System and syllogism in Marx’s Capital

Abstract

Hegel's and Marx's intellectual undertakings remain relevant to an examination of our world. Both authors have elaborated, from different approaches, on important elements concerning modern capitalist societies. Tracing the precise connections between both thinkers, nevertheless, is still a challenge—even though it is now clear that these relationships are not one of idealism versus materialism, but, precisely, the overcoming of such dualism, as Western Marxism and Critical Theory have shown. In its Anglophone version, those inquiries grew and expanded upon different trends, among those, remarkably, New Dialectics. This article aims to analyze Hegel's theory of syllogism as a key to reading Marx's Capital as it has been proposed by Tony Smith. To this end, the paper seeks to reconstruct Smith's interpretation of Hegel’s theory of syllogism and its applications for Hegel's Philosophy of Right as well as to Marx’s Capital. According to Smith, Marx's Capital, the presentation of the dialectical articulations of the categories of political economy in the capitalist mode of production as a specific social order, derives its critical power and scientific coherence precisely from its use of Hegel’s theory of syllogism—which allows Marx to analyze the processes in the social world as organic entities constituted through the articulation of moments of universality, particularity, and individuality. The result is an investigation that seeks to bring Hegel's Logic closer to Marx’s Capital.