Is Marxism reformist?

[Tim Cornelis]

Just looking through the Communist Manifesto and seeing the demands, classical Marxism strikes me as reformist:


1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c

and


(i) Limitation of private property through progressive taxation, heavy inheritance taxes, abolition of inheritance through collateral lines (brothers, nephews, etc.) forced loans, etc.
(ii) Gradual expropriation of landowners, industrialists, railroad magnates and shipowners, partly through competition by state industry, partly directly through compensation in the form of bonds.
(iii) Confiscation of the possessions of all emigrants and rebels against the majority of the people.
(iv) Organization of labor or employment of proletarians on publicly owned land, in factories and workshops, with competition among the workers being abolished and with the factory owners, in so far as they still exist, being obliged to pay the same high wages as those paid by the state.
(v) An equal obligation on all members of society to work until such time as private property has been completely abolished. Formation of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
(vi) Centralization of money and credit in the hands of the state through a national bank with state capital, and the suppression of all private banks and bankers.
(vii) Increase in the number of national factories, workshops, railroads, ships; bringing new lands into cultivation and improvement of land already under cultivation – all in proportion to the growth of the capital and labor force at the disposal of the nation.
(viii) Education of all children, from the moment they can leave their mother’s care, in national establishments at national cost. Education and production together.
50 Draft of a Communist Confession of Faith
(ix) Construction, on public lands, of great palaces as communal dwellings for associated groups of citizens engaged in both industry and agriculture and combining in their way of life the advantages of urban and rural conditions while avoiding the one-sidedness and drawbacks of each.
(x) Destruction of all unhealthy and jerry-built dwellings in urban districts.
(xi) Equal inheritance rights for children born in and out of wedlock.
(xii) Concentration of all means of transportation in the hands of the nation.

Clearly this is reformist. What is the Marxist opinion on this? Does it have any value today?

[Aurora]

However much that state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved. The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today. In view of the gigantic strides of Modern Industry since 1848, and of the accompanying improved and extended organization of the working class, in view of the practical experience gained, first in the February Revolution, and then, still more, in the Paris Commune, where the proletariat for the first time held political power for two whole months, this programme has in some details been antiquated. One thing especially was proved by the Commune, viz., that “the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes.”
Bold mine, although they're old those measures are still generally solid, it's quite common for those measures to be taken out of context or placed in the wrong context.
These are immediate measures that the proletariat will take when it has overthrown the state and established it's dictatorship, in this sense they are in no way reformist as they presuppose a revolution.

[Ocean Seal]

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c

These are the ten planks. Marx later stated that they were meant for the revolutions in 1848. Obviously we are quite far away from that year and since Marx claimed that those demands were useless during his lifetime, I think we should agree that Marx was no reformist.

[Rafiq]

There is quite a difference between young Marx (Communist manifesto) and old Marx (Kapital).

But, I concur with Ocean Seal none the less.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Just to add that Marx's writings on the Paris Commune are probably the best reflection of his mature thought on the issue of reform and revolution.

[KurtFF8]

There is quite a difference between young Marx (Communist manifesto) and old Marx (Kapital).

But, I concur with Ocean Seal none the less.

I think you're confused about what counts as "the young Marx." There is quite a continuity between the Marx of the Manifesto and the Marx of Capital. Even Althusser's schema puts the Manifesto as the point of the break.

[Nox]

OMFG it's the 10 planks of Communism!!! HHHHHHHHNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGG

[Caj]

The ten measures in the Manifesto were part of Marx's early conception of the DotP. Later in his life, he regretted putting it in the Manifesto and claimed that the Paris Commune was the true representation of the DotP.

[ComradeJay]

In order to understand these ten measures it is necessary to read the three preceding paragraphs.


We have seen above, that the first step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class to win the battle of democracy.

The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degree, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible.

Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.

In other words, Marxism is revolutionary because it is based on the recognition that in order to impliament any measures the working class must first take power through a revolution.

These ten demands were not a pleading petition to the bourgeoisie; they were suggestions of the first ten measures to be taken after the revolutionary seizure of power. They are the starting point; the ending point is the complete expropriation of the bourgeoisie and the complete abolition of class society.

Of course, as other posters have mentioned, the first measures to be taken after the revolution would be very different today than they were in 1848, and Marx and Engels recognized this later in their lifetimes.

[hatzel]

I think you're confused about what counts as "the young Marx." There is quite a continuity between the Marx of the Manifesto and the Marx of Capital. Even Althusser's schema puts the Manifesto as the point of the break.

I think it would be fair to claim that the break can be dated precisely to 1845, with the publication of Stirner's The Ego and its Own, which seems to have prompted Marx to get his act together. As such we can certainly agree that the Communist Manifesto would belong to the period immediately after the 'break,' though that isn't to suggest that Marx's thought was static throughout the period; though it grew from the same basic philosophical principles, the political recommendations of...ah...the early-mature Marx are clearly distinguishable in many respects from those of the late-mature Marx. Which is the issue here. Though I certainly agree that the Manifesto was not the product of the young Marx, and was - to a certain degree - rooted in the philosophy of mature Marxism (i.e. historical materialism, post-humanism etc.), it would be foolish to speak of young and mature Marx as two static and coherent periods. Not that I think you're doing so, it's just worth mentioning that pointing out that the Manifesto was the product of the mature Marx does not necessarily imply that it contained the final (or most mature) 'version' of Marx's thought...

[Rooster]

Just to add that Marx's writings on the Paris Commune are probably the best reflection of his mature thought on the issue of reform and revolution.

Which writings are those?

[l'Enfermé]

Which writings are those?
Mostly The Civil War in France (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1871/civil-war-france/index.htm).

[ChrisK]

Which writings are those?

The Civil War in France

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1871/civil-war-france/index.htm

[ChrisK]

Nevermind, Borz beat me to it.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Thanks for posting that link, Borz.

[Rooster]

Mostly The Civil War in France (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1871/civil-war-france/index.htm).

Really? No wonder I couldn't find it. I was labouring under the impression that that was about the 1848 revolutions. Right, I'm going to have to dig my books out and check this out.

[Die Neue Zeit]

The economic measures, though borrowed mainly from Ricardian Socialist tendencies and other left bourgeois schools, were/are in fact more radical than the economic measures enacted by the Paris Commune.

[KurtFF8]

The ten measures in the Manifesto were part of Marx's early conception of the DotP. Later in his life, he regretted putting it in the Manifesto and claimed that the Paris Commune was the true representation of the DotP.

I don't think Marx ever claimed that the ten measures were part of his conception of the DotP.


I think it would be fair to claim that the break can be dated precisely to 1845, with the publication of Stirner's The Ego and its Own, which seems to have prompted Marx to get his act together. As such we can certainly agree that the Communist Manifesto would belong to the period immediately after the 'break,' though that isn't to suggest that Marx's thought was static throughout the period; though it grew from the same basic philosophical principles, the political recommendations of...ah...the early-mature Marx are clearly distinguishable in many respects from those of the late-mature Marx. Which is the issue here. Though I certainly agree that the Manifesto was not the product of the young Marx, and was - to a certain degree - rooted in the philosophy of mature Marxism (i.e. historical materialism, post-humanism etc.), it would be foolish to speak of young and mature Marx as two static and coherent periods. Not that I think you're doing so, it's just worth mentioning that pointing out that the Manifesto was the product of the mature Marx does not necessarily imply that it contained the final (or most mature) 'version' of Marx's thought...

Of course, and I feel like followers of Althusser's schema (which has been rightfully influential in my opinion) have the potential to get too caught up in it as a rigid typology.

I agree here that there is a difference between the time of the Manifesto and the time of Capital for Marx's writings. I just think that to point to the "ten planks" at the end as an erroneous consequence of the "young Marx" is a misunderstanding of both what "young Marx" means in this context, and of the context of the "ten planks" themselves.

[Q]

I'll echo the point ComradeJay made:

Reformism principally stays within the system of capital and is where reforms from the state are implemented in order to soften the suffering of the working class. Given its allegiance to the state, it implies a control of the working class movement by the labour bureaucracy and, fundamentally, a nationalist political project. As such it has no emancipatory value whatsoever and in fact declasses politics and, thus, workers awareness, as soon as it can.

The ten demands in the Communist Manifesto presuppose that the working class seizes power. The Manifesto was written with the experiences of Chartism still fresh, an explicitly political movement of the working class, fighting for democratic changes.

Does this mean that Marxists oppose any kind of reforms this side of the revolution? Certainly not. It was Marx himself who argued throughout his life that the working class must fight for democracy, both to form itself as a class-collective and to instate its class dictatorship. Secondly, the fight for the ten-hour working day and later the eight-hour working day, certainly did not tie the working class movement to a nationalist political project, as it was in contrast an international gain and, as such, helped also in the formation of the working class as a class-collective. Thirdly, even while such and other economic demands are technically implementable under capitalism, the logic of the whole program is towards the working class seizing political power and destroying the old state.

[CommunityBeliever]

Marxism, Engelism, Leninism, and other individualisms are outdated. All of the thinkers of the 20th century and before lacked an understanding of the new sciences of communal relations and new organisation tools like the Internet. We should completely abandon all programs for revolution that were created a century ago, including the one in the communist manifesto.

[Comrade Jandar]

Marxism, Engelism, Leninism, and other individualisms are outdated. All of the thinkers of the 20th century and before lacked an understanding of the new sciences of communal relations and new organisation tools like the Internet. We should completely abandon all programs for revolution that were created a century ago, including the one in the communist manifesto.

I don't think we should "completely abandon all programs for revolution." What your talking about sounds like post-leftism, which is definitely a step in the wrong direction as it rejects class struggle as being central.

[Grenzer]

What your talking about sounds like post-leftism, which is definitely a step in the wrong direction as it rejects class struggle as being central.

I don't think that this is specifically what he's talking about. What he is saying is that we should abandon strategies which were used in a different context than what we face today. Rather than just mechanically and dogmatically repeat the line of Bakunin, Luxemburg, Lenin, Trotsky ,etc; I think CommunityBeliever is trying to say that we should create something from the ground up to reflect current realities, which arguably the ideals of people like Lenin are unsuited for. What have Marxist-Leninist, Trotskyist, Maoist, left communists, and anarchists done recently that has a positive, tangible impact towards advancing revolution recently? Arguably, nothing. I am sure they are "doing their best" but the reality is that by espousing irrelevant and meaningless ideologies, any change in their fortune is more dependent upon certain incidental changes which occur completely independently of these groups' efforts. To borrow a phrase from Die Neue Zeit, this could be called "political nihilism." This is essentially what I think CommunityBeliever is getting at.

I could be wrong, but that's just how I interpreted that statement.

[robbo203]

I'll echo the point ComradeJay made:

Reformism principally stays within the system of capital and is where reforms from the state are implemented in order to soften the suffering of the working class. Given its allegiance to the state, it implies a control of the working class movement by the labour bureaucracy and, fundamentally, a nationalist political project. As such it has no emancipatory value whatsoever and in fact declasses politics and, thus, workers awareness, as soon as it can.

The ten demands in the Communist Manifesto presuppose that the working class seizes power. The Manifesto was written with the experiences of Chartism still fresh, an explicitly political movement of the working class, fighting for democratic changes.

Does this mean that Marxists oppose any kind of reforms this side of the revolution? Certainly not. It was Marx himself who argued throughout his life that the working class must fight for democracy, both to form itself as a class-collective and to instate its class dictatorship. Secondly, the fight for the ten-hour working day and later the eight-hour working day, certainly did not tie the working class movement to a nationalist political project, as it was in contrast an international gain and, as such, helped also in the formation of the working class as a class-collective. Thirdly, even while such and other economic demands are technically implementable under capitalism, the logic of the whole program is towards the working class seizing political power and destroying the old state.

A good summary although I am not sure that I would regard the fight for democracy as strictly "reformist".

The point about reformism is that its focus is ultimately the economic sphere of capitalism, capitalism itself being defined as a socio-economic construction. What you are trying to "reform" in "reformism" is capitalism itself - its economic behaviour so to speak. What is futile about reformism is precisely that, in the final analysis, capitalism cannot be adapted and reconfigured so as to make human needs its prime consideration. On the contrary , capitalism is of necessity responsive primarily to a set of abstract economic laws peculiar to itself. The satisfaction of human needs is incidental to this.

Thus food is grown not primarily for the purpose of satisfying our need to eat - though obviously this is entailed in the production of food - but in order to be sold on a market with a view to profit. That is why people go hungry when food surpluses are allowed to rot in some warehouse or farming land is allowed to lie idle. Too much food has been produced in relation to what the market can bear.

With political reform the focus is not so much on the economic sphere - the economic basis of society - as on its it political superstructure. Political reforms, the granting of elementary democratic rights which Marx quite rightly favoured , establishes the political preconditions that will enable the socio economic basis of society to be radically transformed via a socialist revolution

Reformism - the advocacy of reforms whose focus is ultimately economic - is by its very nature limited and limitating, drawing attention and energy away from the revolutionary alternative of establishing a stateless non- market society. Hence the age-old dillemma - reform or revolution?

[Q]

@robbo:

Perhaps I wasn't clear in that regard, but the fight for democracy is indeed perhaps the central tenet of Marxist politics, as it intertwines with so many other aspects of proletarian revolutionary self-emancipation.

The main thrust behind my previous post can perhaps be best summed up as "reforms do not equal reformism". The point is what your political goal is, what you want to achieve with those reforms.

[Comrade Jandar]

Is Marxism as a political philosophy reformist? Heck no. Has there been a history of reformism and opportunism by self-proclaimed Marxists? Unfortunately, yes. Since there are some (not all) tendencies within Marxism that see participating in bourgeois parliamentarism as a viable strategy for revolution, this is to be expected.

[Brosip Tito]

All I can say is holy shit.

[KurtFF8]

Marxism, Engelism, Leninism, and other individualisms are outdated. All of the thinkers of the 20th century and before lacked an understanding of the new sciences of communal relations and new organisation tools like the Internet. We should completely abandon all programs for revolution that were created a century ago, including the one in the communist manifesto.

What does the internet, for example, have to do with how Marxism is "outdated" exactly?

[Paulappaul]

The economic measures, though borrowed mainly from Ricardian Socialist tendencies and other left bourgeois schools, were/are in fact more radical than the economic measures enacted by the Paris Commune.

Bourgeois Schools = More Radical then the Paris Commune....

Wait what the hell?

[Luís Henrique]

Marxism, Engelism, Leninism, and other individualisms are outdated.

So Marxism, "Engelism" and Leninism are 'individualisms'?

You are misusing words here.

Luís Henrique

[Die Neue Zeit]

Bourgeois Schools = More Radical then the Paris Commune....

Wait what the hell?

I'm only writing about the economic measures. "Centralization of credit in the hands of the state" was the very financial criticism Marx made of the Paris Commune not doing, remember?

[CommunityBeliever]

What does the internet, for example, have to do with how Marxism is "outdated" exactly?Before there was the Internet the world wasn't nearly as connected and we didn't have an understanding of sciences such as network theory. All of the thinkers that were living in the 20th century and before, including Marx, lived in a very different reality that didn't include the Internet. I think we should abandon all the old isms and we should create something from the ground up which reflects current realities.


So Marxism, "Engelism" and Leninism are 'individualisms'?

You are misusing words here.I think we shouldn't subscribe to any doctrine or ism. This idea is effectively reflected in the Non-Doctraine Communist group: "This group is for communists who do not subscribe to a particular doctrine or "ism". If you are a "Marxist-Leninist," Trotskyist, Maoist, Stalinist, Hoxhaist, Luxemburgist, Bordigist, Bukharinist or one of a million other doctrinal "ists", this group is not for you."

[Strannik]

I don't know about later marxists, but I understand Marx precisely as the first thinker who started to use multi-level system analysis and process analysis. To me "Capital" reads pretty much like a strategic analysis of an information system and I believe that modern system analysts use routinely (but without knowing) methodologies that Marx would have considered very similar to his "dialectical materialism".

Marx did not predict Internet as a technological solution, but he did predict that capitalism will increase the flow of information between nations and cultures (via newspapers and telegraphs etc) and creates in doing so an international group/culture that is capable of overthrowing it. Marx also predicted emergence of "price lists" and other informational measures to combat the increasing exploitation. Basically he understood the social concepts that have caused the emergence of internet and its evolution into its current form. I don't think he would be amazed by it.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I don't think that this is specifically what he's talking about. What he is saying is that we should abandon strategies which were used in a different context than what we face today. Rather than just mechanically and dogmatically repeat the line of Bakunin, Luxemburg, Lenin, Trotsky ,etc; I think CommunityBeliever is trying to say that we should create something from the ground up to reflect current realities, which arguably the ideals of people like Lenin are unsuited for. What have Marxist-Leninist, Trotskyist, Maoist, left communists, and anarchists done recently that has a positive, tangible impact towards advancing revolution recently? Arguably, nothing. I am sure they are "doing their best" but the reality is that by espousing irrelevant and meaningless ideologies, any change in their fortune is more dependent upon certain incidental changes which occur completely independently of these groups' efforts. To borrow a phrase from Die Neue Zeit, this could be called "political nihilism." This is essentially what I think CommunityBeliever is getting at.

I could be wrong, but that's just how I interpreted that statement.

1) I think the variety of little groups arguing over this or that position shows that "isms" are not dogmatic inherently. Were some groups top-down and dogmatic? Yes, but so are some scientific institutes or what not and the harm caused by this kind of organization is that they often get bad results, not that the science itself is flawed. Someone can be dogmatically pro-Evolution, but it doesn't make evolutionary science dogmatic. In Marxism, most of these "isms" are just shorthand for a general grouping of political agreements around things, individuals and individual groups might be dogmatic, but Stalinist CPs for example, dogmatism came out of a practical need for people to go along with whatever program the USSR wanted to push, not from something from the ideology.

2) Evaluating any left-wing group other than some massive social-democratic groups and M-L groups based on "not achieving anything" doesn't make any logical sense. First we're comparing "isms" to non "isms" so if that's the comparison than non-isms have never and will never be able have a revolution - if you are saying that workers can spontaneously come to power without organization or theory, then that may or may not be the case, but that view is still an "-ism" so the argument, again, doesn't make sense.

But for me really, saying that anarchism or trotskyism or this or that relatively marginalized group over the last two generations hasn't achieved anything is sort of like looking at a boat in dry-dock while the lake has dried up from an extended drought and saying, "well that'll never float". In most places there hasn't been a whole lot of class resistance, so of course no matter how great someones ideas are or are not, those ideas themselves don't do much.

Ideologies don't make revolutions, political organizations don't make revolutions, but both can play (in my view) an important role in helping workers to overthrow capitalism and set up a society run by the working class to end class society.

[Grenzer]

1) I think the variety of little groups arguing over this or that position shows that "isms" are not dogmatic inherently. Were some groups top-down and dogmatic? Yes, but so are some scientific institutes or what not and the harm caused by this kind of organization is that they often get bad results, not that the science itself is flawed. Someone can be dogmatically pro-Evolution, but it doesn't make evolutionary science dogmatic. In Marxism, most of these "isms" are just shorthand for a general grouping of political agreements around things, individuals and individual groups might be dogmatic, but Stalinist CPs for example, dogmatism came out of a practical need for people to go along with whatever program the USSR wanted to push, not from something from the ideology.

2) Evaluating any left-wing group other than some massive social-democratic groups and M-L groups based on "not achieving anything" doesn't make any logical sense. First we're comparing "isms" to non "isms" so if that's the comparison than non-isms have never and will never be able have a revolution - if you are saying that workers can spontaneously come to power without organization or theory, then that may or may not be the case, but that view is still an "-ism" so the argument, again, doesn't make sense.

But for me really, saying that anarchism or trotskyism or this or that relatively marginalized group over the last two generations hasn't achieved anything is sort of like looking at a boat in dry-dock while the lake has dried up from an extended drought and saying, "well that'll never float". In most places there hasn't been a whole lot of class resistance, so of course no matter how great someones ideas are or are not, those ideas themselves don't do much.

Ideologies don't make revolutions, political organizations don't make revolutions, but both can play (in my view) an important role in helping workers to overthrow capitalism and set up a society run by the working class to end class society.

I didn't say anything of the sort, and I think you're misunderstanding me.

I'm not criticizing these groups for not having significant influence or membership; the material basis for this does not exist yet. What I am criticizing them for is having no revolutionary strategy. The revolutionary strategy for virtually all tendencies today is agitation and nothing else, they have no coherent plan for education and organization. Further more, they have no coherent plan for what to do after a revolution for the most part.

Sure, sure, sure, communism is "not an ideal to which reality itself must be adapted" and all that crap, but the reality is that this is simply not persuasive. If we are to become a major movement, then we must move beyond mere rabble rousing at protests and strikes; although we have little ability to have much of an impact beyond such venues, I think I am right to call leftists out on this. What your statement seems to be coming off as is this: "Since the material conditions don't yet exist for us to have a significant impact, it excuses us from not having a coherent strategy." I could be mistaken on this, so I apologize if I have misunderstood you.

I would also say that such an evaluation on "not achieving anything" does have some merit, because the material basis for socialism has existed for quite some time now. What we have had is a crisis of strategy in my opinion; we have let the labor movement be simply co-opted by the bourgeoisie.

I agree that it is up to the working class itself to make revolution, but the simple fact stands that the working class movement has no coherent strategy to attain power and reorganize society. What we have now is a copious amount of theory, but only a vague sense of how to actually put it into action. There has not been a lot of class resistance, as you identified, but the basis for it does exist and has for quite some time. I would like to see this try to be countered since the working class in terms of prosperity has been declining for decades now. I simply don't buy the argument that "it's not the vanguards' fault, it's the workers that aren't ready yet."

Marxism and communism is lampooned in many intellectual circles for having no fucking idea how it's actually going to go about fulfilling its goals after a revolution, and I would say there is some validity to this criticism.