Marxism And Politics- Ralph Miliband

Question 1

The ‘base’ / Political superstructure

Answer 1

The mode of production of material life, the social, political, and intellectual, is not the consciousness that determines the being but, on the contrary, the social being that determines the consciousness.

Question 2

Economic base

Answer 2

A specific kind of production that predominates over the rest, whose relations thus assign rank ans influence to others.

Question 3

Primacy

Answer 3

An important and illuminating guideline. It’s not an analytical strait jacket.

Question 4

Marx definition of working class

Answer 4

Without consciousness, the working class is just a mass. Only through consciousness and political organisations does the working class form.

Question 5

Productive worker

Answer 5

One who produces surplus value for the capitalist.

Question 6

New working class

Answer 6

A class sharply pulled in contradictory directions. On the one hand, it has undergone “proletarianization” in so far as it is salaried and subordinate and part of the “collective worker.” Yet it has real hopes of joining the upper layers of the social pyramid.

Question 7

Idealogical state apparatus (ISA)

Answer 7

Institutions related in some way to disseminating pro-establishment ideology

Question 8

Repressive State Apparatus (RSA)

Answer 8

Enforce by force via police and military.