C. 0.Lovejoy, The Origin of Man,Science, Vol. 21 I (1981). Engels, Anti-Diihring, pp. 241-8 on the State; pp. 248-9 on slavery.48 Engels, Anti-Diihring, pp. 225-6; earlier Engels noted that without an understanding of this49 G. Plekhanov, Selected Philosophical Works (Moscow, Progress Publishers, 1980). Vol. IV.inevitability of capitalism, the previous forms of socialism were moralistic and utopian (p. 42).pp. 89-90.

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Research Notes 293mechanism, while he describes Par t VIII of Capital I a s actual h i ~ t o ry . ~ utthis focuses attention on the method of political economy.In sum, where Habermas tries to differentiate Marx from Engels by allegingthat the latter tended especially tow ards single-factor technolog ism, Weeks triest o differentiate the tw o by alleging tha t Engels tended tow ards a circulationist (o reven a revisionist) dualism w hile it was M arx who w as the m onist. But W eeksdiscussion withstands close scrutiny no better than does Habermas.

VTh us it can be concluded th at, in terms of their conceptions of the sub ject ma tterof political economy, Engels and Marxs views hardly represent profoundlydifferent ways of seeing things. What of their conceptions of method? Marxsargument in the third section of the Introduction to the Critique of PoliticalEconomy establishes the method of poli tical e c ~ n o m y . ~ he social corp us is thestarting point, say twentieth century English society. Through the process ofanalysis of the imm ediate concept i nt o its cons tituent genera a nd differentiae,increasingly abstract concepts such a s class, wage-labour, price, etc. ar e reached.Given the most simple terms, those term s and other term s subsumed within themarticulate so as t o represent the social corpus a s a n organic synthesis, a concreteunity. O n the one hand it will not d o to dispense with analysis an d ta ke society asit is experienced (the process of reality). A s Ge org Lukacs has commented onthis section, knowledge that is oriented in this way towards the immediatelygiven reality always ends u p with merely notational ideas. The se therefore haveto be mo re exactly defined with the aid of isolating abstraction^.'^^ On the otherhand, it will no m ore d o to begin w ith abstract terms a nd undertake a logicalprocess of synthesis. Lukacs continues inference by dedu ction from categorialideas easily leads t o unsupported speculative conception^'.^^ In either case onehas inchoate terms a nd relationships, abstractly empiricist o r abstractly rationa la s the case may be, and in neither case can the terms a nd relations be assimilatedto the concrete whole.A few pages before his characterization in Anri-Diihring of the subject ma tterand method of political economy, Engels had discussed dialectic^'.^^ Thispassage illustrates his understanding of the method of political ec onomy . Engelsrecounted t ha t Ma rx exam ined the historical processes, the processes of realityin Collettis terms, which characterize both the social corpus of mercantilecapitalism an d th at of capitalismper se. These were analysed in terms of forms ofproperty. C apitalistic private property sublates individual private property. Butan expanding and deepening class struggle attends capitalistic production to thepoint where capitalistic property itself is sublated in social revolution . Hence thesynthesis: it is the negation of the negation.55Th roug h this logical process (inCollettis terms), through the workings of this dialectical law in history (in

50 Marx, Cupital (Moscow, oreign Languages Publishing House, 1954). Vol. I, pp . 565, 714.5 Marx, Introduction, p. 205ff.s2 Lukacs, The Ontology of Social Being, p. 27.5 3 Lukics, The Ontology of Social Being, p. 29.54 Engels, Anti-Diihring, pp . 182-5.5 5 Engels, Anti-Diihring, p. 185; cf. also pp . 389-91.

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294 Research NotesCarvers terms), the concrete unity of capitalism is concisely revealed in itsorganic complexity and potentiality.Thus it appears tha t Engels and Marxs conceptions of the method of politicaleconomy are in accord n o less than their conceptions of its subject matter. Ofcourse this is no t difficult to comprehend if Marx was familiar with the d rafts ofAnti-Diihring.It would be the height of presum ption to suggest that a topic so complex andrich as M arx and Engels theoretical accord could be definitively addressed in thisbrief statement. M ore modestly, it can be proposed that future discussions of thistopic be obliged to be couched in scientificrather than doctrinaire terms. Th is is atimely proposal. On the one hand, the completion of the Gesamfausgabe(MEGA ) and the English translation of the Collecred Works of Marx and Engelshave scientificallyestablished the texts in the former and have made them readilyaccessible in the latter. On the other hand, the ever widening recognition of thescientific stature of historical materialism demands n o less.