Revolutionary ends must already be present in the means and in the revolutionaries.
Evidence
However, the dialectical logic insists, against the language of brute facts and ideology, that the slaves must be free for their liberation before they can become free, and that the end must be operative in the means to attain it. Marx’s proposition that the liberation of the working class must be the action of the working class itself states this a priori. Socialism must become reality with the first act of the revolution because it must already be in the consciousness and action of those who carried the revolution. — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 212
Categorization
- DEFINE: Concise statement of the dialectical principle that means must prefigure ends — the core of Marcuse’s anti-educational-dictatorship logic.
- XREF: Directly engages the Frankfurt School volume’s discussion of Marcuse’s 1968 ‘educational dictatorship’ dilemma and its rejection by student radicals. — connects to: Emancipatory ends must already be operative in the means that achieve them.; Revolutionaries can unconsciously retain the oppressor within themselves. — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 627; A partially victorious revolutionary movement must keep its radical missionaries active. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting…, 382 (+2 more)
Broader Connections
- Emancipatory ends must already be operative in the means that achieve them.
#corroborates(0.97) - Revolutionaries can unconsciously retain the oppressor within themselves.
#expands(0.78) — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 627 - Continuing dialogue is what prevents a revolution from hardening into counter-revolutionary bureaucracy.
#expands(0.75) — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 442 - A partially victorious revolutionary movement must keep its radical missionaries active.
#expands(0.74) — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 382 - Revolution must not exhaust itself in revenge against oppressors.
#expands(0.72) — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 599