Reforms or revolution?

(1) Political argumentation (2) Historical argumentation (3) Scientific argumentation 2. Historical materialism:

(1) How can history be explained? (2) History is the work of man

BEFORE tackling the problem of the application of dialectics to history, it remains for us to study one last law of dialectics.

This will be facilitated by the studies which we have just made wherein we have seen what negation of the negation is and what is meant by the interpenetration, the unity and struggle of opposites.

As always, let us proceed by examples.

1. Reforms or revolution?

When speaking of society, people ask, “Should we instigate reforms or make a revolution?” They debate whether, in order to transform capitalist society into a socialist society, successive reforms or an abrupt transformation— revolution— is needed.

With respect to this problem, let us recall what we have already studied.

Every transformation is the result of a struggle between opposing forces. When something evolves, it is because it contains its opposite, everything being an interpenetration of opposites. We can observe the stuggle of opposites and the transformation of the thing into its opposite. How does

this transformation take place? This is the new problem which confronts

us.

One may believe that this transformation occurs little by little, through a series of small transformations, that the green apple changes into a ripe apple through a series of progressive changes.

Many people think in this way that society is transformed little by little and that the result of a series of these small transformations will be the transformation of capitalist society into a socialist society. These small transformations are reforms and it will be their total, the sum of the small, gradual changes, which will give us a new society.

This theory is called reformism. The supporters of this theory are called reformists, not because they demand reforms, but because they think that reforms are sufficient, that their accumulation will imperceptibly transform society.

Let us see if this is true:

1. Political argumentation. If we look at the tacts, i.e., what nas hap­ pened in other countries, we shall see that, where this system has been tried, it has not been successful. The transformation of capitalist society— its destruction— has succeeded in a single country: the U.S.S.R., and we find that it was not through a series of reforms, but through revolution.

2. Historical argumentation. Generally speaking, is it true that things are transformed by small changes, by reforms?

Let us still look at the facts. If we examine historical changes, we see that they do not occur indefinitely, that they are not continuous. There comes a moment when, instead of small changes, change takes place with an abrupt leap.

In the history of societies, the outstanding events which we find are abrupt changes, revolutions.

Even those who are not familiar with dialectics know, nowadays, that violent changes have occurred in history. However, until the 17th century, it was believed that “ nature does not jump,” that it makes no leaps. People refused to see any abrupt changes in the continuity of change. But science stepped in and revealed, with facts, that changes did occur abruptly. The revolution of 1789 opened people’s eyes even better; it was in itself an obvious example of a clean break with the past. It came to be seen that all the decisive stages of history had been important, abrupt and sudden upheavals. For example, as friendly as they may have been, the

relations between two states grew colder, more strained and bitter, then took on a hostile character—and, all of a sudden, it was war, an abrupt rupture with the continuity of events. Another example: in Germany, after the war of 1914-1918, there was a gradual rise of fascism, then one day Hitler took power: Germany entered a new historical stage.

Today, those who do not deny these abrupt changes maintain that they

are accidents, an accident being something which happens but which might not have happened.

In this way, people explain revolutions in the history of societies by saying, “They were accidents.”

With regard to the history of France, for example, it is maintained that the fall of Louis XVI and the French Revolution occurred because Louis XVI was a weak and soft man. "If he had been an energetic man, we would not have had a revolution.” We even read that, if he had not prolonged his meal at Varennes, he would not have been arrested and the course of history would have been changed. Hence, the French Revolution was just an accident, it is said.

Dialectics, on the contrary, recognized that revolutions are necessities. There are, indeed, gradual changes, but their accumulation ends up producing abrupt changes.

3. Scientific argumentation. Let us take the example of water, if we start at 0° Centigrade, and raise the temperature of the water from 1 °, 2°, 3° up to 98°, the change is continuous. But can it continue indefinitely? We can go again up to 99°, but, at 100° Centigrade, we have an abrupt change: the water is transformed into steam.

If, inversely, from 99° we go down to 1°, again we have a continuous change; but we cannot lower the temperature like this indefinitely, for, at 0° Centigrade, the water is transformed into ice.

From 1° to 99° the water still remains water; only its temperature changes. This is what is called a quantitative change, which answers the question “ How much?” , i.e., “ How much heat is there in the water?” . When the water changes into ice or steam, we have a qualitative change, a change in quality. It is no longer water: it has become ice or steam.

When a thing does not change its nature, we have a quantitative change (in the example of water, we have a change in the degree of heat, but not in nature). When it changes in nature, when a thing becomes another thing, this change is qualitative.

Hence, we see that the evolution of things cannot be quantitative indefinitely: things which change finally undergo a qualitative change.

Quantity changes into quality. This is a general law. But, as always, we

mustn’t be satisfied with only this abstract formula.

tity and Quality,” we can find a large number of examples illustrating how exact this law is, not only in the natural sciences, but in everything else; a law according to which “ quantitative change suddenly produces, at cer­ tain points, a qualitative difference . . (Engels, Anti-Duhring, p. 138.) Here is another example, cited by H. Wallon in volume VIII of the French

Encyclopddie (in which he refers to Engels): nervous energy which ac­

cumulates in a child provokes laughter; but, if it continues to grow, laughter changes into a fit of tears; in this way, children who become excited and laugh too hard end up crying.

We shall give one last well-known example: that of someone running for an elected office. If 4,500 votes are needed for an absolute majority, the candidate is not elected with 4,499 votes; he remains what he is: a candidate. With one more vote, this quantitative change determines a qualitative change, since the candidate becomes an elected official.

This law provides us with the solution to the problem: reform or revolu­ tion.

Reformists tell us: “ You want the impossible which happens only by accident; you are Utopians.” But with this law we can see who really is the one who is dreaming the impossible! The study of the phenomena of nature and science shows us that changes are not gradual indefinitely, but that at a certain moment change becomes abrupt. We are not declar­ ing this arbitrarily; rather it is science, nature and reality which declare this to be true.

We might then ask, "What role do we play in these abrupt changes?” We are going to answer this question and develop this problem by applying dialectics to history. Here we have come to a very famous part of dialectical materialism: historical materialism.