Editing Praxis (process) (section)

==Marxism==
{{Frankfurt School}}
[[Young Hegelian]] [[August Cieszkowski]] was one of the earliest philosophers to use the term ''praxis'' to mean "action oriented towards changing society" in his 1838 work ''[[Prolegomena zur Historiosophie]]'' (''Prolegomena to a Historiosophy'').<ref name=McLellan1>{{cite book |last=McLellan |first=David | author-link=David McLellan (political scientist) |date=1970 |title=The Young Hegelians and Karl Marx |location=London |publisher=McMillan and Co. | pages=10}}</ref> Cieszkowski argued that while absolute truth had been achieved in the speculative philosophy of [[Hegel]], the deep divisions and contradictions in man's consciousness could only be resolved through concrete practical activity that directly influences social life.<ref name=McLellan1 /> Although there is no evidence that [[Karl Marx]] himself read this book,<ref name=Petrovic1>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Petrovic |first=Gajo| author-link=Gajo Petrovic |editor1-last=Bottomore |editor1-first=Tom |editor1-link=Tom Bottomore |editor2-last=Harris |editor2-first=Laurence | editor3-last=Kiernan |editor3-first=V.G. | editor3-link=V. G. Kiernan | editor4-last=Miliband |editor4-first=Ralph |editor4-link=Ralph Miliband |encyclopedia=The Dictionary of Marxist Thought |title=Praxis | date=1991 | edition= Second | publisher=Blackwell Publishers Ltd. | isbn=0-631-16481-2 | pages=437}}</ref> it may have had an indirect influence on his thought through the writings of his friend [[Moses Hess]].<ref name=McLellan2>{{cite book |last=McLellan |first=David | author-link=David McLellan (political scientist) |date=1970 |title=The Young Hegelians and Karl Marx |location=London |publisher=McMillan and Co. | pages=11}}</ref><ref name=Avineri>{{cite book | last = Avineri | first = Shlomo | author-link=Shlomo Avineri |title= The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx |publisher= Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |year=1972 |pages=124–130 |isbn = 0-521-09619-7}}</ref>

[[File:PraxisGermany - Copy.png|thumb|upright=1.2|[[Anarchist]] banner in [[Dresden]], Germany, translating to "Solidarity must become praxis", 20 January 2020]]
Marx uses the term "praxis" to refer to the free, universal, creative and self-creative activity through which man creates and changes his historical world and himself.<ref name=Petrovic2>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Petrovic |first=Gajo| author-link=Gajo Petrovic |editor1-last=Bottomore |editor1-first=Tom |editor1-link=Tom Bottomore |editor2-last=Harris |editor2-first=Laurence | editor3-last=Kiernan |editor3-first=V.G. | editor3-link=V. G. Kiernan | editor4-last=Miliband |editor4-first=Ralph |editor4-link=Ralph Miliband |encyclopedia=The Dictionary of Marxist Thought |title=Praxis | date=1991 | edition= Second | publisher=Blackwell Publishers Ltd. | isbn=0-631-16481-2 | pages=435}}</ref> Praxis is an activity unique to man, which distinguishes him from all other beings.<ref name=Petrovic2 /> The concept appears in two of Marx's early works: the ''[[Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844]]'' and the [[Theses on Feuerbach]] (1845).<ref name=Petrovic1 /> In the former work, Marx contrasts the free, conscious productive activity of human beings with the unconscious, compulsive production of animals.<ref name=Petrovic1 /> He also affirms the primacy of praxis over theory, claiming that theoretical contradictions can only be resolved through practical activity.<ref name=Petrovic1 /> In the latter work, revolutionary practice is a central theme:

{{Quote
|text= The coincidence of the changing of circumstances and of human activity or self-change [Selbstveränderung] can be conceived and rationally understood only as revolutionary practice. (3rd thesis)<ref name=Marx>{{cite web |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm |title=Theses on Feuerbach |last=Marx |first=Karl |date=1845 |website=Marxists Internet Archive |publisher=Lawrence and Wishart  |access-date=1 December 2019}}</ref>
}}
{{Quote
|text=
All social life is essentially practical. All the mysteries which lead theory towards mysticism find their rational solution in human praxis and in the comprehension of this praxis. (8th thesis)<ref name=Marx>{{cite web |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm |title=Theses on Feuerbach |last=Marx |first=Karl |date=1845 |website=Marxists Internet Archive |publisher=Lawrence and Wishart  |access-date=1 December 2019}}</ref>
}}
{{Quote
|text=
Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it. (11th thesis)<ref name=Marx>{{cite web |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm |title=Theses on Feuerbach |last=Marx |first=Karl |date=1845 |website=Marxists Internet Archive |publisher=Lawrence and Wishart  |access-date=1 December 2019}}</ref>
}}

Marx here criticizes the [[materialist]] philosophy of [[Ludwig Feuerbach]] for envisaging [[object (philosophy)|objects]] in a contemplative way. Marx argues that perception is itself a component of man's practical relationship to the world. To understand the world does not mean considering it from the outside, judging it morally or explaining it scientifically. Society cannot be changed by reformers who understand its needs, only by the revolutionary praxis of the mass whose interest coincides with that of society as a whole—the [[proletariat]]. This will be an act of society understanding itself, in which the [[subject (philosophy)|subject]] changes the object by the very fact of understanding it.<ref name=Kołakowski1>{{cite book
|last=Kołakowski
|first=Leszek
|author-link=Leszek Kołakowski
|year=1978a
|title=Main Currents of Marxism, Vol. 1: The Founders
|location=Oxford
|publisher=Clarendon Press
|isbn=0-19-824547-5
|pages=142–144
}}</ref>

Seemingly inspired by the Theses, the nineteenth century [[socialist]] [[Antonio Labriola]] called [[Marxism]] the "philosophy of praxis".<ref name=Petrovic3>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Petrovic |first=Gajo| author-link=Gajo Petrovic |editor1-last=Bottomore |editor1-first=Tom |editor1-link=Tom Bottomore |editor2-last=Harris |editor2-first=Laurence | editor3-last=Kiernan |editor3-first=V.G. | editor3-link=V. G. Kiernan | editor4-last=Miliband |editor4-first=Ralph |editor4-link=Ralph Miliband |encyclopedia=The Dictionary of Marxist Thought |title=Praxis | date=1991 | edition= Second | publisher=Blackwell Publishers Ltd. | isbn=0-631-16481-2 | pages=438}}</ref> This description of Marxism would appear again in [[Antonio Gramsci]]'s ''[[Prison Notebooks]]''<ref name=Petrovic3 /> and the writings of the members of the [[Frankfurt School]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/horkheimer/|title=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy|first=J.C.|last=Berendzen|editor-first=Edward N.|editor-last=Zalta|date=18 May 2017|publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University|access-date=18 May 2017|via=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy}}</ref><ref name=Petrovic4>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Petrovic |first=Gajo| author-link=Gajo Petrovic |editor1-last=Bottomore |editor1-first=Tom |editor1-link=Tom Bottomore |editor2-last=Harris |editor2-first=Laurence | editor3-last=Kiernan |editor3-first=V.G. | editor3-link=V. G. Kiernan | editor4-last=Miliband |editor4-first=Ralph |editor4-link=Ralph Miliband |encyclopedia=The Dictionary of Marxist Thought |title=Praxis | date=1991 | edition= Second | publisher=Blackwell Publishers Ltd. | isbn=0-631-16481-2 | pages=438–439}}</ref> Praxis is also an important theme for Marxist thinkers such as [[Georg Lukács]], [[Karl Korsch]], [[Karel Kosik]] and [[Henri Lefebvre]], and was seen as the central concept of Marx's thought by Yugoslavia's [[Praxis School]], which established a journal of that name in 1964.<ref name=Petrovic4 />