Felipe Navas
European History 4460
Professor: Ping
Exam 1

 

The Essential Ideas of Marxism and the meaning of "Historical of Materialism"

 

According to Carl Marx, the history of humanity has been a struggle between the classes. "The fundamental basis of history is material production, and social life in general depends finally on the class dynamics of the production process. The practical purpose of historical materialism is to analyze the proletariat's social/political situation and thus guide it in its struggle against the Bourgeoisie." (Marx 1988, 25) Marxism as a theory is the most appealing of all system. Is it practical? Have Marxists been able to establish a real Marxist society?

"Marx's historical materialism method involves (1) understanding society in terms of its mode of production, especially its class structure; (2) identifying the influence of class conflicts on the prevailing political institutions and ideologies (including law, religion, and philosophy); and (3) using this "scientific" understanding of society to assess the prospects of historical change, especially for proletarian revolution. (Marx 1988, 29)

    The aim of Marxism is the elimination of the bourgeoisie class, which, according to Marx is the class that lives off the labor of the masses. In other words, the bourgeoisie is the class that has throughout history exploited the working class. As Marx analyzed the phenomenon of class struggle, he saw the need of forming a new social order that created equality among classes. Communism was his new social order; a political system where the means of production are owned by the state. Marx thought that if the means of production were owned by the state and not by the bourgeoisie, the exploitation of men by men would come to an end.

    Marx's socialist/communist ideas have put him in direct confrontation with capitalists that deemed Marx a utopian dreamer. Marx understood that the ruling class was not going to be willing to yield the advantageous position, which it had held on to in the already established system. Marx warned the masses that they were going to have to take the power away by means of revolutions; revolutions that were the direct result of the oppressive ways of government by the bourgeoisie.

    The Marxists and capitalists are at war and mankind has been caught in the crossfire. Communism, with the promise of equality among classes, and capitalism, with the promise of equal opportunity, are in a struggle for power on a world scale. It is clear that it is not in the best interest of either system to allow the other to succeed. So they have sabotaged each other since their struggle began. As a result, the systems have delivered more destruction and misery to most people than the good that they both offer. For example, instead of delivering the equal opportunity which it promises, capitalism has been used as a tool of exploitation by a few against the masses and it has enlarged the gap between rich and poor and between powerful and powerless.

In similarity, communism has failed to create the equality among the classes that it promises; instead, communism has created dictators that have oppressed the people. Nevertheless, communism is determined to create a new man; a man who sees the accumulation of wealth as something unnecessary; a man that desires only the bare necessities of life.

"Life involves before everything else eating and drinking, a habitation, clothing and many other things. The first historical act is thus the production of means to satisfy these needs, the production of material life itself… [I]n any interpretation of history one has first of all to observe this fundamental fact in all its significance." (Marx 1988, 26) Capitalism, capitalizes on the nature of men, exploiting the natural greed of men for the common good. Even though the means of production are owned by a few, in a capitalist society, the rest of the society is kept with a hope that if they work hard, some day they too could be part of the elite and be in control of the means of production.

    "Liberal theorists depicted bourgeois society as morally legitimate; for them, alienation and dehumanization could not be acknowledged. For the bourgeoisie, it is a matter of life and death to understand its own system of production in terms of eternally valid categories: it must think of capitalism as being predestined to eternal survival by the eternal laws of nature and reason. Conversely, contradictions that cannot be ignored must be shown to be purely surface phenomena, unrelated to this mode of production." (Marx 1988, 25)

    In essence, Marxism promises that through socialism, which is the first step toward communism, the new form of government that will deliver the masses from exploitation by the bourgeoisie can be achieved. However, capitalists argue that communism is an unachievable goal because it fails to recognize human nature and the creativity of men.

    The promises of a brighter future have been made to the masses by Marxists and capitalists; the fallacy in these promises is that it implies that those in charge will be trustworthy men; and that they will work only for the common good of the people. Unfortunately, now we know that the greed of capitalists can destroy the lives of those that have the misfortune of getting caught in their web of lies and business schemes. We also know the atrocities committed by communist dictators. Marxists would argue that a bad communist dictator does not represent those ideals of Marx. Just like a bad capitalist is not evidence of a bad system.

Both systems have created the illusion of freedom; and yet, when the people come to represent some kind of threat to the system, neither system hesitates to use their military machine to oppress the people. So, what is freedom anyway? Freedom is nothing but an illusion and submission to the ideas of the ruling class.

An economist and capitalist named Joan Robinson once claimed, "The misery of being exploited by capitalists is nothing compared to the misery of not being exploited at all." (The Economist Newspaper Limited 2010) This creates a "this or that" fallacy. It implies that there were only two options, when in fact there are always other options, for example, creating jobs for people so they can live with dignity, paying them decent wages so the workers can afford education and medicine for their children.

The struggles between the classes will continue until, or as long as, either system fails to recognize and respect the free will of the people; because so far, people have become nothing but, a means to an end for both systems.

 

 

 

 

Bibliography

Marx, Karl. The Communist Manifesto. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1988.

The Economist Newspaper Limited. The rising power of the Chinese worker. July 29, 2010.