Is the proletariat more passive than the peasantry?

[Sewer Socialist]

In the sense that the proletariat have a unique class consciousness, I agree that they have truly revolutionary potential.

But are they not also more passive than say, the peasantry? Or slaves, for that matter? It seems that the peasantry has been involved with far more threatening popular insurrections than the proletariat. Even revolutions like the Russian Revolution, or the Chinese Revolution only occurred with large amounts of support from the peasantry, did they not? Slave revolts seem to be very common, if unorganized and isolated.

It seems like purely proletarian revolutionary movements have been fewer and less successful. The Spanish Civil War, the German uprisings, a few isolated insurrections in the USA, like in West Virginia or Colorado, some general strikes that didn't get very far... and some other minor things.

Is this just a matter of my perspective? Is it a matter of the pervasive nature of modern ideology?

[dudell65]

It's worth noting that capitalism is really good at obfuscating the real relations of production. Slaves see that all they do is for the benefit of the slaveholder, and serfs have a clearly delineated workday, but proletarians only ever seem to be working for their own benefit. Consequently, it's hard to develop class consciousness.

And I wouldn't pin any of those failed revolutions on the proletariat; it's just that the fully developed working class goes hand in hand with the fully developed bourgeoisie and bourgeois state.

[John Nada]

In the sense that the proletariat have a unique class consciousness, I agree that they have truly revolutionary potential.

But are they not also more passive than say, the peasantry? Or slaves, for that matter? It seems that the peasantry has been involved with far more threatening popular insurrections than the proletariat. Even revolutions like the Russian Revolution, or the Chinese Revolution only occurred with large amounts of support from the peasantry, did they not? Slave revolts seem to be very common, if unorganized and isolated.Slave societies and feudalism were around longer. There going to be a lot of slave and peasant revolts just by that fact. But a slave or peasant revolt alone might not have led to socialism. It's led to feudalism and capitalism, under the leadership of the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie did this in alliance with other classes.

If you go by which class had more successful revolutions, the bourgeoisie takes the cake. Though a minority, they've led other classes towards bourgeois democratic revolutions. And relative to feudalism, this was progressive. Hell, they've even led successful counterrevolutions against proletarian revolutions.
It seems like purely proletarian revolutionary movements have been fewer and less successful. The Spanish Civil War, the German uprisings, a few isolated insurrections in the USA, like in West Virginia or Colorado, some general strikes that didn't get very far... and some other minor things. The proletariat did participate in bourgeois democratic revolutions too. A lot of revolutions/rebellions in the 20th century with peasant participation also had proletarians, often with the proletariat in a leading role. In the cases of the Russian and Chinese revolutions, the proletariat were leading the revolution in alliance with the peasantry. Even in the case of Spain, there still was a large peasantry that played a role.

There's no logic reason why they should've either sat back and waited until "their own" bourgeoisie proletarianized the peasantry(which they were either unwilling or too weak to do), or launched a revolution while ignoring 80% of population. The proletariat had the task of carrying out both the bourgeois democratic revolution and proletarian socialist revolution. It was under the proletariat's leadership that the peasantry became a revolutionary force.
Is this just a matter of my perspective? Is it a matter of the pervasive nature of modern ideology?For some reason there seems to be the perception that a lot of third-world revolutions were strictly peasant based. Even in the imperialist nations there was still a lot of peasants. In fact, if you counted the imperialist countries colonies(ie India was a part of Britain) this was even more true. The proletariat would've had to have some participation with the peasantry in "their" countries.

In the case of the US, the US doesn't have a peasantry proper. The farmers were more like the petite-bourgeoisie or rural proletarians. The farmers did start losing ground after the American Civil War, but got a bump up after the Spanish-American war(wonder if it has to do with imperialism?). The farmers took a beating again during the Great Depression, but were saved with government programs. Till after WWII this strata made up 30% of the population, and before(around the time of many of those proletarian insurrections)often made up 40-50%.

But over time the size of those dependent on agriculture dropped. Many farms went out of business because they couldn't compete against agribusiness. Black sharecroppers left the racist south to work in factories. Fertilizers, pesticides, machinery, improved land management, and better strains during what's called the Green Revolution meant fewer farms could produce more with less labor. Now farmers only make up about 2%. Many are old, and some are afraid there won't be enough people skilled in agriculture to replace them.

It's a mistake to think the proletariat and the bourgeoisie are the only classes in the US, or that they're both a homogenous monoliths without various strata and contradictions. Though the proletariat is larger than it's ever been, not to long ago there was a very large petite-bourgeoisie(farmers, small businesspeople, state bureaucrat, military/police, high-paid workers with stable employment, managers, foremen, intellectual workers). Many proletarians of today are descended from that era when you had a lot of shop-keepers, sole proprietors, craftspeople, independent farmers, soldiers, labor aristocrats, state bureaucrats, ect. Members of the petite-bourgeoisie waver(could go either way), and provide a support base against the proletariat if they fall into the hands of the big bourgeoisie, and can even lead very reactionary movements such as with fascism.

The US, being an imperialist nation, has a pretty sizable petite-bourgeoisie, labor aristocracy, bureaucrats, landlords, managers, lumpenproletariat, a very large police and military, and a large share of the world's big bourgeoisie. I'd estimate that the proletariat makes up 70%(85% at most, 30% at least but unlikely), but even going by the higher end, that a 45 million potential support base for the bourgeoisie. That's larger than a lot of countries. The 1% itself is 3 million. Even having a larger proletarian super-majority, and even perhaps one of the largest ever numerically, that presents it's own challenges for a proletarian socialist revolution.

The question posed in this thread reminded me of Engels's The Peasant War in Germany. Engels describes a peasants' insurrection around the Protestant Reformation.
When the peasant war broke out, becoming more predominant in regions with Catholic nobility and princes, Luther strove to maintain a conciliatory position. He resolutely attacked the governments. He said it was due to their oppression that the revolts had started, that not the peasants alone were against them, but God as well. On the other hand, he also said that the revolt was ungodly and against the Gospel. He advised both parties to yield, to reach a peaceful understanding.
Luther had given the plebeian movement a powerful weapon — a translation of the Bible. Through the Bible, he contrasted feudal Christianity of his time with moderate Christianity of the first century. In opposition to decaying feudal society, he held up the picture of another society which knew nothing of the ramified and artificial feudal hierarchy. The peasants had made extensive use of this weapon against the forces of the princes, the nobility, and the clergy. Now Luther turned the same weapon against the peasants, extracting from the Bible a veritable hymn to the authorities ordained by God — a feat hardly exceeded by any lackey of absolute monarchy. Princedom by the grace of God, passive resistance, even serfdom, were being sanctioned by the Bible. Thus Luther repudiated not only the peasant insurrection but even his own revolt against religious and lay authority. He not only betrayed the popular movement to the princes, but the middle-class movement as well. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1850/peasant-war-germany/ch02.htm Luther, with his radical(at the time, sure as hell not now) credentials, was employed to pacify the masses. He switched between radical phases and appeals for peace, for it's a sin to rebel.:lol:
Truchsess' cunning saved him here from certain ruin. Had he not succeeded in fooling the weak, limited, for the most part demoralised peasants and their usually incapable, timid and venal leaders, he would have been closed in with his small army between four columns numbering at least from 25,000 to 30,000 men, and would have perished. It was the narrow-mindedness of his enemies, always inevitable among the peasant masses, that made it possible for him to dispose of them at the very moment when, with one blow, they could have ended the entire war, at least as far as Suabia and Franconia were concerned. The Lake peasants adhered to the agreement, which finally turned out to be their undoing, so rigidly that they later took up arms against their allies, the Hegau peasants. And although the Allgaeu peasants, involved in the betrayal by their leaders, soon renounced the agreement, Truchsess was then out danger.https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1850/peasant-war-germany/ch05.htm Here Engels describes a commander Truchsess. He was vastly outnumbered and outgunned by the peasant and plebeian insurgents. But he successfully won a counterinsurgency. He would pull back and take his time. He negotiated with them, gave promises to one group, attack another, then break his truces or outright ignore it in the first place. When his troops attacked, they hit hard to terrify his enemies. His soldiers fought dirty.

The peasants, being divided and more worried about local shit, were picked off one by one. They started off strong, but burned out. If they were united, they could've easily won. They had the numbers, but weren't organized. The princes were able to defeat them.

IMO Engels had a keen military mind. So much of Peasant War is still true today. Almost prophetic description of insurrections.

[G4b3n]

All of these classes have their own unique social relations that have affected them differently at various points in history. It is fruitless to compare them in terms of who is "most" revolutionary. But as for slaves, they cannot be revolutionaries by definition of their own class interests. They seek (or did seek) to free themselves on an individual level. Yes, there have been revolutions where slaves did virtually all of the lifting, but they were bourgeois in character. "the slave frees himself when, of all the relations of private property, he abolishes only the relation of slavery and thereby becomes a proletarian; the proletarian can free himself only by abolishing private property in general" - Engels

If we are looking at the contemporary state of things, we have a deindustrialized proletariat, the historical movements representing their interests and found therein have been thoroughly defeated and are in desperate need of restructure.

In the east, where revolutionary movements are the most relevant, we have the poor peasantry doing the bulk of the lifting and representing their interests through a collaborationist liberation lens that tends to plague most peasant movement. But it is revolutionary and worthy of support, in my humble opinion.

[John Nada]

Something I think doesn't get mentioned much is grow seasons. Depending on the crops, most the farm labor happened during planting(before winter for winter crop, spring for summer crops) and harvesting in summer. For example, in the US this why students get summer breaks(originally to help out on the family farm), and why voting is in November(winter, so after the harvesting and sowing winter crops). This results in alternating periods of intense labor and idleness, because if the crops failed you are fucked.

With the peasantry, they'd go between busting ass and doing nothing. In their free time they can provide a source of labor. This is what a semi-proletarian is, peasants who'd go work in the cities or other farms on the off-season, then work their or their landlord's land during grow seasons. They'd alternate between being overtly exploited by the bourgeoisie and seemingly battling nature but in actuality being in conflict with the landlords and bourgeoisie when harvesting is done. It's pretty much a lump sum when the peasant sells her/his crops(though in practice it often ends up essentially being employees for the landlord, banks and big agribusinesses), but daily for the proletariat selling her/his labor.

When you think about it, except for maybe slaves, the proletariat is probably the most oppressed class in history, since there's no end of grow season for proletarian labor, except recessions and depressions. Working 40-70 hours every week for decades on end sometimes(if you're "lucky" enough to have a stable job), with the periods of unemployment being abject poverty. That's a new thing in human history, that was only possible under capitalism.

If you look at battles throughout history in nations with a predominately agricultural economy, often it follow the phases of crop growth. In the peasant insurrection that Engels describes, it started after the harvest in October, gained momentum after planting in the end of March-April, then petered out in the end of July, when harvesting time was coming up. Often modern wars follow a similar pattern of battles revolving around planting and harvesting.

[Comrade Maro]

The success of a revolution very much depend on if, and to witch degree, the working class wins the hegemony or influence in society. By that I mean how large sections of the population see their interests in the revolution instead of the remaining system. This again depends on the size of the different sections of the population, how large part of the working masses is the working class? How does the peasantry and the craftsmens organise itself? It depends on the character of the country in question.
Take Italy e.g. where the communist party was the strongest labour party but never could get majorety

[Comrade Jacob]

In less developed nations yes, I would say so.