Engels o herege: história, ecletismo científico, enfrentamento teórico e originalidade no pensamento de Friedrich Engels

Abstract

The present reflection seeks to investigate the treatment given to the theoretical and political legacy of Friedrich Engels, facing the positions on the Marx-Engels relationship and the disputes over his legacy. Later, the author's work will serve as a thread to characterize the German historical terrain, insofar as the process of entification of its late capitalism had a decisive impact on the cultural landscape in which the young revolutionary from Wuppertal was formed. Focusing on the author's youth works, which preceded the process of criticism of classical German thought initiated by him, in partnership with Karl Marx in 1844, when he carried out what we call the "double critique" fundamental to his two most important works in that period "Outline of a Critique of Political Economy" and "The Condition of the Working Class in England". The elements explained in this first part of the text will be essential to substantiate the debate on one of the main polemics about the author's production, his preface to "Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy", written in 1859, and the target of some of the most incisive debates in the theoretical tradition that begins from his joint production with Marx. Although works of the genre focusing on Marx's formation have been available in Brazil for some decades, the same cannot be said about Engels's youth production, which, with rare exceptions, is often ignored. We believe that the differences in the formation of Marx and Engels can be important tools for understanding both the way they "resolved" their relationship with Hegel and Feuerbach as well as to clarify the critical genesis of their pre-1844 works. These differences provide a new key of interpretation for the relationship and the productions of the authors. Thesis developed in the Stricto Sensu Graduate Program in Law at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Research Line: History, Power and Freedom. Study Area: Marxist critique of political economy, law and the state, under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Vitor B. Sartori.