Marx

What did Marx believe the three main evils of capitalism were?

Alienation, domination, exploitation

What about capitalism in the modern day?

Arguably the decrease the post industrial era in the west and the increase in service and office jobs have increased processes such as alienation from the product of labour. Fuchs links the occupy movement to Marxist ideas of international solidarity against capitalism. Also points out that Marx's fixation with developing technology and communication somewhat anticipated the dawn of IT. Eagleton argues that the modern media is adversely affected by capitalism too - sensationalisation, controversy and profit is key. Zizeck claims that the 2007 economic crisis generated a renewed interest in Marx as it conformed to his assertion that crises were endemic to capitalism.

So what's all this 'needs and drives' stuff that Marx goes on about?

In Marx's 'Grundrisse', he describes human nature as a 'totality of needs and drives'; throughout early works such as his 1844 Economic and Political Manuscripts through to later ones, he speaks of 'needs', 'drives', 'instincts' etc, and along with eating, drinking and procreation he specifies that work is a fundamental human drive (using raw materials to create products of sustenance).

What is communism? How is it different to socialism?

Communism is public ownership of natural resources, property, the modes of production and the abolition of inheritance. It aims to make individuals more equal. Marx doesn't want people to have to be highly specialised all the time and kinda wants them to enjoy their lives and flourish as individuals. He also wants to redistribute wealth. Socialism differs in that it pertains to just the public ownership of natural resources and property.

What does Terry Eagleton say about it all?

Detectives exist *because* there are criminals, just as poor people exist *because* of the rich. It's not as simple as the two coincidentally coexisting. Parts of communism flawed but capitalist economy is flawed too. Thinks we've given it a really long try and peeps who say 'it will all finally come right' and wealth will eventually be redistributed are bullshitting. He calls the comm mani a 'persuasive piece of political propaganda'.

Talk about domination

Domination is the process of one class ruling and subordinating the other. In this case, Marx refers to the bourgeoisie dominating the proletariat. The bourgeoisie are the proletariat's managers, they own the mode of production and control the means of production. The working class do not have any say regarding their pay, industrial activities or working hours, and the bourgeoisie purposefully set wages just high enough for the working class to survive, but too low to be independent or purchase the products that they produce. Wages get driven down if needed, and there is always a reserve army of labour. So the bourgeoisie essentially own the proletariat. Marx is obsessed with the class struggle 'the history of all hitherto societies is the history of the class struggle'. Thus this concept of one class collectively dominating the other, which is overworked, living in poor conditions and fragmented, is a big deal for him. Also the needs of the capitalist get increasingly refined so they get richer, whilst poor get poorer. It is interesting to think about the way in which domination works in present day. Is it West vs poorer countries with sweatshops such as Bangladesh and China? Is it men vs women?

How did Marx's work change over his career/between works?

Early on, Marx was more philosophy-oriented, being influenced by philosophers such as Hegel and Kant. However, his later works exemplified a transition to political economy, under the influence of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, two pioneers of the discipline. His works tended to target different audiences. For example, Capital was a highly technical economic account of capitalism. Whereas the communist manifesto was very much a 'call to action' of the working class, more hyperbolic and simple.

Talk about exploitation

Exploitation is related to domination in that it is the process of the bourgeoisie abusing the proletariat to generate surplus income and thus, CAPITAL. Marx's labour theory of value posits that a product's market value correlates with the amount of work it took to produce. However, the proletariat work long hours for very little wages, just enough to cover their living costs, and consequently have extremely poor living and working conditions; the capitalist factory owners, however, expropriate the remainder of money for themselves. Workers have few rights. If workers are unhappy with wages or conditions, they are fired and reserve army of labour kicks in - the unemployed.

What else has Max been liable to criticism for?

He state that there is 'like, definitely gonna be a revolution sometime soon, man', but at the same time calls workers to action in the communist manifesto: 'working people of all countries, unite!', which seems kinda weird. Like, that's not really just letting it happen. Furthermore, Sowell criticised the popularity of Marx on the basis that his 'empirical contradictions' and 'logical refutations' were overlook because of the comprehensive, dramatic, fascinating, intellectually exhilarating and morally superior nature of his argument, creating the illusion of making 'the parts fall into place'. He argued that individuals felt inclined to agree with Marx to avoid appearing morally corrupt.

What are the foundations of Marxist philosophy?

Historical materialism. Marx adopted this approach under the influence of Hegel's dialectical approach to idealism. However, Marx felt that history could more accurately be analysed through the material, rather than through ideas. Historical materialism posits that history can be analysed through study of materials, produce, and thus, the modes of production relating to each era. He believed that the economy thus influenced the ideological 'superstructure' in society, which consisted of culture, religion and politics.

Why didn't Marx like capitalist society's ideology?

Marx didn't understand why we had to specialise so much. Why do we insist that everyone is an expert in one thing instead of doing many, in 'German Ideology' he posits that man should be able to 'hunt in the morning, to fish in the afternoon, to rear cattle in the evening and to criticise after dinner', without ever being a huntsman, a fisherman, a herder or a critic. He also got really wound up by the way we stigmatised the unemployed even though machines meant that there really weren't enough jobs. There was a strange paradox of many people being unemployed and many people being overworked because it was more economically efficient. He wanted leisure and unemployment to be seen as positive things, as signs that our means of production were prosperous. He also hated the way that people were encouraged to be competitive, aggressively ambitious and money seeking. People started to see things and people to be just as worthy as the amount of money that they could generate. Additionally, originality and luxury cannot really coexist with capitalism because everything is mass produced for as cheap as possible.

How did Marx think capitalism would end?

Marx held the teleological view (under the influence of Hegel) that history was moving through different dominant economic systems and modes of production that were constantly being overthrown and replaced with superior ones. He simply stated that capitalism would inevitably collapse to be replaced by communism, without specifying how or under what circumstances. This statement has been criticised by Karl Popper as not providing any substantial basis on which his claims can be refuted, as he presented no clear scientific hypothesis. Marx simply stated that he didn't want to write "recipes for the cookshops of the future". He also stated that there would be a brief period of proletariat dictatorship after the collapse of capitalism to combat existing elements of the capitalist economy.

What's commodity fetishism?

Marx saw that commodity fetishism was the tendency for inhabitants of capitalist economies to view institutions, practices and individuals in terms of how much capital they could generate. He gives the example of marriage, arguing that individuals enter into marriage because they are economically efficient.

Talk about alienation

There are four different types of alienation: 1) Alienation from nature - technological advances and industrialisation means that humans are not connected to the natural world. Marx states in Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts that each generation is "standing on the shoulders of the last." Jonathan Woolf elaborates on this concept talking about how we interact with things such as plumbing every day without questioning how they were made etc, as well as designated 'nature sections' in parks. Fuchs argues that the ecological crisis today is an extreme version of humans' alienation from nature. 2) Alienation from the products of one's labour - the worker puts much time and effort into products, but does not own, or often even see, the product of their labour, which gets appropriated by the capitalist and sold into the outside world, and thus the worker becomes more and more alienated from their products as time goes on. They also can't afford to buy the shit they manufacture. 3) Alienation from man to man - workers grow hostile towards both the capitalist and the entire system of capitalist production. 4) Alienation from the process of production - workers are not working spontaneously and are not driven by creativity, but instead perform repetitive and mundane tasks, not by choice, but because they are forced by the capitalist as a means of sustenance. 5) Alienation from 'species-being' - Marx believes that individuals' species being is the essence of man, which is fulfilled by the drive to produce, turning inorganic matter into meaningful products. However, the highly specialised division of labour prevents this. The more that labour is divided, the more that individuals become alienated.