In short, Marx's influence is vast and contested. His ideas were used to justify authoritarian state socialism, which we encountered in the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba, for instance,
to inspire anti-colonial revolutions, to build powerful labor movements, and to create sophisticated critical theories of culture, society, and the psyche.
Even for thinkers who fundamentally reject his conclusions, his analytical frameworks, with concepts like class, ideology, exploitation, and the critique of capitalism,
and to which we now can add rising inequality, automation, and AI, remain unavoidable reference points in modern intellectual life.
This means that not all of Marx’s influence led to violent revolution.
In Western Europe, many workers' parties, like the Labour Party in the UK or the SPD in Germany, adopted "Evolutionary Socialism".
A peculiar exception was the Dutch SDAP, the Social Democratic Workers’ Party (SDAP – Sociaal-Democratische Arbeiderspartij). One of its leaders was Pieter Troelstra.
After the outbreak of the Russian Revolution in 1917, Troelstra believed he saw his opportunity and called upon the Dutch population in 1918 for a socialist revolution, following Germany as an example.
This failed, and his call went down in history as "Troelstra's Mistake". It was a great disappointment for him.
Due to a lack of organization and because a well-organized counter-movement emerged quite quickly, the attempted revolution fizzled out. I'll save you all the historical details.
This "Evolutionary Socialism" meant: Instead of overthrowing the state, the parties I just mentioned, also the SDAP in the Netherlands,
used Marxist critiques of capitalism to push for labor unions, the 40-hour workweek, universal healthcare, and progressive taxation.
Eventually, this would lead to what was called the "Welfare" state in several European countries, a "mixed economy" where capitalism still existed but was heavily regulated to protect the working class.
In the discussion after one of the previous lectures, one of the participants, John Howard Cassio, made the following comment, and I quote:
Marxism has shaped society more than we think. Half of the world used to be socialist regimes up to 35 years ago, and the rest had to compete with them.
Since that kind of world order ended, the socialism we had embedded in capitalist society has been retreating and regressing.
The result is what you are seeing now. We are going back to the situation of society when Marx was alive, which is different from today.
Very few shades of gray back then. Now Marx said one thing that we are seeing today. He said, "Capitalism has in itself the seeds of its own self-destruction". -END QUOTE
And another of the participants in the discussion asked the brilliant question: "But what will replace it?"
And with that question, she formulated the prelude of all the next lectures to come. The lectures will explore subjects like post-capitalist alternatives,
crises of neoliberalism, economic consequences of climate change and the capitalist responses to these issues. And finally: the possible return of Marx’s "seeds of destruction" today?
Main Sources:
MacMillan The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2nd edition
of Economic Thought (2012)
TABLE OF CONTENT -----------------------------------------------------------------
1 - 100 Philosophers 9 May 2009 Start of
2 - 25+ Women Philosophers 10 May 2009 this blog
3 - 25 Adventures in Thinking 10 May 2009
4 - Modern Theories of Ethics 29 Oct 2009
5 - The Ideal State 24 Febr 2010 / 234
6 - The Mystery of the Brain 3 Sept 2010 / 266
7 - The Utopia of the Free Market 16 Febr 2012 / 383
8. - The Aftermath of Neo-liberalism 5 Sept 2012 / 413
9. - The Art Not to Be an Egoist 6 Nov 2012 / 426
10 - Non-Western Philosophy 29 May 2013 / 477
11 - Why Science is Right 2 Sept 2014 / 534
12 - A Philosopher looks at Atheism 1 Jan 2015 / 557
13 - EVIL, a philosophical investigation 17 Apr 2015 / 580
14 - Existentialism and Free Will 2 Sept 2015 / 586
15 - Spinoza 2 Sept 2016 / 615
16 - The Meaning of Life 13 Febr 2017 / 637
17 - In Search of my Self 6 Sept 2017 / 670
18 - The 20th Century Revisited 3 Apr 2018 / 706
19 - The Pessimist 11 Jan 2020 / 819
20 - The Optimist 9 Febr 2020 / 824
21 - Awakening from a Neoliberal Dream 8 Oct 2020 / 872
22 - A World Full of Patterns 1 Apr 2021 / 912
23 - The Concept of Freedom 8 Jan 2022 / 965
24 - Materialism 7 Sept 2022 / 1011
25 - Historical Materialism 5 Oct 2023 / 1088
26 - The Bonobo and the Atheist 9 Jan 2024 / 1102
27 - Artificial Intelligence 9 Feb 2024 / 1108
28 - Why Am I Here 6 Sept 2024 / 1139
The Discussion
[13:16]
[13:17] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): thank youHerman
[13:18] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): Well i say evil billioaires together the AI boom might indeed bring it all down, AI might be cool but this is insane hype of CEOs dreaming of firing everyone replacig them with ai
[13:18] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): + energy consuming data centers buildig non stip in a hopeless charge for endless profit to the ai billionaires
[13:18] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): it can't be well
[13:18] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): endd
[13:19] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): the tech might be cool by itself but it's out of control at momet
[13:19] herman Bergson: I don't know the future.....
[13:20] herman Bergson: In what way Bejiita...got an example?
[13:21] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): well they are building these AI datacenters and taking all computer hardware, then they actively say they hope this will force everyone to only have dumb terminals and rent all their computeer hardware from the cloud NVidias CEO is one that said this
[13:21] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): was met with outrage
[13:23] herman Bergson: It doesn't mean that AI really can do the job, they imagine...
[13:23] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): in short they want to end private computing
[13:23] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): indeed herman, as said, used right it can be a helpful tool but like this vibe coding hype
[13:23] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): the CEOs dreaming of firing all their programmers
[13:23] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): with vibe coding
[13:24] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): luckily this dont seem to work
[13:24] herman Bergson: They are talking to their shareholders and the stock markets
[13:24] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): in short, the rich ones want to take it all- the peak of capitalism
[13:25] herman Bergson: I don't think the masses will be happy with it
[13:26] herman Bergson: To be discarded is even worse than being exploited
[13:26] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): indeed
[13:27] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): people are already lashing out
[13:27] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): the Luigi effect I call it
[13:28] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont) whispers: what is the Luigi effect?
[13:28] herman Bergson: What kind of effect is that, Bejiita?
[13:29] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): Luigi was that guy shooting that health minister CEO or something and recently a worked burned a warehouse down while filming it and stating again and again " they only needed to pay us so we could live!"
[13:30] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): people are revolting ofer the greed
[13:30] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): over
[13:30] herman Bergson: Where did that happen?
[13:31] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5xTO4bVfW0
[13:33] herman Bergson: holy cow....
[13:34] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): people have had enough i feel
[13:34] herman Bergson: It burned down completely
[13:34] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): aha
[13:34] herman Bergson: this is massive...
[13:35] herman Bergson: This might be an incident and if not it might be the beginning of.....???????
[13:36] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): when you are threated like a slave and not getting enough to be able to even support yourself while the bosses make millions... yes this is the result i feel in the end
[13:37] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): modern slavery, paid to much to die and too little to live
[13:37] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): yes
[13:38] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): eeveryone deserve a decent life after all
[13:38] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): human right i say
[13:38] herman Bergson: At least we have a minimum wage in the Netherlands...
[13:39] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): aah
[13:40] herman Bergson: well, let's begin to think of a nice weekend :-)
[13:41] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): also i heard a horrible thing with Amazon, a guy died and the workers were firced to just keep working around his body, so Jeff Bezos could make more billions
[13:41] herman Bergson: Unless there's still something urgent to discuss
[13:41] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): That's why i NEVER want anything to do with Amazon
[13:42] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): horrible work conditions
[13:42] herman Bergson: We'll get to that in the coming lectures...
[13:43] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwBgMOAUA0w
[13:43] herman Bergson: For now, we call it a day and relax
[13:43] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): here is that other onw
[13:43] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): one
[13:43] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): like UUUUH :(
[13:43] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): well befoe i depress u even more lets play some cards
[13:45] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): I can't invite you for cards..i have no card able
[13:45] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): table
[13:45] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): aaaa yes didnt thought of Bergie isnt here
[13:45] herman Bergson: the table is outside Beertje
[13:45] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): :)))
[13:46] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): ok let's enjoy the cards then
[13:46] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): aaa you also have one thats right herman
[13:46] herman Bergson: Let's check it out.....
[13:46] Particle Physicist Bejiita (bejiita.imako): ㋡
[13:46] .: Beertje :. (beertje.beaumont): thank yu for this lecture Herman
[13:46] herman Bergson: Class dismissed...
No comments:
Post a Comment