Transcript What is Sociological Theory?

Lesson 4
Karl Marx
Robert Wonser
SOC 368 – Classical Sociological Theory
Spring 2014
Marx’s Life
 born in Trier, Germany to into a middle-class
family of Jewish heritage on May 5, 1818.
 was introduced to classics of literature and
philosophy at an early age
 attended the universities of Bonn and Berlin
 studied philosophy and literature at the
universities
 could not secure a university faculty position
 became a journalist in Prussia
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
2
Marx’s Life
 married in 1843 and moved to Paris
 1844 Marx meets Friedrich Engels (1820-1895)
 Engels was the son of a wealthy businessman
(textiles)
 Engels wrote The Condition of the Working
Class in England in 1844
 In 1844 Marx writes the Economic and
Philosophical Manuscripts
 1845 Marx is expelled from Paris and moves to
Brussels
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
3
Marx’s Life
 1845-46 Marx and Engels write The Germany
Ideology
 Marx and Engels join the growing worker’s
rights associations emerging in Europe
 1848 Marx and Engels publish The Communist
Manifesto
 Marx moved to London in the 1850’s where he
lived for the rest of his life
 Marx withdraws from public life and in 1867 he
publishes the first volume of das Capital
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
4
Marx’s Life
 Engels completed and published the final
two volumes of Marx’s das Capital after
Marx’s death on March 14, 1883 in London.
 Marx worked very little during his life and
was financially supported a great deal by
Engels
 Marx had become very famous toward the
end of his life and was celebrated by
socialists and radicals around the world
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
5
Marx’s Intellectual Influences: Hegel
 G. W. F. Hegel (1770-1831):
 Hegel was an idealist and developed a philosophy based
upon dialectical reason (tension between numenon and
phenomenon)
 The importance of negation
 True reality is reflected in reason
 “All that is real is rational; and all that is rational is real.”
 Marx considered Hegel’s philosophy to be a
conservative expression of the status quo
 Marx argued that Hegel’s philosophy must be “stood on
its head”
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
6
Marx’s Intellectual Influences: Feuerbach
 Ludwig Feuerbach and the Young Hegelians:
 generally, the Young Hegelians argued that Hegel’s
philosophy could be used in politically progressive ways
 they hoped to use reason to dissolve the legitimacy of
religious beliefs, as well as the oppressive nature of the
political state
 Marx criticized the Young Hegelians for developing religiouslike ideas – many believed in Hegel’s notion of the “Spirit”
 The Young Hegelians believed that the important wars would
be fought with words
 Feuerbach’s The Essence of Christianity – religious beliefs
did not emerged from the Spirit, but from social relationships
 Marx followed Feuerbach and argued that all social
institutions (and importantly those of an economic nature)
emerged from social relationships
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
7
Marx’s Intellectual Influences: Smith
 Adam Smith:
 early theorist of the political economy
 1776 – An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the
Wealth of Nations
 what are the laws of the economic market?
 assumed that capitalist social relationships were natural
– moved by the natural flow of supply and demand
 assumed that the economic order of a society is
independent of other social institutions
 labor theory of value
 “invisible hand” – individual self-interest is beneficial to
society
 Smith advocates laissez-faire economics
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
8
Marx’s Intellectual Influences: Engels
Friedrich Engels:
The Condition of the Working Class in
England in 1844
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
9
The Dialectic
 Basic idea is the centrality of contradiction.
 For Hegel: used to understand historical change.
A philosophical endeavor only.
 For Marx: “contradictions of capitalism” and
“class contradictions” needed to be worked out
in the real world, not only in our minds.
 How is capitalism contradictory?
…drive for profit, increases exploitation, increases
likelihood of revolt
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
10
The Dialectical Method
When speaking of causality, they are
always attuned to reciprocal relationships
among social factors as well as the
dialectical totality of social life of which
they are embedded.
Accounting for the past, present and future
Current trends lead to possible futures
with no inevitabilities.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
11
Men make their own history, but they do
not make it just as they please; they do not
make it under circumstances chosen by
themselves, but under circumstances
directly encountered from the past. The
tradition of all the dead generations
weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the
living.” (Marx, 1852/1963:15)
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
12
Human Potential
Our human nature is a product of the time
and place, the social relations and
institutional context we find ourselves in.
What effect in human nature does capitalism
impose?
Species being the potentials and powers
that are uniquely human and that
distinguish us from other species.
Manifests through labor.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
13
Labor
Our labor can create something that
previously only existed in our imagination.
Production reflects a purpose.
Process where we create external objects
from our internal thoughts – objectification
Works with material nature to satisfy our
material needs.
We transform nature through labor but it
also transforms us.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
14
Alienation
 There was inherent relation between labor and
human nature that is perverted through
capitalism. This perverted relation is called
alienation.
 Rather than being an end in itself—an
expression of human capabilities—labor in
capitalism is reduced to a means to an end—
earning money.
 Because of labor is not our own (paid by the
capitalists and all) it no longer transforms us.
Instead we are alienated from our labor, and
therefore our true human nature.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
15
Alienation from:
1)
2)
3)
4)

Their productive activity
The product
Their fellow workers
Human potential
Inherent contradiction found in
capitalism: between human nature and
what capitalism requires of us.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
16
The Structures of Capitalist Society
 Capitalism creates alienation
 An economic system where workers work for
owners of capital and the profits are privatized.
 More than just an economic system but also a
system of power. Political power has been
transformed into economic relations.
 Under capitalism the economy appears to be a
natural force.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
17
Commodities
 Commodity a product of materialist orientation
with a focus on productive capacity of actors.
 Upon interacting with others and nature, humans
produce the objects necessary to survive, which
are then used by oneself or immediate others 
commodities use value. But under capitalism
this becomes working to produce exchange
value where objects aren’t used immediately but
later exchanged for money or other objects.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
18
Use vs Exchange Values
Use value tied to human needs and the
objects to satisfy those needs; difficult to
compare; they’re qualitatively different.
In the process of exchange though
commodities are compared to one
another, which are quantitatively different.
Exchange value is separate from the
physical property of the object.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
19
Fetishism of Commodities
 Commodities are products of human labor but
can be separated from the needs and purposes
of the creator (becoming exchange values). 
 EV floats free from commodity and seems to
exist independently. In capitalism this the
commodity and market do become real
independent phenomena and take on
independent, mystical external reality.
 This is the fetishism of commodities
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
20
Fetishism of Commodities
For Marx, true value comes from the fact
that labor produces it and someone needs
it, its value represents social relations.
Capitalism distorts this relationship to one
of relations between commodities, hiding
the exploitative social relations that built it.
Also a process of reification (or
“thingification”)
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
21
Capital, Capitalists and the Proletariat
Proletariat are workers who sell their labor
and who don’t own means of production.
Since they only produce for exchange they’re
also consumers.
Capitalists are those who pay the wages
Capital is money that produces more
money, or, money that is invested rather
than used to satisfy human needs.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
22
Circulation of Commodities
 M¹- C - M²
 C¹ - M - C²
 Commodities are purchased to make a profit, not
necessarily to use (e.g. stocks).
 Capital is a particular social relation, capital
cannot increase except by exploiting those who
actually do the work.
 Exploitation is a necessary part of capitalism.
 Thought to be an objective economic system
rather than system of power
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
23
Exploitation
 “Capital is dead labor, that, vampire-like, only
lives by sucking living labor, and lives the more,
the more labor it sucks” (1867/1967:233)
 Coercion is rarely through naked force but
instead through the workers own needs but
because of capitalism, can only be satisfied
through wage labor.
 In this regard we are thought to be ‘free
laborers’, free to accept the capitalists’ terms.
 If we refuse, there’s a reserve army of
unemployed willing to take it.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
24
Exploitation
 The capitalists pay the workers less than the
value the workers produce and keep the rest for
themselves  surplus value
 “The rate of surplus-value is therefore an exact
expression for the degree of exploitation of
labor-power by capital, or of the laborer by the
capitalist.”
 Capitalists much engage in exploitation or others
will and ruin them (general law of capitalist
accumulation), this intensifies since the workers
are the source of value, the exploitation
increases creating class conflict.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
25
Class Conflict
 Class, group of people in similar situations
with respect to control of the means of
production.
 Also defined by Marx in its potential for
conflict.
 Class exists only when people become aware
of their conflicting relation to other classes.
Without awareness, they’re a class in itself.
When they become aware they become a
true class, for itself.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
26
Bourgeoisie and Proletariat
Bourgeoisie particular name for the
capitalists in the modern economy who
own the means of production.
Conflict between bourgeoisie and
proletariat is a real material contradiction.
Increasing proletarianization occurs.
Capitalists seek greater productivity 
machines  fewer jobs  more proletariat
 more gravediggers
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
27
Some of Marx’s famous expressions
 “Religion is the opium of the masses.”
 “Workers of the world unite!!!”
 “The history of all hitherto existing society is the
history of class struggle.”
 “The workingmen have no country.”
 “The ruling ideas of each age have ever been
the ideas of its ruling class.”
 The bourgeoisie “creates a world after its own
image.”
 “Capitalism creates its own gravedigger.”
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
28
Key Ideas
 all societies have internal tensions – the dominant
versus the oppressed
 conflict is the basis of society
 the conflict of modern societies is primarily between the
bourgeoisie (owners) and the proletariat (workers)
 economic class is the most important factor in
understanding society – the means of production
 capitalism produces a specific form of alienation and
exploitation
 “those who control the means of production control the
means of mental production”
 The use of ideologies to perpetuate capitalism and forestall
revolution
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
29
Marx and Economic Revolution
 Marx argues that because capital is privately
owned by the bourgeoisie, and surplus is not
adequately shared, exploitation of workers is the
necessary consequence.
 Because they are alienated, workers are not
aware of their common condition of exploitation.
Thus, workers are in a state of false
consciousness because they are not aware of
their collective interests.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
30
Marx and Economic Revolution
However, Marx argues that inevitably
workers will become aware of their shared
conditions of exploitation and will develop
a class consciousness.
A class for itself
This will result in an economic revolution
where workers will seize control over the
means of production and distribute surplus
equally.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
31
Marx and Economic Revolution
Essentially, Marx’s theory is based upon
economic determinism. He argues that
changes in the economy change all other
facets of society.
If there are economic imbalances they will
manifest themselves in other dimensions
of society.
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
32
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
33
Key Criticisms
1) The problem of actually existing communism
2) Missing emancipatory subject (proletariat rarely
assume this position and actively oppose
communism)
3) Missing dimension of gender (men’s paid labor
relies ion women’s unpaid labor)
4) Marx saw economy solely driven by production
and ignored consumption
5) Marx’s reliance on Western notion of ‘progress’
as problematic (what of our current ecological
crises?)
Lesson 4: Karl Marx Classical Sociological
Theory
34