Can Socialists be influenced by and agree with Karl Marx and Marxism and still not be

[tradeunionsupporter]

Can Socialists be influenced by and agree with Karl Marx and Marxism and still not be Marxists ?

[syndicat]

sure. that's my own viewpoint, being a libertarian socialist, but informed by reading of Marx and Marxists. Marx was a smart guy and had a lot of good ideas. I just don't agree with the idea of a "dictatorship of the proletariat" and I don't think of socialism being brought about by a political party running a state, but as brought about through workers taking over the means of production and running the economy and society directly.

[mikelepore]

That would be a discussion about how to define a word, as though we were preparing to write a dictionary.

[Kami]

Sure, I seem to recall the phrase "Marxian" being used in this context.

[revolution inaction]

many anarchists are infulenced by marx and marxism without being marxists

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Yes, i'd put myself in this category.

I guess you could technically say i'm a 'Marxist', because I do agree with a lot of Marx's analysis, in relation to Historical Materialism, the class struggle etc.

However, i'd say that personally i'm not one for being exclusive in terms of tendencies and views - i'm always open to new ideas. In any case, i'm a Socialist first. That this inadvertantly makes me a 'Marxist' is of no concern to me.

[Dean]

Can Socialists be influenced by and agree with Karl Marx and Marxism and still not be Marxists ?

Yes,
I'm not a Marxist but I draw on Marx, and appreciate his theories in the furtherance of my own understanding.

[Comrade B]

I would say it depends on what you disagree with him on and what you agree with. Some ideas are more central than others.

[Nolan]

I would say there's no clear line between Marxism and anarchism, so yes.

[GPDP]

I would say so. Yes, I draw a lot of my socialism from Marx, but he's far from the only influence. The likes of Kropotkin, Lenin, and hell, even contemporary intellectuals like Chomsky have all influenced my thoughts in some manner. I don't agree with any of them on absolutely all aspects of their thoughts, which is why I hesitate to call myself anything but the broadest leftist labels (socialist when speaking to non-leftists or a general audience, and communist when speaking to leftists).

So yeah. I agree with much of Marxism, but I do not consider myself an out-and-out Marxist. Same with anarchism, really. I like a lot of what anarchism is about, but I do not consider myself a dyed-in-the-wool anarchist anymore.

[tradeunionsupporter]

I ask this question because I agree with Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and agree with Marxism on many issues but don't agree with their views on Religion. I do agree with and I am influenced by Marxism and Marxist ideas but I don't call myself a Marxist.

[LeftSideDown]

Most people, even non-Socialists, are influenced by Marx. The idea of "class warfare" is one that is extremely prevalent.

[MarxSchmarx]

Oh most definitely. One guy even went so far as to claim:


Je ne suis pas Marxiste.

[REVLEFT'S BIEGGST MATSER TROL]

Most people, even non-Socialists, are influenced by Marx. The idea of "class warfare" is one that is extremely prevalent.

Yes, how silly of people to get that idea. :rolleyes:

[Nolan]

Most people, even non-Socialists, are influenced by Marx. The idea of "class warfare" is one that is extremely prevalent.

Well, gee, in my experience its usually because they take part in it themselves in some form or another. Like being in a union. Marx didn't invent class struggle, he simply described it. It's natural to see those who get richer from your work while you get poorer as the enemy.

[A.R.Amistad]

The question is like asking "can a Marxist be a Marxist and still not be a Marxist?" The term "socialist" is so very broad that even the Nazi Scumbags call themselves "National 'Socialists.'" Socialism is a term that originated from the aftermath of the French revolution, and many of the pre-Marxian socialists had heavy elements of racism, sexism, nationalism, etc. that we on RevLeft largely consider reactionary, but at one time may have been excepted by the pre-Marxian 'left.' So yes, of course, a socialist can also not be a Marxist. They could be a Bernsteinite (which is what I think you are describing), a Knights of Labor type, a Oneida Commune type or whatever.


sure. that's my own viewpoint, being a libertarian socialist, but informed by reading of Marx and Marxists. Marx was a smart guy and had a lot of good ideas. I just don't agree with the idea of a "dictatorship of the proletariat" and I don't think of socialism being brought about by a political party running a state, but as brought about through workers taking over the means of production and running the economy and society directly.


Marx never spoke of any sort of party, revoltionary or not, administering the worker's state, and really neither did Lenin. His main works on the State, namely State and Revolution, says nothing about a revolutionary party having any sort of state funtcioning aside from being a leading Marxist activist group in the revolution. Nowhere does State and Revolution describe the one-party state. Both Marx's and Lenin's harsh criticism of Blanquism are prime examples of that. "We are Marxists, not Blanquists" -V.I. Lenin

But I digress.......;)

[AerodynamicOwl]

Can Socialists be influenced by and agree with Karl Marx and Marxism and still not be Marxists ?

Marx went as far as to not even identify himself as a Marxist. (i cant find the source though)

[A.R.Amistad]

Karl Marx, letter to wife Jenny Caroline

"If that is Marxism, then I am not a Marxist."

[ZeroNowhere]

Oh most definitely. One guy even went so far as to claim: [I am not a Marxist quote]
Please let's not use that quote out of context, Rubel's done that enough for everyone. All it was was Marx differentiating himself from a certain tendency who happened to call themselves Marxists based on differences between their views on other issues. The 'Marxists' label only became popular later as an insult by Bakuninites and the like, and was adopted by Engels and such in response. De Leonite also originated as an insult, of course.

To be honest, I generally don't use the term 'Marxist', given that I tend to differ a lot from most 20th Century Marxism, generally in places where it differs from Marx, though I will in situations where I wish to stress that perhaps somebody who hasn't read Marx should probably stop making bizarre claims about his beliefs. Generally, I find it more useful to use terms like 'libertarian communist', 'De Leonite' and such, especially given that 'Marxism' isn't an insult any more, whereas 'De Leonite' is still a term generally used as one.


Karl Marx, letter to wife Jenny CarolineHm, really? Generally, I've only seen the quote being quoted by Engels.

[mikelepore]

I call myself a Marxist because I agree with these three most basic concepts described by Marx:

* For any period of human history, to describe the prevailing methods of economic production, both in the tools and the social relations, is the starting point for explaining all further characteristics about that period of history, such as law, religion, philosophy, family arrangements, art, etc.

* At junctures in history when one great social system develops into another, such as the transitions from classical slavery to feudalism, or from feudalism to capitalism, or from capitalism into socialism, a major factor that provides the leverage to make social change occur is the fact that the population is fragmented into groups with opposed material interests. A typical form of that fragmentation is the fact that those who perform most of the productive labor, and those who own most of the wealth and issue the rules, are not the same group. The subject of a daily conflict is the division of labor's product among those who have produced it and those who did not.

* Profits are derived by capitalists from the fact that tools and materials are "constant" capital, in their depreciation they transfer their own economic value to the product, whereas labor power is "variable" capital, transfering to the product an amount of value that is greater than the workers' own exchange value as commodities on the labor market. The value of a generic commodity tends to be proportional to the total duration of labor time that is necessary for all steps of its production under the prevailing historical conditions.

I came from a Marxian tradition that considers these to be the three fundamental premises.

Of course, you have recognized these principles by name: the materialist conception of history, the class struggle, and the law of value.

***

Besides those three, I do NOT agree with all many other ideas of Marx and Engels.

I do not agree with their speculations about the transitional methods by which a classless society can be implemented, which were very inconsistent from one day to the next, when any methods were suggested at all, which was very rarely.

I do not agree with their summary of the political state, which has the fault of being self-referential, circular, and therefore more semantical than explanatory: a classless society would be stateless because the state is defined as the form of government that exists in a society that is divided into classes.

[AerodynamicOwl]

Hm, really? Generally, I've only seen the quote being quoted by Engels.

It was referenced in an 1890 letter Between Engles and Schmidt, but the actual quote ive seen many times, but none of the top of my head. :blushing:


Just as Marx used to say, commenting on the French "Marxists" of the late [18]70s: "All I know is that I am not a Marxist."

[Left-Reasoning]

You can be a Marxian without being a Marxist, yes.

[MarxSchmarx]

Please let's not use that quote out of context, Rubel's done that enough for everyone. All it was was Marx differentiating himself from a certain tendency who happened to call themselves Marxists based on differences between their views on other issues. The 'Marxists' label only became popular later as an insult by Bakuninites and the like, and was adopted by Engels and such in response. De Leonite also originated as an insult, of course.


Not to derail the thread, but it is not out of context. The context is Marx's reaction to people who have been uncritical of his work, which, yes, as you say, has been what a lot of 20th century Marxism has been about. Moreover, as Bertrand Russell contemptuously remarked, citing Marx as an authority instead of Marx's evidence fetishizes Marx's analysis. Marx was reacting to this uncritical acceptance of his ideas, and this has proven to be quite the premonition.

As far as it's source, it was not in a letter to Jenny: it appears in a remark Marx made to an unstable sycophant:
http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2010/03/28/howard-zinns-je-ne-suis-pas-marxiste/

[Die Neue Zeit]

No, the context of Marx's reaction was based upon French debate on a minimum program (i.e., the purpose of including reforms in a program). Guesde was *not* an unstable sycophant:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm

[RGacky3]

Karl Marx contributed tons to the modern understanding of economics and history, the labour theory of value, his analysis of capitalism, the materialistic view of history, class-struggle, all of these analysis were and are invaluble to our understanding.

Heres where the problem lies, many people who call themselves Marxists, follow all of what Marx wrote as if it were gospel without weighing it against reality, and they take marxes analysis and don't put in in context. For example, his materialistic view of history is great but it is not the only view, it has to be tempered with many many other factors, class struggle is a huge factor in history but not the only one, many things have to be considered.

I don't consider myself a Marxist because I don't consider Marx to be the end all of socialism, or of historical analysis, he's important, but not all important.