The Basic Tenets of Marxism Power Point

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The Basic Tenets of Marxism

“The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.”





I. History and Class Struggle(Historical Materialism)

• Human history is the history of class struggles among the classesin society.

• A class is defined by the relations of its members to the means of production .

• Me ans of productio n - the combination of the means of labor andthe subject of labor used by workers to make products.

- Means of labor include machines, tools, factory andequipment, infrastructure, and so on:

- Subject of labor includes raw materials and materialsdirectly taken from nature.

- Means of production by themselves produce nothing -- labor is needed for production to take place.

http://www.answers.com/topic/subject-of-labor

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• The class struggles that define humanhistory in each of its stages is betweenthose that own the means of production

and those that work the means of production.




Stages of History:• Primitive communism – equalitarian hunting and

gathering / tribal organizations

• Slave society – largely agricultural production done byslaves for slave owners

• Feudalism – largely agricultural production done byserfs, indentured servants, slaves for large landowners

- within feudalism, trade expands leading tomerchants (bourgeoisie) / increased use of money




• Capitalism - Economic system in which most of the means of production are privately owned, and production is guided andincome distributed largely through the operation of markets.

- Based open competition, profit motive.

- Encourages private investment and business,compared to a government-controlled economy.

- Investors in these private companies (i.e.shareholders) also own the firms and are known as

capitalists.

- The first Industrial Revolution took place under capitalism.Marx lived from 1818-1883.




• Under capitalism , the capitalists own themeans of production , the proletariat ownonly their capacity to work.

• Landlords rule the land, and the peasants are less significant than workers and aretrapped in the idiocy of rural life .



I. History and Class Struggle:Class Consciousness

• Prior to the overthrow of capitalism the proletariat mustdevelop its own class consciousness . Other classes havetheir own forms of class consciousness.

• Television, literature, art, music and other forms of culture tend to reflect the class ideology of the class towhich the artist belongs. However, the ideology of otherclasses can also affect the artist.

• Class hatred is good. Class collaboration is a bad.



II. Revolutionary Change

• New classes usually win power by revolution .Revolutions are violent, because the dying ruling classdoesn't give up power without a desperate struggle.

• The capitalist class wins power over the feudal class by abourgeois democratic revolution . A bourgeois democraticrevolution is a progressive step in the right direction.For Marxists, it is not an end-all stage.

- French Revolution

- Revolutions of 1830 / 1848




• The proletariat wins power by a proletarian revolution. According to Marx and Lenin, this revolution must beviolent, because the bourgeoisie won't give up power byelectoral means.

• The proletariat will then begin constructing socialism,destroying the bourgeoisie and eliminating classdifferences in the process.

- This period is also known as “the dictatorship of the proletariat.”

• The final stage, the end of history is a classless society – communism .




• Socialism - The main feature is mixed ownership of the means of production (with an emphasis on public),distribution and exchange .

- In the first stages of socialism the state is adictatorship of the proletariat., i.e. theproletariat rules the other classes byforce.

- The socialist slogan is "From each according to his ability, to each according to his work."




• Communism - a system of social organization in which property(especially real property and the means of production) is held incommon.

- the movement that aims to overthrow the capitalist order

by revolutionary means and to establish a classless society inwhich all goods will be socially owned.

- a system of government in which the state plans and controlsthe economy and a single, often authoritarian party holdspower, claiming to make progress toward a higher social

order in which all goods are equally shared by the people.

- The communist slogan is "From each according to his ability,to each according to his needs."

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• Originally, proletarian (socialist) revolutions weresupposed to occur first in the most advancedcapitalist countries, e.g. Germany, Great Britain,the United States, France, Belgium, the

Netherlands.

• It wasn't supposed to occur first in a backward

country like Russia, where capitalism barely took root, there was a tiny proletariat, anunderdeveloped bourgeoisie and no bourgeoisdemocratic revolution.




• None of the former or current socialistcountries (Russia, China, Cuba, NorthKorea, Vietnam) had undergone a

bourgeois-democratic revolution when thecommunists seized power. Thecommunists tried to build socialismanyway, and some of their leftist rivals

used the missing bourgeois-democratic revolution to predict that communistpower would end badly.



III. Marxist Economics

• Under capitalism, workers "tend" to bepaid the bare amount required for them tosupport their families and reproduce. This

is because of competition for jobs fromthe reserve army of labor , i.e. theunemployed.




• The capitalist sells the product of theworkers' labor at a price proportional to itsvalue , which is the socially necessary labor

required to produce it.

• The difference between what the product

sells for and what the workers are paid issurplus value and is appropriated by thecapitalist.




• Because the workers can't buy the full product of theirlabor and the capitalists don't consume all the surplusvalue, there tend to be recessions.

- This is one of the major reasons why capitalistcountries sought overseas colonies during theIndustrial Revolution > Imperialism.

• The steady increase in labor saving machinery createsunemployment and drives down wages. This emphasizesthe tendency for there to be economic recessions.




• The tendency to pay the workers bare subsistencewages leads to the increasing impoverishment of the proletariat .

• As a small number of people become super wealthy, aneven greater number become impoverished, polarizingthe classes.

- “The middle classes must increasingly disappear until the world is divided into millionaires and paupers.”

(Friedrich Engels)



IV. The State

• The state is the means whereby the ruling class forcibly maintains its rule over the other classes.

• During socialism, the workers will take control of the state to begin the construction communism> “dictatorship of the proletariat.”

• Communism , which evolves peacefully fromsocialism, is a classless society under which thestate will wither away.



V. Religion

• God is created in the image of man, not man in the image of God.

• Organized religions have been used to give the poor and oppressedhope that their afterlife will be better than their current one.

• Religion and the Church have been used as forms of social controlto preserve the power of the ruling class.

• With the establishment of communism, the necessity to believe inGod and a better life in heaven will disappear. “Heaven will becreated on Earth.”

- Marx believed religion would eventually wither away. Violentmeans to suppress organized religion need not be taken.

- “Religion is the opiate of the masses.”



VI. Marxist Revisionists:Trade Unionists

• Trade unions are good as training groundsfor the class struggle, but it is capitalistideology to suppose that they can make

any permanent improvement in thecondition of the proletariat.

• The belief that trade unions can make apermanent difference is a heresy calledeconomism or trade-unionism.



VI. Marxist Revisionists:Eduard Bernstein (1850-1932)

• Argued that it waspossible for workers towin power peacefully bywinning elections.

Revolution was notnecessary.

• This was revisionism and

the orthodox Marxisthave used revisionism asan epithet ever since.



VII. Marxism-Leninism




• Imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism.

- The working class in the mother countries isbribed to keep it passive by exploiting the labor

of the colonies . This explains why theworking class became more prosperous in the late19th and early 20th centuries instead of becoming more miserable as a direct reading of Marxist theory might suggest.

- The rivalry of the colonial countries becomes moreand more intense leading to imperialist wars . WWIwas a prime example.




• The working class needs to be led by avanguard party , i.e. the Communist Party which in turn is led by professional

revolutionaries.

• The leadership of the working class by thevanguard party continues into the periodof socialism.



VII. Stalinism

• Socialism in One Country

- The Soviet Union should concentrate its forces on building

socialism within the country first because worldwide

revolution is not imminent.



VII. Maoism

• Mao believed that in a country likeChina, the revolution couldproceed first in the countrysidewhich would surround the cities.

• The peasants, not the workers,could lead a socialist revolution.

• emphasized class struggle withinsocialism and its evolution

towards communism to be playedout in a series of cultural revolutions .



VII. Leninist Revisionists:Fidel Castro & Che Guevara

• Socialist revolution DOESNOT have to be led by aCommunist Party.

• Socialist revolution can beled by peasants.

• Soviet Union is obligated to

aid all revolutionary socialistcountries looking to break away from imperialistdomination (Guevara).



VII. Marxist-Leninist Revisionists:Kim Il Sung

• Juche – “self -reliance”

• A blend of Marxism-Leninism withKorean nationalism.

• Adaptation of Marxism-Leninismto Korean conditions.

• Self-reliance--the need to rely ondomestic resources, heightenvigilance against possibleexternal challenges, andstrengthen domestic politicalsolidarity.

• Sacrifice, austerity, unity, andpatriotism became dominantthemes

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The Basic Tenets of Marxism Power Point