Is Marxism a Theory?

[Kronsteen]

Theory and practice are obviously related. You can't have a project to change the world without some notion of what you're trying to change, what can be changed, what needs to be changed and how to bring about that change. And you can't construct a theory about the world without data, which comes from feedback and interaction with what you're studying.

The difference between a political theory and a political project is then a matter of emphasis. A theory is more concerned with building a model than doing anything with it - and may just be constructed to satisfy intellectual curiosity. A project is more concerned with making a difference - and may just exist to satisfy emotional impulses. But you can't have one without the other.

So which is marxism? Is it a theory which can sometimes be put into practice? Or is it a project for political change? One which requires theory, but doesn't need deep, complete, or consistant theory. One which needs only so much theory as each stage or aspect of the project requires.

It's got to be the latter. "In the beginning was the deed", insisted Rosa Luxemburg. "The philosophy of praxis", as Antonio Gramsci referred to marxism.

But if you talk to most marxists, they'll give you the impression that marxism is a project for change...with a unified theory of everything attached. Marxist theory is supposed to explain everything from a war in Angola to a recession in Japan to homelessness levels in New York. In fact, it's even supposed to explain the thoughts that go on in people's heads, the way water boils, and the nature of electrons!

Of course, it can't predict wars or recessions, the psychological insights may be valid but they're also vague, and the attempts to rope in hard science are just embarrassing. So it's not a very good theory of everything - but the fact that it exists at all is important, because it appeals so much to people who say what they want is not a grand unified explanation for reality, but a change of economic substructure.

So, marxism was once a definite project with a sketchy theory, that seems to have mutated into a grand theory with a rather vague project.

Which might be one of many reasons why the project has not been a success.

Your thoughts on any of the above? (And I'm asking for thoughts, not screeches of rage.)

[Commie73]

I would say that Marxism is firstly a theoretical framework for understanding capitalist relations. Marxs writings do provide a programme for change, but marxism only becomes ideology in that sense when it is adopted by the revolutionary subject -the working class.

Pannekoek has a good take on this in Lenin as philosopher:


Because of this scientific basis, however, Marxism is more than a mere science. It is a new way of looking at the past and the future, at the meaning of life, of the world, of thought; it is a spiritual revolution, it is a new world-view, a new life-system. As a system of life Marxism is real and living only through the class that adheres to it. The workers who are imbued with this new outlook, become aware of themselves as the class of the future, growing in number and strength and consciousness, striving to take production into their own hands and through the revolution to become masters of their own fate. Hence Marxism as the theory of proletarian revolution is a reality, and at the same time a living power, only in the minds and hearts of the revolutionary working class.


Thus Marxism is not an inflexible doctrine or a sterile dogma of imposed truths. Society changes, the proletariat grows, science develops. New forms and phenomena arise in capitalism, in politics, in science, which Marx and Engels could not have foreseen or surmised. Forms of thought and struggle, that under former conditions were necessary must under later conditions give way to other ones. But the method of research which they framed remains up to this day an excellent guide and tool towards the understanding and interpretation of new events. The working class, enormously increased under capitalism, today stands only at the threshold of its revolution and, hence, of its Marxist development; Marxism only now begins to get its full significance as a living force in the working class. Thus Marxism itself is a living theory which grows, with the increase of the proletariat and with the tasks and aims of its fight.

[Kronsteen]

I would say that Marxism is firstly a theoretical framework for understanding capitalist relations. Marxs writings do provide a programme for change, but marxism only becomes ideology in that sense when it is adopted by the revolutionary subject

So, you and Pannekoek are saying marxism isn't primarily a programme to overthrow capitalism, but rather a kind of super-theory, a worldview or fundamental way of thinking - one that could be used in the cause of reform, or revolution, but doesn't have to be.

As for the Anton Pannekoek quote...


Marxism is more than a mere science. It is a new way of looking at the past and the future, at the meaning of life, of the world, of thought; it is a spiritual revolution, it is a new world-view, a new life-system.

...try replacing 'Marxism' with 'Scientology', and marxism looks like just another wacky cult. I find it very difficult to believe the hardheaded, violent overthrow of governments is just an adjunct to a belief system.

[thesadmafioso]

It is a theory designed with a heavy emphasis on implementation, as the two are inseparably intertwined. Louis Althusser outlines this concept quite extensively in his work "Philosophy as a Revolutionary Weapon".

"The fusion of Marxist theory and the Workers’ Movement is the most important event in the whole history of the class struggle, i.e. in practically the whole of human history"

"Marxist-Leninist philosophy, or dialectical materialism, represents the proletarian class struggle in theory. In the union of Marxist theory and the Workers’ Movement (the ultimate reality of the union of theory and practice) philosophy ceases, as Marx said, to ‘interpret the world’. It becomes a weapon with which ‘to change it’: revolution."

Source: http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/althusser/1968/philosophy-as-weapon.htm

[Commie73]

So, you and Pannekoek are saying marxism isn't primarily a programme to overthrow capitalism, but rather a kind of super-theory, a worldview or fundamental way of thinking - one that could be used in the cause of reform, or revolution, but doesn't have to be.


What im saying is that marxism is a theory of understanding capitalism and a programme of overthrowing it, but that only really means something when it is taken up by the working class itself.




...try replacing 'Marxism' with 'Scientology', and marxism looks like just another wacky cult. I find it very difficult to believe the hardheaded, violent overthrow of governments is just an adjunct to a belief system.

Marxism isnt a belief system. You have to read the actual chapter, pannekoek does not mean "spiritual revolution" in a religious sense of the the word spiritual...

[Kronsteen]

It is a theory designed with a heavy emphasis on implementation

That's interesting, because the tradition that I'm loosely tied to is that of the UK-SWP, which is non-orthodox trotskyism. They've always been impatient with discussions of theory, painting marxism as first and foremost a revolutionary project - with a smallish number of resident intellectuals providing the analysis and theory for the rest of us.

You say marxism is a theory designed to be implemented. They say it's an objective to be theorised - with the theories to be constantly updated in the light of experience.

I have to say that if we're revolutionaries, the goal of revolution would seem to be more important than a fully worked out description of what has to be overthrown, or a plan drawn up in detail in advance of how to do it. If it comes down to a choice between knowing all about capitalism and getting rid of it, a marxist should chose the latter.

Obviously theory and practice are interdependent, but your characterisation stresses the 'theory' side of the coin - and you may be in the majority.

I'll read the Althusser essay.

[thesadmafioso]

That's interesting, because the tradition that I'm loosely tied to is that of the UK-SWP, which is non-orthodox trotskyism. They've always been impatient with discussions of theory, painting marxism as first and foremost a revolutionary project - with a smallish number of resident intellectuals providing the analysis and theory for the rest of us.

You say marxism is a theory designed to be implemented. They say it's an objective to be theorised - with the theories to be constantly updated in the light of experience.

I have to say that if we're revolutionaries, the goal of revolution would seem to be more important than a fully worked out description of what has to be overthrown, or a plan drawn up in detail in advance of how to do it. If it comes down to a choice between knowing all about capitalism and getting rid of it, a marxist should chose the latter.

Obviously theory and practice are interdependent, but your characterisation stresses the 'theory' side of the coin - and you may be in the majority.

I'll read the Althusser essay.

Practice cedes a great deal of its potential when it is not adequately supported with theory. Workers movements under capitalism are always going to exist, what Marxism seeks to do is to utilize that discontent towards a grander objective of revolution. Without the guidance of theory, practice becomes hollow and ineffectual, yet without action theory is meaningless. The significance of developed theory stems from the perpetual existence of struggle on some scale under a capitalistic mode of economic production, as the conditions for action will remain present in congruence with the continued existence of capitalism. This is compared to the non permanent and ever shifting state of Marxist theory, a factor which is far more prone to encountering error. And as theory is something more open to refinement and polish, it is naturally something which will receive a disproportionate degree of focus in party environments more often than not.

[Commie73]

That's interesting, because the tradition that I'm loosely tied to is that of the UK-SWP, which is non-orthodox trotskyism. They've always been impatient with discussions of theory, painting marxism as first and foremost a revolutionary project - with a smallish number of resident intellectuals providing the analysis and theory for the rest of us.


Which is one of the main reasons why the SWP is just plain wrong. ive had so many political arguments with SWP members where they dont use any sort of political analysis, they just trot out the party line. The practice o the SWP is also a bit suspect...

Marxism isnt the property of an elite of intellectuals or experts in revolution, its a way of understanding the world under capitalism. Communist ideas develop within the class itself, and within the organizations of the class, but its a proccess of collective development, you cant just have a resident group of intellectuals telling you what the theory is.

[Kronsteen]

Marxism isnt the property of an elite of intellectuals or experts in revolution, its a way of understanding the world under capitalism.

Indeed, but Lenin in 'What is to be Done?' wrote quite clearly that the workers are incapable of replicating the insights of marxist intellectuals on their own - which always struck me as an odd thing to say, because marxist theory is supposed to be generalised from the experience of...the workers.

I suppose a case could be made that in Russia at the time, it might have been true, but Leninists and Trotskyists (including my own, er, beloved party) have maintained both irreconcilable positions - marxism is codified worker's consciousness, and the workers need marxists to give them that consciousness.

[Commie73]

Indeed, but Lenin in 'What is to be Done?' wrote quite clearly that the workers are incapable of replicating the insights of marxist intellectuals on their own - which always struck me as an odd thing to say, because marxist theory is supposed to be generalised from the experience of...the workers.

I suppose a case could be made that in Russia at the time, it might have been true, but Leninists and Trotskyists (including my own, er, beloved party) have maintained both irreconcilable positions - marxism is codified worker's consciousness, and the workers need marxists to give them that consciousness.


There is a case for the necessity of revolutionary organizations arguing for communist positions, but these organizations are of an entirely different form to ones controlled by an elite of intellectuals. Class conciousness comes about through struggle and the class cannot delegate its role as revolutionary subject to anyone else.

heres anothe pannekoek quote:


persons with the same fundamental conceptions unite for the discussion of practical steps and seek clarification through discussions and propagandize their conclusions, such groups might be called parties, but they would be parties in an entirely different sense from those of today. Action, the actual class struggle, is the task of the working masses themselves, in their entirety, in their real groupings as factory and millhands, or other productive groups, because history and economy have placed them in the position where they must and can fight the working class struggle

http://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/1936/party-class.htm

[A Marxist Historian]

So, you and Pannekoek are saying marxism isn't primarily a programme to overthrow capitalism, but rather a kind of super-theory, a worldview or fundamental way of thinking - one that could be used in the cause of reform, or revolution, but doesn't have to be.

As for the Anton Pannekoek quote...



...try replacing 'Marxism' with 'Scientology', and marxism looks like just another wacky cult. I find it very difficult to believe the hardheaded, violent overthrow of governments is just an adjunct to a belief system.

Well, we are all familiar I hope with Marx's own comment on the matter. Polemicizing against some German or other, he said "if that is Marxism I'm not a Marxist."

Is "Marxism" a "program to ovethrow capitalism"? Not to Marx. He did not initially assume that capitalism needed to be overthrown, indeed in his earliest writings for the *original* "Rheinische Zeitung" he was a fairly radical liberal editing a newspaper financed by Rhineland Jewish businessmen.

Rather he decided that was the case after a whole lot of thought about a whole lot of things, in terms of philosophy, economics and history. And at one time or another he wrote about just about anything you could imagine. Why? Because he was very into dialectics, and one of the most basic laws of dialectics is that everything is connected to everything else.

So is that a super-theory, i.e. an instant add-water mechanical solution to anything imaginable? No. Is it a worldview? Certainly.

Can it be really used in the purpose of political ends *other* than revolution? No, not without distorting it in some way, "revising" it in the traditional terminology, which is why "revisionist" is a basic Marxist slur word.

Why? Because it's an integrated whole, with everything connected dialectically to everything else. Knock out one pillar, everything else collapses, and turns into useless rubble that just gets in your way.

Which doesn't mean it can't evolve and grow. In fact it has to, as the other biggest rule of dialectics is that everything is always changing, so theories have to change to reflect how the world changes.

Trouble is, Marxist theories usually change because Marxist politicians want them to change when they become inconvenient. Classic example being all those Marxist and indeed Leninist ideas that became oh so inconvenient for Stalin when he took over. Like world revolution and workers of the world unite.

-M.H.-

[A Marxist Historian]

Indeed, but Lenin in 'What is to be Done?' wrote quite clearly that the workers are incapable of replicating the insights of marxist intellectuals on their own - which always struck me as an odd thing to say, because marxist theory is supposed to be generalised from the experience of...the workers.

Well, no. Marxist theory is supposed to be generalized from the experience of the *entire human race,* not just the workers. From that experience, it is learned that one particular class of the human race has nothing to lose but its chains and a world to win, because unlike all other classes, its interests and socialism are *objectively* identical. Whether they happen to realize it or not.

As Marx emphasized, one of the biggest and nastiest features of capitalist society is the accelerating divorce between physical and mental labor. You have a particular group of society, the intellectuals, who are supposed to be the *only* people who come up with ideas. Well, that is just as true for socialist ideas as any other.

In fact Marx says that right in the Manifesto, that it is the best representatives of the *bourgeois intellectuals,* the exact words he uses, that develop socialist ideas. Not the working class.

The Leninist party idea is pretty much right there in the Manifesto if you read closely. Which is not an accident, as the German Communist League was very much a democratic-centralist vanguard organization of the Leninist type. It's just nobody bothered to theorize this, that was just the way things were done, as that's what seemed to be the commonsense way to do things in Germany in the 1940s, which was pretty near as repressive as Tsarist Russia in Lenin's lifetime.


I suppose a case could be made that in Russia at the time, it might have been true, but Leninists and Trotskyists (including my own, er, beloved party) have maintained both irreconcilable positions - marxism is codified worker's consciousness, and the workers need marxists to give them that consciousness.

No, Marxism is *not* codified workers' consciousness. What is the consciousness of the average worker? What the capitalists want him to think. Racism, national chauvinism, sexism, etc. If that were not true, we wouldn't have to have revolutions or revolutionary movements, as any country with democracy would simply vote the capitalists out and the communists in. They'd have to go to allout military dictatorship, and that couldn't last forever.

-M.H.-

[Kronsteen]

Pannekoek has a good take on this in Lenin as philosopher

Having now read Anton Pannekoek's Lenin as Philosopher, I can only say he comes accross as a sycophant - one who's convinced Lenin's ontology and epistemology were right both in his notebooks and conspectus of Hegel, and in Empiriocriticism, despite the two being incompatible. But that's a whole other thread.


Communist ideas develop within the class itself, and within the organizations of the class

So Marx himself was unnecessary - the workers develop communist ideas for themselves. Precisely the opposite of what Lenin said.


Class conciousness comes about through struggle and the class cannot delegate its role as revolutionary subject to anyone else.

Marxist parties don't seem to have a role in all this.

[Kronsteen]

In the union of Marxist theory and the Workers’ Movement (the ultimate reality of the union of theory and practice) philosophy ceases, as Marx said, to ‘interpret the world’. It becomes a weapon with which ‘to change it’: revolution."

So here the workers have the movement and the marxists have the theory - which implies the marxists aren't only rank and file workers but special too. And both need each other to make the revolution.


what Marxism seeks to do is to utilize that discontent towards a grander objective of revolution

Once again, marxists may be workers but they're also above the workers.

[Kronsteen]

Polemicizing against some German or other, he said "if that is Marxism I'm not a Marxist."

He was addressing Paul Lafargue. Who was French and Marx's future son-in-law. Lafargue was interpreting marxism as a kind of economic determinism - in the vein of the French physiocrats.

If you are The Marxist Historian, perhaps you need to brush up on your history.


one of the most basic laws of dialectics is that everything is connected to everything else

That's a quote from Lenin, made in very specific circumstances, and he wasn't talking about dialectics. The notion of 'totality' may have been implicit in the writings of Engels and Trotsky on dialectics, but I don't recall it being explicitly stated.

Though John Rees in Algebra of Revolution listed it as one of the three pillars of dialectic theory - which he winds up saying is identical with...Marxism itself. I'm not sure how you feel about agreeing with the UK-SWP's chief disgraced intellectual.


Can it be really used in the purpose of political ends *other* than revolution? No

So the marxist world-view (your term) can't be used to do anything other than make a worker's revolution? I suppose that answers my original question - marxism is a project, not a theory.


it's an integrated whole, with everything connected dialectically to everything else. Knock out one pillar, everything else collapses, and turns into useless rubble that just gets in your way.

You're saying if one little bit of marxism gets removed, the whole edifice collapses like a house of cards? We'd better hope Marx wasn't wrong about any of his major themes.


it is the best representatives of the *bourgeois intellectuals,* the exact words he uses, that develop socialist ideas. [...] What is the consciousness of the average worker? What the capitalists want him to think.

So the workers are sheep, and the marxists - who have somehow avoided sheepification - will save them, by organising them for their own future good.

[thesadmafioso]

So here the workers have the movement and the marxists have the theory - which implies the marxists aren't only rank and file workers but special too. And both need each other to make the revolution.



Once again, marxists may be workers but they're also above the workers.

I would not say that the standard Marxist theoretician is above the proletariat in any way. The fact that the two occasionally serve varied roles in the act of revolution says nothing which implies the existence of a hierarchy of superiority.

But yes, the workers movement is something which is often times separate from the process of theoretical formulation and the two are interdependent if they seek an end to the common ills which they both seek to correct. Of course these two aspects of revolutionary action are not monolithic, room exists in the dichotomy for shared involvement within the two elements, but this is not to say that either one holds anymore value than the other. One does not need to be a Marxist to be involved in direct agitation against capitalism, and involvement in this struggle does not bar one from participation on the side of theory.

[Sun Wukong]

I think the question posed in the OP is a false dichotomy. My immediate reaction to it is that Marxism is neither a theory nor a project, but a method. Here I stand with Georg Lukacs.

Marx's 'thesis 11' is the best summation I can think of to demonstrate that there is obviously no way one can look upon Marxism as a 'theory' in the way that, say, general relativity, is a theory. There is clearly a practical element to being a Marxist or upholding Marxism. However, I think it is wrong to characterise it as a political project in the way that Marxist (or those pretending to be) groups are projects.

Marxism is the science of radical emancipation. To me, it is precisely this and nothing more. Perhaps that is a religious view, I don't know. But I suspect I would continue to call myself a Marxist, and imagine others would too, even after (if) capitalism falls, because it is the only honest expression of defending the exploited and oppressed

[Kronsteen]

Marxism is neither a theory nor a project, but a method.

A method of doing what, precisely? Is there a marxist method of baking bread? Of tying your shoelaces or operating a mechanical digger? No, projects have methods, and methods may or may not have coherent theoretical underpinnings.

Which means, in analysing my question, you've answered it. Thank you.

[punisa]

So the workers are sheep, and the marxists - who have somehow avoided sheepification - will save them, by organising them for their own future good.

Although you were being sarcastic, you actually wrote the very essence of marxism - the one that most of us are too shy to openly declare :)

In our circles the "working class" is something regarded as almost sacred, but if you actually spend some time trying to organize them and/or explain the situation we are currently in - you will soon discover that (unfortunately !) many of them are indeed sheep and will always put more trust in what the TV says.

But seriously, why do so many see this as a problem? (The fact that some people posses that certain set of values that drive them to assist and help other workers in understanding the general problem with capitalism)

I guess it soon boils down to vanguard/no vanguard debate...

[Jose Gracchus]

Presumably a meaningful function 'conscious' revolutionaries could have is in attempting to compile and transmit the history and lessons of past class struggle to the working class in contemporary and future struggles. However, the correct lessons and how they should be applied can only be discovered by the working class in the process of struggle, it cannot be imparted by means of top-down organization or propagandizing.

[Agent Blazkowicz]

I would say Marxism is a theory just like evolution is a theory and just like evolution, it has a lot of data and objective evidences to back it up.

[Kronsteen]

So the workers are sheep, and the marxists - who have somehow avoided sheepification - will save them, by organising them for their own future good.
Although you were being sarcastic, you actually wrote the very essence of marxism - the one that most of us are too shy to openly declare[...]
But seriously, why do so many see this as a problem? (The fact that some people posses that certain set of values that drive them to assist and help other workers in understanding the general problem with capitalism)

To me, this is the central ambiguity of Leninism.

The workers must free themselves, but they can't, so we'll do it for them and declare they're doing it for themeselves.

Between 1917 and 1923 in Russia, the terms "dictatorship of the proletariat" and "dictatorship of the party" got used a lot, and sometimes fused. The party slipped between identifying itself as 'representing' the workers and representing the 'true' interests of the workers which the workers couldn't recognise themselves.


Presumably a meaningful function 'conscious' revolutionaries could have is in attempting to compile and transmit the history and lessons of past class struggle to the working class in contemporary and future struggles. However, the correct lessons and how they should be applied can only be discovered by the working class in the process of struggle, it cannot be imparted by means of top-down organization or propagandizing.

So, we teach the workers, but the workers should only be taught by themselves.

You can fudge it however you like - by calling the revolutionary party the memory of the workers, or the soul of the class, or the vanguard of the revolution. But it remains an unresolved ambiguity - one that you can't resolve by throwing the word 'dialectical' at it, or calling anyone who points it out an 'idealist'.

[Kronsteen]

I would say Marxism is a theory just like evolution is a theory and just like evolution, it has a lot of data and objective evidences to back it up.

Evolution explains past events, and makes negative predictions about the future - eg. it predicts that however horses develop, they will never evolve wheels.

It could be refuted by evidence, but this hasn't happened.

No one who understands the subject disbelieves the theory.

There are no competing theories that explain nearly as much.

There is only one theory of evolution.



Marxism also explains past events, and also makes negative predictions - eg. that however capitalism develops, it will never cease to be exploitative.

There have been a few positive predictions, some of which were refuted by events.

It's not clear whether the core of marxism could be refuted by evidence, because the terms are sufficiently elastic to accommodate any apparent refutation. This has happened countless times.

Many who understand it disbelieve it.

There are significant competing theories which explain as much.

There are many incompatible marxisms.

[Jose Gracchus]

You can fudge it however you like - by calling the revolutionary party the memory of the workers, or the soul of the class, or the vanguard of the revolution. But it remains an unresolved ambiguity - one that you can't resolve by throwing the word 'dialectical' at it, or calling anyone who points it out an 'idealist'.

You're being ridiculous. While the left at ebbs of class struggle can become very alien to the working-class, it certainly does not have to be. Workers can and do resist on their own, but certainly disseminating knowledge of past struggles and the like (and where else are newly class-conscious workers going to get it, either by becoming leftists or going to the left?) If there is no role whatsoever for conscious leftists, why are any of us here? Why don't you make a positive claim or assertion for once, instead of wasting our time with this bilge.

Its like a catalyst in chemistry; the reaction moves toward completion without it, but a catalyst can accelerate the rate of reaction and reduce the energy requirements of driving it.

This is hardly the same as saying the conscious leftists 'are' the class, or 'stand in' for the class, or anything else. Do you have an equally absurd caricature, that any social change would occur with absolute and total independence from any of those conscious, organizing, and theorizing about that change? Do you think Russia and Germany in 1917-1921 and 1918-1919 was just evil Bolsheviks controlling workers, or do you think the class for itself was doing anything? What about Spain 1936-37, dumb tools of anarchist leaders?

You maintain vagueness so that you don't have to carry through your "skepticism" to its historically and socially absurd conclusion. Concretize your complaints: tell us what you think was going on vis-a-vis your concern in really existing historical events. Call it empirical and skeptical.

[Kronsteen]

Its like a catalyst in chemistry; the reaction moves toward completion without it, but a catalyst can accelerate the rate of reaction

That is a clear metaphor - that the party encourages the workers to do quicker what they would do anyway eventually. The opposite view would be 'party as reagent' - one that it is a necessary precondition for a workers' movement.

The classic text on the role of the party is Lenin's What is to be done?. Sometimes he comes down on the 'reagent' side of the debate:


We have said that there could not have been Social-Democratic consciousness among the workers. It would have to be brought to them from without. The history of all countries shows that the working class, exclusively by its own effort, is able to develop only trade union consciousness, i.e., the conviction that it is necessary to combine in unions, fight the employers, and strive to compel the government to pass necessary labour legislation, etc.[2] The theory of socialism, however, grew out of the philosophic, historical, and economic theories elaborated by educated representatives of the propertied classes, by intellectuals.


Since there can be no talk of an independent ideology formulated by the working masses themselves in the process of their movement the only choice is — either bourgeois or socialist ideology.


In order to become a Social-Democrat, the worker must have a clear picture in his mind of the economic nature and the social and political features of the landlord and the priest, the high state official and the peasant, the student and the vagabond (...and therefore workers' education is vital).


We must take up actively the political education of the working class


The economic struggle merely “impels” the workers to realise the government’s attitude towards the working class. Consequently, however much we may try to “lend the economic, struggle itself a political character”, we shall never be able to develop the political consciousness of the workers (to the level of Social-Democratic political consciousness) by keeping within the framework of the economic struggle


Class political consciousness can be brought to the workers only from without, that is, only from outside the economic struggle, from outside the sphere of relations between workers and employers.

...and sometimes he's not so sure:


Even in the most advanced countries of Europe it can still be seen that the exposure of abuses in some backward trade, or in some forgotten branch of domestic industry, serves as a starting-point for the awakening of class-consciousness, for the beginning of a trade union struggle, and for the spread of socialism.


A basic condition for the necessary expansion of political agitation is the organisation of comprehensive political exposure. In no way except by means of such exposures can the masses be trained in political consciousness and revolutionary activity.


The consciousness of the working masses cannot be genuine class-consciousness, unless the workers learn, from concrete, and above all from topical, political facts and events

This could be a nuanced position...or a conflicted one. It looks to me like Lenin's trying to have it both ways.

Of course, just because Lenin wrote it doesn't make it right or wrong. But it's his thinking rather than Marx's on the role of the party which we're all in the tradition of following. Marx wrote almost nothing on the subject.

In parenthesis, we're also in the tradition of following Lenin's philosophical position, taken from Plekanov, adapted from Engels, derived from Hegel. And that's a position you and I both reject without feeling like class traitors.

[Jose Gracchus]

I'm not a Leninist, and what does What Is To Be Done necessarily have to do with "Marxism" in general? If WITBD was axiomatic from Marx, it follows Lenin would not have felt it necessary to write it, and Leninists wouldn't consider it such an important work, nor would it follow that major Marxist figures disputed it at the time and ever since.

Since the topic of the thread is the party in "Marxism", I feel no need to be tied down by Lenin and his toxic borrowings from Kautsky, including the idea that consciousness is something developed by the bourgeois intelligentsia and imported into the working-class movement. I'm quite comfortable with the idea of spontaneism, I just think it is susceptible to hijacking and being led astray, and may not be the most efficient path. I think the broadest possible participation and active involvement is a prerequisite of communism, and consider myself in any case to be in alignment with Marx himself on this issue, though I am influenced by social anarchism.

[Kronsteen]

Fair enough. In my own mileau in the UK, most marxists are trotskyists, which effectively means we're leninists most of the time.

Actually, most of us are unclear on the differences between Lenin and Trotsky, nevermind the differences between Marx and Engels. We emphasise action over study. After 10 years of activism, finally reading them has proven...disconcerting.

[Jose Gracchus]

In the U.S. it seems I more often run across Brezhnevites who defend Qaddhafi's Libya (even at times asserting it is a "socialist state" but they're just not fortunate to have a leader "as good as Lenin" - a Brezhnevite I met actually said this), so perhaps this social context determines a lot of our views towards Marxism. You're used to people treating it as a sacred text or philosopher's stone, with worshipful rituals toward ancient events and what have you. I'm used to "Marxism" being basically a left-wing marketing/street cred symbol to be dismissed at a moment's convenience as student political hipsters tail whatever the newest radical chic is, or the latest plot to aggrandize their sect.

Similarly, I've grown very suspicious of what is dubbed "activism" by sects and their brainwashed monastic followers.

[Zanthorus]

Marx wrote almost nothing on the subject.

Marx's writings on the subject of organisation span almost his entire from his entry into the Communist League in 1847, through his time in the IWMA, to his critique of the Gotha Unity congress which birthed the German SAPD (Later SPD) in 1875 and the formation of the French Parti Ouvrier in 1881. There is also all of Engels' writings on SPD internal affairs and on the affairs of the Second International parties until 1895. Although they never sat down and worked out any systematic 'theory' of the party, nevertheless it is possible to argue that there is a distinctive theory of revolutionary organisation in Marx and Engels which can be compared with similar theories by Lenin, Luxemburg etc, for example there is this (http://www.marxists.org/archive/johnstone/1967/xx/me-party.htm) piece by Monty Johnstone.