III. MARX'S LEVELS OF GENERALITY
Bertell Ollman identifies seven levels of abstraction from the most unique to the most general, however, because Marx himself moves from the most abstract to the concrete1, I prefer to reverse the order – doing this, furthermore, highlights the way in which what is learned at the higher levels of abstraction can be brought to bear upon the lower ones. Ollman also includes two levels which we can omit for the purposes of this essay: [1] the level of the animal world which brings into focus everything we have in common with the animal world and [2] the level of generality “which brings into focus our qualities as material parts of nature.” (Ollman 56) With these changes in mind, Ollman's five remaining levels abstraction are [1] human society, [2] class society, [3] capitalist society as such, [4] contemporary capitalist society and [5] and “whatever is unique about a person or situation”. (55-56)
On the grounds however that historical materialism can be used to investigate other modes of production besides capitalism, and that in fact both Marx and Engles had things to say regarding classless societies, I prefer to revise levels two to four in the following manner:
Level 2 asks, “How is this labour organised? Is it a classless society or a class society? What must hold true for such societies?” Doing so, and uncovering why a set of relations must be true for all classless societies allows us to make certain statements about communism as a classless society as well as primitive communism. The same process applied to class societies allows us to explain some of the continuity between the earliest forms of class society through to capitalism today (for example the existence of a state).
Level 3 asks, “what sort of class society (slave, feudal, capitalist?)/ classless society (post- or pre- class?)? And what must hold true for any such society?” 'Capitalism' at the most abstract is treated in this level. It is here we identify its laws of motion and fundamental tendencies. For example, we can here identify the tendency for capital to become concentrated and centralised2 – what we cannot identify is the concrete development of that tendency, how it is being actually expressed, mitigated, resisted, realised. It is also here that we encounter proletarians and bourgeoisie as abstractions defined purely in how they relate to the means of production and to each other.
Level 4 allows us to bring more particularities into focus – proletarians can be concretised into engineers or waiters the bourgeoisie into CEO's or politicians. It asks what is true of a particular mode of production at any given moment of its development – the duration and scope of that moment must depend on the purpose of the investigation. It's also on this level where the inheritance of previous modes of production can most fruitfully be investigated (combined and uneven development in Russia3, for example – although this can then be generalised into a rule at the previous level).
And Level 5 once more, is “whatever is unique about a person or situation” (55-56).
Clearly the distinction between the last two levels can be blurred. Also, there are probably situations where it is useful to talk about humans as animals, animals as organisms, organisms as material things etc. (when dealing with ecology for example) – but we can probably safely ignore these right now.
The skill and thoroughness with which Marx moved between these levels of generality accounts for the complexity, detail, and completeness of the Marxist conception of history. As a rule, Marx presents his analysis by moving from the general to the particular – this allows insights expressed at higher levels of abstraction to govern subsequent ones. However, these insights can themselves acquired by generalising from information gathered at lower levels. It is this system by which Marx accounts for continuity and change, and by which he can identify and take account of transformation.
1For a detailed discussion of this see Brien, Kevin M. “The Dialectical Movement from the Abstract to the Concrete” in Marx, Reason and the Art of Freedom. (Templeton University Press, Philidelphia 1987) p.17-44
2This is the tendency for the units of capital to become fewer and larger. Another way of putting this is that as competition forces some capitalists to the wall they are either bought up or else the vacuum created by their death is filled by the expansion of the surviving capitalists. This occurs both horizontally (fewer and fewer capitalists competing within a single sector) and vertically (where multiple sectors of the economy come under the control of large 'umbrellas' or conglomerations). That is the very dynamics of capitalist competition lead to monopoly capital.
3This is the way in which two modes of production can intermingle – feudalism and capitalism existed cheek to jowl in Russia.
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