First Published: Workers Viewpoint, Vol. 2, No. 6, July 1977.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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Who was Karl Marx? Why are his teachings loved by the working-class and despised by the capitalists and all who serve their interests? Questions like these are more and more on the minds of workers. Greater numbers of workers are seeking out communist solutions and communist leadership. And everyday, the capitalists grow more haunted by the “spectre of communism” that Marx and his comrade Engels proclaimed over a century ago!
Karl Marx was born on May 15, 1818 in Trier, Germany. He lived during the great storms of the bourgeois democratic revolution and actively participated in the revolutionary movement. Before his death in 1883 Marx witnessed the American War of Independence and the Civil War, the French Revolution and other revolutionary upsurges in Germany, Belgium, etc. He saw the great advances of industry, such as the Industrial Revolution in England; and of natural science, such as the discovery of the cell, the transformation of energy and the theory of evolution.
Marx systematized and synthesized the correct kernels of the most advanced thinking of the bourgeois democratic revolution in Europe, German philosophy, English political economy and French socialism. He criticized these theories in light of the most advanced revolutionary experience of his time and his own revolutionary practice.
Dialectical and historical materialism is the basic law governing political economy and scientific socialism (as well as the dialectics of nature.)
In his desire to battle the reactionary monarchy in Germany, Marx was attracted to the teachings of Hegel, an influential philosopher among the German intellectuals. What was revolutionary about Hegel’s philosophy was his dialectical method. His view rejected anything that was final, unchanging or “sacred.” Marx was won over to this view that everything in the world develops through a process of birth and death, rising from lower to higher stages of growth in leans and bounds. The reactionary part of Hegel’s teachings was his idealism. Hegel believed that nature was the degrading of the “absolute idea.” Thinking and ideas were primary to Hegel, and nature (reality) existed only through the idea descending to appear on earth. Marx turned this “upside-down” thinking right-side up – ideas are a reflection of the real world in the minds of men.
One philosopher who took the lead in criticising Hegel’s incorrect ideas was Feuerbach. He correctly rejected Hegel’s view that ideas exist outside of man. Feuerbach said that reality is independent of any philosophy and that nothing exists outside of nature and man. Feuerbach helped to clarify Marx’s thinking and caused him to become a materialist.
But Feuerbach failed to see that man’s interaction with nature and other men is also part of reality, and that this exists outside of what man thinks about his actions. Because of this error, Feuerbach’s materialism was static not active. Man was what he was due to his social environment. Different men are products of different environments. But isn’t it men themselves that change their environment, change nature and society? No, answered Feuerbach, man was doomed to only knowing nature and society but never changing it.
Marx, however, understood that man’s activity transformed nature and society, and in the course of this, changed himself. Marx criticised Feuerbach’s separation of thinking and being (human activity) and pointed out the fundamental aim of all correct, revolutionary thinking – to change the world. This was a crushing blow against idealism of the student-type, the idealism of academic “professors.”
Can we know the taste of a pear by looking it up in a dictionary? No! The only way to know the taste of a pear is to bite into it! Why do we need to know the role and origin of the trade union misleaders? The only reason we need to know this is so that we can better fight the capitalists!
In criticising Feuerbach, Marx: laid out the difference between revolutionary and reactionary thinkers, “The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.”
Whether we seek knowledge in order to change the world for the sole purpose of changing the world or seek it to appear “wise,” to impress others is a question of proletarian stand. For “whom” is the fundamental question we must constantly ask ourselves, for the working class or for ourselves. To change the world is the one and only reason for Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought. Communists, Marx said, “have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole.”
What is the fundamental interest of the proletariat as a whole? The working class’s fundamental interest and historic mission is the overthrow of the capitalist class and the founding and strengthening of the proletarian dictatorship over the capitalists. Furthermore it is to lead all strata oppressed by capitalist society in the struggle to end all classes and therefore all exploitation of man by man. In short, all that is necessary to establish classless, communist society.
What does this concretely mean for the multi-national U.S. proletariat at this time? Since we do not yet have the dictatorship of the proletariat in the U.S. our task cannot be the strengthening of working class rule. We are in a period of the preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Preparation means different things at different times. We are not “free” to prepare any way we please but must prepare according to what is necessary, given the sum total, of objective conditions (for example, whether reform or repression is the main form of capitalist rule at this time and subjective conditions (for example, the strengths and weaknesses of ourselves and our class). Thus we must grasp what preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat means at the present time.
We have identified that preparation today means that we must grasp correct methods of leadership and work in order to win and train the advanced. In short, we must grasp the correct line on the organizational sphere of the Workers Viewpoint Organization.
Thus, whether we have a correct stand with the vast majority or an incorrect stand with the capitalists is a highly concrete question. And this stand cannot be separated from the correct Marxist tactics, forms of struggle and organization, which are also based on a concrete analysis of concrete conditions. Communist principles on strategy and tactics, plan, policy, command and action are integrally linked. Correct methods of work and leadership cannot be separated from correct world outlook. Violation of the Marxist stand, method and viewpoint can occur on tactical questions, policy matters. In fact, this is how the lack of concrete analysis of concrete conditions often shows itself. Though one may appear to be pushing the correct general line and deviating from correct tactics, it is in essence a separation of objective reality from our subjective reflection of the concrete reality. This leads to separating theory from practice by treating problems outside of the proper time, place and conditions.
Thus, no general line, no general call such as “the immediate and universal preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat,” is complete without understanding its concrete content, concrete practice at this point. It is incomplete without a positive program of action, positive proposals and suggestions, and moreover, without identifying the concrete key link to grasp and implement. For example, preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat at this particular moment concretely consists of grasping and implementing the correct line on the organizational sphere of the Workers Viewpoint Organization, the concrete key link for the foundation of the Party.
The correctness or incorrectness of the ideological and political line is decisive. The correctness of the ideological and political line includes correctness of principles, plan, tactics, policy, command and action. Any break along this chain is bound, to have serious effects on the working class; it can sabotage the preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Theory is the summation and synthesis of the sum total of experience, historical experience in its general aspect. Chairman Mao said that the correctness of generality resides in the particular. To have a correct understanding of theory and shoot it at the concrete target of the U.S. revolution, namely a correct ideological and political line, we must use theory as a guide (and not as dogma) to develop “a profound grasp of the practical movement.” The correctness of our grasp and application of theory is revealed in our grasp of the particulars of class struggle and the practical movement, as class struggle is always concrete.
One form that the failure to make a concrete analysis of concrete conditions is book worship. This is an extremely dangerous deviation with important consequences; as Chairman Mao pointed out:
The method of studying the social sciences exclusively from the book is likewise extremely dangerous and may even lead one onto the road of counter-revolution. Clear proof of this is provided by the fact that whole batches of Chinese Communists who confined themselves to books in their study of the social sciences have turned into counter-revolutionaries. When we say Marxism is correct, it is certainly not because Marx was a ’prophet’ but because his theory has been proved correct in our practice and in our struggle. We need Marxism in our struggle. In our acceptance of his theory no such formalistic or mystical notion as that of ’prophecy’ ever enters our minds. Many who have read Marxist books have become renegades from the revolution, whereas illiterate workers often grasp Marxism very well. Of course we should study Marxist books, but this study must be integrated with our country’s actual conditions. We need books, but we must overcome book worship, which is divorced from the actual situation. How can we overcome book worship? The only way is to investigate the actual situation.
History has given us notorious examples of such “book-worshipers.” Prior to the October revolution in Russia Marxists assumed that socialist revolution would occur first in advanced capitalist countries (such as Germany or England) or in close connection with the socialist revolution in them. The October revolution raised the question of whether socialism could exist in one or a few countries. Could socialism exist in capitalistically less-developed Russia without the aid of socialism in more developed Western Europe?
Lenin made a concrete analysis of concrete conditions and soberly summed-up the reality of the October revolution. Not only could socialism exist in one or a few countries, concluded Lenin, but the new-born Soviet Russia was concrete, living proof of this! This was due to the specific features of the international situation and concrete class forces in Russia at that time, as well as the Bolshevik’s understanding and utilization of these concrete facts. (See Stalin’s, “The October Revolution And The Tactics of The, Russian Communists”, in the collection, On The Opposition)
Trotsky, on the other hand, was blind to this reality. He was blinded by his book-worship and the “beauty” of his unreal theory of “permanent revolution.” He pit the general line of continuing world revolution against the particular reality of socialism in Russia, and this led him to oppose in practice the dictatorship of the proletariat. Trotsky failed to see that the general truth of the world revolution lived in the concrete, particular truth of socialism in Russia.
Another book-worshipper was Wang Ming in the Chinese Revolution. He failed to make a concrete analysis of the concrete conditions of semi-feudal, semi-colonial China. Dogmatically looking at the historical experience of the October revolution, he pushed the line of taking the cities first before the countryside, a view that was incorrect given the situation in China. The consequence of his deviation was that the Chinese Communist Party suffered 90% losses in the red base areas and 100% losses in the Kuomintang-held areas. Though this line was defeated by the correct line of Chairman Mao, it was at a great price and after much bloodshed!
Only by grasping that generality resides within particularity, that truth is concrete, that the “living soul” of revolutionary theory is a concrete analysis of concrete conditions can we know the world in order to change it. And this is precisely what Marx’s example teaches us.
With dialectical materialism as his scalpel, Marx dissected a simple commodity exchange and drew the conclusion that the value of every commodity is determined by the degree of socially-necessary labor time spent on its making. More important, he learned that the source of the wealth of the capitalists, profits, is surplus value created by labor. As Lenin said, “Marx traced the development of capitalism from embryonic commodity economy, from simple exchange, to its highest forms, to large-scale production.”
This provided the materialist foundation for understanding the motion of classes and class society.
Marx’s whole life was filled with great revolutionary deeds as well as important contributions to revolutionary science.
Marx worked on numerous revolutionary newspapers, the Rheinische Zeitung (1842), the Paris Vorwarts (1844), the Deutsch-Brussler-Zeitung (1848-49) and the New York Tribune (1852-61).
From 1844-45 he was active in the revolutionary movement in Paris, In 1847 both he and Engels joined the Communist League, an international revolutionary organization and the forerunner of the German Social-Democratic Labor Party. Marx and Engels wrote many things for the League, such as the Communist Manifesto, a basic text of communist thought.
Marx was banished from Belgium for his participation in the Revolution of February, 1848. He went to Germany where he was involved in various revolutionary activities. After the May uprisings of 1849 in Dresden and the Rhine Province, the German government forced him to leave. From there he went to Paris. After the June 13, 1849 demonstrations protesting the sending of French troops to suppress the revolution in Italy, Marx was banished from France. He went to London where he spent the rest of his days.
In 1864, as the working-class movement in Europe was again on the rise, Marx took the lead in founding and guiding the International Workingmen’s Association (the First International.)
Months before the Paris uprising Marx warned the workers that to overthrow the government would be an act of desperation since conditions were not favorable. But when in March, 1871, the revolt was forced upon the workers and they seized Paris, Marx praised their “heaven-storming” courage. Although the revolution failed, Marx saw the Commune’s experience had great historic importance for the course of the proletarian revolution.
Before the Commune, Marx had applied his dialectical materialism to the history of society and had concluded that history moved forward due to the struggle of classes, the slave and the slave owner, the serf and the lord, the worker and the capitalist – in short, between the oppressed and the oppressor. He had learned that the working-class was the product of the development of industry, how it was trained, educated and organized to overthrow the capitalist class, and how the proletariat would end the existence of classes altogether:
The advance of industry, whose involuntary promoter is the bourgeoisie, replaces the isolation of the laborers, due to competition, by their revolutionary combination, due to association. The development of Modern Industry, therefore, cuts from under its feet the very foundation on which the bourgeoisie produces and appropriates products. What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces, above all, are its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable. (Communist Manifesto)
After the experience of the Paris Commune Marx knew how this was to come about. The working-class must “smash” the capitalist state-machinery (the army, the courts, the legislature, etc.) and not take hold of it ready-made. The working-class must replace the capitalist state with a rule of its own, the dictatorship of the proletariat!
This profound lesson, the greatest of Marx’s contributions to the working-class, was the end-result of his entire life of revolutionary thinking and practice.
At Marx’s graveside, Engels said that Marx was “before all else a revolutionist. His real mission in life was to contribute, in one way or another, to the overthrow of capitalist society and of the state institutions which it had brought into being, to contribute to the liberation of the modern proletariat which he was the first to make conscious of its own position and its needs, conscious of the conditions of its emancipation. Fighting was his element. And he fought with a passion, a tenacity and a success such as few could rival.”
Is it any wonder that Marx’s legacy is cherished by the working-class and hated by the capitalists?