The German Ideology: A Rewriting of Phenomenology of Spirit? —A Study of the Relationship between Marx and Hegel

Since the inception of historical materialism, the relationship between Marx’s and Hegel’s philosophies has remained a central question of inquiry in academic circles. The German Ideology, a landmark in the development of historical materialism, has been the subject of extensive scholarly research from both philological and intellectual history perspectives. Yet, scholars have not yet fully elucidated the Hegelian philosophical elements. For instance, Wataru Hiromatsu, the Japanese scholar, took the self-alienation theory in the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 as his point of departure, yet failed to uncover that The German Ideology essentially constitutes a reworking of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit. This paper contends that there is a profound structural and substantive correspondence between the two works: in The German Ideology, the historical development of self-consciousness in the Phenomenology of Spirit is systematically recast as the genetic history of human labor. This reworking is far more than a simple substitution of content; its significance lies in its capacity to effect a paradigm shift in practical philosophy.