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{{short description|Economic and sociopolitical worldview}}
{{about||the political ideology commonly associated with ]|Marxism-Leninism}}
{{for|the political ideology commonly associated with states governed by communist parties|Marxism–Leninism}}
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{{Marxism|expanded=all}}
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{{Use British (Oxford) English|date=January 2014}}
{{Use Oxford spelling|date=January 2014}}
'''Marxism''' is a worldview and method of societal analysis that focuses on ] relations and societal conflict, that uses a ], and a ]al view of social transformation. Marxist methodology uses ] and ] inquiry and applies that to the critique and analysis of the development of ] and the role of ] in systemic economic change.
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2020}}
], after whom Marxism is named]]
{{Marxism sidebar}}


'''Marxism''' is a ] and method of ] analysis. It uses a ] and ] interpretation of historical development,{{sfn|Krupavičius|2011|pp=314–315}} better known as ], to analyse ] relations, ], and ]. Marxism originates with the works of 19th-century German philosophers ] and ]. Marxism has developed over time into various branches and ], and as a result, there is no single, definitive "]".<ref name="Wolff and Resnick, 1987">{{cite book |last1=Wolff |first1=Richard |author1-link=Richard D. Wolff |last2=Resnick |first2=Stephen |author2-link=Stephen Resnick |url=https://archive.org/details/economicsmarxian00wolf_0 |title=Economics: Marxian versus Neoclassical |year=1987 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0801834806 |page= |quote=The German Marxists extended the theory to groups and issues Marx had barely touched. Marxian analyses of the legal system, of the social role of women, of foreign trade, of international rivalries among capitalist nations, and the role of parliamentary democracy in the transition to socialism drew animated debates&nbsp;... Marxian theory (singular) gave way to Marxian theories (plural). |url-access=registration}}</ref> Marxism has had a profound effect in shaping the modern world, with various ] and ] political movements taking inspiration from it in varying local contexts.<ref>{{cite web |title=Left-wing / Right-wing |url=https://www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/l/e.htm |access-date=16 July 2022 |website=] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220716014016/https://www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/l/e.htm |archive-date=16 July 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Radical left |url=https://www.dictionary.com/browse/radical-left |access-date=16 July 2022 |website=] |quote=Radical left is a term that refers collectively to people who hold left-wing political views that are considered extreme, such as supporting or working to establish communism, Marxism, Maoism, socialism, anarchism, or other forms of anticapitalism. The radical left is sometimes called the far left.}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=March |first=Luke |date=2009 |title=Contemporary Far Left Parties in Europe: From Marxism to the Mainstream? |url=https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/ipg/ipg-2009-1/10_a_march_us.pdf |journal=IPG (Internationale Politik und Gesellschaft) |volume=1 |pages=126–143 |via=]}}</ref>
In the mid-to-late 19th century, the ] of Marxism were inspired by two ]: ] and ]. Marxist analyses and methodologies have influenced multiple political ideologies and social movements. Marxism encompasses an ], a ], a ], and a ] view of social change.<ref></ref>


In addition to the various schools of thought, which emphasise or modify elements of ], several Marxian concepts have been incorporated into an array of ]. This has led to widely varying conclusions.<ref>{{cite book |last=O'Hara |first=Phillip |title=Encyclopedia of Political Economy, Volume 2 |publisher=] |year=2003 |isbn=978-0415241878 |page=107 |quote=Marxist political economists differ over their definitions of capitalism, socialism and communism. These differences are so fundamental, the arguments among differently persuaded Marxist political economists have sometimes been as intense as their oppositions to political economies that celebrate capitalism.}}</ref> Alongside Marx's ], the defining characteristics of Marxism have often been described using the terms "]" and "historical materialism", though these terms were coined after Marx's death and their tenets have been challenged by some self-described Marxists.<ref>{{cite book |first1=Lucia |last1=Pradella |author1-link=Lucia Pradella |chapter=Foundation: Karl Marx (1818–83) |editor1-first=Alex |editor1-last=Callinicos |editor1-link=Alex Callinicos |editor2-first=Stathis |editor2-last=Kouvelakis |editor2-link=Stathis Kouvelakis |editor3-first=Lucia |editor3-last=Pradella |editor3-link=Lucia Pradella |date=2021 |title=Routledge Handbook of Marxism and Post-Marxism |url=https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Handbook-of-Marxism-and-Post-Marxism/Callinicos-Kouvelakis-Pradella/p/book/9780367653743 |access-date=19 April 2023 |publisher=] & ] |isbn=9781351370011 |pages=25–26}}</ref>
There is no single definitive Marxist theory; Marxist analysis has been applied to diverse subjects and has been misconceived and modified during the course of its development, resulting in numerous and sometimes contradictory theories that fall under the rubric of Marxism or Marxian analysis.<ref>{{cite book |last= Wolff and Resnick|first= Richard and Stephen |title= Economics: Marxian versus Neoclassical |publisher=The Johns Hopkins University Press|date=August 1987|isbn= 0-8018-3480-5|page = 130|quote= Marxian theory (singular) gave way to Marxian theories (plural).}}</ref>


As a school of thought, Marxism has had a profound effect on society and global academia. To date, it has influenced many fields, including ],<ref>{{cite journal |last=O'Laughlin |first=Bridget |title=Marxist Approaches in Anthropology |journal=] |date=October 1975 |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=341–370 |doi=10.1146/annurev.an.04.100175.002013 |s2cid=2730688 |issn=0084-6570}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Roseberry |first=William |title=Marx and Anthropology |journal=] |date=21 October 1997 |volume=26 |issue=1 |pages=25–46 |doi=10.1146/annurev.anthro.26.1.25}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite book |title=A History of Archaeological Thought |edition=2nd |last=Trigger |first=Bruce G. |author-link=Bruce G. Trigger |publisher=] |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-521-60049-1 |location=New York |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SuoekuMtIIsC |doi=10.1017/CBO9780511813016 |page=337}}</ref> ], ],<ref>{{cite book |title=Criminological Theory: The Essentials |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XPA44ThcnJkC |publisher=] |date=6 April 2011 |isbn=9781412992343 |first=Stephen G. |last=Tibbetts}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite book |last=Dworkin |first=Dennis |author-link=Dennis Dworkin |date=1997 |title=Cultural Marxism in Post-War Britain: History, the New Left, and the Origins of Cultural Studies |location=Durham |publisher=]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hartley |first1=John |chapter=Culture from Arnold to Schwarzenegger: Imperial Literacy to Pop Culture (destination democracy?) |title=A Short History of Cultural Studies |date=2003 |publisher=] |location=London |pages=31–57}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite news |last=Sperber |first=Jonathan |author-link=Jonathan Sperber |date=16 May 2013 |title=Is Marx still relevant? |language=en-GB |work=] |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/16/karl-marx-ideas-resonate-today |access-date=1 October 2023 |issn=0261-3077 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211208211516/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/16/karl-marx-ideas-resonate-today |archive-date=8 December 2021}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite book |last1=Malott |first1=Curry |last2=Ford |first2=Derek |title=Marx, capital, and education: towards a critical pedagogy of becoming |date=2015 |publisher=Peter Lang |isbn=978-1-4539-1602-5 |oclc=913956545}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> ], ],<ref>{{cite book |editor-first=Mike |editor-last=Wayne |title=Understanding Film: Marxist Perspectives |publisher=] |date=2005 |page=24}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite book |last=Mitchell |first=Don |title=Mean streets: homelessness, public space, and the limits of capital |publisher=University of Georgia Press |date=2020 |isbn=978-0-8203-5691-4 |oclc=1151767935}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> ], ],<ref>{{cite book |first=Terry |last=Eagleton |author-link=Terry Eagleton |title=Marxism and Literary Criticism |location=Berkeley |publisher=] |date=1976}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite journal |last=Becker |first=Samuel L. |title=Marxist approaches to media studies: The British experience |journal=] |date=18 May 2009 |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=66–80 |doi=10.1080/15295038409360014}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Alvarado |first1=Manuel |author1-link=Manuel Alvarado |last2=Gutch |first2=Robin |last3=Wollen |first3=Tana |date=1987 |title=Learning the Media: Introduction to Media Teaching |publisher=] |pages=62, 76}}</ref> ], ], ], ],<ref name="Pavón-Cuéllar 2017">{{cite book |last=Pavón-Cuéllar |first=David |author-link=:es:David Pavón-Cuéllar |year=2017 |chapter=Marxism, Psychoanalysis, and Critique of Psychology |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rCQlDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA125 |title=Marxism and Psychoanalysis: In or Against Psychology? |location=] and ] |publisher=] |edition=1st |series=Concepts for Critical Psychology |pages=113–149 |isbn=9781138916586 |lccn=2016032101}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sheehan |first=Helena |title=Marxism and Science Studies: A Sweep through the Decades |journal=] |date=July 2007 |volume=21 |issue=2 |pages=197–210 |doi=10.1080/02698590701498126 |s2cid=143737257 |url=http://doras.dcu.ie/508/ |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=24 February 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210224101154/http://doras.dcu.ie/508/ |url-status=live}}</ref> ],<ref name="Johnson-2000"/> ], and ].
Marxism builds on a materialist understanding of societal development, taking as its starting point the necessary economic activities required by human society to provide for its material needs. The form of economic organization or ] is understood to be the basis from which the majority of other social phenomena&nbsp;– including ], political and legal systems, morality and ideology&nbsp;– arise (or at the least by which they are directly influenced). These social relations form the ], for which the economic system forms the base. As the ] (most notably technology) improve, existing forms of social organization become inefficient and stifle further progress. These inefficiencies manifest themselves as social contradictions in the form of ].<ref name="ComparingEconomic">''Comparing Economic Systems in the Twenty-First Century'', 2003, by Gregory and Stuart. P.62, ''Marx's Theory of Change''. ISBN 0-618-26181-8.</ref>


== Overview ==
According to Marxist analysis, class conflict within capitalism arises due to intensifying contradictions between highly productive mechanized and ] performed by the ], and private ownership and private appropriation of the ] in the form of ] (profit) by a small minority of private owners called the ]. As the contradiction becomes apparent to the proletariat, social unrest between the two antagonistic classes intensifies, culminating in a ]. The eventual long-term outcome of this revolution would be the establishment of ] – a socioeconomic system based on cooperative ownership of the means of production, ], and ]. Karl Marx hypothesized that, as the productive forces and technology continued to advance, socialism would eventually give way to a ] stage of social development. Communism would be a classless, stateless, humane society erected on ] and the principle of "]s".
Marxism seeks to explain ] within any given society by analysing the material conditions and ] required to fulfill human material needs. It assumes that the form of economic organisation, or ], influences all other social phenomena, including broader social relations, political institutions, legal systems, cultural systems, aesthetics and ideologies. These social relations and the economic system form a ]. As ] (i.e. ]) improve, existing forms of organising production become obsolete and hinder further progress. ] wrote: "At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or—this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms—with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of ]."<ref name="Critique of Political Economy">{{cite book |title=] |first=Karl |last=Marx |author-link=Karl Marx |date=1859 |chapter=Introduction}}</ref>


These inefficiencies manifest themselves as social contradictions in society which are, in turn, fought out at the level of ].<ref name="ComparingEconomic">{{cite book |title=Comparing Economic Systems in the Twenty-First Century |date=2003 |first1=Paul R. |last1=Gregory |first2=Robert C. |last2=Stuart |pages=62 |chapter=Marx's Theory of Change |publisher=] Publishing |isbn=0618261818}}</ref> Under the ], this struggle materialises between the minority who own the ] (the ]) and the vast majority of the population who produce goods and services (the ]).<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/10/karl-marx-yesterday-and-today |title=Karl Marx, Yesterday and Today |first=Louis |last=Menand |author-link=Louis Menand |magazine=] |date=3 October 2016 |access-date=20 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210704201500/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/10/karl-marx-yesterday-and-today |archive-date=4 July 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref> Starting with the conjectural premise that ] occurs due to the struggle between different ] within society who contradict one another,<ref>{{cite journal |title=Marx's Theory of Classes: Science and Ideology |first=Edward |last=Andrew |journal=] |volume=8 |number=3 |date=September 1975 |pages=454–466 |publisher=Canadian Political Science Association |doi=10.1017/S0008423900046084 |jstor=3231070 |s2cid=154040628}}</ref> a Marxist would conclude that ] exploits and oppresses the proletariat; therefore, capitalism will inevitably lead to a ].<ref>{{cite journal |title=Historical Inevitability and Human Agency in Marxism |first1=G. A. |last1=Cohen |author1-link=G. A. Cohen |first2=R. |last2=Veryard |first3=D. H. |last3=Mellor |author3-link=Hugh Mellor |first4=A. G. M. |last4=Last |first5=Randolph |last5=Quirk |author5-link=Randolph Quirk |first6=John |last6=Mason |journal=Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences |volume=07 |number=1832 |date=8 September 1986 |pages=65–87 |publisher=] |jstor=2397783}}</ref> In a ] society, ]—as the means of production—would be replaced by ] ownership.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Karl Marx on the Individual and the Conditions for His Freedom and Development |last=Simirnov |first=G. |journal=The Marxist |volume=3 |number=3–4 |date=July–December 1985 |url=https://www.cpim.org/marxist/198504_marxist_marxism&indv_simirnov.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210210184046/https://www.cpim.org/marxist/198504_marxist_marxism&indv_simirnov.htm |archive-date=10 February 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |chapter=Marx's Vision of Sustainable Human Development |first=Paul |last=Burkett |title=Karl Marx |editor1-first=Bertell |editor1-last=Ollman |editor2-first=Kevin B. |editor2-last=Anderson |edition=1st |date=2012 |publisher=] |location=London |isbn=9781315251196}}</ref> A ] would not base production on the creation of private profits but on the criteria of satisfying human needs—that is, ]. ] explained that "the capitalist mode of appropriation, in which the product enslaves first the producer, and then the appropriator, is replaced by the mode of appropriation of the products that is based upon the nature of the modern means of production; upon the one hand, direct social appropriation, as means to the maintenance and extension of production—on the other, direct individual appropriation, as means of subsistence and of enjoyment."<ref name="Engels-3"/>
Marxism has developed into different branches and schools of thought. Different schools place a greater emphasis on certain aspects of ] while de-emphasizing or rejecting other aspects of Marxism, sometimes combining Marxist analysis with non-Marxian concepts. Some variants of Marxism primarily focus on one aspect of Marxism as the determining force in social development – such as the mode of production, class, power-relationships or property ownership – while arguing other aspects are less important or current research makes them irrelevant. Despite sharing similar premises, different schools of Marxism might reach contradictory conclusions from each other.<ref>{{cite book |last= O'Hara|first= Phillip |title= Encyclopedia of Political Economy, Volume 2 |publisher= ]|date=September 2003|isbn= 0-415-24187-1|page = 107|quote=


] and its proponents view capitalism as ] and incapable of improving the population's ] due to its need to compensate for the ] by cutting employees' wages and ] while pursuing military aggression. The ] would succeed ] as humanity's ] through ] by workers. According to Marxian ], socialism is not an inevitability but an economic necessity.<ref>{{cite book |title=] |first=Karl |last=Marx |author-link=Karl Marx |quote=Men make their own history. |date=1852}}</ref>
Marxist political economists differ over their definitions of capitalism, socialism and communism. These differences are so fundamental, the arguments among differently persuaded Marxist political economists have sometimes been as intense as their oppositions to political economies that celebrate capitalism.}}</ref> For instance, different Marxian economists have contradictory explanations of economic ] and different predictions for the outcome of such crises. Furthermore, different variants of Marxism apply Marxist analysis to study different aspects of society (e.g. ], ], or ]).<ref>{{cite book |last= Wolff and Resnick|first= Richard and Stephen |title= Economics: Marxian versus Neoclassical |publisher=The Johns Hopkins University Press|date=August 1987|isbn= 0-8018-3480-5|page = 130|quote= The German Marxists extended the theory to groups and issues Marx had barely touched. Marxian analyses of the legal system, of the social role of women, of foreign trade, of international rivalries among capitalist nations, and the role of parliamentary democracy in the transition to socialism drew animated debates&nbsp;... Marxian theory (singular) gave way to Marxian theories (plural).}}</ref>


=== Etymology ===
These theoretical differences have led various socialist and communist parties and political movements to embrace different political strategies for attaining socialism and advocate different programs and policies from each other. One example of this is the division between revolutionary socialists and ] that emerged in the ] (SPD) during the early 20th century.
The term ''Marxism'' was popularised by ], who considered himself an '']'' during the dispute between Marx's orthodox and '']'' followers.<ref>{{harvnb|Haupt|2010|p=18–19}}; {{harvnb|Kołakowski|2005|p=}}; {{harvnb|Lichtheim|2015|pp=233, 234–235}}</ref> Kautsky's revisionist rival ] also later adopted the term.{{sfn|Haupt|2010|p=18–19}}


Engels did not support using ''Marxism'' to describe either Marx's or his views.{{sfn|Haupt|2010|p=12}} He claimed that the term was being abusively used as a rhetorical ] by those attempting to cast themselves as genuine followers of Marx while casting others in different terms, such as '']''.{{sfn|Haupt|2010|p=12}} In 1882, Engels claimed that Marx had criticised self-proclaimed Marxist ] by saying that if Lafargue's views were considered Marxist, then "one thing is certain and that is that I am not a Marxist."{{sfn|Haupt|2010|p=12}}
] and of society have been adopted by academics in the disciplines of ] and ],<ref>Bridget O'Laughlin (1975) ''Marxist Approaches in Anthropology'' Annual Review of Anthropology Vol. 4: pp. 341–70 (October 1975) {{doi|10.1146/annurev.an.04.100175.002013}}.<br />William Roseberry (1997) ''Marx and Anthropology'' Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 26: pp. 25–46 (October 1997) {{doi|10.1146/annurev.anthro.26.1.25}}</ref>
],<ref>S. L. Becker (1984) "Marxist Approaches to Media Studies: The British Experience", Critical Studies in Mass Communication, 1(1): pp. 66–80.</ref> ], ], ], ], ] and ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and ].<ref>See ], Robin Gutch, and Tana Wollen (1987) ''Learning the Media: Introduction to Media Teaching'', Palgrave Macmillan.</ref>


=== Historical materialism ===
==Overview==
]]]The Marxian analysis begins with an analysis of material conditions, taking at its starting point the necessary economic activities required by human society to provide for its material needs. The form of economic organization, or ], is understood to be the basis from which the majority of other social phenomena&nbsp;– including social relations, political and legal systems, morality and ideology&nbsp;– arise (or at the least by which they are directly influenced). These social relations base the economic system and the economic system forms the ]. As the ], most notably ], improve, existing forms of social organization become inefficient and stifle further progress. As ] observed: "At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or_ this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution''."<ref>A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, Introduction 1859</ref>
These inefficiencies manifest themselves as social contradictions in society in the form of ]. Under the ], this struggle materializes between the minority (the ]) who own the ], and the vast majority of the population (the ]) who produce goods and services. Taking the idea that ] occurs because of the struggle between different ] within society who are under contradiction against each other, leads the Marxist analysis to the conclusion that ] exploits and oppresses the proletariat, which leads to a ].

Capitalism (according to Marxist theory) can no longer sustain the living standards of the population due to its need to compensate for ] by driving down wages, cutting social benefits and pursuing military aggression. The ] system would succeed capitalism as humanity's mode of production through workers' ]. According to Marxism, especially arising from ], ] is a historical necessity (but not an inevitability).<ref>Free will, non-predestination and non-determinism are emphasized in Marx's famous quote "Men make their own history&nbsp;..." The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, Karl Marx 1852.</ref>

In a socialist society ] in the ] would be superseded by co-operative ownership. A socialist economy would not base production on the creation of private profits, but would instead base production and economic activity on the criteria of satisfying human needs – that is, ]. As Engels observed: "Then the capitalist mode of appropriation in which the product enslaves first the producer, and then appropriator, is replaced by the mode of appropriation of the product that is based upon the nature of the modern means of production; upon the one hand, direct social appropriation, as means to the maintenance and extension of production_ on the other, direct individual appropriation, as means of subsistence and of enjoyment."'<ref>Socialism, Utopian and Scientific, Chapter three 1882</ref>

==Concepts==

===Historical Materialism===
{{main|Historical materialism}} {{main|Historical materialism}}
{{further|Marxist historiography|Marx's theory of history}}
{{see also|Historical determinism|Historicism|Historiography|People's history|Philosophy of history}}
{{quote box|quote=The discovery of the materialist conception of history, or rather, the consistent continuation and extension of materialism into the domain of social phenomenon, removed two chief defects of earlier historical theories. In the first place, they at best examined only the ideological motives of the historical activity of human beings, without grasping the objective laws governing the development of the system of social relations. ... in the second place, the earlier theories did not cover the activities of the ''masses'' of the population, whereas historical materialism made it possible for the first time to study with scientific accuracy the social conditions of the life of the masses and the changes in these conditions.|source=— Russian Marxist theoretician and revolutionary ], 1913{{sfn|Lenin|1967|p=15}}|align=right|width=246px|bgcolor=#c6dbf7}}
{{blockquote|text=Society does not consist of individuals, but expresses the sum of interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand.|sign=], {{lang|de|]}}, 1858<ref>{{cite book |last=Marx |first=Karl |author-link=Karl Marx |orig-date=1858 |date=1993 |title=] |translator-first=M. |translator-last=Nicolaus |publisher=] |isbn=0140445757 |page=265}}</ref>}}
Marxism uses a ] methodology, referred to by Marx and ] as the materialist conception of history and later better known as historical materialism, to analyse the underlying causes of societal development and change from the perspective of the collective ways in which humans make their living.{{sfn|Evans|1975|p=53}}{{sfn|Johnston|2015|p=4}} Marx's account of the theory is in '']'' (1845)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Marx |first1=Karl |author1-link=Karl Marx |last2=Engels |first2=Friedrich |author2-link=Friedrich Engels |date=1932 |orig-date=1845 |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/11/russia.htm |chapter=The German Ideology |title=Marx/Engels Collected Works |volume=5 |location=Moscow |publisher=] |access-date=11 July 2020 |via=] |archive-date=29 September 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200929180136/https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/11/russia.htm/ |url-status=live}}</ref> and the preface '']'' (1859).<ref name="Critique of Political Economy"/> All constituent features of a society (]es, political pyramid and ]) are assumed to stem from economic activity, forming what is considered the ].<ref>{{cite journal |first=Pawel |last=Zaleski |title=Tocqueville on Civilian Society. A Romantic Vision of the Dichotomic Structure of Social Reality |journal=Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte |publisher=Felix Meiner Verlag GmbH |volume=50 |date=2008 |pages=260–266 |jstor=24360940}}</ref>{{sfn|Johnston|2015|p=4}} The base and superstructure metaphor describes the totality of social relations by which humans produce and re-produce their social existence. According to Marx, the "sum total of the forces of production accessible to men determines the condition of society" and forms a society's economic base.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |editor1-last=Chambre |editor1-first=Henri |editor2-last=McLellan |editor2-first=David T. |editor2-link=David McLellan (political scientist) |date=2020 |orig-date=1998 |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Marxism#ref35144 |title=Historical materialism |encyclopedia=] |access-date=11 July 2020 |archive-date=6 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200706145958/https://www.britannica.com/topic/Marxism#ref35144 |url-status=live}}</ref>


The base includes the material ] such as the ], ] and ], i.e. the social and political arrangements that regulate production and distribution. From this base rises a superstructure of legal and political "forms of ]" that derive from the economic base that conditions both the superstructure and the ] of a society. Conflicts between the development of material productive forces and the relations of production provoke ]s, whereby changes to the economic base lead to the superstructure's ].<ref name="Critique of Political Economy"/><ref>{{cite book |first=Friedrich |last=Engels |author-link=Friedrich Engels |orig-date=1877 |date=1947 |chapter-url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/introduction.htm |chapter=Introduction |title=] |location=Moscow |publisher=] |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=24 May 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130524035517/http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/introduction.htm |url-status=live}}</ref>
{{Quote box|width=246px|bgcolor=#c6dbf7|align=right|quote="The discovery of the materialist conception of history, or rather, the consistent continuation and extension of materialism into the domain of social phenomenon, removed two chief defects of earlier historical theories. In the first place, they at best examined only the ideological motives of the historical activity of human beings, without grasping the objective laws governing the development of the system of social relations&nbsp;... in the second place, the earlier theories did not cover the activities of the ''masses'' of the population, whereas historical materialism made it possible for the first time to study with the accuracy of the ] the social conditions of the life of the masses and the changes in these conditions."|source=Russian Marxist theoretician and revolutionary ], 1913.<ref>]. p. 15.</ref>}}
{{quote
|text ="Society does not consist of individuals, but expresses the sum of interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand."|sign =&nbsp;], '']'', 1858<ref>''Grundrisse: Foundations of the Critique of Political Economy, by Karl Marx & Martin Nicolaus, ''Penguin Classics'', 1993, ISBN 0-14-044575-7, pg 265</ref>}}


This relationship is ] in that the base initially gives rise to the superstructure and remains the foundation of a form of ]. Those newly formed social organisations can then act again upon both parts of the base and superstructure so that rather than being static, the relationship is ], expressed and driven by conflicts and contradictions. Engels clarified: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. ] and ], ] and ], ] and ], ]-master and ], in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Marx |first1=Karl |author1-link=Karl Marx |last2=Engels |first2=Friedrich |author2-link=Friedrich Engels |orig-date=1847 |date=1888 |chapter-url=http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/61/pg61-images.html |chapter=Bourgeoisie and Proletariat |title=] |editor-last=Engels |editor-first=Friedrich |editor-link=Friedrich Engels |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=13 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220413062025/https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/61/pg61-images.html |url-status=live}}</ref>
The historical materialist theory of history<ref>Evans, p. 53; Marx's account of the theory is the Preface to '']'' (1859). .
Another exposition of the theory is in ''The German Ideology''. It, too, is available online from .
</ref> dialectically analyses the underlying causes of societal development and change in the collective ways humans make their living. All constituent features of a society (social classes, political pyramid, ideologies) stem from economic activity, an idea often conveyed with the metaphor of the ].


Marx considered recurring class conflicts as the driving force of human history as such conflicts have manifested as distinct ] stages of development in ]. Accordingly, Marx designated human history as encompassing four stages of development in relations of production:
The base and superstructure metaphor explains that the totality of social relations in and by which humans product and re-product their social existence, forms a society's economic ''base''. From this base rises a ''superstructure'' of political and legal institutions, i.e., ]. The base corresponds to the social consciousness (politics, religion, philosophy, etc.), and it conditions the superstructure and the dominant ideology. A conflict between the development of material productive forces and the relations of production provokes social revolutions, thus, the resultant changes to the economic base will lead to the transformation of the superstructure.<ref>See '']'' (1859), , Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1977, with some notes by R. Rojas,
# ]: cooperative ] societies.
and Engels: '']'' (1877), Introduction
# ]: development of tribal to ] in which ] is born.
</ref> This relationship is reflexive; At first the base gives rise to the superstructure and remains the foundation of a form of social organization. Hence, that formed social organization can act again upon both parts of the base and superstructure, whose relationship is not unilinear but ], namely a relationship driven by conflicts and contradictions. As ] clarified: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes."'<ref>Communist manifesto, chapter one 1847</ref>
# ]: aristocrats are the ], while ]s evolve into the ].
# ]: capitalists are the ruling class who create and employ the ].


While historical materialism has been referred to as a materialist theory of history, Marx did not claim to have produced a master key to history and that the materialist conception of history is not "an historico-philosophic theory of the {{lang|fr|marche générale}}, imposed by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it finds itself."<ref>{{citation |last=Weber |first=Cameron |date=January 2023 |title=Did Karl Marx's "Turn" the Original Social Theory of Class Struggle? |url=https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/115897/1/MPRA_paper_115897.pdf |archive-url= |archive-date=}}</ref> In a letter to the editor of the Russian newspaper paper {{lang|ru-latn|Otechestvennyje Zapiski}} (1877),<ref>{{cite book |last1=Marx |first1=Karl |author1-link=Karl Marx |last2=Engels |first2=Friedrich |author2-link=Friedrich Engels |date=1968 |orig-date=1877 |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/11/russia.htm |chapter=Letter from Marx to Editor of the Otecestvenniye Zapisky |title=Marx and Engels Correspondence |location=New York |publisher=International Publishers |access-date=11 July 2020 |via=] |archive-date=29 September 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200929180136/https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/11/russia.htm/ |url-status=live}}</ref> he explained that his ideas were based upon a concrete study of the actual conditions in Europe.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Wittfogel |first=Karl A. |date=July 1960 |title=The Marxist View of Russian Society and Revolution |journal=] |location=Cambridge |publisher=] |volume=12 |issue=4 |pages=487–508 |doi=10.2307/2009334 |jstor=2009334 |s2cid=155515389}}</ref>
Marx considered these socio-economic conflicts as the driving force of human history since these recurring conflicts have manifested themselves as distinct transitional stages of development in Western Europe. Accordingly Marx designates human history as encompassing four stages of development in relations of production.<ref>Marx does not claim to have produced a master-key to history. Historical materialism is not "an historico-philosophic theory of the ''marche generale'', imposed by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it finds itself", K. Marx, Letter to editor of the Russian newspaper paper ''Otetchestvennye Zapiskym'', 1877. He explains that his ideas are based upon a concrete study of the actual conditions in Europe.</ref>


=== Criticism of capitalism ===
# '']:'' as in co-operative tribal societies.
{{further|Anti-capitalism|Criticism of capitalism}}
# ''] Society:'' a development of tribal to city-state; aristocracy is born.
]" cartoon made by the ] in 1911 ] and ].]]
# '']:'' aristocrats are the ruling class; merchants evolve into capitalists.
# '']:'' capitalists are the ruling class, who create and employ the proletariat.


According to the Marxist theoretician and revolutionary socialist Vladimir Lenin, "the principal content of Marxism" was "Marx's economic doctrine."{{sfn|Lenin|1967|p=7}} Marx demonstrated how the capitalist ] and their economists were promoting what he saw as the lie that "the interests of the capitalist and of the worker are ... one and the same." He believed that they did this by purporting the concept that "the fastest possible growth of productive ]" was best for wealthy capitalists and workers because it provided them with employment.{{sfn|Marx|1849}}
===Criticism of capitalism===
{{quote|"We are, in Marx's terms, ‘an ensemble of social relations' and we live our lives at the core of the intersection of a number of unequal social relations based on hierarchically interrelated structures which, together, define the historical specificity of the capitalist modes of production and reproduction and underlay their observable manifestations."|Martha E. Gimenez, ''Marxism and Class, Gender and Race: Rethinking the Trilogy''<ref>Marxism and Class, Gender and Race: Rethinking the Trilogy, by Martha E. Gimenez, Published (2001) in ''Race, Gender and Class'', Vol. 8, No. 2, pp. 23–33.</ref>}}


] is a matter of ]—the amount of labour performed beyond what is received in goods.<ref name="Holmstrom 1977">{{cite journal |last=Holmstrom |first=Nancy |date=June 1977 |title=Exploitation |journal=] |volume=7 |number=2 |pages=353–369 |doi=10.1080/00455091.1977.10717024 |jstor=40230696}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Marx |first=Karl |author-link=Karl Marx |title=] |publisher=] |date=1976 |page=647}}</ref> Exploitation has been a ] feature of every ] and is one of the principal features distinguishing the social classes.{{sfn|Callinicos|2010|pp=98–99}}{{sfn|Johnston|2015|p=5}} The power of one social class to control the ] enables its exploitation of other classes.{{sfn|Callinicos|2010|pp=100–103}} Under capitalism, the ] is the operative concern, whereby the ] of a ] equals the socially necessary labour time required to produce it. Under such conditions, ]—the difference between the value produced and the value received by a labourer—is synonymous with ''surplus labour,'' and capitalist exploitation is thus realised as deriving surplus value from the worker.<ref name="Holmstrom 1977"/>{{sfn|Callinicos|2010|pp=97–100}}
According to the Marxist theoretician and ] ], "the principal content of Marxism" was "Marx's economic doctrine".<ref>]. p. 07.</ref> Marx believed that the capitalist bourgeois and their economists were promoting what he saw as the lie that "The interests of the capitalist and those of the worker are&nbsp;... one and the same"; he believed that they did this by purporting the concept that "the fastest possible growth of productive ]" was best not only for the wealthy capitalists but also for the workers because it provided them with employment.<ref>].</ref>


In ], exploitation of the worker was achieved via physical ]. Under the capitalist mode of production, workers do not own the means of production and must "voluntarily" enter into an exploitative work relationship with a capitalist to earn the necessities of life. The worker's entry into such employment is voluntary because they choose which capitalist to work for. However, the worker must work or starve. Thus, exploitation is inevitable, and the voluntary nature of a worker participating in a capitalist society is illusory; it is production, not circulation, that causes exploitation. Marx emphasised that capitalism ''per se'' does not cheat the worker.<ref>{{cite book |author-link=Allen W. Wood |last=Wood |first=Allen W. |date=2004 |title=Karl Marx |location=New York |publisher=] |isbn=9780415316989}} {{page needed|date=June 2024}}</ref>
Exploitation is a matter of ]&nbsp;– the amount of labour one performs beyond what one receives in goods. Exploitation has been a socio-economic feature of every class society, and is one of the principal features distinguishing the social classes. The power of one social class to control the ] enables its exploitation of the other classes.


] ({{langx|de|Entfremdung}}) is the estrangement of people from their humanity and a systematic result of capitalism. Under capitalism, the fruits of production belong to employers, who expropriate the surplus created by others and generate alienated labourers. In Marx's view, alienation is an objective characterisation of the worker's situation in capitalism—his or her self-awareness of this condition is not prerequisite.<ref>"Alienation". ''A Dictionary of Sociology''.</ref>{{Full citation needed|date=June 2024}}
In capitalism, the ] is the operative concern; the ] of a ] equals the socially necessary labour time required to produce it. Under that condition, ] (the difference between the value produced and the value received by a labourer) is synonymous with the term "surplus labour"; thus, capitalist exploitation is realised as deriving surplus value from the worker.


In addition to criticism, Marx has also praised some of the results of capitalism stating that it "has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together"<ref name="The Communist Manifesto"/> and that it "has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal arrangements."<ref name="The Communist Manifesto"/>
In pre-capitalist economies, exploitation of the worker was achieved via physical coercion. In the capitalist mode of production, that result is more subtly achieved; because the worker does not own the means of production, he or she must voluntarily enter into an exploitive work relationship with a capitalist in order to earn the necessities of life. The worker's entry into such employment is voluntary in that he or she chooses which capitalist to work for. However, the worker must work or starve. Thus, exploitation is inevitable, and the "voluntary" nature of a worker participating in a capitalist society is illusory.
<!-- production not circulation; Marx emphasised that capitalism (''per se'') does not cheat the worker. -->


Marx posited that the remaining feudalist societies in the world and forms of socialism that did not conform with his writings would be replaced by communism in the future in a similar manner as with capitalism.<ref name="World History">{{cite book |last1=Black |first1=Jeremy |title=World History |last2=Brewer |first2=Paul |last3=Shaw |first3=Anthony |last4=Chandler |first4=Malcolm |last5=Cheshire |first5=Gerard |last6=Cranfield |first6=Ingrid |last7=Ralph Lewis |first7=Brenda |last8=Sutherland |first8=Joe |last9=Vint |first9=Robert |publisher=Parragon Books |year=2003 |isbn=0-75258-227-5 |location=] |page=342 |author1-link=Jeremy Black (historian)}}</ref>
] is the estrangement of people from their humanity (<small>German:</small> ''Gattungswesen'', "species-essence", "species-being"), which is a systematic result of capitalism. Under capitalism, the fruits of production belong to the employers, who expropriate the surplus created by others, and so generate alienated labourers.<ref>"Alienation" entry, ''A Dictionary of Sociology''</ref> In Marx's view, alienation is an objective characterization of the worker's situation in capitalism&nbsp;– his or her self-awareness of this condition is not prerequisite.


===Social classes=== === Social classes ===
{{main|Marxian class theory}}
The identity of a social class derives from its relationship to the ]; Marx describes the social classes in capitalist societies:
{{see also|Class conflict|Classless society|Social class|Three-component theory of stratification}}
* ]: "those individuals who has nothing to offer but their ], because in the capitalist mode of production, they do not own the means of production". As Andrei Platonov expressed "The working class is my home country and my future is linked with the proletariat."<ref>Andrei Platonov, the 20th-century Russian writer</ref> The capitalist mode of production establishes the conditions enabling the bourgeoisie to ] the proletariat because the workers' labour generates a ] greater than the workers' ].
Marx distinguishes social classes based on two criteria, i.e. ownership of means of production and control over the ] of others. Following this criterion of class based on property relations, Marx identified the ] of the ] with the following social groups:
* ]: those who "own the means of production" and buy labour power from the proletariat, thus exploiting the proletariat; they subdivide as bourgeoisie and the petit bourgeoisie.
* ]: "he class of modern ]ers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labour power in order to live."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Engels |first1=Friedrich |author1-link=Friedrich Engels |title=Manifesto of the Communist Party |date=1888 |location=London |page=Footnote |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm#a1 |publisher=Progress Publishers |access-date=15 March 2015 |archive-date=27 January 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180127164331/https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm#a1 |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Marx |first=Karl |publisher=Progress Publishers |year=1887 |location=Moscow |title=] |volume=1 |chapter=The Buying and Selling of Labour-Power |author-link=Karl Marx |access-date=10 February 2013 |chapter-url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch06.htm |via=]}}</ref> The capitalist mode of production establishes the conditions that enable the bourgeoisie to ] the proletariat as the worker's labour generates a ] greater than the worker's ].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Screpanti |first1=Ernesto |author1-link=Ernesto Screpanti |date=2019 |chapter=Measures of Exploitation |title=Labour and Value: Rethinking Marx's Theory of Exploitation |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dDa1DwAAQBAJ |publication-place=Cambridge |publisher=Open Book Publishers |page=75 |doi=10.11647/OBP.0182 |isbn=9781783747825 |access-date=24 July 2023 |quote=Marx's value theory is a complex doctrine in which three different kinds of speculation coalesce: a philosophy aimed at proving that value is created by a labour substance; an explanation of the social relations of production in capitalism; and a method for measuring exploitation. |doi-access=free}}</ref>⁠
** ] are those who work and can afford to buy little labour power i.e. small business owners, peasant landlords, trade workers et al. Marxism predicts that the continual reinvention of the means of production eventually would destroy the petit bourgeoisie, degrading them from the middle class to the proletariat.
** ]: the outcasts of society, such as the criminals, ], ], or ], without any ] or ].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Holt |first1=Justin P. |title=The Social Thought of Karl Marx |date=2014 |publisher=] |isbn=9781412997843 |page= |chapter=Class}}</ref> Having no interest in national, let alone ], economic affairs, Marx claimed that this specific sub-division of the proletariat would play no part in the eventual social revolution.
* ]: The outcasts of society such as criminals, vagabonds, beggars, prostitutes, et al., who have no stake in the economy and no mind of their own and so are decoyed by every bidder.
* Bourgeoisie: those who "own the means of production" and buy labour power from the proletariat, thus exploiting the proletariat. They subdivide as bourgeoisie and the petite bourgeoisie.<ref name="Siegrist">{{cite encyclopedia |last=Siegrist |first=Hannes |date=2001 |title=Bourgeoisie and Middle Classes, History of |editor-last=Wright |editor-first=James D. |editor-link=James D. Wright |encyclopedia=] |volume=2 |edition=2nd |location=Oxford |publisher=] |pages=784–789 |isbn=9780080430768 |doi=10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.62013-5}}</ref>
* ]: an historically important social class who retain some wealth and power.
** ]: those who work and can afford to buy little labour power (i.e. ], ]s, ]s and trade workers). Marxism predicts that the continual reinvention of the means of production eventually would destroy the petite bourgeoisie, degrading them from the ] to the proletariat.<ref name="Siegrist"/>
* ] and ]: a scattered class incapable of organizing and effecting socio-economic change, most of whom would enter the proletariat, and some become landlords.
* ]: a historically significant social class that retains some wealth and power.
* ] and farmers: a scattered class incapable of organising and effecting ] change, most of whom would enter the proletariat while some would become landlords.<ref>{{cite book |last=Wolf |first=Eric R. |author-link=Eric Wolf |date=1999 |title=Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Century |publisher=] |chapter=Conclusion |page=294}}</ref>
Class consciousness denotes the awareness—of itself and the social world—that a social class possesses and its capacity to act rationally in its best interests.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Parenti |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Parenti |title=Power and the Powerless |chapter=Class Consciousness and Individualized Consciousness |pages=94–113 |publisher=St. Martin's Press |date=1978 |isbn=0-312-63373-4}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title=Class consciousness - Social Stratification, Marxism {{&}} Class Conflict |first=André |last=Munro |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/class-consciousness |encyclopedia=]}}</ref> Class consciousness is required before a social class can effect a successful revolution and, thus, the ].<ref>{{Cite book |title=Sociological Theory in the Classical Era |first1=Laura Desfor |last1=Edles |first2=Scott |last2=Appelrouth |publisher=] |year=2020 |isbn=978-1506347820 |page=48}}</ref>


Without defining '']'',<ref>{{cite book |last=McCarney |first=Joseph |date=2005 |chapter-url=http://marxmyths.org/joseph-mccarney/article.htm |chapter=Ideology and False Consciousness |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130509062317/http://marxmyths.org/joseph-mccarney/article.htm |archive-date=9 May 2013 |title=Marx Myths and Legends |editor1-first=R. |editor1-last=Lucas |editor2-first=A. |editor2-last=Blunden}}</ref> Marx used the term to describe the production of images of social reality. According to Engels, "ideology is a process accomplished by the so-called thinker consciously, it is true, but with a false consciousness. The real motive forces impelling him remain unknown to him; otherwise it simply would not be an ideological process. Hence he imagines false or seeming motive forces."<ref>{{cite book |last=Engels |first=Friedrich |author-link=Friedrich Engels |orig-date=14 July 1893 |date=1968 |chapter-url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1893/letters/93_07_14.htm |chapter=Letter to Franz Mehring |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121222215623/http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1893/letters/93_07_14.htm |archive-date=22 December 2012 |title=Marx and Engels Correspondence |translator-link=Dona Torr |translator-first=D. |translator-last=Torr |location=London |publisher=]}}</ref>
] denotes the awareness&nbsp;– of itself and the social world&nbsp;– that a social class possesses, and its capacity to rationally act in their best interests; hence, class consciousness is required ''before'' they can effect a successful revolution.


Because the ruling class controls the society's means of production, the superstructure of society (i.e. the ruling social ideas) is determined by the best interests of the ruling class. In '']'', Marx says that "he ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is, at the same time, its ruling intellectual force."<ref>{{cite book |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01b.htm |title=The German Ideology |first=Karl |last=Marx |author-link=Karl Marx |date=1845 |via=] |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=2 January 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150102205347/http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01b.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> The term '']'' initially referred to the study of the material conditions of economic production in the capitalist system. In Marxism, political economy is the study of the means of production, specifically of capital and how that manifests as economic activity.<ref>{{cite book |chapter=Introduction |title=Political Economy: A Textbook issued by the Economics Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R |date=1957 |publisher=] |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/subject/economy/authors/pe/index.htm#INTRODUCTION |via=]}}</ref>
Without defining ],<ref>Joseph McCarney: '''', April 2005</ref> Marx used the term to denote the production of images of social reality; according to Engels, "ideology is a process accomplished by the so-called thinker consciously, it is true, but with a false consciousness. The real motive forces impelling him remain unknown to him; otherwise it simply would not be an ideological process. Hence he imagines false or seeming motive forces".<ref>Engels: to ], (London 14 July 1893), Donna Torr, translator, in ''Marx and Engels Correspondence'', International Publishers, 1968</ref> Because the ruling class controls the society's means of production, the superstructure of society, the ruling social ideas are determined by the best interests of the said ruling class. In ''The German Ideology'', "the ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is, at the same time, its ruling intellectual force".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01b.htm|title=Karl Marx, ''The German Ideology''}}</ref>


{{quote box
The term "]" originally denoted the study of the conditions under which economic production was organised in the capitalist system. In Marxism, political economy studies the means of production, specifically of capital, and how that manifests as economic activity.
| quote = Marxism taught me what society was. I was like a blindfolded man in a forest, who doesn't even know where north or south is. If you don't eventually come to truly understand the history of the class struggle, or at least have a clear idea that society is divided between the rich and the poor, and that some people subjugate and exploit other people, you're lost in a forest, not knowing anything.
| source = — Cuban revolutionary and Marxist–Leninist politician ] on discovering Marxism, 2009{{sfn|Castro|2009|p=100}}
| align = right
| width = 246px
| bgcolor = #c6dbf7
}}


This new way of thinking was invented because ] believed that ] of the means of production (i.e. the ], land, wealth of nature, trade apparatus and wealth of the society) would abolish the exploitative working conditions experienced under capitalism.<ref name="Engels-3">{{cite book |last=Engels |first=Friedrich |author-link=Friedrich Engels |date=Spring 1880 |chapter=III |title=] |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/soc-utop/ch03.htm |via=]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Goldman |first=Emma |author-link=Emma Goldman |date=1932 |chapter=1 |title=There Is No Communism in Russia |url=https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-there-is-no-communism-in-russia |access-date=29 January 2024 |via=The Anarchist Library |language=en}}</ref> Through working class revolution, the ] (which Marxists saw as a weapon for the subjugation of one class by another)<ref>{{cite book |last=Lukács |first=György |author-link=György Lukács |date=1924 |chapter=The State as Weapon |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1924/lenin/ch05.htm |title=Lenin: A Study on the Unity of his Thought |via=]}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Mitchinson |first=Phil |date=21 July 2010 |title=Marxism and the state |url=https://socialist.net/marxism-and-the-state/ |work=] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230606102252/https://socialist.net/marxism-and-the-state/ |archive-date=6 June 2023}}</ref> is seized and used to suppress the hitherto ruling class of capitalists and (by implementing a commonly owned, democratically controlled workplace) create the society of ] which Marxists see as true democracy.<ref>{{cite web |first=Søren |last=Mau |date=18 July 2023 |title=Communism is Freedom |url=https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/communism-is-freedom |website=] Blog |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240603044105/https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/communism-is-freedom |archive-date=3 June 2024}}</ref> An economy based on cooperation on human need and social betterment, rather than competition for profit of many independently acting profit seekers, would also be the end of class society, which Marx saw as the fundamental division of all hitherto existing history.<ref name="The Communist Manifesto"/> Marx saw the fundamental nature of capitalist society as little different from that of a slave society in that one small group of society exploits the larger group.<ref>{{cite magazine |last1=Foster |first1=John Bellamy |author1-link=John Bellamy Foster |first2=Hannah |last2=Holleman |first3=Brett |last3=Clark |date=1 July 2020 |title=Marx and Slavery |magazine=] |url=https://monthlyreview.org/2020/07/01/marx-and-slavery/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240108225402/https://monthlyreview.org/2020/07/01/marx-and-slavery/ |archive-date=8 January 2024}}</ref>
{{Quote box|width=246px|bgcolor=#c6dbf7|align=right|quote="Marxism taught me what society was. I was like a blindfolded man in a forest, who doesn't even know where north or south is. If you don't eventually come to truly understand the history of the class struggle, or at least have a clear idea that society is divided between the rich and the poor, and that some people subjugate and exploit other people, you're lost in a forest, not knowing anything."|source=Cuban revolutionary and Marxist-Leninist politician ] on discovering Marxism, 2009.<ref>]. p. 100.</ref> }}


Through ] of the means of production, the ] is eliminated, and the motive of furthering human flourishing is introduced. Because the surplus produced by the workers is the property of the society as a whole, there are no classes of producers and appropriators. Additionally, as the state originates in the bands of retainers hired by the first ruling classes to protect their economic privilege, it will ] as its conditions of existence have disappeared.<ref name="Origins of the Family- Chapter IX">{{cite book |first=Friedrich |last=Engels |author-link=Friedrich Engels |chapter-url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1884/origin-family/ch09.htm |title=] |chapter=IX. Barbarism and Civilization |via=] |access-date=26 December 2012 |archive-date=22 October 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121022225930/http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1884/origin-family/ch09.htm |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="ZhaoDickson2001">{{cite book |first1=Jianmin |last1=Zhao |first2=Bruce J. |last2=Dickson |title=Remaking the Chinese State: Strategies, Society, and Security |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5Mm2BEf4iiwC&pg=PA2 |access-date=26 December 2012 |year=2001 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0415255837 |page=2 |archive-date=6 June 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130606012544/http://books.google.com/books?id=5Mm2BEf4iiwC&pg=PA2 |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref><ref name="cq">{{cite encyclopedia |last=Kurian |first=George Thomas |author-link=George Kurian |date=2011 |title=Withering Away of the State |page=1776 |encyclopedia=The Encyclopedia of Political Science |location=Washington, DC |publisher=] |doi=10.4135/9781608712434.n1646 |isbn=9781933116440 |s2cid=221178956}}</ref>
===Revolution, socialism, and communism===
Marxists believe that the transition from capitalism to socialism is an inevitable part of the development of human society; as Lenin stated, "it is evident that Marx deduces the inevitability of the transformation of capitalist society wholly and exclusively from the economic law of motion of contemporary society."<ref>]. p. 35.</ref>


=== Communism, revolution and socialism ===
Marxists believe that a socialist society will be far better for the majority of the populace than its capitalist counterpart, for instance, prior to the ] of 1917, Lenin wrote that "The socialization of production is bound to lead to the conversion of the means of production into the property of society&nbsp;... This conversion will directly result in an immense increase in productivity of labour, a reduction of working hours, and the replacement of the remnants, the ruins of small-scale, primitive, disunited production by collective and improved labour."<ref>]. p. 35–36.</ref>
] protester in Spain, 2006, waving a ] with a ], both symbols of socialism]]
According to ''The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx'', "Marx used many terms to refer to a post-capitalist society—positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that 'socialism' and 'Communism' are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death."<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Hudis |editor1-first=Peter |editor2-last=Vidal |editor2-first=Matt |editor3-last=Smith |editor3-first=Tony |editor4-last=Rotta |editor4-first=Tomás |editor5-last=Prew |editor5-first=Paul |date=September 2018 – June 2019 |url=https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190695545.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190695545 |title=The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx |chapter-url=https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190695545.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190695545-e-50 |chapter=Marx's Concept of Socialism |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220401001417/https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190695545.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190695545-e-50 |archive-date=1 April 2022 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0190695545 |doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190695545.001.0001}} (Also: {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220105234655/https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190695545.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190695545 |date=5 January 2022}})</ref>


According to ] theory, overthrowing capitalism by a ] in contemporary society is inevitable. While the inevitability of an eventual socialist revolution is a controversial debate among many different ], all Marxists believe socialism is a necessity. Marxists argue that a ] society is far better for most of the populace than its capitalist counterpart. Prior to the ], ] wrote: "The ] is bound to lead to the conversion of the means of production into the property of society. ... This conversion will directly result in an immense increase in productivity of labour, a reduction of working hours, and the replacement of the remnants, the ruins of small-scale, primitive, disunited production by collective and improved labour."{{sfn|Lenin|1967|pp=35–36}} The failure of the ], along with the failure of socialist movements to resist the outbreak of ], led to renewed theoretical effort and valuable contributions from Lenin and ] towards an appreciation of Marx's ] and efforts to formulate a ].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Kuruma |first=Samezo |date=1929 |url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/kuruma/crisis-intro.htm |title=An Introduction to the Theory of Crisis |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200331084713/https://www.marxists.org/archive/kuruma/crisis-intro.htm |archive-date=31 March 2020 |translator-first=M. |translator-last=Schauerte |journal=Journal of the Ohara Institute for Social Research |volume=4 |number=1}}</ref>
==Classical Marxism==
{{Main|Classical Marxism}}
The term Classical Marxism denotes the collection of socio-eco-political theories expounded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. "Marxism, as ] remarked, is always open, always critical, always self-critical." As such, Classical Marxism distinguishes between "Marxism" as broadly perceived, and "what Marx believed"; thus, in 1883, Marx wrote to the French labour leader ] and to ] (Marx's son-in-law)&nbsp;– both of whom claimed to represent Marxist principles&nbsp;– accusing them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and of denying the value of reformist struggle; from Marx's letter derives the paraphrase: "If that is Marxism, then I am not a Marxist".<ref>"Accusing Guesde and Lafargue of 'revolutionary phrase-mongering' and of denying the value of reformist struggles, Marx made his famous remark that, if their politics represented Marxism, 'ce qu'il y a de certain c'est que moi, je ne suis pas Marxiste' ('what is certain is that I myself am not a Marxist')." See: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Hall|first=Stuart|title=Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies|year=1996|publisher=Routledge|location=London|isbn=978-0-415-08803-9|page=418|coauthors=Dave Morely, Kuan-Hsing Chen|accessdate=4 March 2013|url=http://books.google.com/?id=EPENAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA418&dq=%22If+that+is+Marxism,+then+I+am+not+a+Marxist%22+hall#v=onepage&q=%22If%20that%20is%20Marxism%2C%20then%20I%20am%20not%20a%20Marxist%22%20hall&f=false|quote=I have no hesitation in saying that this represents a gigantic crudification and simplification of Marx's work – the kind of simplification and reductionism which once led him, in despair, to say "if that is marxism, then I am not a marxist"}}</ref> American Marxist scholar ] responded to this comment by saying, "there are few thinkers in modern history whose thought has been so badly misrepresented, by Marxists and anti-Marxists alike".<ref>Not found in search function at </ref>


===Criticism=== === Democracy ===
] in the centre. The ] were an early example of a ].]]
Some Marxists have criticised the academic ]alisation of Marxism for being too shallow and detached from political action. For instance, Zimbabwean ] ], himself a professional academic, stated that "Its practitioners remind one of ], who in the Greek legend fell in love with his own reflection&nbsp;... Sometimes it is necessary to devote time to clarifying and developing the concepts that we use, but indeed for Western Marxists this has become an end in itself. The result is a body of writings incomprehensible to all but a tiny minority of highly qualified scholars."<ref>]. p. 12.</ref>
Karl Marx criticised ] as not democratic enough due to the unequal socio-economic situation of the workers during the Industrial Revolution which undermines the democratic agency of citizens.<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soscij.2010.07.002 |doi=10.1016/j.soscij.2010.07.002 |title=Karl Marx's sociological theory of democracy: Civil society and political rights |date=2011 |last1=Niemi |first1=William L. |journal=] |volume=48 |issue=1 |pages=39–51}}</ref> Marxists differ in their positions towards democracy.<ref>{{cite book |last=Miliband |first=Ralph |author-link=Ralph Miliband |title=Marxism and politics |publisher=Aakar Books |date=2011 |pages= |isbn=}}</ref>{{pn|date=June 2024}}<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/191498 |jstor=191498 |title=Karl Marx on Democracy, Participation, Voting, and Equality |last1=Springborg |first1=Patricia |journal=] |date=1984 |volume=12 |issue=4 |pages=537–556 |doi=10.1177/0090591784012004005}}</ref> Types of ] include ], ], ] and can include voting on how surplus labour is to be organised.<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://doi.org/10.1080/08935690009358994 |doi=10.1080/08935690009358994 |title=Marxism and democracy |date=2000 |last1=Wolff |first1=Richard |author-link=Richard D. Wolff |journal=] |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages=112–122}}</ref> According to ] political decisions reached by voting in the party are binding for all members of the party.<ref name=freedomunity>Lenin, Vladimir (1906). . ]. Retrieved 14 February 2020.</ref>


== Schools of thought ==
==Academic Marxism==
{{main|Marxist schools of thought}}
]]]
{{see also|List of communist ideologies}}
Marxism has been adopted by a large number of academics and other scholars working in various disciplines.


=== Classical ===
The ] of ] was first developed in the Soviet Union in 1929, when a young archaeologist named Vladislav I. Ravdonikas (1894–1976) published a report entitled "For a Soviet history of material culture". Within this work, the very discipline of archaeology as it then stood was criticised as being inherently bourgeoisie and therefore anti-socialist, and so, as a part of the academic reforms instituted in the Soviet Union under the administration of Premier ], a great emphasis was placed on the adoption of Marxist archaeology throughout the country.<ref>]. p. 326–340.</ref> These theoretical developments were subsequently adopted by archaeologists working in capitalist states outside of the Leninist bloc, most notably by the Australian academic ] (1892–1957), who used Marxist theory in his understandings of the development of human society.<ref>]. p. 79.</ref>
{{main|Classical Marxism}}
Classical Marxism denotes the collection of socio-eco-political theories expounded by ] and ].<ref>{{cite journal |url=http://isj.org.uk/classical-marxism-and-the-question-of-reformism/ |title=Classical Marxism and the question of reformism |last=Gluckstein |first=Donny |author-link=Donny Gluckstein |date=26 June 2014 |journal=] |number=143 |access-date=19 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210813092715/http://isj.org.uk/classical-marxism-and-the-question-of-reformism/ |archive-date=13 August 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref> As ] remarked, "Marxism is always open, always critical, always self-critical."<ref>{{cite book |last=Mandel |first=Ernest |author-link=Ernest Mandel |date=1994 |title=Revolutionary Marxism and Social Reality in the 20th Century |publisher=] |isbn=0-391-03800-1 |page=50}}</ref> Classical Marxism distinguishes ''Marxism'' as broadly perceived from "what Marx believed." In 1883, Marx wrote to his son-in-law ] and French labour leader ]—both of whom claimed to represent Marxist principles—accusing them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and denying the value of reformist struggle.<ref name="PPO"/> From Marx's letter derives Marx's famous remark that, if their politics represented Marxism, '{{lang|fr|ce qu'il y a de certain c'est que moi, je ne suis pas Marxiste}}' ('what is certain is that I myself am not a Marxist')."<ref name="PPO">{{cite book |last1=Marx |first1=Karl |author1-link=Karl Marx |last2=Guesde |first2=Jules |author2-link=Jules Guesde |date=1880 |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm |title=The Programme of the Parti Ouvrier |access-date=11 July 2020 |via=] |archive-date=1 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200701023827/https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hall |first1=Stuart |first2=Dave |last2=Morely |first3=Kuan-Hsing |last3=Chen |title=Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies |date=1996 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=978-0415088039 |page=418 |access-date=4 March 2013 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EPENAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA418 |quote=I have no hesitation in saying that this represents a gigantic crudification and simplification of Marx's work—the kind of simplification and reductionism which once led him, in despair, to say "if that is marxism, then I am not a marxist. |archive-date=19 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220319081927/https://books.google.com/books?id=EPENAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA418 |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref>
<!-- American Marxist scholar ] responded: "There are few thinkers in modern history whose thought has been so badly misrepresented, by Marxists and anti-Marxists alike."
Not found in search function at {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220319081310/https://www.marxists.org/archive/draper/index.htm |date=19 March 2022}}. -->


=== Libertarian ===
==Political Marxism==
{{main|List of communist ideologies#Libertarian Marxism}}
{{Refimprove section|date=October 2010}}
{{See also|Libertarian socialism#Marxist}}
{{main|Political Marxism}}
Libertarian Marxism emphasises the ] and ] aspects of Marxism. Early currents of libertarian Marxism, such as ], emerged in opposition to ].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Memos |first=Christos |date=2012 |title=Anarchism and Council Communism on the Russian Revolution |journal=] |volume=20 |number=2 |issn=0967-3393 |pages=22–47 }}</ref><ref name="Non-Leninist Marxism">{{cite book |title=Non-Leninist Marxism: Writings on the Workers Councils |date=2007 |publisher=Red and Black Publishers |isbn=978-0979181368 |location=St. Petersburg, Florida |first1=Hermann |last1=Gorter |author1-link=Herman Gorter |first2=Antonie |last2=Pannekoek |author2-link=Antonie Pannekoek |first3=Sylvia |last3=Pankhurst |author3-link=Sylvia Pankhurst |first4=Otto |last4=Rühle |author4-link=Otto Rühle}}{{page needed|date=June 2024}}</ref>


Libertarian Marxism is often critical of ] positions such as those held by ].<ref>{{cite magazine |url=http://libcom.org/library/social-democracy-1-aufheben-8 |title=The Retreat of Social Democracy&nbsp;... Re-imposition of Work in Britain and the 'Social Europe' |magazine=Aufheben |issue=8 |date=1999 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=5 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220405120630/https://libcom.org/library/social-democracy-1-aufheben-8 |url-status=live}}</ref> Libertarian Marxist currents often draw from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels' later works, specifically the {{lang|de|]}} and '']'';<ref>{{cite book |first=Ernesto |last=Screpanti |author-link=Ernesto Screpanti |title=Libertarian communism: Marx Engels and the Political Economy of Freedom |publisher=] |location=London |date=2007 |isbn=978-0230018969}}</ref> emphasising the Marxist belief in the ability of the ] to forge its destiny without the need for a ] to mediate or aid its liberation.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Hal |last=Draper |author-link=Hal Draper |title=The Principle of Self-Emancipation in Marx and Engels |journal=] |volume=8 |issue=8 |pages=81–104 |url=http://socialistregister.com/index.php/srv/article/view/5333 |date=1971 |access-date=25 April 2015 |archive-date=5 March 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305121403/http://socialistregister.com/index.php/srv/article/view/5333 |url-status=live}}</ref> Along with ], libertarian Marxism is one of the main currents of ].<ref>{{citation |last=Chomsky |first=Noam |author-link=Noam Chomsky |url=http://www.chomsky.info/audionvideo/19700216.mp3 |title=Government In The Future |publisher=Poetry Center of the New York YM-YWHA |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130116194522/http://www.chomsky.info/audionvideo/19700216.mp3 |archive-date=16 January 2013 |type=Lecture}}</ref>
Since the late 19th century, Marxist-inspired socialist parties have been internally divided, between proponents of ] and proponents of ], and between the respective revolutionary and reformist branches. ], ] leader Vladimir Lenin, said that "the supersession of the ] state by the ] is impossible without violent revolution".<ref>Robert Vincent Daniels. A Documentary History of Communism in Russia: From Lenin to Gorbachev. Lebanon, New Hampshire, USA: University of New England Press, 1993. Pp. 48.</ref> ] and ] political theorist ] claims that, in their later life, Engels and Marx had advocated the development of socialism through ]ary means, wherever possible.<ref>Michael Harrington. ''Socialism: Past and Future''. Reprint edition of original published in 1989. New York, New York, USA: Arcade Publishing, 2011. Pp. 42.</ref>


Libertarian Marxism includes currents such as ], ], ], ], parts of the ], ], ] (a form of ]),<ref>{{cite book |title=Orgone Addicts: Wilhelm Reich Versus The Situationists. |url=http://www.lust-for-life.org/Lust-For-Life/ReichVersusTheSituationists/ReichVersusTheSituationists.htm |first=Jim |last=Martin |quote=I will also discuss other left-libertarians who wrote about Reich, as they bear on the general discussion of Reich's ideas...In 1944, Paul Goodman, author of ], ], and co-author of ''Gestalt Therapy'', began to discover the work of Wilhelm Reich for his American audience in the tiny libertarian socialist and anarchist milieu. |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=8 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100308103733/http://www.lust-for-life.org/Lust-For-Life/ReichVersusTheSituationists/ReichVersusTheSituationists.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> ]<ref>{{cite journal |last=Howard |first=Dick |title=Introduction to Castoriadis |journal=Telos |year=1975 |issue=23 |page=118}}</ref> and ].<ref name="map">{{cite web |url=http://libcom.org/library/libertarian-marxist-tendency-map |title=A libertarian Marxist tendency map |publisher=Libcom.org |access-date=11 October 2013 |archive-date=10 November 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211110232041/http://libcom.org/library/libertarian-marxist-tendency-map |url-status=live}}</ref> Libertarian Marxism has often strongly influenced both ] and ]. Notable theorists of libertarian Marxism have included ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and ],<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.ted.com/speakers/yanis_varoufakis |title=Yanis Varoufakis thinks we need a radically new way of thinking about the economy, finance and capitalism |last=Varoufakis |first=Yanis |author-link=Yanis Varoufakis |publisher=] |access-date=14 April 2019 |quote=Yanis Varoufakis describes himself as a "libertarian Marxist |archive-date=2 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200402234100/https://www.ted.com/speakers/yanis_varoufakis |url-status=live}}</ref> the latter claiming that Marx himself was a libertarian Marxist.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/yanis-varoufakis-we-leftists-are-not-necessarily-pro-public-sector-marx-was-anti-state-1-7861928 |title=Yanis Varoufakis: We leftists are not necessarily pro public sector – Marx was anti state |last=Lowry |first=Ben |work=The NewsLetter |date=11 March 2017 |access-date=14 April 2019 |archive-date=2 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200402234059/https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/yanis-varoufakis-we-leftists-are-not-necessarily-pro-public-sector-marx-was-anti-state-1-7861928 |url-status=live}}</ref>
Since Marx's death in 1883, various groups around the world have appealed to Marxism as the theoretical basis for their politics and policies, which have often proved to be dramatically different and conflicting.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} One of the first major political splits occurred between the advocates of 'reformism', who argued that the transition to socialism could occur within existing bourgeois parliamentarian frameworks, and ], who argued that the transition to a socialist society required a revolution and the dissolution of the capitalist state. The 'reformist' tendency, later known as ], came to be dominant in most of the parties affiliated to the ] and these parties supported their own governments in the First World War.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} This issue caused the communists to break away, forming their own parties which became members of the ].{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}}


=== Humanist ===
The following countries had governments at some point in the 20th century who at least nominally adhered to Marxism:<ref>{{cite book |last=Service|first=Robert|title=Comrades: Communism: A World History|year=2008|publisher=Pan MacMillan|isbn=0-330-43968-5|postscript=<!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}}</ref>
{{main|Marxist humanism}}
], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], the ] and ], ], ], ], and ]. In addition, out of twenty eight Indian states, three state viz. ], ] and ] have had Marxist governments, but change occurred through electoral processes. Some of these governments such as in ], ], ], ] and ] have been democratic in nature and maintained regular ].
Marxist humanism was born in 1932 with the publication of Marx's '']'' and reached a degree of prominence in the 1950s and 1960s. Marxist humanists contend that there is continuity between the early philosophical writings of Marx, in which he develops his ], and the structural description of ] society found in his later works, such as '']''.{{sfnm |1a1=Fromm |1y=1966 |1pp=69–79 |2a1=Petrović |2y=1967 |2pp=35–51}} They hold that grasping Marx's philosophical foundations is necessary to understand his later works properly.{{sfn|Marcuse|1972|pp=1–48}}


Contrary to the official ] of the ] and interpretations of Marx rooted in the ] of ], Marxist humanists argue that Marx's work was an extension or transcendence of ] ].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Spencer |first=Robert |date=17 February 2017 |title=Why We Need Marxist-Humanism Now |url=https://www.plutobooks.com/blog/marxist-humanism-now/ |location=London |publisher=] |access-date=17 September 2019 |archive-date=28 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200428104950/https://www.plutobooks.com/blog/marxist-humanism-now/ |url-status=live}}</ref> Whereas other Marxist philosophies see Marxism as ], Marxist humanism reaffirms the doctrine that "man is the measure of all things"—that humans are essentially different to the rest of the ] and should be treated so by Marxist theory.{{sfn|Edgley|1991|p=420}}
===History===
The 1917 ], led by Vladimir Lenin, was the first large scale attempt to put Marxist ideas about a workers' state into practice. The new government faced counter-revolution, civil war and foreign intervention.<ref name="redoctoberobstacles">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/history/ussr/events/revolution/index.htm|title=Documents on the Russian Revolution|work=]|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref> Lenin consistently explained "this elementary truth of Marxism, that the victory of socialism requires the joint efforts of workers in a number of advanced countries" (Lenin, Sochineniya (Works), 5th ed Vol XLIV p418.) It could not be developed in Russia in isolation, he argued, but needed to be spread internationally.


=== Academic ===
The 1917 October Revolution did help inspire a revolutionary wave over the years that followed,<ref name="bavarianrevolution">{{cite web |url=http://www.historicaleye.com/Munich1.html|title=historicaleye.com|last=Rees|first=Simon|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="hungaryrevolution">{{cite web |url=http://en.internationalism.org/ir/139/1919-Hungarian-Revolution-01|title=The Hungarian Revolution of 1919 (i)&#124;International Communist Current|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="germanrevolution">{{cite web |url=http://libcom.org/history/working-class-activity-councils-germany-1918%E2%80%911923-peter-rachleff|title=Working-class activity and councils&nbsp;– Germany 1918‑1923 – Peter Rachleff&#124;libcom.org|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="germanrevolution2">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/subject/germany-1918-23/|title=The History of the German Revolution: 1918–1923|work=]|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref> with the development of Communist Parties worldwide, but without success in the vital advanced capitalist countries of Western Europe. Socialist revolution in ] and other western countries failed, leaving the ] on its own. An intense period of debate and stopgap solutions ensued, ] and the ] (NEP). Lenin died and Joseph Stalin gradually assumed control, eliminating rivals and consolidating power as the Soviet Union faced the events of the 1930s and its global crisis-tendencies. Amidst the geopolitical threats which defined the period and included the probability of invasion, he instituted a ruthless program of ] which, while successful,<ref name="stalinindustrialise">{{cite web |url=http://www.ibiblio.org/expo/soviet.exhibit/collect.html|title=Collectivization and Industrialization|work=]|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref> was executed at great cost in human suffering, along with long-term environmental devastation.<ref name="stalinindustrialise" />
{{see also|Marxist ethics|Marxist film theory|Marxist geography|Marxist philosophy}}
], an Australian archaeologist and one of the 20th century's most prominent Marxist academics]]
According to a 2007 survey of American professors by ] and Solon Simmons, 17.6% of ] professors and 5.0% of ] professors identify as Marxists, while between 0 and 2% of professors in all other disciplines identify as Marxists.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gross |first1=Neil |author1-link=Neil Gross |last2=Simmons |first2=Solon |chapter=The Social and Political Views of American College and University Professors |pages=19–50 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D1vCAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA19 |editor1-last=Gross |editor1-first=Neil |editor2-last=Simmons |editor2-first=Solon |title=Professors and Their Politics |date=2014 |publisher=] |isbn=978-1421413358 |doi=10.1353/book.31449 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=7 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407113153/https://books.google.com/books?id=D1vCAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA19 |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref>


=== Archaeology ===
Modern followers of ] maintain that as predicted by Lenin, Trotsky, and others already in the 1920s, Stalin's "socialism in one country" was unable to maintain itself, and according to some Marxist critics, the ] ceased to show the characteristics of a socialist state long before its formal dissolution.
{{main|Marxist archaeology}}
The ] of ] was first developed in the ] in 1929, when a young archaeologist named ] published a report entitled "For a Soviet history of material culture"; within this work, the very discipline of archaeology as it then stood was criticised as being inherently bourgeois, therefore anti-socialist and so, as a part of the academic reforms instituted in the Soviet Union under the administration of General Secretary ], a great emphasis was placed on the adoption of Marxist archaeology throughout the country.{{sfn|Trigger|2007|pp=326–340}}


These theoretical developments were subsequently adopted by archaeologists working in capitalist states outside of the Leninist bloc, most notably by the Australian academic ], who used Marxist theory in his understandings of the development of human society.{{sfn|Green|1981|p=79}}
In the 1920s the ] between ] and Marxist economists took place. The Austrians claimed that Marxism is flawed because prices could not be set to recognize opportunity costs of factors of production, and so socialism could not make rational decisions.


=== Sociology ===
The ] party, a Chinese nationalist revolutionary party, had Marxist members who opposed the Chinese Communist Party. They viewed the Chinese revolution in different terms than the Communists, claiming that China had already passed its feudal stage and was in a stagnation period rather than in another mode of production. These Marxists in the Kuomintang opposed the Chinese communist party ideology.<ref>{{cite book |url=http://books.google.com/?id=usOMZjTWrJ0C&pg=PA207&dq=china+stagnated+feudalism+political#v=onepage&q=guomindang%20marxists&f=false|title=Feudalism and non-European societies|author=T. J. Byres, Harbans Mukhia|year=1985|publisher=Psychology Press|location=|page=207|isbn=0-7146-3245-7|pages=|accessdate=2010-11-28}}</ref>
{{main|Marxist criminology|Marxist sociology}}
Marxist sociology, as the study of ] from a Marxist perspective,<ref name="Johnson-2000">{{cite book |last=Johnson |first=Allan G. |author-link=Allan G. Johnson |date=2000 |title=The Blackwell Dictionary of Sociology: A User's Guide to Sociological Language |publisher=] |isbn=0-631-21681-2 |pages=}}</ref> is "a form of ] associated with ... Marxism's objective of developing a ] (]) science of capitalist ] as part of the mobilisation of a revolutionary ]."<ref name="encofsoc">{{cite encyclopedia |url=http://www.bookrags.com/research/marxist-sociology-eos-03/ |title=Marxist Sociology |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Sociology |publisher=] |date=2006 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=4 September 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190904193835/http://www.bookrags.com/research/marxist-sociology-eos-03/ |url-status=live}}</ref> The ] has a section dedicated to the issues of Marxist sociology that is "interested in examining how insights from Marxist ] and Marxist analysis can help explain the complex dynamics of modern society."<ref name="section">{{cite web |url=http://www2.asanet.org/sectionmarxist/about.html |title=About the Section on Marxist Sociology |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090109001255/http://www2.asanet.org/sectionmarxist/about.html |archive-date=9 January 2009}}</ref>


Influenced by the thought of ], Marxist sociology emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. With Marx, ] and ] are considered seminal influences in ]. The first Marxist school of sociology was known as ], of which ] and ] were among its most notable members. During the 1940s, the ] school became accepted within Western academia, subsequently fracturing into several different perspectives, such as the ] or ]. The legacy of Critical Theory as a major offshoot of Marxism is controversial. The common thread linking Marxism and Critical theory is an interest in struggles to dismantle structures of oppression, exclusion, and domination.<ref>{{cite book |doi=10.1017/CBO9781139196598.007 |last=Fuchs |first=Christian |author-link=Christian Fuchs |chapter=What is Critical Theory? |title=Foundations of Critical Theory |publisher=] |date=2021 |pages=17–51}}</ref> Due to its former state-supported position, there has been a backlash against Marxist thought in ] states, such as ]. However, it remains prominent in the sociological research sanctioned and supported by communist states, such as ].<ref> {{cite journal |last=Xiaogang |first=Wu |url=http://www.asanet.org/footnotes/intl_0509.html |title=Between Public and Professional: Chinese Sociology and the Construction of a Harmonious Society |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402111425/http://www.asanet.org/footnotes/intl_0509.html |archive-date=2 April 2015 |journal=ASA Footnotes |date=May–June 2009 |volume=37 |number=5}}</ref>
Following ], Marxist ideology, often with Soviet military backing, spawned a rise in revolutionary communist parties all over the world. Some of these parties were eventually able to gain power, and establish their own version of a Marxist state. Such nations included the ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and others. In some cases, these nations did not get along. Rifts occurred between the Soviet Union and China,<ref name="sinosovietsplit">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/sino-soviet-split/index.htm|title=The Great Debate: Documents of the Sino-Soviet Split.|work=]|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref> as well as Soviet Union and Yugoslavia (in 1948), whose leaders disagreed on certain elements of Marxism and how it should be implemented into society.<ref name="titostalinsplit">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxist.com/History-old/yugoslavia48.html|title=Behind the Stalin-Tito Clash|accessdate=16 May 2011}}</ref>


=== Economics ===
Many of these self-proclaimed Marxist nations (often styled ]s) eventually became authoritarian states, with stagnating economies. This caused some debate about whether Marxism was doomed in practise or these nations were in fact not led by "true Marxists". Critics of Marxism speculated that perhaps Marxist ideology itself was to blame for the nations' various problems. Followers of the currents within Marxism which opposed Stalin, principally cohered around Leon Trotsky, tended to locate the failure at the level of the failure of ]: for communism to have succeeded, they argue, it needed to encompass all the international trading relationships that capitalism had previously developed.
{{main|Marxian economics}}
Marxian economics is a school of economic thought tracing its foundations to the critique of classical ] first expounded upon by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.<ref name="Wolff and Resnick, 1987"/> Marxian economics concerns itself with the analysis of ] in capitalism, the role and distribution of the ] and ] in various types of ]s, the nature and origin of ], the impact of class and class struggle on economic and political processes, and the process of ]. Although the Marxian school is considered ], ideas that have come out of Marxian economics have contributed to mainstream understanding of the global economy. Certain concepts of Marxian economics, especially those related to ] and the ], such as ], have been fitted for use in capitalist systems.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Loesche |first1=Frank |last2=Torre |first2=Ilaria |title=Creative Destruction |journal=Encyclopedia of Creativity |edition=Third |date=2020 |pages=226–231 |doi=10.1016/B978-0-12-809324-5.23696-1|isbn=9780128156155 |s2cid=242692186}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Marx |first=Karl |author-link=Karl Marx |title=Theories of Surplus-Value: "Volume IV" of Capital |publisher=] |location=London |volume=2 |pages=495–96 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sU23AAAAIAAJ |access-date=10 November 2010 |year=1969 |isbn=9780853151944 |orig-year=1863}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Aghion |first1=Philippe |last2=Howitt |first2=Peter |title= Endogenous growth theory |url=https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262528467/endogenous-growth-theory/ |access-date=29 December 2023 |year=1998 |publisher=] |location=Cambridge, MA. |isbn=9780262011662}}</ref>


=== Education ===
The Chinese experience seems to be unique. Rather than falling under a single family's self-serving and dynastic interpretation of Marxism as happened in North Korea and before 1989 in Eastern Europe, the Chinese government&nbsp;– after the end of the struggles over ]'s legacy in 1980 and the ascent of ]&nbsp;– seems to have solved the succession crises{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} that have plagued self-proclaimed Leninist governments since the death of Lenin himself. Key to this success is another Leninism which is a NEP writ very large; Lenin's own NEP of the 1920s was the "permission" given to markets including speculation to operate by the Party which retained final control. The Russian experience in ] was that markets under socialism were so opaque as to be both inefficient and corrupt but especially after China's application to join the ] this does not seem to apply universally.
Marxist education develops Marx's works and those of the movements he influenced in various ways. In addition to the educational psychology of ]<ref>{{cite web |last=Malott |first=Curry |date=16 July 2021 |title=Vygotsky's revolutionary educational psychology |url=https://mronline.org/2021/07/16/vygotskys-revolutionary-educational-psychology/ |access-date=29 July 2021 |website=Monthly Review Online |archive-date=29 July 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210729130303/https://mronline.org/2021/07/16/vygotskys-revolutionary-educational-psychology/ |url-status=live}}</ref> and the pedagogy of ], Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis' '']'' is a study of educational reform in the U.S. and its relationship to the reproduction of capitalism and the possibilities of utilising its contradictions in the revolutionary movement. The work of ], especially since the turn of the 21st century, has further developed Marxist educational theory by developing revolutionary critical pedagogy,<ref>{{cite book |last1=McLaren |first1=Peter |author1-link=Peter McLaren |last2=Pruyn |first2=Marc |last3=Huerta-Charles |first3=Luis |title=This fist called my heart |date=2016 |isbn=978-1-68123-454-0 |oclc=945552771}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> as has the work of Glenn Rikowski,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rikowski |first1=Glenn |title=Scorched Earth: prelude to rebuilding Marxist educational theory |journal=] |date=December 1997 |volume=18 |issue=4 |pages=551–574 |doi=10.1080/0142569970180405}}</ref> Dave Hill,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rasinski |first1=Lotar |last2=Hill |first2=Dave |author2-link=Dave Hill (politician) |last3=Skordoulis |first3=Kostas |title=Marxism and education: international perspectives on theory and action |publisher=] |location=New York |date=2019 |isbn=978-0-367-89169-5 |oclc=1129932782}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> and Paula Allman.<ref>{{cite book |last=Allman |first=Paula |title=On Marx: an introduction to the revolutionary intellect of Karl Marx |date=2007 |publisher=Sense |isbn=978-90-8790-192-9 |oclc=191900765}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> Other Marxists have analysed the forms and pedagogical processes of capitalist and communist education, such as Tyson E. Lewis,<ref>{{cite journal |last=Lewis |first=Tyson E. |title=Mapping the Constellation of Educational Marxism(s) |journal=] |date=January 2012 |volume=44 |issue=sup1 |pages=98–114 |doi=10.1111/j.1469-5812.2009.00563.x |s2cid=144595936}}</ref> Noah De Lissovoy,<ref>{{cite journal |last=De Lissovoy |first=Noah |title=Pedagogy in Common: Democratic education in the global era |journal=] |date=January 2011 |volume=43 |issue=10 |pages=1119–1134 |doi=10.1111/j.1469-5812.2009.00630.x |s2cid=219539909}}</ref> Gregory Bourassa,<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bourassa |first=Gregory N. |title=An Autonomist Biopolitics of Education: Reproduction, Resistance, and the Specter of Constituent Bíos |journal=Educational Theory |date=June 2019 |volume=69 |issue=3 |pages=305–325 |doi=10.1111/edth.12370 |s2cid=212828309}}</ref> and Derek R. Ford.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ford |first1=Derek |title=Communist study: education for the commons |date=2016 |publisher=] |isbn=978-1-4985-3245-7 |oclc=957740361}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Ford |first=Derek R. |title=] |publisher=Iskra Publishers |year=2023 |isbn=978-1-0880-7169-4}}</ref> Curry Malott has developed a Marxist history of education in the U.S.,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Malott |first1=Curry |title=History of education for the many: from colonisation and slavery to the decline of U.S. imperialism |date=2020 |publisher=] |isbn=978-1-350-08571-8 |oclc=1100627401}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> and ] examined the history of communist education.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gettleman |first1=Marvin |author1-link=Marvin Gettleman |title=Explorations in the History of Left Education in Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Europe |journal=] |date=January 1999 |volume=35 |issue=1 |pages=11–14 |doi=10.1080/0030923990350101}}</ref> Sandy Grande has synthesised Marxist educational theory with Indigenous pedagogy,<ref>{{cite book |last=Grande |first=Sandy |title=Red pedagogy: Native American social and political thought |date=2004 |publisher=] Publishers |isbn=978-0-7425-1828-5 |oclc=54424848}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref> while others like John Holt analyse adult education from a Marxist perspective.<ref>{{cite book |last=Holst |first=John D |title=Social movements, civil society, and radical adult education |date=2002 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0-89789-811-9 |oclc=47142191}}{{page needed|date=April 2022}}</ref>


Other developments include:
The death of "Marxism" in China has arguably been prematurely announced, but since the Hong Kong handover in 1997, the Beijing leadership has clearly retained final say over both commercial and political affairs.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}}


* the educational aesthetics of Marxist education<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ford |first1=Derek R. |last2=Lewis |first2=Tyson E. |title=On the Freedom to Be Opaque Monsters |journal=Cultural Politics |date=1 March 2018 |volume=14 |issue=1 |pages=95–108 |doi=10.1215/17432197-4312940 |s2cid=155093850}}</ref>
In 1991 the Soviet Union was dismantled and the new Russian state, alongside the other emerging republics, ceased to identify themselves with Marxism. Other nations around the world followed suit. Since then, radical Marxism or Communism has generally ceased to be a prominent political force in global politics, and has largely been replaced by more moderate versions of democratic socialism – or, more commonly, by ] capitalism. Marxism has also had to engage with the rise in the ]. Theorists including ] and ] have synthesized Marxism, socialism, ] and ] into an ideology known as ].<ref>{{cite web |title=An Ecosocialist Manifesto|url=http://www.iefd.org/manifestos/ecosocialist_manifesto.php|publisher=International Endowment for Democracy|accessdate=2 September 2010|author=Joel Kovel|author2=Michael Löwy|date=September 2001}}</ref>
* Marxist analyses of the role of fixed capital in capitalist education<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ford |first1=Derek R. |title=Spatializing Marxist Educational Theory: School, the Built Environment, Fixed Capital and (Relational) Space |journal=Policy Futures in Education |date=August 2014 |volume=12 |issue=6 |pages=784–793 |doi=10.2304/pfie.2014.12.6.784 |s2cid=147636876 |doi-access=free}}</ref>
* the educational psychology of capital<ref>{{Cite book |title=New Understanding of Capital in the Twenty-First Century |last=Rikowski |first=Glenn |publisher=] |year=2020 |isbn=978-8674193303 |location=Belgrade |pages=9–31 |editor-last=Pejnović |editor-first=Vesna Stanković |chapter=The Psychology of Capital |editor-last2=Matić |editor-first2=Ivan}}</ref>
* the educational theory of Lenin<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=FitzSimmons |first1=Robert |last2=Suoranta |first2=Juha |author2-link=Juha Suoranta |date=2020 |title=Lenin on Learning and the Development of Revolutionary Consciousness |url=http://www.jceps.com/archives/8208 |journal=] |volume=18 |issue=1 |pages=34–62 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=7 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407083016/http://www.jceps.com/archives/8208 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Malott |first1=Curry |title=Right-to-Work and Lenin's Communist Pedagogy: An Introduction |journal=Texas Education Review |volume=3 |issue=2 |date=2017 |doi=10.15781/T2ZW18X7W |doi-access=free |hdl=2152/45917 |hdl-access=free}}</ref>
* the pedagogical function of the Communist Party<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Boughton |first1=Bob |title=Popular education and the 'party line' |journal=] |date=June 2013 |volume=11 |issue=2 |pages=239–257 |doi=10.1080/14767724.2013.782189 |s2cid=143914501}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ford |first1=Derek R. |title=Studying like a communist: Affect, the Party, and the educational limits to capitalism |journal=] |date=16 April 2017 |volume=49 |issue=5 |pages=452–461 |doi=10.1080/00131857.2016.1237347 |s2cid=151616793|url=https://scholarship.depauw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1004&context=educ_facpubs}}</ref>


The latest field of research examines and develops Marxist pedagogy in the postdigital era.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ford |first1=Derek R. |last2=Jandrić |first2=Petar |title=Postdigital Marxism and education |journal=] |date=19 May 2021 |volume=56 |issue=1 |pages=1–7 |doi=10.1080/00131857.2021.1930530 |s2cid=236356457 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Carmichael |first1=Patrick |title=Postdigital Possibilities: Operaismo, Co-research, and Educational Inquiry |journal=Postdigital Science and Education |date=April 2020 |volume=2 |issue=2 |pages=380–396 |doi=10.1007/s42438-019-00089-0 |s2cid=214035791 |doi-access=free |hdl=10547/623793 |hdl-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ford |first1=Derek R. |title=Pedagogically Reclaiming Marx's Politics in the Postdigital Age: Social Formations and Althuserrian Pedagogical Gestures |journal=Postdigital Science and Education |date=October 2021 |volume=3 |issue=3 |pages=851–869 |doi=10.1007/s42438-021-00238-4 |s2cid=237850324}}</ref>
===Social democracy===
{{main|Social democracy}}
{{Social democracy sidebar}}
Social democracy is a ] that emerged in the late 19th and early 20th century. Many parties in the second half of the 19th century described themselves as social democratic, such as the British ], and the ]. In most cases these were revolutionary socialist or Marxist groups, who were not only seeking to introduce socialism, but also democracy in un-democratic countries. Many social democrats reject the idea that socialism can be accomplished only through ], revolution and dictatorship of the proletariat.


=== Historiography ===
The modern social democratic current came into being through a break within the socialist movement in the early 20th century, between two groups holding different views on the ideas of Karl Marx. Many related movements, including ], ], and ], arose at the same time (often by splitting from the main socialist movement, but also through the emergence of new theories) and had various, quite different objections to Marxism. The social democrats argued that socialism should be achieved through evolution rather than revolution. Such views were strongly opposed by the revolutionary socialists,<ref name="apriltheses">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/apr/04.htm|title=V. I. Lenin: The Tasks of the Proletariat in the Present Revolution (a.k.a. the April Theses)|work=]|accessdate=17 May 2011}}</ref><ref name="stateandrevolution">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/|title=The State and Revolution|last=Lenin|first=Vladimir|work=]|language=an English Translation|accessdate=17 May 2011}}</ref> who argued that any attempt to reform capitalism was doomed to fail, because the reformists would be gradually corrupted and eventually turn into capitalists themselves.
{{main|Marxist historiography}}
Marxist historiography is a school of ] influenced by Marxism, the chief tenets of which are the centrality of ] and ] constraints in determining historical outcomes. Marxist historiography has contributed to the history of the ], oppressed nationalities, and the ] of ]. Friedrich Engels' most important historical contribution was {{lang|de|Der deutsche Bauernkrieg}} about the ] which analysed social warfare in early Protestant Germany regarding emerging capitalist classes.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Wolf |first=Eric R. |date=Spring 1987 |title=The Peasant War in Germany: Friedrich Engels as Social Historian |journal=] |publisher=] |volume=51 |number=1 |pages=82–92 |jstor=40402763}}</ref> ''The German Peasants' War'' indicates the Marxist interest in ] with class analysis and attempts a dialectical analysis.<ref>{{cite book |title=The Elgar Companion to Marxist Economics |first1=Ben |last1=Fine |author1-link=Ben Fine |first2=Alfredo |last2=Saad-Filho |first3=Marco |last3=Boffo |date=January 2012 |publisher=] |page=212 |isbn=9781781001226 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xe0VQArHt8sC&q=determinism&pg=PA212}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=The Problem of Freedom in Marxist Thought |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A2WSBgAAQBAJ&q=marxist+history+deterministic&pg=PA5 |page=5 |first=J. J. |last=O'Rourke |date=6 December 2012 |publisher=] |isbn=9789401021203}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=Fifty Key Works of History and Historiography |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9pem7Ip_WUgC&pg=PA247 |first=Kenneth |last=Stunkel |date=23 May 2012 |page=247 |publisher=] |isbn=9781136723667}}</ref>


Engels' short treatise '']'' was salient in creating the ] impetus in British politics. Marx's most important works on social and political history include '']'', '']'', '']'', and those chapters of ''Capital'' dealing with the historical emergence of ] and ] from ] English society.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Krieger |first=Leonard |date=June 1953 |title=Marx and Engels as Historians |journal=] |volume=14 |number=3 |pages=381–403 |publisher=] |doi=10.2307/2707808 |jstor=2707808}}</ref> Marxist historiography suffered in the ] as the government requested overdetermined historical writing. Notable histories include the '']'', published in the 1930s to justify the nature of Bolshevik party life under ]. A ] inside the ] (CPGB) formed in 1946.<ref>{{cite web |first=Eric |last=Hobsbawm |title=The Historians' Group of the Communist Party |author-link=Eric Hobsbawm |date=9 June 2023 |url=https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/the-historians-group-of-the-communist-party |website=] Blog |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230610104315/https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/news/the-historians-group-of-the-communist-party |archive-date=10 June 2023}}</ref>
Despite their differences, the reformist and revolutionary branches of socialism remained united until the outbreak of ]. The war proved to be the final straw that pushed the tensions between them to breaking point.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} The reformist socialists supported their respective national governments in the war, a fact that was seen by the revolutionary socialists as outright treason against the ] (Since{{Citation needed|date=May 2012}} it betrayed the principle that the workers "have no nation", and the fact that usually the lowest classes are the ones sent into the war to fight, and die, putting the cause at the side). Bitter arguments ensued within socialist parties, as for example between ] (reformist socialist) and ] (revolutionary socialist) within the Social Democratic Party of Germany. Eventually, after the October Revolution, most of the world's socialist parties fractured. The reformist socialists kept the name "Social democrats", while the revolutionary socialists began calling themselves "Communists", and soon formed the modern Communist movement, the ].


While some members of the group, most notably ] and E. P. Thompson, left the CPGB after the ],<ref>{{cite book |title=The Crisis of Theory: E. P. Thompson, the New Left and Postwar British Politics |last=Hamilton |first=Scott |publisher=] |year=2012 |location=Manchester |chapter=Yesterday the struggle: 'Outside the Whale' and the fight for the 1930s |page=52}}</ref> the common points of British Marxist historiography continued in their works. Thompson's '']'' is one of the works commonly associated with this group.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Steinberg |first=Marc W. |date=April 1991 |title=The Re-Making of the English Working Class? |journal=Theory and Society |volume=20 |number=2 |pages=173–197 |doi=10.1007/BF00160182 |jstor=657718|hdl=2027.42/43644 |hdl-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Howell |first=David |date=10 October 2014 |title=Creativities in Contexts: E. P. Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class |journal=Contemporary British History |volume=28 |number=4 |pages=517–533 |doi=10.1080/13619462.2014.962918}}</ref> ]'s ''Bandits'' is another example of this group's work. ] was also a great pioneer of the 'history from below' approach. Living in Britain when he wrote his most notable work, '']'' (1938), he was an ] Marxist and so outside of the CPGB. In India, B. N. Datta and ] are the founding fathers of Marxist historiography. Today, the senior-most scholars of Marxist historiography are ], ], ], ], and ], most of whom are now over 75 years old.<ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Bottomore |editor-first=Thomas |editor-link=Thomas Bottomore |date=1991 |title=A Dictionary of Marxist Thought |publisher=] |page=54 |isbn=978-0631180821}}</ref>
Since the 1920s, doctrinal differences have been constantly growing between social democrats and Communists (who themselves are not unified on the way to achieve socialism), and Social Democracy is mostly used as a specifically Central European label for ] since then, especially in Germany and the Netherlands and especially since the 1959 ] of the German SPD that rejected the praxis of class struggle altogether.


===Socialism=== === Literary criticism ===
{{main|Socialism|Socialism (Marxism)}} {{main|Marxist literary criticism}}
{{More citations needed|date=June 2024}}
{{Socialism sidebar}}
Marxist literary criticism is a loose term describing ] based on ] and ] theories.<ref>{{cite book |first=Terry |last=Eagleton |author-link=Terry Eagleton |title=Marxism and Literary Criticism |location=Berkeley |publisher=] |date=1976}}</ref> Marxist criticism views ] as reflections of the ] from which they originate. According to Marxists, even literature is a social institution with a specific ideological function based on the background and ideology of the author. Marxist literary critics include ], ], ], and ].<ref>{{cite web |first=Daniel |last=Hartley |title=Marxist Literary Criticism: An Introductory Reading Guide |date=18 December 2023 |url=https://www.historicalmaterialism.org/marxist-literary-criticism-an-introductory-reading-guide/ |website=historicalmaterialism.org |archive-url= |archive-date=}}</ref>
The term ''socialism'' refers to two fundamentally different ideologies – democratic socialism and Marxist–Leninist socialism. The Marxist-Leninists sought to work towards a classless, stateless, moneyless society with a Marxist ideology by first creating a socialist state, which represents the proletariat. On the other hand, democratic socialists attempt to work towards an ideal state by social reform and are often little different from social democrats, with the democratic socialists having a more leftist stance.


=== Aesthetics ===
The Marxist–Leninist form of government has been in decline since the ] and its satellite states. Very few countries have governments that describe themselves as socialist in the Marxist sense; as of 2012, only ], ], ], ], and the People's Republic of China do so.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}}
{{main|Marxist aesthetics}}
{{More citations needed section|date=June 2024}}
Marxist aesthetics is a theory of ] based on or derived from the theories of ]. It involves a ] and ], or ], approach to the application of Marxism to the cultural sphere, specifically areas related to taste, such as art and beauty, among others. Marxists believe that economic and social conditions, and especially the class relations that derive from them affect every aspect of an individual's life, from religious beliefs to legal systems to cultural frameworks.<ref>{{cite book |last=Marcuse |first=Herbert |author-link=Herbert Marcuse |date=1978 |title=The Aesthetic Dimension: Toward a Critique of Marxist Aesthetics |title-link=The Aesthetic Dimension |chapter=Preface |publisher=] |isbn=0-8070-1518-0 |pages=ix–xiii}}</ref> Some notable Marxist aestheticians include ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and ].{{Citation needed|date=April 2021}}


== History ==
On the contrary, electoral parties that describe themselves as socialist or democratic socialist are on the rise, joined together by international organizations such as the ] and the ]. Parties described as socialist are currently dominant in the democracies of the developing world and serve as the ruling party or the main opposition party in most European democracies. ], and ] with a strong leftist tinge, are on the rise in European democracies.
=== Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels ===
{{main|Karl Marx|Friedrich Engels}}
]
Marx addressed the ] and ] of the working class, the ] and historical materialism.{{sfn|Guo|2011|p=1495}}{{sfn|Krupavičius|2011|p=314}} He is famous for analysing history in terms of class struggle, summarised in the initial line introducing '']'' (1848): "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles."<ref name="The Communist Manifesto">{{cite book |last1=Marx |first1=Karl |author1-link=Karl Marx |chapter=Bourgeois and Proletarians |title=The Communist Manifesto |date=1848 |location=London |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm#007 |access-date=12 March 2019 |publisher=] |archive-date=27 January 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180127164331/https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm#007 |url-status=live}}</ref>


Together with Marx, Engels co-developed communist theory. Marx and Engels first met in September 1844. Discovering that they had similar views of philosophy and socialism, they collaborated and wrote works such as {{lang|de|Die heilige Familie}} ('']''). After Marx was deported from France in January 1845, they moved to Belgium, which permitted greater ] than other European countries. In January 1846, they returned to Brussels to establish the ].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Beamish |first=Rob |date=18 March 1998 |title=The Making of the Manifesto |journal=] |volume=34 |pages=218–239 |url=https://socialistregister.com/index.php/srv/article/view/5708/2604}}</ref>
The characterization of a party or government often has little to do with its actual economical and social platform. The government of ], which describes itself as socialist, allows a large private sector to flourish and is socially conservative compared to most Western democracies. A more specific example is universal health-care, which is a trademark issue of many European socialist parties but does not exist in China. Therefore, the historical and cultural aspects of a movement must be taken into context in order for one to arrive at an accurate conclusion about its political ideology from its nominal characterization.


In 1847, they began writing ''The Communist Manifesto'' (1848), based on Engels' ''The Principles of Communism''. Six weeks later, they published the 12,000-word pamphlet in February 1848. In March, Belgium expelled them, and they moved to ], where they published the {{lang|de|]}}, a politically ] newspaper. By 1849, they had to leave Cologne for London. The Prussian authorities pressured the British government to expel Marx and Engels, but Prime Minister ] refused.{{Citation needed|date=April 2021}}
===Communism===
{{main|Communist state}}
{{Communism sidebar |Variants}}
A number of states declared an allegiance to the principles of Marxism and have been ruled by self-described Communist Parties, either as a ] or a single list, which includes formally several parties, as was the case in the ]. Due to the absolute dominance of the Communist Party in their governments, these states are often called "communist states" by Western political scientists. However, they have described themselves as "socialist", reserving the term "communism" for a future classless society,<ref name="marxismandnationalquestion" /> in which the state would no longer be necessary (on this understanding of communism, "communist state" would be an ]){{spaced ndash}}for instance, the ] was the Union of Soviet ''Socialist'' Republics.


After Marx died in 1883, Engels became the editor and translator of Marx's writings. With his '']'' (1884)—analysing ] ] as guaranteeing male social domination of women, a concept analogous, in communist theory, to the capitalist class's economic domination of the working class—Engels made ]ly significant contributions to ] and ].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Carver |first=Terrell |date=Winter 1985 |title=Engels's Feminism |journal=] |volume=6 |number=3 |pages=479–489 |jstor=26212414}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Sayers |first1=Janet |last2=Evans |first2=Mary |last3=Redclift |first3=Nanneke |date=1987 |chapter=Introduction: Engels, socialism, and feminism |title=Engels Revisited |publisher=] |isbn=9780203857212}}</ref>
Communist governments have historically been characterized by state ownership of productive resources in a ] and sweeping campaigns of economic restructuring such as ] of industry and ] (often focusing on ] or state farms.) While they promote collective ] of the means of production, Communist governments have been characterized by a totalitarian state apparatus in which decisions are made by the ruling Communist Party. Libertarian communists have characterized the Soviet model as ] or ] since the concentrated state played the part formerly capitalist played in economy.


=== Russian Revolution and the Soviet Union ===
====Marxism–Leninism====
{{main|Communist Party of the Soviet Union|Leninism|Marxism–Leninism|October Revolution|Trotskyism}}
{{main|Marxism–Leninism|Leninism}}
=== Onset ===
{{Marxism–Leninism sidebar |Related}}
{{multiple image
Marxism–Leninism, strictly speaking, refers to the ideology based upon the ] and the ] developed by Vladimir Lenin known as ]. However, in various contexts, different (and sometimes opposing) political groups have used the term "Marxism–Leninism" to denote the ideologies that they claimed to be upholding. The core ideological features of Marxism–Leninism are those of Marxism and Leninism, that is to say, belief in the necessity of a revolutionary overthrow of capitalism through ], to be followed by a ] as the first stage of moving towards communism, and the need for a ] to lead the proletariat in this effort. Those who view themselves as Marxist-Leninists, however, vary with regards to the leaders and thinkers that they choose to uphold as progressive (and to what extent).{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}}
| align = right
| total_width = 300
| image1 = Lenin in 1920 (cropped).jpg
| caption1 = ], founder of the ] and the leader of the ].
| image2 = Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R15068, Leo Dawidowitsch Trotzki.jpg
| caption2 = ], founder of the ] and a key figure in the ].
}}


With the ] in 1917, the ] took power from the ].<ref>{{cite book |last=Wade |first=Rex A. |author-link=Rex A. Wade |date=2004 |chapter="All Power to The Soviets": The Bolsheviks Take Power |title=Revolutionary Russia: New Approaches |publisher=] |isbn=0-203-33984-3 |page=211}}</ref> The Bolsheviks established the first ] based on the ideas of ] and ].<ref>{{cite book |last=Acton |first=Edward |title=Critical Companion to the Russian Revolution, 1914-1921 |editor1-first=Edward |editor1-last=Acton |editor2-first=Vladimir Iu. |editor2-last=Cherniaev |editor3-first=William G. |editor3-last=Rosenberg |year=1997 |publisher=] |isbn= |page=8}}</ref> Their newly formed federal state promised to end Russian involvement in ] and establish a revolutionary worker's state. Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as ], ] and ].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Adams |first1=Katherine H. |last2=Keene |first2=Michael L. |title=After the Vote Was Won: The Later Achievements of Fifteen Suffragists |date=10 January 2014 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=978-0-7864-5647-5 |page=109 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oyaxYvSG6gAC&dq=lenin+universal+literacy+after+the+vote+was+won&pg=PA109}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Ugri͡umov |first=Aleksandr Leontʹevich |title=Lenin's Plan for Building Socialism in the USSR, 1917–1925 |date=1976 |publisher=Novosti Press Agency Publishing House |page=48 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gXknAQAAMAAJ&q=lenin+universal+literacy}}</ref> 50,000 workers had passed a resolution in favour of Bolshevik demand for transfer of power to the ].<ref>{{cite book |last=Head |first=Michael |title=Evgeny Pashukanis: A Critical Reappraisal |date=12 September 2007 |publisher=] |isbn=978-1-135-30787-5 |pages=71–72 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PYGNAgAAQBAJ&dq=october+revolution+50+000+workers&pg=PT83}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Shukman |first=Harold |title=The Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Russian Revolution |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ScabEAAAQBAJ&dq=october+revolution+50+000+workers&pg=PA21 |publisher=] |date=5 December 1994 |page=21 |isbn=978-0-631-19525-2}}</ref> Following the October Revolution, the Soviet government struggled with the ] and several independence movements in the ]. This period is marked by the establishment of many socialist policies and the development of new socialist ideas, with ] becoming the dominant ideological strain.<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Bullock |editor1-first=Alan |editor1-link=Alan Bullock |editor2-last=Trombley |editor2-first=Stephen |editor2-link=Stephen Trombley |title=The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought |edition=Third |publisher=] |date=1999 |isbn=978-0006863830 |page=506}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |last=Lisichkin |first=G. |date=1989 |script-title=ru:Мифы и реальность |title=Mify i real'nost' |language=ru |trans-title=Myths and reality |magazine=] |volume=3 |pages=59}}</ref>
Leninism holds that capitalism can only be overthrown by revolutionary means; that is, any attempts to ''reform'' capitalism from within, such as social democracy, ] and non-revolutionary forms of democratic socialism, are doomed to fail due to the inherent contradictions of the capitalist and labour class relations.<ref name="marxismandnationalquestion">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1913/03.htm|title=Marxism and the National Question|work=]|accessdate=25 May 2011}}</ref> The first goal of a Leninist party is to educate the proletariat, so as to remove the various modes of perceived ] the bourgeois have instilled in them, instilled in order to make them more docile and easier to exploit economically, such as ] and ].{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} Once the proletariat has gained class consciousness the party will coordinate the proletariat's total might to overthrow the bourgeois government, thus the proletariat will seize all political and economic power. Lastly the proletariat (thanks to their education by the party) will implement a dictatorship of the proletariat which would bring upon them the construction and development of socialism, the lower phase of communism. After this, partisan and non-partisan distinction would essentially dissolve as the entire proletariat is elevated to the level of revolutionaries.


In 1919, the nascent Soviet Government established the ] and the ] for doctrinal Marxist study and to publish official ideological and research documents for the Russian Communist Party.<ref>{{cite book |last=David-Fox |first=Michael |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.7591/9781501705397 |title=Revolution of the Mind: Higher Learning among the Bolsheviks, 1918–1929 |date=1 November 2016 |publisher=] |doi=10.7591/9781501705397 |isbn=978-1-5017-0539-7}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Barber |first=John |date=1981 |title=Soviet Historians in Crisis, 1928-1932 |publisher=] |isbn=978-1-349-05239-4 |page=16}}</ref> With Lenin's death in 1924, there was an internal struggle in the Soviet Communist movement, mainly between ] and ], in the form of the ] and ], respectively. These struggles were based on both sides' different interpretations of Marxist and Leninist theory based on the situation of the ] at the time.<ref>{{cite book |last=McMeekin |first=Sean |date=2017 |title=The Russian Revolution: A New History |publisher=] |isbn=978-0465039906}}</ref>
The dictatorship of the proletariat refers to the absolute power of the working class. It is governed by a system of proletarian ], in which ], known in the October Revolution as "]".


====Trotskyism==== === Chinese Revolution ===
{{main|Anti-revisionism|Chinese Communist Party|Chinese Communist Revolution|Maoism|Socialism with Chinese Characteristics}}
{{main|Trotskyism}}
{{quote box|quote=The theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin is universally applicable. We should regard it not as a dogma, but as a guide to action. Studying it is not merely a matter of learning terms and phrases but of learning Marxism-Leninism as the science of revolution. It is not just a matter of understanding the general laws derived by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin from their extensive study of real life and revolutionary experience, but of studying their standpoint and method in examining and solving problems.|source=— ], '']''<ref>{{cite book |first=Tse Tung |last=Mao |author-link=Mao Zedong |url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/red-book/quotes.htm |title=Quotes from Mao Tse Tung |via=] |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=19 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220319081311/https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/red-book/quotes.htm |url-status=live}}</ref>|right|width=246px|bgcolor=#c6dbf7}}
Trotskyism is the theory of Marxism as advocated by ]. Trotsky considered himself a Bolshevik-Leninist, arguing for the establishment of a vanguard party. He considered himself an advocate of orthodox Marxism. His politics differed sharply from those of Stalin or Mao, most importantly in declaring the need for an international "]". Numerous groups around the world continue to describe themselves as Trotskyist and see themselves as standing in this tradition, although they have diverse interpretations of the conclusions to be drawn from this.
At the end of the ] and, more widely, ], the Chinese Communist Revolution occurred within the context of the ]. The ], founded in 1921, conflicted with the ] over the country's future. Throughout the Civil War, ] developed a theory of Marxism for the Chinese historical context. Mao found a large base of support in the peasantry as opposed to the Russian Revolution, which found its primary support in the urban centres of the Russian Empire. Some significant ideas contributed by Mao were the ideas of ], ] and ]. The ] (PRC) was declared in 1949. The new socialist state was to be founded on the ideas of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin.<ref>{{cite book |last=Franke |first=Wolfgang |title=A Century of Chinese Revolution, 1851–1949 |publisher=Basil Blackwell |location=Oxford |date=1970}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Ellison |editor-first=Herbert J. |title=The Sino-Soviet Conflict: A Global Perspective |date=1982 |url=https://www.questia.com/library/101611113/the-sino-soviet-conflict-a-global-perspective |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200803181900/https://www.questia.com/library/101611113/the-sino-soviet-conflict-a-global-perspective |archive-date=3 August 2020}}</ref>


From Stalin's death until the late 1960s, there was increased conflict between China and the Soviet Union. ], which first began under ], and the policy of ], were seen as ] and insufficiently Marxist. This ideological confrontation spilt into a broader global crisis centred around which nation was to lead the international socialist movement.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/1964/phnycom.htm |title=1964: On Khrushchov's Phoney Communism and Its Historical Lessons for the World |last=Mao |first=Zedong |author-link=Mao Zedong |date=July 1964 |via=] |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=30 May 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200530131843/https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/1964/phnycom.htm |url-status=live}}</ref>
Trotsky advocated proletarian revolution as set out in his theory of "permanent revolution", and he argued that in countries where the bourgeois-democratic revolution had not triumphed already (in other words, in places that had not yet implemented a capitalist democracy, such as Russia before 1917), it was necessary that the proletariat make it permanent by carrying out the tasks of the social revolution (the "socialist" or "communist" revolution) at the same time, in an uninterrupted process. Trotsky believed that a new socialist state would not be able to hold out against the pressures of a hostile capitalist world unless socialist revolutions quickly took hold in other countries as well, especially in the industrial powers with a developed proletariat.


Following Mao's death and the ascendancy of ], Maoism and official Marxism in China were reworked. Commonly referred to as ], this new path was initially centred around ], which claims to uphold Marxism–Leninism and Maoism, while adapting them to Chinese conditions.<ref>{{cite news |title=The Years of Hardship and Danger |url=http://cpcchina.chinadaily.com.cn/people/2010-09/14/content_11301454_6.htm |access-date=24 October 2017 |work=] |date=14 September 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171024153451/http://cpcchina.chinadaily.com.cn/people/2010-09/14/content_11301454_6.htm |archive-date=24 October 2017 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=Wei-Wei |last=Zhang |title=Ideology and economic reform under Deng Xiaoping, 1978–1993 |publisher=] |date=1996}}</ref> Deng Xiaoping Theory was based on ], which sought to uphold the central role of the Chinese Communist Party and uphold the principle that China was in the ] and that it was still working to build a communist society based on Marxist principles.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Schram |first1=Stuart |year=1989 |title=The Thought of Mao Tse-Tung |publisher=] |isbn=978-0521310628}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://en.people.cn/dengxp/vol2/text/b1290.html |title=Uphold the Four Cardinal Principles |date=30 March 1979 |access-date=27 March 2020 |work=] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190827102126/http://en.people.cn/dengxp/vol2/text/b1290.html |archive-date=27 August 2019 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Shambaugh |first1=David |title=The Modern Chinese State |year=2000 |publisher=] |isbn=9780521776035 |page=184}}</ref>
On the ] of Marxism, Trotskyists are considered to be on the left. They fervently support democracy, oppose political deals with the imperialist powers, and advocate a spreading of the revolution until it becomes global.


=== Late 20th century ===
Trotsky developed the theory that the Russian workers' state had become a "]". Capitalist rule had not been restored, and nationalized industry and economic planning, instituted under Lenin, were still in effect.<ref name=TrotskyTRB>{{cite web|last=Trotsky|first=Leon|title=''The Revolution Betrayed''|url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/revbet/ch09.htm|work=]|accessdate=5 June 2013|quote=The Soviet Union is a contradictory society halfway between capitalism and socialism, in which: (a) the productive forces are still far from adequate to give the state property a socialist character; (b) the tendency toward primitive accumulation created by want breaks out through innumerable pores of the planned economy;&nbsp;... (g) a further development of the accumulating contradictions can as well lead to socialism as back to capitalism; (h) on the road to capitalism the counterrevolution would have to break the resistance of the workers; (i) on the road to socialism the workers would have to overthrow the bureaucracy.}}</ref> However, the state was controlled by a bureaucratic caste with interests hostile to those of the working class. Trotsky defended the Soviet Union against attack from imperialist powers and against internal ], but called for a ] within the USSR to restore socialist democracy. He argued that if the working class did not take power away from the Stalinist bureaucracy, the bureaucracy would restore capitalism in order to enrich itself.<ref name=TrotskyTRB /> In the view of many Trotskyists, this is exactly what has happened since the beginning of ] and ] in the USSR. Some{{who|date=October 2010}} argue that the adoption of ] by the People's Republic of China has also led to capitalist counter-revolution.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} Most modern Trotskyist organisations are organised internationally, such as the ], ] and the ]. They are mostly rather small groupings.
{{Further|Cold War}}
] at the ] in 1960]]
In 1959, the ] led to the victory of ] and his ]. Although the revolution was not explicitly socialist, upon victory, Castro ascended to the position of prime minister and adopted the ] model of socialist development, allying with the Soviet Union.{{sfn|Bourne|1986}}{{sfn|Coltman|2003}} One of the leaders of the revolution, the Argentine Marxist revolutionary ], subsequently went on to aid revolutionary socialist movements in ] and Bolivia, eventually being killed by the Bolivian government, possibly on the orders of the ] (CIA), although the CIA agent sent to search for Guevara, Felix Rodriguez, expressed a desire to keep him alive as a possible bargaining tool with the Cuban government. He posthumously went on to become an internationally recognised icon.<ref>{{cite news |title=Cuba pays tribute to Che Guevara |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7033880.stm |work=] |access-date=14 June 2018 |date=9 October 2007 |language=en |archive-url= |archive-date=}}</ref>


In the ], the ] government undertook the ] from 1966 to 1976 to purge Chinese society of capitalist elements and achieve socialism. Upon ]'s death, his rivals seized political power, and under the leadership of ], many of Mao's Cultural Revolution era policies were revised or abandoned, and a large increase in privatised industry was encouraged.<ref>{{cite news |date=22 October 2011 |title=Deng Xiaoping's legacy: The Great Stabiliser |newspaper=] |url=https://www.economist.com/books-and-arts/2011/10/22/the-great-stabiliser |url-status=live |access-date=14 September 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190506090043/https://www.economist.com/books-and-arts/2011/10/22/the-great-stabiliser |archive-date=6 May 2019}}</ref><ref>{{bulleted list|
====Chinese communism====
|{{cite news |url=http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/mediafile/200607/05/F2006070515295500635.swf |title=Selected Works of Deng Xiaopeng Volume 1 (1938–1965) |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080510060245/http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/mediafile/200607/05/F2006070515295500635.swf |archive-date=10 May 2008 |url-status=dead}}
{{main|Ideology of the Communist Party of China}}
|{{cite news |url=http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/mediafile/200607/05/F2006070515261400629.swf |title=Selected Works of Deng Xiaopeng Volume 2 (1975–1982) |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080403035549/http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/mediafile/200607/05/F2006070515261400629.swf |archive-date=3 April 2008 |url-status=dead}}
|{{cite news |url=http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/mediafile/200607/05/F2006070515274900631.swf |title=Selected Works of Deng Xiaopeng Volume 3 (1982–1992) |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080316192034/http://english.cpc.people.com.cn/mediafile/200607/05/F2006070515274900631.swf |archive-date=16 March 2008 |url-status=dead}}
}}</ref>


The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the collapse of most of those socialist states that had professed a ] ideology. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the emergence of the ] and ] capitalism as the dominant ideological trends in Western politics championed by United States president ] and British prime minister ] led the West to take a more aggressive stance towards the Soviet Union and its Leninist allies. Meanwhile, the reformist ] became ] in March 1985 and sought to abandon Leninist development models toward ]. Ultimately, Gorbachev's reforms, coupled with rising levels of popular ], led to the ] in late 1991 into a series of constituent nations, all of which abandoned Marxist–Leninist models for socialism, with most converting to capitalist economies.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/12/resources/5037?stylename=yul.ead2002.xhtml.xsl&pid=mssa:ms.0650&query=&clear-stylesheet-cache=yes&hlon=yes&big=&adv=&filter=&hitPageStart=&sortFields=&view=all |title=Collection: Cuban revolution collection &#124; Archives at Yale |website=Archives.yale.edu |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=10 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220410194038/https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/12/resources/5037?stylename=yul.ead2002.xhtml.xsl&pid=mssa:ms.0650&query=&clear-stylesheet-cache=yes&hlon=yes&big=&adv=&filter=&hitPageStart=&sortFields=&view=all |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=D'Encausse |first=Helene Carrere |date=1993 |title=The End of the Soviet Empire: The Triumph of the Nations |translator-first=F. |translator-last=Philip |location=New York |publisher=] |isbn=978-0465098125 |page=16}}</ref>
=====Maoism=====
{{main|Maoism}}
{{Maoism sidebar}}
Maoism or Mao Zedong Thought ({{zh|s=毛泽东思想|t=毛澤東思想|p=Máo Zédōng Sīxiǎng}}), is a variant of ] derived from the teachings of the Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong (]: "Mao Tse-tung").


=== 21st century ===
The term "Mao Zedong Thought" has always been the preferred term by the ], and the word "Maoism" has never been used in its English-language publications except ]ly. Likewise, Maoist groups{{Which|date=November 2010}} outside China have usually called themselves Marxist–Leninist rather than Maoist, a reflection of Mao's view that he did not change, but only developed, Marxism–Leninism. However, some{{Who|date=November 2008}} Maoist groups believing Mao's theories to have been sufficiently substantial additions to the basics of the Marxist ], call themselves "Marxist-Leninist-Maoist" or simply "Maoist".
] casting a vote in 2007]]
At the turn of the 21st century, China, Cuba, Laos, North Korea, and Vietnam remained the only officially Marxist–Leninist states remaining, although a Maoist government led by ] was elected into power in Nepal in 2008 following a long guerrilla struggle.<ref>{{cite web |title=List Of Communist Countries Today |url=https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/list-of-communist-countries-today.html |access-date=2 May 2021 |website=WorldAtlas |date=30 November 2018 |language=en-US |archive-date=2 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210502194059/https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/list-of-communist-countries-today.html |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=New Maoist-led government installed in Nepal |url=https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2008/09/nepa-s02.html |access-date=2 May 2021 |website=World Socialist Web Site |date=2 September 2008 |archive-date=2 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210502194101/https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2008/09/nepa-s02.html |url-status=live}}</ref>


The early 21st century also saw the election of socialist governments in several Latin American nations, in what has come to be known as the "]"; dominated by the Venezuelan government of ]; this trend also saw the election of ] in Bolivia, ] in Ecuador, and ] in Nicaragua. Forging political and economic alliances through international organisations like the ], these socialist governments allied themselves with Marxist–Leninist Cuba. Although none espoused a Stalinist path directly, most admitted to being significantly influenced by Marxist theory. Venezuelan president ] declared himself a ] during the swearing-in of his cabinet two days before his inauguration on 10 January 2007.<ref>{{cite news|first=Nathalie |last=Malinarich |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6246219.stm |publisher=] |title=Chavez accelerates on path to socialism |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170912102355/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6246219.stm |archive-date=12 September 2017 |access-date=19 June 2007}}</ref> Venezuelan Trotskyist organisations do not regard Chávez as a Trotskyist, with some describing him as a bourgeois nationalist,<ref>{{cite web|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071010152457/http://www.jir.org.ve/article.php3?id_article=211 |url=http://www.jir.org.ve/article.php3?id_article=211 |title=Declaración Polãtica de la JIR, como Fracción Pública del PRS, por una real independencia de clase (Extractos) – Juventud de Izquierda Revolucionaria |language=es |trans-title=Political Declaration of the JIR, as a Public Fraction of the PRS, for a real class independence (Excerpts) – Revolutionary Left Youth |archive-date=10 October 2007 |access-date=26 July 2013}}</ref> while others consider him an honest revolutionary leader who made significant mistakes due to him lacking a Marxist analysis.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://venezuela.elmilitante.org/content/view/6417/182/ |last=Sanabria |first=William |title=La Enmienda Constitucional, Orlando Chirino y la C-CURA |language=es |trans-title=The Constitutional Amendment, Orlando Chirino and the C-CURA |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091218105614/http://venezuela.elmilitante.org/content/view/6417/182/ |archive-date=18 December 2009}}</ref>
In the People's Republic of China, Mao Zedong Thought is part of the official doctrine of the Communist Party of China, but since the 1978 beginning of Deng Xiaoping's ]-oriented reforms, the concept of "]" has come to the forefront of Chinese politics, ] has taken hold, and the official definition and role of Mao's original ] in the PRC has been radically altered and reduced (see '']'').


For Italian Marxist ] and ] in their 2011 book '']'', "this new weak communism differs substantially from its previous Soviet (and current Chinese) realisation, because the South American countries follow democratic electoral procedures and also manage to decentralise the state bureaucratic system through the ]. In sum, if weakened communism is felt as a spectre in the West, it is not only because of media distortions but also for the alternative it represents through the same democratic procedures that the West constantly professes to cherish but is hesitant to apply."<ref>{{cite book |first1=Gianni |last1=Vattimo |first2=Santiago |last2=Zabala |title=Hermeneutic Communism: From Heidegger to Marx |publisher=] |date=2011 |page=122 |isbn=9780231528078}}</ref>
Unlike the earlier forms of Marxism–Leninism in which the urban proletariat was seen as the main source of revolution, and the countryside was largely ignored, Mao believed that peasantry could be the main force behind a revolution, led by the proletariat and a vanguard Communist party. The model for this was of course the Chinese communist rural Protracted People's War of the 1920s and 1930s, which eventually brought the Communist Party of China to power.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} Furthermore, unlike other forms of Marxism–Leninism in which large-scale industrial development was seen as a positive force, Maoism made all-round rural development the priority.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}}


], ] since 2012]]
Mao felt that this strategy made sense during the early stages of socialism in a country in which most of the people were peasants.
] ] ] has announced a deepening commitment of the Chinese Communist Party to the ideas of Marx. At an event celebrating the 200th anniversary of Marx's birth, Xi said, "We must win the advantages, win the initiative, and win the future. We must continuously improve the ability to use Marxism to analyse and solve practical problems", adding that Marxism is a "powerful ideological weapon for us to understand the world, grasp the law, seek the truth, and change the world." Xi has further stressed the importance of examining and continuing the tradition of the CPC and embracing its revolutionary past.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-marx-china/no-regrets-xi-says-marxism-still-totally-correct-for-china-idUSKBN1I50ET |title=No regrets: Xi says Marxism still 'totally correct' for China |first=Christian |last=Shepherd |newspaper=] |date=4 May 2018 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=20 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220420043317/https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-marx-china/no-regrets-xi-says-marxism-still-totally-correct-for-china-idUSKBN1I50ET |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/17/asia/xi-jinping-marxism-china-intl/index.html |title=At the height of his power, China's Xi Jinping moves to embrace Marxism |first=Steven |last=Jiang |website=] |date=18 May 2018 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=7 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407074735/https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/17/asia/xi-jinping-marxism-china-intl/index.html |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://qz.com/1270109/chinas-communist-party-and-xi-jinping-are-celebrating-the-200th-birthday-of-karl-marx-with-a-vengeance/ |title=China's huge celebrations of Karl Marx are not really about Marxism |website=Qz.com |date=4 May 2018 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=10 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220410194139/https://qz.com/1270109/chinas-communist-party-and-xi-jinping-are-celebrating-the-200th-birthday-of-karl-marx-with-a-vengeance/ |url-status=live}}</ref>
Unlike most other political ideologies, including other socialist and Marxist ones, Maoism contains an integral ] doctrine and explicitly connects its political ideology with ]. In Maoist thought, "political power grows from the barrel of the gun" (a famous quote by Mao), and the ] can be mobilized to undertake a "]" of armed struggle involving ] in three stages.


The fidelity of those varied revolutionaries, leaders and parties to the work of ] is highly contested and has been rejected by many Marxists and other socialists alike.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Phillips |first=Ben |year=1981 |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-7/cpml-ussr.htm |title=USSR: Capitalist or Socialist? |journal=The Call |volume=10 |issue=8 |access-date=16 July 2020 |archive-date=29 June 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150629124947/https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-7/cpml-ussr.htm |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Garner |first=Dwight |date=18 August 2009 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/19/books/19garner.html |title=Fox Hunter, Party Animal, Leftist Warrior |newspaper=] |access-date=31 August 2020 |archive-date=27 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200727061411/https://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/19/books/19garner.html |url-status=live}}</ref> Socialists in general and socialist writers, including ], acknowledge that the actions of ] leaders have damaged "the enormous appeal of socialism generated by the October Revolution."<ref>{{cite book |last=Volkogonov |first=Dimitri |date=1991 |title=Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy |translator-first=Harold |translator-last=Shukman |location=London |publisher=] |pages=173 |isbn=978-0297810803}}</ref>
=====Socialism with Chinese characteristics=====
{{main|Socialism with Chinese characteristics}}
Socialism with Chinese characteristics ({{zh | t={{linktext|中國|特色|社會主義}} | s={{linktext|中国|特色|社会主义}} | p=Zhōngguótèsè shèhuìzhǔyì}}), literally the modern form of Chinese Marxism, is the official ideology of the CPC based upon ]. This ideology supports the creation of a ] dominated by the public sector since China is in the ].{{citation needed|date=September 2014}} The Chinese government maintains that it has not abandoned Marxism but has developed many of the terms and concepts of Marxist theory to accommodate reality.{{citation needed|date=September 2014}} The CPC argues that socialism is compatible with these economic policies.{{citation needed|date=September 2014}} In current Chinese Communist thinking, China is in the primary stage of socialism{{mdash}}a view which explains the Chinese government's flexible economic policies to develop into an industrialized nation.{{citation needed|date=September 2014}}


====Left communism==== == Criticism ==
{{main|Left communism}} {{main|Criticism of Marxism}}
{{see also|Criticism of communist party rule|Criticism of socialism}}
{{Left communism sidebar}}
Criticism of Marxism has come from various political ideologies and academic disciplines.<ref>{{cite book |last=Kirby |first=Mark |title=Sociology in Perspective |year=2000 |publisher=Heinemann |isbn=978-0435331603 |page=273}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Ollman |first=Bertell |title=Criticisms of Marxism 1880–1930 |year=1957 |publisher=] |pages=1, 6}}</ref> This includes general criticism about lack of internal consistency, criticisms related to historical materialism, that it is a type of historical determinism, the necessity of suppression of individual rights, issues with the implementation of communism and economic issues such as the distortion or absence of price signals and reduced incentives. In addition, empirical and epistemological problems are frequently identified.<ref>{{cite book |first1=M. C. |last1=Howard |first2=J. E. |last2=King |date=1992 |title=A History of Marxian Economics |volume=II, 1929–1990 |location=Princeton, NJ |publisher=]}}</ref><ref name=popper>{{cite book |last=Popper |first=Karl |author-link=Karl Popper |title=Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge |publisher=Routledge |year=2002 |isbn=978-0415285940 |page=49}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author-link=John Maynard Keynes |last=Keynes |first=John Maynard |date=1991 |title=Essays in Persuasion |publisher=] |pages=300 |isbn=978-0393001907}}</ref>
{{POV-check|section|date=May 2011}}
Left communism is the range of communist viewpoints held by the Communist Left, which criticizes the political ideas of the Bolsheviks from a position that is asserted to be more authentically Marxist and proletarian than the views of Leninism held by the ] after its first two Congresses.


Some Marxists have criticised the academic ]alisation of Marxism for being too shallow and detached from political action.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Horton |first=John |title=A Contribution to the Critique of Academic Marxism: Or How the Intellectuals Liquidate Class Struggle |journal=Synthesis–Fall 1977 |date=1977 |volume=2 |number=1/2 |pages=78–104 |publisher=Social Justice/Global Options |jstor=43783343}}</ref> Zimbabwean ] ], himself a professional academic, stated: "Its practitioners remind one of ], who in the Greek legend fell in love with his own reflection. ... Sometimes it is necessary to devote time to clarifying and developing the concepts that we use, but indeed for Western Marxists this has become an end in itself. The result is a body of writings incomprehensible to all but a tiny minority of highly qualified scholars."{{sfn|Callinicos|2010|p=12}}
Two major traditions can be observed within Left communism: the ]-] tradition; and the ] tradition. The political positions those traditions have in common are a shared opposition to what is termed '']'', nationalism, all kinds of national liberation movements and ] and there is an underlying commonality at a level of abstract theory. Crucially, Left Communist groups from both traditions tend to identify elements of commonality in each other.{{Vague|date=October 2010}}


Additionally, some intellectual critiques of Marxism contest certain assumptions prevalent in Marx's thought and Marxism after him without rejecting Marxist politics.<ref>{{cite book |last=Baudrillard |first=Jean |author-link=Jean Baudrillard |year=1975 |orig-date=1973 |title=] |translator-first=Mark |translator-last=Poster |location=New York |publisher=] |isbn=978-0914386063}}</ref> Other contemporary supporters of Marxism argue that many aspects of Marxist thought are viable but that the corpus is incomplete or outdated regarding certain aspects of economic, political or ]. They may combine some Marxist concepts with the ideas of other theorists such as ]—the ] is one example.<ref>{{cite book |last=Held |first=David |date=October 1980 |title=Introduction to Critical Theory: Horkheimer to Habermas |publisher=] |pages=16 |isbn=9780520041752}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Jameson |first1=Fredric |chapter=The Theoretical Hesitation: Benjamin's Sociological Predecessor |pages=11–30 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XSL3gr4m_k8C&pg=PA11 |editor1-last=Nealon |editor1-first=Jeffrey T. |editor2-last=Irr |editor2-first=Caren |title=Rethinking the Frankfurt School: Alternative Legacies of Cultural Critique |date=2002 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0791454923 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=7 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407083202/https://books.google.com/books?id=XSL3gr4m_k8C&pg=PA11 |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref>
The historical origins of Left Communism can be traced to the period before the ], but it only came into focus after 1918 . All{{According to whom|date=October 2010}} Left Communists were supportive of the October Revolution in Russia,{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} but retained a critical view of its development. Some,{{Which|date=November 2010}} however, would in later years come to reject the idea that the revolution had a proletarian or socialist nature, asserting that it had simply carried out the tasks of the bourgeois revolution by creating a ] system.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}}


=== General ===
Left Communism first came into being as a clear movement in or around 1918.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} Its essential features were: a stress on the need to build a ] entirely separate from the ] and ] elements who were seen as having betrayed socialism in 1914, opposition to all but the most restricted participation in ], and an emphasis on the need for revolutionaries to move on the offensive.{{Citation needed|date=October 2010}} Apart from that, there was little in common between the various wings. Only the Italians{{Or|date=October 2010}} accepted the need for electoral work at all for a very short period of time, and the German-Dutch, Italian and Russian wings opposed the "right of nations to self-determination", which they denounced as a form of ].
Philosopher and historian of ideas ] said that "Marx's theory is incomplete or ambiguous in many places, and could be 'applied' in many contradictory ways without manifestly infringing its principles." Specifically, he considers "the laws of dialectics" as fundamentally erroneous, stating that some are "truisms with no specific Marxist content", others "philosophical dogmas that cannot be proved by scientific means", and some just "nonsense"; he believes that some Marxist laws can be interpreted differently, but that these interpretations still in general fall into one of the two categories of error.{{sfn|Kołakowski|2005|pp=662, 909}}


] shows that if capitalists use cost-cutting techniques and real wages do not increase, the rate of profit must rise, which casts doubt on Marx's view that the rate of profit would tend to fall.<ref>{{cite book |first1=M. C. |last1=Howard |first2=J. E. |last2=King |date=1992 |title=A History of Marxian Economics |volume=II, 1929–1990 |chapter=7 |at=§§II–IV |location=Princeton, NJ |publisher=]}}</ref>
===Dispute that the Soviet Union was Marxist===
Marx defined "communism" as a classless, egalitarian and stateless society. To Marx, the notion of a communist state would have seemed an oxymoron,<ref name="State Capitalism"> Raya Dunayevskaya under the name of Freddie James 1941</ref><ref name="Guide to the Communist Manifesto"></ref><ref name="Never Been A Communist Regime"></ref> as he defined communism as the phase reached when class society and the state had already been abolished. Once the lower stage towards communism, commonly referred to as socialism, had been established, society would develop new social relations over the course of several generations, reaching what Marx called the higher phase of communism when not only bourgeois relations but all class social relations had been abandoned. Such a development has yet to occur in any historical self-claimed socialist state.<ref name="State Capitalism"/><ref name="Guide to the Communist Manifesto"/><ref name="Never Been A Communist Regime"/>


The allegations of inconsistency have been a large part of Marxian economics and the debates around it since the 1970s.<ref>{{cite book |first1=M. C. |last1=Howard |first2=J. E. |last2=King |date=1992 |title=A History of Marxian Economics |volume=1929–1990 |chapter=7 |location=Princeton, NJ |publisher=]}}</ref> ] argues that this undermines Marx's critiques and the correction of the alleged inconsistencies because internally inconsistent theories cannot be correct by definition.<ref name="Kliman-P3">{{harvnb|Kliman|2007|p=3|ps=: "Marx's value theory would be ''necessarily wrong'' if it were internally inconsistent. Internally inconsistent theories may be appealing, intuitively plausible and even obvious, and consistent with all available empirical evidence—but they cannot be right. It is necessary to reject them or correct them. Thus the alleged proofs of inconsistency trump all other considerations, disqualifying Marx's theory at the starting gate. By doing so, they provide the principal justification for the suppression of this theory as well as the suppression of, and the denial of resources needed to carry out, present-day research based upon it. This greatly inhibits its further development. So does the very charge of inconsistency. What person of intellectual integrity would want to join a research program founded on (what he believes to be) a theory that is internally inconsistent and therefore false?"}}, However, in his book, Kliman presents an interpretation where these inconsistencies can be eliminated. The connection between the inconsistency allegations and the lack of study of Marx's theories was argued further by {{cite magazine |last=Cassidy |first=John |author-link=John Cassidy (journalist) |title=The Return of Karl Marx |magazine=] |date=20–27 October 1997 |page=252 |quote=His mathematical model of the economy, which depended on the idea that labor is the source of all value, was riven with internal inconsistencies and is rarely studied these days.}}</ref>
Even within the Stalinist state at its height, there were repressed<ref name="State Capitalism"/> expressions of Marxist orthodoxy, revealed after the fall of the USSR, arguing that it had developed new class structures: those who are in government and therefore have power (sometimes referred to as the ]), and those who are not in government and do not have power, the working class. This is taken to be a different form of capitalism, in which the government, as owner of the means of production, takes on the role formerly played by the capitalist class; this arrangement is referred to as "]."<ref name="State Capitalism"/> These statist regimes have generally followed a ] model without making a transition to this hypothetical final stage.<ref name="chomsky.info"/>


=== Epistemological and empirical ===
Some academics such as ] dispute the claim that the political movements in the former Soviet Union were Marxist.<ref name="chomsky.info"> Chomsky, 1986</ref> Communist governments have historically been characterized by state ownership of productive resources in a planned economy and sweeping campaigns of economic restructuring such as nationalization of industry and ] (often focusing on ] or state farms). While they promote collective ] of the means of production, Communist governments have been characterized by a strong state apparatus in which decisions are made by the ruling Communist Party. Dissident communists have characterized the Soviet model as ] or state capitalism.
Critics of Marxism claim that Marx's predictions have failed, with some pointing towards the GDP per capita generally increasing in capitalist economies compared to less market-oriented economics, the capitalist economies not suffering worsening economic crises leading to the overthrow of the capitalist system and communist revolutions not occurring in the most advanced capitalist nations, but instead in undeveloped regions.{{sfn|Kliman|2007|p=208}}<ref>{{cite web |url=http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.KD.ZG |title=GDP per capita growth (annual %) |date=2016 |publisher=] |access-date=22 May 2016 |archive-date=15 May 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160515232458/http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.KD.ZG |url-status=live}}</ref> It has also been criticised for allegedly resulting in lower living standards in relation to capitalist countries, a claim that has been disputed.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Cereseto |first1=S |last2=Waitzkin |first2=H |title=Economic development, political-economic system, and the physical quality of life. |journal=] |date=June 1986 |volume=76 |issue=6 |pages=661–666 |doi=10.2105/ajph.76.6.661 |pmid=3706593 |pmc=1646771}}</ref>


In his books, '']'' and '']'', philosopher of science ] criticised the ] and ] of historical materialism.<ref name="Popper-1963">{{cite web |url=http://www.stephenjaygould.org |title=Science as Falsification |last=Popper |first=Karl |author-link=Karl Popper |date=1963 |website=Stephenjaygould.org |access-date=22 November 2015 |archive-date=13 November 2004 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041113084448/http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ |url-status=live}}</ref> Popper believed that Marxism had been initially scientific in that Marx had postulated a genuinely predictive theory. When these predictions were not borne out, Popper argues that the theory avoided ] by adding ad hoc hypotheses that made it compatible with the facts. Because of this, Popper asserted, a theory that was initially genuinely scientific degenerated into ] dogma.<ref name="Popper-2002">{{cite book |last1=Popper |first1=Karl Raimund |author1-link=Karl Popper |title=Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge |date=2002 |publisher=] |isbn=978-0415285940 |page=449 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IENmxiVBaSoC&pg=PA449 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=7 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407083053/https://books.google.com/books?id=IENmxiVBaSoC&pg=PA449 |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref>
==Variants==
Marxists can interpret the ''Manifesto'' differently, and therefore all variants cannot be covered in this article.


=== Anarchist and libertarian ===
===Marxism–Leninism===
{{main|Anarchism and Marxism|Libertarian socialism#Marxist}}
{{Main|Marxism–Leninism}}
] has had a strained relationship with Marxism. Anarchists and many non-Marxist libertarian socialists reject the need for a ], claiming that socialism can only be established through decentralised, non-coercive organisation.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Benjamin |last=Franks |date=2012 |title=Between Anarchism and Marxism: the beginnings and ends of the schism… |journal=] |volume=17 |number=2 |pages=207–227 |doi=10.1080/13569317.2012.676867}}</ref> Anarchist ] criticised Marx for his authoritarian bent.<ref name=Bakunin1872>{{citation |last=Bakunin |first=Mikhail |author-link=Mikhail Bakunin |title=Letter to ''La Liberté'', quoted in ''Bakunin on Anarchy'', translated and edited by Sam Dolgoff, 1971 |date=5 October 1872 |url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/bakunin/works/1872/la-liberte.htm |via=] |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=19 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220319081314/https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/bakunin/works/1872/la-liberte.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> The phrases "barracks socialism" or "]" became shorthand for this critique, evoking the image of citizens' lives being as regimented as the lives of ]s in ].<ref name="Sperber_2013">{{cite book |last=Sperber |first=Jonathan |author-link=Jonathan Sperber |year=2013 |title=Karl Marx: A Nineteenth-Century Life |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hBpSh9JYAKcC |publisher=] |isbn=978-0871403544 |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=26 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211026144010/https://books.google.com/books?id=hBpSh9JYAKcC |url-status=live |via=]}}</ref>


=== Economic ===
At least in terms of adherents and the impact on the world stage, Marxism–Leninism, also known colloquially as Bolshevism or simply communism is the biggest trend within Marxism, easily dwarfing all of the other schools of thought combined.<ref>For example, the Communist Party of China alone has more than 66 million members. See http://www.chinatoday.com/org/cpc/</ref> Marxism–Leninism is a term originally coined by the ] in order to denote the ideology that Vladimir Lenin had built upon the thought of Karl Marx. There are two broad areas that have set apart Marxism–Leninism as a school of thought.
Other critiques come from an economic standpoint. ] writing in 1898,<ref>{{cite book |first=V. K. |last=Dmitriev |author-link=Vladimir Karpovich Dmitriev |date=1974 |orig-date=1898 |title=Economic Essays on Value, Competition and Utility |location=Cambridge |publisher=]}}</ref> ] writing in 1906–1907,<ref>{{bulleted list|
|{{cite journal |first=Ladislaus |last=von Bortkiewicz |author-link=Ladislaus Bortkiewicz |date=1952 |orig-date=1906–1907 |title=Value and Price in the Marxian System |journal=International Economic Papers |volume=2 |pages=5–60}}
|{{cite book |first=Ladislaus |last=von Bortkiewicz |author-link=Ladislaus Bortkiewicz |date=1984 |orig-date=1907 |chapter=On the Correction of Marx's Fundamental Theoretical Construction in the Third Volume of Capital |editor-first=Eugen von |editor-last=Böhm-Bawerk |editor-link=Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk |title=Karl Marx and the Close of his System |location=Philadelphia |publisher=Orion Editions}}
}}</ref> and subsequent critics have alleged that Marx's ] and the law of the ] are internally inconsistent. In other words, the critics allege that Marx drew conclusions that do not follow his theoretical premises. Once these alleged errors are corrected, his conclusion that aggregate price and profit are determined by and equal to the aggregate value and surplus value no longer holds. This result calls into question his theory that exploiting workers is the sole source of profit.<ref>{{cite book |first1=M. C. |last1=Howard |first2=J. E. |last2=King |date=1992 |title=A History of Marxian Economics |volume=II, 1929–1990 |chapter=12 |at=§III |location=Princeton, NJ |publisher=]}}</ref>


Marxism and socialism have received considerable critical analysis from multiple generations of ] regarding scientific methodology, economic theory and political implications.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://mises.org/library/what-we-can-know-about-world |title=What We Can Know About the World |date=1 December 2009 |website=Mises.org |access-date=4 August 2019 |publisher=] |archive-date=13 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200213094330/https://mises.org/library/what-we-can-know-about-world |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=von Mises |first1=Ludwig |author1-link=Ludwig von Mises |title=Omnipotent Government |date=2008 |publisher=Read Books |isbn=978-1443726467 |url=https://mises.org/library/omnipotent-government-rise-total-state-and-total-war |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=12 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220412085854/https://mises.org/library/omnipotent-government-rise-total-state-and-total-war |url-status=live}}{{page needed|date=July 2020}}</ref> During the ], a theory of subjective value was developed by ],<ref>{{citation |last1=Nenovsky |first1=Nikolay |last2=Karpouzanov |first2=Momtchil |date=2010 |title=Value, Prices and Money. Comparing Marx and Menger |url=https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/62040/2/MPRA_paper_62040.pdf |archive-url= |archive-date=}}</ref> with scholars viewing the development of marginalism more broadly as a response to Marxist economics.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Screpanti |first1=Ernesto |author1-link=Ernesto Screpanti |title=An Outline of the History of Economic Theory |last2=Zamagni |first2=Stefano |author2-link=Stefano Zamagni |publisher=] |year=2005 |pages=170–173}}</ref> Second-generation Austrian economist ] used praxeological and subjectivist methodology to fundamentally attack the law of value. ] has regarded his criticism as "definitive", arguing that Böhm-Bawerk's critique of Marx's economics was so "thorough and devastating" that he believes that as of the 1960s, no Marxian scholar had conclusively refuted it.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Haberler |first1=Gottfried |author1-link=Gottfried Haberler |editor1-last=Drachkovitch |editor1-first=Milorad M. |editor1-link=Milorad M. Drachkovitch |title=Marxist Ideology in the Contemporary World: Its Appeals and Paradoxes |date=1966 |publisher=Books for Libraries Press |isbn=978-0836981544 |url=https://archive.org/details/marxistideologyi00drac/page/124/mode/1up |page=124}}</ref> Third-generation Austrian ] rekindled the debate about the ] by arguing that without price signals in capital goods, in his opinion, all other aspects of the market economy are irrational. This led him to declare that "rational economic activity is impossible in a socialist ]."<ref name="Mises">{{cite book |title=Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth |year=2014 |publisher=] |isbn=978-1610164542 |url=https://mises.org/pdf/econcalc.pdf |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=23 September 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080923191714/https://mises.org/pdf/econcalc.pdf |url-status=live}}{{page needed|date=July 2020}}</ref>{{BSN|reason=Advocacy source; a third-party RS would better establish ]|date=December 2024}}
First, Lenin's followers generally view his additions to the body of Marxism as the practical corollary to Marx's original theoretical contributions of the 19th century; insofar as they apply under the conditions of advanced capitalism that they found themselves working in. Lenin called this time-frame the era of ]. For example, Joseph Stalin wrote that {{Cquote|Leninism grew up and took shape under the conditions of imperialism, when the contradictions of capitalism had reached an extreme point, when the proletarian revolution had become an immediate practical question, when the old period of preparation of the working class for revolution had arrived at and passed into a new period, that of direct assault on capitalism.<ref></ref>}}
The most important consequence of a Leninist-style theory of Imperialism is the strategic need for workers in the industrialized countries to bloc or ally with the oppressed nations contained within their respective countries' colonies abroad in order to overthrow capitalism. This is the source of the slogan, which shows the Leninist conception that not only the proletariat, as is traditional to Marxism, are the sole revolutionary force, but all oppressed people:{{Cquote|'''Workers''' and Oppressed Peoples of the World, Unite!<ref></ref>}}


] and ] argue that Marx's economic theory was fundamentally flawed because it attempted to simplify the economy into a few general laws that ignored the impact of institutions on the economy.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Acemoglu |first1=Daron |author1-link=Daron Acemoglu |last2=Robinson |first2=James A. |author2-link=James A. Robinson (economist) |title=The Rise and Decline of General Laws of Capitalism |journal=] |date=1 February 2015 |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=3–28 |doi=10.1257/jep.29.1.3 |url=https://www.nber.org/papers/w20766 |hdl=1721.1/113636 |s2cid=14001669 |hdl-access=free |access-date=24 April 2022 |archive-date=17 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220417165543/https://www.nber.org/papers/w20766 |url-status=live}}</ref> These charges have been disputed by other influential economists, like ]<ref name="Roemer1982">{{cite book |last=Roemer |first=John |title=A General Theory of Exploitation and Class |date=1982 |author-link=John Roemer |language=English |publisher=] |page=iv |isbn=978-0674344402}}</ref> and ].<ref name="Vrousalis2020">{{cite journal |last1=Vrousalis |first1=Nicholas |title=Review of Ernesto Screpanti's Labour and Value: Rethinking Marx's Theory of Exploitation. Cambridge: Open Book Publishers, 2019, 131 pp. |journal=Erasmus Journal for Philosophy and Economics |date=27 May 2020 |volume=13 |issue=1 |doi=10.23941/ejpe.v13i1.472 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240501164010/https://www.ejpe.org/journal/article/view/472 |archive-date=1 May 2024 |url=https://www.ejpe.org/journal/article/view/472 |url-status=live}}</ref>
Second, the other distinguishing characteristic of Marxism–Leninism is how it approaches the question of organization. Lenin believed that the traditional model of the Social Democratic parties of the time, which was a loose, multitendency organization was inadequate for overthrowing the Tsarist regime in Russia. He proposed a cadre of professional revolutionaries that disciplined itself under the model of ].


== See also ==
===Marxism–Leninism after Stalin===
{{Portal|Communism}}
For better or worse, Marxism–Leninism as a body of thought and practice was closely identified with the figure of Joseph Stalin after the death of Lenin. After the death of Stalin, the leader of the USSR, ] made several ideological and practical ruptures with his predecessor which led to the eventual split of Marxism–Leninism into two main branches, post-Stalin "Moscow-aligned" communism and ]. In turn, these branches evolved into multiple schools of thought over time.
{{cols|colwidth=22em}}

* ]
===Post-Stalin Moscow-aligned communism===
* ]
At the ], Khrushchev made several ideological ruptures with his predecessor, Joseph Stalin. First, Khrushchev denounced the so-called ] that had developed around Stalin, which ironically enough Khrushchev had had a pivotal role in fostering decades earlier. More importantly, however, Khrushchev rejected the heretofore orthodox Marxist–Leninist tenet that class struggle continues even under socialism. Rather, the State ought to rule in the name of all classes. A related principle that flowed from the former was the notion of ], or that the newly emergent socialist bloc could peacefully compete with the capitalist world, solely by developing the productive forces of society.
* ]

* ]
====Eurocommunism====
{{main|Eurocommunism}}
Beginning around the 1970s, various communist parties in Western Europe, such as the ] in Italy and the ] under ] tried to hew to a more independent line from Moscow. Particularly in Italy, they leaned on the theories of ], despite the fact that by 1921 Gramsci believed that a Communist Party in the Leninist sense was needed. This trend went by the name Eurocommunism.

===Anti-revisionism===
{{main|Anti-Revisionism}}
There are many proponents of Marxist–Leninism who rejected the theses of Khrushchev. They believed that Khrushchev was unacceptably altering or "revising" the fundamental tenets of Marxism–Leninism, a stance from which the label "anti-revisionist" is derived. Usually, they are referred to externally by the following epithets, although anti-revisionists typically refer to themselves simply as Marxist-Leninists.

====Maoism====
{{Main|Maoism}}
Maoism takes its name from Mao Zedong, the erstwhile leader of the People's Republic of China; it is the variety of ] that took inspiration, and in some cases received material support, from China, especially during the Mao period. There are several key concepts that were developed by Mao. First, Mao concurred with Stalin that not only does class struggle continue under the ], it actually accelerates as long as gains are being made by the proletariat at the expense of the disenfranchised bourgeoisie. Second, Mao developed a strategy for revolution called ] in what he termed the ] countries of the Third World. Prolonged People's War relied heavily on the peasantry. Third, Mao wrote many theoretical articles on epistemology and dialectics, which he called ].

====Hoxhaism====
{{Main|Hoxhaism}}
Hoxhaism, so named because of the central contribution of Albanian statesman ], was closely aligned with the People's Republic of China for a number of years, but grew critical of Maoism because of the so-called ] put forth by elements within the Chinese Communist Party and because it viewed the actions of Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping unfavourably. Ultimately, however, Hoxhaism as a trend came to the understanding that Socialism had never existed in China at all.

===Trotskyism===
{{Main|Trotskyism}}
Trotskyism is the usual term for followers of the ideas of Russian Marxist ], the second most prominent leader of the ]. Trotsky was a contemporary of Lenin from the early years of the ], where he led a small trend in competition with both Lenin's Bolsheviks and the ]; nevertheless Trotsky's followers claim to be the heirs of Lenin in the same way that mainstream Marxist-Leninists do. There are several distinguishing characteristics of this school of thought; foremost is the theory of ]. Another shared characteristic between Trotskyists is a variety of theoretical justifications for their negative appraisal of the post-Lenin Soviet Union; that is to say, after Trotsky was expelled by a majority vote from the CPSU<ref>{{dead link|date=June 2012}}</ref> and subsequently from the Soviet Union. Trotsky characterized the government of the USSR after his expulsion as being dominated by a "bureaucratic caste" and called for it to be overthrown.<ref>"The characterisation of the anti-bureaucratic revolution as "political revolution" referred to the fact that the bureaucracy had politically expropriated the proletariat&nbsp;..." http://www.radicalsocialist.in/index.php/articles/marxist-theory/100-capitalist-restoration-in-the-former-soviet-union</ref>

===Left Communism===
{{Main|Left Communism}}

Left communism is the range of communist viewpoints held by the communist left, which criticizes the political ideas of the Bolsheviks from a position that is asserted to be more authentically Marxist and proletarian than the views of Leninism held by the Communist International after its first two congresses.

Although she lived before left communism became a distinct tendency, ] has been heavily influential for most left communists, both politically and theoretically. Proponents of left communism have included ], ], ], ], ], and ].

Prominent left communist groups existing today include the International Communist Current and the International Bureau for the Revolutionary Party. Also, different factions from the old Bordigist International Communist Party are considered left communist organizations.

===Western Marxism===
{{Main|Western Marxism}}
Western Marxism includes a wide variety of ] based in ] and ] (and more recently ] ), in contrast with ], the ] or ].

===Structural Marxism===
{{Main|Structural Marxism}}
Structural Marxism is an approach to Marxism based on ], primarily associated with the work of the French theorist ] and his students.In Althusser's theory, the structural order of the capitalist mode of production is distinct both from the actual, real agents involved in its relations and from the ideological forms in which those relations are understood. Structural Marxism was influential in France during the late 1960s and 1970s, and also came to influence philosophers, political theorists and sociologists outside of France during the 1970s.

===Autonomist Marxism===
{{Main|Autonomism}}

] is a term applied to a variety of social movements around the world, which emphasizes the ability to organize in autonomous and horizontal networks, as opposed to hierarchical structures such as unions or parties. Autonomist Marxists, including ], broaden the definition of the working-class to include salaried and unpaid labour, such as skilled professions and housework; it focuses on the working class in advanced capitalist states as the primary force of change in the construct of capital. Modern autonomist theorists such as ] and ] argue that network power constructs are the most effective methods of organization against the neoliberal regime of accumulation, and predict a massive shift in the dynamics of capital into a 21st-century ].

===Marxist humanism===
{{Main|Marxist humanism}}

Marxist humanism is a branch of Marxism that primarily focuses on ], especially the '']'' in which Marx develops his ], as opposed to his later works, which are considered to be concerned more with his structural conception of ]. It was opposed by ]'s "]", who qualified it as a ] movement.

Marxist humanists contend that 'Marxism' developed lopsidedly because Marx's early works were unknown until after the orthodox ideas were in vogue{{spaced ndash}}the Manuscripts of 1844 were published only in 1932{{spaced ndash}}and it is necessary to understand Marx's philosophical foundations to understand his latter works properly.

===Marxism-De Leonism===
Marxism-De Leonism, is a form of syndicalist Marxism developed by ]. De Leon was an early leader of the first US socialist political party, the Socialist Labour Party. This party exists to the present day. ] lies outside the Leninist tradition of communism. The highly decentralized and democratic nature of the proposed De Leonist government is in contrast to the democratic centralism of Marxism–Leninism and what they see as the dictatorial nature of the Soviet Union. The success of the De Leonist plan depends on achieving majority support among the people both in the workplaces and at the polls, in contrast to the Leninist notion that a small vanguard party should lead the working class to carry out the revolution. Daniel De Leon and other De Leonist writers have issued frequent polemics against 'democratic socialist' movements, especially the Socialist Party of America, and consider them to be "reformist" or "bourgeois socialist". De Leonists have traditionally refrained from any activity or alliances viewed by them as trying to reform capitalism, though the Socialist Labor Party in De Leon's time was active during strikes and such, such as social justice movements.{{Citation needed|date=November 2010}}

===Marxist feminism===
{{Main|Marxist feminism}}
Marxist feminism is a sub-type of ] theory which focuses on the dismantling of capitalism as a way to liberate women. Marxist feminism states that private property, which gives rise to economic inequality, dependence, political confusion and ultimately unhealthy social relations between men and women, is the root of women's oppression. According to ], in capitalist societies the individual is shaped by class relations; that is, people's capacities, needs and interests are seen to be determined by the mode of production that characterises the society they inhabit. Marxist feminists see gender inequality as determined ultimately by the capitalist mode of production. Gender oppression is class oppression and women's subordination is seen as a form of class oppression which is maintained (like ]) because it serves the interests of capital and the ]. Marxist feminists have extended traditional ] by looking at domestic labour as well as wage work in order to support their position.{{Citation needed|date=November 2010}}

==Etymology==
The term "Marxism" was popularized by ] who considered himself an "orthodox" Marxist during the dispute between the orthodox and revisionist followers of Marx.<ref name="Georges Haupt 2010. pp. 18–19">Georges Haupt, Peter Fawcett, Eric Hobsbawm. ''Aspects of International Socialism, 1871–1914: Essays by Georges Haupt''. Paperback Edition. Cambridge, England, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010. pp. 18–19.</ref> Kautsky's revisionist rival ] also later adopted use of the term.<ref name="Georges Haupt 2010. pp. 18–19"/> Engels did not support the use of the term "Marxism" to describe either Marx's or his views.<ref name="Georges Haupt 2010. Pp. 12">Georges Haupt, Peter Fawcett, Eric Hobsbawm. ''Aspects of International Socialism, 1871–1914: Essays by Georges Haupt''. Paperback Edition. Cambridge, England, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Pp. 12.</ref> Engels claimed that the term was being abusively used as a rhetorical qualifier by those attempting to cast themselves as "real" followers of Marx while casting others in different terms, such as "Lassallians".<ref name="Georges Haupt 2010. Pp. 12"/> In 1882, Engels claimed that Marx had criticized self-proclaimed "Marxist" ], by saying that if Lafargue's views were considered "Marxist", then "One thing is certain and that is that I am not a Marxist".<ref name="Georges Haupt 2010. Pp. 12"/>

==History==

===Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels===
{{Main|Karl Marx|Friedrich Engels}}

Karl Heinrich Marx (5 May 1818&nbsp;– 14 March 1883) was a German ], political economist, and socialist revolutionary, who addressed the matters of ] and ] of the working class, the ], and historical materialism. He is famous for analysing history in terms of class struggle, summarised in the initial line introducing the '']'' (1848): "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles". His ideas were influential in his time, and it was greatly expanded by the successful Bolshevik October Revolution of 1917 in ].

Friedrich Engels (28 November 1820&nbsp;– 5 August 1895) was a German
] and Karl Marx's co-developer of communist theory. Marx and Engels met in September 1844; discovering that they shared like views of philosophy and socialism, they collaborated and wrote works such as ''Die heilige Familie'' ('']''). After the French deported Marx from France in January 1845, Engels and Marx moved to Belgium, which then permitted greater ] than other European countries; later, in January 1846, they returned to Brussels to establish the Communist Correspondence Committee.

In 1847, they began writing ''The Communist Manifesto'' (1848), based upon Engels' ''The Principles of Communism''; six weeks later, they published the 12,000-word pamphlet in February 1848. In March, Belgium expelled them, and they moved to ], where they published the '']'', a politically ] newspaper. Again, by 1849, they had to leave Cologne for London. The Prussian authorities pressured the British government to expel Marx and Engels, but Prime Minister ] refused.

After Karl Marx's death in 1883, Friedrich Engels became the ] and ] of Marx's writings. With his '']'' (1884)&nbsp;– analysing ] ] as guaranteeing male social domination of women, a concept analogous, in communist theory, to the capitalist class's economic domination of the working class&nbsp;– Engels made ]ly significant contributions to ] and ].

===Late 20th century===

====Political Marxism====
In 1959, the ] led to the victory of anti-imperialist ] (1926–) and his ]. Although the revolution had not been explicitly socialist, upon victory Castro ascended to the position of Prime Minister and eventually adopted the Leninist model of socialist development, forging an alliance with the Soviet Union.<ref>See ] and ].</ref> One of the leaders of the revolution, the Argentine Marxist revolutionary ] (1928–1967), subsequently went on to aid revolutionary socialist movements in ] and Bolivia, eventually being killed by the Bolivian government, possibly on the orders of the CIA, though the CIA agent sent to search for Guevara, Felix Rodriguez expressed a desire to keep him alive as a possible bargaining tool with the Cuban government; he would posthumously go on to become an internationally recognised icon.

In the People's Republic of China, the Maoist government undertook the ] from 1966 through to 1976 in order to purge capitalist elements from Chinese society and entrench socialism. However, upon Mao's death, his rivals seized political power and under the Premiership of Deng Xiaoping (1978–1992), many of Mao's Cultural Revolution era policies were revised or abandoned and much of the state sector privatised.

The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the collapse of most of those socialist states that had professed a Marxist–Leninist ideology. In the late 1970s and 1980s, the emergence of the ] and ] as the dominant ideological trends in western politics – championed by U.S. President ] and U.K. Prime Minister ] – led the west to take a more aggressive stand against the Soviet Union and its Leninist allies. Meanwhile, in the Soviet Union, the reformist ] (1931–) became Premier in March 1985, and began to move away from Leninist-based models of development towards social democracy. Ultimately, Gorbachev's reforms, coupled with rising levels of popular ethnic nationalism in the Soviet Union, led to the state's dissolution in late 1991 into a series of constituent nations, all of which abandoned Marxist–Leninist models for socialism, with most converting to capitalist economies.

===21st century===

====Political Marxism====
At the turn of the 21st century, China, Cuba, Laos and Vietnam remained the only officially Marxist–Leninist states remaining, although a Maoist government led by ] (1954–) was elected into power in Nepal in 2008 following a long guerrilla struggle. The early 21st century also saw the election of socialist and anti-imperialist governments in several Latin American nations, in what has come to be known as the "]". Dominated by the Venezuelan government of ], this trend also saw the election of ] in Bolivia, ] in Ecuador and ] in Nicaragua; forging political and economic alliances through international organisations like the ], these socialist governments allied themselves with Marxist–Leninist Cuba, and although none of them espoused a Leninist path directly, most admitted to being significantly influenced by Marxist theory. For Italian Marxist Gianni Vattimo in his 2011 book '']'' "this new weak communism differs substantially from its previous Soviet (and current Chinese) realization, because the South American countries follow democratic electoral procedures and also manage to decentralize the state bureaucratic system through the ]. In sum, if weakened communism is felt as a specter in the West, it is not only because of media distortions but also for the alternative it represents through the same democratic procedures that the West constantly professes to cherish but is hesitant to apply"<ref>Gianni Vattimo and Santiago Zabala. ''Hermeneutic Communism: From Heidegger to Marx'' Columbia University Press. 2011. p. 122</ref>

==Criticisms==
{{main|Criticisms of Marxism}}

Criticisms of Marxism have come from various political ideologies. Additionally, there are intellectual critiques of Marxism that contest certain assumptions prevalent in Marx's thought and Marxism after him, without exactly rejecting Marxist politics.<ref>For example, {{cite book |last=Baudrillard |first=Jean |date=1973 |title=The Mirror of Production}}</ref> Other, contemporary supporters of Marxism argue that many aspects of Marxist thought are viable, but that the corpus is incomplete or outdated in regards to certain aspects of economic, political or ]. They may therefore combine some Marxist concepts with the ideas of other theorists such as ]: the ] is one example.

===Socialist critiques===
Democratic socialists and social democrats reject the idea that socialism can be accomplished only through extra-legal class conflict and a proletarian revolution. The relationship between Marx and other socialist thinkers and organizations, rooted in Marxism's "scientific" and anti-utopian socialism, among other factors, has divided Marxists from other socialists since Marx's life. After Marx's death, and with the emergence of Marxism, there have additionally been dissensions within Marxism itself- the splitting of the ] into ] and ] a notable example. "Orthodox" Marxism became counterposed to a less dogmatic, more innovative, or even ] Marxism.

===Anarchist critiques===
{{main|Anarchism and Marxism}}

Anarchism has had a strained relationship with Marxism since Marx's life. ] reject the need for a ], claiming that socialism cannot be established except through decentralized, noncoercive organization. ], who are often neither socialists nor capitalists, reject Marxism as a statist ideology.

===Economic critiques===

Other critiques come from an economic standpoint. Economists such as ] have criticized Marxism for allocating resources inefficiently.

V. K. Dmitriev, writing in 1898,<ref>V. K. Dmitriev, 1974 (1898), ''Economic Essays on Value, Competition and Utility''. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press</ref> ], writing in 1906–07,<ref>Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz, 1952 (1906–1907), "Value and Price in the Marxian System", ''International Economic Papers'' 2, 5–60; Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz, 1984 (1907), "On the Correction of Marx's Fundamental Theoretical Construction in the Third Volume of ''Capital''". In Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk 1984 (1896), ''Karl Marx and the Close of his System'', Philadelphia: Orion Editions.</ref> and subsequent critics have alleged that Marx's ] and law of the ] are internally inconsistent. In other words, the critics allege that Marx drew conclusions that actually do not follow from his theoretical premises. Once these alleged errors are corrected, his conclusion that aggregate price and profit are determined by, and equal to, aggregate value and surplus value no longer holds true. This result calls into question his theory that the exploitation of workers is the sole source of profit.<ref>M. C. Howard and J. E. King. (1992) A History of Marxian Economics: Volume II, 1929–1990, chapter 12, sect. III. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.</ref>

Both Marxism and socialism have received considerable critical analysis from multiple generations of ] in terms of scientific methodology, economic theory, and political implications.<ref> What We Can Know About The World. Hans F. Sennholz.</ref><ref> Omnipotent Government. Ludwig Von Mises</ref> During the ], subjective value theory was rediscovered by ], a development which undermined the British cost theories of value fundamentally. The restoration of subjectivism and ] methodology previously employed by classical economic scientists including ], ], ], and ] led Menger to criticise ] methodology in general. Second-generation Austrian economist ] employed praxeological and subjectivist methodology attacking the law of value fundamentally. Non-Marxist economists have regarded his criticism as definitive with ] arguing that Böhm-Bawerk's critique of Marx's economics was so thorough and devastating that as of the 1960s no Marxian scholar had conclusively refuted it.<ref>] in ] (ed.), ''Marxist Ideology in the Contemporary World– Its Appeals and Paradoxes'' (New York: Praeger, 1966), p. 124</ref> Third-generation Austrian ] sparked the ] by identifying that without price signals in capital goods all other aspects of the market economy are irrational. This led him to declare "...&nbsp;that rational economic activity is impossible in a socialist ]."<ref name="Mises">{{cite book | title=Economic calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth | accessdate=2008-09-08 | last=Von Mises | first=Ludwig | authorlink=Ludwig von Mises | year=1990 | format=pdf | publisher=] | url=https://mises.org/pdf/econcalc.pdf}}</ref> Mises then elaborated on every form of socialism more completely in his 1922 book ''Socialism, an Economic and Sociological Analysis''. Contemporary Austrian critics include ], ] ], ], and ].

==See also==
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==References==

===Footnotes===
{{reflist|30em}}

===Bibliography===
{{Refbegin}}
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* {{cite book |title=My Life: A Spoken Autobiography|last1={{smallcaps|Castro}}|first1=Fidel|last2={{smallcaps|Ramonet}}|first2=Ignacio (interviewer)|year=2009|publisher=Scribner|location=New York|isbn=978-1-4165-6233-7|ref=Cas09}}
* {{cite book |title=The Real Fidel Castro|last={{smallcaps|Coltman}}|first=Leycester|year=2003|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven and London|isbn=978-0-300-10760-9|ref=Col03}}
* {{cite book |title=Prehistorian: A Biography of V. Gordon Childe|last={{smallcaps|Green}}|first=Sally|year=1981|publisher=Moonraker Press|location=Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire|isbn=0-239-00206-7|ref=Gre81}}
* {{cite book |title=Karl Marx: A Brief Biographical Sketch with an Exposition of Marxism|last={{smallcaps|Lenin}}|first=Vladimir|authorlink=Vladimir Lenin|year=1967|origyear=1913|publisher=Foreign Languages Press|location=Peking|isbn=|url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/index.htm|accessdate=2014-06-17|nopp=|ref=Len67}}
* {{cite book |title=Wage Labour and Capital|last={{smallcaps|Marx}}|first=Karl|authorlink=Karl Marx|year=1849|publisher=Neue Rheinische Zeitung|location=Germany|isbn=|url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/index.htm|accessdate=2014-06-17|nopp=|ref=Mar49}}
* {{cite book |title=A History of Archaeological Thought|edition=2nd|last={{smallcaps|Trigger}}|first=Bruce G.|authorlink=Bruce Trigger|year=2007|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=New York|isbn=978-0-521-60049-1|nopp=|ref=Tri07}}
{{Refend}}
* {{cite book |author=Avineri, Shlomo|year=1968|title=The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx|publisher=Cambridge University Press|authorlink=Shlomo Avineri}}
* {{cite book |author=Dahrendorf, Ralf|title=Class and Class Conflict in Industrial Society|year=1959|authorlink=Ralf Dahrendorf|location=Stanford, CA|publisher=Stanford University Press}}
* ], ''An Introduction to Karl Marx''. Cambridge, England, 1986.
* Michael Evans, ''Karl Marx''. London, 1975.
* {{cite book |author=Kołakowski, Leszek|title=Main Currents of Marxism|year=1976|publisher=Oxford University Press|authorlink=Leszek Kołakowski}}
* {{cite book |author=Parkes, Henry Bamford|title=Marxism: An Autopsy|year=1939|location=Boston|publisher=Houghton Mifflin|authorlink=Henry Bamford Parkes}}
* {{cite encyclopedia |last1=Prychitko |first1=David L. |authorlink1= David Prychitko |last2= |first2= |authorlink2= |editor= ] (ed.) |encyclopedia=] |title=Marxism |url=http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Marxism.html |year=2008 |edition= 2nd |publisher=] |isbn=978-0-86597-665-8 |oclc=237794267}}
* ]: ''Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition'', 1983, Reissue: Univ North Carolina Press, 2000
* ] (1977) '''' Chap. 5 ''''
* {{cite book |last=Screpanti|first=E|author2=S. Zamagna|year=1993|title=An Outline of the History of Economic Thought}}
* {{cite book |author=McLellan, David|title=Marxism After Marx|year=2007|location=Basingstoke|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|authorlink=David McLellan (academic)}}


==External links== == References ==
=== Citations ===
{{Commons category|Marxism}}
{{reflist}}


===General resources=== === Bibliography ===
{{refbegin|30em}}
* (])
<!-- AAA -->
*
* {{cite book |last=Alderson |first=David |year=2017 |title=For Humanism |location=United States |publisher=] |isbn=978-0745336145}}
*
<!-- BBB -->
*
* {{cite book |last=Bourne |first=Peter |author-link=Peter Bourne |title=Fidel: A Biography of Fidel Castro |date=1986 |publisher=] |location=New York}}
* (offers many suggestions on what to read, depending on the student's familiarity with the subject)
<!-- CCC -->
* {{cite book |last=Callinicos |first=Alex |author-link=Alex Callinicos |title=The Revolutionary Ideas of Karl Marx |publisher=Bookmarks |location=London |date=2010 |orig-date=1983 |isbn=978-1905192687}}
* {{cite book |last1=Castro |first1=Fidel |author-link=Fidel Castro |title=My Life: A Spoken Autobiography |date=2009 |publisher=Scribner |location=New York |isbn=978-1416562337 |id=Ignacio Ramonet (interviewer)}}
* {{cite book |last=Coltman |first=Leycester |author-link=Leycester Coltman |title=The Real Fidel Castro |url=https://archive.org/details/realfidelcastro00colt_0 |url-access=registration |date=2003 |publisher=] |location=New Haven, CT / London |isbn=978-0300107609}}
<!-- DDD -->
* {{cite book |last=D'Amato |first=Paul |title=] |publisher=] |year=2006 |isbn=978-1931859295}}
<!-- EEE -->
* {{cite encyclopedia |last=Edgley |first=Roy |editor1-last=Bottomore |editor1-first=Tom |editor1-link=Tom Bottomore |editor2-last=Harris |editor2-first=Laurence |editor3-last=Kiernan |editor3-first=V.&nbsp;G. |editor3-link=V. G. Kiernan |editor4-last=Miliband |editor4-first=Ralph |editor4-link=Ralph Miliband |encyclopedia=The Dictionary of Marxist Thought |title=Philosophy |year=1991 |orig-date=1983 |edition=2nd |publisher=] |isbn=978-0631164814 |pages=419–423}}
* {{cite book |last=Evans |first=Michael |title=Karl Marx |location=London |date=1975 |publisher=] Ltd |isbn=978-0415436779}}
<!-- FFF -->
* {{cite book |last=Fromm |first=Erich |author-link=Erich Fromm |year=1966 |orig-date=1961 |title=Marx's Concept of Man |url=https://archive.org/details/marxsconceptofma00from |url-access=limited |location=New York |publisher=Frederick Ungar Publishing Co. |isbn=978-0804461610 |access-date=9 October 2021}}
<!-- GGG -->
* {{cite book |last=Green |first=Sally |title=Prehistorian: A Biography of V. Gordon Childe |date=1981 |publisher=Moonraker Press |location=Bradford-on-Avon, UK |isbn=978-0239002068}}
* {{cite encyclopedia |last=Guo |first=Dingping |encyclopedia=] |title=Marxism |pages=1495–1501 |editor1-last=Badie |editor1-first=Bertrand |editor1-link=Bertrand Badie |editor2-first=Dirk |editor2-last=Berg-Schlosser |editor2-link=Dirk Berg-Schlosser |editor3-first=Leonardo |editor3-last=Morlino |editor3-link=Leonardo Morlino |volume=5 |date=2011 |publisher=] |doi=10.4135/9781412994163 |isbn=9781412959636}}
<!-- HHH -->
* {{cite book |last=Haupt |first=Georges |author-link=Georges Haupt |editor1-first=Peter |editor1-last=Fawcett |editor2-first=Eric |editor2-last=Hobsbawm |editor2-link=Eric Hobsbawm |date=2010 |title=Aspects of International Socialism, 1871–1914: Essays by Georges Haupt |edition=paperback |location=Cambridge |publisher=]}}
<!-- JJJ -->
* {{cite book |last=Johnston |first=Les |date=2015 |title=Marxism, Class Analysis And Socialist Pluralism: A Theoretical and Political Critique of Marxist Conceptions of Politics |orig-date=1986 |publisher=] |series=Routledge Library Editions: Marxism |volume=15 |isbn=978-1-315-71497-4}}
<!-- KKK -->
* {{cite book |last=Kliman |first=Andrew |author-link=Andrew Kliman |date=2007 |title=Reclaiming Marx's "Capital": A Refutation of the Myth of Inconsistency |location=Lanham, MD |publisher=]}}
* {{cite book |last=Kołakowski |first=Leszek |author-link=Leszek Kołakowski |year=2005 |title=Main Currents of Marxism: The Founders, the Golden age, the Breakdown |translator-last=Falla |translator-first=P. S. |publisher=] |isbn=978-0393329438 |oclc=213085194 |location=New York}}
* {{cite encyclopedia |last=Krupavičius |first=Algis |author-link=:lt:Algis Krupavičius |encyclopedia=] |title=Communist Parties |pages=314–320 |editor1-first=Bertrand |editor1-last=Badie |editor1-link=Bertrand Badie |editor2-first=Dirk |editor2-last=Berg-Schlosser |editor2-link=Dirk Berg-Schlosser |editor3-first=Leonardo |editor3-last=Morlino |editor3-link=Leonardo Morlino |volume=2 |date=2011 |publisher=] |doi=10.4135/9781412994163 |isbn=9781412959636}}
<!-- LLL -->
* {{cite book |last=Lenin |first=Vladimir |author-link=Vladimir Lenin |title=Karl Marx: A Brief Biographical Sketch with an Exposition of Marxism |date=1967 |orig-date=1913 |publisher=Foreign Languages Press |location=Peking |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/index.htm |access-date=17 June 2014 |archive-date=2 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190702055230/https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/index.htm |url-status=live |via=]}}
* {{cite book |last=Lichtheim |first=George |author-link=George Lichtheim |date=2015 |title=Marxism: An Historical and Critical Study |orig-date=1961 |publisher=] |series=Routledge Library Editions: Marxism |volume=13 |isbn=978-1-315-71310-6}}
<!-- MMM -->
* {{cite book |last=Marcuse |first=Herbert |author-link=Herbert Marcuse |chapter=The Foundation of Historical Materialism |year=1972 |orig-date=1932 |title=Studies in Critical Philosophy |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/historical-materialism/index.htm |publisher=Beacon Press Boston |isbn=0807015288 |pages=1–48 |access-date=21 September 2020 |archive-date=12 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201112025951/https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/historical-materialism/index.htm |url-status=live |via=Marxists Internet Archive}}
* {{cite book |last=Marx |first=Karl |author-link=Karl Marx |title=Wage Labour and Capital |date=1849 |publisher=] |location=Germany |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/index.htm |access-date=17 June 2014 |archive-date=8 June 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090608082512/http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/index.htm |url-status=live |via=Marxists Internet Archive}}
<!-- PPP -->
* {{cite book |last=Petrović |first=Gajo |author-link=Gajo Petrović |year=1967 |title=Marx in the Mid-twentieth Century: A Yugoslav Philosopher Considers Karl Marx's Writings |url=https://archive.org/details/marxinmidtwentie00petr |url-access=limited |location=Garden City, New York |publisher=] |oclc=1036708143 |access-date=9 October 2021}}
<!-- SSS -->
* {{cite book |last=Smith |first=Cyril |author-link=Cyril Smith (Marxist) |year=1998 |title=Marx at the Millennium |chapter=The Standpoint of Socialised Humanity |chapter-url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/smith-cyril/works/millenni/smith3.htm |url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/smith-cyril/works/millenni/index.htm |access-date=18 October 2020 |via=Marxists Internet Archive |archive-date=8 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201108105507/https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/smith-cyril/works/millenni/index.htm |url-status=live}}
<!-- TTT -->
* {{cite book |last=Trigger |first=Bruce G. |author-link=Bruce Trigger |title=A History of Archaeological Thought |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofarchaeo0000trig |url-access=registration |edition=2nd |date=2007 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=New York |isbn=978-0521600491 |ref=Tri07}}
{{refend}}


== Further reading ==
===Introductory articles===
* {{cite book |last=Agar |first=Jolyon |date=2006 |title=Rethinking Marxism: From Kant and Hegel to Marx and Engels |location=London / New York |publisher=] |isbn=041541119X}}
*
* {{cite book |last=Avineri |first=Shlomo |date=1968 |title=The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx |publisher=] |author-link=Shlomo Avineri |isbn=9780521096195}}
*
* {{cite book |last=Dahrendorf |first=Ralf |title=Class and Class Conflict in Industrial Society |url=https://archive.org/details/classclassconfli0000dahr |url-access=registration |date=1959 |author-link=Ralf Dahrendorf |location=Stanford, CA |publisher=] |isbn=978-0804705608}}
*
* {{cite book |last=Elster |first=Jon |author-link=Jon Elster |title=An Introduction to Karl Marx |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1986 |isbn=0521329221}}
* {{cite encyclopedia |last=Kuznicki |first=Jason T. |editor-first=Ronald |editor-last=Hamowy |editor-link=Ronald Hamowy |encyclopedia=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism |chapter=Marxism |chapter-url=https://sk.sagepub.com/reference/libertarianism/n193.xml |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC |year=2008 |publisher=]; ] |location=Thousand Oaks, CA |doi=10.4135/9781412965811.n193 |isbn=978-1412965804 |oclc=750831024 |lccn=2008009151 |pages=318–320 |via=]}}
* {{cite book |last=McLellan |first=David |title=Marxism After Marx |date=2007 |location=Basingstoke |publisher=] |author-link=David McLellan (academic) |isbn=978-1403997289}}
* {{Cite book |title=Marxism: An Autopsy |last=Parkes |first=Henry Bamford |author-link=Henry Bamford Parkes |publisher=] |year=1964 |edition=1st Phoenix |url=https://www.worldcat.org/title/265852 |series=Phoenix Books |oclc=265852 |ol=28368284M |orig-date=1939}}
* {{cite encyclopedia |last=Prychitko |first=David |author-link=David L. Prychitko |editor=David R. Henderson |editor-link=David R. Henderson |encyclopedia=] |chapter=Marxism |chapter-url=https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Marxism.html |year=2008 |edition=2nd |publisher=] |location=Indianapolis |isbn=978-0865976658 |oclc=237794267|pages=337–340}}
* {{cite book |last=Robinson |first=Cedric J. |author-link=Cedric Robinson |title=Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition |orig-date=1983 |publisher=] |date=2000 |isbn=978-0241514177}}
* {{cite book |last=Rummel |first=R.J. |author-link=R. J. Rummel |date=1977 |url=http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE12.HTM |title=Conflict In Perspective |chapter-url=http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/CIP.CHAP5.HTM |chapter=Marxism, Class Conflict, and the Conflict Helix}}
* {{cite book |last1=Screpanti |first1=Ernesto |author1-link=Ernesto Screpanti |last2=Zamagni|first2=Stefano |date=1993 |title=An Outline of the History of Economic Thought |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780199279142}}
* {{cite book |last=Sheehan |first=Helena |author-link=Helena Sheehan |orig-date=1985 |date=2017 |title=Marxism and the Philosophy of Science: A Critical History |location=London |publisher=] |isbn=978-1786634269}}


== External links ==
===Marxist websites===
{{sister project links|d=Q7264|wikt=Marxism|c=Category:Marxism|n=no|voy=no|m=no|mw=no|species=no|b=Marxism, Communism, and Socialism|s=Category:Marxism|v=no}}
* a project of the Monthly Review Foundation
{{Library resources box|by=no|onlinebooks=no|about=yes|wikititle=marxism}}
*
* {{Britannica|367344}}
* information and documents for living Marxism
* {{YouTube|playlist=PLtjwQ74cM2RxKnMbrJCktvTq-YCEjamoV|Marxism lecture by Prof. Raymond Geuss}}
* website of the ]
* a journal of Marxist theory linked to the ]
* Marxist website of news and analysis.
* Website the League for the Fifth International
* a journal of economics, society, and culture
* issues, events, theory, and debate
* Marxist theory, analysis, and debate
*


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Latest revision as of 18:20, 7 January 2025

Economic and sociopolitical worldview For the political ideology commonly associated with states governed by communist parties, see Marxism–Leninism.

Karl Marx, after whom Marxism is named
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Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflict, and social transformation. Marxism originates with the works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought, and as a result, there is no single, definitive "Marxist theory". Marxism has had a profound effect in shaping the modern world, with various left-wing and far-left political movements taking inspiration from it in varying local contexts.

In addition to the various schools of thought, which emphasise or modify elements of classical Marxism, several Marxian concepts have been incorporated into an array of social theories. This has led to widely varying conclusions. Alongside Marx's critique of political economy, the defining characteristics of Marxism have often been described using the terms "dialectical materialism" and "historical materialism", though these terms were coined after Marx's death and their tenets have been challenged by some self-described Marxists.

As a school of thought, Marxism has had a profound effect on society and global academia. To date, it has influenced many fields, including anthropology, archaeology, art theory, criminology, cultural studies, economics, education, ethics, film theory, geography, historiography, literary criticism, media studies, philosophy, political science, political economy, psychoanalysis, science studies, sociology, theatre, and urban planning.

Overview

Marxism seeks to explain social phenomena within any given society by analysing the material conditions and economic activities required to fulfill human material needs. It assumes that the form of economic organisation, or mode of production, influences all other social phenomena, including broader social relations, political institutions, legal systems, cultural systems, aesthetics and ideologies. These social relations and the economic system form a base and superstructure. As forces of production (i.e. technology) improve, existing forms of organising production become obsolete and hinder further progress. Karl Marx wrote: "At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or—this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms—with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution."

These inefficiencies manifest themselves as social contradictions in society which are, in turn, fought out at the level of class struggle. Under the capitalist mode of production, this struggle materialises between the minority who own the means of production (the bourgeoisie) and the vast majority of the population who produce goods and services (the proletariat). Starting with the conjectural premise that social change occurs due to the struggle between different classes within society who contradict one another, a Marxist would conclude that capitalism exploits and oppresses the proletariat; therefore, capitalism will inevitably lead to a proletarian revolution. In a socialist society, private property—as the means of production—would be replaced by cooperative ownership. A socialist economy would not base production on the creation of private profits but on the criteria of satisfying human needs—that is, production for use. Friedrich Engels explained that "the capitalist mode of appropriation, in which the product enslaves first the producer, and then the appropriator, is replaced by the mode of appropriation of the products that is based upon the nature of the modern means of production; upon the one hand, direct social appropriation, as means to the maintenance and extension of production—on the other, direct individual appropriation, as means of subsistence and of enjoyment."

Marxian economics and its proponents view capitalism as economically unsustainable and incapable of improving the population's living standards due to its need to compensate for the falling rate of profit by cutting employees' wages and social benefits while pursuing military aggression. The socialist mode of production would succeed capitalism as humanity's mode of production through revolution by workers. According to Marxian crisis theory, socialism is not an inevitability but an economic necessity.

Etymology

The term Marxism was popularised by Karl Kautsky, who considered himself an orthodox Marxist during the dispute between Marx's orthodox and revisionist followers. Kautsky's revisionist rival Eduard Bernstein also later adopted the term.

Engels did not support using Marxism to describe either Marx's or his views. He claimed that the term was being abusively used as a rhetorical qualifier by those attempting to cast themselves as genuine followers of Marx while casting others in different terms, such as Lassallians. In 1882, Engels claimed that Marx had criticised self-proclaimed Marxist Paul Lafargue by saying that if Lafargue's views were considered Marxist, then "one thing is certain and that is that I am not a Marxist."

Historical materialism

Main article: Historical materialism Further information: Marxist historiography and Marx's theory of history See also: Historical determinism, Historicism, Historiography, People's history, and Philosophy of history

The discovery of the materialist conception of history, or rather, the consistent continuation and extension of materialism into the domain of social phenomenon, removed two chief defects of earlier historical theories. In the first place, they at best examined only the ideological motives of the historical activity of human beings, without grasping the objective laws governing the development of the system of social relations. ... in the second place, the earlier theories did not cover the activities of the masses of the population, whereas historical materialism made it possible for the first time to study with scientific accuracy the social conditions of the life of the masses and the changes in these conditions.

— Russian Marxist theoretician and revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, 1913

Society does not consist of individuals, but expresses the sum of interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand.

— Karl Marx, Grundrisse, 1858

Marxism uses a materialist methodology, referred to by Marx and Engels as the materialist conception of history and later better known as historical materialism, to analyse the underlying causes of societal development and change from the perspective of the collective ways in which humans make their living. Marx's account of the theory is in The German Ideology (1845) and the preface A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859). All constituent features of a society (social classes, political pyramid and ideologies) are assumed to stem from economic activity, forming what is considered the base and superstructure. The base and superstructure metaphor describes the totality of social relations by which humans produce and re-produce their social existence. According to Marx, the "sum total of the forces of production accessible to men determines the condition of society" and forms a society's economic base.

The base includes the material forces of production such as the labour, means of production and relations of production, i.e. the social and political arrangements that regulate production and distribution. From this base rises a superstructure of legal and political "forms of social consciousness" that derive from the economic base that conditions both the superstructure and the dominant ideology of a society. Conflicts between the development of material productive forces and the relations of production provoke social revolutions, whereby changes to the economic base lead to the superstructure's social transformation.

This relationship is reflexive in that the base initially gives rise to the superstructure and remains the foundation of a form of social organisation. Those newly formed social organisations can then act again upon both parts of the base and superstructure so that rather than being static, the relationship is dialectic, expressed and driven by conflicts and contradictions. Engels clarified: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes."

Marx considered recurring class conflicts as the driving force of human history as such conflicts have manifested as distinct transitional stages of development in Western Europe. Accordingly, Marx designated human history as encompassing four stages of development in relations of production:

  1. Primitive communism: cooperative tribal societies.
  2. Slave society: development of tribal to city-state in which aristocracy is born.
  3. Feudalism: aristocrats are the ruling class, while merchants evolve into the bourgeoisie.
  4. Capitalism: capitalists are the ruling class who create and employ the proletariat.

While historical materialism has been referred to as a materialist theory of history, Marx did not claim to have produced a master key to history and that the materialist conception of history is not "an historico-philosophic theory of the marche générale, imposed by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it finds itself." In a letter to the editor of the Russian newspaper paper Otechestvennyje Zapiski (1877), he explained that his ideas were based upon a concrete study of the actual conditions in Europe.

Criticism of capitalism

Further information: Anti-capitalism and Criticism of capitalism
The "Pyramid of Capitalist System" cartoon made by the Industrial Workers of the World in 1911 criticising capitalism and social stratification.

According to the Marxist theoretician and revolutionary socialist Vladimir Lenin, "the principal content of Marxism" was "Marx's economic doctrine." Marx demonstrated how the capitalist bourgeoisie and their economists were promoting what he saw as the lie that "the interests of the capitalist and of the worker are ... one and the same." He believed that they did this by purporting the concept that "the fastest possible growth of productive capital" was best for wealthy capitalists and workers because it provided them with employment.

Exploitation is a matter of surplus labour—the amount of labour performed beyond what is received in goods. Exploitation has been a socioeconomic feature of every class society and is one of the principal features distinguishing the social classes. The power of one social class to control the means of production enables its exploitation of other classes. Under capitalism, the labour theory of value is the operative concern, whereby the value of a commodity equals the socially necessary labour time required to produce it. Under such conditions, surplus value—the difference between the value produced and the value received by a labourer—is synonymous with surplus labour, and capitalist exploitation is thus realised as deriving surplus value from the worker.

In pre-capitalist economies, exploitation of the worker was achieved via physical coercion. Under the capitalist mode of production, workers do not own the means of production and must "voluntarily" enter into an exploitative work relationship with a capitalist to earn the necessities of life. The worker's entry into such employment is voluntary because they choose which capitalist to work for. However, the worker must work or starve. Thus, exploitation is inevitable, and the voluntary nature of a worker participating in a capitalist society is illusory; it is production, not circulation, that causes exploitation. Marx emphasised that capitalism per se does not cheat the worker.

Alienation (German: Entfremdung) is the estrangement of people from their humanity and a systematic result of capitalism. Under capitalism, the fruits of production belong to employers, who expropriate the surplus created by others and generate alienated labourers. In Marx's view, alienation is an objective characterisation of the worker's situation in capitalism—his or her self-awareness of this condition is not prerequisite.

In addition to criticism, Marx has also praised some of the results of capitalism stating that it "has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together" and that it "has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal arrangements."

Marx posited that the remaining feudalist societies in the world and forms of socialism that did not conform with his writings would be replaced by communism in the future in a similar manner as with capitalism.

Social classes

Main article: Marxian class theory See also: Class conflict, Classless society, Social class, and Three-component theory of stratification

Marx distinguishes social classes based on two criteria, i.e. ownership of means of production and control over the labour power of others. Following this criterion of class based on property relations, Marx identified the social stratification of the capitalist mode of production with the following social groups:

  • Proletariat: "he class of modern wage labourers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labour power in order to live." The capitalist mode of production establishes the conditions that enable the bourgeoisie to exploit the proletariat as the worker's labour generates a surplus value greater than the worker's wage.⁠
  • Bourgeoisie: those who "own the means of production" and buy labour power from the proletariat, thus exploiting the proletariat. They subdivide as bourgeoisie and the petite bourgeoisie.
  • Landlords: a historically significant social class that retains some wealth and power.
  • Peasantry and farmers: a scattered class incapable of organising and effecting socioeconomic change, most of whom would enter the proletariat while some would become landlords.

Class consciousness denotes the awareness—of itself and the social world—that a social class possesses and its capacity to act rationally in its best interests. Class consciousness is required before a social class can effect a successful revolution and, thus, the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Without defining ideology, Marx used the term to describe the production of images of social reality. According to Engels, "ideology is a process accomplished by the so-called thinker consciously, it is true, but with a false consciousness. The real motive forces impelling him remain unknown to him; otherwise it simply would not be an ideological process. Hence he imagines false or seeming motive forces."

Because the ruling class controls the society's means of production, the superstructure of society (i.e. the ruling social ideas) is determined by the best interests of the ruling class. In The German Ideology, Marx says that "he ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is, at the same time, its ruling intellectual force." The term political economy initially referred to the study of the material conditions of economic production in the capitalist system. In Marxism, political economy is the study of the means of production, specifically of capital and how that manifests as economic activity.

Marxism taught me what society was. I was like a blindfolded man in a forest, who doesn't even know where north or south is. If you don't eventually come to truly understand the history of the class struggle, or at least have a clear idea that society is divided between the rich and the poor, and that some people subjugate and exploit other people, you're lost in a forest, not knowing anything.

— Cuban revolutionary and Marxist–Leninist politician Fidel Castro on discovering Marxism, 2009

This new way of thinking was invented because socialists believed that common ownership of the means of production (i.e. the industries, land, wealth of nature, trade apparatus and wealth of the society) would abolish the exploitative working conditions experienced under capitalism. Through working class revolution, the state (which Marxists saw as a weapon for the subjugation of one class by another) is seized and used to suppress the hitherto ruling class of capitalists and (by implementing a commonly owned, democratically controlled workplace) create the society of communism which Marxists see as true democracy. An economy based on cooperation on human need and social betterment, rather than competition for profit of many independently acting profit seekers, would also be the end of class society, which Marx saw as the fundamental division of all hitherto existing history. Marx saw the fundamental nature of capitalist society as little different from that of a slave society in that one small group of society exploits the larger group.

Through common ownership of the means of production, the profit motive is eliminated, and the motive of furthering human flourishing is introduced. Because the surplus produced by the workers is the property of the society as a whole, there are no classes of producers and appropriators. Additionally, as the state originates in the bands of retainers hired by the first ruling classes to protect their economic privilege, it will wither away as its conditions of existence have disappeared.

Communism, revolution and socialism

May Day protester in Spain, 2006, waving a red flag with a raised fist, both symbols of socialism

According to The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx, "Marx used many terms to refer to a post-capitalist society—positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that 'socialism' and 'Communism' are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death."

According to orthodox Marxist theory, overthrowing capitalism by a socialist revolution in contemporary society is inevitable. While the inevitability of an eventual socialist revolution is a controversial debate among many different Marxist schools of thought, all Marxists believe socialism is a necessity. Marxists argue that a socialist society is far better for most of the populace than its capitalist counterpart. Prior to the Russian Revolution, Vladimir Lenin wrote: "The socialisation of production is bound to lead to the conversion of the means of production into the property of society. ... This conversion will directly result in an immense increase in productivity of labour, a reduction of working hours, and the replacement of the remnants, the ruins of small-scale, primitive, disunited production by collective and improved labour." The failure of the 1905 Russian Revolution, along with the failure of socialist movements to resist the outbreak of World War I, led to renewed theoretical effort and valuable contributions from Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg towards an appreciation of Marx's crisis theory and efforts to formulate a theory of imperialism.

Democracy

The Soviet of Workers' Deputies of St. Petersburg in 1905: Leon Trotsky in the centre. The Soviets were an early example of a workers council.

Karl Marx criticised liberal democracy as not democratic enough due to the unequal socio-economic situation of the workers during the Industrial Revolution which undermines the democratic agency of citizens. Marxists differ in their positions towards democracy. Types of democracy in Marxism include Soviet democracy, New Democracy, Whole-process people's democracy and can include voting on how surplus labour is to be organised. According to democratic centralism political decisions reached by voting in the party are binding for all members of the party.

Schools of thought

Main article: Marxist schools of thought See also: List of communist ideologies

Classical

Main article: Classical Marxism

Classical Marxism denotes the collection of socio-eco-political theories expounded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. As Ernest Mandel remarked, "Marxism is always open, always critical, always self-critical." Classical Marxism distinguishes Marxism as broadly perceived from "what Marx believed." In 1883, Marx wrote to his son-in-law Paul Lafargue and French labour leader Jules Guesde—both of whom claimed to represent Marxist principles—accusing them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and denying the value of reformist struggle. From Marx's letter derives Marx's famous remark that, if their politics represented Marxism, 'ce qu'il y a de certain c'est que moi, je ne suis pas Marxiste' ('what is certain is that I myself am not a Marxist')."

Libertarian

Main article: List of communist ideologies § Libertarian Marxism See also: Libertarian socialism § Marxist

Libertarian Marxism emphasises the anti-authoritarian and libertarian aspects of Marxism. Early currents of libertarian Marxism, such as left communism, emerged in opposition to Marxism–Leninism.

Libertarian Marxism is often critical of reformist positions such as those held by social democrats. Libertarian Marxist currents often draw from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels' later works, specifically the Grundrisse and The Civil War in France; emphasising the Marxist belief in the ability of the working class to forge its destiny without the need for a vanguard party to mediate or aid its liberation. Along with anarchism, libertarian Marxism is one of the main currents of libertarian socialism.

Libertarian Marxism includes currents such as autonomism, council communism, De Leonism, Lettrism, parts of the New Left, Situationism, Freudo-Marxism (a form of psychoanalysis), Socialisme ou Barbarie and workerism. Libertarian Marxism has often strongly influenced both post-left and social anarchists. Notable theorists of libertarian Marxism have included Maurice Brinton, Cornelius Castoriadis, Guy Debord, Raya Dunayevskaya, Daniel Guérin, C. L. R. James, Rosa Luxemburg, Antonio Negri, Anton Pannekoek, Fredy Perlman, Ernesto Screpanti, E. P. Thompson, Raoul Vaneigem, and Yanis Varoufakis, the latter claiming that Marx himself was a libertarian Marxist.

Humanist

Main article: Marxist humanism

Marxist humanism was born in 1932 with the publication of Marx's Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 and reached a degree of prominence in the 1950s and 1960s. Marxist humanists contend that there is continuity between the early philosophical writings of Marx, in which he develops his theory of alienation, and the structural description of capitalist society found in his later works, such as Capital. They hold that grasping Marx's philosophical foundations is necessary to understand his later works properly.

Contrary to the official dialectical materialism of the Soviet Union and interpretations of Marx rooted in the structural Marxism of Louis Althusser, Marxist humanists argue that Marx's work was an extension or transcendence of enlightenment humanism. Whereas other Marxist philosophies see Marxism as natural science, Marxist humanism reaffirms the doctrine that "man is the measure of all things"—that humans are essentially different to the rest of the natural order and should be treated so by Marxist theory.

Academic

See also: Marxist ethics, Marxist film theory, Marxist geography, and Marxist philosophy
V. Gordon Childe, an Australian archaeologist and one of the 20th century's most prominent Marxist academics

According to a 2007 survey of American professors by Neil Gross and Solon Simmons, 17.6% of social science professors and 5.0% of humanities professors identify as Marxists, while between 0 and 2% of professors in all other disciplines identify as Marxists.

Archaeology

Main article: Marxist archaeology

The theoretical development of Marxist archaeology was first developed in the Soviet Union in 1929, when a young archaeologist named Vladislav I. Ravdonikas published a report entitled "For a Soviet history of material culture"; within this work, the very discipline of archaeology as it then stood was criticised as being inherently bourgeois, therefore anti-socialist and so, as a part of the academic reforms instituted in the Soviet Union under the administration of General Secretary Joseph Stalin, a great emphasis was placed on the adoption of Marxist archaeology throughout the country.

These theoretical developments were subsequently adopted by archaeologists working in capitalist states outside of the Leninist bloc, most notably by the Australian academic V. Gordon Childe, who used Marxist theory in his understandings of the development of human society.

Sociology

Main articles: Marxist criminology and Marxist sociology

Marxist sociology, as the study of sociology from a Marxist perspective, is "a form of conflict theory associated with ... Marxism's objective of developing a positive (empirical) science of capitalist society as part of the mobilisation of a revolutionary working class." The American Sociological Association has a section dedicated to the issues of Marxist sociology that is "interested in examining how insights from Marxist methodology and Marxist analysis can help explain the complex dynamics of modern society."

Influenced by the thought of Karl Marx, Marxist sociology emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. With Marx, Max Weber and Émile Durkheim are considered seminal influences in early sociology. The first Marxist school of sociology was known as Austro-Marxism, of which Carl Grünberg and Antonio Labriola were among its most notable members. During the 1940s, the Western Marxist school became accepted within Western academia, subsequently fracturing into several different perspectives, such as the Frankfurt School or critical theory. The legacy of Critical Theory as a major offshoot of Marxism is controversial. The common thread linking Marxism and Critical theory is an interest in struggles to dismantle structures of oppression, exclusion, and domination. Due to its former state-supported position, there has been a backlash against Marxist thought in post-communist states, such as Poland. However, it remains prominent in the sociological research sanctioned and supported by communist states, such as in China.

Economics

Main article: Marxian economics

Marxian economics is a school of economic thought tracing its foundations to the critique of classical political economy first expounded upon by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxian economics concerns itself with the analysis of crisis in capitalism, the role and distribution of the surplus product and surplus value in various types of economic systems, the nature and origin of economic value, the impact of class and class struggle on economic and political processes, and the process of economic evolution. Although the Marxian school is considered heterodox, ideas that have come out of Marxian economics have contributed to mainstream understanding of the global economy. Certain concepts of Marxian economics, especially those related to capital accumulation and the business cycle, such as creative destruction, have been fitted for use in capitalist systems.

Education

Marxist education develops Marx's works and those of the movements he influenced in various ways. In addition to the educational psychology of Lev Vygotsky and the pedagogy of Paulo Freire, Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis' Schooling in Capitalist America is a study of educational reform in the U.S. and its relationship to the reproduction of capitalism and the possibilities of utilising its contradictions in the revolutionary movement. The work of Peter McLaren, especially since the turn of the 21st century, has further developed Marxist educational theory by developing revolutionary critical pedagogy, as has the work of Glenn Rikowski, Dave Hill, and Paula Allman. Other Marxists have analysed the forms and pedagogical processes of capitalist and communist education, such as Tyson E. Lewis, Noah De Lissovoy, Gregory Bourassa, and Derek R. Ford. Curry Malott has developed a Marxist history of education in the U.S., and Marvin Gettleman examined the history of communist education. Sandy Grande has synthesised Marxist educational theory with Indigenous pedagogy, while others like John Holt analyse adult education from a Marxist perspective.

Other developments include:

  • the educational aesthetics of Marxist education
  • Marxist analyses of the role of fixed capital in capitalist education
  • the educational psychology of capital
  • the educational theory of Lenin
  • the pedagogical function of the Communist Party

The latest field of research examines and develops Marxist pedagogy in the postdigital era.

Historiography

Main article: Marxist historiography

Marxist historiography is a school of historiography influenced by Marxism, the chief tenets of which are the centrality of social class and economic constraints in determining historical outcomes. Marxist historiography has contributed to the history of the working class, oppressed nationalities, and the methodology of history from below. Friedrich Engels' most important historical contribution was Der deutsche Bauernkrieg about the German Peasants' War which analysed social warfare in early Protestant Germany regarding emerging capitalist classes. The German Peasants' War indicates the Marxist interest in history from below with class analysis and attempts a dialectical analysis.

Engels' short treatise The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 was salient in creating the socialist impetus in British politics. Marx's most important works on social and political history include The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, The Communist Manifesto, The German Ideology, and those chapters of Capital dealing with the historical emergence of capitalists and proletarians from pre-industrial English society. Marxist historiography suffered in the Soviet Union as the government requested overdetermined historical writing. Notable histories include the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks), published in the 1930s to justify the nature of Bolshevik party life under Joseph Stalin. A circle of historians inside the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) formed in 1946.

While some members of the group, most notably Christopher Hill and E. P. Thompson, left the CPGB after the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, the common points of British Marxist historiography continued in their works. Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class is one of the works commonly associated with this group. Eric Hobsbawm's Bandits is another example of this group's work. C. L. R. James was also a great pioneer of the 'history from below' approach. Living in Britain when he wrote his most notable work, The Black Jacobins (1938), he was an anti-Stalinist Marxist and so outside of the CPGB. In India, B. N. Datta and D. D. Kosambi are the founding fathers of Marxist historiography. Today, the senior-most scholars of Marxist historiography are R. S. Sharma, Irfan Habib, Romila Thapar, D. N. Jha, and K. N. Panikkar, most of whom are now over 75 years old.

Literary criticism

Main article: Marxist literary criticism
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Marxist literary criticism is a loose term describing literary criticism based on socialist and dialectic theories. Marxist criticism views literary works as reflections of the social institutions from which they originate. According to Marxists, even literature is a social institution with a specific ideological function based on the background and ideology of the author. Marxist literary critics include Mikhail Bakhtin, Walter Benjamin, Terry Eagleton, and Fredric Jameson.

Aesthetics

Main article: Marxist aesthetics
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Marxist aesthetics is a theory of aesthetics based on or derived from the theories of Karl Marx. It involves a dialectical and materialist, or dialectical materialist, approach to the application of Marxism to the cultural sphere, specifically areas related to taste, such as art and beauty, among others. Marxists believe that economic and social conditions, and especially the class relations that derive from them affect every aspect of an individual's life, from religious beliefs to legal systems to cultural frameworks. Some notable Marxist aestheticians include Anatoly Lunacharsky, Mikhail Lifshitz, William Morris, Theodor W. Adorno, Bertolt Brecht, Herbert Marcuse, Walter Benjamin, Antonio Gramsci, Georg Lukács, Ernst Fischer, Louis Althusser, Jacques Rancière, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Raymond Williams.

History

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

Main articles: Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
Marx and Engels

Marx addressed the alienation and exploitation of the working class, the capitalist mode of production and historical materialism. He is famous for analysing history in terms of class struggle, summarised in the initial line introducing The Communist Manifesto (1848): "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles."

Together with Marx, Engels co-developed communist theory. Marx and Engels first met in September 1844. Discovering that they had similar views of philosophy and socialism, they collaborated and wrote works such as Die heilige Familie (The Holy Family). After Marx was deported from France in January 1845, they moved to Belgium, which permitted greater freedom of expression than other European countries. In January 1846, they returned to Brussels to establish the Communist Correspondence Committee.

In 1847, they began writing The Communist Manifesto (1848), based on Engels' The Principles of Communism. Six weeks later, they published the 12,000-word pamphlet in February 1848. In March, Belgium expelled them, and they moved to Cologne, where they published the Neue Rheinische Zeitung, a politically radical newspaper. By 1849, they had to leave Cologne for London. The Prussian authorities pressured the British government to expel Marx and Engels, but Prime Minister Lord John Russell refused.

After Marx died in 1883, Engels became the editor and translator of Marx's writings. With his Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State (1884)—analysing monogamous marriage as guaranteeing male social domination of women, a concept analogous, in communist theory, to the capitalist class's economic domination of the working class—Engels made intellectually significant contributions to feminist theory and Marxist feminism.

Russian Revolution and the Soviet Union

Main articles: Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Leninism, Marxism–Leninism, October Revolution, and Trotskyism

Onset

Vladimir Lenin, founder of the Soviet Union and the leader of the Bolshevik party.Leon Trotsky, founder of the Red Army and a key figure in the October Revolution.

With the October Revolution in 1917, the Bolsheviks took power from the Russian Provisional Government. The Bolsheviks established the first socialist state based on the ideas of soviet democracy and Leninism. Their newly formed federal state promised to end Russian involvement in World War I and establish a revolutionary worker's state. Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as universal education, universal healthcare and equal rights for women. 50,000 workers had passed a resolution in favour of Bolshevik demand for transfer of power to the soviets. Following the October Revolution, the Soviet government struggled with the White Movement and several independence movements in the Russian Civil War. This period is marked by the establishment of many socialist policies and the development of new socialist ideas, with Marxism–Leninism becoming the dominant ideological strain.

In 1919, the nascent Soviet Government established the Communist Academy and the Marx–Engels–Lenin Institute for doctrinal Marxist study and to publish official ideological and research documents for the Russian Communist Party. With Lenin's death in 1924, there was an internal struggle in the Soviet Communist movement, mainly between Joseph Stalin and Leon Trotsky, in the form of the Right Opposition and Left Opposition, respectively. These struggles were based on both sides' different interpretations of Marxist and Leninist theory based on the situation of the Soviet Union at the time.

Chinese Revolution

Main articles: Anti-revisionism, Chinese Communist Party, Chinese Communist Revolution, Maoism, and Socialism with Chinese Characteristics

The theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin is universally applicable. We should regard it not as a dogma, but as a guide to action. Studying it is not merely a matter of learning terms and phrases but of learning Marxism-Leninism as the science of revolution. It is not just a matter of understanding the general laws derived by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin from their extensive study of real life and revolutionary experience, but of studying their standpoint and method in examining and solving problems.

Mao Zedong, Little Red Book

At the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War and, more widely, World War II, the Chinese Communist Revolution occurred within the context of the Chinese Civil War. The Chinese Communist Party, founded in 1921, conflicted with the Kuomintang over the country's future. Throughout the Civil War, Mao Zedong developed a theory of Marxism for the Chinese historical context. Mao found a large base of support in the peasantry as opposed to the Russian Revolution, which found its primary support in the urban centres of the Russian Empire. Some significant ideas contributed by Mao were the ideas of New Democracy, mass line and people's war. The People's Republic of China (PRC) was declared in 1949. The new socialist state was to be founded on the ideas of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin.

From Stalin's death until the late 1960s, there was increased conflict between China and the Soviet Union. De-Stalinisation, which first began under Nikita Khrushchev, and the policy of detente, were seen as revisionist and insufficiently Marxist. This ideological confrontation spilt into a broader global crisis centred around which nation was to lead the international socialist movement.

Following Mao's death and the ascendancy of Deng Xiaoping, Maoism and official Marxism in China were reworked. Commonly referred to as socialism with Chinese characteristics, this new path was initially centred around Deng Xiaoping Theory, which claims to uphold Marxism–Leninism and Maoism, while adapting them to Chinese conditions. Deng Xiaoping Theory was based on Four Cardinal Principles, which sought to uphold the central role of the Chinese Communist Party and uphold the principle that China was in the primary stage of socialism and that it was still working to build a communist society based on Marxist principles.

Late 20th century

Further information: Cold War
Fidel Castro at the United Nations General Assembly in 1960

In 1959, the Cuban Revolution led to the victory of Fidel Castro and his July 26 Movement. Although the revolution was not explicitly socialist, upon victory, Castro ascended to the position of prime minister and adopted the Leninist model of socialist development, allying with the Soviet Union. One of the leaders of the revolution, the Argentine Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara, subsequently went on to aid revolutionary socialist movements in Congo-Kinshasa and Bolivia, eventually being killed by the Bolivian government, possibly on the orders of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), although the CIA agent sent to search for Guevara, Felix Rodriguez, expressed a desire to keep him alive as a possible bargaining tool with the Cuban government. He posthumously went on to become an internationally recognised icon.

In the People's Republic of China, the Maoist government undertook the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976 to purge Chinese society of capitalist elements and achieve socialism. Upon Mao Zedong's death, his rivals seized political power, and under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, many of Mao's Cultural Revolution era policies were revised or abandoned, and a large increase in privatised industry was encouraged.

The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the collapse of most of those socialist states that had professed a Marxist–Leninist ideology. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the emergence of the New Right and neoliberal capitalism as the dominant ideological trends in Western politics championed by United States president Ronald Reagan and British prime minister Margaret Thatcher led the West to take a more aggressive stance towards the Soviet Union and its Leninist allies. Meanwhile, the reformist Mikhael Gorbachev became General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in March 1985 and sought to abandon Leninist development models toward social democracy. Ultimately, Gorbachev's reforms, coupled with rising levels of popular ethnic nationalism, led to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in late 1991 into a series of constituent nations, all of which abandoned Marxist–Leninist models for socialism, with most converting to capitalist economies.

21st century

Hugo Chavez casting a vote in 2007

At the turn of the 21st century, China, Cuba, Laos, North Korea, and Vietnam remained the only officially Marxist–Leninist states remaining, although a Maoist government led by Prachanda was elected into power in Nepal in 2008 following a long guerrilla struggle.

The early 21st century also saw the election of socialist governments in several Latin American nations, in what has come to be known as the "pink tide"; dominated by the Venezuelan government of Hugo Chávez; this trend also saw the election of Evo Morales in Bolivia, Rafael Correa in Ecuador, and Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua. Forging political and economic alliances through international organisations like the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, these socialist governments allied themselves with Marxist–Leninist Cuba. Although none espoused a Stalinist path directly, most admitted to being significantly influenced by Marxist theory. Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez declared himself a Trotskyist during the swearing-in of his cabinet two days before his inauguration on 10 January 2007. Venezuelan Trotskyist organisations do not regard Chávez as a Trotskyist, with some describing him as a bourgeois nationalist, while others consider him an honest revolutionary leader who made significant mistakes due to him lacking a Marxist analysis.

For Italian Marxist Gianni Vattimo and Santiago Zabala in their 2011 book Hermeneutic Communism, "this new weak communism differs substantially from its previous Soviet (and current Chinese) realisation, because the South American countries follow democratic electoral procedures and also manage to decentralise the state bureaucratic system through the Bolivarian missions. In sum, if weakened communism is felt as a spectre in the West, it is not only because of media distortions but also for the alternative it represents through the same democratic procedures that the West constantly professes to cherish but is hesitant to apply."

Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party since 2012

Chinese Communist Party General Secretary Xi Jinping has announced a deepening commitment of the Chinese Communist Party to the ideas of Marx. At an event celebrating the 200th anniversary of Marx's birth, Xi said, "We must win the advantages, win the initiative, and win the future. We must continuously improve the ability to use Marxism to analyse and solve practical problems", adding that Marxism is a "powerful ideological weapon for us to understand the world, grasp the law, seek the truth, and change the world." Xi has further stressed the importance of examining and continuing the tradition of the CPC and embracing its revolutionary past.

The fidelity of those varied revolutionaries, leaders and parties to the work of Karl Marx is highly contested and has been rejected by many Marxists and other socialists alike. Socialists in general and socialist writers, including Dimitri Volkogonov, acknowledge that the actions of authoritarian socialist leaders have damaged "the enormous appeal of socialism generated by the October Revolution."

Criticism

Main article: Criticism of Marxism See also: Criticism of communist party rule and Criticism of socialism

Criticism of Marxism has come from various political ideologies and academic disciplines. This includes general criticism about lack of internal consistency, criticisms related to historical materialism, that it is a type of historical determinism, the necessity of suppression of individual rights, issues with the implementation of communism and economic issues such as the distortion or absence of price signals and reduced incentives. In addition, empirical and epistemological problems are frequently identified.

Some Marxists have criticised the academic institutionalisation of Marxism for being too shallow and detached from political action. Zimbabwean Trotskyist Alex Callinicos, himself a professional academic, stated: "Its practitioners remind one of Narcissus, who in the Greek legend fell in love with his own reflection. ... Sometimes it is necessary to devote time to clarifying and developing the concepts that we use, but indeed for Western Marxists this has become an end in itself. The result is a body of writings incomprehensible to all but a tiny minority of highly qualified scholars."

Additionally, some intellectual critiques of Marxism contest certain assumptions prevalent in Marx's thought and Marxism after him without rejecting Marxist politics. Other contemporary supporters of Marxism argue that many aspects of Marxist thought are viable but that the corpus is incomplete or outdated regarding certain aspects of economic, political or social theory. They may combine some Marxist concepts with the ideas of other theorists such as Max Weber—the Frankfurt School is one example.

General

Philosopher and historian of ideas Leszek Kołakowski said that "Marx's theory is incomplete or ambiguous in many places, and could be 'applied' in many contradictory ways without manifestly infringing its principles." Specifically, he considers "the laws of dialectics" as fundamentally erroneous, stating that some are "truisms with no specific Marxist content", others "philosophical dogmas that cannot be proved by scientific means", and some just "nonsense"; he believes that some Marxist laws can be interpreted differently, but that these interpretations still in general fall into one of the two categories of error.

Okishio's theorem shows that if capitalists use cost-cutting techniques and real wages do not increase, the rate of profit must rise, which casts doubt on Marx's view that the rate of profit would tend to fall.

The allegations of inconsistency have been a large part of Marxian economics and the debates around it since the 1970s. Andrew Kliman argues that this undermines Marx's critiques and the correction of the alleged inconsistencies because internally inconsistent theories cannot be correct by definition.

Epistemological and empirical

Critics of Marxism claim that Marx's predictions have failed, with some pointing towards the GDP per capita generally increasing in capitalist economies compared to less market-oriented economics, the capitalist economies not suffering worsening economic crises leading to the overthrow of the capitalist system and communist revolutions not occurring in the most advanced capitalist nations, but instead in undeveloped regions. It has also been criticised for allegedly resulting in lower living standards in relation to capitalist countries, a claim that has been disputed.

In his books, The Poverty of Historicism and Conjectures and Refutations, philosopher of science Karl Popper criticised the explanatory power and validity of historical materialism. Popper believed that Marxism had been initially scientific in that Marx had postulated a genuinely predictive theory. When these predictions were not borne out, Popper argues that the theory avoided falsification by adding ad hoc hypotheses that made it compatible with the facts. Because of this, Popper asserted, a theory that was initially genuinely scientific degenerated into pseudoscientific dogma.

Anarchist and libertarian

Main articles: Anarchism and Marxism and Libertarian socialism § Marxist

Anarchism has had a strained relationship with Marxism. Anarchists and many non-Marxist libertarian socialists reject the need for a transitory state phase, claiming that socialism can only be established through decentralised, non-coercive organisation. Anarchist Mikhail Bakunin criticised Marx for his authoritarian bent. The phrases "barracks socialism" or "barracks communism" became shorthand for this critique, evoking the image of citizens' lives being as regimented as the lives of conscripts in barracks.

Economic

Other critiques come from an economic standpoint. Vladimir Karpovich Dmitriev writing in 1898, Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz writing in 1906–1907, and subsequent critics have alleged that Marx's value theory and the law of the tendency of the rate of profit to fall are internally inconsistent. In other words, the critics allege that Marx drew conclusions that do not follow his theoretical premises. Once these alleged errors are corrected, his conclusion that aggregate price and profit are determined by and equal to the aggregate value and surplus value no longer holds. This result calls into question his theory that exploiting workers is the sole source of profit.

Marxism and socialism have received considerable critical analysis from multiple generations of Austrian economists regarding scientific methodology, economic theory and political implications. During the marginal revolution, a theory of subjective value was developed by Carl Menger, with scholars viewing the development of marginalism more broadly as a response to Marxist economics. Second-generation Austrian economist Eugen Böhm von Bawerk used praxeological and subjectivist methodology to fundamentally attack the law of value. Gottfried Haberler has regarded his criticism as "definitive", arguing that Böhm-Bawerk's critique of Marx's economics was so "thorough and devastating" that he believes that as of the 1960s, no Marxian scholar had conclusively refuted it. Third-generation Austrian Ludwig von Mises rekindled the debate about the economic calculation problem by arguing that without price signals in capital goods, in his opinion, all other aspects of the market economy are irrational. This led him to declare that "rational economic activity is impossible in a socialist commonwealth."

Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson argue that Marx's economic theory was fundamentally flawed because it attempted to simplify the economy into a few general laws that ignored the impact of institutions on the economy. These charges have been disputed by other influential economists, like John Roemer and Nicholas Vrousalis.

See also

References

Citations

  1. Krupavičius 2011, pp. 314–315.
  2. ^ Wolff, Richard; Resnick, Stephen (1987). Economics: Marxian versus Neoclassical. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 130. ISBN 978-0801834806. The German Marxists extended the theory to groups and issues Marx had barely touched. Marxian analyses of the legal system, of the social role of women, of foreign trade, of international rivalries among capitalist nations, and the role of parliamentary democracy in the transition to socialism drew animated debates ... Marxian theory (singular) gave way to Marxian theories (plural).
  3. "Left-wing / Right-wing". Marxists Internet Archive. Archived from the original on 16 July 2022. Retrieved 16 July 2022.
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