Comrade Qwatt
15th February 2008, 12:19
I thought seeing as I am new here, that I would very much like to start a discussion on Marxist history, particularly historiographic periodization and the development of bourgeois society. Marx said that idealistic of 'utopian' socialism, such as the writings of Saint-Simon, Fourier and Owen, were simply the results of the proletarian class consciousness not yet being being fully formed, because obviously bourgeois society had only just really overthrown feudalism and the production relations of proletarian/bourgeois had yet to come into full fruition. Marx then says that idealism (an inherently anti-materialist perspective) exists because of a lack of developed proletarian consciousness, and that as bourgeois property develops so will a more coherent proletarian position grounded in fact.
My statement and question is thus, does modern left communism, utopian and other anarchist positions accurately constitute an anti-Marxist perspective? I thought for a while on this point, but how can this be possible, given the advanced stage bourgeois society exists in today, but almost immediately it came to me. It seems credible that the answer is that utopian socialism exists more of a result of ignorance of material conditions than a correct understanding of them, which of course would explain why the 'utopian' camp is so related to the Ivory Tower naive idealists prevalent among the petite-bourgeois, and even lumpenproletariat, mostly students with a very limited understanding of material development.
"A part of the bourgeoisie is desirous of redressing social grievances in order to secure the continued existence of bourgeois society.
To this section belong economists, philanthropists, humanitarians, improvers of the condition of the working class, organisers of charity, members of societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals, temperance fanatics, hole-and-corner reformers of every imaginable kind. This form of socialism has, moreover, been worked out into complete systems. - Karl Marx"
I think the modern breed of anti-globalization, environmentalism, anarchism etc correctly relates to this.
Indeed I believe it's accurate to say that most revisionism and utopianism comes from a position of ignorance, but can sometimes be accompanied by bourgeois usurpation. Instead of looking at the development of a proletarian propertied state as a period of history, directly following bourgeois property, instead this is replaced by a vague yet infinetely strange theory of 'freedom' which obviously takes it's inspiration from 19th century literalistic bourgeois concepts rather than Marxist theory.
We then, as Marxist firmly grounded in a position of reality, must overcome utopian dreaming and work to build real socialism.
My statement and question is thus, does modern left communism, utopian and other anarchist positions accurately constitute an anti-Marxist perspective? I thought for a while on this point, but how can this be possible, given the advanced stage bourgeois society exists in today, but almost immediately it came to me. It seems credible that the answer is that utopian socialism exists more of a result of ignorance of material conditions than a correct understanding of them, which of course would explain why the 'utopian' camp is so related to the Ivory Tower naive idealists prevalent among the petite-bourgeois, and even lumpenproletariat, mostly students with a very limited understanding of material development.
"A part of the bourgeoisie is desirous of redressing social grievances in order to secure the continued existence of bourgeois society.
To this section belong economists, philanthropists, humanitarians, improvers of the condition of the working class, organisers of charity, members of societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals, temperance fanatics, hole-and-corner reformers of every imaginable kind. This form of socialism has, moreover, been worked out into complete systems. - Karl Marx"
I think the modern breed of anti-globalization, environmentalism, anarchism etc correctly relates to this.
Indeed I believe it's accurate to say that most revisionism and utopianism comes from a position of ignorance, but can sometimes be accompanied by bourgeois usurpation. Instead of looking at the development of a proletarian propertied state as a period of history, directly following bourgeois property, instead this is replaced by a vague yet infinetely strange theory of 'freedom' which obviously takes it's inspiration from 19th century literalistic bourgeois concepts rather than Marxist theory.
We then, as Marxist firmly grounded in a position of reality, must overcome utopian dreaming and work to build real socialism.