Marxism exam Flashcards
What are the basic claims advanced in the Theses on Feuerbach 1-4 and 6?
thesis 1: the main defect of all materialism so far is that the object is conceived only in its physical form and not as a practice/human activity. Feuerbach wants sensuous objects to be differentiated from thought objects but he doesn’t conceive human activity as objective identity.
thesis 2: non-practical questions are purely academic, and thinking cannot be separated from practice
thesis 3: Marx rejects the idea that social change comes from above, through education or reforms alone. Instead, he argues that real transformation happens when people actively change both society and themselves through revolutionary struggle, where human activity reshapes both material conditions and human consciousness
thesis 4: Feuerbach wants to resolve the religious world into its secular basis, but once he reduces religious concepts to secular origins he doesn’t then dismantle the societal structures that caused the religious concepts
thesis 6: Feuerbach resolves the essence of religion into the essence of man, but Marx disagrees as the essence of man isn’t inherent in each individual but instead a social phenomenon. Feuerbach is looking at it too individually and abstracting the historical process from religious sentiment
He essentially says that philosophy should be used to change the world, and we need to do something more with it than Feuerbach has done so far. It needs to be rooted in reality and the material conditions in which it exists.
(Materialists like Feuerbach see the world as made of matter but humans as only passive observers, but Marx believed that human beings shape the world through practice, transforming reality rather than simply observing it)
Marx’s characterization of “the new revolutionary philosophers in Germany” in the Preface to “The German Ideology”;
Marx is criticizing the revolutionary philosophers for wanting to change ideas rather than material condition.
The revolutionary philosophers are ineffective because they believe that criticizing ideology alone will change the world without addressing social and economic structures underneath them.
Marx is mocking philosophers (Bauer, Stirner) who believe that revolution can happen by changing consciousness instead of by overthrowing material structures.
Three “premises from which [Marx and Engels] start” in “The German Ideology” (pp. 107-08)
- The existence of living human individuals
- The production of the means of subsistence
- Social organisation of production (both externally and internally)
The three pre-modern “stages of development in the division of labour” or “forms of ownership” recognized by Marx and Engels in “The German Ideology”;
- Tribal ownership
- the ancient communal and state ownership which proceeds especially from the union of several tribes into a city by agreement or by conquest;
- feudal or estate ownership
What is Marx and Engels’ argument on “the production of ideas”?
“the production of ideas, of conceptions, of consciousness is directly interwoven with the material activity and the material relationships of men; it is the language of actual life. Conceiving, thinking, and the intellectual relationships of men appear here as the direct result of their material behavior.”
- the production of ideas is directly intervowen with the material activites and relationships of men. “it is the language of actual life’.
- Historical materialism: forms of society cannot be based on ideology but rather on the modes of production and the material conditions of life.
- “Consciousness does not determine life, but life determines consciousness”
The “four moments, four aspects of the primary historical relationships” identified by Marx and Engels on pp. 115-17
- Production of material life
- Production of new needs
- Reproduction of human beings (both natural AND social relations)
- Relation to nature and amongst humans
Production of Material Life to satisfy the basic needs of life such as eating, drinking, shelter, clothing etc. This is a fundamental condition of all history which humans must do to sustain themselves.
Production of New Needs: “once a need is satisfied, which requires the action of satisfying and the acquisition of the instrument for this purpose, new needs arise.”
Reproduction of Human Beings (Family and Social Organization): Men who remake their own lives begin to make other men. “The relationship between the husband and wife, parents and children, the family.” “The production of life, of one’s own life in labor and of another in procreation”. This is both a natural relationship (having children) and a social relationship (maintaining families/communities/traditions)
Cooperation (Social Interaction and Division of Labor): “A certain mode of production or industrial stage is always combined with a certain mode of cooperation or social stage, and this mode of cooperation is itself a ‘productive force.’” The amount of productive forces which men can access will determine the nature of their society.
social relationships, but also the duality of two different relations: to nature and to cooperation
What is Marx’s definition of communism?
- Communism is the real movement that transforms the existing social order.
- This movement arises from current conditions.
- The productive power created by individuals working together under the division of labor feels like an external force, beyond their control, because their cooperation is not voluntary but shaped by existing structures. They do not understand its origins or direction and cannot govern it.Instead, this force follows its own course, shaping human will and actions.
- However, with communist regulation of production—eliminating the alienation between people and their labor—the forces of supply and demand disappear, and people regain control over production, exchange, and their social relationships.
The six headings under which Marx proposes to “examine the system of bourgeois economy
Capital, landed property, wage-labour, the state, foreign trade, world market
The “general conclusion” which became the “guiding principle” of Marx’s studies (you will be asked about the textual details of this passage)
This passage is a classic excerpt from Karl Marx’s Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, where he lays out the materialist conception of history. Let me break it down step by step:
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Social Existence Determines Consciousness
- Marx argues that people’s ways of thinking (social consciousness) are shaped by the material conditions of their existence, not the other way around. In other words, economic structures shape political, intellectual, and social life.
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Conflict Between Productive Forces and Relations of Production
- As societies develop, their productive forces (technology, labor, resources) eventually come into conflict with the existing relations of production (laws, property rights, class structures).
- For example, in feudal society, the rise of capitalist production (e.g., merchants, factories) eventually clashed with feudal laws and traditions, leading to social revolution.
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Revolution as a Result of Economic Change
- When the existing economic system becomes a barrier to further development, a social revolution occurs. This is because the economic “base” (productive forces) determines the “superstructure” (laws, politics, culture).
- The transformation of economic conditions leads to the restructuring of the entire society, including its legal and political institutions.
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Revolution Only Happens When Material Conditions Are Ready
- Marx states that societies don’t undertake revolutionary changes unless the material conditions for those changes have already developed.
- For instance, socialism could only emerge after capitalism has fully developed the productive forces necessary for a post-capitalist system.
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Historical Progress Through Economic Epochs
- Marx outlines major historical stages of economic development:
- Asiatic (early communal societies)
- Ancient (slave societies, e.g., Rome)
- Feudal (agrarian societies ruled by lords and serfs)
- Modern Bourgeois (capitalist societies with industrial production)
- Each stage has contradictions that eventually lead to its transformation into the next stage.
- Marx outlines major historical stages of economic development:
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Capitalism as the Last Antagonistic Mode of Production
- The bourgeois (capitalist) system is the last system based on class antagonism. Unlike past systems, capitalism itself creates the conditions for its own resolution by developing productive forces that can support a post-capitalist society.
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“Prehistory” of Human Society Ends with Capitalism
- Marx suggests that capitalism is the final class-based system and that its contradictions will eventually lead to a new, non-exploitative system (i.e., communism).
- At that point, what he calls the “prehistory” of humanity (marked by class struggles) will end, and real human history—free from class antagonism—will begin.
In Simple Terms:
Marx is saying that economic systems evolve due to internal conflicts between how society produces goods and the social structures governing that production. These conflicts lead to revolutions, which bring about new economic systems. Capitalism, though highly productive, also contains contradictions (like inequality and exploitation) that will eventually lead to its transformation into a new system.
The four aspects of alienated labour analyzed by Marx in the 1844 manuscripts
- Alienation from the object of one’s labour
- Alienation from other activities
- Alienation from human species life
- Alienation from one another
N3: This is the part that is the most up to interpretation. We are separated from nature through alienated labour. Human beings are not like other animals in the sense that we are defenseless. We are therefore incapable as individuals of securing our own means of subsistence. Our advantage comes from how our individual corporal organization opens us up to coordination with other humans. We are not appropriated to a particular habitat, to a particular diet, we are the most omnivorous, flexible animal. Our social cooperation allows us to adapt more than other animals. But alone, we are vulnerable. Human beings’ relationship to the nature we need to survive is a social relationship. Alienated labour changes this superiority to the animal to inferiority. This is what he means. In separating the worker from the conditions of their labour, alienated labour cuts off the human beings from the nature of their life.
The three defining characteristics of Stalinism, according to Thompson
Anti-intellectualism
- Oratory product, discourse
- hostility toward independent thought, academic freedom, and intellectual debate.
Moral nihilism
- morality was subordinated to political expediency. the ends justified the means used to get there, and if morality came in opposition to party politics
Denial of creative agency
- Stalinism denied individuals the ability to think, act, or create independently of the state. Whether in politics, art, or science, creativity had to conform to ideological guidelines
- Individual deviation from party line and thinking was seen as a threat to it
Marx’s definition of labour-power, and the two conditions that must be met in order that labour-power can befound on the market as a commodity
The aggregate of those mental and physical capabilities existing in the physical form, the living personality, of a human being, capabilities which he sets in motion whenever he produces a use-value of any kind.
two conditions:
Be free to sell their labour
Free of the means of production (266)
How the value of labour-power is determined
valueLp= value of keeping someone alive
the means of subsistence and reproduction
training, education
The simple elements of the labour process
purposeful activity, that is work itself,
the object on which that work is performed (raw materials)
the instruments of that work
What is the valorisation process?
+ the trick
Valorization process = production of surplus value. This process involves exploitation labour-power beyond the point at which it reproduces itself.
The Trick: to create M^1 lies in the labour power, which is the only commodity that can produce more value than it costs (surplus value).
Marx’ definition of primitive accumulation
So-called primitive accumulation, therefore, is nothing else than the historical process of divorcing the producer from the means of production. It appears as ‘primitive’ because it forms the pre-history of capital, and of the mode of production corresponding to capital.
the historical process of the expropriation of direct producers so that they no longer have direct access to the means of production and, as an extension, life.
The two characteristic features of the labour process when it is carried out under the capitalist; p.281
worker works under control of the capitalist to whom his labour belongs
product is property of the capitalist and not of his worker
