Abstract

This translation provides a Portuguese version of “The History of Dialectics”, written by Herbert Marcuse. The original was published as an encyclopedia entry on “Dialectics”, in Marxism, Communism, and Western Societies: A Comparative Encyclopaedia (New York: Herder and Herder, 1972). It starts by presenting a detailed analysis of “The Significance of Dialectics in Ancient Philosophy”, since Zeno, the Sophists and Socrates to Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and Plotinus. Further on, Marcuse writes a section on “The Significance of Dialectics in Kant, Fichte and Hegel”; he finally concludes with an approach to “The Meaning and Significance of Dialectics in Marx”, the only philosopher who was bestowed with a whole section. Overall, this text exhibits a very comprehensive, qualified analysis of the history of dialectics and reveals Marcuse as a first-rated philosophical scholar in the concept of dialectics.