Marxism

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Marxism definition

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A system of economic, social, and political philosophy based on ideas that view social change in terms of economic factors.

A central tenet is that the means of production is the economic base that influences or determines the political life.

Under Marxism, outdated class structures were supposed to be overthrown with force (revolution) instead of being replaced through patient modification. It held that as capitalism has succeeded feudalism, it too will be removed by a dictatorship of the workers (proletariat) called socialism, followed quickly and inevitably by a classless society which governs itself without a governing class or structure.

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Draw the figure of share of wealth of the two classes in capitalist society according to Marx

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Figure 1: The capitalist society according to Karl Marx

Figure 2: Indicates the ideal society according to Karl Marx. There is no gap between the rich and the poor and there is abundant supply of materialistic wealth.

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Reasons for the evolution of Marxism

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- During the Industrial Revolution, very few people became enormously rich.

* Most stayed poor.

* There was a uneven distribution of wealth.

* Many felt the only way to change was to take over ownership of the means of production. (capital and equipment used to produce and exchange goods)

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Frederick Engels-1848

- Communist Manifesto

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- Based on his observations he developed the theory in law (Marxism) that was developed from studies of economic and social patterns.

- It was based on the belief that socialism is established as society leaps forward,and everyone has plenty of personal possessions, but no one is able to exploit others for their own benefits.

- Reformism was built upon this concept, also known as social democracy that supported WWI.

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Communist Manifesto

- by Karl Marx & Frederick Engels

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1. Abolition of property

2. Heavy, progressive taxes

3. Abolition of inheritance

4. Confiscation of property of all emigrants and rebels

5. Central banking

6. State-controlled communication and transportation

7. State-controlled education of the children

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Class Struggle

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- Marx believed that history involved inequality.

* Struggle between the owners, or bourgeoisie and the working class, or Proletariat.

* All wealth is made by labor.–Labor only get a small fraction of wealth.

* Eventually the world would be controlled by a small number of capitalist.

* Governments needed to be controlled by force.

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Lenin

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Lenin thought that there was no way to get the workers to stand up for themselves and they would therefore need a political party—"the Vanguard Party"—not only to educate them, but to lead them in the revolution and in running the government

In this way, government would not be comprised of self-governing communities of workers, as the original term "communism" implies, but by a central planning institution run by the Vanguard Party.

Lenin gave up on the notion of a moneyless society because, he found, money was required to control transactions and, more importantly, to figure out how valuable our work actually is to society.

It quickly became apparent that idea that people would only take what they need and share, particularly in times of scarcity like at the end of WWI, was just wishful thinking.

Greed was a problem. And not only that, without a way to keep track of who was getting what and how much of it they were getting, it was too difficult for the central planning institution to determine what to produce, what training to give to the working class, what production facilities to build, what resources to acquire, etc.. And with this he gave up on the notion of society without private property, gradually allowing more and more private property that was not and could not become income producing or vital to state interests. (referring to being able to own everything from clothing to dinnerware, but not real estate, shops, factories, or farms.)

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Trotsky

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Trotsky's focus was more on revolution. He believed that there should be a permanent revolution. In short, according to Marx, in order for a society to undergo a (Marxist) communist revolution, the society would first have to industrialize from a more feudal aristocratic state.

The feudal aristocracy carry its politico-socio-economic advantage into the industrial era by being able to buy or pay laborers to build factories, mills, etc., and then pay workers to work in them. Only once the separation of labor and ownership of the means of production (e.g. factories) became severe would the workers revolt. As such, Marx required two steps: polarized industrialization and revolution.

Trotsky, however, thought that the communist world could force or create conditions to empower the working class in the not yet polarized and/or industrialized world, thereby spreading the revolution beyond its traditional borders. This would put the workers of the communist countries into an almost permanent revolution as even once they won their revolution at home, they would need to carry it on to other countries.

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Stalin

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Stalinist Communism stands out from the others in a few ways, and the main reason for this is that it was brought about in response to actually trying to implement Marxist-Leninist Communism and Permanent Revolution.

There was a Vanguard Party, which centrally planned everything. There was Permanent Revolution. However, both of these were different. The Vanguard Party was comprised of supporters of Stalinist ideology only. Anyone else was eliminated. And while there was permanent revolution, Stalin still believed a country would need to go through the stages of developing nationalism in order to industrialize, then developing proletarianism (worker-ism) once industrialized. As such, he tried to spread both stages, rapidly spreading nationalism by classifying people into new nations and then rapidly industrializing those nations. (Unfortunately, this was easy to for him to do given that anyone who refused to support the part of fit into a newly invented nation were forced to work in labor camps to build industrial facilities and equipment.)

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Evgeny Pashukanis

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Pashukanis set out to model his theory on the framework that Marxhad employed in Volume I of Capital which opens with a rigorous discussion of theconcept “commodity” (Marx, 1970 , ch. 1); he sought to explain “the deep interconnection between the legal form and the commodity form” and for this reason his theory is often referred to as the “commodity form” theory

His key proposition was that “the legal relation between subjects is simply the reverse side of the relation between products of labour which have become commodities”

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Criticism of Marxism

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1. The “over-concentration” on economic relationships (considered by Marxists to be the most important basic relationships in society) has lead to a number of criticisms:

a. Marxism is accused of being "economically determinist". That is, the idea that Marxists over-exaggerate the importance of economic relationships; relationships that are seen to determine the shape taken by all other relationships (family, education,friendship, religious and so forth).

b. By concentrating upon economic relationships and conflicts Marxists tend to either overlook other forms of (non-economic) conflict or attempt to explain these conflicts as ultimately having economic roots.

Radical feminists, for example, argue that the roots of male - female conflict are not simply economic (to do with social class) but patriarchal.

2. The subjective interpretations of individuals is under-emphasised when looking at the way in which people see and act in the social world. A person's subjective interpretation of their class, for example, might be quite different to their objective class position.

3. Capitalism, as an economic and political system, has proven to be more durable and flexible than Marx maintained. In modern social systems, for example, the advent of Communism does not appear imminent.

4. Many forms of Neo-Marxism have been criticised (usually by other Marxists) as being little more than a "left-wing" variety of Functionalism ("Left Functionalism" as Jock Young has termed it). In place of society existing for "the benefit of all", Young argues that many Marxists simply substitute the idea that society exists for "benefit of a ruling class").

5. Some forms of Neo-Marxism resemble little more than a giant "conspiracy theory",whereby a Capitalist Ruling Class are able to manipulate other classes in society for their own ends / benefits.

6. Critics like Sir Karl Popper have claimed that Marxism is unscientific in its methodology.(Marx was a false prophet for his theory insisted upon changing the whole of an existing society) In particular, he argues that Marxism is not a theory that can be tested and possibly falsified, mainly because it sees the replacement of Capitalism by Communism as "historically inevitable". In this respect, Popper classifies Marxism as a“faith”.

7. The Marxist perspective lends itself to always examining social relationships in terms of their conflictual basis (just as the Functionalist perspective tends to look at those same relationships in terms of their consensual basis). This emphasis might be misplaced.

8. Much Marxism - both old and modern - has tended to ignore the role and position of women in society. Women tend to be marginalized to the periphery of much Marxist theorising, possibly because of the focus upon work relationships. This criticism is probably not as valid now as it once was