Scholar Interrupted at His Writing by Gerrit Dou (1635).
Personal reviewer on grasping the historical invariance of Marxism.
The historical “invariance” of Marxism upholds the continuance of the communist programme developed by Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels that is grounded in the approach of critical materialism. It ensures that the communist programme must remain in line with the materialist critique, as the social relations analyzed by Marx, namely the capitalist class relations and the law of value, are reproduced in contemporary society.
Invariance is not intransigence (refusal to compromise or to abandon an often extreme position or attitude) or blind dogmatic obedience to the literature written by Marx & Engels, but rather the continuity of the materialist method and the programme derived from it. While various phenomena appear to change capitalist society, the changes do not disrupt the reproduction of the value-forme. The essence, namely the fundamental relations of capital as analyzed by Marx, is reproduced or replicated within these changes. You can only break invariance if you can prove that the fundamental relations in capitalism have changed through the use of critical materialist analysis.
Any attempts to revise or modernize Marxism to the changing conditions do not advance theory, but instead dull the revolutionary elements of the programme by changing it to fit the bourgeois society. As said by Amadeo Bordiga in The Historical Invariance of Marxism:
“A new doctrine cannot appear at just any historical moment. There are given, very characteristic—and also very rare—periods in history when it can appear like a dazzling beam of light. If the crucial moment is not recognized and the terrible light not faced, it is no good resorting to little candles instead; by which the way is lit for academic pedants and fighters of little faith.”
— Amadeo Bordiga, The Historical Invariance of Marxism (1952)
By analyzing history, the question of invariance is not just merely theoretical but also historical. There are concrete moments in history where the party decides to maintain or divorce the invariant programme under the pressure of the so-called material conditions or constraints. What presents itself as pragmatism or tactical flexibility often reveals the total divorce of the programme, hence, opportunism.
Eduard Bernstein’s Social Democracy
The divorce of the programme is evident in Eduard Bernstein’s conception of Social Democracy. Bernstein believes that capitalism can be harnessed and its internal contradictions neutralized through a series of gradual reforms. Bernstein’s theory implies that socialism can emerge in capitalism without rupture; it also replaces the programme of rupture with a process of adaptation.
Bernstein’s conception already operates within the inversion of erscheinung and wesen, where appearance (erscheinung) is taken for essence (wesen). Capitalism may change forme or appearance through policies, institutions, etc., but not in its essence: relations of production. Reforms can modify conditions, but it doesn’t abolish the capitalist class relations. Replacing the communist programme with the process of adaptation strips Marxism of its theory of revolution.
Capitalism is defined by contradictory class antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie; the resolution requires rupture, not reconciliation. Without the rupture of the state forme, the Marxists will not transition to Communism, as it just reproduces the law of value and capitalist class relations. Reforms do not eliminate contradiction, as class antagonism still exists, but is mediated through various institutions of the state. It appears solvable in the lens of reformism without the violent overthrow of the bourgeoisie class and the state.
Stalinist Socialism in One Country
A pragmatist divorce, Iosef Stalin’s socialism in one country contradicts the internationalism of the communist programme. But before we critique the Stalinist pragmatism, we must look first at the historical-material context of soviet realpolitik.
It emerged from the defeat of the socialist revolution in Western Europe, more decisively in Germany, where Lenin expected it to have a successful breakthrough. However, due to SPD’s abandonment of revolutionary defeatism by voting for war credits, it contributed to the failure of the revolution to consolidate, and the anti-war Spartacists led by Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht were killed and defeated.
With the defeat of the socialist revolution in Germany and the disintegration of other post-war revolutionary movements, the anticipated international wave of revolutions did not materialize. This left the Soviet state isolated within a global capitalist system.
Under these conditions, a turn toward internal consolidation emerged within the Soviet state, expressed in the doctrine of socialism in one country, as a means of preserving the revolution. This, in turn, produced the hardening of the Soviet state-forme and the displacement of international revolutionary extension.
However, the rejection of Stalinist realpolitik and pragmatism does not automatically mean upholding the continuance of the invariant communist programme. A Marxist can denounce socialism in one country but remain ungrounded in historical invariance and the critical materialist methodology conceived by Marx. This introduces us to a similar unorthodox deviation.
Leon Trotsky’s Permanent Revolution
To continue the Marxist analysis, we must first define Trotsky’s position. Permanent revolution, which comes from Leon Trotsky, outright rejects socialism in one country that was conceived by the Stalinists. Trotsky states that revolutions that happen in underdeveloped countries do not happen in orderly steps; the proletariat should take power and will have to keep pushing forward to socialism, and the revolution must spread internationally to survive.
Trotsky preserves the programme at the level of principle, but moderates its realization through historically specific conditions. He suggested that the proletariat should democratically fight for things like land reform and national independence for these things to materialize. He also advocated for the adaptation of tactics depending on the situation and constraints.
Here is how Trotsky contradicts the programme even if he holds its principles. Invariance states that the programme applies everywhere, regardless of the conditions of a country, since the essence of fundamental relations of capitalism remains. The policies and priorities, such as gaining the immediate minimums (National Liberation, Land Reform, etc.), mediate the programme through historical conditions rather than the assertion of the maximal programme (Abolishment of classes, state, and capitalism). Revolution becomes conditioned by these mediations; even though it is not formally divided into stages (very ironic since Trotsky rejected the Mensheviks’ two-Stage Approach). Finally, the changing of tactics and strategies must always be subordinated to the invariant programme, as the adaptation of tactics always risks divorcing the programme by adaptation to the bourgeois state. This is why the permanent revolution by Trotsky risks reproducing the tendencies he tends to overcome.
“Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence. ”
— Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The German Ideology (1845-1846)
From the passages written by Marx and Engels, communism is a movement produced by the internal contradictions of capitalism itself. Via abolition, communism is not management, reformism, or the extension of the present state of things. Communism ends capitalist class relations. It is the negative picture of a capitalist society.¹
Therefore, the invariant programme is theorized by Bordiga to assert its goals, which are the destruction of capital; it is not revised to adapt and acquire immediate conditions, partial demands, or minimal stages of transition.
The contradictions of capital will soon produce an inevitable crisis that can lead to its destruction, however there is no predetermined time when it will collapse. Communist revolution is indeed destructive, not in a voluntarist way. Its devastation will soon come, driven by its own internal contradictions as described by Marx himself in Capital Vol 1.²
- Heisse, Fragments on Invariance (2025). When we speak of communism as a “stateless, moneyless, classless” society, we intuit that the communist program is an inverted picture of capitalist society, but that the categories proper to the capitalist mode of production are inadequate to capture the positive dimension of communism (that is, of communism in its “highest phase”)
- K. Marx, Capital: A Critique of Political Economy (1867). Along with the constantly diminishing number of the magnates of capital, who usurp and monopolise all advantages of this process of transformation, grows the mass of misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, exploitation; but with this too grows the revolt of the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disciplined, united, organised by the very mechanism of the process of capitalist production itself. The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished along with, and under it. Centralisation of the means of production and socialisation of labour at last reach a point where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. This integument is burst asunder. The knell of capitalist private property sounds. The expropriators are expropriated.
To prove that the programme is invariant, it must be tested on historical conditions, not just in theory alone. To further move the critique, let us see what happens when the party abandons the programme in a specific historical context. With that in mind, let us revisit the infamous historical defeats and what caused them to be defeated by the reactionary forces.
P.S. (Will be continued in the 2nd part).
Personal Notes:
I’d like to thank the left-communist comrades who helped me grasp the concepts of invariance. Without them, I would be unmotivated to read theoretical blocks of texts written by known Marxist theorists. Reading complicated theories with friends & comrades is really fun.
References:
Bordiga, A. (1953). The historical invariance of Marxism. International Communist Party. https://www.international-communist-party.org/basictexts/english/52HistIn.htm
Heisse. (2025). Fragments on invariance. Seenothing. https://seenothing.noblogs.org/2025/12/20/fragments-on-invariance
Marx, K. (1867). Capital: a critique of political economy. Marxist Internet Archive. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/
Marx, K., & Engels, F. (1845-1846). The German ideology. Marxist Internet Archive.https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/
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