Ο κύκλος και το τετράγωνο. Σχετικά με τη διπλή ζωή της ιστορικής πραγματικότητας

Abstract

The article is a critique and an overview of the romantic approach to Greek historiography on industry and the role of working people in society. Starting with the principle of reality, the article assesses those studies that substitute historical reality with approaches that usually serve the ideological needs of the researchers involved. The reference to historical materialism, which takes place regardless of the historical data, creates a serious gap between the desires Of romantic historians, political scientists and sociologists and the historical reality which is the outcome of the principle of reality of historical science. These romantic approaches present an agricultural society as if it had experienced the processes of the industrial revolution i.e. the development of the industrial sector, working class and other processes involved. Thus, these studies tend to attribute every oddity to the peripheral character of Greece, to the imperfect composition of the bourgeoisie etc. These approaches to history based on ideological and political views lead to such an extreme neglect of historical reality that this romantic historiography tends to function as a mechanism of control of science and they cancel out its capacity to criticize and enlighten.