ABSTRACT
This article aims to reconstruct the prehistory of the Althusserian reformulation of dialectical materialism in an epistemological key. Through the study of the pioneering work carried out in the 1930s by the intellectuals of the Cercle de la Russie Neuve, the aim is to grasp, on the one hand, the extent to which their reinterpretation of Marx on the basis of the Hegelian philosophy of nature, as distinct from the Engelsian ontologizing of the dialectic, anticipates Althusserian thought and, on the other, the reasons for the repression with this attempt was subsequently crushed, also due to Althusser himself. The conclusion is that a new alliance between Althusser’s epistemology and Hegel’s philosophy would be able to re-establish the properly political scope of the relative autonomy of theory, i.e. to address the relationship between truth, history and politics in a new way.
Keywords:
Althusser; Dialectical materialism; Hegelism; Historical epistemology; Philosophy of nature; Marxism