I've recently been reading the Communist Manifesto with a friend, and there is a point in the argument I'm having trouble with: the claim that the ideas, conceptions, and values of an age are inseparable from the social, political, historical, and economic circumstances of that age.
To what extent, I wonder, is this actually the case? And if it is true, then do ideas conceived of under one system have any validity under another system? Because I mean, wouldn't that sort of invalidate Marx's own ideas of a post-Capitalist system, as they were conceived of in a Capitalist context?
I guess my problem here is that he uses the argument that morals and ideas arise only within a given system to shoot down philosophical or moral counter-arguments to Communism. He seems to say they are moot, since they wouldn't apply if the Capitalist system were swept away. Why wouldn't that apply to his own morals and philosophies?
I've recently been reading the Communist Manifesto with a friend, and there is a point in the argument I'm having trouble with: the claim that the ideas, conceptions, and values of an age are inseparable from the social, political, historical, and economic circumstances of that age.
To what extent, I wonder, is this actually the case? And if it is true, then do ideas conceived of under one system have any validity under another system? Because I mean, wouldn't that sort of invalidate Marx's own ideas of a post-Capitalist system, as they were conceived of in a Capitalist context?
Congratulations. You are now a political philosopher.
I haven't read the Manifesto, but giving the author some credit, I'd assume that he dealt with that apparent contradiction, even if not completely satisfactorily.
I guess my problem here is that he uses the argument that morals and ideas arise only within a given system to shoot down philosophical or moral counter-arguments to Communism. He seems to say they are moot, since they wouldn't apply if the Capitalist system were swept away. Why wouldn't that apply to his own morals and philosophies?
Again, I assume he would have found some way to sidestep this problem, and ground the reasons for Communism in something that the previous point can't touch. Some proposal of of how to have "values, ideals, etc.", but different from what we currently mean by those, such that they can prop up a proposal of a socio-political system, but such that the other argument doesn't apply.
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Again, I assume he would have found some way to sidestep this problem, and ground the reasons for Communism in something that the previous point can't touch. Some proposal of of how to have "values, ideals, etc.", but different from what we currently mean by those, such that they can prop up a proposal of a socio-political system, but such that the other argument doesn't apply.
Maybe, but if he did so, he didn't do it in the Manifesto. The thing is, the argument occupies all of 1/3 of a page; he assumes the reader agrees with the premise, & so does not elucidate the premise. He probably put forth a more complete version elsewhere.
But from my totally-not-as-smart-as-Marx perspective, I'm not sure how he could work around the problem without compromising the validity of the argument.
If the argument is that short, could you quote it? It's been a while since I've read that passage and I feel you're misunderstanding or misinterpreting it, but I don't have the text with me and I'm not sure on which part you're talking about it, so in order for me to do a proper explanation/argument it would help if I knew which part you're having a hard time with.
The charges against Communism made from a religious, a
philosophical, and, generally, from an ideological standpoint,
are not deserving of serious examination.
Does it require deep intuition to comprehend that man's ideas,
views and conceptions, in one word, man's consciousness, changes
with every change in the conditions of his material existence, in
his social relations and in his social life?
What else does the history of ideas prove, than that
intellectual production changes its character in proportion as
material production is changed? The ruling ideas of each age
have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.
When people speak of ideas that revolutionise society, they do
but express the fact, that within the old society, the elements
of a new one have been created, and that the dissolution of the
old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old
conditions of existence.
When the ancient world was in its last throes, the ancient
religions were overcome by Christianity. When Christian ideas
succumbed in the 18th century to rationalist ideas, feudal
society fought its death battle with the then revolutionary
bourgeoisie. The ideas of religious liberty and freedom of
conscience merely gave expression to the sway of free competition
within the domain of knowledge.
"Undoubtedly," it will be said, "religious, moral, philosophical
and juridical ideas have been modified in the course of
historical development. But religion, morality philosophy,
political science, and law, constantly survived this change."
"There are, besides, eternal truths, such as Freedom, Justice,
etc. that are common to all states of society. But Communism
abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all
morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it
therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experience."
What does this accusation reduce itself to? The history of
all past society has consisted in the development of class
antagonisms, antagonisms that assumed different forms at
different epochs.
But whatever form they may have taken, one fact is common to all
past ages, viz., the exploitation of one part of society by the
other. No wonder, then, that the social consciousness of past
ages, despite all the multiplicity and variety it displays,
moves within certain common forms, or general ideas, which
cannot completely vanish except with the total disappearance of
class antagonisms.
The Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with
traditional property relations; no wonder that its development
involves the most radical rupture with traditional ideas.
But let us have done with the bourgeois objections to Communism.
(I exaggerated its brevity, but not by much.)
Now, here is how I read the argument, and you can correct me if I'm wrong: Moral and philosophical arguments against Communism fail because under a Communist system, the the conditions of existence will be so radically different from any previous system that ideologies that arose within those previous systems will be swept away along with the systems. Or: ideologies that arise within an economic paradigm are only relevant within that paradigm.
Now, he does refer specifically to the ruling class's ideologies, but I see no reason why the principle wouldn't apply to any ideas or ideologies.
That's not what Marx is saying. He's essentially saying that the idealogies of any given age pertain only to that age. But he is constantly(throughout the teatise as well as in this particular passage) references older governing paradigms (and their respective revolutions) and the fact that the idealogies of that age are as a result and inseperable from the ruling class that brought about the previous paradigm shift-because those two factors(idealogy and economic system) are in fact inseperable- and it has always been outgrown and overthrown by a new the economic/idealogical social revolution; which again he contends are inseperable. What he is saying is simply; that it is time to overthrow the bourgeois system because its economic and idealogical systems are archaic and must be replaced. His argument is that any argument made from a standpoint from the bourgeois is therefore meaningless as it is essentially an anarchonism. He also boasts that communism is by far the most radical and progressive jump in history. which leads me into my final point;
But whatever form they may have taken, one fact is common to all
past ages, viz., the exploitation of one part of society by the
other. No wonder, then, that the social consciousness of past
ages, despite all the multiplicity and variety it displays,
moves within certain common forms, or general ideas, which
cannot completely vanish except with the total disappearance of
class antagonisms.
The Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with
traditional property relations; no wonder that its development
involves the most radical rupture with traditional ideas.
This is essentially saying that communism is different from all other idealogies in that it is not based upon even the standing tennants that have survived each age;
despite all the multiplicity and variety it displays,
moves within certain common forms, or general ideas,
He is saying that communism severs the unbroken normality of class exploitation that has persisted through each previous age.
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My at-a-glance 'isms': (in no particular order)
1. Secular Humanism
2. Secular Millenarianism
a. Singularitarianism
b.Transhumanism
c. secular altruism
Class exploitation is a symptom only; the perception of corruption is actually responsible for distrust in a society.
You have it backwards. Class exploitation comes first (some people have to sell their labor because they do not own the means of production... that is exploitation). Corruption is a method by which it happens; the State is constructed as a defender of ruling class monopoly on the means of production, through the creation of artificial property rights and the creation of a professional caste of mercenaries used to defend these artificial rights: police, army, judges, etc.
Statism is a necessary precondition of capitalism. This is why capitalism occured after the enclosures, and at the same time as the rise of the nation states and the sweeping away of the old feudal system.
Originally Posted by WhoeverUsesBirdsReapsGame Class exploitation is a symptom only; the perception of corruption is actually responsible for distrust in a society. oh my god, you have no idea what you're talking about. Listen to Dark Angel.
That's why classes and economics were invented in the first place- to attempt to remedy the consequences of such a perception.
wait, what? so you're saying that economics and social classes were created to remedy the perception that government was corrupt? Do you have any idea how economics actually arose?
He seemed to try to blame private ownership of property for the strife in other economic systems, especially in capitalism.
QUOTE]
You’re really missing the point of the manifesto. Have you ever taken the time to read it sir? All he's saying is that private ownership- particularly inheritance rights- exacerbates class separations. Inter-class struggle and subjugation of the working classes is the primary focus of Communism.
[QUOTE]He failed to address for what reason private ownership of property was created in the first place: the perception of functionality. People fear things can break; therefore they must restrict access to them from their would-be destroyers. QUOTE] honestly, you've lost me. What does private ownership have to do with the perception of functionality? Can anyone elucidate this for me?
[QUOTE] That's why communism failed; people in it still blamed others for failing to adequately maintain and repair things. Ownership of the means of production was wholly public, yet people still perceived a lack of responsibility where they believed it should have been present.
I say instead that communism failed (and by that I mean a communist state has never been achieved) because there weren't effective checks and balances in the (socialist) system. Effectively you could perhaps say a socialist system has been achieved before- although I disagree on that point and posit that the entire movement was commandeered and perverted by Stalin (and the later despotic leaders) who used the movement to place himself in power and the proletariat and bourgeois were subjugated under a new rule which persisted with the class antagonisms that communist doctrine proposed to eradicate- but the a government controlled state was supposed to dissolve. If anything, this is the major critique of Marx's work, as he fails to illustrate exactly how this revolutionary state was supposed to dissipate.
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My at-a-glance 'isms': (in no particular order)
1. Secular Humanism
2. Secular Millenarianism
a. Singularitarianism
b.Transhumanism
c. secular altruism
First: 'communism' (really, the USSR and similarly oriented regimes) failed because Marxism-Leninism isn't
a) particularly Marxist
b) particularly communist
c) has the complete wrong freaking approach to successful class warfare because of a very basic flaw in their methodology
Of course I'm speaking as an anarchist of the anarcho-communist (Kropotkin, Makhno) variety, and a pretty sectarian one at that, so I'm biased. Anarchists agree with a large chunk of Marxist analysis, pre-Lenin and only if we limit ourselves to the economics and not delve into the realm of the political strategies.
The most common misconception of communism (small-c, the general concept rather than Communism, i.e. Marxist-Leninist dogmatic definiton of small-c communism) is that it is a statist philosophy. It is not. Radical liberals (i.e. what Americans call libertarians) and typical conservatives claim it is because in their philosophy, private property is a natural right and you need a state to deprive people of it. In our philosophy, we consider it an artificial right that a state had to be created to impose it. This is a disputed point of contention, obviously. But anyway, communism is the abolition of private ownership of the means of production. The methods by which this is attained vary depending on which communists you're talking to. But even Marx said that the state would 'wither away' in the communist society. Since the purpose of the state, according to Marx (and anarchists for that matter), is to allow class dominance of a few over the many, its purpose would be moot in the classless society. It's conceivable that a peaceful transition to communism would leave behind a vestigial state, but since it would have no purpose, assuming it wasn't used as an instrument of reaction, it would of necessity wither away over time as it would be redundant and thus ineconomical for it to stick around.
Libertarians again don't make a distinction between community control and state control, which is strangely something they share with radical statists (and M-Ls) who wish to eliminate the distinction by creating a strong nation-state which substitutes itself to, not merely represent, the community. If you have a hard time distinguishing between the two: if I speak with the neighbors in my apartment building and we organically organise together to militate for better conditions in our building, that's a community group. If the government starts a renters protection agency, that's state control. The state is in general an external agent to the community, and it is in general organized in a hierarchical, top down manner. Community is organic (you are part of it just because of natural proclivities... I live in the building therefore I'm part of the collection/set named 'tenants') and while it can be authoritarian/hierarchical, it is not necessarily so.
Communism is about community control, and quite frankly to us anarchists the idea of nationalisation or state control runs directly counter to that idea. The state exists as an instrument of class domination. The history of the USSR seems to indicate this: the class of petit bourgeois intellectuals drawn to the Bolsheviks ended up taking power by using the state apparatus, nationalisation concentrated ownership of capital into the state (which was controlled by this class), ergo while it got rid of the capitalist class it didn't get rid of class society but created a new dominant class. The events in Krondstadt, where committed socialists and communists revolted against the Bolsheviks in the name of the revolution (and were crushed by Trotsky), and the eradication of the free soviets and reorganisation of such under Bolshevik control, sealed the deal. The Bolsheviks became agents of counterrevolution in a newly rebuilt class society.
The USSR though had the distinction of being almost a *caste* society, completly eliminating the meritocratic elements of capitalism, which is the one saving grace of that system (meritocratic classes are more stable, as a society of exploitation, than castes in which you are born, live in and die without possibility of advancement). Which is why it folded before the capitalist countries did.
First: 'communism' (really, the USSR and similarly oriented regimes) failed because Marxism-Leninism isn't
a) particularly Marxist
b) particularly communist
c) has the complete wrong freaking approach to successful class warfare because of a very basic flaw in their methodology
Well no, It's not particularly Marxist, but it's a matter of great contention as to whether you're presuppositions are correct. I happen to think Lenin was wrong about a few things- markedly the relationship between socialism and communism, but I'm not too sure he was too far of with the idea of a vanguard party.
But anyway, communism is the abolition of private ownership of the means of production.QUOTE] well that's part of it, yes.
[QUOTE]But even Marx said that the state would 'wither away' in the communist society. right; this is transition from socialism to communism- but he didn't describe exactly how this was supposed to happen, nor did he illustrate a time frame or benchmarks for how long a socialist system was supposed to remain in place.
It's conceivable that a peaceful transition to communism would leave behind a vestigial state, but since it would have no purpose, assuming it wasn't used as an instrument of reaction, it would of necessity wither away over time as it would be redundant and thus ineconomical for it to stick around.
this is all evocative theorization, but somehow I fail to see this actually falling into place as such. Not to mention; I'm fairly certain the Marx had no intention of (which isn't of course to say other theorists didn't of course) this course.
Communism is about community control, and quite frankly to us anarchists the idea of nationalisation or state control runs directly counter to that idea
oh I quite agree. Marx of course proposed that it would create a state (although an organic party state comprised of the proletariat) to meet this end. What I fail to recognize though, is how this would be viable over relatively large land masses/ populations. Also I'd be interested to hear an anarchist’s perspective on the need for a police force- or anything of that nature.
the class of petit bourgeois intellectuals drawn to the Bolsheviks ended up taking power by using the state apparatus, nationalisation concentrated ownership of capital into the state (which was controlled by this class), ergo while it got rid of the capitalist class it didn't get rid of class society but created a new dominant class.
I tired to say this(putting more emphasis on Stalin- who Trotsky, on his deathbed, warned, should never be allowed to take control) ; however you’ve phrased it much more eloquently, and illuminated the root of the issue. The communist- or as you indicated; more precisely the Bolshevik- revolution ended up in effecting (or is this affecting) another 'regular' revolution.
meritocratic classes are more stable
yes they are :). (You might notice by glancing downwards that I am an elitist)
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My at-a-glance 'isms': (in no particular order)
1. Secular Humanism
2. Secular Millenarianism
a. Singularitarianism
b.Transhumanism
c. secular altruism
To what extent, I wonder, is this actually the case? And if it is true, then do ideas conceived of under one system have any validity under another system? Because I mean, wouldn't that sort of invalidate Marx's own ideas of a post-Capitalist system, as they were conceived of in a Capitalist context?
I guess my problem here is that he uses the argument that morals and ideas arise only within a given system to shoot down philosophical or moral counter-arguments to Communism. He seems to say they are moot, since they wouldn't apply if the Capitalist system were swept away. Why wouldn't that apply to his own morals and philosophies?
Congratulations. You are now a political philosopher.
I haven't read the Manifesto, but giving the author some credit, I'd assume that he dealt with that apparent contradiction, even if not completely satisfactorily.
Again, I assume he would have found some way to sidestep this problem, and ground the reasons for Communism in something that the previous point can't touch. Some proposal of of how to have "values, ideals, etc.", but different from what we currently mean by those, such that they can prop up a proposal of a socio-political system, but such that the other argument doesn't apply.
Awesome avatar provided by Krashbot @ [Epic Graphics].
Maybe, but if he did so, he didn't do it in the Manifesto. The thing is, the argument occupies all of 1/3 of a page; he assumes the reader agrees with the premise, & so does not elucidate the premise. He probably put forth a more complete version elsewhere.
But from my totally-not-as-smart-as-Marx perspective, I'm not sure how he could work around the problem without compromising the validity of the argument.
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philosophical, and, generally, from an ideological standpoint,
are not deserving of serious examination.
Does it require deep intuition to comprehend that man's ideas,
views and conceptions, in one word, man's consciousness, changes
with every change in the conditions of his material existence, in
his social relations and in his social life?
What else does the history of ideas prove, than that
intellectual production changes its character in proportion as
material production is changed? The ruling ideas of each age
have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.
When people speak of ideas that revolutionise society, they do
but express the fact, that within the old society, the elements
of a new one have been created, and that the dissolution of the
old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old
conditions of existence.
When the ancient world was in its last throes, the ancient
religions were overcome by Christianity. When Christian ideas
succumbed in the 18th century to rationalist ideas, feudal
society fought its death battle with the then revolutionary
bourgeoisie. The ideas of religious liberty and freedom of
conscience merely gave expression to the sway of free competition
within the domain of knowledge.
"Undoubtedly," it will be said, "religious, moral, philosophical
and juridical ideas have been modified in the course of
historical development. But religion, morality philosophy,
political science, and law, constantly survived this change."
"There are, besides, eternal truths, such as Freedom, Justice,
etc. that are common to all states of society. But Communism
abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all
morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it
therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experience."
What does this accusation reduce itself to? The history of
all past society has consisted in the development of class
antagonisms, antagonisms that assumed different forms at
different epochs.
But whatever form they may have taken, one fact is common to all
past ages, viz., the exploitation of one part of society by the
other. No wonder, then, that the social consciousness of past
ages, despite all the multiplicity and variety it displays,
moves within certain common forms, or general ideas, which
cannot completely vanish except with the total disappearance of
class antagonisms.
The Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with
traditional property relations; no wonder that its development
involves the most radical rupture with traditional ideas.
But let us have done with the bourgeois objections to Communism.
(I exaggerated its brevity, but not by much.)
Now, here is how I read the argument, and you can correct me if I'm wrong: Moral and philosophical arguments against Communism fail because under a Communist system, the the conditions of existence will be so radically different from any previous system that ideologies that arose within those previous systems will be swept away along with the systems. Or: ideologies that arise within an economic paradigm are only relevant within that paradigm.
Now, he does refer specifically to the ruling class's ideologies, but I see no reason why the principle wouldn't apply to any ideas or ideologies.
This is essentially saying that communism is different from all other idealogies in that it is not based upon even the standing tennants that have survived each age;
He is saying that communism severs the unbroken normality of class exploitation that has persisted through each previous age.
1. Secular Humanism
2. Secular Millenarianism
b.Transhumanism
c. secular altruism
4. Existentialism
5. Intellectualism
6. Atheism
7. Realism
b. philosophic
c. contructive
9. Egalitarianism
b. feminism
11. Liberal conservatism
12. Anti-consumerism
13. Reductionism
You have it backwards. Class exploitation comes first (some people have to sell their labor because they do not own the means of production... that is exploitation). Corruption is a method by which it happens; the State is constructed as a defender of ruling class monopoly on the means of production, through the creation of artificial property rights and the creation of a professional caste of mercenaries used to defend these artificial rights: police, army, judges, etc.
Statism is a necessary precondition of capitalism. This is why capitalism occured after the enclosures, and at the same time as the rise of the nation states and the sweeping away of the old feudal system.
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Originally Posted by WhoeverUsesBirdsReapsGame
Class exploitation is a symptom only; the perception of corruption is actually responsible for distrust in a society.
oh my god, you have no idea what you're talking about. Listen to Dark Angel.
actually arose? wait, what? so you're saying that economics and social classes were created to remedy the perception that government was corrupt? Do you have any idea how economics
You’re really missing the point of the manifesto. Have you ever taken the time to read it sir? All he's saying is that private ownership- particularly inheritance rights- exacerbates class separations. Inter-class struggle and subjugation of the working classes is the primary focus of Communism.
[QUOTE]He failed to address for what reason private ownership of property was created in the first place: the perception of functionality. People fear things can break; therefore they must restrict access to them from their would-be destroyers. QUOTE] honestly, you've lost me. What does private ownership have to do with the perception of functionality? Can anyone elucidate this for me?
[QUOTE]
That's why communism failed; people in it still blamed others for failing to adequately maintain and repair things. Ownership of the means of production was wholly public, yet people still perceived a lack of responsibility where they believed it should have been present.
I say instead that communism failed (and by that I mean a communist state has never been achieved) because there weren't effective checks and balances in the (socialist) system.
Effectively you could perhaps say a socialist system has been achieved before- although I disagree on that point and posit that the entire movement was commandeered and perverted by Stalin (and the later despotic leaders) who used the movement to place himself in power and the proletariat and bourgeois were subjugated under a new rule which persisted with the class antagonisms that communist doctrine proposed to eradicate- but the a government controlled state was supposed to dissolve. If anything, this is the major critique of Marx's work, as he fails to illustrate exactly how this revolutionary state was supposed to dissipate.
1. Secular Humanism
2. Secular Millenarianism
b.Transhumanism
c. secular altruism
4. Existentialism
5. Intellectualism
6. Atheism
7. Realism
b. philosophic
c. contructive
9. Egalitarianism
b. feminism
11. Liberal conservatism
12. Anti-consumerism
13. Reductionism
a) particularly Marxist
b) particularly communist
c) has the complete wrong freaking approach to successful class warfare because of a very basic flaw in their methodology
Of course I'm speaking as an anarchist of the anarcho-communist (Kropotkin, Makhno) variety, and a pretty sectarian one at that, so I'm biased. Anarchists agree with a large chunk of Marxist analysis, pre-Lenin and only if we limit ourselves to the economics and not delve into the realm of the political strategies.
The most common misconception of communism (small-c, the general concept rather than Communism, i.e. Marxist-Leninist dogmatic definiton of small-c communism) is that it is a statist philosophy. It is not. Radical liberals (i.e. what Americans call libertarians) and typical conservatives claim it is because in their philosophy, private property is a natural right and you need a state to deprive people of it. In our philosophy, we consider it an artificial right that a state had to be created to impose it. This is a disputed point of contention, obviously. But anyway, communism is the abolition of private ownership of the means of production. The methods by which this is attained vary depending on which communists you're talking to. But even Marx said that the state would 'wither away' in the communist society. Since the purpose of the state, according to Marx (and anarchists for that matter), is to allow class dominance of a few over the many, its purpose would be moot in the classless society. It's conceivable that a peaceful transition to communism would leave behind a vestigial state, but since it would have no purpose, assuming it wasn't used as an instrument of reaction, it would of necessity wither away over time as it would be redundant and thus ineconomical for it to stick around.
Libertarians again don't make a distinction between community control and state control, which is strangely something they share with radical statists (and M-Ls) who wish to eliminate the distinction by creating a strong nation-state which substitutes itself to, not merely represent, the community. If you have a hard time distinguishing between the two: if I speak with the neighbors in my apartment building and we organically organise together to militate for better conditions in our building, that's a community group. If the government starts a renters protection agency, that's state control. The state is in general an external agent to the community, and it is in general organized in a hierarchical, top down manner. Community is organic (you are part of it just because of natural proclivities... I live in the building therefore I'm part of the collection/set named 'tenants') and while it can be authoritarian/hierarchical, it is not necessarily so.
Communism is about community control, and quite frankly to us anarchists the idea of nationalisation or state control runs directly counter to that idea. The state exists as an instrument of class domination. The history of the USSR seems to indicate this: the class of petit bourgeois intellectuals drawn to the Bolsheviks ended up taking power by using the state apparatus, nationalisation concentrated ownership of capital into the state (which was controlled by this class), ergo while it got rid of the capitalist class it didn't get rid of class society but created a new dominant class. The events in Krondstadt, where committed socialists and communists revolted against the Bolsheviks in the name of the revolution (and were crushed by Trotsky), and the eradication of the free soviets and reorganisation of such under Bolshevik control, sealed the deal. The Bolsheviks became agents of counterrevolution in a newly rebuilt class society.
The USSR though had the distinction of being almost a *caste* society, completly eliminating the meritocratic elements of capitalism, which is the one saving grace of that system (meritocratic classes are more stable, as a society of exploitation, than castes in which you are born, live in and die without possibility of advancement). Which is why it folded before the capitalist countries did.
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Well no, It's not particularly Marxist, but it's a matter of great contention as to whether you're presuppositions are correct. I happen to think Lenin was wrong about a few things- markedly the relationship between socialism and communism, but I'm not too sure he was too far of with the idea of a vanguard party.
[QUOTE]But even Marx said that the state would 'wither away' in the communist society. right; this is transition from socialism to communism- but he didn't describe exactly how this was supposed to happen, nor did he illustrate a time frame or benchmarks for how long a socialist system was supposed to remain in place.
no intention of (which isn't of course to say other theorists didn't of course) this course. this is all evocative theorization, but somehow I fail to see this actually falling into place as such. Not to mention; I'm fairly certain the Marx had
oh I quite agree. Marx of course proposed that it would create a state (although an organic party state comprised of the proletariat) to meet this end. What I fail to recognize though, is how this would be viable over relatively large land masses/ populations.
Also I'd be interested to hear an anarchist’s perspective on the need for a police force- or anything of that nature.
I tired to say this(putting more emphasis on Stalin- who Trotsky, on his deathbed, warned, should never be allowed to take control) ; however you’ve phrased it much more eloquently, and illuminated the root of the issue. The communist- or as you indicated; more precisely the Bolshevik- revolution ended up in effecting (or is this affecting) another 'regular' revolution.
yes they are :). (You might notice by glancing downwards that I am an elitist)
1. Secular Humanism
2. Secular Millenarianism
b.Transhumanism
c. secular altruism
4. Existentialism
5. Intellectualism
6. Atheism
7. Realism
b. philosophic
c. contructive
9. Egalitarianism
b. feminism
11. Liberal conservatism
12. Anti-consumerism
13. Reductionism
Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.
Individualities may form communities, but it is institutions alone that can create a nation.
Nothing succeeds like the appearance of success.
Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle.