With this influential pamphlet, Engels set out to make the definitive introduction to scientific socialism. Basing it on the three chapters from his book Herrn Eugen Dühring's Umwälzung der Wissenschaft (1878) – also known as Anti-Dühring – he here wished to reproduce the most topical excerpt from the theoretical section of the book, that of strictly scientific socialism. Engels put them together himself and asked Paul Lafargue (1842-1911), Karls Marx' son-in-law, to translate the work into French and add some extra remarks.

Anti-Dühring had been serialized in a German newspaper between 1877 and 1878 as a polemical response to the works of Eugen Dühring (1833-1921) – a philosophy lecturer at the University of Berlin, whose brand of socialism was making significant inroads into German social democracy. He criticized Marx and Engel's centralism and economic determinism, while proposing a gradualist political programme (Hunt 2009: 295). Engels' response "went beyond the usual Marx-Engels invective into a broader definition and defence 'of the dialectical method and the communist world outlook' [...]. All of Engel's great gifts as a propagandist and popularizer were on display as he countered the allure of Dühring with a pacey, engaging and comprehensible explanation of the science of Marxism" (Hunt 2009: 296).

The reception of the pamphlet was a success: Engels "proudly described it making a 'regular revolution' and 'tremendous impression' in France." (2009: 300) As the French translation proved to be extremely popular and gained a widespread audience, Engels considered it important to translate it into other languages as well, turning it into a veritable propaganda pamphlet. Indeed, the work became extremely popular and was translated into numerous languages, exercising profound influence upon the theory of socialism throughout Europe.

OCLC locates merely two copies in libraries worldwide, both being in Denmark.

References and further reading:

Gissurarson, Hannes Hólmsteinn. (2021). Communism in Iceland, 1918–1998. Reykjavik: Social Science Research Institute at the University of Iceland. (tilføjes 63244)

The Frock-Coated Communist: The Revolutionary Life of Friedrich Engels. London: Allen Lane.

Guðmundsson, Steinþór.  (1928). Fr. Engels. Þróun jafnaðarstefnunnar. Rjettur: Tímarit um þjóðfelags- og menningarmál , 13. árg. 1928, 1. hefti, pp. 125.26. https://timarit.is/page/4089270#page/n122/mode/2up