Alexander Bogdanov

Bogdanov playing chess with Lenin during a visit to Gorky on Capri, Italy, April 1908.

Alexander Aleksandrovich Bogdanov (Александр Александрович Богданов; born Alyaksandr Malinovsky, Belarusian: Алякса́ндр Алякса́ндравіч Маліно́ўскі) (22 August 1873–7 April 1928) was a Russian physician, philosopher, science fiction writer, economist, culture theorist, and revolutionary of Belarusian ethnicity.

The polymath Bogdanov received training in medicine and psychiatry. His scientific interests ranged from the universal systems theory to the possibility of human rejuvenation through blood transfusion. He invented an original philosophy called tektology, now regarded as a forerunner of systems theory.

He was a key figure in the early history of the Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party, joining it in 1903 but expelled in 1909 after leading the ultra-left, boycottist (or ultimatist) tendency. He maintained that the party could only work through illegal organizations (due to the suppression of political parties during this period).

After 1911, he drifted from political activism to writing on philosophy, culture, and economics. Served as an Army doctor in WWI. He did not rejoin the Party, but after the October Revolution, he became an organizer and leader of Proletkult. After 1921, he left politics to work in the field of science while remaining a widely respected figure of Old Bolshevism. He died in April 1928 while experimenting with blood transfusions.

Literature

Red Star: The First Bolshevik Utopia, 1984. Download.

By Bogdanov

Non-fiction

Books

• Poznanie s istoricheskoi tochki zreniya [Познание с исторической точки зрения; Knowledge from a Historical Viewpoint], St. Petersburg, 1901, 217 pp. Self-published. (in Russian)
• Empiriomonizm: stat'i po filosofii [Эмпириомонизм: статьи по философии; Empirio-Monism: Articles on Philosophy], 3 Vols, Moscow: S. Dorovatovskiy and A. Charushnikov, 1904-06, 184+169+159 pp. (in Russian)
• Kul'turnye zadachi nashego vremeni [Культурные задачи нашего времени; The Cultural Tasks of Our Time], Moscow: S. Dorovatovskiy and A. Charushnikov, 1911, 92 pp. (in Russian)
• Filosofiya zhivogo opyta: populiarnye ocherki [Философия живого опыта: Популярные очерки: Материализм, эмпириокритицизм, диалектический материализм, эмпириомонизм, наука будущего; Philosophy of Living Experience: Popular Essays], St. Petersburg: M.I. Semenov, 1913, 272 pp. (in Russian)
• Vseobschaya organizatsionnaya nauka (Tektologiya) [Всеобщая организационная наука (Тектология); The Universal Science of Organization (Tektology)], Vol. 1, St. Petersburg: Semenov, 1913, 255 pp. (in Russian)
• Vseobschaya organizatsionnaya nauka (Tektologiya) [Всеобщая организационная наука (Тектология)], Vol. 2, Moscow, 1917, 153 pp. Self-published. (in Russian)
• Tektologiya: vseobschaya organizatsionnaya nauka [Тектология: Всеобщая организационная наука], 3 Vols, Berlin, Petrograd and Moscow: Z.I. Grzhebin, 1922, 530 pp. Vols 1-2 in 2nd ed., Volume 3 in 1st ed. (in Russian)
  • Essays in Tektology, trans. George Gorelik, Seaside, CA: Intersystems Publications, 1980, 265 pp; 2nd ed., 1984.
  • Tektologiya: vseobschaya organizatsionnaya nauka. Tom 1, Moscow: Ekonomika, 1989, 303 pp. (in Russian)
  • Tektologiya: vseobschaya organizatsionnaya nauka. Tom 2, Moscow: Ekonomika, 1989, 352 pp. (in Russian)
  • Bogdanov’s Tektology, Book 1, trans. Vadim N. Sadovsky, Andrei Kartashov, Vladimir V. Kelle and Peter Bystrov, ed. Peter Dudley, Hull: Centre for Systems Studies, University of Hull, 1996, 322 pp.
• A Short Course of Economics Science, trans. J. Fineberg, ed. S.M. Dvolaitsky, Communist Party of Great Britain, 1923; Revised ed., 1925.
• God raboty Instituta perelivanya krovi [Annals of the Institute of Blood Transfusion], Moscow, 1926-27. (in Russian)

Articles

• "Avtobiografia", in Entsiklopedicheskii slovar XLI, 1926, pp 29-34. (in Russian)
• "Ocherki organizatsionnoi nauki" [Очерки организационной науки], Proletarskaya kul'tura 7/8 (April-May 1919). (in Russian)
  • Essays in Organisation Science
• "Proletarian Poetry", Labour Monthly 4:5-6 (May-June 1923).
• "The Criticism of Proletarian Art" (from Kritika proletarskogo iskusstva, 1918), Labour Monthly 5:6 (December 1923).
• "Religion, Art and Marxism", Labour Monthly 6:8 (August 1924).
• "The Workers’ Artistic Inheritance", The Labour Monthly 6:9 (September 1924), pp 549-597.
• Bogdanov's articles published in the journal MIAB, 2000-05. (in Russian)

Bibliography

• On the website of the International Alexander Bogdanov Institute

Fiction

• Krasnaya zvezda [Красная звезда], St. Petersburg, 1908; 2nd ed., 1924. The second edition includes the poem "A Martian Stranded on Earth" about a Martian who has reached Earth but is unable to return to his native planet. where mankind has attained a superior level of communist civilization. (in Russian)
  • Red Star: The First Bolshevik Utopia, trans. Charles Rougle, eds. Loren R. Graham and Richard Stites, Indiana University Press, 1984. Contains also Engineer Menni and "A Martian Stranded on Earth".
• Inzhener Menni [Engineer Menni], Moscow: Izdanie S. Dorovatoskogo i A. Carushnikova, 1912. The title page carries the date 1913. A historical novel about the social revolution on Mars. (in Russian)

On Bogdanov

• V.I. Lenin, "Materialism and Empirio-Criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy" [1909; 1920], in Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 14, Moscow: Progress, 1972, pp 17-362. A polemic against Bogdanov and others, dealing with the influence of Positivism in the Bolshevik Party. Written during February to October 1908 in Geneva and London. Translated into over 20 languages.
• K. M. Jensen, Beyond Marx and Mach: Aleksandr Bogdanov’s Philosophy of Living Experience, Dordrecht, Boston and London: D. Reidel, 1978, 189 pp.
• Evald Ilyenkov, "Chapter 2. The Positive Programme of Russian Positivism", in Leninist Dialectics and the Metaphysics of Positivism [1979], New Park Publications, 1982. A study of the novel Red Star.
• George Gorelick, "Bogdanov's Tektology: Nature, Development and Influences", Studies in Soviet Thought, 26 (1983), pp 37-57.
• Zenovia Sochor, Revolution and Culture: The Bogdanov-Lenin Controversy, Cornell University Press, 1988.
• Russian Review, Vol. 49, No 3, Jul 1990, Special Issue on Alexander Bogdanov
• Peter Dudley, Simona Pustylnik, Reading The Tektology: provisional findings, postulates and research directions, Hull: Centre for Systems Studies, University of Hull, 1995.
• Simona Pustylnik, "Biological Ideas of Bogdanov's Tektology". Presented at the international conference, Origins of Organization Theory in Russia and the Soviet Union, University of East Anglia (Norwich), 8-11 January 1995.
• John Biggart, Georgii Gloveli, Avraham Yassour, Bogdanov and his Work. A guide to the published and unpublished works of Alexander A. Bogdanov (Malinovsky) 1873-1928, Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998.
• John Biggart, Peter Dudley, Francis King (eds.), Alexander Bogdanov and the Origins of Systems Thinking in Russia, Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998.
• David G. Rowley, "How Important Was Alexander Bogdanov?", H-Russia, May 2000. Double-review.
• Arran Gare, "Aleksandr Bogdanov and Systems Theory", Democracy & Nature, 2000.
• Stefan, "Bogdanov, technocracy and socialism", Socialist Standard 106:1232 (April 2007), p 10.
• M. E. Soboleva, A. Bogdanov und der philosophische Diskurs in Russland zu Beginn des 20. Jahrhunderts. Zur Geschichte des russischen Positivismus, Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 2007, 278 pp. (in German)
• McKenzie Wark, "Against Social Determinism", Public Seminar, 5 December 2013.

External links

• International Alexander Bogdanov Institute, Ekaterinburg. Bogdanov's biography.
• Alexander Bogdanov Archive at marxists.org
• Bogdanov in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction
• Portrait, 1895.
• Portrait, 1903.
• Bogdanov at Wikipedia