Liberalism and Marxism, these are terms which always seem to pop up whenever one has a political discussion. The two have often been conflated, but in recent times as the world goes through political turmoil, the two have become hot-button topics and more and more persons find themselves either comfortable describing a liberal as a Marxist or simply unaware that there are many small and major differences between the two. But what is Liberalism and what is Marxism? Why do persons look at the two as the same and who is it who pushes this train of thought?
In order to answer the last set of questions, one must start with describing both the central tenets and beliefs of the two ideologies and their historical beginnings. Once one understands these, it becomes easier to understand why they are conflated and why persons look to conflate them.
This piece is not aimed at converting the reader to my preferred stance of Marxism, though if that were to happen that would be a great bonus. Rather, this piece is aimed at clearing the air and firmly defining terms and their historical epoch so that whenever a political discussion takes place one at least knows the differences in these ideologies.
Liberalism as in ideology was borne out of the struggles of the enlightenment period which pitted the mercantile burghers against the landed and powerful (politically) nobility and aristocracy. The central tenet of liberalism is the right and freedom of the individual or individualism (bear that in mind), this is so because the burghers while they were immensely wealthy (as they were merchants who traded in spices and cloth and then sugar and cotton even industry such as shipbuilding), they did not control the state and its armed appendages, therefore their individual assets (read liberties) were at the mercies of any whim and fancy of any monarch. The feudal monarchs and nobility knew that the rich burghers were at their mercies and extracted all which they could without any mercy and that as such led the burghers to take up arms against the feudal monarchs (see the French Revolution, American Revolution, and the Glorious Revolution).
The burghers knowing that they couldn’t take power by themselves enlisted the help of the serfs, and together they overthrew the feudal monarchies of the day. The serfs were enlisted with promises along the lines of the end of oppression, low taxes etc, however, to allow for those things would, in the end, infringe on the individual rights of the burghers to make money. The burgher of the day was the one who fitted out the slave ships, who had shares in sugar plantations or (if they were smart) invested in cotton. They were the ones who employed the underpaid spinsters, the sailor who was pressed for years on end or even the plantation overseer (who often times was left footing the bill while the owners ran off), to hold up the promises would, in the end, lead them to ruin. As such, after much toing and froing, the liberal came to the conclusion that they would offer just enough to stave off the rebellion due to them not keeping promises, while at the same time keeping more than the lions share.
That the liberal view of individual rights simply means the right to exploit can also be found in how the liberals views democracy and how the state is run. In feudal times there was the king, his inner court (or cabinet if you will) and the parliament. The king ruled almost by decree, taking advice from his cabinet while the parliament simply petitioned on the behalf of the citizenry (nobles got the upper house while the commoners ‘burghers’ got the lower house. Again, such rule could not work as the burgher had no real power, only a petition and as such, they again enlisted the help of the serfs and gave the parliament more and in most cases total power over the monarch. If the previously mentioned seems familiar, it is because we still have that form of monarchical rule, the burgher (now the bourgeoise) sits at the top with their close aides as cabinet ministers, a senate made up of their ranks and a lower house which in most cases acts as a form of petition (most bills are introduced with the explicit approval of the leader of the party). The promises made to the serfs was one of self-rule, but self-rule would infringe on the individual right to accumulate capital which needs human exploitation. The solution was the previously mentioned, to grant them the power to elect an MP who can only petition, while retaining the real levers of power (party presidency, head of government, opposition and cabinet), to give them just enough to say promise kept while keeping enough to ensure that the collective does not take anything away.
The hard-fought battle for women’s equality shows us as well how the liberal deliberately places a premium on the rights of the individual at the detriment of the collective as to do otherwise would see the system implode. When women were granted the right to vote in the early half of the last century it was a liberal victory, for while women could vote, the property restrictions remained thus immediately doing away with a group (poor women) who would aim to undermine the system while doing enough to fend off the rebellion. Again we see where individual rights are simply in liberal speak a code for the right of capital.
A more explicit and in your face example of liberalism’s slight of hand when it comes to individual rights can be seen also in wage negotiations. Most liberal nations allow for unions and collective bargaining (an outcome of the labour wars in the late 19th to early 20th century) and as such recognise the right to strike. However, as those rights to seek better standards of work can impede on the individual right to profit, most liberal nations allow for scabs in one form or another. The promise of negotiations can be said to have been kept, thus avoiding violent clashes, while at the same time more than enough is kept to ensure that profits continue and the machine keeps whirring.
Liberalism in short puts a premium on the rights of the individual while sacrificing the rights of the collective, and therein lies the difference between liberalism and Marxism in spite of any similarity.
Marxism as an ideology was borne out the struggles of the industrial revolution, when capitalism gained a real foothold, and the serfs were en-masse turned into the proletariat. The industrial revolution forced the land-owning nobility and aristocracy to become capitalists, and as such, they moved their lands from serfs farming wheat, corn etc to forcing out the serfs and using the land to raise sheep (for cotton and the spinning mills) or for the land to be used to build industrial plants. The former serfs were forced (or coerced) to move from the countryside to the town in order to work in the newly industrialised centres and factories. They had the individual right to find work and make something of themselves but were severely restricted in all aspects, as the vote, for example, could only be cast if one had enough land or money, and factories and ideas could only be turned into realities with money, something the newly formed proletariat did not have access to.
Marxists hold the view that the rights of the collective supersede the rights of the individual, the reasons can be seen from above, but more examples will be given. Each individual belongs to a collective and though the individual does exist and have rights, the individual actions have effects on the collective as a whole. A simple example would be, while the individual has a right to a house, one shouldn’t extend that right to mean owning ten apartment complexes while the majority of the community remains homeless. Another example would be, while one does have the right to operate a business, that does not mean one has the right to exploit the community for the profit. A further simple example would be, while one does have the individual right to a profit from one’s seed capital, that does not mean that the collective (the workers) should only receive a pittance of a salary or no stock/share options or board seats.
The fight for the collective right against the right of the individual as it relates to wealth distribution is one which the Marxist and liberal have been at odds against each other for ages. The liberal view of individualism (which led to the mass abandoning of land) is the antithesis to Marxism. Marxism states that the land which the serfs had been forced off of in order to satisfy the whims of an individual instead would have been turned over to them and dealt with on a collective basis. The liberal view of the business, its top-down structure, with the owner of the land and machines making all the money while the workers own pittances runs counter to the Marxist view where the worker owns, operates and shares in the profits of the company.
The liberal definition of democracy is also sharply at odds with anything which a Marxists definition of democracy. For again while the liberals believe in top-down, representative democracy via petition while the elites maintain a hold on power, the Marxist sees that a democracy should be inclusive of all members and that all the members have some voice in how policy is reached, and actions are taken. The examples of Nicaragua and Venezuela both show us just how at odds the liberal view of democracy is from that of a Marxist.
In the end, the difference between the Marxist and the liberal is a simple one. It is that while the liberal seeks to appease and mitigate the excesses of the system, the capitalist mode of distribution, the Marxist seeks to undermine and replace it. After the smoke clears and the dust settles, the liberal will be on the side of private capital while the Marxist will be seeking its total and absolute abolition.
So why are the two compared and who dares make that silly comparison after the previous explanations? The people who make that comparison, the persons who champion that cause are reactionaries, members of the capitalist class, and they do this because they fully understand that the system as it remains cannot hold for much longer.
There are many members of the capitalist elite who understand that this liberal era is having its swansong. They understand that wages have frozen or are falling while they make profits, they also understand that even the limited power that the people have now could lead to them getting more of their wealth. They understand that the IMF and World Bank have said that as things stand now, nations will be lucky if they experience 4% growth after 2020 because of the way the liberal capitalist system is set up. Because of this, they despise the liberal who they understand is holding them back from uber profits (which are gained by uber exploitation meted against the workers) and they seek to undermine and destroy the liberal system.
The reactionaries are not idiots, they know that the worker is peeved with the way the current system operates and wants a change. In order to divert them from the agents who they would naturally gravitate to (Marxists) they conflate Marxists and liberals, they say both want the same thing ‘freeness’. They use what looks like similarities all while hiding the fact that beneath the similarities are key glaring differences. They do it in short, so that they can undermine the parties and groups which seek to abolish the system and replace it with egalitarianism and foist in its place parties and groups which endorse and preach capitalism of the totalitarian variety with no leash, 19th to early 20th-century style capitalism.
Do not fall for the lies, obfuscations and misleading statements, a liberal and a Marxist are about as similar as those between a dog and a goat. Understand and appreciate that the two are different, and if you dislike either after knowing this, that’s ok. Just know that words have meanings, words are used in certain ways for a purpose especially when it comes to politics. Not knowing the differences in the meanings is not a trifling matter, this type of knowledge is the kind which shapes a nation and its people for good or for ill. Learn the differences between the ideologies in order to have an actual discussion and reach actual conclusions, to simply repeat silly talking points simply ends in nations drowning in a sea of ignorance.
jamaicachange 