Marx's perspective indigenous people

[BIG BROTHER]

Hey comrades,

I have always believed that Marxism itself although internationalist started as Ethnocentric ideology since capitalism first started in Europe but since Lenin continued Marxism and capitalism spread through the world is not Ethnocentric anymore.

Nevertheless I'm completely ignorant on what analysis Marx and Engels had on indigenous people of America for example. Does anybody know?

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I highly recommend this book (http://www.fernwoodpublishing.ca/The-Tragedy-of-Progress-David-Bedford-Danielle-Irving-Stephens/), which, though the ending is a little weak/wishy-washy, gives a good overview of Marx/Engels' take on indigenous cultures, and looks for a Marxist answer to aboriginal questions that rejects the eurocentric logic of, "Their historical moment is passed, and they just need to become proles," which is unfortunately endemic among leftists.

[BIG BROTHER]

The book seems good but I don't got the $$$ to buy it.

I mean I know now as Marxism evolved, in great deal thanks to the contributions made by Lenin, we support oppressed nationalities and do not counterpoise Socialism as a precondition to support their struggle.

So as a contemporary Marxis I would support lets say an indigenous uprising in Mexico.

But what I wonder is what Marx thought about the indigenous people during his time.

[B0LSHEVIK]

Hey comrades,

I have always believed that Marxism itself although internationalist started as Ethnocentric ideology since capitalism first started in Europe but since Lenin continued Marxism and capitalism spread through the world is not Ethnocentric anymore.

Nevertheless I'm completely ignorant on what analysis Marx and Engels had on indigenous people of America for example. Does anybody know?

Well to put it bluntly, Marx was not fond of indigenous peoples. Not that he had a distaste them, rather that he felt they were not in a position to build socialism or in other words 'backward.' Marx and thus marxism was very eurocentric, and the Russian rev did little to change that. As a matter of fact, Marx probably wouldnt have liked the idea of (asiatic)Russia going from a feudal state to marxist state in one step. To this day people in mexico and latin america will call communism/anarchism european ideas. I would have to say Mao and Fidel/Che are the faces of socilaism in their respective regions.

[BIG BROTHER]

Well to put it bluntly, Marx was not fond of indigenous peoples. Not that he had a distaste them, rather that he felt they were not in a position to build socialism or in other words 'backward.' Marx and thus marxism was very eurocentric, and the Russian rev did little to change that. As a matter of fact, Marx probably wouldnt have liked the idea of (asiatic)Russia going from a feudal state to marxist state in one step. To this day people in mexico and latin america will call communism/anarchism european ideas. I would have to say Mao and Fidel/Che are the faces of socilaism in their respective regions.

I wouldn't say everyone in Mexico calls Marxism an European idea(even though it is) I myself I'm Mexican and for many of us its just our idea as international workers.

And what I wonder now does anybody have any text were Marx' refers to indigenous people? I'm sure for example that you are right Bolshevista but I just wanna see it myself so I can educate myself on this.

[B0LSHEVIK]

I wouldn't say everyone in Mexico calls Marxism an European idea(even though it is) I myself I'm Mexican and for many of us its just our idea as international workers.

And what I wonder now does anybody have any text were Marx' refers to indigenous peoJosé Carlos Mariáteguiple? I'm sure for example that you are right Bolshevista but I just wanna see it myself so I can educate myself on this.

Yea Im mexican too (but from SoCal). And not everyone calls it that, but enough mexican intellgentsia have referred to it as such that it kind of sticks with me now.

Theres actually been a lot of work done into this question. Have you heard of José Carlos Mariátegui? (look up nicaragua/cuba/peru) He founded several communist parties in South/Central america and has written extensively on the question. He argued that many civilizations in the americas before the conquest were 'socialist.' That is, socialist 3 centuries before Marx even was born! He also argues that many ameri-indian societies were marxist, far more so than the Soviet union ever was at least. He argued against Marx, that is, against waiting for a industrial proletariat to evolve. This was not because time was a constraint, but because he claimed capitalism in the Americas had neglected or all but ignored and isolated millions of ameri-indians throughout our continent. Therefore, according to Jose, Marxist socialism would bypass these people too. Though Marx later, after the commune in Paris, began shifting on the position.

Oh, and Look up Das Kapital, first chapter, he speaks very social-darwiny of 'tribal peoples.'

To clarify; Marx believes that Euroculture is where its at (industralized, literate, etc etc) because it has long ago shed tribal beliefs and is farther up the evolutionary ladder than say Chiapas Mx, who is still:

"founded either on the immature development of man individually, who has not yet severed the umbilical cord that unites him with his fellowmen in a primitive tribal community, or upon direct relations of subjection. They can arise and exist only when the development of the productive power of labour has not risen beyond a low stage, and when, therefore, the social relations within the sphere of material life, between man and man, and between man and Nature, are correspondingly narrow."

Just read Kapital.

[BIG BROTHER]

Oh ok I see. Shit reading Capital is good but I won't be doing it soon >_< too much stuff to do :P

But yea I see indeed he was kinda chauvinistic, I think some indigenous people too were kinda socialist, primitive communist in a sense, but that was mostly the northeastern semi-domatic people.

The sedentary ones, like the Mexica and the Inca were very stratified.

But thank you for the info!!!

[Savior]

Oh ok I see. Shit reading Capital is good but I won't be doing it soon >_< too much stuff to do :P

But yea I see indeed he was kinda chauvinistic, I think some indigenous people too were kinda socialist, primitive communist in a sense, but that was mostly the northeastern semi-domatic people.

The sedentary ones, like the Mexica and the Inca were very stratified.

But thank you for the info!!!

Most people don't realize that Marx was limited by his time in ideas. Marxism as a theory is right but even if his views are not up to today's standards does not discredit him in the least. For example would most of you feel comfortable dating and making love to someone that is a transexual? Most would not. But in the future it will be considered normal to be with a transexual.

[B0LSHEVIK]

Most people don't realize that Marx was limited by his time in ideas. Marxism as a theory is right but even if his views are not up to today's standards does not discredit him in the least. For example would most of you feel comfortable dating and making love to someone that is a transexual? Most would not. But in the future it will be considered normal to be with a transexual.


I agree with you on Marx, but,

LOL WTF?

I doubt being a TS will be common, let alone making love to them over women. Just my $.02.


ON EDIT: youre not saying that because of the chinese ratio of men to women being 20 : 1, are you?

Thats a problem that just came by my mind.

[BIG BROTHER]

Most people don't realize that Marx was limited by his time in ideas. Marxism as a theory is right but even if his views are not up to today's standards does not discredit him in the least. For example would most of you feel comfortable dating and making love to someone that is a transexual? Most would not. But in the future it will be considered normal to be with a transexual.

I never said that that doesn't mean Marxism is bankrupt or anything like that.

Marxism is a theory that is alive and has no dogmas, which is why it has evolved with the movement.

I just wanted to educate myself about Marx's own ideas about indigenous people during his time, that is all.

[southernmissfan]

I agree with you on Marx, but,

LOL WTF?

I doubt being a TS will be common, let alone making love to them over women. Just my $.02.


ON EDIT: youre not saying that because of the chinese ratio of men to women being 20 : 1, are you?

Thats a problem that just came by my mind.

Umm I think Savior is saying that transsexuals will be more openly accepted and relationships with trans people will likewise be more accepted. Similar to how homosexuals are more openly accepted compared to say a few decades ago. There's a lot of work to do but things have improved.

[ZeroNowhere]

Well to put it bluntly, Marx was not fond of indigenous peoples. Not that he had a distaste them, rather that he felt they were not in a position to build socialism or in other words 'backward.' Marx and thus marxism was very eurocentric, and the Russian rev did little to change that. As a matter of fact, Marx probably wouldnt have liked the idea of (asiatic)Russia going from a feudal state to marxist state in one step.
It didn't do so in either case, but, um, do you have any idea of what Marx actually wrote about Russia (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/03/zasulich1.htm)?

[BIG BROTHER]

It didn't do so in either case, but, um, do you have any idea of what Marx actually wrote about Russia (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/03/zasulich1.htm)?

Zero you are right on with showing what Marx actually thought about Russia.

What I wonder though is what do you mean when you say it didn't do so in either case?

I'm not trying to attack you just make myself clear, just gain more understanding.

[Amphictyonis]

It didn't do so in either case, but, um, do you have any idea of what Marx actually wrote about Russia (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/03/zasulich1.htm)?

That the advanced capitalist nations would have to go socialist for Russia to skip capitalism.

[B0LSHEVIK]

It didn't do so in either case, but, um, do you have any idea of what Marx actually wrote about Russia (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/03/zasulich1.htm)?

Well I havent read every single pamphlet, essay or letter written by Marx on Russia, But I know and understand what Marx thought about a country in Russias shoes. And yes, I am aware that Marx set up a double standard for Russia by alotting power in the socalled Mir or commune. He was wrong though, wasnt he? Didnt even Lenin come out against this? And Im very sure that Marx would have disagreed ultimately with the Soviet solution. The problem though maybe that Marx was wrong the whole time on Russia.

The interest of this letter is not to be found in the historical predictions it makes, but rather in the example it offers of the way that Marx's mind worked. The reasoning here represents a good example of Marx's materialist approach to history. He wants to arrive at a fairly detailed level of understanding of the social and economic relations - the property relations - that constituted a historical form of the rural commune. And he then seeks to provide an analysis of the way in which those relations might be expected to develop under a specific set of historical circumstances. And key within this analysis is the workings of the specific form of property that corresponded to this social system - the social relations of production.

I suppose the letter illustrates something else as well: Marx's interest at the end of his life in finding an alternative pathway to socialism. The revolutions of 1848 were long in the past, and a proletarian revolution had not ensued. The Paris Commune had been decisively and violently repressed in 1871. Working-class militancy was not propitious in the advanced capitalist countries - France, Germany, or Britain. So the prospects of revolution in the advanced capitalist world were not encouraging to Marx. And so finding some hope for an alternative process of social development through which the ends of socialism might be achieved was an appealing prospect for Marx.

It is also also interesting to recall that one of the disputes among the Bolsheviks within Soviet leadership in the 1920s and 1930s was the issue of cooperatives in agriculture. Alex Chayanov (who Stalin purged) advocated for a more democratic route to Soviet socialism, through the mechanism of locally established rural cooperatives. Chayanov claimed that Marx was wrong on believing these communes could organize socialist development because 'rural' values operate in a way that individual families work to live, not to create surplus and thus profit; and were therefore contrary to capitalist OR socialist development. We all know how collectivization went in Russia. Some would argue that rather than representing a bright new future for the peasants, soviet-collectivization represented a cruel war against rural society. Though to be fair, was not necessarily Marxist.

[bailey_187]

I dont know if Marx had any writings on indigneous people in the America's, but he did write on Colonialism in India.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1853/06/25.htm



These small stereotype forms of social organism have been to the greater part dissolved, and are disappearing, not so much through the brutal interference of the British tax-gatherer and the British soldier, as to the working of English steam and English free trade. Those family-communities were based on domestic industry, in that peculiar combination of hand-weaving, hands-spinning and hand-tilling agriculture which gave them self-supporting power. English interference having placed the spinner in Lancashire and the weaver in Bengal, or sweeping away both Hindoo spinner and weaver, dissolved these small semi-barbarian, semi-civilized communities, by blowing up their economical basis, and thus produced the greatest, and to speak the truth, the only social revolution ever heard of in Asia.
Now, sickening as it must be to human feeling to witness those myriads of industrious patriarchal and inoffensive social organizations disorganized and dissolved into their units, thrown into a sea of woes, and their individual members losing at the same time their ancient form of civilization, and their hereditary means of subsistence, we must not forget that these idyllic village-communities, inoffensive though they may appear, had always been the solid foundation of Oriental despotism, that they restrained the human mind within the smallest possible compass, making it the unresisting tool of superstition, enslaving it beneath traditional rules, depriving it of all grandeur and historical energies. We must not forget the barbarian egotism which, concentrating on some miserable patch of land, had quietly witnessed the ruin of empires, the perpetration of unspeakable cruelties, the massacre of the population of large towns, with no other consideration bestowed upon them than on natural events, itself the helpless prey of any aggressor who deigned to notice it at all. We must not forget that this undignified, stagnatory, and vegetative life, that this passive sort of existence evoked on the other part, in contradistinction, wild, aimless, unbounded forces of destruction and rendered murder itself a religious rite in Hindostan. We must not forget that these little communities were contaminated by distinctions of caste and by slavery, that they subjugated man to external circumstances instead of elevating man the sovereign of circumstances, that they transformed a self-developing social state into never changing natural destiny, and thus brought about a brutalizing worship of nature, exhibiting its degradation in the fact that man, the sovereign of nature, fell down on his knees in adoration of Kanuman, the monkey, and Sabbala, the cow.
England, it is true, in causing a social revolution in Hindostan, was actuated only by the vilest interests, and was stupid in her manner of enforcing them. But that is not the question. The question is, can mankind fulfil its destiny without a fundamental revolution in the social state of Asia? If not, whatever may have been the crimes of England she was the unconscious tool of history in bringing about that revolution.


Basically Marx seems to view Colonialism, atleast in respect to India, as a regretable yet progressive. Whether Marx's view is based on reliable evidence, i dont know. However the reasoning is basicaly the same Marx/Marxists use to defend capitalism and its destruction bought to English peasents with the enclosures etc

[ComradeOm]

Well I havent read every single pamphlet, essay or letter written by Marx on Russia, But I know and understand what Marx thought about a country in Russias shoes. And yes, I am aware that Marx set up a double standard for Russia by alotting power in the socalled Mir or commune. He was wrong though, wasnt he? Didnt even Lenin come out against this?He wrote a whole book to refute it - The Development of Capitalism in Russia. But since Lenin couldn't bring himself to simply come out and say 'Marx was wrong' he instead attacked the underlying assumptions. The obshchina could not be used as a basis for 'skipping' capitalism because it itself had become compromised by the capitalist mode of production. Or to summarise the entire book: 'Too later suckers, Russia's already capitalist'. Of course this being Lenin, the book itself contains some fairly questionable assumptions/omissions of its own, but its still an interesting read

More to the point however is that Development of Capitalism was published in 1899 when Lenin was still enmeshed in the mechanicalism of the Second International. The latter, which he broke with in 1917, did subscribe to a rigidly 'stagist' vulgarisation of Marxism. To ascribe this to Marx (or indeed today's 'Marxism') would be incorrect

[ZeroNowhere]

Working-class militancy was not propitious in the advanced capitalist countries - France, Germany, or Britain. So the prospects of revolution in the advanced capitalist world were not encouraging to Marx.In actuality, his hope for the Russian mir was based on his optimism as regards revolution in the advanced capitalist world. He stated numerous times that the possibility of communism from the Russian mir rests in the fact that it continues to exist simultaneously with the progressive collapse of capitalist elsewhere. As it happens, he was over-optimistic as regards capitalism's lifespan being at an end, and this was ensured by two World Wars. Nonetheless, I think that it would be rather strange to suggest that Marx thought that there wasn't much chance of a revolution in the West when he stated that capitalism was entering a death-crisis.


And yes, I am aware that Marx set up a double standard for Russia by alotting power in the socalled Mir or commune.There was no 'double standard'. The Russian mir co-existed with a rotting capitalism elsewhere. On its own, it was simply collapsing progressively, but it needn't collapse of necessity.


He was wrong though, wasnt he?I wouldn't say so. Given a revolution in the West, the communes could well have passed 'straight to communism', but there wasn't one, and that's what Marx was wrong about.


Basically Marx seems to view Colonialism, atleast in respect to India, as a regretable yet progressive.Marx's view had been essentially that India and such had been passing from hand to hand over the years, due to invasions and so on, and only capitalist development could set the foundation for Indian independence. He had been fairly unflattering about the actual rule, and I recall some fairly venomous censures ("a bleeding process, with a vengeance," etc). Ultimately, "The Indians will not reap the fruits of the new elements of society scattered among them by the British bourgeoisie, till in Great Britain itself the now ruling classes shall have been supplanted by the industrial proletariat, or till the Hindus [Indians] themselves shall have grown strong enough to throw off the English yoke altogether." As such, "We have here given but a brief and mildly-colored chapter from the real history of British rule in India. In view of such facts, dispassionate and thoughtful men may perhaps be led to ask whether a people are not justified in attempting to expel the foreign conquerors who have so abused their subjects." Ultimately, I don't think that there was much 'Eurocentricism' in his views on India, just a fairly logical analysis of the facts at hand, although these were not always accurate. It wasn't particularly 'orientalist': "I share not the opinion of those who believe in a golden age of Hindustan."

[Savior]

Umm I think Savior is saying that transsexuals will be more openly accepted and relationships with trans people will likewise be more accepted. Similar to how homosexuals are more openly accepted compared to say a few decades ago. There's a lot of work to do but things have improved.
Percisely, most people 50 years ago or even more recently were not comfortable with idea of homosexualisty being widespread, but with time is become more common.


I never said that that doesn't mean Marxism is bankrupt or anything like that.

Marxism is a theory that is alive and has no dogmas, which is why it has evolved with the movement.

I just wanted to educate myself about Marx's own ideas about indigenous people during his time, that is all.

I know you were, just i was getting the feeling that people were dehumanizing marx and making him a god.

I agree with you on Marx, but,

LOL WTF?

I doubt being a TS will be common, let alone making love to them over women. Just my $.02.


ON EDIT: youre not saying that because of the chinese ratio of men to women being 20 : 1, are you?

Thats a problem that just came by my mind.

No, i meant that times change, and if someones ideas from 150 years ago are all that modern but his others are then give him a little free reign.

[BIG BROTHER]

damm this is getting good.

The piece provided by bailey gives me a lot of insigh into Marx's mind. Thank you!

[Amphictyonis]

He respected their culture, didn't see them as social savages Marx simply thought they lacked industry and so in that sense called them primitive. Primitive but socially advanced. He used them as an example to show how our relation top the means of production determines our social standing in society. Women in particular provided just as much to sustenance as men in native American tribes so they appreciated much more freedom than many western women in, lets say, the 1950's.

[Amphictyonis]

I dont know if Marx had any writings on indigneous people in the America's
http://libcom.org/library/karl-marx-iroquois-franklin-rosemont

[BIG BROTHER]

http://libcom.org/library/karl-marx-iroquois-franklin-rosemont

The article that you gave me has lead me to start reading the notes of Marx that it analyzes. Indeed it confirms Marxism is not a dogma but a living science and of course it gives me a lot of insight into Marx's views of indigenous people.

[A Revolutionary Tool]

Why don't you just read Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1884/origin-family/index.htm
Has plenty of analysis on indigenous people doesn't it. Although back then they were called primitives, something pejorative nowadays.

[Zanthorus]

According to Loren Goldner at least, Marx had given up on the Russian Commune's by the time of his death:


Bordiga believed that everything important had been said about the Russian question by Marx's death in 1883. To wit: Marx's correspondence with the Populists in the 1870's, the two cubic meters of notes on Russian agriculture he left at his death (he didn't finish Capital because in the last decade of his life he became fascinated by the agrarian question in Russia), and the various new prefaces to the Manifesto and other writings from the 1878-1883 period that reflected his involvement with Russia. (He had even concealed the extent of this from Engels, who became furious when he read that work on the Russian question had been the real reason for the incompleteness ofCapital). The important things for Bordiga were Marx's discovery of the Russian commune, and the belief Marx entertained between 1878 and 1881 that on the basis of the commune Russia might literally skip the capitalist phase of history, might even do so in the absence of a revolution in the West, and that the peasants, priorto the capitalization of agriculture, might be central to the process. Marx wrote (in the famous letter to Vera Zasulich) that "If Russia follows the path that it took after 1861 it will miss the greatest chance to leap over all the fatal alternatives of the capitalist regime that history has ever offered to a people. Like all other countries, it will have to submit to the inexorable laws of that system". By his death, Marx had decided that Russia had missed the chance, and told the Russian Populists so.http://home.earthlink.net/~lrgoldner/bordiga.html

I know Engels did say that Russia had missed the chance in the 1890's. I've never seen anything by Marx reputing his earlier views on the Commune, but a good deal of his works remain untranslated, so it's possible (Or it could be in one of the letters which isn't on the Marxists Internet Archive).

[BIG BROTHER]

Does anybody know where I can get Marx's Ethnological Notebooks online? After reading the article provided by Amphi I wanna read them really bad.