home  /  Early Modern  /  Social structure of capitalist society. On the class structure of capitalism (Part 2). What will we do with the received material?

Social structure of capitalist society. On the class structure of capitalism (Part 2). What will we do with the received material?

Early Modern
22.08.2023

Studying the class structure of slave-owning and feudal societies, in both cases we are dealing with main classes these formations, the mutual connection of which and the form of appropriation of surplus labor determine the slave-owning and feudal economy: slave owners and slaves, landowners and peasants. The main classes are those classes whose presence is determined by a given method of production and which, through their relationships, determine the nature of production relations and the economic structure of a given society..


For a capitalist society, such basic classes are proletariat And bourgeoisie. Without their existence, without their connection in the process of production, without the exploitation of the proletariat by the bourgeoisie, the most capitalist mode of production is unthinkable.

These main capitalist classes begin to develop within the depths of feudalism. Feudalism, based on agriculture, gives room within itself and craftsman production. Simultaneously with the development of guild crafts, commercial capital also developed in the depths of feudalism. A capitalist uniting a certain number under one roof hired workers, creates a capitalist form cooperation. This capitalist form of cooperation develops as the opposite of peasant farming and independent craft production.

Thus, already in the depths of feudalism, a class of wage workers and a class of capitalists are created. Capitalism develops primarily in cities, as opposed to the remaining feudal countryside. Along with the development of large-scale industry, the bourgeoisie and its antagonist, the proletariat, are growing. The bourgeoisie conquers one economic position after another, pushing the ruling class of medieval society into the background. In this course of historical development, the bourgeoisie, along with economic gains, also made political ones. In the first stages of its development, the bourgeoisie appears as a special group oppressed by the nobility. estate, concentrated mainly in cities. With the development of guild craft, free artisans (as was the case, for example, in Italy and France) created their own urban self-governing communities. This right was achieved or direct war with their feudal lords or that of the communities paid off from feudal lords. During manufacturing production, the bourgeoisie acts as " third estate"in contrast to the nobility and clergy. The further manufacturing develops, the more the third estate stratifies. From it the bourgeoisie and the proletariat stand out more and more clearly.

Finally, along with the development of large-scale industry, the bourgeoisie opposes the feudal nobility and overthrows its power. The developed productive forces of capitalist industry and the emerging capitalist relations corresponding to them came into conflict with the old feudal relations of production, with the class privileges protecting the latter, with feudal law and the state. Therefore, the task of the bourgeoisie was to seize state power and bring it into line with the emerging bourgeois economy.

Having seized power, the bourgeoisie turns all its attention to ensuring that the working class brought to life does not destroy its rule. The bourgeois revolution replaces the old class of feudal exploiters new class of exploiters- bourgeoisie. The ruling class that has come to power again needs to oppress the proletariat. To this end, he does not break the old state machine, but only rebuilds it and adapts it to his interests.

Bourgeois ideologists always portray the bourgeois revolution as a struggle for freedom, equality and fraternity. In reality, the bourgeoisie seeks to destroy only the feudal privileges that hinder its dominance. Having seized power into its own hands, the bourgeoisie destroys all feudal and patriarchal relations. “She mercilessly tore apart the motley feudal threads connecting a person with his hereditary overlords and left no connection between people other than bare interest, heartless purity. In the cold water of selfish calculation, she drowned the sacred impulse of pious dreaminess, knightly inspiration and bourgeois sentimentality. She turned a person’s personal dignity into exchange value» .

The bourgeoisie recognizes only one privilege - the privilege owner. In an effort to abolish feudal privileges, the bourgeoisie proclaims “equality.” But there is bourgeois equality actual inequality, in which there remain the haves and the have-nots, the exploiter and the exploited, the bourgeois and the proletarian. The bourgeoisie seeks to destroy all feudal fetters that hinder the development of trade and industry. The bourgeoisie needs the free development of industry and trade, and therefore bourgeois ideologists proclaim freedom. But bourgeois freedom means freedom for the haves and at the same time enslavement for hired workers.

In order to overthrow the rule of the feudal lords with the help of the proletariat and peasantry, the bourgeois revolution portrays the special interests of the bourgeoisie as universal interests as the interests of the whole society. The bourgeoisie seeks to present the matter in such a way that it acts in the revolution not as a special class with its own interests, but as a representative of the entire people, as opposed to the ruling nobility. The bourgeoisie succeeds in this until the proletariat has developed into an independent class, has not yet grown to the consciousness of its own own interests.

Meanwhile, it is in bourgeois society that the contradictions between the ruling class and the oppressed classes (the proletariat, the poorest and middle peasants) develop with the greatest severity and depth. basis theirs is the contradiction of capitalism - the contradiction between social production and private appropriation.

The owner of the means of production is a relatively small group of capitalists. The capitalists are opposed by a huge army of hired workers, deprived of the means of production. Wage workers can only exist by sell their labor capitalists. They are “free” from any means of production. The continuous growth of the labor force forced out of production through the introduction of technical improvements in the form of a “reserve army of labor”, the growth of unemployment, the constant tendency of the capitalist to lower the wages of workers - these are the consequences for the working class of the capitalist principles of freedom, equality, private property and selfish gain.

The working class, in its struggle against the bourgeoisie, goes through various stages development.

In the early period of capitalism, the working class already existed, but does not yet recognize itself as a separate independent class, opposing other classes with their interests. In this early period, the working class exists as a class “in itself” and for others (for the capital that exploits it), but not yet “ for myself».

The struggle of workers against capitalists begins at the earliest stages. At first, the workers fight the capitalist individually. Then the workers of an entire factory and even an entire industry or locality speak out. At this stage, the workers’ struggle is directed not so much against the capitalist mode of production itself as against its external manifestations. The workers see that the victorious march of developing capitalism causes the introduction of machines, and therefore a change in old methods of production, the displacement of labor and an increase in unemployment. Therefore, the worker mistakenly believes that all evil depends on the use of machines in production. He directs all his hatred towards cars. Workers destroy machines, set fire to factories, destroy foreign competing goods, and generally strive to return to the now obsolete position of the medieval workshop or factory worker. The workers still don't understand class essence capitalist mode of production. At this stage of development, the proletariat is a dispersed mass scattered throughout the country.

But along with the growth of industry, the strength and power of the proletariat grows. Large industry concentrates thousands of workers in one enterprise. The school of collective labor develops among workers class solidarity. Workers are beginning to realize that they, as a collective whole, have their own special interests opposed to the interests of capital. The development of railways, telephone, telegraph, etc. speeds up the methods of communication. At the same time, the unification of workers throughout the country is happening much faster. The unification of workers, which would have taken centuries in the Middle Ages, is accomplished in a few years. Capitalism is conquering the world market. Along with goods, workers are transferred from one country to another. The proletariat breaks the bonds of national borders and becomes a class international proletariat.

At this stage the working class is aware its class interests, opposes itself to other classes and, first of all, to its antagonist - the bourgeois class. Acting as a class for himself, he creates his own political party.

To protect their class interests, workers create trade unions; Among the most advanced elements of the working class, political the consignment, there is a unification of the working class on an international scale - in International.


Mode of production

The sociological theory of capitalist society of Marx and Engels was developed most systematically and in detail in Capital and economic manuscripts of the 60s. Engels’s works “Anti-Dühring”, “Ludwig Feuerbach and the end of classical German philosophy”, Engels’s cycle “Letters on Historical Materialism”, etc. are also of great importance. The creation of a mature form of Marxist theory of society became possible thanks to Marx's study of the capitalist economy. A number of theoretical constructs characteristic of the formative stage were removed by Marx (for example, the theory of alienated labor), but at the same time many important ideas of the works of the 40-50s. were saved by them

1 Marks K., Towards a critique of political economy. Preface // Op. T. 13. pp. 6-9.


SOCIOLOGY OF GERMANY

nena. Therefore, when presenting a mature form of Marxist theory of society, it is necessary to use the provisions (although not all) of the “German Ideology”, “Manifesto of the Communist Party”, “Economic Manuscripts of 1857-1859” and other works. The closer the date of creation of the work is to the beginning of the creative activity of Marx and Engels, the more their ideas were taken into the mature form of their theory.

The essence of the materialist understanding of history is the position about the ontological primacy of social being and the secondary nature of social consciousness, about social being as determining and social consciousness as being determined. Social existence in its concreteness is revealed by Marx as a process of social labor (production).

In constructing the theory of capitalist society, Marx proceeds from the concept of labor as a developing process of interaction between society and nature: “Labor is, first of all, a process taking place between man and nature, a process in which man, through his own activity, mediates, regulates and controls the exchange of substances between himself and nature " 1 . Through labor, a person, in accordance with his needs (real or imaginary), produces material (material) consumer goods. The labor process includes as simple moments: a) purposeful activity, or labor as such (labor in the narrow sense of the word, b) the object of labor and c) the means of labor. The subject of labor is natural objects and natural objects already mediated by labor, to which labor itself is directed: the earth with its subsoil, flora and fauna, water resources. “A means of labor is a thing or a complex of things that a person places between himself and the object of labor and which serves for him as a conductor of his influence on this object. He uses the mechanical, physical and chemical properties of things in order, in accordance with his purpose, to use them as instruments of influence on other things” 2. The creation of means of labor is a feature that distinguishes humans from animals: humans deeply and multi-stage transform natural materials, while animals have only a superficial impact on them, coinciding with their direct consumption. Means of labor, therefore, are machines, tools, various types of equipment used

1 Marx K., Capital. T. 1 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 23. P. 168.

2 Ibid. P. 190.

History of sociology


As a conductor of human impact on nature. The means of labor also include the material conditions of production that play an auxiliary role in production - pipes, barrels, vessels, industrial buildings, roads, transport, etc. In general, means of labor (mechanical) are, as Marx believed, the most essential characteristic of the economy of any society: “Economic eras differ not in what is produced, but in how it is produced, with what means of labor” 1 .

The development of an automatic system of machines determines the formation of the social nature of production: the means of production are set in motion by an ever-increasing mass of members of society, i.e. increasingly collectively. Society is increasingly subject to the tendency to become a single factory, a single system of machines. In accordance with all this, the concentration and centralization of capital occurs: large capitals absorb small capitals, large capitalists expropriate small capitalists. A contradiction is formed between the social nature of the productive forces and the private form of their appropriation. This contradiction determines the increasingly dynamic development of the capitalist mode of production, not only increases social productive forces, but also determines the constant increase in the exploitation of workers, regular economic crises, the systematic destruction of productive forces, enormous waste of human labor, for which capital, with tireless ingenuity, creates more and more new ones. forms, which is a necessary prerequisite for its further development. The development of the capitalist mode of production increases the torment of labor. Marx writes: “... the accumulation of wealth at one pole is at the same time the accumulation of poverty, the torment of labor, slavery, ignorance, coarseness and moral degradation at the opposite pole, i.e. on the side of the class that produces its own product as capital” 2. Due to all this, both the necessity and the possibility of overcoming capitalist production relations, capitalist private property are created, i.e. implementation of the socialist revolution, establishing control of associated producers over social productive forces.

1 Marks K. Capital. T. 1 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 23. S. 191.

2 Ibid. P. 660.

SOCIOLOGY OF GERMANY 275

Social class structure of society

The capitalist mode of production presupposes, according to Marx, as its moment the distribution of individuals into types of activity depending on their relationship to the means of production, i.e. gives rise to the social-class structure of society. The key concept of Marx's theory - the concept of class - did not, however, receive a direct and strict definition. But Marx's view of the social structure of bourgeois society can be reconstructed from the economic theory of Marxism. Marx understands classes as large social groups characterized by different attitudes towards the means of production (real control, ownership of them or the absence of such control, ownership) and to each other. Classes as social groups of private owners and non-owners act either as a subject or as an object of exploitation, respectively. It seems that the definition of classes given by V.I. Lenin in his work “The Great Initiative” quite adequately reproduces Marx’s position. This definition, as we know, reads: “Classes are large groups of people that differ in their place in a historically defined system of social production, in their relationship (mostly fixed and formalized in laws) to the means of production, in their role in the social organization of labor, and, consequently, according to the method of obtaining and the size of the share of social wealth that they have. Classes are groups of people from which one can appropriate the work of another, due to the difference in their place in a certain structure of the social economy” 1.

Marx identifies two main classes of bourgeois society - bourgeoisie And proletariat (hired workers), i.e. owners of capital and owners of labor. Marx, back in the “Manifesto of the Communist Party,” noted that capitalist society, unlike its predecessors, is predominantly class-based: “Our era, the era of the bourgeoisie, differs, however, in that it has simplified class contradictions: society is increasingly split into two large hostile camps, into two large classes facing each other - the bourgeoisie and the proletariat" 2. A prerequisite for the capitalist mode

1 Lenin V.I. Great initiative //Lenin V.I. Poly. collection op. T. 39. P. 15.

2 Marx K., Engels F. Manifesto of the Communist Party // Marks K.,
Engels F. Op. T. 4. P. 425.



276 History of sociology

production, constantly reproduced by itself (on an expanded scale), is the functioning of the means of production (past labor) in the form of capital and workers (living labor) in the form of the proletariat. The proletariat creates surplus value, and capital commands its labor. A proletarian, according to Marx, is an individual engaged in productive labor in the context of the capitalist mode of production. According to Marx, productive labor under the capitalist mode of production is labor that produces not just products, but, firstly, goods and, secondly, surplus value, capital. As Marx wrote, productive labor is exchanged for capital, not for income. In the latter case, we would be talking about the labor of artisans, persons of “free labor,” etc., who create goods, but not surplus value, not capital, and are not exploited. For example, the personal shoemaker of a capitalist who owns a shoe factory is an unproductive worker, unlike the proletarians who produce in this factory not only boots, but also surplus value, capital. Marx characterized the subjects of productive labor as follows: “The number of these productive workers includes, of course, all those who in one way or another participate in the production of goods, starting with the worker in the proper sense of the word and ending with the director, engineer (as opposed to the capitalist)” 1 . The proletariat thus includes proletarians of mental and physical labor. Marx speaks of the total worker, the total proletariat, the particles of which are proletarians who perform a variety of functions in the system of social division of labor. “Just as in their nature the head and hands belong to the same organism, so in the process of labor mental and physical labor are combined... The product generally transforms from the direct product of the individual producer into a social one, into the common product of the collective worker, i.e. combined working personnel, whose members are closer or further away from direct impact on the subject of labor. Therefore, the very cooperative nature of the labor process inevitably expands the concept of labor productivity and its bearer, the productive worker. Now, in order to work productively, there is no need to directly use your hands; it is enough to be an organ of the collective worker, to perform one of its

1 Marks K. Theories of surplus value // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T.26.Ch. 1.S. 138.


SOCIOLOGY OF GERMANY

subfunctions" 1. “A characteristic feature of the capitalist mode of production is precisely that it separates different types of labor from each other, and, therefore, also mental and physical labor, or those types of labor in which one or the other side predominates, and distributes them among different people. This, however, does not prevent the fact that the material product is joint product of labor these people, or that their joint labor is embodied in material wealth; on the other hand, this does not in the least interfere with this or does not change at all in the fact that the relation of each of these people individually to capital represents the relation to the capital of a hired worker and in this special sense - attitude of a productive worker. All these people are not only directly employed in the production of material wealth, but also exchange their labor directly for money as capital and therefore, in addition to reproducing their labor power, directly create surplus value for the capitalist. Their labor consists of paid labor plus unpaid surplus labor” 2. Thus, according to Marx, all workers - from laborers to designers and scientists, embodying all links of the production process leading to the creation of a mass of capitalist goods, are the total labor force, the total proletarian, who opposes the total capital and is exploited by it. In the class of the proletariat, Marx also included hired workers engaged in trade, or the commercial proletariat. This layer of the proletariat does not produce surplus value, but creates the conditions for its realization.

Marx viewed the proletarian class as an integral, but internally divided social group. The author of Capital divided the proletariat into spheres (industrial, agricultural, commercial, etc.) and sectors (metallurgists, weavers, miners, etc.), by type of labor activity (proletarians of physical and mental labor), and by skill level (proletarians of skilled or complex and unskilled or simple labor), by level of payment (highly paid and low-paid proletarians), etc.

Marx noted that the existence of the class of hired workers is contradictory: on the one hand, it is united by socialization -

1 Marks K. Capital. T. 1 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 23. pp. 516-517.

2 Marks K. Marks K.,
Engels F. T. 48. P. 61.

History of sociology


There is production and objective opposition to capital (this tendency dominates), but on the other hand, there is a counteracting tendency of competitive struggle between proletarians for more favorable conditions for the sale of their labor power and for the possibility of selling their labor power in general.

The aggregate proletariat is opposed by the aggregate bourgeoisie, united by the average rate of profit. The bourgeois class is divided into layers in accordance with which particular transformed form of surplus value is appropriated. Marx identified: a) industrial capitalists (business income), b) bankers or rentiers (interest on capital), c) merchant capitalists (trade profit) and d) landowners (land rent). These layers are united by the appropriation of surplus value and confront the proletariat as a single whole. Industrial capitalists, traders, bankers (rentiers) and landowners are interested in strengthening (intensifying) the exploitation of the proletariat and “squeezing” the maximum amount of surplus value out of it. But regarding the surplus value already produced, there is a confrontation (competition) between different layers of the bourgeois class: the industrial capitalist strives for a low price for credit, a high price for his products, low rent for land, a banker for a high price for credit, a landowner for a high rent, etc. The friction between layers of the bourgeoisie is quite acute and determines the forms of reality of capitalist society, but only until it comes to the common interests of the capitalists in the face of the proletarian class. In this case, factional strife becomes unimportant for the bourgeois class, it becomes united and turns, in Marx’s words, into a real “Masonic brotherhood” to defend the interests of capital.

The most active part of the bourgeois class are the capitalist industrialists; they are at the center of Marx's study. An industrial capitalist combines two functions in his activities - the functions of production management (managerial labor) and labor of exploitation, labor of appropriating surplus value. “A capitalist is not a capitalist because he runs an industrial enterprise, - on the contrary, he becomes the head of industry because he is a capitalist. Supreme power in industry becomes an attribute of capital, just as in the feudal era the highest power


OCIOLOGY OF GERMANY

supreme power in military affairs and in court was an attribute of land ownership” 1. Marx focuses on the second function. It is seen by Marx as becoming obsolete: the proletarians are able to replace the capitalist within the enterprise and hire him as a worker (he points to such examples in contemporary England) or to displace the capitalist class within the entire society.

In addition to the proletarians engaged in direct production, there is also a thin layer of hired workers who carry out the work of managing the labor of the former, including the functions of supervision and control over it. Marx included in their composition “industrial officers (managers)” and “non-commissioned officers (overseers, foremen, overlooker, contre-maitres)” 2. There are no clear instructions from Marx about determining the place of the relevant individuals in the social class structure; from his position it follows that this group is not independent in social terms: its lower strata gravitate towards the proletariat, and its upper strata - towards the bourgeoisie.

As a special part of the proletarian class, Marx considered unemployed, this product of the “relative overpopulation” of bourgeois society. The author of Capital called this social group the “industrial reserve army.” This social group is the visible embodiment of the contradiction between productive forces and capital. The development of the capitalist mode of production, growing capitalist accumulation leads to an increase in this layer. The more capitalism develops, the more capital is accumulated, the more the absolute and relative number of unemployed grows. Taking advantage of the existence of this layer, the bourgeoisie exerts economic pressure on the proletariat, forcing it to accept terms favorable to it for the sale of labor power. Unemployment “chains the worker to capital more tightly than the hammer of Hephaestus chained Prometheus to the rock” 3 . Unemployment and pauperism 4 were, according to Marx, one of

1 Marks K. Capital. T. 1 // Marx K, Engels F. Op. T. 23. P. 344.

2 Ibid. pp. 343-344.

3 Ibid. P. 660.

4 Marx used the term “paupers” in relation to the declassed
capital to producers: a) workers who have become victims of unemployment
(at the stage of a mature capitalist mode of production) and b) expropriation
to peasants and artisans (at the stages of emergence and formation
of the capitalist mode of production).

History of sociology


The most visible manifestations of the contradiction between productive forces and production relations. This phenomenon, as a reproducible prerequisite for the development of the capitalist mode of production, not only is the destruction of man as a productive force, but also destroys the proletarians as individuals, leading to various forms of degradation and social barbarism - crimes, mental disorders, etc. Marx noted, in particular, the direct connection between the mental health of the proletarian class and the development of capitalist relations: “The growth of the number of insane people in Great Britain does not lag behind the growth of exports and has outstripped the growth of population” 1 .

Marx identifies as an important element of the social structure of bourgeois society, acting as an intermediate link between capitalists and proletarians, small owners or small producers, those. a social group of individuals who combine in their activities the functions of capital and labor, command of labor (their own or one’s own and others’) and the functions of direct labor (one’s own or one’s own and others’). Representatives of this layer, paradoxical as it may sound at first glance, are engaged in one way or another in the labor of exploiting themselves 2 . This social group is largely a legacy of pre-capitalist modes of production and, on a limited, increasingly narrowing scale, continues to exist under the capitalist mode of production. It occupies any noticeable place in the system of social production until capital has completely mastered the production process, without

3 Marks K. The increase in the number of insane people in England // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 12. P. 548.

2 “The independent peasant or artisan splits into two. As the owner of the means of production he is a capitalist, as a worker he is his own wage-labourer. Thus, as a capitalist, he pays himself wages and derives his profit from his capital, i.e. exploits himself as a wage worker and, in the form of surplus value, pays himself the tribute that labor is forced to give to capital... This way of thinking, no matter how irrational it may seem at first glance, is in fact still something correct, namely: in the case under consideration, the producer creates, however, his own surplus value (it is assumed that he sells his goods at its value), in other words, only his own labor is embodied in the entire product... only thanks to the ownership of the means of production he has his own surplus labor, and in this sense he treats himself as a hired worker." (Marx K., Engels F. Economic manuscript of 1861-1863 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 48. pp. 57-58).


SOCIOLOGY OF GERMANY

achieved real dominance over production methods. The weight of this layer is inversely proportional to the degree of capitalist development - with the development of bourgeois relations, it asymptotically tends to zero. The most typical representatives of this layer are peasants, artisans and small traders. Marx views this layer as eroding, decomposing into elements that make up the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, but never completely disappearing in bourgeois society 1 . Adjacent to this layer are individuals engaged in the work of providing personal services primarily to representatives of the bourgeois class - servants, cooks, gardeners, tailors, shoemakers, hairdressers, etc. This layer is occupied with unproductive labor; his labor produces goods, but not surplus value, not capital.

A special part of the layer of small owners is petty bourgeoisie,“small owners”, according to Marx, i.e. a social group of small owners who command their own and others’ labor and are “something in between a capitalist and a worker” 2 . The small proprietors and the petty bourgeoisie represent degrees of difference in numbers along the path of transition from the proletariat to the bourgeoisie.

Particularly difficult was the problem of determining the place in the social class structure of individuals who ensure the functioning of the political and legal superstructure, as well as forms of social consciousness - politicians, officials, military men, lawyers, clergy, philosophers, scientists, musicians.

1 “...A craftsman or peasant who produces with the help of his
own means of production, or little by little turns into small
a capitalist who actually exploits the labor of others, or is deprived of his own
means of production... and turns into a hired worker. This is the trend
in that form of society in which the capitalist mode of production predominates
production" (Marx K. Economic manuscript of 1861-1863 // Marks K.,
Engels F. Op. T. 48. pp. 58-59).

2 Marx K. Capital. T. 1 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 23. P. 318.

History of sociology


Kants, artists, writers, etc. Marx thought a lot about whether they could be classified as proletarians, but he never came to a clear and final conclusion.

When studying the social structure of bourgeois society, Marx also touched upon the problem of vertical social mobility, i.e. the problem of changing the socio-economic status (status) of individuals relative to the position of their social group. He considered the main form of vertical social mobility in bourgeois society to be the decomposition of groups of small owners and the petty bourgeoisie, the development of which is characterized by a tendency to disintegrate into a capitalist minority and a proletarian majority.

Class struggle

The class struggle in general, and the class struggle of the proletariat and bourgeoisie in particular, arising from the development of contradictions in the mode of production, are in the sociological system of Marx and Engels a necessary form of social dynamics, a powerful factor in the development of society. Marx emphasized: “The struggle between the capitalist and the wage worker begins with the very emergence of the capitalist relation” 1 .

The class struggle of the proletariat unfolds in three forms. This is an economic struggle, i.e. the struggle for improving the conditions for selling one’s labor force (increasing wages, providing better working conditions, etc.), political struggle (for eventual mastery of the state), ideological and theoretical struggle (expressing one’s interests at the scientific and ideological level). Engels wrote about the German labor movement: “For the first time since the labor movement existed, the struggle is being conducted systematically in all three of its directions, coordinated and interconnected: theoretical, political and practical-political (resistance to capitalists). In this, so to speak, concentric attack lies the strength and invincibility of the German movement” 2. The most common and historically initial one is the economic struggle, the struggle for surplus value. The bourgeoisie strives, as Marx put it, to “squeeze” the maximum possible amount of surplus value from the proletariat by increasing the working day, intensifying the labor process, etc. The proletariat resists

1 Marks K. Capital. T. 1 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 23. P. 438.

2 Engels F. Addendum to the 1870 preface to The Peasants' War
Germany" // Marx K., Engels F. T. 18. P. 499.


SOCIOLOGY OF GERMANY

Therefore, it fights for higher wages, improvement (stabilization) of working conditions, and the introduction of factory legislation. An indicator of the maturity of the proletariat is the political form of its class struggle, i.e. the struggle to seize political power (the state), to establish one’s own dictatorship. As its most striking example, Marx considered the Paris Commune, which arose in 1871. The ideological, or theoretical, form of struggle means the introduction of communist ideas into the masses of the proletariat and the struggle against bourgeois and petty-bourgeois thought forms and feelings. The proletariat in its development, deploying these forms of struggle, passes the path from a class-in-itself to a class-for-itself. From a collection of atomized individuals aware only of their particular (individual or collective) interests, it turns into a community of individuals who recognize themselves as a class with common interests, a class antagonistic to the bourgeoisie.

In the class struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, other layers of bourgeois society behave differently. The petty bourgeoisie can be an ally of the proletariat, but this is a very unstable ally due to social duality. Engels, in the preface to The Peasant War in Germany, wrote about them: “They are extremely unreliable, except in those cases when victory is won: then they raise an unbearable cry in the beer halls. Nevertheless, among them there are also very good elements who themselves join the workers” 1. In many works, Marx and Engels noted that the petty bourgeoisie very often found itself on the side of the bourgeoisie and against the proletariat in the class battles of the 20th century. The lumpen-proletariat layer in a critical situation of acute class struggle shows itself to be malicious, inclined to “sell” itself to reaction. This was shown, for example, by the events of June 1848 in Paris, when the “mobile guard”, formed by the bourgeoisie from the lumpen proletariat, was used to suppress the uprising of the Parisian working class. Marx and Engels noted in 1848: “The lumpen proletariat, that passive product of the rotting of the lowest strata of the old society, is in some places drawn into the movement by the proletarian revolution, but due to its situation in life it is much more inclined to sell itself for reactionary machinations” 2 .

1 Engels F. Preface to the second edition of “The Peasant War in
Germany" // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 16. P. 418.

2 Marx K., Engels F. Manifesto of the Communist Party // Marks K.,
Engels F. Op. T. 4. P. 434.


284 History of sociology

The international aspect of the class struggle of the proletariat is extremely important. Since the level of development of capitalism in the most advanced countries of Western Europe is approximately the same, and the capitalist mode of production, as it develops, outgrows state and national boundaries, the revolution must simultaneously embrace developed nations (primarily we were talking about France, England and Germany). The international character of the socialist revolution is the most important condition for its success. Even in The German Ideology, Marx and Engels wrote that when a revolution is carried out in an isolated country, the expansion of its communication with the outside world will inevitably destroy local communism.

The theory of classes and class struggle is one of the fundamental parts of the Marxist theory of society. In its development, Marx relied on the achievements of world social science thought, starting with ancient authors. The author of Capital himself defined his contribution to the tradition of class theory as follows: “As for me, I owe neither the credit that I discovered the existence of classes in modern society, nor that I discovered their struggle among themselves. Long before me, bourgeois historians outlined the historical development of this class struggle, and bourgeois economists outlined the economic anatomy of classes. What I did new was the following: 1) that existence of classes connected only with certain historical phases of production, 2) that the class struggle necessarily leads to the dictatorship of the proletariat, 3) that this dictatorship of the proletariat itself constitutes only a transition to the destruction of all classes and to society without classes" 1 .

The combination of three forms of class struggle in capitalist society in a social revolution will lead, as the founders of Marxism believed, to the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat, which in turn will be a prologue to the beginning of the history of a society without private property and classes.

Political-legal superstructure and forms of social consciousness

The mode of production creates and reproduces an adequate political-legal superstructure and forms of social

1 Marks K. Letter to I. Weidemeyer dated March 5, 1852 // Marx K., Engels F. Op. T. 28. pp. 424-427.


SOCIOLOGY OF GERMANY

consciousness and determines - sometimes in a very complex, indirect form - their development.

The greatest attention of Marx and Engels was directed to the study of state policy. This was due, firstly, to the theoretically greatest importance of the state in social life compared to other superstructural phenomena, which was expressed primarily in its direct impact on the mode of production, and, secondly, practically, to the importance of the state (policy) from the point of view of class contradictions, a possible proletarian revolution.

The most essential principles on which politics and law are based in bourgeois states are the principles of freedom and equality. Marx believed that freedom and equality (in the understanding of the New Age) are the political and legal attributes of capital, the political and legal forms of its movement. Freedom in bourgeois society, according to Marx, in its essence is the phenomenon of the absence of any (mainly political and legal nature) obstacles to the movement of capital, its expanded reproduction, the phenomenon of limitlessness, the limitlessness of the accumulation of capital. This definition of freedom is therefore negative, carried out through negation. Every individual is free only insofar as he personifies the expanded reproduction of capital. The capitalist, as the personification of capital, is disproportionately freer than the proletarian, and a capitalist with more capital is freer than a capitalist with less capital. Marx wrote: “Under conditions of free competition, it is not individuals who are free, but capital. As long as production based on capital is the necessary and therefore the most suitable form for the development of social productive power, the movement of individuals within purely capitalist conditions appears as their freedom, which, however, is dogmatically glorified as such by incessant references to limits, destroyed by free competition" 1 .

Lecture 7 (a) _ Capitalist formation

Capitalism – social-economic a formation based on the exploitation of hired labor, private ownership of the means of production (in the absence of any ownership of the bearer of labor power - humans); capitalism is also characterized by: the predominance of commodity production; formally declared freedom of enterprise; profit as the main goal of production activity.

The difference between capitalism and the antagonistic formations that preceded it is that the main producer (in this word, the hired worker) is formally free, he can leave his workplace at any time if this does not directly threaten the lives of other citizens. At the same time, the formal nature of this “freedom” becomes obvious as soon as we pay attention to the strict economic dependence under which a hired worker or employee, freed from violent forms of coercion to work, falls. Moreover, one can trace a pattern according to which, The more the worker liberates himself politically, the more the ruling class needs to enslave him in another way, namely by removing him from the products of his own labor, i.e. economically. Social wealth in the form of private property can turn a person into someone else’s property, both directly (slave, serf) and indirectly (proletarian). If at the individual level each hired worker feels freer than the serf peasant (who could not just leave his master), then at the level of the entire society this dependence manifests its insurmountable rigidity. Indeed, an employee is free to quit and not work, but how will he then receive a livelihood? In order to live, a person deprived of ownership of the means of production will be forced to get a job with another capitalist. It is possible that the conditions of exploitation for the new employer will be more lenient, but this does not change the most important thing: an individual, deprived of the means of production, is forced to sell his labor power in order to ensure at least the mere fact of his existence. The alternatives are either starvation or criminal activity, i.e. the alternative is extremely poor, I can’t even dare to call it “freedom”. That is why the definition of capitalism includes this indication that with a given method of production, exploitation occurs precisely formally free labor force.

§ 1. Class structure of bourgeois-capitalist society

[main anthropological types Bur.-Cap. society]

Bourgeoisie - the ruling class of capitalist society, whose representatives own the means of production and live by appropriating surplus value in the form of profit.

Petty bourgeoisie- the lowest layer of the ruling class, whose representatives own small means of production and are either self-employed (that is, they work for themselves without being hired by anyone), or have the opportunity to exploit such a small number of hired workers that does not allow them to completely get rid of from productive labor. In other words, the petty bourgeoisie represents that layer of the bourgeoisie that continues to participate in productive labor.

Capitalists- the upper layer of the bourgeois class, capable of living exclusively through the exploitation of other people's labor.

Bureaucracy/bureaucracy (state bourgeoisie)– national managers; 1. designation of a layer of employees in large organizations that have arisen in various spheres of society. As a necessary element of administration, bureaucracy turns into a special social layer, which is characterized by hierarchy, strict regulation, division of labor and responsibility in the implementation of formalized functions that require special education. Bureaucracy is characterized by a tendency to become a privileged layer, independent of the majority of members of the organization, which is accompanied by an increase in formalism and arbitrariness, authoritarianism and conformism, the subordination of the rules and tasks of the organization’s activities mainly to the goals of its strengthening and preservation. 2. a specific form of social organizations in society (political, economic, ideological, etc.), the essence of which lies, firstly, in the separation of the centers of executive power from the will and decisions of the majority of members of this organization, and secondly, in the primacy of the form over the content of the activity of this organization organization, thirdly, in subordinating the rules and tasks of the organization’s functioning to the goals of its preservation and strengthening. B. is inherent in a society built on social inequality and exploitation, when power is concentrated in the hands of one or another narrow ruling group. The fundamental feature of B. is the existence and growth of a layer of bureaucrats - a privileged bureaucratic-administrative caste divorced from the people.

Managers– private managers, a professional group of hired employees who carry out managerial work within the framework of the enterprise (firm) that hired them.

Proletariat - a subordinate class of capitalist society, whose representatives are deprived of ownership of the means of production and therefore are not able to individually significantly influence the organization of production, and in order to live they are forced to sell their labor power.

Labor aristocracy- a privileged part of the working class, whose representatives have the most valuable and rare labor skills, a high level of skill and are highly valued by the owners of production. The wages of such workers are noticeably higher than those of the majority of ordinary workers, and during a crisis they are the last to be fired.

Paupers– [lit. “poor”] is the lowest, the poorest, the exploited

and a disenfranchised layer of the proletariat.

The bulk of the workers- the majority of the proletariat, distinguished according to the residual principle, by cutting off the upper and lower layers.

Intelligentsia – (from Latin itelliges understanding, thinking, reasonable),

social stratum of people professionally engaged

mental, mainly complex, creative work,

development and dissemination of culture.

Lumpen – (from German Lumpen - rags) – the totality of all declassed

layers of the population (tramps, homeless people, beggars, criminal elements, etc.).

According to the Marxist concept, each society successively passes through several stages in its development - socio-economic formations: primitive communal, slaveholding, feudal, capitalist, socialist and communist.

The formation of society and progressive transformations are based on the following logic:

labor development production social

Evolution of relationship forces

An objective change in production relations constitutes the content of social progress, and their specificity is an evaluative indicator of the quality of the social system.

The leading social subject, who owns the capital of the productive forces - the means of production and labor (its qualifications and scientific thought), determines production relations, constructing a socio-economic formation and directing all the most important social instruments in the direction of expressing their interests. The development of productive forces leads to the need for a systemic transformation of society, a change in the leading social subject and production relations.

The first formational transition (from the primitive communal system to slavery) took place on the basis of the emergence of several social components: the market, goods, a little later, money and social institutions - primarily economic and political (state and legal legislation), as well as the modern form of the family . It was at the dawn of slavery that the social system took on its stable elemental configuration, which has survived to this day.

But in addition, the new socio-economic formation is characterized by the emergence of private ownership of the means of production and exploitation. It was these qualitative expressions of the objective development of the productive forces that supplemented labor production relations with new content - the struggle for capital and power, that is, for subjective priority in the construction of the personal-social system and its management. This struggle became the basis of social progress and permeated all subsequent history.

The corresponding deep division of social interests was expressed in the fundamental opposition of the most important economic socio-positional groups, the emergence and irreconcilable relations of which were determined by the private form of ownership of the means of production and all capital. “Free and slave, patrician and plebeian, landowner and serf..., in short, the oppressor and the oppressed were in eternal antagonism to each other, waged a continuous, sometimes hidden, sometimes open struggle, always ending in a revolutionary reorganization of the entire social edifice...”.


The highest stage of the period of social development with private ownership is capitalist society. Although Marx does not note a fundamental qualitative difference between slavery, feudalism and capitalism. Private ownership of the means of production and capital is the basis that levels out all the differences between these socio-economic formations. It creates its own special method of reproduction of goods and the principle of income distribution, characterized by exploitation in the form of ex-propriation of part of the profit or all of the profit by the owner of the means of production exclusively by right of ownership. “Slavery is the first form of exploitation inherent in the ancient world; it is followed by serfdom in the Middle Ages and wage labor in modern times. These are the three great forms of enslavement which characterize the great ages of civilization; open, and more recently disguised slavery always accompanies her.” The only difference is in the time, conditions and object of operation. In the slave-owning formation, a slave was subjected to exploitation - an absolutely unfree person, forcibly chained to his master throughout the entire time. Feudalism and capitalism ex-propriate the profit created by the wage labor of a formally free person, who, however, objectively driven by his natural needs, still comes to the means of production, and therefore to their owner, and is forced to accept all his conditions. The main one is agreement, in exchange for labor, the creation of goods and wages, to give profit to the owner of private property and transfer the most precious thing he has - labor power into someone else's capital.

Thus, the evolutionary development of the period of private ownership of the means of production is determined by the replacement of open and forceful coercion of a person with coercion of labor - “hidden, voluntary and therefore hypocritical.” Only capitalism, unlike feudalism, works in conditions of industrial growth and urbanization due to a powerful breakthrough in the development of productive forces.

For the first time in social history, the exploitative stage of human progress creates a mass phenomenon of social alienation, which in these conditions is based on the fundamental rejection of the instruments of creative activity (means of production and labor, as well as the main monetary result of production - profit) from their true owner and creator - labor in form of a slave or hired worker. This is how the social process of turning labor into a servant of capital takes place, with all the ensuing consequences for the entire social system.

It is obvious that the private form of capital forms social-positional groups that fundamentally differ from each other in all economic parameters-features and integration status in the economic hierarchy. First of all, by ownership of the means of production and the method of generating income, as well as by the income itself. The most active and active of these groups, directly related to production, form classes that occupy the two highest positions in the corresponding system of production relations.

Classes are the result of a high level of progressive social development. They concretized the social space, expanded and diversified it, supplemented it with completely new subjects and their communication connections. But the main thing is that from the moment of their appearance, taking different forms in the course of social history, they gave it new content, were the organizational engine of social progress, supplementing the quantitative component of labor with the quality of social group antagonism.

Their confrontation served as a source for the formation of a special type of human consciousness - social and humanitarian knowledge and ideological principles, the decisive scientific formulation of which occurred, of course, much later - in the 19th century.

Capitalism is the most progressive social system with a private (personal) form of ownership of the means of production. It forms two classes - capitalists and the proletariat (who do not own the means of production and sell their labor power, which creates goods and services, is exploited and receives wages).

A capitalist is the owner of all components of capital, including physical (means of production) and human (wage labor). The historical birth and functioning of the capitalist form a fundamental interval of social evolution in terms of the most important properties of capital itself - objective expansion and subjective concentration in the process of capitalist economic competition.

These properties are in the vector of development of productive forces and transform a small part of independent individual craftsmen into owners of all capital. The further historical movement of capitalist relations brings this formation to an even higher quality level, where the role of centralization is greatly enhanced: “The capitalist mode of production, which at first displaced independent workers, is now displacing the capitalists themselves, although not yet into the industrial reserve army, but only into the category surplus population."

Capitalism, already contemporary to K. Marx, was characterized by the unification of banking and industrial property in the hands of a single, most active capitalist subject. An industrialist-capitalist who has gained strength does not trust his profit, freed from commodity reproduction at a certain stage of its increase, to a third-party bank, but creates his own bank to provide credit. In turn, the financier-capitalist, who grew up on usury and stock market speculation, begins to buy shares of industrial enterprises. Naturally, concentrating the main economic instruments and having a part of their colossal personal profit already free from economics, such capitalists cannot help but influence the formation of political power with further access to general social management. First of all, to create the most favorable conditions for preserving and increasing personal capital.

Thus, the objective development of productive forces in the course of the progress of capitalist relations forms the highest qualitative level of the corresponding social formation - oligarchic with its leading social group subject. The absence of oligarchy speaks either of the complete exclusion of private ownership of the means of production from social life, or of the underdevelopment (possibly artificial social-democratic restraint) of capitalism.

Oligarchy is the highest stratum of capitalists, objectively born of a personal form of strategic capital based on its basic properties in the process of economic competition, as well as in terms of the most important systemic characteristic - centralization.

A similar procedural logic took place, by the way, in other private property formations - slave ownership and feudalism. But hidden and less intense. The fundamental difference between capitalism lies in the final break with the tribal component of social history. Its high stage completely “cleanses” the economy of external elements, in particular of an ethnic nature, filling the concept of class with exclusively economic content of the system of production relations, which determines and governs all sociality.

Oligarchic formation under capitalism is natural in the property and method of existence of any social system - its centralization, which is expressed in the subjective concentration of all necessary social resources, giving the opportunity and right to monopoly socio-political construction and management. Today, this law already constitutes geopolitics, determining the quality of the entire global social space. The modern process of globalization, based on the expansion and concentration of world private capital and the desire of the world oligarchy to concentrate the corresponding political resources, is the highest type of objective process of centralization in the conditions of the capitalist formation.

However, another, no less important property and vital way of existence of systemic sociality - dynamism with its inevitable qualitative changes, moves further social progress without stopping history at the “liberal eternity” of oligarchic power.

The socialist revolution takes place at a critical moment when the content of capitalist relations of production does not correspond to the colossal level of progressive development of productive forces: “The bourgeoisie, in less than a hundred years of its class rule, has created more numerous and enormous productive forces than all previous generations combined... Modern bourgeois society with his... relations of production and exchange... already resembles a wizard who is no longer able to cope with the underground forces caused by his spells.” The formation of a socialist formation can be artificially slowed down for a while, but cannot be stopped forever.

Expressing historical necessity, socialist transformation takes place in conditions of growing class consciousness of the proletariat, thanks to the formation of ideology and scientific knowledge. It is this fundamental feature of modern society that distinguishes the socialist revolution from its earlier predecessors and riots, which mainly took place only with the catastrophic impoverishment of the working people and general pauperization.

Today, knowledge is capable of “not only explaining the world, but also changing it,” creating a “critical mass” of understanding of alienation and the need for systemic social change.

The entire economic-political logic and its framework in the form of a link between capital - profit - power under socialism acquires a different, qualitatively new owner as ownership of the means of production is nationalized and all capital passes into public ownership and disposal.

Nationalization of capital is the neutralization of antagonistic differences in the system of production relations, the elimination of classes and exploitation. If, under the capitalist method of reproduction, the profit of the capitalist and the wages of hired labor are economic factors of inverse relationship, then under socialism and the national form of ownership, wages are an integral part of profit, to the distribution of which all workers are involved; in these economic conditions, profit and wages are related by a direct function. This approach also removes the most important production mechanism of alienation - the antagonistic division of capital and labor, returning social priorities to the latter.

Thus, objective social progress makes the capitalist, a once significant and primary subject of social relations who played a huge positive role in the organization of production and general social centralization, a “superfluous” person, a pitiful anachronism standing in the way of the further course of social history. It is the perception of this fact by the public consciousness that is a consequence of the formation of ideology and scientific character of social and humanitarian knowledge.

This is a socio-economic formation that is based on human exploitation, the exploitation of forced labor and private property. This formation is characterized by the dominance of commodity-money relations, the presence of a developed social division of labor, as well as the transformation of labor into goods.

Features of a capitalist society

Capitalism refers to an economic system and social system, the main features of which are private ownership of the means of production, complete freedom of entrepreneurial activity, and the exploitation of labor.

The capitalist system replaced the feudal one as a social order. This change in order brought a number of specific features to different countries. The most important and decisive economic significance for the emergence of capitalism was the so-called primitive accumulation of capital. To make it clearer, peasants (that is, small producers), using a violent method, were deprived of all means of subsistence and, accordingly, they became legally completely free. And all the means of production were in the hands of the bourgeoisie.

Capitalist society as an economic formation is characterized by several main features:

  • Market-price mechanism for coordinating the activities of an individual.
  • Private disposal of the means of production.
  • Maximizing income and benefit.

This economic system puts in the first place the problem of efficient distribution and exploitation of resources. And this problem is solved, as a rule, through human effort and labor. In the foreground are personal freedom, individualism, rationalization and subjectivism.

Since the entry into force of the capitalist system, the position of the individual is not determined by social status and religious norms, as it was before. Now a person can establish himself in society in accordance with his capabilities and abilities. Man becomes the measure of all things.

According to the statements of the German sociologist, historian, and economist Max Weber, the Protestant ethics, which is characterized by a person’s responsibility to himself, society and the Almighty, the intrinsic value of labor and profit, played a large and no less significant role in the formation and development of the capitalist formation. Such ethics were approved during the religious reformation and replaced the Catholic one, which in turn preached not work, but consumption, profit and pleasure. She sanctified the inequalities of classes and the right to sin, since any sin could be forgiven.

Post-Soviet society compared the foundations of this formation primarily with injustice and the use of human labor. The principle of “the struggle of all against all” or “man is a wolf to man” has become the main one. It was even scary to think that such a society had a right to exist.

Capitalism as a form of society

It is important to understand that capitalism is not only an economic system, it is also a formation that unites individuals and makes unimaginable moral demands on them. The norms that emerged along with capitalism determine the viability of the market-economic mechanism. Capitalism implies:

  • Freedom as a kind of opportunity to act in accordance with independently set goals and responsibility for the choices made.
  • Civil society as a set of institutions, associations, unions in order to exclude the possibility of seizing power.
  • A modular person who is always able to join one or another structure, association, party. At the same time, this person must always be ready for active and even violent action against those who try to limit his freedom and right to choose.
  • Democracy as a form of government that presupposes political freedom.
  • Private property as a social institution that gives all members of the formation equal rights to own and use resources.
  • Limited role of government.
  • Market competition.
  • Freedom of entrepreneurial activity.
  • A market system that includes labor, land and capital markets.

All of the above features of a capitalist society can be called capitalist ideology, that is, a system of values, views, and moral principles by which the public lived.

Structure of capitalist society

As mentioned earlier, the basis of the economy is the production of goods and services, commerce and other types of economic activity. A large number of goods and services were produced for sale, but subsistence farming was not prohibited. As for exchanges, they were carried out in free markets, and not under coercion, but on the basis of mutually beneficial transactions.

According to the definitions of Karl Marx, the source of vital benefits for the majority of the population is human labor, and not under coercion, but under conditions of employment. That is, this is the sale of labor for subsequent remuneration - wages.

Capitalist society arose spontaneously, and in principle, it did not embody any plan, did not have global, equal and binding goals for all individuals, and did not control all aspects of life. It assumed the autonomy of the individual.

On the main element of the class structure of capitalism

The structure of capitalist society, according to Karl Marx, is not a “pure” structure, but a kind of system in which, along with elements of “pure capitalist”, there are also elements of class structure that grew up on non-capitalist relations of production.

On the one hand, capitalism is the ownership of the means of production, which were created through the labor of others, and the ownership of means, which completely excludes the labor of capitalists. On the other hand, there is the labor of mercenaries, which completely excludes the ownership of workers in these means of production. A similar distinction is also characteristic of modern society, but the fact that the capitalist is a function of capital, and the wage worker is a function of labor power, is absolutely striking and obvious. This is the essence of two radically opposed attitudes towards the means of production. The first attitude led to the emergence of the capitalist class, and the second - directly to the formation of the proletariat, or simply, the working class. This is precisely the most essential feature of the class structure, and that is why it is a systemic element of the class structure.

The classes of capitalist society or, as Marx called them, “two hostile camps” - the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. Capitalists are the builders of the capitalist formation, leaders, and engines of progress.

Capitalism and modernity

Due to the fact that in our time, technological progress, social development, globalization have moved to another level, cultural and social differences have noticeably softened, the situation of workers has improved, the importance and size of the middle class has increased (skilled workers, office workers, successful representatives of business, both medium and and small).

All the processes described above became the basis for radical changes. And it seemed that the classes of capitalist society were a thing of the past. But, due to neoliberalism, mercantilism and the decline of social protection, modern capitalism is returning to the path where it all began. All capital is concentrated in the hands and estates of a few percent of society who received it by inheritance. And the rest of the population not only does not have a constant stable income, but its size is constantly becoming smaller.