Reformism or Revolution: 3. Dieterich and historical materialism¶

Marxist Theory · 2026-05-13

Core Argument¶

This article argues that Heinz Dieterich's theoretical framework — the "New Historical Project" and "21st Century Socialism" — is not a development beyond Marxism but a regression to pre-Marxist, utopian socialism. The central claim is that Dieterich's method inverts historical materialism by treating history as the product of conscious "projects" rather than as the outcome of objective material conditions and class struggle. Woods contends that Dieterich's approach is fundamentally idealist: it explains social change through ideas, plans, and moral sentiments rather than through the development of the productive forces and the contradictions they generate in relations of production.

The article further argues that Dieterich's errors are not incidental but systematic. His treatment of the English Revolution, the French Revolution, early Christianity, and the nature of socialist transition all reveal the same underlying defect: a substitution of moral indignation and schematic blueprints for concrete historical and materialist analysis. The consequence, Woods claims, is a politics that is reformist in practice — one that seeks to reconcile classes rather than to lead the working class to revolutionary power — despite its radical-sounding rhetoric.

Theoretical Grounding¶

The article is grounded in the classical Marxist tradition of historical materialism as developed by Marx, Engels, and subsequently by Lenin and Trotsky. Woods draws on several foundational texts:

The German Ideology — for the proposition that human beings distinguish themselves from animals when they begin to produce their means of subsistence, and that "the first premise of all human history is the existence of living human individuals."
The 1859 Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy — for the base-superstructure model and the claim that "it is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but, on the contrary, their social existence determines their consciousness."
Engels' letter to Bloch — to rebut the caricature of Marxism as economic determinism, insisting that the economic is the "ultimate determining element" but not the only one.
The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte — for the dialectic of structure and agency: "Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please."
The Critique of the Gotha Programme — for the distinction between lower and higher stages of communism, and the insistence that the transitional period requires the dictatorship of the proletariat.
The Civil War in France — for the derivation of the workers' state from the actual experience of the Paris Commune, rather than from any a priori blueprint.

The article also draws on Trotsky's methodological writings, particularly his introduction to The Living Thoughts of Karl Marx, which contrasts Marx's objective, materialist method with the subjective approach of bourgeois economics.

The theoretical tradition invoked is that of revolutionary Marxism as opposed to both reformism and utopian socialism. The article positions itself within the lineage that runs from Marx and Engels through Lenin and Trotsky, and it treats the experience of the Paris Commune and the 1905 Russian Revolution (with the spontaneous emergence of the soviets) as decisive theoretical reference points.

Conjunctural Relevance¶

The article was published in 2008, at a moment when the "pink tide" in Latin America was in full swing. Hugo Chávez had been in power in Venezuela since 1999, Evo Morales was elected in Bolivia in 2005, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador in 2006. The question of what kind of socialism was possible in the 21st century was a live political debate, and Heinz Dieterich had positioned himself as a key intellectual influence on Chávez's project.

Woods' intervention is therefore not merely a theoretical polemic but a political one. The conjuncture is defined by:

The rise of reformist governments in Latin America that rhetorically embraced socialism but did not break with capitalism.
The legacy of Stalinism and the collapse of the USSR, which Dieterich treats as the failure of "historical socialism" (i.e., Marxism), thereby opening the door for a "new" socialism untainted by that history.
The persistence of extreme inequality and poverty, which Dieterich documents but from which he draws reformist conclusions.
The presence of a mass movement in Venezuela that had shown high levels of revolutionary consciousness, yet was being led by a political current (including Dieterich's allies) that sought to contain rather than develop that consciousness.

Woods' argument is that Dieterich's theoretical errors have practical consequences: they disarm the working class by substituting moral appeals and blueprints for class struggle, and they provide a veneer of radicalism for what is essentially a project of managing capitalism with a human face.

Where the Argument Continues¶

This article is the third in a series titled "Reformism or Revolution," which systematically critiques Dieterich's Socialism of the 21st Century. The argument continues in:

Part 4: "History and economics" — which examines Dieterich's economic theories, particularly his treatment of exchange value and unequal exchange.
Part 5: "The theory of value" — which engages with Dieterich's understanding (or misunderstanding) of Marx's labour theory of value.
Part 6: "The law of value" — which addresses the operation of the law of value under capitalism and its implications for socialist transition.
Part 7: "The transition to socialism" — which develops the Marxist theory of the transitional period and the dictatorship of the proletariat in contrast to Dieterich's "participative democracy."

The broader corpus of In Defence of Marxism contains numerous articles on Venezuela, Latin America, and the question of reformism versus revolution. The political line developed here is consistent with the RCI's position that the Venezuelan process, while containing progressive elements, cannot lead to socialism without a revolutionary break with capitalism and the construction of workers' power.

Connections¶

This article should be read alongside:

Marx and Engels, The German Ideology — for the foundational statement of historical materialism.
Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte — for the dialectic of structure and agency.
Engels, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific — for the distinction between utopian and scientific socialism, which is the central theoretical axis of Woods' critique.
Lenin, State and Revolution — for the Marxist theory of the state and the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Trotsky, The Living Thoughts of Karl Marx — for the methodological contrast between objective and subjective approaches to history.
Karl Kautsky, The Foundations of Christianity — for the historical analysis of early Christian communism that Woods invokes against Dieterich.
Alan Woods, Reformism or Revolution (the full series) — for the complete argument against Dieterich.

The article also connects to the broader Marxist debate on the nature of the Venezuelan process, including contributions from the RCI's Against the Stream podcast and articles on marxist.com analysing the limits of Chavismo and the need for a revolutionary party.

Key Quotes¶

"Historical materialism sets out from the premise that the mainspring of historical development is, in the last analysis, the development of the productive forces — that is, humankind's power over nature."
"Dieterich refers to historical transformations as 'projects', that is to say, he defines great historical changes in terms of ideology, thus standing history on its head. This is precisely the opposite of Marx's method of historical materialism."
"Unlike the utopian socialists, Marx and Engels did not invent schemes ('historical projects') for the future society, but attempted to derive their ideas about socialism from the real historical conditions and the real movement of the working class."
"It is entirely wrong to say that capitalism was brought about as the result of a conscious plan or project of the bourgeois. Unlike socialism, capitalism can and does arise spontaneously out of the development of the productive forces."
"The working out of blueprints for the socialist society of the future formed no part of the materialist method of Marx and Engels, who were quite content to allow future generations to work out the details for themselves."
"Marx's conception of workers' power (the dictatorship of the proletariat) was not a utopian project but a practical programme for workers' power, for a workers' democracy, which Marx did not suck out of his thumb but derived from the actual historical experience of the French working class."