[Marxism] Marx political economy/notes of consciousness

["Charles Brown" <cbrown@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

From: Waistline2@xxxxxxx


>The working class raising itself to ruling class cannot abolish itself on

the basis of consciousness.

^^^^

CB: The working class cannot do that without class and socialist
consciousness. That's the proposition. Throughout history
oppressed/exploitive classes have remained so because of the greater
classconsciousness of oppresser/exploiting classes. <

Reply

MP: Here is the heart of the dispute. Consciousness cannot abolish a class.
What abolished slavery was the steam engine, etc. What abolished the
sharecropper was mechanization of agriculture. What abolishes the working
class as a working class is . . . .

^^^^^^
CB: What abolished slavery in the United States was the ripeness of the
contradiction between industrial bourgeoisie and the slavocracy.

The sharecropper is not a main class in capitalism. The end of the
sharecropper due to mechanization is analogous to the reduction in the
number of workers in a factory because of advances in efficiency of
machinery, and is not a change in the form of property

The proposition is not that "consciousness abolishes a class". It is that
the working class must be class conscious to overthrow capitalism.

^^^^^^^
What has been the roadblocks in the working class movement in our country is
not the greater class consciousness of the bourgeoisie, but a very real
material development in the boundary of the industrial system.

^^^^^^
CB: The meaning of this is unclear.  What do you mean the boundary develops
?

You have not yet said what the "boundary" or "material boundary" is and how
it prevents the working class movement from doing its thing.

It is class, not technological consciousness , that is lacking.

^^^^^^^

That is what is fundamental and defined the reform movement for the past
century. If we approach it from the standpoint of "consciousness" then the
failure to overthrow the bourgeois property relations is exculsively the
fault of its conscious sector or
the CPUSA and the SWP.

I do not believe this is true for a moment.

Peace

Melvin P.

^^^^^
CB: It is a lacking in the thinking, beliefs, attitudes of the great mass of
people. Whether it is a "fault"....





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