The ethnological reception of Marx: from anthropological evolutionism to the critique of the colonial system

Abstract

The purpose of this text is to make a brief account of the ethnological reception of Marx between 1879 and 1882, particularly the works of M. M. Kovalevsky and L. H. Morgan, contemporary anthropologist. The writings that Marx made on these works contain extracts, summaries, and annotations in which the interest that he had, during the last years of his life, in non-Western societies, in their historical development, and in their particular forms of organization, is manifested. In this text, an analytical review is made of both the ethnological writings of Marx and the analyzes that other authors have already made in this regard. His approach to ethnology and, in particular, to evolutionary theory, show the centrality that the concern about ancient societies and non-capitalist forms of existence had in his theoretical and political project, as well as the importance that he gave to empirical research for the analysis of these problems. As a result of this bibliographic investigation, it is concluded that in the writings of Kovalevsky and Morgan, Marx found important contributions to his criticism of the capitalist system, which were articulated around the renewal of his theoretical paradigm by a multilinear conception of history and the criticism of colonialism of his time.