Did the Communists correctly understand the law of opposites?
In theory, if we apply the law of the coexistence of opposites to the economic structure of society, it turns out that capitalism cannot exist without communism (well, as it were, "it turns out that way"). And it is impossible to destroy the opposite, that is, as there is light, so there is darkness. But the Marxists tried to fight capitalism. So that's what baffled me, is it possible to ERADICATE absolutely one of the opposites? Does not your own teaching contradict you?
Hegel's dialectic presupposes not only thesis and antithesis, but also synthesis – the union of opposites that creates something new. This new one also has an antithesis. But communism is the ultimate synthesis, which removes all contradictions once and for all, and there can be no antitheses to communism in principle. So it can do without capitalism.
This is a theory that we have all observed.
Communists-correctly understood the law. But in your question, it can be traced that you seem to have “stumbled” over a kind of terminology, which you tried to interpret in your own way, and not in accordance with what is meant. Not to mention the fact that the communist-materialist dialectic, although based on the developments of the idealist philosopher Hegel, should be interpreted exclusively from materialist positions.
Now to the point. The bottom line is that applying the law of unity and struggle of opposites to capitalism-socialism-communism is not correct. This law is not about that.
If we are talking about the a'la “5-point” formations (which are rather conditional and are a simplification in relation to the pre-capitalist period), then it is more correct to consider them from the position of the laws of transition of quantitative changes to qualitative and the law of negation. The reasoning goes something like this:
1) Contradictions between the productive forces and the relations of production are accumulating in society. Roughly speaking, technologies allow us to do one thing, but existing laws, ideas, institutions, etc. – formed under previous technological opportunities-prevent this: this happens due to (and as) technological development , on the one hand, and obsolescence of social relations, on the other. That is, productive forces (including technologies, production capabilities) develop, and production relations become proportionately obsolete. These are quantitative changes.
2) The contradictions between the productive forces and the relations of production reach a certain “critical point”, when it is already obvious to everyone that it is possible to live better-technology allows, but institutions, laws, traditions, etc. the add-on interferes. This leads to a revolution-the forced demolition of obsolete junk and the establishment of new social relations that are more appropriate to the modern productive forces of the historical moment under consideration. This is a qualitative change.
The “law of negation of negation” – will be more obvious if we imagine that steps 1 and 2 with the accumulation of changes (1) and a qualitative leap (2) – a change of state-occur repeatedly.:
1) State 1.
2) Accumulation of changes.
3) Transition of quantitative changes to qualitative ones – a jump from state 1 to state 2
4) State 2
5) Accumulation of changes.
6) Another transition of quantitative changes to qualitative ones – a jump from state 2 to state 3
“Negation of negation” – about the fact that state 2 is the negation of state 1, but state 3, which is the negation of state 2, is not state 1 at all.That is, capitalism, for that matter, is the negation of feudalism, and socialism is the negation of capitalism. But: socialism is not equal to feudalism; similarly, communism, which is the negation of socialism, is not equal to capitalism.
Let's return to the 1st law of dialectics about the struggle of opposites.
By opposites, we mean phenomena that are defined through each other.
In the classical example, for example, light and dark are considered as opposites, because
darkness = no light
light = something that excludes darkness (darkness ceases to be darkness if there is light in it)
These concepts are interrelated and are defined through each other.
And if we do not consider a speculative “spherical vacuum”, but something that really exists, then we say that any pair of opposites is inherent in the subject of consideration, but-at any time-to a different extent, which determines how the contradiction (between opposite trends) will be resolved and what direction the process under consideration will take in this or that case.
Therefore, when talking about the opposites, for example, between capitalist and socialist production relations, we should not consider specific states with a particular system, but rather trends (towards capitalism/socialism) in the social relations of any state (or the world as a whole).
For example, at such and such a time interval (say, in the 20-50s), public sentiment in the USSR tended towards socialist and communist construction. But at another time interval, on the contrary, society began to gravitate towards the capitalist form of social relations (say, the 80s-90s).