The Modern Transformation of Capitalist Society and the Relevance of Classical Marxist Methodology

The article considers the philosophical and methodological aspects of research on the evolution of modern capitalist society. In this context, the issue of the relevance of classical Marxist methodology is discussed. Lenin’s theory of imperialism is shown from the standpoint of developing the ideas expressed by K. Marx in Capital, addressing a new historical material. Marx believed that concentration, centralization, and monopolization of capitalist production serves as the ripening of prerequisites for the “expropriation of the expropriators” and the eve of a social revolution, which paves the way for a post-capitalist social order. Lenin drew attention to new developing trends in this process. He came to the conclusion that monopoly capitalism is characterized as the end of “free market” or, in other words, that imperialism is the end of “pure” capitalistic forms. This idea echoes the ideas of Marx expressed in the preface to the first volume of Capital: the era of transformation of the capitalist mode of production is beginning. In the present article, the author gives a brief review of post-war history, examining its three eras (“welfare state”, including Soviet society; neoliberalism; neo-mercantilism) as forms of transformation of the capitalist mode of production on the basis of its incomplete rejection. According to the author, this process can be interpreted as the downward development of capitalism, or its systemic crisis. It is argued that neither Marx nor Lenin could have foreseen the difficulties that arose as a result of the prolonged crisis. At the same time, Lenin’s book indicates two factors that became a condition for this: the embourgeoisement of the industrial class (“opportunism”) and the emergence of non-economic bureaucratic relations within monopolies. The article concludes that it is not at all necessary to refute Marx and Lenin in order to characterize modern capitalism. However, it is necessary to adjust the Marxist sociological “optics” to a more detailed mode. Then, we will be able to move from the abstract schemes of Soviet historical materialism to a more accurate, dialectical reflection of the economic realities of our time.

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