In the beginning was the work : Donald MacKinnon's metaphysics after Lenin

Abstract

Donald MacKinnon expressed a distinctly realist and actualist metaphysic. One aspect of his metaphysics that is less frequently commented upon, however, is his reception of Vladimir Lenin. While not an unqualified admirer of Bolshevism, it is readily apparent that MacKinnon incorporated elements of Lenin’s philosophy and theories regarding practice into his critique of idealism and his Christology also. Beginning with the writings of Lenin himself, and tracing this influence throughout MacKinnon’s oeuvre, we give the most expansive treatment to date of MacKinnon’s reception of Lenin, showing that there is a coherency in his reception of Lenin with his philosophical realism and actualist metaphysics more generally. This can be seen especially in the way that he reads Leninist philosophical tactics as a variety of metaphysical actualism, insofar as revolutionary agency and freedom may exceed reductionist accounts of historical causality or spiritual idealisation. The burgeoning forth of new options and circumstances as a result of revolutionary action, coupled with his belief in the primacy of resurrection, hereby undermines any pseudo-tragic or culturally pessimistic reading of MacKinnon’s trajectory.