On May 5th, 1818, Karl Marx, hero of the international proletatiat, was born. His revolution of Socialist theory reverberates throughout the world carries on to this day, in increasing magnitude. Every passing day, he is vindicated. His analysis of Capitalism, development of the theory of Scientific Socialism, and advancements on dialectics to become Dialectical Materialism, have all played a key role in the past century, and have remained ever-more relevant throughout.
He didn’t always rock his famous beard, when he was younger he was clean shaven!
Some significant works:
Economic & Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844
The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte
Critique of the Gotha Programme
Manifesto of the Communist Party (along with Engels)
And, of course, Capital Vol I-III
Interested in Marxism-Leninism, but don’t know where to start? Check out my “Read Theory, Darn it!” introductory reading list!
No problem, never apologize for being curious! I mainly use this account to try and gain comrades and correct misconceptions about theory when I can, so it isn’t wasted time by any stretch! And developing a plan is excellent, I always recommend that if I can, many people meander and spend far more time than necessary as a consequence.
If you’ve seen my “Read Theory, Darn it!” intro reading list, you’ll find that the way I structured it is focused on building up over time. I start with a quick FAQ from Engels, then Blackshirts and Reds to dispel common red scare myths and promote a sympathetic view towards the people in Socialist countries in their real struggles to build real Socialism.
After that, though, it delves into the theory side, in a specific order. I start with Dialectical Materialism, as it’s by far the most useful concept to understand first. It’s kinda like approaching the world from a scientific point of view, always stressing to view things as they exist in context and in motion, rather than isolated and static. After that comes the Law of Value, and the concept of Scientific Socialism, then we return to Socialist history and Imperialism/Colonialism, Social theory, then putting it all into practice.
I bring this up, because if you really study the Dialectical Materialism section well, you’ll already be equipped to do your own political analysis from the Socialist viewpoint, even if you don’t fully understand the Law of Value, the theory of the State, etc. Those all help contextualize, but in my opinion that’s the single biggest step you can take in knowledge of Marxism, and when you can consider the most critical “pre-req” research relatively solid. Studying Cuba after you get those basics firmly down will help you see what they are trying to do, and measure how they are doing in your own eyes, for whenever you can make it to Havana.
Now, you can always spend way more time reading, but you can also start reading Che Guevara’s speeches and writings as well as Fidel Castro’s interviews and whatnot to begin to get some context on the thoughts and actions of Cuban revolutionary leaders. I also recommend researching what happened to Slavador Allende in Chile, who tried to play by the rules, so to speak, rather than going the revolutionary path. This is an important point of contrast to put the success of the Cuban Revolution in context.
Feel free to ask any questions you want, no worries!
Thanks! I had the chance to read a bit.
So far… Engels Principles of Communism says some sensible things to do if the government is trusted (for example, the concept of abolishing private property, inheritance taxes, etc…), but it is also makes some point that I find concerning. Specifically, the combination of the answers provided to “Q16: Will it be possible to bring about the abolition of private property by peaceful means?” and “Q24: How do communists differ from socialists?” concern me because Q16 suggests violence as a method and Q24 significantly broadens the scope of who is an enemy of the revolution, while still keeping it ambiguous. A call for violent revolution + ambiguity of who is the enemy is a dangerous recipe because it leaves a lot of room for “interpretation” and “nuance” that will probably lead to disagreement between violent factions.
I think of this mixture of call for violence + an ambiguous enemy in the context of what I see sometimes being posted to social media, including Lemmy. I have seen calls for violence against “owners” that often extends to small business owners and landlords, usually without distinguishing between a commercial entity as a ‘landlord’ and a grandma renting out a room. Sometimes I think this is just a figure of speech but sometimes I doubt and consider that these might be actual calls to action. So, then, when I see such a broad brush being used to paint the ‘enemy’ I get the impression that pretty much anyone benefiting in some way from these systems is an enemy if they do not immediately understand and fully embrace the revolution. A revolution, then, seems to ask the revolutionary to be violent against friends and families if living in a developed country. I find it difficult to imagine that a majority within a population would want to go through this process if they fully understand the implication. When a Engles writes about “the majority of the people”, does this count every individual in the population, or only those who are friendly to the revolution?
As I continue I am curios of whether I will find find some robust method to distinguish between the ‘proletariat’ and the ‘petty-bourgeois’, and to find out whether I will keep my head during the revolution. It would be nice to find some ideas on how to achieve the goals without violence. I have also seen that many more modern philosophies are built on top of Marxism-Leninism (like Degrowth), so in any case I am certain I will get a lot of value out of this topic.
I also found that you are running a book club on Das Kapital, I will try to catch up.
Do you know of a community where I can ask questions about this topic?
It’s great to see you reading! One thing I do want to point out, though, Principles of Communism is more of an FAQ than a developed and principled response to each question. It’s helpful for getting terms straight, but can also lead to people like yourself reading more into each line than is likely intended. I’ll respond to 16 and 24.
Re: 16, the question of reform or revolution, and the theory of the State. Revolution, in the Marxist sense, does not mean killing everyone that would oppose you, even the bourgeoisie. Revolution requires overthrowing the State, and replacing it with one that is comprehensively for the workers. It does not mean forming a small band of warriors to go and kill grandma for renting out a house so she can retire, it means guiding the revolution that will redistribute land while providing safety nets that make it so that grandma doesn’t need to be a landlord to survive.
When Communists and Socialists say “violence is necessary,” they mean that never in history has a ruling class given up power without force. The fun thing about the ruling class, though, is that it’s small. It can only rely on the state to do its bidding and fight, it cannot fight by itself. Jeff Bezos is not going to grab a rifle and fight a glorious war. What’s interesting about various Socialist revolutions, like in Russia, frequently the army stands down. The reason for this is that revolution isn’t something you can just do, it happens when the overwhelming majority of the population (total, not just the proletariat, though these are often very similar numbers as the proletariat outnumbers every other class in most nations), and the army frequently stands down in mass.
There are violent and lengthy revolutions, such as the Chinese revolution. This one was a long and bloody fight against colonialism, and then against a nationalist dictatorship. The people, however, supported the Communists, which is why they won. Cuba was an example of a mid-length revolution. There was a revolutionary war, but similar to Russia, the army did not fight very hard as they were in it for money, while the campesinos and beardos were in it for a better world.
There are also dogmatic, anti-Marxist “Marxists,” like the Shining Path in Peru under Gonzalo. They are little more than a band of murderous thugs that think “class struggle” means killing villagers that don’t agree, or randomly assassinating politicians instead of building up a mass movement. These are the people you are referring to as your fear, and they do exist, but are in an incredible minority globally.
I recommend reading Reform or Revolution by Rosa Luxemburg and Lenin’s The State and Revolution for why revolution is necessary. Entirely peaceful methods have been tried, like Allende in Chile, and they get overthrown by the bourgeoisie against the people, along with the US.
Re: question 24. Revolution does not happen without a broad, mass, organized movement. If that movement does not exist, there will be no revolution. When Engels says these reactionary types must be opposed, he means so ideologically, so that when a revolution does happen, the revolution will take a correct character. It does not mean killing everyone that disagrees, it means you must thoroughly debunk and discredit incorrect viewpoints, and if they engage violently (as the SPD did against the KPD in Germany, or some of the reactionary “left” groups in Russia during the Russian Civil War), defend yourself if you must.
As for as distinguishing between Proletarian and Petty Bourgeois, it’s not necessary at the individual level. Marxism is not a moral judgement, but an analysis of how classes behave in society. It doesn’t mean killing the petite bourgeoisie, it means working towards abolishing the foundations of the petite bourgeoisie through collectivization at the degree to which production has developed. Make sense? You’d keep your head, unless you decided to take up arms against a popular revolution and gave the people no other choice. Marxism isn’t about collectivizing through killing the owners, but through siezing the state and weilding its power to gradually fold more production into the public sector. You can’t kill a farm into a collectivized industrial farm, you have to develop out of small ownership.
When people say “kill the landlords” online, they are usually expressing frustration at the parasitic nature of landlordism, they are not announcing that they intend to kill grandma. I really want to stress this, the Marxist goal is not to achieve classless society by killing owners. Rather, the Marxist position is that you can’t achieve classless society that way, as each level of development best coincides with different forms of ownership, and it is highly developed industry that can best be publicly owned and planned.
As for Capital, I actually recommend staying away from it until you get some more of the basics of theory under your belt. You’ll notice its absence from my intro reading list, it’s an advanced text! It’s certainly a critical read, but if you want to get into the economic side, I recommend Wage Labor and Capital and Wages, Price, and Profit. Both combined are very short compared to even a single volume of Capital’s 3. However, I won’t stop you if you’ve decided to dive into the deep end! I just think you’ll understand it better if you are more familiar with Dialectical Materialism and Scientific Socialism first.
Glad you’re reading, feel free to ask more questions! If you want to ask questions, the Marxism comm on Hexbear is a good spot, or Ask Lemmygrad on Grad, or the Socialism and Communism communities on Lemmy.ml.
Yes, it does, very much so. Thanks a lot!
It is good to hear. For what it’s worth, I just went through a bit of an exercise for Cuba trying to look for examples of the types of violence that they committed and also looked into some of the other groups that I associate with the concept of a “violent revolution” (ETA in Spain, IRA in Ireland, different groups in Yugoslavia). What I found is:
The groups that I associate with terrorism tactics are nationalistic, not fighting for socialism (at least not as a main goal).
The Cuban revolutionaries used guerrilla tactics that, from what I can find, did not use terrorism as a tool. Their enemies, including CIA-backed groups, did.
So, that’s points in favor to Cuba.
Good to know! Before the 2016 US election I would rarely choose the literal interpretation when reading statements like this online. When Trump was elected and I realized that people online were not actually being sarcastic and making jokes, I began to take online statements more seriously and literally. I still think there is a high probability that some people who write about violence online mean it literally. That doesn’t necessarily reflect on Marxist-Leninists though, many ideologies/religions can be pushed to extremism, and it is not entirely fair to ask everyone not to use figurative language online.
I am half way through Wage Labor and Capital now. It is very interesting, I think that I will like Marx’s Das Kaptial because I do like dense/analytical. I already have several questions but I will first read more and then see if I can get some help in the communities you mentioned.