Marxist why does your ideology advocate for state control?

[Mrcapitalist]

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.

[argeiphontes]

To take the means of production away from capitalists, of course.

[Radio Spartacus]

You ought to familiarize yourself with the concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat, this passage from the manifesto concerns that. Besides, Marx developed a more nuanced view on the proletarian state in his writings on the Paris commune

[Sea]

Marxist is your refrigerator running?

Oh then you better go catch it lol.
Your post doesn't make any sense. None of the things you listed are questions, and if anything, they answer your own question.

[Comrade Jacob]

It's all so you don't have it..."Mrcapitalist".
Yeah, I don't think you own the means of production, you're probably just a worker that wants to feel big.

[helot]

It's all so you don't have it..."Mrcapitalist".
Yeah, I don't think you own the means of production, you're probably just a worker that wants to feel big.


or at best petite bourgeois.

[Tim Cornelis]

Your post doesn't make any sense. None of the things you listed are questions, and if anything, they answer your own question.

You don't recognise the 10 planks of communism from the Manifesto? Heresy, blasphemy, either one of those or both.

[Yuppie Grinder]

The Communist Manifesto really doesn't serve as a good introduction to Communist thought imo. Marx and Engels would get a lot cooler later on.

[Fourth Internationalist]

In short, Marxists only advocate for state control of the means of production insofar as the state is a proletarian state (meaning a state of the working class) because states are instruments of class rule (however, reforms for nationalization of certain industries like banks, etc. can be fought for and viewed as progressive by revolutionary Marxists within the context of the bourgeois state). State control will cease to exist once socialism is reached because socialism is a classless, and therefore stateless, society.

[Sea]

You don't recognise the 10 planks of communism from the Manifesto? Heresy, blasphemy, either one of those or both.I'm pretty sure that's just a shitty paraphrasing of the 10 points / planks whatever.

[Sabot Cat]

I'm pretty sure that's just a shitty paraphrasing of the 10 points / planks whatever.

Actually, they're copied ad verbatim from Chapter 2 of the Communist Manifesto.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch02.htm

So if it's a shitty paraphrasing, it is Marx's shitty paraphrasing.

[motion denied]

Marx's and Engels' views changed since 1848. See Civil War in France, it is not enough that the proletariat should control the bourgeois state, it should destroy it.

[Vanguard1917]

Marxism 'advocates' statelessness. The dictatorship of the proletariat is just a means to achieve that goal.

[tachosomoza]

or at best petite bourgeois.

"Temporarily embarrassed millionaire"

[Remus Bleys]

You got me. I'm all about the current government owning everything.

Yup. I don't call for the smashing of the bourgeois state and to replace it by one that will wither away into a stateless society.

You see this is all my nefarious plot I have written out on the back of my Stalin Poster that's on my room hanging up. I don't actually want any of that, i am a dirty dirty statist.

[Red Commissar]

As Marx and Engels said in an 1872 preface to the Communist Manifesto (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/preface.htm):

(section II is the 10 planks the op put)


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.” (See The Civil War in France: Address of the General Council of the International Working Men’ s Association, 1871, where this point is further developed.) Further, it is self-evident that the criticism of socialist literature is deficient in relation to the present time, because it comes down only to 1847; also that the remarks on the relation of the Communists to the various opposition parties (Section IV), although, in principle still correct, yet in practice are antiquated, because the political situation has been entirely changed, and the progress of history has swept from off the earth the greater portion of the political parties there enumerated.

But then, the Manifesto has become a historical document which we have no longer any right to alter. A subsequent edition may perhaps appear with an introduction bridging the gap from 1847 to the present day; but this reprint was too unexpected to leave us time for that.

The conditions Marx and Engels laid out was in the context of the 1848 liberal revolutions, and at the time they were considered to be radical republican ideals, positions that were immediate such that it would pave the way to make a new society. Overtime it was shown they weren't radical, especially as things like central banking, progressive taxation, and universal education became non-controversial as time passed. They did not change the text of the original Manifesto for posterity's sake- the "general principles" they mention is that of class struggle.

So yeah, no Marxist really takes that part of the manifesto seriously.

[Fourth Internationalist]

So yeah, no Marxist really takes that part of the manifesto seriously.

Marxists should still take it seriously, but Marxists should also recognise the time period that I was written in and what is or isn't relevant when and where. For example, communists in Western/bourgeois democracies needn't demand for public education or ending child labor. In other places, those demands need to be raised. There are other demands they made that apply here and there, but not there nor there. I think you think this, but saying that one shouldn't take it seriously is a bit drastic.

[Red Commissar]

Marxists should still take it seriously, but Marxists should also recognise the time period that I was written in and what is or isn't relevant when and where. For example, communists in Western/bourgeois democracies needn't demand for public education or ending child labor. In other places, those demands need to be raised. There are other demands they made that apply here and there, but not there nor there. I think you think this, but saying that one shouldn't take it seriously is a bit drastic.

Well, I'm not the only one that says that. Look in the preamble I just posted- Marx and Engels said that "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."

My point was that these things aren't necessarily in themselves communist. They are progressive demands, but they aren't going to create communism nor should they be presented as such. These demands are actually quite doable by industrialized nations as Marx noted- most of the points would pretty much be fulfilled by say an old-school scandinavian-style government.

The OP was trying to strawman that this = state control of everything, which isn't really something communists should be associating themselves with. Even those that say it is a transitionary mean acknowledge it as just that- transitionary, and not communism.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

Because we're evil jew-vampires who want to control you through the federal reserve by taking your guns.

And to simplify Marxist ideals to the notion of 'state control' is fucking ludicrous. By that definition, nearly every country on the planet is 'socialist' (unsurprisingly, this stance is taken by most members of the Austrian school).

[Comrade #138672]

At that time, the free market capitalism was first to be overcome by a form of centralized state-capitalism, in order to pave the way for socialism. However, as has been mentioned already, this has already largely been done by a lot of first-world capitalist countries in response to the crises, the pressure from below, and the pressure from revolutions elsewhere. This has created a new "middle-class" which ironically has marginalized socialism in the first-world.

[Comrade Jacob]

The Communist Manifesto really doesn't serve as a good introduction to Communist thought imo. Marx and Engels would get a lot cooler later on.

They should have redone the manifesto later on when Marxism had more science to it.

[Q]

Marxist why does your ideology advocate for state control?
We do not. The ten planks you're citing have since then been reconsidered and amended according to new circumstances. Marxists focus on the struggle for democracy, that is, the rule of society over itself - as opposed to the oligarchy all developed capitalist societies have today (laughably mislabelled as "democracy").

We wish to destroy the state, not take it over.

[Fourth Internationalist]

Well, I'm not the only one that says that. Look in the preamble I just posted- Marx and Engels said that "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."


I know, I'm just saying that describing this position as 'not taking that part of the Manifesto seriously' sounds overly dismissive compared to the substance of the actual position on that part of the Manifesto, which is basically to place it in the proper conetext of location and time.

[Sea]

Actually, they're copied ad verbatim from Chapter 2 of the Communist Manifesto.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch02.htm

So if it's a shitty paraphrasing, it is Marx's shitty paraphrasing.Oh really? Guess it's been a while! :lol:

[Sabot Cat]

Oh really? Guess it's been a while! :lol:

I know what you mean; the Manifesto is pretty much the only work by Marx I could claim that I'm intimately familiar with. :p

[Tim Redd]

State control will cease to exist once socialism is reached because socialism is a classless, and therefore stateless, society.

Socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat a transition society between capitalism and classless, stateless communism. In socialism classes still exist. However the purpose of socialism is to abolish classes. When classes have been abolished worldwide, we can then abolish the state and that is when communism will begin.

[Per Levy]

it hurts, it hurts, it hurts


Socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat a transition society between capitalism and classless, stateless communism. In socialism classes still exist. However the purpose of socialism is to abolish classes. When classes have been abolished worldwide, we can then abolish the state and that is when communism will begin.

first of the dictatorship of the proletariat is not socialism, it is the dotp, its that simple. second of all socialism, at least by marx/engels, isnt any different than communism, just 2 words they used to decsibe the same thing.

also who is "we" in that scenario of yours? the party, the workers, something else?

[Tim Cornelis]

"we can then abolish the state and that is when communism will begin."

This is my problem with Marxist-Leninists. They view the withering away of the state as a matter of policy or choice. As if we have to consciously choose to abolish the state. The state dies off because of the social dynamics, and is not subject to policy or will. As if we have to organise a national assembly to decide that we will abolish the state.

The workers' state is a central network of workers' associations and workers' councils wielding coercive power. Once the counter-revolution is defeated, the workers' associations and workers' councils will remain but the coercive power has gradually disappeared in proportion to the strength of the counter-revolution. It's an 'automatic' process because of the internal dynamics of the workers' state. Because Marxist-Leninists often do not acknowledge this they wrongly espouse the belief that a state like the USSR could have withered away at all.

[Fourth Internationalist]

Socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat a transition society between capitalism and classless, stateless communism. In socialism classes still exist. However the purpose of socialism is to abolish classes. When classes have been abolished worldwide, we can then abolish the state and that is when communism will begin.

Socialism is not the dictatorship of the proletariat. Socialism is communism, albeit only the first stage of communism. Still, it is classless and stateless, but not yet the final stage of communism.

If socialism were synonymous with the proletarian dictatorship, why did Stalin only claim that the USSR was socialist long after 1917? Did he think that Russia wasn't a workers' state after the October Revolution?

[WilliamGreen]

I think it was mentioned but the true marxist shouldn't uphold the system it should destroy it

[reb]

The only people who call for state control of the means of production are stalinists and other utopian socialists who confuse the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat as being a real state. Marxists call for the smashing of the state, the ending of the wage-labor system, classes and commodity production.

[Sea]

I know what you mean; the Manifesto is pretty much the only work by Marx I could claim that I'm intimately familiar with. :p
Seriously? The Manifesto is the one work that I've judged to not be worth my time! I read it once when I was still new to politics and if anything it just answered questions that I didn't think to ask; not very useful for an introductory work.

[Tim Redd]

The only people who call for state control of the means of production are stalinists and other utopian socialists who confuse the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat as being a real state. Marxists call for the smashing of the state, the ending of the wage-labor system, classes and commodity production.

You're mistaken, not sure where you're getting your information. However every actual Marxist since Marx knows that proletarian revolution smashes the old bourgeois state as Marx and Engels stated, establishes the new state of the dotp that then lays hold of the capitalist means of production in addition to aiding any preexisting workers cooperatives.

It is true, that bourgeois and petite bourgeois revisionist and reformist influences inside the Marxist movement don't call for smashing the state. But that's another matter.

[Mrcapitalist]

Socialism is not the dictatorship of the proletariat. Socialism is communism, albeit only the first stage of communism. Still, it is classless and stateless, but not yet the final stage of communism.

If socialism were synonymous with the proletarian dictatorship, why did Stalin only claim that the USSR was socialist long after 1917? Did he think that Russia wasn't a workers' state after the October Revolution?
Do the proletarians control the economy democratically in the dictator of the proletariat?

[Mrcapitalist]

Because we're evil jew-vampires who want to control you through the federal reserve by taking your guns.

And to simplify Marxist ideals to the notion of 'state control' is fucking ludicrous. By that definition, nearly every country on the planet is 'socialist' (unsurprisingly, this stance is taken by most members of the Austrian school).
I meant totalitarian control

[Flying Purple People Eater]

I meant totalitarian control

And just what is 'totalitarian control' in this case?

It's still a ridiculous generalization, as you are not only trying to group the USSR's modus operandi with the Third Reich of all things under the liberal definition of "totalitarian government", but you are also making the assumption that:

A. The USSR was a communist society (it wasn't).

B. All Marxists advocate the USSR and its' style of government (many do not).

C. The 'ideology of Marxism' (the goals of creating a communist society? Marxian economics? Care to be more specific?) advocates for 'totalitarian control' in the first place (I've got a very nervous feeling that you're using 'totalitarian control' in a very Orwellian sense here - e.g. 'Totalitarian control over business' or 'Totalitarian market interference').


Thus, if you are truly asking the question "dear Marxists, why does your ideology advocate totalitarian control?", then it is a non-question for the reasons outlined above.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

Do the proletarians control the economy democratically in the dictator of the proletariat?

I think the terminology 'dictatorship of the proletariat' is sadly an archaism of Marxism that has by existing into the modern era alienated many a curious person from far-left politics (or at least turned them to some brand of anarchism).

The use of the word 'dictatorship' here stems from Marx's borrowing of the original Greco-Roman meaning, which literally means 'rule' - i.e. the 'rule of the proletariat' as in the Proletariat have all economic and political power. It does not mean 'dictatorship' in the modern sense of the term.

I would defend democratic decision making in the DotP, but I believe that there are many Marxists (specifically left communists) who criticise the concept of a bourgeois form of democracy in the first place (not to say that they are not against democratic or autocratic decision making).

[Fourth Internationalist]

Do the proletarians control the economy democratically in the dictator of the proletariat?

I would hope so. Otherwise, a beaurocracy will develop, and counter-revolution back to capitalism will occur. A prime example of this occurring was in the great workers' state aka the dictatorship of the proletariat of Russia, in which by 1924 the Stalinist beaurocracy had consolidated power after Lenin's death, due to the degeneration of the revolution as a result of isolation and imperialism, which caused many economic hardships and political chaos in the country at the time. A degenerated workers' state had formed, which has not yet transformed the economy back to capitalism despite removing the rest of the proletariat from political power. By the late 1930's, after the Great Purges that destroyed nearly every and all proletarian aspects of the state and party apparatus, the Soviet Union, which was once on its way froward to socialism, was now state capitalist.

[Raquin]

"we can then abolish the state and that is when communism will begin."

This is my problem with Marxist-Leninists. They view the withering away of the state as a matter of policy or choice. As if we have to consciously choose to abolish the state. The state dies off because of the social dynamics, and is not subject to policy or will. As if we have to organise a national assembly to decide that we will abolish the state.

The workers' state is a central network of workers' associations and workers' councils wielding coercive power. Once the counter-revolution is defeated, the workers' associations and workers' councils will remain but the coercive power has gradually disappeared in proportion to the strength of the counter-revolution. It's an 'automatic' process because of the internal dynamics of the workers' state. Because Marxist-Leninists often do not acknowledge this they wrongly espouse the belief that a state like the USSR could have withered away at all.
Marxist-Leninists(including Lenin), when Marxism-Leninism was still a thing, didn't actually espouse the belief that the Soviet state would wither away in the same sense that you people are using the phrase, you are quite misinformed here. Lenin advanced the line of doing away with the separation between the state(by this it is meant the government-administrative apparatus) and the civil society, the prerequisite conditions for which he thought were things like multiplying the Soviet forces of production exponentially, increasing the level of culture among the proletariat, establishing a socialist agrarian system in the country, democratizing the state apparatus more, and so on. In a nutshell the Bolsheviks envisioned the State encompassing the whole of society and vice versa amounting to the "withering away of the state". I mean read the last articles Lenin wrote before his death. His primary concern was about maximizing the efficiency of the state apparatus, improving the state appartus, extending its scope, etc, etc. He even spelled out some suggestions to help the Bolsheviks deal with the issue which centered mostly on combating the NEP-ushered bureaucracy(by bureaucracy, by the way, he didn't mean the ~evil Stalinists~ or ~proto-Stalinists~; by bureaucracy he meant those elements within the state apparatus which are remnants of the old Tsarist personnel, the NEPmen, and the bourgeois and petty-bourgeois speculators - his notion was to purge all these elements and replace them with proven party communists, in which his model was the Foreign Affairs Commissariat, a Commissariat composed 100% of loyal party communists with no ex-Tsarist elements whatsoever).

Certainly you don't believe that any sane communist would stick to the old utopian anti-statist prejudices after actually having experienced what it is like to run a country? That would be ridiculous.

[Mrcapitalist]

“There are, besides, eternal truths, such as Freedom, Justice, etc., that are common to all states of society. But Communism abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experience.”
"Abolition [Aufhebung] of the family! Even the most radical flare up at this infamous proposal of the Communists."
All of this sounds like nonsense

[Baseball]

I think the terminology 'dictatorship of the proletariat' is sadly an archaism of Marxism that has by existing into the modern era alienated many a curious person from far-left politics (or at least turned them to some brand of anarchism).

The use of the word 'dictatorship' here stems from Marx's borrowing of the original Greco-Roman meaning, which literally means 'rule' - i.e. the 'rule of the proletariat' as in the Proletariat have all economic and political power. It does not mean 'dictatorship' in the modern sense of the term.

I would defend democratic decision making in the DotP, but I believe that there are many Marxists (specifically left communists) who criticise the concept of a bourgeois form of democracy in the first place (not to say that they are not against democratic or autocratic decision making).

No. That is describing dictatorship in the "modern sense of the term." Its no coincidence that they harshest dictatorships of the 20th century were by regimes CLAIMING to be socialist, or CLAIMING to be building socialism. All power having been concentrated in the hands of the "proleteriat."

[Comrade #138672]

No. That is describing dictatorship in the "modern sense of the term." Its no coincidence that they harshest dictatorships of the 20th century were by regimes CLAIMING to be socialist, or CLAIMING to be building socialism. All power having been concentrated in the hands of the "proleteriat."Those regimes were not dictatorships of the proletariat.