Marxism: Marx's ideas

Question 1

Like Durkheim, what did Marx see around him?

Answer 1

• the harm caused by the modern industrial society and the promise of progress to a better world it held

Question 2

What did Marx call his theory that it was possible to understand society scientifically and knowledge would point the way to a better society?

Answer 2

• scientific socialism

Question 3

Unlike the view of functionalists, how did Marx see historical change?

Answer 3

• he saw it as a contradictory process in which capitalism w`ould in crease human misery before giving way to a classless communist society

Question 4

What are the 7 key ideas about human history, capitalism, and its replacement by a future communist society did Marx have?

Answer 4

• historical materialism
• class society and exploitation
• capitalism
• class consciousness
• ideology
• alienation
• the state, revolution and communism

Question 5

What is materialism?

Answer 5

• the view that humans are beings with material needs such as food, clothing etc and must therefore work to meet them

Question 6

Due to humans having material needs and needing to meet them through work, what do they have to use?

Answer 6

• the forces/ means of production

Question 7

Over history, tools, machines etc have been developed to assist production. In working to meet their needs, what also do humans do?

Answer 7

• cooperate with one another

Question 8

What is the formal phrase that describes how humans have cooperated with each other to meet their material needs?

Answer 8

• enter into social relations of production

Question 9

As the forces of production and the social relations of production also develop, what happens?

Answer 9

• a division of labour develops and the eventually gives rise to a division between two classes

Question 10

What are the two classes that Marx believes develop with the division of labour?

Answer 10

• the class that owns the means of production

- the class of labourers

Question 11

What does Marx refer to the forces and relations of production together as?

Answer 11

• the mode of production

Question 12

What does the mode of production form?

Answer 12

• the economic base of society

Question 13

What influence does the economic base have over society?

Answer 13

• the economic base shapes/ determines all other features of society - the superstructure of institutions, ideas, beliefs and behaviour that arise from this base

Question 14

`Marx describes early society as ‘primitive communism’ - what does this include?

Answer 14

• no classes
• no private ownership
• no exploitations
• everyone works
• everything is shared

Question 15

In class societies, one class owns the means of production, what owes this enable them to do?

Answer 15

• exploit the labour of others for their own benefit

- in particular, they can control society’s surplus product

Question 16

What are the three successive class societies that Marx identifies (each with its own form of exploitation)?Give some details

Answer 16

• ancient society - based on the exploitation of slaves legally tied to their owners
• feudal society - based on the exploitation of serfs legally tied to the land
• capitalist society - based on the exploitation of free wage labourers

Question 17

What are the three distinctive features of capitalism beyond the division of bourgeoisie and proletariat?

Answer 17

• proletariat are legally free and separate from the means of production - they have to sell their labour power in return for wages
• due to competition between capitalists, ownership of the means of production becomes concentrated in fewer and fewer hands
• capitalism continually expands the forces of production in its pursuit of profit - production becomes concentrated in ever-larger units and technological advances de-skill the workforce

Question 18

How is the selling of labour power in return for wages not an equal exchange?

Answer 18

• the P don’t receive the value of the goods that their labour produces but only the cost of subsistence
• the difference between the two is the surplus value

Question 19

What are the results of competition be5tween capitalists meaning the ownership of production becomes concentrated in fewer and fewer hands?

Answer 19

• it drives small independent producers into the ranks of the proletariat
• it also forces capitalists to pay the lowest wages possible, causing the impoverishment of the proletariat

Question 20

What causes class polarisation?

Answer 20

• the concentration of ownership and deskilling of the proletariat

Question 21

Due to the polarising of the classes, bringing the P together in larger numbers, and driving down wages - what happens?

Answer 21

• the working class can develop a consciousness of its own economic and political interests in opposition to those of its exploiters

Question 22

As a result of class consciousness, what happens?

Answer 22

• the P moves from being a class in itself to becoming a class for itself

Question 23

For Marx, what does the class that owns the means of production also control?

Answer 23

• the means of mental production - the production of ideas

Question 24

What are the dominant ideas in society?

Answer 24

-the ideas of the economically dominant class

Question 25

What does ideology foster in the P?

Answer 25

• a false consciousness

Question 26

What is alienation the result of?

Answer 26

• our loss of control over our labour and its products and therefore our separation from our true nature

Question 27

What does alienation exist in all class societies?

Answer 27

• because the owners control the production process for their own needs

Question 28

Under capitalism, Marx believes alienation reaches its peak - why?

Answer 28

• workers are com0ploetely separated from and have no control over the forces of production
• the division of labour is at its most intense and detailed - the worker is reduced to an unskilled labourer mindlessly repeating a meaningless task

Question 29

How does Marx define the state?

Answer 29

• as ‘armed bodies of me’ ie,. the army, police, prison, courts etc

Question 30

What do the state exist for in Marx’s view?

Answer 30

• to protect the interests of the class of owners who control it

Question 31

How do the ruling class use the state?

Answer 31

• they use it as a weapon in the class struggle, to protect their property, suppress opposition and prevent revolution

Question 32

What does Marx believe the P revolution overthrowing capitalism will do?

Answer 32

• abolish the state and create a classless communist society
• abolish exploitation
• replace private ownership with social ownership
• replace production for profit with production to satisfy human needs
• end alienation

Question 33

Also like Durkheim, how did Marx believe it was possible to understand society and what would this do? What did he call this?

Answer 33

• it was possible to understand society scientifically and that this knowledge would point the way to a better society
• scientific socialism

Question 34

How can Marx’s view of class be criticised?

Answer 34

• simplistic, one-dimensional view of inequality, sees class as only important division eg. ignores gender
• two class model is simple - eg. can be subdivided into wc skilled and unskilled
• class polarisation has not occurred, middle class has grown while wc has shrunk

Question 35

How can Marx’s ideas be considered too economically deterministic?

Answer 35

• view that economic factors are the sole cause of everything - fails to recognise free will
• Marx’s predictions have not come true