Introduction

This chapter argues that the science of history has been misrepresented by postmodernists as a monolithic relic of modernity. If history and event are seen not as binary opposites but as a complementary pair, then both classical Marxism and a strand of French theory after Louis Althusser offer unique sciences of history. Although there is greater stress on historical discontinuity in post-Althusserian theory, this body of contemporary thought has commitments consistent with the Marxist understanding of revolution as a quantity to quality leap. The political stakes of Marxist and post-Althusserian theories are then introduced. The Hegelian influence on Marxism is presented as supporting political gradualism and technological determinism. Althusser is shown to set in motion a self-referential rationalism that shores up the authority of theorists. Chapter abstracts follow.