Marxism

These are my Emergence of Sociological Theories notes.

This is some crazy stuff. (2/3 are actual points, and 1/3 are my own thoughts).

Marx:

-Mode of Production:

-way of transform the nature, which is considered the basics of society

-like how the production of slaves, were the basics of society

-now, we have Capitalism

-in each mode of production, there will always be 2 social classes (Dominators, and the Dominated)

-Capitalism vrs. Workers, like in the past Lords vrs. Peasants

-In more general terms, Owners of mean of Production vrs. Workers

-will always have a class struggle

-Marx’s idea of Capitalism was heavily influenced by Hegel, the German dude

-Believes that a revolution will happen, when the working classes opposes capitalism and create a new mode of production

-Why will a revolution happen?

-The workers are exploited, dominated, and alienated.

-The difference between a human and animal, is that humans are conscious of what they are doing (according to Marx).

-Surplus Value ------ Used Value ------ Exchange Value

-only when the Exchange Value is larger than Used Value, you will get profit

-So in Marx’s views, why do workers continue being dominated?

-Cost of labour power, where the workers get paid.

-We can assume that the suppliers (ex. For car companies), they will be sold for fairly the same price because it is too hard to have any real competition in this part.

-When the price of raw materials do not make a difference, then the next way to reduce the Used Value, is to reduce the money used for Labour Power

-Therefore, companies make jobs to be competitive. This is however a game, because there will be a point where the wage cannot be lowered anymore.

-HOWEVER, when everybody plays the same way, then the competition is then at a stalemate again.

-Now we can replace workers with machines, or even children.

-Then with extreme capitalism, morals are no more. If children are cheaper, then it works. Then luckily, government saw that it was too crazy, and started making laws on age limits.

-There may be companies that want to stop being dominating, but if they start being less competitive, they risk being overtaken by other capitalist companies.

-Ford found the assembly line, which got him ahead of the competition.

-When that happened, he made a great idea where he raised his employee’s wages. Since there were a surplus of cars made and his employees could not afford a car, he can continue the production when he can get his employees to buy his cars.

-BUT, when other companies do the same thing, there is a competition again. They will most likely try to lower the price for Labour power, again.

-Then, this will conclude with workers starting a revolution.

-This is the communist manifesto.

-However, Marx has not made a clear declaration of what the communist society (after the revolution) be like.

-And our current world, has been doing things (somewhat) differently than continuing to exploit workers. Some people have started seeing the need to maintaining and sustaining the world.

-In a communist society, there is no more social class. Then it will most likely be a bloodshed.

-How will the people within a social class be, when their social class disappears? Chaos?

-In a communist society, the government may be the ones to take care of the society.

-But if you give so much power to so little people, then the consequence of abuse of power will be so drastic.

-Marx has one of the best explanation for capitalism, but doesn’t give a solution and thinks it humanity will end. (and it has not)

-Marx’s idea, is that if we get rid of Capitalism, everything will be okay. But he does not think of the outcome.

-That is why people think Marx supports Communism, just because other people read his work and think that is the only way.

Is capitalism the best way for humanity?

-Probably impossible to say, capitalism can be devastating depending on how society handles it. But it also possible that society uses communism in a positive way.

-Social work wants to make everything equal, meaning that SWs are against capitalism….?