invaluable introduction into Marxism. A "must" read for all workers and
youth.
The
Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism
by
V.I. Lenin
the
civilised world the teachings of Marx evoke the utmost hostility
and hatred of all bourgeois science (both official and liberal),
which regards Marxism as a kind of "pernicious sect." And
no other attitude is to be expected, for there can be no "impartial"
social science in a society based on class struggle.
one way or another, all
official and liberal science defends
wage slavery, where Marxism has declared relentless war on wage
slavery. To expect science to be impartial in a wage-slave society
is as silly and naive as to expect impartiality from manufacturers
on the question of whether workers’ wages should be increased by
decreasing the profits of capital.
But
this is not all. The history of philosophy and the history of social
science show with perfect clarity that there is nothing resembling
"sectarianism" in Marxism, in the sense of its being a
hidebound, petrified doctrine, a doctrine which arose away from
the high-road of development of world civilisation. On the contrary,
the genius of Marx consists precisely in the fact that he furnished
answers to questions which had already engrossed the foremost minds
of humanity. His teachings arose as a direct and immediate
continuation of the teachings of the greatest representatives
of philosophy, political economy and socialism.
The
Marxian doctrine is omnipotent because it is true. It is complete
and harmonious, and provides men with an integral world conception
which is irreconcilable with any form of superstition, reaction, or
defence of bourgeois oppression. It is the legitimate successor of
the best that was created by humanity in the nineteenth century in
the shape of German philosophy, English political economy and French
Socialism.
On
these three sources of Marxism, which are at the same time its
component parts, we shall dwell briefly.
I
philosophy of Marxism is materialism. Throughout the modern
history of Europe, and especially at the end of the eighteenth
century in France, which was the scene of a decisive battle against
every kind of medieval rubbish, against feudalism in institutions
and ideas, materialism has proved to be the only philosophy that is
consistent, true to all the teachings of natural science and hostile
to superstition, cant and so forth. The enemies of democracy
therefore tried in every way to "refute," undermine and
defame materialism, and advocated various forms of philosophical
idealism, which always, in one way or another, amounts to an
advocacy or support of religion.Marx
and Engels always defended philosophical materialism in the most
determined manner and repeatedly explained the profound error of
every deviation from this basis. Their views are most clearly and
fully expounded in the works of Engels, Ludwig Feuerbach and
Anti-Dühring, which like the Communist Manifesto, are
handbooks for every class-conscious worker.
Marx did not stop at the materialism of the eighteenth century; he
advanced philosophy. He enriched it with the acquisitions of German
classical philosophy, especially of the Hegelian system, which in
its turn led to the materialism of Feuerbach. The chief of these
acquisitions is dialectics, i.e., the doctrine of
developments in its fullest and deepest forms, free of one-sidedness
– the doctrine of the relativity of human knowledge, which provides
us with a reflection of eternally developing matter. The latest
discoveries of natural science-radium, electrons, the transmutation
of elements – have confirmed remarkably Marx’s dialectical
materialism, despite the teachings of the bourgeois philosophers
with their "new" reversions to old and rotten idealism.Deepening
and developing philosophical materialism, Marx completed it,
extended its knowledge of nature to the knowledge of human
society. Marx’s historical materialism was one of the
greatest achievements of scientific thought. The chaos and
arbitrariness that had previously reigned in the views on history
and politics gave way to a strikingly integral and harmonious
scientific theory, which shows how, in consequence of the growth of
productive forces, out of one system of social life another and
higher system develops – how capitalism, for instance, grows out of
feudalism.Just
as man’s knowledge reflects nature (i.e., developing matter), which
exists independently of him, so man’s social
knowledge (i.e. the various views and doctrines –
philosophical, religious, political, and so forth) reflects the
economic system of society. Political institutions are a
superstructure on the economic foundation. We see, for example, that
the various political forms of the modern European states serve to
fortify the rule of the bourgeoisie over the proletariat.Marx’s
philosophy is matured philosophical materialism, which has provided
humanity, and especially the working class, with powerful
instruments of knowledge.
Having
recognised that the economic system is the foundation on which the
political superstructure is erected, Marx devoted most attention to
the study of this economic system. Marx’s principal work, Capital,
is devoted to a study of the economic system of modern, i.e.,
capitalist, society.
political economy, before Marx, evolved in England, the most
developed of the capitalist countries. Adam Smith and David Ricardo,
by their investigations of the economic system, laid the foundations
of the labour theory of
value. Marx continued their work. He rigidly proved and
consistently developed this theory. He showed that the value of
every commodity is determined by the quantity of socially necessary
labour time spent on its production.
Where
the bourgeois economists saw a relation of things (the exchange of
one commodity for another), Marx revealed a
relation of men. The exchange of commodities expresses the
tie by which individual producers are bound through the market.
Money signifies that this tie is becoming closer and closer,
inseparably binding the entire economic life of the individual
producers into one whole. Capital signifies a further
development of this tie: man’s labour power becomes a commodity. The
wage-worker sells labour power to the owner of the land, factories
and instruments of labour. The worker uses one part of the labour
day to cover the expense of maintaining himself and his family
(wages), while the other part of the day the worker toils without
remuneration, creating surplus value for the capitalist, the
source of profit, the source of the wealth of the capitalist class.
The
doctrine of surplus value is the cornerstone of Marx’s economic
theory.
created by the labour of the worker, presses on the worker by
ruining the small masters and creating an army of unemployed. In
industry, the victory of large-scale production is at once apparent,
but we observe the same phenomenon in agriculture as well: the
superiority of large-scale capitalist agriculture increases, the
application of machinery grows, peasant economy falls into the noose
of money-capital, it declines and sinks into ruin, burdened by its
backward technique. In agriculture, the decline of small-scale
production assumes different forms, but the decline itself is an
indisputable fact.
destroying small-scale production, capital leads to an increase in
productivity of labour and to the creation of a monopoly position
for the associations of big capitalists. Production itself becomes
more and more social-hundreds of thousands and millions of workers
become bound together in a systematic economic organism-but the
product of the collective labour is appropriated by a handful of
capitalists. The anarchy of production grows, as do crises, the
furious chase after markets and the insecurity of existence of the
mass of the population.
While
increasing the dependence of the workers on capital, the capitalist
system creates the great power of united labour.
traced the development of capitalism from the first germs of
commodity economy, from simple exchange, to its highest forms, to
large-scale production
and
the experience of all capitalist countries, old and new, is clearly
demonstrating the truth of this Marxian doctrine to increasing
numbers of workers every year.
Capitalism
has triumphed all over the world, but this triumph is only the
prelude to the triumph of labour over capital.
III
feudalism was overthrown, and "free" capitalist
society appeared on God’s earth, it at once became apparent that
this freedom meant a new system of oppression and exploitation of
the toilers. Various socialist doctrines immediately began to rise
as a reflection of and protest against this oppression. But early
socialism was utopian socialism. It criticised capitalist society,
it condemned and damned it, it dreamed of its destruction, it
indulged in fancies of a better order and endeavoured to convince
the rich of the immorality of exploitation.
socialism could not point the real way out. It could not explain the
essence of wage-slavery under capitalism, nor discover the laws of
its development, nor point to the social force which is
capable of becoming the creator of a new society.
stormy revolutions which everywhere in Europe, and especially in
France, accompanied the fall of feudalism, of serfdom, more and more
clearly revealed the struggle of
classes as the basis and the motive force of the whole development.
Not a single
victory of political freedom over the feudal class was won except
against desperate resistance. Not a single capitalist country
evolved on a more or less free and democratic basis except by a life
and death struggle between the various classes of capitalist
society.
genius of Marx consists in the fact that he was able before anybody
else to draw from this and apply consistently the deduction that
world history teaches. This deduction is the doctrine of the
class struggle.
always were and always will be the stupid victims of deceit and
self-deceit in politics until they learn to discover the interests
of some class behind all moral, religious, political and
social phrases, declarations and promises. The supporters of reforms
and improvements will always be fooled by the defenders of the old
order until they realise that every old institution, however
barbarous and rotten it may appear to be, is maintained by the
forces of some ruling classes. And there is only one way of smashing
the resistance of these classes, and that is to find, in the very
society which surrounds us, and to enlighten and organise for the
struggle, the forces which can — and, owing to their social
position, must — constitute a power capable of sweeping away the
old and creating the new.
philosophical materialism has alone shown the proletariat the way
out of the spiritual slavery in which all oppressed classes have
hitherto languished. Marx’s economic theory has alone explained the
true position of the proletariat in the general system of
capitalism.
organisations of the proletariat are multiplying all over the world,
from America to Japan and from Sweden to South Africa. The
proletariat is becoming enlightened and educated by waging its class
struggle; it is ridding itself of the prejudices of bourgeois
society; it is rallying its ranks ever more closely and is learning
to gauge the measure of its successes; it is steeling its forces and
is growing irresistibly.
V I Lenin
1913