From “Economic Base” to “Economic Order”: Ehrlich’s Inheritance and Criticism of Marx’s Legal Thought

The terms “economic base” and “economic order” reflect the difference in class positions between Marx and Ehrlich. Although his “living law” is very similar to the basic principle of historical materialism, and Ehrlich also gave historical materialism a very high evaluation; however, in order to avoid Marx’s method of class analysis, and highlight the dynamic role of the law, he used “economic order” instead of “economic base” to describe the relationship between economy and law. Ehrlich believes that law, as an important norm for the maintenance of social order, plays an important role in the formation and development of the economic order, and it protects the interests of the general public rather than just the ruling class. It is easy to see that Ehrlich’s effort to replace the “economic base” with the “economic order” was based on a “misreading” of Marx from the outset. Marx and others saw the reaction of law to the economic base; more importantly, private law, as an important part of the legal system, has always been closely related to the economic base. Therefore, as long as it is within the analytical framework of the historical materialism, the bourgeois law cannot get rid of its class “brand”.