The Revolutionary Potential of the Working Class

The Revolutionary Potential of the Working Class PDF

Author: Ernest Mandel

Publisher:

Published: 1974

Total Pages: 88

ISBN-13:

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Monograph appraising the potential of the working class in the USA as an agent of radical social change - cites the growing radicalization of certain minority groups and low income groups, youth unrest, etc., and considers the future prospects for socialism. Illustrations.

Condition of the Working-Class in England

Condition of the Working-Class in England PDF

Author: Friedrich Engels

Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 477

ISBN-13: 1442936916

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This masterpiece by Engels reflects his views on the plight of labour classes in England. It is based on his in-depth research and parliamentary reports. In a factual and analytic manner he has voiced his support for fundamental human rights. It is an emphatic protest against the barbarianism of capitalism and industrialization. A prototypical opus!

Consciousness and Action Among the Western Working Class

Consciousness and Action Among the Western Working Class PDF

Author: Michael Mann

Publisher: Palgrave

Published: 1973

Total Pages: 94

ISBN-13:

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This book makes a comparative analysis of working-class consciousness in Britain, France, Italy and the United States and seeks to answer the question of whether the working class today is a potentially revolutionary force in the West. In France and Italy class conflict and working-class consciousness have reached a higher level of intensity than in Britain or the United States. Both Marxist and functionalist explanations for this are discussed, special attention being paid to the recent French Marxism of Althusser, Mallet and Touraine. Class consciousness is examined as a dynamic process by analyzing the "explosion of consciousness" which often seems to occur in turbulent strike situations. The author concludes that class conflict is more complex than either group of theorists suggest. Working-class consciousness and the relationship between labor and capital are found to be dualistic and fundamentally unstable. Revolutionary potential is greatest in situations of uneven economic and social development when the capital-labor contradiction may be reinforced by other social conflicts. This means that the Marxist claim that the working-class carries in itself the power to be a class for itself must be rejected.

The Dangerous Class

The Dangerous Class PDF

Author: Clyde Barrow

Publisher: University of Michigan Press

Published: 2020-10-19

Total Pages: 209

ISBN-13: 0472128086

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Marx and Engels’ concept of the “lumpenproletariat,” or underclass (an anglicized, politically neutral term), appears in The Communist Manifesto and other writings. It refers to “the dangerous class, the social scum, that passively rotting mass thrown off by the lowest layers of old society,” whose lowly status made its residents potential tools of the capitalists against the working class. Surprisingly, no one has made a substantial study of the lumpenproletariat in Marxist thought until now. Clyde Barrow argues that recent discussions about the downward spiral of the American white working class (“its main problem is that it is not working”) have reactivated the concept of the lumpenproletariat, despite long held belief that it is a term so ill-defined as not to be theoretical. Using techniques from etymology, lexicology, and translation, Barrow brings analytical coherence to the concept of the lumpenproletariat, revealing it to be an inherent component of Marx and Engels’ analysis of the historical origins of capitalism. However, a proletariat that is destined to decay into an underclass may pose insurmountable obstacles to a theory of revolutionary agency in post-industrial capitalism. Barrow thus updates historical discussions of the lumpenproletariat in the context of contemporary American politics and suggests that all post-industrial capitalist societies now confront the choice between communism and dystopia.

Workers and Politics

Workers and Politics PDF

Author: R. G. Williams

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Published: 2022-07-13

Total Pages: 184

ISBN-13: 1527579913

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This book is a study of working-class politics, particularly in terms of British labour history. It explores the history of the British Left, the history of British Socialism, the history of British Communism, the ideas of Karl Marx, and the historical development of Socialism as the ideology of the working class.

The Working Class from Marx to Our Times

The Working Class from Marx to Our Times PDF

Author: Marcelo Badaró Mattos

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2022-04-23

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13: 3030973557

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This book reviews Marx's contributions to the debate on the working class. The first part of the work presents the synthesis of the main contributions of Marx and Engels (and 20th century Marxist writers) to the understanding of social classes, the class struggle, and the working class. The remaining parts present exercises of dialogue between Marx's and Marxists’ discussions on the working class, presented in the first part, and empirical elements of class reality today, as well as debates in the social sciences and historiography on the same issues. The thesis defended in the book is simple: the "working class,” also called the "proletariat,” as it appears in the work of Karl Marx, had and has validity as an analytical category for the understanding of social life under capitalism. Nevertheless, Marx’s discussion on the issue is complex and the category “working class” in his approach is wider than many Marxists have presented it.