Marx S Theory Of Revolution In Emperical Reality Term paper
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Over the course of his active life, Karl Marx' philosophy concerning the revolutionary process naturally evolved and developed. His work must therefore be considered in its entirety to adequately understand his perceptions and views. It would be inaccurate to characterize Marx' analysis of the revolutionary process strictly on the basis of his early writing - such works as The German Ideology (1845-46) and The Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts (1844). In order to acquire a better understanding of his theories, one must examine the evolution of the theoretical premises suggested by these introductory works when tested in revolutionary practice. Marx, being a scientific thinker understood that the ultimate test of any theory is practice. The location for testing his ideas regarding class struggle - his laboratory - was the labor movement. The two crucial texts to understanding Marx's thinking about revolution are The Communist Manifesto and The Civil War in France. Of these, The Civil War in France is perhaps more important because it demonstrates a mature statement of Marx' revolutionary theory. Written in the period prior to the great revolutions of 1848-49, The Communist Manifesto is primarily a theoretical anticipation of future revolutionary developments based upon historical research and is quite accurately expressed. However, The Civil War in France was written after the class struggle developed to the point that it introduced a new institution: the commune. This new state formation, which was the world's first workers' government, developed in spite of the influence of Blanquist conspiratorial theories and Proudhonist anti-statist anarchist ideas. Moreover, it was the first revolution that underlined Marx theory of revolution. The Paris Commune developed spontaneously from the process of class struggle; the need for a new political form arose and The Commune was created to address it. In their 1872 introduction to The Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels acknowledged the important influence of the Paris Commune on their philosophy: 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 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.) (1) Marx claimed that among his most important contributions to sociological and political ideas was his detection of "the dictatorship of the proletariat" (the working class organized as the ruling class), Marx identified this as the key for the transition to socialism. Calling it "a new point of departure of world-historic importance" Marx recognized that the commune represented the first concrete manifestation of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The incident of the Paris Commune provided practical answers to the theoretical questions hinted at in The Communist Manifesto. The Paris Commune is the key to understanding Karl Marx' theory of revolution.Any analysis of the revolutionary theory of Karl Marx should begin with the thinker himself. A materialist approach, which is understanding that ideas and theories don't just pop out of thin air, would begin with biographical details, with the historical context and the social movements affecting the thinker. Examining these factors allows a greater understanding of Marx s theories and gives a truer sense of their importance. The best evidence of a person's ideas is not necessarily what they put down on paper. Action often provides a better gauge than rhetoric when determining the importance of ideas a person attaches his theories. In examining Marx' life, it is obvious that he was a devoted husband and father, an admirer of Shakespeare and classical Greek drama, a one-time romantic poet who was especially contemptuous of the superficial popular poet Martin Tupper, an impoverished radical journalist, chess player and social scientist. Above everything else, Karl Marx was a revolutionary. Unlike an ivory-tower intellectual, working in an isolated and sterile environment proposing abstract theorems of no real consequence, Marx was an active participant in building the revolutionary movement. Marx was a revolutionary.Marx was involved in the working-class movement across the entire continent of Europe. He was the editor of the Left Hegelian opposition newspaper Rheinische Zeitung; and for 11 tumultuous months in 1848-49 he edited the revived Neue Rheinische Zeitung. He was also a contributor to numerous journals. As a leading member of the Communist League, Marx was the primary author of its legendary manifesto. He corresponded frequently with working class activists in Europe, Russia and the United States, exchanging ideas and arguing vociferously about tactics and strategies. Marx was often called upon to conduct workshops, classes and training sessions for workers in Belgium, France and England. He attended rallies and meetings addressing working class organizations. He helped to form the International Working Men's Association, served on its General Council and wrote many of its important tracts. From his exile in England he carefully observed the development of workers' parties in Europe, and intervened to correct their activities, such as his critique of the Gotha program of the German party. As previously mentioned, one can conclude that Marx was a revolutionary activist. In addition to his immense participation and contributions to the revolution of the proletariat, Marx was also committed to theoretical analysis. At all times Marx demonstrated a combination of theory and practice, with more stress on one side or the other as events demanded. In the revolutionary upsurge prior to the events of 1848, the youthful Marx was actively involved in creating links among workers across Europe through the Communist League. During this period he continued his theoretical explorations, as demonstrated by writings such as The Poverty of Philosophy, Wage Labor and Capital and The Holy Family. After the failure of the revolutions of 1848-49, Marx was one of the few among the Communist League to admit to recognize that the prospect of immediate revolution was off the agenda. He therefore turned to more intensive research, spending hours in the British Museum in hopes to gain a greater understanding of the capitalist system. Yet even while pursuing this theoretical work (which would lead, among other things, to the first volume of Capital) Marx continued to correspond with other revolutionaries, addressed labor meetings and wrote polemical articles.After more than a decade of emphasizing theoretical work, Marx was inspired by events in Italy, Poland and elsewhere in Europe, particularly the response of the English proletariat to the US Civil War. Acknowledging the possibility of a renewed working class movement, Marx was instrumental in the 1864 founding of the International Working Men's Association (IWMA), an activist grouping of revolutionaries from Europe and North America. The period of Marx' activity with the IWMA was perhaps the most combative, prolific and eventful of his life. The IWMA had somewhat (though limited and inconsistent) influenced in the European workers' movement. The Paris Commune of 1871 marked the high point for the IWMA, with Marx vigorously defending the communards on behalf of the organization. Marx' revived political activism meant that much of his most important theoretical work, including Theories of Surplus Value, The Grundrisse and the additional planned five volumes of Capital - was suspended. It was left to Engels and others to prepare Marx' last works for publication after his death in 1883. Clearly, when faced with a choice between revolutionary activism and theoretical deliberations, Marx chose the former. In order to attain an understanding of the extreme importance of the analysis of the Paris Commune, Marx` theory of revolution must be introduced. Marx outlines his theory of revolution in The Communist Manifesto and he also explicitly projects it in the Gotha Program of 1875. Identifying class struggle as the primary dynamic in history, he characterizes the modern world as the stage for a dramatic confrontation between the ruling bourgeoisie (the capitalists) and the downtrodden proletariat (the working class). Driven by the logic of capitalism in seeking greater profit, the bourgeoisie constantly revolutionized the means of economic production, the fulcrum of history. In so doing, it unwittingly mobilizes socio-historical forces that it can no longer control, thus ironically calling into existence the destined class, the proletariat, to end its rule. As the proletariat increases in number and political awareness the result, according to the Communist Manifesto would be that heightened class antagonism would generate a revolution and the inevitable defeat of the bourgeoisie. Analyzing the experience of the short-lived revolutionary government established in Paris during the Franco-Prussian War, we can interpret the formation and existence of the Commune as a historical confirmation of Marx` theory of revolution. One can conclude that it is necessary for workers to seize political power by armed insurrection and then to destroy the capitalist or in this case the monarchist state. Finally, The Commune discovers the political form under which the economic emancipation of labor could take place.The Paris Commune represented a new form of government, never before seen or imagined. In its brief existence, the commune was never a socialist one in its entirety, although it contained some elements of an early form of Socialism. Yet Marx suggested that events would force it to act in a socialist manner. The multiplicity of interpretation to which the Commune has been subjected, and the multiplicity of interests which construed it in their favor, show that it was a thoroughly expansive political structure, while all previous forms of government had been emphatically repressive. Its true secret was this: Because it was a working class government in essence, the product of a class struggle would result in lowering the income and status of the comfortable bourgeoisie, but on the other hand there would also exist a working-class with higher income and greater satisfaction thus creating greater contentment for society as a whole. The political form at last discovered under which means to work out the economical emancipation of labor. Excluding this last condition, the Communal Constitution would have been impossibility and a delusion. The political rule of the producer cannot co-exist with the perpetuation of his social slavery. The Commune was therefore utilized as a lever for uprooting the economical foundation upon which rests the existence of classes, and therefore of class rule. With the emancipation of laborers, every man becomes a workingman, and productive labor ceases to be a class attribute. The Paris Commune, with its expansive political form, indicated how a workers' government could negate the political functionaries and the bureaucratic layers that had blocked revolutionary efforts in the past. The Commune was formed from municipal councilors, chosen by universal suffrage in the various wards of the town, responsible and revocable at short terms. The majorities of its members were naturally working men, or acknowledged representatives of the working class. The Commune was to be both legislative and executive at the same time, but not a parliamentary body. Instead of continuing to be the agent of the Central Government, the police was at once stripped of its political attributes, and turned into the responsible, and at all times revocable, agent of the Commune. So were the officials of all other branches of the administration. From the members of the Commune downwards, the public service had to be done at workman's wage. The vested interests and the representation authority of the high dignitaries of state disappeared along with the high dignitaries themselves. Public functions ceased to be the private property of the tools of the Central Government. Not only municipal administration, but also the whole initiative hitherto exercised by the state was laid into the hands of the Commune. Using state power, the working class, through the commune would uproot the means by which the bourgeoisie had maintained its dictatorship, through the ideologies of repression. The first decree of the Commune was therefore the suppression of the standing army, and the substitution for it of the armed people. Once relieved of the standing army and the police (the physical force elements of the old government) the Commune was anxious to break the spiritual force of repression, the "parson-power", by the disestablishment of all churches as proprietary bodies. The priests were sent back to the recesses of private life, there to feed upon the alms of the faithful in imitation of their predecessors, the apostles. The whole of the educational institutions were opened to the people gratuitously, and at the same time cleared of all interference of church and state. Thus, not only was education made accessible to all, but science freed itself from the fetters which class prejudice and governmental force had imposed upon it. The Paris Commune was, of course, intended to serve as a model to all the great industrial centers of France. Once the communal regime established itself in Paris and the secondary center, the old centralized government in the provinces, too, would have to give way to the self-government of the producers. In a rough sketch of national organization, which the Commune had no time to develop, it states clearly that the Commune was to be the political form of even the smallest country and that in the rural districts the standing army was to be replaced by a national militia, with an extremely short term of service. The rural communities of every district were to administer their common affairs by an assembly of delegates in the central town and these district assemblies were again to send deputies to the National Delegation in Paris, each delegate to be at any time revocable and bound by the mandat imperatif (formal instructions) of his constituents. The few but important functions which would still remain for a central government were not to be suppressed, as has been intentionally misstated, but were to be discharged by Communal and thereafter responsible agents. The highly democratic nature of the commune form of government would make it extremely efficient at performing necessary social tasks. The working class would run the "state," rather than the reverse. Without the need to repress the majority in the interests of a minority, the "state" would assume a different character; have greater legitimacy in the public perception. The commune would win middle class support by providing "good government." The Communal Constitution would have restored to the social body all the forces hitherto absorbed by the state parasite feeding upon, and clogging the free movement of society. By this one act, it would have initiated the regeneration of France. The Commune would have delivered the peasant of the blood tax, giving him a cheap government and transform the notary, advocate, executor, and other judicial vampires, into salaried communal agents, elected by, and responsible to, himself. It would have freed him of the tyranny of the garde champetre, the gendarme, and the prefect; it would have put enlightenment by the schoolmaster in the place of stultification by the priest. And the French peasant is, above all, a man [sic] of reckoning. He would find it extremely reasonable that the pay of the priest, instead of being extorted by the tax-gatherer, should only depend upon the spontaneous action of the parishioners' religious instinct. Such were the great immediate advantages, which the rule of the Commune (and that rule alone) held out to the French peasantry. With parts of their city occupied by Prussian soldiers,...
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