Shortly before he was assassinated in 1940, Leon Trotsky — one of Marx's most devoted converts and a key figure in the Russian Revolution — made this selection from Capital, to which he appended his own lengthy and insightful introduction. Compact and fascinating, this invaluable work not only presents Marx's thoughts in his own words but also places them in the swirling context of the 20th century. A critical analysis of ideas that have influenced millions of lives for well over a century, this book will be an important addition to the libraries of students and instructors of economics, history, government, and Communist thought.
During the twentieth century the problem of post-revolutionary bureaucracy emerged as the most pressing theoretical and political concern confronting Marxism. No one contributed more to the discussion of this question than Leon Trotsky. In Trotsky and the Problem of Soviet Bureaucracy, Thomas M. Twiss traces the development of Trotsky’s thinking on this issue from the first years after the Bolshevik Revolution through the Moscow Trials of the 1930s. Throughout, he examines how Trotsky’s perception of events influenced his theoretical understanding of the problem, and how Trotsky’s theory reciprocally shaped his analysis of political developments. Additionally, Twiss notes both strengths and weaknesses of Trotsky’s theoretical perspective at each stage in its development.
A Selection of Writings on Dialectical Materialism by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Plekhanov, and Luxemburg, and Alan Woods. Edited by John Peterson with an Introduction by Alan Woods. On the bicentennial of his birth, Karl Marx’s ideas are more relevant than ever. While he is perhaps best known for his writings on economics and history, anyone who wishes to have a fully rounded understanding of his method must strive to master dialectical materialism, which itself resulted from an assiduous study and critique of Hegel. Dialectical materialism is the logic of motion, development, and change. By embracing contradiction instead of trying to write it out of reality, dialectics allows Marxists to approach processes as they really are, not as we would like them to be. In this way we can understand and explain the essential class interests at stake in our fight against capitalist exploitation and oppression. At every decisive turning point in history, scientific socialists must go back to basics. Marxist theory represents the synthesized experience, historical memory, and guide to action of the working class. The Revolutionary Philosophy of Marxism aims to arm the new generation of revolutionary socialists with these essential ideas.
The last volume of the late Tony Cliff's Selected Works deals with the major themes of Trotskyism after Trotsky, extending the study of state capitalism to the political developments of Russia and China and addressing issues of oppression in relation to Marxist theory. Areas cover include the nature of Stalinist Russia, reformism, the permanent war economy, and why socialists must fight for gay liberation and against the oppression of women, all by a committed socialist activist and the world's most renowned critic of the political system in Stalinist Russia.
This selection from the major writings of the most influential Marxist thinkers provides easy and direct access to the sources of the 20th century's most important ideology. Those who are baffled by the ramifications of Marxism will find here the major statements of classical and contemporary Marxist theory from Marx himself, through Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin to Mao, Marcuse, Guevara, and Cabral. Together these texts give us a comprehensive view both of the Marxist tradition and of the varieties of contemporary Marxism. Professor McLellan has provided every excerpt with a list of further reading and with an introduction, which places each author in a historical and political context. Students will find this an indispensable first-hand guide to essential Marxism. David McLellan, professor emeritus of Political Theory at the University of Kent at Canterbury, has lectured widely in North America and continental Europe. He has authored a number of books on Karl Marx, including "Karl Marx: His Life and Thought" and "Marxism after Marx." Many of his works have been translated into foreign languages. He is also the editor of "Karl Marx: Selected Writings."
This book contains a selection of essays on key subjects Mandel worked on: the theory of the state, imperialism, reformism, and bureaucracy. "The Leninist Theory of Organisation" is an influential essay on class consciousness and organisation. The "Introduction to Marxist Economic Theory" was widely used as a textbook in classes on Marxist economics. This book is the first in a series of selected writings by Ernest Mandel. CONTENTS: Introduction by Ian Parker The Marxist Theory of the State The Marxist Theory of Imperialism and its Critics An Introduction to Marxist Economic Theory The Nature of Social-Democratic Reformism On Bureaucracy: A Marxist Analysis The Leninist Theory of Organisation.
The theory of Permanent Revolution has been associated with Leon Trotsky for more than a century since the first Russian Revolution in 1905. Trotsky was the most brilliant proponent of Permanent Revolution but by no means its sole author. The documents in this volume, most of them translated into English for the first time, demonstrate that Trotsky was one of several participants in a debate from 1903-7 that involved numerous leading figures of Russian and European Marxism, including Karl Kautsky, Rosa Luxemburg, Franz Mehring, Parvus and David Ryazanov. This volume reassembles that debate, assesses it with reference to Marx and Engels, and provides new evidence for interpreting the formative years of Russian revolutionary Marxism.
In this classic exposition of Marxist thought, Raya Dunayevskaya, with clarity and great insight, traces the development and explains the essential features of Marx's analysis of history. Using as her point of departure the Industrial and French Revolutions, the European upheavals of 1848, the American Civil War, and the Paris Commune of 1871, Dunayevskaya shows how Marx, inspired by these events, adapted Hegel's philosophy to analyze the course of history as a dialectical process that moves "from practice to theory." The essence of Marx's philosophy, as Dunayevskaya points out, is the human struggle for freedom, which entails the gradual emergence of a proletarian revolutionary consciousness and the discovery through conflict of the means for realizing complete human freedom. But freedom for Marx meant freedom not only from capitalist economic exploitation but also from all political restraints. Continuing her historical analysis, Dunayevskaya reveals how completely Marx's original conception of freedom was perverted through its adaptations by Stalin in Russia and Mao in China, and the subsequent erection of totalitarian states. The exploitation of the masses persisted under these regimes in the form of a new "state capitalism." Yet despite the profound derailment of Marxist political philosophy in the twentieth century, Dunayevskaya points to developments such as the Hungarian revolt of 1956, and the Civil Rights struggles in the United States as signs that the indomitable quest for freedom on the part of the downtrodden cannot be forever repressed. The Hegelian dialectic of events propelled by the spirit of the masses thus moves on inexorably with the hope for the future achievement of political, economic, and social freedom and equality for all.
