On The Intellectual Relationship Between Marx And Rousseau

With the rise of the classical political philosophy represented by Strauss and the modern western political philosophy represented by Rawls,there was a heated debate about the essence of Marx’s philosophy in China.The ideological relationship between Marx and Rousseau has been pushed to the forefront again,and those fundamental theoretical characteristics and key symbolic terms in the process of the systematic construction of Marxist political philosophy need to be thoroughly understood.At the same time,distinguishing the ideological relationship between Marx and Rousseau can help us understand the source of Marx’s thoughts more comprehensively,analyze the formation process of Marx’s historical materialism more deeply,and help us to better use Marxism with Chinese characteristics and times to guide our political and ideological construction.Rousseau’s political philosophy inherits the western rationalist political tradition,the natural law system and the modern contract theory,and takes this as the theoretical background to form a political philosophy system with freedom and equality,public will,people’s sovereignty,private property,and community as the main keywords.Rousseau ended the tradition of western natural law,reached the peak of contract theory,opened a new field and topic of western political philosophy,and thus laid the tone of modern and contemporary political philosophy.After Rousseau,Kant and Hegel are the heirs of Rousseau’s legacy.Kant adds a transcendental basis for Rousseau’s moral politics,but Kant’s moral philosophy is formalistic.Hegel criticized Kant’s empty moral philosophy and endowed it with economic and political connotations.At the same time,he also criticized Rousseau’s idea of public will and social contract theory,and put forward his own concept of state as the highest entity of ethics.Marx was familiar with Rousseau’s works and thoughts,wrote the Rousseau Notes in the Croznach Notes,and criticized Hegel’s view of the country with Rousseau as a reference,which was reflected in the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Law.Since then,Rousseau’s influence on Marx has been throughout his life,and his attitude towards Rousseau has gone through a process from appreciation to criticism and then to transcendence.There are Rousseau factors in the important themes of Marx’s philosophy of state,freedom,private property,and people’s sovereignty,and they are ultimately sublated.This article holds that Marx has both criticism and inheritance to Rousseau,there are essential differences between the two.Marx’s historical materialism has achieved a comprehensive transcendence of Rousseau’s political philosophy.This paper attempts to demonstrate two conclusions that are directly related:First,the ideological relationship between Marx and Rousseau presents a theoretical pedigree that has been continuously deepened and expanded from Rousseau to Marx.Rousseau’s general will,Kant’s good will,and Hegel’s universal will have internal consistency;Second,Rousseau is as important a theoretical source as Hegel and a key figure in Marx’s turn to material interests and materialism.