/leftypol/ - Leftist Politically Incorrect

>Liberal Historiography
Well, we must assess different sources. We see in the work of Hobbes (1651) and Locke (1690), the positing of a "state of nature" preceding the "state of society", which in its respective constitution is a "social contract". The theory of social contract is preceded by Plato's writings in Crito - that the citizen of a state must show loyalty to a state for the services which it provides. The "state of nature" is elaborated on by Rousseau (1754) by a reversal of Hobbes, by seeing how natural man (later termed a "noble savage") is well-behaved and not simply self-interested, whilst it is the state of society, by the introduction of private property, which permits violence. Thus, Rousseau (1761) resolves the phenomenon of War as a political/social constitution, not a natural one. Only the civilised can be so "uncivilised", as it appears. The apparent progress of human society results in the weakening of morals and degeneration of politics. This is a shared view by Montesquieu (1734) who saw that as Rome advanced, it grew more tyrannical, through and by a diminishment of virtue in society. This is like the "anacyclosis" of Plato, Aristotle and Polybius, which is a theory of the progressive degeneration of politics, and so is a cyclical view of history - by class warfare. For the rest, the Bible was taken as a description of the past.

The idea of linear progress only begins later on, such as we read in Kant (1784), who posits a "universal history":
<Each, according to his own inclination, follows his own purpose, often in opposition to others; yet each individual and people, as if following some guiding thread, go toward a natural but to each of them unknown goal; all work toward furthering it, even if they would set little store by it if they did know it […] The history of mankind can be seen, in the large, as the realization of Nature’s secret plan to bring forth a perfectly constituted state as the only condition in which the capacities of mankind can be fully developed, and also bring forth that external relation among states which is perfectly adequate to this end.
https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/kant/universal-history.htm
This is quite identical to Smith's "invisible hand" (1776). Kant's ultimate vision is a "universal civic society" (also termed the "Kingdom of Ends") which is then the tract of historical development. Kant also saw that the ends of conflict must be affected the "perpetual peace" (1795) of global (e.g. cosmopolitan) citizenship, following the universal "Rights of Man and Citizen" declared (1789). We can then see a link between Kant and the United Nations' "Universal Declaration of Human Rights" (1948):
https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
Following from Kant is Hegel, who sees progress in History as that which accords to Spirit, which in his view, is Freedom, which must therefore be conceived (1830):
<The History of the world is none other than the progress of the consciousness of Freedom
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/hi/history3.htm
This only applies in the universal, not particular case:
<The consciousness of Freedom first arose among the Greeks, and therefore they were free; but they, and the Romans likewise, knew only that some are free, — not man as such […] the Greek and Roman world only that some are free; whilst we know that all men absolutely (man as man) are free
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/hi/history3.htm
What this entails is given in Philosophy of Right (1820):
<In accordance with these four principles, the world-historical realms are the following: (1) the Oriental, (2) the Greek, (3) the Roman, (4) the Germanic […] The world-view of this first realm is substantial, without inward division, and it arises in natural communities patriarchically governed […] it is in a world of this character [The Greek] that the principle of personal individuality arises, though it is still not self-enclosed but kept in its ideal unity […] the due satisfaction of particular needs is not yet comprised in the sphere of freedom but is relegated exclusively to a class of slaves […] [The Roman] begins in the clash between the substantial intuition of an aristocracy and the principle of free personality in democratic form […] [With the Germanic,] reconciliation of objective truth and freedom as the truth and freedom appearing within self-consciousness and subjectivity, a reconciliation with the fulfilment of which the principle of the north, the principle of the Germanic peoples, has been entrusted.
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/pr/prstate.htm
Here, Hegel extends the Germanic to the Anglo-Saxon, and indeed, we see that the political ideal of individual (read: subjective) liberty has always been English in its character, which has now spread over the entire world. So, this is the progressive liberal vision, that history is both (i) universal, and (ii) determined toward freedom. It concerns men individually, and not classes in particular. However, it is only the liberal cause of freedom which has led to the proper criticism of man by class position. Thus, all consistent liberals and socialists champion the true ends of their political revolution to be a practical justice. We read in Gossen (1854) that a free market fulfills the ends of socialism. This is repeated by Henry George (1879) and Schumpeter (1908). Marx also says that Communism allows for bourgeois practice (1875):
<bourgeois right […] principle and practice are no longer at loggerheads
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/ch01.htm
So, all universal history is liberal history, in essence.

I've noticed that most historians without a political agenda do lean toward class struggle and material conditions as primary causes for historical events, regardless if they're marxists or not.

It should also be seen that Hegel's historiography is repeated by the view of Spengler (1922), that the "West" follows Rome by a Germanic influence, which has as its ethos, the Faustian imperative for infinity. This contributes to scientific achievement, and political radicalism. So this is concurred upon by Conservative historians as well as Liberals, but the overt economism of liberalism is also seen as a decline of the very power which upheld its former potentials - with Socialism as a basic extension of Liberal utopianism. Thomas Carlyle (1839) originally complained upon the "cash nexus" of debased human relations - followed up by Marx and Engels, in seeing it destroy the traditional family structure. A liberal like Wicksteed (1910) seeks to justify the disperson of all integral bonds into the atomistic strands of self-interested individuals. This is the ideology of political economy:
<Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother…
https://biblehub.com/genesis/2-24.htm
The Socialist and Conservative have thus also been united in their defense of protections of things like culture (e.g. Wagner, 1850). The dissatisfaction of the new age is then its economistic character - which as yet, is the sole basis of man's conceptual universality, as granted by his status as a property owner. Capitalism is universalist, and this is the crux of conservative complaints. Hegel's further condition (or rather - his lack of condition) is perceiving "man as man", but this is only possible where "man" becomes "citizen", as understood by Kant, and Marx - for Marx writes (1843) that the "Rights of Man" are the rights of men from society, not toward it. Marx's Communism then, is an attempt to realise men without the medium of property, which is also the racial and/or traditional doctrine of conservatives. So then, Socialists, Liberals and Conservatives relate likewise. And so as Rothbard writes (1969):
<Socialism is a reactionary reversion, a self-contradictory attempt to achieve classical radical ends: liberty, progress, the withering away or abolition of the State, by using old-fashioned statist and Tory means: collectivism and State control. Socialism is a New Toryism doomed to rapid failure whenever it is tried, a failure demonstrated by the collapse of central planning in the Communist countries of Eastern Europe. Only libertarianism is truly radical. Only we can complete the unfinished revolution of our great forebears, the bringing of the world from the realm of despotism into the realm of freedom. Only we can replace the governance of men by the administration of things.
https://mises.org/mises-wire/meaning-revolution
All politics then has its ends in the realisation of men for men.