Date: Sun, 10 Nov 1996 21:37:29 GMT
From: Chris Burford <cburford-AT-gn.apc.org>
Subject: M-I: Equality and civil society


>>>>>>
From: acaruso-AT-juno.com (Anthony J Caruso)
Date: Sun, 10 Nov 1996 11:19:08 EST
Subject: Re: M-I: Reply to Carrol Cox


Marxism is supposed to 	make us all equals, isn't it?  

<<<

No. Interestingly that idea does not appear anywhere in marxism.


Liberty, Equality and Fraternity are ideals of the French
Revolution. Bourgeois democratic ideas, progressive in 
the face of feudalism.

Marxists fight to end exploitation of the working class by capital 
and the political domination of capital etc. 
They may fight for the defence and the extension 
of bourgeois democratic rights in civil society. They
may well want to enlarge the concept of 
fraternity to include sorority.

But it is not accurate to say that Marxism is "supposed to make
us all equal"

That is idealism. We are all different. We interact differently.
It is the false ideal of bourgeois civil society that we
are all, or should be all "equal".

And while marxism is not supposed to make us especially *unequal*
in terms of political power, there is a deep difference between
a marxist approach and that of radical democrats, libertarians
or anarchists, who imagine that social change can take place
without social roles which embody political power. 

The 20th century has got some terrible lessons about the need for
socialist legality, but there is still a crunch issue around
the question of the meaning of the "dictorship of the 
proletariat": how power should be used to prevent the reemergence
of a capitalist class that will exploit and oppress working people.

Sorry if this sounds like another slap down. I enjoyed your 
spirited post, which generated a number of points. 
This was a creative point I did not want to let go by. 



Chris Burford
London.

 


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