How Is The Peasantry A Class?

[Outinleftfield]

I can see how serfs would be a class since their working conditions were different from the proletariat (they were tied to the land and paid their master to work the field).

However, in Russia serfdom had been abolished before the revolution. The peasants all either worked for a wage, worked for themselves, or owned land and employed other peasants for a wage(the kulaks).

How does that make the peasantry different from the bourgeoisie and the proletariat? The first kind of peasant is being exploited in the same way the proletariat is(they both work for a wage), the only difference is they are agricultural workers instead of industrial workers. The second is similar to a craftsman or a cooperative worker since they aren't employing anybody or being employed. The third really has no difference from the bourgeoisie. They both own the means of production and both exploit other people's labor, only giving them a wage.

But Marx for some strange reason considered the peasants their own class. Is it because of some perceived difference in quality of life, outlook, values, or what? If Marx was alive today would he see white collar and blue collar workers as two separate classes?

[ComradeOm]

In a nutshell - because the peasants generate their wealth from the land. They are not involved in commodity production beyond a sideline in small scale artisan production. However toiling the land remains their primary focus and, while surplus produce may be sold on the market, the average peasant is typically involved in subsistence farming

Conversely a small farmer who owns his land and who farm is run primarily for profit (ie, he is not reliant on his own produce to feed his family) is usually not classified as a peasant. He has a different relationship with the market and indeed with the land itself. Such farms may often employ labour but, while part of the capitalist economy, are rarely classified as bourgeois (commodity production again)

Agricultural labourers are rarely considered part of the traditional peasantry as they derive their income from wages rather than working their own land. In some cases they are considered simply a poorer stratum of the peasantry while in others, typically capitalist nations, they may constitute a rural proletariat in their own right

[ArrowLance]

Peasants are distinct from the proletariat in that they do not sell their labour, but instead sell the product of their labour as well as consume it themselves. They are different from the bourgeoisie in that they do not exploit others labour. And different from the petite-bourgeoisie/craftsman in that their product is consumed by themselves and just the large difference in atmosphere and conditions (at the time agriculture was very distant from city production).

It's late and I'm a bit tired so if this was a bit hard to follow I apologize.

[Outinleftfield]

I see. So the peasants generally owned their labor (obviously with exceptions like serfs, poor peasant hirelings, and the rich peasants that hire them(kulaks) who logically evolve over time into a rural bourgeois class as business expands).

Isn't that what Marx wanted for the proletariat, worker ownership? I wonder then why he saw peasants as reactionary when their property relations were the same as what he wanted for the proletariat. The only difference based on your descriptions of the peasantry seems to be that the peasants only subsisted.

Do we still have peasants in the United States? Would a small farmer who grows for himself and only sells a little produce at the farmer's market to pay his bills be a peasant?

[ArrowLance]

I see. So the peasants generally owned their labor (obviously with exceptions like serfs, poor peasant hirelings, and the rich peasants that hire them(kulaks) who logically evolve over time into a rural bourgeois class as business expands).

Isn't that what Marx wanted for the proletariat, worker ownership? I wonder then why he saw peasants as reactionary when their property relations were the same as what he wanted for the proletariat. The only difference based on your descriptions of the peasantry seems to be that the peasants only subsisted.

Do we still have peasants in the United States? Would a small farmer who grows for himself and only sells a little produce at the farmer's market to pay his bills be a peasant?

That's not even really possible in the United States, to own the land and produce the product only for yourself with a little surplus is expensive. Too expensive. There may be a few of these type around, but they are an oddity and in no way are a class. No use wasting time on them.

[ComradeOm]

Isn't that what Marx wanted for the proletariat, worker ownership? I wonder then why he saw peasants as reactionary when their property relations were the same as what he wanted for the proletariat. The only difference based on your descriptions of the peasantry seems to be that the peasants only subsistedIndividual ownership of a single plot cannot be compared to Marx's vision of socialised industry, if only because the latter implies common ownership of the means of production

It also has to be said that Marx saw the peasantry as an obsolete class, a relic of the middle ages that had no place in capitalism (as has so been proven). If a class has no place in capitalism then how can it be expected to serve as a model for socialism?

"The lower middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant, all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not revolutionary, but conservative. Nay more, they are reactionary, for they try to roll back the wheel of history"