The Role of Consciousness in Marx's Theory of History

In the preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy we have Marx's famous phrase "it is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being which determines their consciousness."[1] Again in the German Ideology we find Marx saying that "life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life"[2] and that "consciousness is, therefore, from the very beginning a social product, and remains so as long as men exist at all. . . . moreover, it is quite immaterial what consciousness starts to do on its own."(3] Finally, in the Communist Manifesto Marx asks rhetorically "does it require deep intuition to comprehend that man's ideas, views and conceptions, in a word, man's consciousness, changes with every change in the conditions of his material existence, in his social relations and in his social life?"(4] These well-worn phrases of Marx have been cited by many a writer who in attempting to explicate Marx's materialist conception of history have concluded that with Marx consciousness has exactly the opposite role that it had for Hegel. Whereas Hegel treated nature as a shadowy product of mind (Geist) Marx treats consciousness as a more or less epiphenomenal manisfestation of material forces--a manifestation which at best can have the quality of being a mirror-image of reality, but which oftentimes functions as an illusion when it, attributes to itself causal powers which are really attributable to material forces. Marx himself seems to give credence to this interpretation when in the 1872 afterword to Capital he states that: