The book provides a genealogy of 'dialectical materialism' by tracing the development of Marxist ideas from their origins in German philosophical thought to the ideology of the social-democratic groups in Russia in the 1890s, from which Lenin and the revolutionary generation emerged. It reconstructs Marx's original conceptions and examines the modifications that were made to them by himself and by his Russian followers, which eventually gave rise to the doctrine of 'dialectical materialism', first expounded by Plekhanov.

First published in 1978, this book rapidly established itself as a classic of modern Marxism. Cohen's masterful application of advanced philosophical techniques in an uncompromising defense of historical materialism commanded widespread admiration. In the ensuing twenty years, the book has served as a flagship of a powerful intellectual movement--analytical Marxism. In this expanded edition, Cohen offers his own account of the history, and the further promise, of analytical Marxism. He also expresses reservations about traditional historical materialism, in the light of which he reconstructs the theory, and he studies the implications for historical materialism of the demise of the Soviet Union.

Research Paper (undergraduate) from the year 2011 in the subject Philosophy - Philosophy of the 19th Century, grade: A, University of Nairobi, language: English, abstract: This paper seeks to explain Karl Marx’s dialectical materialism and historical dialectics. The stimulus of the work of Marx was the hope of a social revolution in his lifetime or in the future. Unlike British classical economics who aimed at the welfare of the capitalists, Marx worked to represent the interest of the wage earner. This is best represented in the "Communist Manifesto" of 1848. Marx called himself a materialist, though under Hegelian influence. In 1843, he went to France to study socialism. There, he met Engels, the manager of a factory in Manchester. From him, he came to know of English labour conditions and English economics. After taking part in the French and German revolutions of 1848, he sought refuge in England in 1849 from where he wrote and amassed knowledge.

Why did Karl Marx want to exclude politics and the market from his vision of a future socialism? In Karl Marx: The Burden of Reason, Allan Megill begins with this question. Megill's examination of Marx's formative writings casts new light on Marx's relation to philosophy and reveals a hitherto largely unknown 'rationalist' Marx. In demonstrating how Marx's rationalism permeated his attempts to understand politics, economics, and history generally, Megill forces the reader to rethink Marx's entire intellectual project. While Megill writes as an intellectual historian and historian of philosophy, his highly original redescription of the Marxian enterprise has important implications for how we think about the usability of Marx's work today. Karl Marx: The Burden of Reason will be of interest to those who wish to reflect on the fate of Marxism during the era of Soviet Communism. It will also be of interest to those who wish to discern what is living and what is dead, what is adequate and what requires replacement or supplementation, in the work of a figure who, in spite of everything, remains one of the greatest philosophers and social scientists of the modern world.

In Marxism and Philosophy Korsch argues for a reexamination of the relationship between Marxist theory and bourgeois philosophy, and insists on the centrality of the Hegelian dialectic and a commitment to revolutionary praxis. Although widely attacked in its time, Marxism and Philosophy has attained a place among the most important works of twentieth-century Marxist theory, and continues to merit critical reappraisal from scholars and activists today.