Now hidden, Now Open

[Connolly]

A simple question in relation to the opening lines of the communist manifesto.

In it, Marx says ""in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large""


Im just wondering what exactly Marx meant by the bolded bit. My impression is that it quite adequatley describes the present consciousness of the working class and its struggle. At least in the western world. That is, in some senses, its oppression and consciousness is "hidden" - but still existent. That its not always 'open'.

[Raúl Duke]

Maybe it's a reference that there are times where the class struggle is not that apparent while in others it is visible in plain sight and the divisions are rigidly formed.

It's always present, the class struggle, since both classes are still in existence and the interests of one class is rarely, if ever, in the interest of the other.

Although he was referring to past struggles in history, yet he predicted that if it happened before it will happen again (Historical Materialism) and thus theorized that this time the new oppressed class: the proletariat would win against the bourgeoisie such as when the bourgeoisie and the peasantry won against the aristocracy back in feudalism. The major difference from before is that the proletariat is theorized to create a class-less state-less society (due to certain characteristical differences of the proletariat in capitalism to the bourgeoisie and peasantry of feudalism.) while all previous class struggles lead to the creation of a different class hierarchy and different types of government.

[hekmatista]

I think he meant that the conflict, as a conflict of classes, is often "hidden" from the perception of the combatants themselves, as well as observers. Think of the overthrow of the Shah back in 1979; the main actors were the Iranian workers, but only a small minority of them were following any class-conscious leadership (which is one reason the clerical "national" bourgeoisie emerged as the new ruling strata.)

[gla22]

I think he was saying to the communists it is open and obvious however to the standard proletariat it is hidden.

[Raúl Duke]

(which is one reason the clerical "national" bourgeoisie emerged as the new ruling strata.) Actually, in my interpretation, in that case there was many sections in conflict inside the bourgeoisie: The quislings who supported the Shah and were willing to bend over to imperialism, the nationalist secular bourgeoisie (one characterization of this was Mossadeq's National Front.), and the religious clerics "bourgeoisie" which were also anti-imperialist.

The religious clerics came to power (although interestingly I heard that the West thought that the left would rise to power.) and there anti-imperialism helped the Iranian economy become quite "independent" (as in not a subservient economy to imperialism; most of these economies usually have only one sector highly developed while the rest of the sectors are not. In Iran, while most of the GDP comes from oil {in Mexico only like 10% of the GDP was from oil when I last checked} the sectors of the economy are quite balanced in terms of workforce employed between the 3: agricultural, industrial, and service.) yet probably seemed to reach some kind of stagnation which possibly results to the class conflict of workers and especially middle class (petit bourgeoisie?) towards the ruling clerical elites and the bourgeoisie that support them.

[Dros]

A simple question in relation to the opening lines of the communist manifesto.

In it, Marx says ""in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large""


Im just wondering what exactly Marx meant by the bolded bit. My impression is that it quite adequatley describes the present consciousness of the working class and its struggle. At least in the western world. That is, in some senses, its oppression and consciousness is "hidden" - but still existent. That its not always 'open'.

What Marx is getting at here is that class struggle is constantly occurring. Sometimes, it manifests itself openly in the form of strikes or class warfare. Sometimes, it manifests itself in far more hidden and subtle ways as alienation or a covert struggle over resources like wages et. all. For instance, if you ask any average person in the first world, even a worker, if there is currently a class struggle, they will probably say "no". But the class struggle is still here even though it is hard to see.

[hekmatista]

The following was written in 1979 (full text: http://hekmat.public-archive.net/). The subsequent path of the Islamic Republic as a terrorist dictatorship of the bourgeoisie confirms the analysis.
"In our opinion, the current deviationist populist views in the communist movement of our country, which are themselves the basis of the ideological and political disarming of the working class before the liberal bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie, thrive, from the theoretical aspect, on the absence of a Marxist-Leninist cognition of the laws of movement of our society and on the mechanical substitution of clichéd patterns for Marxism and Leninism. The theoretical foundations of these deviations must be sought in the prevalence of non-Marxist and non-Leninist views on capital, capitalist system, imperialism and dependent capitalist system. Important political and tactical deviations such as recognising a part of the bourgeoisie of Iran as "national and progressive", substituting the policy of class collaboration for the endeavour to form in practice a revolutionary anti-imperialist front, insufficient work in 'ceaselessly exposing the liberal bourgeoisie and the conservative section of the petty bourgeoisie, and consequently abandoning the political leadership of the democratic struggles into the hands of the petty bourgeoisie, the liberal bourgeoisie, etc, are all, from the theoretical aspect, reflections of the immense gulf which separates "revolutionary" theory in Iran from the teachings of Marx and Lenin on the criticism of the economy of capitalism and its highest stage, imperialism. The main part of the theoretical literature of the communist movement of our country, views and understands capital not from the viewpoint of Marxism but from that of a capitalist. Without the analysis and cognition of the laws and necessities of movement of the whole social capital and the preconditions of its production, reproduction and accumulation in the dependent capitalist system of Iran, it straightaway sets out to examine the different strata of the bourgeoisie (and not even the different. strata of capital). It classifies the Iranian bourgeoisie; brings its different "factions" to war with one another; counts their "contradictory" interests; in a metaphysical and predetermined fashion, considers, sometimes this and sometimes that stratum of the bourgeoisie "within people's camp" and "outside people's camp" and. does not say even a word about the whole of the system which is based on the common interests of the different strata of capital (and hence of the bourgeoisie); about the system which essentially makes the existence and accumulation of capital possible with a high and definite degree of profitability; end about the system which in the final analysis the working class and its communist vanguards are at war with, in its entirety. The political outcome of such a method of approach is clear. When communists forget what system they have set out to criticise, expose and overthrow; when , instead of the class struggle, which is the essence of the democratic revolution, they make the competition of the different strata of the bourgeoisie a problem for the working class; when everyday under a pretext - that for instance the present revolution is not socialist - they plead for a section of the bourgeoisie before the workers and in practice inspire in the working class their own populist thinking, precisely in contradiction with the logical and spontaneous needs and interpretations of this class; and finally withhold scientific socialism from he workers; then the workers' movement loses its militancy, becomes conservative and lays hope in the regime of the compromisers. It fears the politicisation of its own economic moves and is finally delivered to the reformists, compromisers and opportunists. The necessary condition for the victory of the democratic revolution under the leadership of the proletariat is the existence of a large section of workers who are aware of their long-term interests, who do not look at the victory of the democratic revolution as an end-in-itself and who regard it as a necessary step for the establishment of the preconditions of the final move of the working class towards socialism. "