Universal History (Marx Vs. Hegel)

Essay IV: Universal History (Marx v Hegel) The view of history as universal was a turning point for historians, who had until that point had a more isolated view of history, wherein it related to a single place and the series of events taking place there. Universal history described the history of the human race as a whole, and while this idea had been around since the time of the Romans, it become more developed in the nineteenth century. Two prominent proponents of this were German philosophers Karl Marx and Georg Hegel. While the two shared the view of a history that encompassed all of man, they differed in the details of their theories. Marx viewed history as a cyclical series of class struggles, while Hegel instead saw history as the linear evolution of a world mind toward ultimate consciousness. They also differed in that Marx saw history as events spurred by humans, while Hegel believed that the hand of God was played a key role in guiding history. Hegel saw history as a “necessary development, out of the concept of the mind’s freedom alone, of the . . . self-consciousness and freedom of mind.” History is the mind “clothing itself with the form of events,” specifically the world mind clothing itself as it develops further and further towards freedom and self-consciousness. The world mind is the …show more content…
This would not have been possible without the work of German historian Leopold von Ranke. He redefined history as a science, revolutionizing the subject through works of his such as Histories of the Latin and Germanic Nations , and causing history to be adopted by universities throughout the world. Yet historians after von Ranke have been critiquing him mercilessly ever since, such as Paul Veyne with his book Writing History: Essays on Historiography (1984). Veyne criticizes von Ranke for assuming that history can be completely and accurately