itself to the belief that, although France’s military victory was necessary for her economic development, Napoleon’s military genius was unnecessary for France’s military victory.
What, then, accounts for the glorious record of success that blessed French arms? According to Plechanov, “The French Republic would have emerged victorious from the wars it waged at that time because its soldiers were incomparably the best in Europe.”[1] Note two things. Plechanov’s explanation is military. He does not claim that the superiority of the French soldier was the inescapable consequence of the state of French productive forces. Second, the same incomparable French soldiers lost battles when they were commanded by other generals and won them when they were commanded by Napoleon. Something more than legend must account for the almost unanimous judgment of military authorities of all countries that Napoleon was the greatest military genius in modern history.
Despite anything that may be said about Napoleon, Plechanov clings firmly to the belief that like all men of talent he is “the product of social relations.” Talented people can influence only individual features of particular events but not their general trend, for “they are themselves the product of this trend.” This is true not only in politics, war, and social relations but in art, science, and literature. “Here too,” he concludes, “in the last analysis, everything [!] depends upon the course of social development and on the relation of social forces.”[2]
Plechanov has come the full circle—despite the heterodox epicycles—from dogma to dogma. ····· Its inadequacies notwithstanding, social determinism has left a permanent deposit on the thought patterns of our time. We must assess the value of this deposit before we can carry our theme forward. It is clear that, as long as scholarship remains free and is not gleichgeschaltet, the naïve glorification of the hero as the creator of an age will no longer have any intellectual standing. The hero will always be taken with his time and his problems. But is this all that has been won by social determinism? Or is the heritage of social determinism, purified of its extreme versions, richer and more usable than this?
