The Relationship between "Bourgeois" and "Marxist" Historiography

Abstract

At many universities in the Western world today, there is hardly any topic an will be asked to discuss more frequently than the relationship between and historiography. At the same time, he will be obliged to define himself and his own work in terms of these two poles. Discussion of the matter is difficult because the basis for scholarly inquiry an objective relationship to one's subject is lacking. The historian seems to look at the question differently from the historian. But we must not forget that in using the terms and we, too, are following Marxist practice. Our acceptance of the Marxist position as a point of departure is clearly provisional, and as we proceed, we shall see that the apparently irreconcilable opposition of and will prove not to be so irreconcilable after all. In making this initial concession to the Marxist view, we shall be able to temper the military metaphors both sides are so fond of using. I shall not roll out the heavy artillery of Hegelian concepts, as Bernard Willms does in his valuable essay Marxismus Wissenschaft Universitfit,' nor shall I open the attack on a number of fronts, as the authors of issue number 70 of Das Argument do in their Kritik der biirgerlichen Geschichtswissenschaft.2 Instead, I shall try to characterize the bourgeois and Marxist positions in historiography. This will involve three steps: citing statements of purpose by major representatives of both schools, comparing the contents of leading bourgeois and Marxist publications in the field, and describing the most extreme and what have been to date the most usual types of exchange between the two camps. I shall then expand the scope of our inquiry by examining Marx's and Engels'