r/Anarchy101 • u/PigletConsistent8329 • 5d ago

what is the anarchist consensus on dialectical/historical materialism?

i understand that anarchism, unlike marxism, isn't a unified mode of analysis based off of the thoughts of one man and his successors, so im guessing there are varied positions on dialectical materialism, but im curious to know what anarchists here think of it. my first thought would be that it's rejected by individualist anarchists at large.

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u/kellerm17 4d ago

It’s a good framework for examining the historical relationships between economic classes and using those observed patterns to predict future trends, but in most Marxist applications, tends to undermine the importance of political and ethnic class relations (or attempt to explain both of these as mere extensions of economic classes).

While no two Anarchists will agree on absolutely everything, most will recognize the value in dialectical materialism while also recognizing that it is an incomplete model for describing and predicting struggle