Information about Political Science 443: Theory and Philosophy of Marxism

The fundamental purpose of this class is to develop an understanding of the political and social thought of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels as an example of a particular way of viewing the relationship of political theory to political practice. The class was last taught in the Spring of 1997.

In addition to the syllabus below students might be interested in some of the following websites:

The Marx-Engels Internet Archive can be found at:

A searchable data base for the archive is at:

Political Science 443 Bruce E. Wright

Theory and Philosophy of Marxism Spring 1997

Office: UH 506, office hours: M 1-2 and 4-5, W 12-2

office phone: 773-3437

Required texts:

Robert Tucker, Marx-Engels Reader

Lenin, State and Revolution and Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism

Mao, Selected Works

Bruce E. Wright, Theory in the Practice of the Nicaraguan Revolution (Ohio University Press) You should know that I receive no royalties of any kind from your purchase of my book. If money is a serious problem you can probably get by without purchasing this book. You need each of the others.

Supplemental Texts: (I have asked the bookstore to stock a few copies of each of these books. Look at them early in the semester to see if you want to buy any of them. You should probably purchase one of these in order to orient yourself to contemporary discussions in Marxist theory).

John F. Sitton, Recent Marxian Theory (The State University of New York Press)

Robert Meister, The Politics of Identity

Ernesto Laclau, New Reflections on the Revolution of Our Time (Verso)

Terrell Carver, Rational Choice Marxism (Pennsylvania University Press)

Douglas Kellner, Critical Theory, Marxism and Modernity (Johns Hopkins University Press)

Note: The Marx Engels Archive on the World Wide Web contains many of the texts of Marx and of Lenin and Mao. You may consult these rather than buying the relevant texts for Lenin and Mao but you will need Tucker.

Class Schedule

I. Introduction to the class and the philosophical background of Marx's thought(2 weeks)

Kant, Hegel and Feuerbach

II. Marx as a German Thinker - the Reaction against "Idealism"

Read: Tucker, Part I, pp. 3-200 and pp. 683-717 (2 weeks)

You will be expected to respond in class to the following question: "What did Marx accept from Hegel and what did he reject in Hegel?"

III. The Basic Theory of Marx and Engels (3 weeks)

A. Basic Economic Theory: Read Manifesto and Tucker,

Part II (pp. 203-373)

B. Sub-structure, superstructure and forces of production

C. Revolution, Inevitability and practical action

Read Tucker, Parts III & IV (pp. 501-677)

D. The Classless Society and Communism

IV. Alleged Problems with Basic Theory: (1 week) Meister might be helpful here.

A. Contradiction between dialectics and materialism

B. Inevitability scientifically impossible

C. Denial of Politics

V. Lenin - Politics and the Imperial order ( 1 week)

Read: Lenin, Imperialism and State and Revolution

a. Imperialism as an explanation of why Marxism failed to account for failure of revolution in Western Europe and how it can succeed in other parts of the world

b. Revolution and the vanguard

VI. Stalinism and its aftermath through the disintegration of the Soviet Union (2 sessions)

VI. Trotsky and his followers (1 session)

VII. Mao (1 session) Read Mao

VIII. The Social Democratic alternative (2 sessions)

Where does it go from here?

VIII. Gramsci, the Frankfurt school through Habermas, and others

(1 week) Kellner would be helpful here.

X. New models in practice: the case of Nicaragua

(1 week) Read Wright

XI. New departures in theory: the postmodern critique of Marxism (1 week) Laclau, Sitton or Carver and Thomas would be helpful here.

XII. Conclusion

Written Assignments

This class is designated as one of those political science courses that meets the upper division writing requirement. Each of your three papers will be graded both in terms of its demonstration of your knowledge of the material covered in the class and on the basis of the extent to which it meets expectations of proper professional writing in the discipline. Extensive comments will be made on your individual papers in terms of needed improvements in your writing. There will be class discussion of the general principles that you need to understand to write successfully and there will be specific classroom discussion of problems that have commonly appeared in your papers as each paper is returned.

The three written assignments that you are asked to undertake are intended to produce a substantial final paper that assesses Marxism as a theory that can lead to rational political practice. The idea is for you to undertake substantial research that focuses on how Karl Marx's theories have developed in practice during the twentieth century. Your assignments are broken into three more or less equal parts. Each will constitute one third of your semester grade. The final grade may be influenced by substantial improvement in your work over the semester.

Part I (Due at beginning of class March 31)

Prepare a substantial analysis of the fundamental elements of Karl Marx's notion of how theory relates to revolutionary practice. Include discussion of Marx's critique of earlier theories that suggests that traditionally philosophy has served as ideology rather than as a guide to liberating practice. You should explicitly deal with how elements of Hegel's thought were incorporated in Marx's view as well as how his critique of some elements of Hegel's thought led Marx to his alternative understanding of how revolutionary theory can guide practice. This will require you to make sense of how Hegel and Marx understood the development of history. Include in your analysis Marx's understanding of the relationship between the economic foundations of social relationships and how this relates to the development of ideology. Consider how he thinks that his theory differs from previous theories and how he thinks that it can relate to the ultimate development of a classless society and the withering away of the state. What role does he think that his theory can play with relation to practical revolutionary activity? You should reach some tentative conclusion about how, if at all, Marx's views can guide contemporary practice.

As you do this paper you should be thinking about the second part of the assignment in terms of choosing some group of actors or theorists to study in that part.

Part II. (Due April 28)

Further develop the ideas that you have included in your first paper. Here you should do this by examining the actual use of Marxian theory either by some political party or movement or as an element of academic theory that presumes to relate itself to practice or use Marxian theory to examine some contemporary political issue. You should choose some party, group or academic school (e.g. the Frankfurt School, structuralism, rational choice Marxism, post-Marxism, post modernism, Marxist feminism) that has seen itself as guided by Marx's theory or some such group that might be seen as an alternative to Marxism but that is aware of Marx's analysis. The other basic option if to choose an issue the examination of which can serve as an elaboration and critique of Marxian theory. Sitton should be a guide to some possible topics. You should engage in a substantial research project in which you fully survey relevant literature. You are assumed to be familiar at this stage with the basic theories of Lenin and the development of Marxism in the Soviet Union. You should explicitly discuss the relationship of your movement or issue with Lenin's basic position. The purpose of this analysis as a whole is to consider what happens when people attempt to engage in some sort of political practice that is presumably guided by Marxist theory or how we can make sense of the development of Marxist theory in the 20th century.

Before you complete this aspect of the project you will have received the first paper back and should consider the critiques of the first paper and the suggestions that I have made for your work.

This aspect of the paper is intended to allow you to consider some topic in which you have a genuine interest. If you have any difficulty in finding a topic you should consult with me about possible topics. What I have done here is to attempt to give you a basic outline of what I have in mind. It is possible that you can develop a topic that is somewhat different from what is specified here. For example in the past students have considered questions as disparate as the role of countercultural music as a possible revolutionary movement and of the relationship between liberation theology and Marxism as well as the more straightforward consideration of the Soviet Union, China or other socialist systems or parties. Others have considered the role of organizations such as the IWW as alternatives to Marxist movements. The point is that you should be able, in consultation with me, to find a topic that is of genuine interest to you.

Part III. (Due at time of final exam as per class schedule) Further develop the previous paper given the critiques and suggestions made by the instructor. Now the point is to finalize the project by an explicit consideration of your movement in relation to the question of the extent to which Marx's basic theory can continue to serve as a guide to political practice and an understanding of that practice. Here you are expected to discuss both the strengths and weaknesses of Marxism as a guide to political practice. You should conclude with some general discussion of how political theory can relate to political practice on the basis of what you have learned from the study of Marxism. You should be able to relate what you have to say to the contemporary political situation and to how, if at all, it can make sense to try to continue to develop political theory. You should be aware of the challenge of postmodernist theory as well as of relevant practical political developments in all areas of the world. Is the demise of the Soviet Union, for example, evidence of the fact that Marxism is dead? Is the postmodern challenge to all "grounded theory" evidence that the whole project of political theory is an illusion, including Marxism? You might well explicitly discuss whether it makes sense to continue to teach this class, given contemporary political and theoretical developments.

The final paper may well contain much of what was included in the earlier papers. The idea is that you will now have written one paper that is roughly equivalent in quality and quantity to an article in a professional academic journal. By now you should have an extensive bibliography of materials that you have consulted.

443 and the internet

This semester we will be experimenting with a method of accommodating students with different schedules by having two different meeting hours (two sections, though informal structured for this particular class). Each section will meet two hours each week. One additional hour per week will be based on your work on the internet and other computer applications and personal discussions with the professor in his office. This hour can be at your choice of times to use the computer. We will have a class e-mail account so that each of our e-mails will be available to all participants. When everyone’s schedule is available we can establish a couple of hours each week for more personal contact. contact.

Of course each student will have a different level of computer skills. Each of us can learn from the others. By the end of the class each student will have developed sufficient computer skills to do serious research and engage in communication using the computer.

You should establish your e-mail account as soon as possible. As a CSUF student you have the right to an account and an address. You can use computers in the computer center, the social science research center and in the library. If you have a computer with a modem at home you can use it to contact the CSUF computer. If you have an internet provider on your home computer you can, of course, use internet resources through that provider. Details of these arrangements will be developed as early as possible.

There are several websites that will be especially useful for this class. The most important is the Marx-Engels archive at

http://csf.colorado.edu/psn/marx/Admin. This contains the text of many of Marx and Engel’s works as well of some other related authors. It is provides you with a search capacity that can make it much easier and quicker to locate key terms and concepts from the original sources. You can, for example, locate a term such as "relations of production" and see how it is used in a number of different contexts. Thus our class discussion can be usefully supplemented by your research on the internet. You should also be able to locate internet sources that will be helpful in working on your research topic. As the semester goes along we can undoubtedly aid each other in finding and using appropriate internet resources.

Through the use of e-mail we should all be able to collaborate and to aid each other in our work. If you find a useful source be sure to let other students know about it through our e-mail hook-up.