Tuesday, October 29, 2013

A passage from "The Junius Pamphlet," by Rosa Luxemburg: HW (6)

“Social democracy is simply the embodiment of the modern proletariat's class struggle, a struggle which is driven by a consciousness of its own historic consequences. The masses are in reality their own leaders, dialectically creating their own development process. The more that social democracy develops, grows, and becomes stronger, the more the enlightened masses of workers will take their own destinies, the leadership of their movement, and the determination of its direction into their own hands. And as the entire social democracy movement is only the conscious advance guard of the proletarian class movement, which in the words of the Communist Manifesto represent in every single moment of the struggle the permanent interests of liberation and the partial group interests of the workforce vis à vis the interests of the movement as whole, so within the social democracy its leaders are the more powerful, the more influential, the more clearly and consciously they make themselves merely the mouthpiece of the will and striving of the enlightened masses, merely the agents of the objective laws of the class movement.”

 (“The Political Leader of the German Working Classes, Collected Works 2, 280)

I think this passage is explaining the main concept of communism by emphasizing more on the first chapter of the communist Manifesto.

The first chapter of the Manifesto, which talks about the Bourgeois and Proletarians, examines the Marxist idea of history, with the preliminary idea asserting that the history of all up till the present society is the history of class struggles. It continue to say that in capitalism, the working class(proletariat) are fighting in the class struggle against the owners of the means of production( the bourgeois) and this past class struggle always ended either with revolution that restructured society, or the destruction of the competing classes.

Moreover, the Manifesto explains that the reason the bourgeois exist and exploit the proletariat with low wages is private property, "the accumulation of wealth in private hands, and the eventual formation and increase of capital. The passage is explaining the importance of the proletariat coming together to support the idea for liberation in the hands of the bourgeoisie, through revolution against the bourgeoisie such as riots or creation of unions. Luxemburg, however, is giving them the confidence of surmounting their ordeals and the eventual rise to power. It also explained that communism is the key to class equality amongst the citizens of Europe; hence the proletarians should stand for that as their destiny is in their own hands.

Personally I think this passage is all about advocacy for humanity and equal rights; because if people were treated equally despite of education, financial stability, etc.; these limitations could not categorize people, and this would eventually eliminate discrimination which further leads to crime and violence. Therefore this also means giving the opportunity for everyone to equally and amicably work together without having to step on each others feet.

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