from an analysis of economics in the driving forces of history, the works of Marx lack all investigations into the areas of psychology, art, politics, legality, morality, science, and cultural history that are required to support his conclusions, hence, they lack the necessary objective foundations to make them logically binding and valid. On the contrary, Hägerström argues that a non-scientific subjective tendency can be detected in Marx’s writings, which is a factor that is useful in explaining Marx’s peculiar philosophy of history.51 The subjective basis of Marx’s conclusions is most certainly to be found in his sympathy for the underprivileged classes, a sympathy that Marx applies as a guiding principle in the determination of his philosophy of history, while he at the same time wishes to avoid the establishment of a moral system. However, Marx strives to establish a scientific foundation for his theory by hiding the subjective grounds for his conclusions behind a scientific front.52 If we, Hägerström, try to establish the scientific foundation for Marx’s formulation of historical materialism, the judgment closest at hand is that Marx, in order to construct an ideology for the proletariat (an ideology that serves a political function as a weapon in the struggle for power), applies the Marxist understanding of philosophy as the scientific substratum to his ideology.This is an ideology that is materialistic rather than idealistic, as the former was untainted by conservatism, capitalism, feudalism, or liberalism.53 If Hägerström’s analysis is utilized here, one finds a prime example of what happens when one allows scientific investigations to become value guided. But this does not seem to alter Hägerström’s opinion of the political content of Marx’s doctrines.What is affected is the professed universal scientific validity of Marxism, hence the historical materialism of Marx must be restricted to the object of investigation - economics and its history and theory - rather than to be extended to every aspect of human life. p a r t i v, c h a p t e r 2 258 51 Cf. ibid., p. 66. 52 Ibid., pp. 67-70. 53 Ibid., p. 69.
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