Study Of Raymond Aron’s View Of History

Raymond Aron,an important French thinker,is known as the "intervening observer." His life has been extensive,and his achievements in politics,sociology,ethics,and international relations have his own unique insights into history.Not only in the doctoral thesis,he began to explore the objectivity limit of history,criticize historical determinism,and also talked about history many times in the later works and the lectures of the French Academy.Aron’s thoughts on historical understanding were initially wandering between Kant and Marx.He agrees with the "consensus" of Kant’s historical development,but rejects the decisive role of nature in it;he affirms Marx’s discourse on the subjective status of human beings,but does not agree with the end result of the communist society as a historical development.Later,influenced by German historicism,analytics and hermeneutics,Aron firmly focused on people.He found that on the one hand,people can understand history,but the limits of human knowledge make history unable to be fully recognized,which is manifested as the contradiction between historical epistemology and agnosticism;on the other hand,history itself has certain causal laws,but it cannot explain all events,manifested as a contradiction between historical determinism and indeterminism.In the end,based on this double contradiction,Aron chose the compromise.He believes that in the middle of determinism and agnosticism,both historical objectivity and human subjectivity can be exerted.This is the historical view of contingent determinism.In general,Aron’s view of history contains characteristics such as authenticity,limits and compromises.His vision of historical trends and future society is similar to Marx’s historical materialism,which is a free society without exploitation and oppression.However,Aron’s excessive attention to human subjectivity made him separate from Marx,who is concerned with the production of matter,and it is difficult to justify himself in the trap of limits and pluralism.This article uses Marx’s historical materialism to analyze Aron’s balanced choice between historical determinism and agnosticism.It not only gives people an innovative way of thinking about history,but also gives the "historic people" a realistic revelation-It is necessary to Clarify responsibilities,and choose more carefully.