Note: This article was written in the magazine The Granma, a spokesman for the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, on the occasion of the bicentennial of the birth of Karl Marx in May 2018.
No matter how much the propaganda machine of capitalism tries to refute Marx's analysis, his views have been vindicated by history.
Every time the economic crisis alarm bells ring, sales of Karl Marx's books skyrocket. There will be few, like the German thinkers of the nineteenth century, who have understood the functions of capitalism and its consequences for humanity.
The monopoly propaganda machine of capitalism has refuted his analysis and tried desperately to issue a death sentence against the ideas for which he has dedicated his life, but Marxism has stood the test of time. It landed and proved to be accurate, not only as a way to understand the world but also as a tool to change it.
Two centuries after its birth, Granma International is presenting ten of Marx's prophecies covering the twenty-first century.
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| Ten Marxist ideas |
10 Thoughts of Marxism Explaining the 21st Century
1. Concentration and centralization of capital
In his masterpiece of capitalism, Marx explained the economic rebirth of capitalism and predicted the trend of concentration and centralization of capital. The first aspect of this relates to the consensus of surplus-value, that is, the value which is created by the labour-power of the labourer but which the capitalist uses at his disposal as a profit. The second term refers to the increase in capital that results from the merger of several different capitalists and is always accompanied by economic bankruptcies and economic crises.
The implications of this analysis are devastating for those who defend the merits of the market's invisible hand in the distribution of wealth. As Marx predicted, one of the characteristics of capitalism in the twenty-first century is that the gap between rich and poor is widening. According to a recent Oxfam report, 82% of the world's wealth in 2017 went into the pockets of the richest 1% of the world's population, while 3.7 billion people, half of the world's poorest people. Their wealth did not increase at all.
2. The instability of capitalism and the recurrence of crises
These German thinkers were the first six people in the world to understand that economic crises are not the result of a breakdown in the capitalist system but are a permanent feature. Even today, capitalist economists try to come up with a different idea about the economic crisis of the capitalist system.
However, from the stock market crash of 1929 to 2007-2008, the journey of the capitalist economy has remained the same as that marked by Marx.
That is why even the biggest Wall Street moneylenders keep turning the pages of Marx's writing capital to find a solution to this problem.
3. Class struggle
Probably one of the most revolutionary Marxist ideas lay in this understanding: "So far all the history of the world is a history of class struggle," as we read in the Communist Manifesto of 1848 by Marx and Engels. ۔ This claim plunged liberal thought into crisis.
According to Marx, the capitalist state is also a weapon of the upper class to dominate others through the reproduction of its own values and its own class. A century and a half later, 99% of the people are waging a social struggle against the domination of the 1%.
4. Industrial surplus army
According to Marx, the capitalist always needs to keep wages low in order to maximize the rate of profit, and this goal can only be achieved as long as there are workers who can replace them. Available to those who refuse to accept the terms of employment. He called it the Industrial Additional Army. However, since the nineteenth century, social and trade union movements have changed the elements of this situation, especially in developed countries. But the search for low-wage workers is still an essential element of the business sector.
During the twentieth century, large manufacturing companies in Europe and the United States moved to Asia in search of low-skilled skilled workers. While recent governments have pointed to job losses in the process, as has been the case with the Donald Trump administration in the United States, the reality is that these companies have exploited cheap labour to maintain high profits. ۔
Current research on wages shows that the purchasing power of the working class in Western countries has been declining for almost 30 years. The gap between executive and lower-level employees has widened. According to an article in The Economist, in countries such as the United States, wages have plummeted over the past 20 years, while the salaries of the highest-ranking executives have risen sharply: earning 40 to 110 times more than average. Are
5. The negative role of financial capital
Marx elaborated on the tactics of exploitation in the consensus of capital. He has been particularly critical of financial capital, which does not have a direct material role in the economy, but rather is accumulated in a mythical way, such as in the form of a promissory note, promissory note, or bond.
No one could have imagined the modern development of this sector of the economy in his time. Today it is possible to perform financial transactions through the computer at the speed of light.
Large-scale investment and the exposure of complex financial systems, such as lending to non-payers at high-interest rates, which led to the 2007-2008 crisis, all strongly support Marx's reservations.
6. Creating false needs
The nineteenth century did not see the development of commercial advertising on TV and radio, and the modern methods of personalized advertising on the Internet, but Marx was already aware of the potential of capitalism to create false needs and discord among the people. Was warned One and a half hundred years ago he predicted:
"The proliferation of commodities and necessities takes the form of the creation of inhuman, artificial, unnatural and imaginary inclinations and desires and the ever-increasing obedience."
In today's world, mobile phones become obsolete in a matter of months and advertisers have a responsibility to persuade consumers to buy the latest models. At the same time, home appliances are planned so that they stop working within a few years and thus need to be replaced.
7. Globalization
Marx and Engels wrote in the Communist Manifesto: “The need for a constantly growing market for our products pursues capitalists all over the world and forces them to build their nests everywhere, to settle everywhere. And make connections everywhere. ”
The globalization of markets and the dominance of consumer-oriented culture for it could not have been more accurate.
8. The rise of monopolies
This globalization trend leads to the creation of international monopolies. The presumption of classical economic theory was that competition would increase the share of the property, but Marx went a step further and pointed out the tendency of the market to mix on the basis of the law of the most powerful. As a result, the share of the property will increase, so that the most powerful capitalist corporations will take over the economy. The media, telecommunications, and large oil monopolies are just a few recent examples of this process.
9. The suicidal tendency of capitalism
One of the most insightful ideas about capitalism in the Communist Manifesto is:
"Everything that is solid dissolves in the air."
Marx and Engels were both aware of the simultaneously creative and self-destructive nature of capitalism, in which the pursuit of the enrichment of labour at all costs imposes on society the inhuman rhythm and unsustainable use of production. Does
This is the trend that has brought our planet to the brink of destruction. The effects of human warming on global warming have been scientifically proven, although the presidents of some countries, such as the United States, have consistently denied it.
10 The revolutionary potential of the working class
Marx's powerful influence on history was not due to his in-depth analysis of the contradictions of capitalism, but to his call for the creation of a new society based on communism. Was
His message that the working class has the potential to liberate itself from exploitation and inequality forever changed the twentieth century and led to revolutions in other countries, including Russia, China, Vietnam and Cuba. Gave birth His call for working-class unity is perfectly valid in the 21st century.
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