I offer this up with an attempt to clear up the
misconceptions of Marxism. The first point which I brought up
in the post about “what gets my goat” is Karl Marx was an economist.
He thought in terms of the economic. His vision of the future was an
economic one, not a political one. So he created Marxism as an economic
vision. He never had any thought about turning it into a political system.
What this means is any attempt to turn it into a political system a la stalinism
and Leninism are by definition different then Marxism. As marxism is an economic
system it can be pared with any political system. thus we can have Marxism matched
with the political system called democracy. In fact, we can mix and match any political system
with any economic system. So on the left side we have the political systems which are democracy,
dictatorships, anarchism, oligarchy, theocracies, Communism and monarchies and on the right side we
have the economic systems which are hunter-gather, feudalism, slavery, mercantilism,
capitalism and Marxism. We can mix and match any left side political system with
any right side economic system. Clearly some matches work better then others.
Now the soviet union was communism stretched out into both a political and economic system
and thus we can see why it failed. Marxism has never been tried anywhere in the world.
(by the way, anarchism was tried and was very successful during the Spanish civil war of
the 1930’s until stamped out in 1938 by Franco’s forces)The basic premise of Marx
is this idea of profit and who got the profit. In the business world, you got a business.
the business overhead equals $5 (for demonstration purposes only we are keeping it simple)
and the labor cost of one worker name Bob, is $5, thus the businesses cost is $10, the businessman
then charges $20 for the item made by Bob and the difference is $10. That difference is called profit.
The business owner then gets that $10. Here is where marxism stands in.
Why does the business owner get the $10? He didn’t make the item out of his hard work and sweat, Bob did.
Yet Bob will only get a fraction of the profit. Think in terms of Bob actually creating every hour $50 dollars of profit
for the owner, yet Bob will still get his $5 bucks and only $5 bucks while the owner gets every thing over and above
that original $10 dollars cost. Marx said let us remove the owner who is making his money on the hard work of Bob
and the actually creator of the item in question should get the profit which is Bob. So by removing the ownership class
you actually give the profit to those who actually do the work, the so called worker class. That is Marxism in a nutshell.
Nothing political in that at all and that is why it is not a political theory but an economic theory.
The means of production is owned by the worker, the very statement from Marx. He who does the work get the profit.
is a short hand version. So marxism is simply a question of who gets the profit, the do-nothing owner or the hard working
Bob. And that boys and girls is Marxism, pure and simple. There is no question of human nature in any of this.
It is simply a question of who gets the profit. Ta-da.
One thing I don’t get about Marxism, is why does it have to be about an economic system for like, the whole nation? Couldn’t some company in the US just spring up and decide to operate under the Marxist set up described in the opening post without any change to American law or the American way of life for the rest of us?
1Samuel8;]The business owner gets the $10 profit and Bob gets his $5 because everybody agreed to those terms.
K: these are the only terms offer by anybody.It is inherent within capitalism and one of the major failings of capitalism.
Edit: upon reflection, I must say, bob must agree to these terms. He has no other choice. He will not
get any better deal under capitalism. He does not have any other options.
Peter Kropotkin"]Yet Bob will only get a fraction of the profit."
1Sam – and Bob only took a fraction of the risk."
K: not at all. isn’t it a risk to begin a job? A worker risk just as much as the owner.
The owner risk is what exactly? Money? That risk is fairly minimal for most people. Most people I know
who start a business even if the business fails still wind up breaking even or or with a small loss. Rarely
does starting a new business completely financially destroy a person such as losing your home or the like.
The risk you talk about is minimal at best.
Uccisore":One thing I don’t get about Marxism, is why does it have to be about an economic system for like, the whole nation? Couldn’t some company in the US just spring up and decide to operate under the Marxist set up described in the opening post without any change to American law or the American way of life for the rest of us?"
K: there are worker owned business in the United States. However the point I make and my example about bob show that
the worker, regardless of the business, will still do the work and get a fraction of the profit brought in by their effort in making
the product. Capitalism is about the owner and them getting their profit but the vast majority of people are workers.
Why do workers sacrifice their income to benefit the owner? You have large pools of workers, the vast majority, working to
benefit the much smaller pool of owners. How is that right? The laws benefit the owner, not the workers.
P.K.,
Good to meet you here, sir. My problem with Marxism comes from two issues. 1. I don’t think workers in power would become any more humane than were those who held power before them. I buy the old adage “Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Revolutions do not often entail moral improvements. Note the French Revolution. 2. Dialectical materialism often sees as opposites ideas that not only are not antithetical but could lend to complementations.
Of course Marxism is political, his entire project is dealing with generic man…political man… man qua his relation to society and nature. History started, for Marxism, when man objectified himself against another man and against nature. His dialectic has overt consequences on power/capitol structures, which seems to be the definition of politics. Not to mention the fact that. for Marx, to change the mode of production, and thus man’s relation to nature, is to change every aspect of man’s life, to change man’s consciousness itself…to change the relations - politics. The mode of production of material l.ife conditions the social, political, and mental life of man - man in general.
I think it is important to note that Marx saw himself as a scientist, and the dialect as an empirical science. Which is to say that there is truth to the claim that his theory is not a politic. But that doesn’t mean that his philosophy doesn’t have very profound political implications…
I don’t like anything about your “clearing up” of misconceptions, either. If we are going to clear up misconceptions, then lets really clear them up, and not pigeon hole the discussion. Karl Marx’s philosophy is a dialectic issuing from the basic premise that what defines man is his relation to nature - labor. The basic premise that man’s consciousness issues from his objectification of nature and the purposeful intent that he bestows on it, is the ultimate reason why we need to remove private property. Because man is his relation to nature, and man’s relation to nature is his labor. Crystallized labor is capitol. Thus, when the bourgeois Capitalist takes a cut of the workers pie he is alienating that worker. He is not simply stealing from the worker, or depriving the worker, but he is alienating the worker in the expressivist sense of alienation. He is taking from the worker, what makes the worker uniquely human. He is taking the workers expression.
Marx is just a watered down, pro-state government, populist version of Proudhon.
Sittlichkeit - you’re right on the money, but like I say, all the key stuff is in Proudhon. Marx still upheld the notion of the benevolent state and central banking. This was a cause of a serious split between the two, personally and philosophically. And I’ve gotta say, I strongly side with the French on that one.
Marx was an hegelian as it was" The Philosophy" during the years Marx was educated.
Marx is said to have turned hegel on his head, The dialectical is hegel’s.
Proudhon influenced Marx but no where near as profoundly as Hegel.
The Philosophy of Misery: The Evolution of Capitalism
I should have never researched him because now I’m going to end up reading that instead of doing coursework.
-edit-
Nevermind, I checked the online catalog for the library and it only has a 1868 copy written in French. Maybe I’ll check it out anyway, and “lose” it on ebay.
Peter Kropotkin"]Marx was an hegelian as it was" The Philosophy" during the years Marx was educated.
Marx is said to have turned hegel on his head, The dialectical is hegel’s.
Proudhon influenced Marx but no where near as profoundly as Hegel."
soiatd:" Have you read Proudhon?"
K: yep, when I was an anarchist I read most of the major anarchist books.
Note, I did not say Proudhon had no influenced because clearly he did
but Marx was still a self proclaimed Hegelian and I believe Hegel was
an major if not the major influence on Marx.
Sure sure, I’m not leaping in here saying ‘no, you’re wrong, it’s all about Proudhon’. I’m just wondering whether conceptually there’s more linking Marx and Proudhon than Marx and Hegel.
No question, Marx saw himself as a child of Hegel, conceptually speaking. But philosophers:
a) aren’t necessarily the best judges of their own work
b) often take on a historical-conceptual role that is unintended
In the second case, I don’t think there’s any question this happened to Marx/Marxism. It became, after all, the justification and groundwork for Stalinism, which is a fascistic and totalitarian form of Marxism that I don’t think the German ever wanted or aimed for. I imagine you agree up until this point, and that Leninism was a more ‘genuine’ Marxism, more ‘true’ to the original.
In the light of history, might it not be possible that Marx was in fact more influenced by Proudhon? Not in how he saw himself. Not in how he spoke to himself. But in how the ideas and texts reverberated, were interpreted and experienced, and what they helped bring about in the material world.
You might disagree, but that’s a question I’m asking. You already know what I think the answer is.
“profiting”(if you want to be cliffnotes about marxism) from exploiting the labour power of others and how the accumulation of wealth in private hands builds up an unjust society
marxism not a political theory, only economic? it includes theories on government(dictatorship of the proletariat) etc etc etc etc etc etc etc
if you count War time(Civil War in Spain) as proof that anarchism functioned, we can also count the first years of the USSR as marxism functioning smoothly
You speak for all individuals – employers and employees alike and all industries??
[Thank God the only real Marxists exist on the internet!]
The point you fail to understand is that the “profit” paid to the employee is in the present and the “profit” paid to the employer is in the future. Each party to the transaction is receiving different things.
That, by the way, is the major failing in Marx’s theory of exploitation. Money now is not the same as money in the future.
Marxists completely fail to understand time preferences among individuals or even among the production process. They think everything happens right away and without any concept of future risk. People are treated like animals and machines. Marxism is a very inhumane philosophy on top of being wrong.
– because the employment contract offers workers money at a specified time. The workers are choosing a schedule of payment – not just a payment.
