Abstract

Vast is the Marxist literature on Marxist political errors, but limited is the Marxist understanding of Marxist fallibility, that is, of the liability to commit political errors. Likewise, the simpler varieties of left-wing dogmatism have been well studied, but little is understood of that self-mystifying thinking whereby non-dogmatic and non-doctrinaire revolutionaries end up being the victims of collective political self-mystifications which are the prime instantiations of political fallibility. ;The present work studies self-mystification and fallibility as coterminous and brings out the intrinsic relation between fallibility and the higher form of dogmatism, namely self-mystifying thinking. The discussion includes a systematic critique of the prevailing styles of political error-analysis and underlines their truncated and reductive nature. ;The issue of fallibility and dogmatism is then discussed in relation to the theory of revolutionary organization and revolutionary consciousness, with particular attention being given to the New Left's attempt to come to terms with this issue. ;Finally, the notions of a critique of political fallibility and of a politico-existential project informed by this critique are discussed in terms of the notion of self-demystifying revolutionary praxis