The New York Workers School , colloquially known as " Workers School ", was an ideological training center of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) established in New York City for adult education in October 1923. For more than two decades the facility played an important role in the teaching of party doctrine to the organization's functionaries , as well as offering a more general educational program to trade union activists .
135-762: The Workers School was a model for local CPUSA training centers in the area (e.g., the Jewish Workers University , founded in New York City in 1926) and in other American cities (e.g., the Chicago Workers School). It also provided the direct inspiration for the New Workers School , established by the breakaway Communist Party (Majority Group) headed by Jay Lovestone and Benjamin Gitlow (supported by Bertram D. Wolfe and Ben Davidson ) after they left
270-584: A fresco measuring more than 1,000 square feet (93 m ) in the RCA Building at Rockefeller Center in New York City. Preliminary sketches for the work were approved in November 1932 and a contract signed calling for the payment of $ 21,000. In March 1932, Rivera and his helpers moved to New York and began their work. Work progressed rapidly on the complicated work, which featured a central motif highlighting scientific discovery, with flaming red socialist themes in
405-514: A socialist revolution in contemporary society is inevitable. While the inevitability of an eventual socialist revolution is a controversial debate among many different Marxist schools of thought , all Marxists believe socialism is a necessity. Marxists argue that a socialist society is far better for most of the populace than its capitalist counterpart. Prior to the Russian Revolution , Vladimir Lenin wrote: "The socialisation of production
540-519: A Marxist would conclude that capitalism exploits and oppresses the proletariat; therefore, capitalism will inevitably lead to a proletarian revolution . In a socialist society, private property —as the means of production—would be replaced by cooperative ownership. A socialist economy would not base production on the creation of private profits but on the criteria of satisfying human needs—that is, production for use . Friedrich Engels explained that "the capitalist mode of appropriation, in which
675-544: A Yiddish-language periodical with its launch of Arbeiter Kampf (Workers' Struggle) in 1933. Beginning in January 1934, the group also began to produce a mimeographed discussion bulletin of "programmatic documents" under the title Where We Stand. At least 4 issues were produced. In May 1934 a quarterly magazine was launched called The Road To Communism , which the Communist Party USA (Opposition) published on behalf of
810-475: A backlash against Marxist thought in post-communist states, such as Poland . However, it remains prominent in the sociological research sanctioned and supported by communist states, such as in China . Marxian economics is a school of economic thought tracing its foundations to the critique of classical political economy first expounded upon by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxian economics concerns itself with
945-526: A certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or—this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms—with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution ." These inefficiencies manifest themselves as social contradictions in society which are, in turn, fought out at
1080-542: A concrete study of the actual conditions in Europe. According to the Marxist theoretician and revolutionary socialist Vladimir Lenin, "the principal content of Marxism" was "Marx's economic doctrine." Marx demonstrated how the capitalist bourgeoisie and their economists were promoting what he saw as the lie that "the interests of the capitalist and of the worker are ... one and the same." He believed that they did this by purporting
1215-481: A gold watch were stolen. At the time Lovestone claimed this was a GPU operation, though the FBI came to the conclusion that it was a hoax perpetuated by Lovestone to obtain a new passport. Hoax or not, the expelled board members lawyer, Maurice Sugar reproduced some of the very documents Lovestone claimed had been stolen at the trial. A special Bulletin , published by the expelled members sympathizers also published some of
1350-413: A labourer—is synonymous with surplus labour, and capitalist exploitation is thus realised as deriving surplus value from the worker. In pre-capitalist economies , exploitation of the worker was achieved via physical coercion . Under the capitalist mode of production, workers do not own the means of production and must "voluntarily" enter into an exploitative work relationship with a capitalist to earn
1485-593: A large body of new members in the American Communist movement presented a challenge for the group of core cadres, as the understanding of party ideology by many of these new members was seen as defective. With the Rand School firmly in the grasp of the WPA's hated rivals, the need for a new party training school was seen as a pressing order of the day. By October 1923 a new Communist Party training school had been readied —
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#17328589731171620-496: A materialist theory of history, Marx did not claim to have produced a master key to history and that the materialist conception of history is not "an historico-philosophic theory of the marche générale , imposed by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it finds itself." In a letter to the editor of the Russian newspaper paper Otechestvennyje Zapiski (1877), he explained that his ideas were based upon
1755-756: A new "International Conference of the Communist Opposition." Representatives of the CP(MG) collaborated with their comparable others in Germany, Sweden, and Czechoslovakia in a preliminary gathering held in Berlin in March 1930 to organize the event. The call for the founding conference was published over the signature of Heinrich Brandler of the National Council of the "Communist Party of Germany (Opposition)." The conference
1890-679: A new organization. The first was led by Bert Miller who wanted the sect to unite with the Conference for Progressive Labor Action . When he was unable to convince the leadership of the group to do so, he took a small following into the CPLA himself. Early in February 1933 former National Secretary Ben Gitlow submitted his resignation from the Lovestone organization, having come to see the general line of mass collectivization and frenetic industrialization in
2025-573: A number of trade union organizations of the 1930s, particularly in the automobile and garment industries. A growing disaffection with the Soviet Union in the years after the Great Purge of 1937–38 ultimately led the group to drop the word "Communist" from its name before its dissolution in the first days of 1941. The Communist Party (Opposition), known commonly as "The Lovestoneites", was one of two primary opposition organizations which split away from
2160-403: A post-capitalist society—positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that 'socialism' and 'Communism' are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death." According to orthodox Marxist theory, overthrowing capitalism by
2295-534: A public lecture on Sunday afternoons and conducted its courses during the evening hours, Monday through Thursday. The school was intended "to teach and defend the principles of Leninism within the Communist Party and the working class and to train workers for the class struggle", according to the party at the time of its launch. The Marx-Lenin School taught courses in beginning and advanced Marxism , American history,
2430-608: A public organization known as the Workers Party of America (WPA). This effort was met with success, as a majority of the Finnish Socialist Federation , the Workers Council group, and others previously opposed to underground political activity flocked to the new organization. Membership soared from barely over 4,000 in the old underground CPA in 1922 to more than 15,000 in the legal WPA in 1923. The presence of such
2565-531: A result, there is no single, definitive " Marxist theory ". Marxism has had a profound effect in shaping the modern world, with various left-wing and far-left political movements taking inspiration from it in varying local contexts. In addition to the various schools of thought , which emphasise or modify elements of classical Marxism , several Marxian concepts have been incorporated into an array of social theories . This has led to widely varying conclusions. Alongside Marx's critique of political economy ,
2700-605: A series of Sunday night lectures by Jay Lovestone on "The Class War Today." Other course titles included, "Fundamentals of Communism", "Program of the Communist International", "Marxian Philosophy", "Social Forces in American History", and "English for Foreign-Born Workers." Very similar courses were taught at the New Workers School in subsequent years, with Modern Monthly editor V. F. Calverton being added to
2835-541: A week in exchange for a weekly salary of $ 12 — an amount which was insufficient to cover the costs of life in New York City. Pressure was placed upon instructors to maintain enrollment in the school by conducting classes in a lively style as for both political and economic reasons high enrollment levels by the Workers School's administration. Admission to the New York Workers School was not limited to members of
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#17328589731172970-685: A word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes." Marx considered recurring class conflicts as the driving force of human history as such conflicts have manifested as distinct transitional stages of development in Western Europe . Accordingly, Marx designated human history as encompassing four stages of development in relations of production: While historical materialism has been referred to as
3105-408: Is a process accomplished by the so-called thinker consciously, it is true, but with a false consciousness. The real motive forces impelling him remain unknown to him; otherwise it simply would not be an ideological process. Hence he imagines false or seeming motive forces." Because the ruling class controls the society's means of production, the superstructure of society (i.e. the ruling social ideas)
3240-453: Is a study of educational reform in the U.S. and its relationship to the reproduction of capitalism and the possibilities of utilising its contradictions in the revolutionary movement. The work of Peter McLaren , especially since the turn of the 21st century, has further developed Marxist educational theory by developing revolutionary critical pedagogy, as has the work of Glenn Rikowski, Dave Hill, and Paula Allman. Other Marxists have analysed
3375-516: Is an accepted version of this page Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism , to analyse class relations, social conflict , and social transformation . Marxism originates with the works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels . Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought , and as
3510-401: Is bound to lead to the conversion of the means of production into the property of society. ... This conversion will directly result in an immense increase in productivity of labour, a reduction of working hours, and the replacement of the remnants, the ruins of small-scale, primitive, disunited production by collective and improved labour." The failure of the 1905 Russian Revolution , along with
3645-403: Is certain and that is that I am not a Marxist." The discovery of the materialist conception of history, or rather, the consistent continuation and extension of materialism into the domain of social phenomenon, removed two chief defects of earlier historical theories. In the first place, they at best examined only the ideological motives of the historical activity of human beings, without grasping
3780-402: Is determined by the best interests of the ruling class. In The German Ideology , Marx says that "[t]he ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is, at the same time, its ruling intellectual force." The term political economy initially referred to the study of the material conditions of economic production in
3915-449: Is divided between the rich and the poor, and that some people subjugate and exploit other people, you're lost in a forest, not knowing anything. — Cuban revolutionary and Marxist–Leninist politician Fidel Castro on discovering Marxism, 2009 This new way of thinking was invented because socialists believed that common ownership of the means of production (i.e. the industries , land, wealth of nature, trade apparatus and wealth of
4050-448: Is introduced. Because the surplus produced by the workers is the property of the society as a whole, there are no classes of producers and appropriators. Additionally, as the state originates in the bands of retainers hired by the first ruling classes to protect their economic privilege, it will wither away as its conditions of existence have disappeared. According to The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx , "Marx used many terms to refer to
4185-416: Is necessary to understand his later works properly. Contrary to the official dialectical materialism of the Soviet Union and interpretations of Marx rooted in the structural Marxism of Louis Althusser , Marxist humanists argue that Marx's work was an extension or transcendence of enlightenment humanism . Whereas other Marxist philosophies see Marxism as natural science , Marxist humanism reaffirms
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4320-465: Is not prerequisite. In addition to criticism, Marx has also praised some of the results of capitalism stating that it "has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together" and that it "has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal arrangements." Marx posited that the remaining feudalist societies in the world and forms of socialism that did not conform with his writings would be replaced by communism in
4455-551: Is often critical of reformist positions such as those held by social democrats . Libertarian Marxist currents often draw from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels' later works, specifically the Grundrisse and The Civil War in France ; emphasising the Marxist belief in the ability of the working class to forge its destiny without the need for a vanguard party to mediate or aid its liberation. Along with anarchism , libertarian Marxism
4590-761: Is one of the main currents of libertarian socialism . Libertarian Marxism includes currents such as autonomism , council communism , De Leonism , Lettrism , parts of the New Left , Situationism , Freudo-Marxism (a form of psychoanalysis ), Socialisme ou Barbarie and workerism . Libertarian Marxism has often strongly influenced both post-left and social anarchists . Notable theorists of libertarian Marxism have included Maurice Brinton , Cornelius Castoriadis , Guy Debord , Raya Dunayevskaya , Daniel Guérin , C. L. R. James , Rosa Luxemburg , Antonio Negri , Anton Pannekoek , Fredy Perlman , Ernesto Screpanti , E. P. Thompson , Raoul Vaneigem , and Yanis Varoufakis ,
4725-629: Is the favorite cover illustration of every periodical from Kino , the movie review, to Krokodil , the humorous magazine. His photograph appears as often and as universally on the Russian magazine covers as the ' Gibson Girl ' or Greta Garbo on the covers of American magazines. Towns and factories and clubs and streets are named after him. His speech on the Five-Year Plan was set to music! * * * [A]pparently Stalin insists upon being embalmed and worshipped while still alive! The movement suffered three splits during its existence, only one of which produced
4860-613: The Communist Party USA in the late 1920s and early 1930s, paralleling factional differences within the Soviet leadership. A so-called Left Opposition centered around James P. Cannon , Max Shachtman and others, supported Leon Trotsky and were expelled in 1928 to form the Communist League of America . Soon thereafter, another cleavage emerged, this time between the supporters of Nikolai Bukharin and Joseph Stalin . When Bukharin
4995-543: The Executive Committee of the Communist International which represented a revision of the decisions of the 6th World Congress of the Comintern . The remaining members of the regular CPUSA met these demands of its expelled dissidents with indifference or hostility. During its first years, the CP(MG) considered itself a "loyal opposition" to the official Communist Party, a fact reflected by the group's decision to endorse
5130-711: The Foley Square trial that she took "educational courses" on communism at the Jefferson School of Social Service and the New York Workers School. In the 1950s, the Workers School remained part of discussion of Communist infiltration in America. For example, in 1959, Frank Meyer , then anti-communist editor at National Review magazine, formerly a communist educator, testified to three phases of Communist training operations: 1) public agitation and propaganda, 2) molding of hard-core Communists, and 3) inner party training schools,
5265-589: The Left Wing Section of the Socialist Party which emerged as the forerunner of the American Communist Party in 1919. The first editor of the publication was Ben Gitlow, assisted by Bert Wolfe as associate editor. At the time of the 1st National Conference in 1930, Editor Gitlow and Secretary Lovestone traded hats. The Revolutionary Age changed its name to The Workers Age in January 1932, with
5400-535: The Workers Communist League . Gitlow and Becker's new organization soon merged with a group led by B.J. Field to form the League for a Revolutionary Workers Party . Finally, Herbert Zam split with a small following in 1934. They had argued that it was useless to continue as an "opposition" intending to reform the Communist Party, and advocated the group declare itself an independent party. When this perspective
5535-574: The "glorious traditions" in fulfilling the "tremendous tasks" set by a previous publication of the same name in establishing the American Communist movement in 1919. The organization declared that: Under the pretext of 'fighting the Rights,' the present leadership of the Communist International has been revising the fundamental principles of Leninism and distorting and destroying the Leninist line of
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5670-464: The "sum total of the forces of production accessible to men determines the condition of society" and forms a society's economic base. The base includes the material forces of production such as the labour , means of production and relations of production , i.e. the social and political arrangements that regulate production and distribution. From this base rises a superstructure of legal and political "forms of social consciousness " that derive from
5805-593: The 1930s. A May 1933 article by Bert Wolfe in Workers Age mocked the ritualistic torrents of adulation being bestowed upon Stalin as part of an organized campaign in the USSR: Throughout the Soviet Union today and throughout the Communist International there is an organized campaign for the development of a new 'ism' — 'Stalinism.' Stalin's fiftieth birthday [1929] was celebrated with incense and flattery. His picture
5940-508: The 1930s. The organization emerged from a factional fight in the CPUSA in 1929 and unsuccessfully sought to reintegrate with that organization for several years. Over the course of its existence the organization made use of four names: The members often referred to their organization as the Communist Party (Opposition) or "CPO." Activists in the Communist Party (Opposition) played a role in
6075-646: The 1940s, the Western Marxist school became accepted within Western academia, subsequently fracturing into several different perspectives, such as the Frankfurt School or critical theory . The legacy of Critical Theory as a major offshoot of Marxism is controversial. The common thread linking Marxism and Critical theory is an interest in struggles to dismantle structures of oppression, exclusion, and domination. Due to its former state-supported position, there has been
6210-468: The CPUSA. The new "Communist Party (Majority Group)" demanded that the official CPUSA turn away from the "opportunist sectarian" perspective of the Third Period and its use of "ultra-left phrases in the leading campaigns of the party", cease with its mass expulsions of dissidents and immediately reinstate those recently expelled, and "examine and take a stand" against the decisions of the 10th Plenum of
6345-467: The CPUSA. The new organization made its presence known with the first number of a new newspaper, The Revolutionary Age , subtitled "An Organ of Marxism-Leninism in the United States." The first issue was dated November 1, 1929, and featured "An Appeal to All Party Members and Revolutionary Workers" above the fold, in which the new "Communist Party USA (Majority Group)" declared itself the continuer of
6480-730: The Central Committee that Israel Breslow , editor of the party's Yiddish organ, had refused to resign from the Amalgamated Clothing Workers to join the new dual union, and that he was receiving an English language newsletter from the German Oppositionists. The Central committee refused to act, Moriarty even expressing sympathy for the KPO. In March 1930, the ECCI purged Moriarty, MacDonald, Bushay and Breslow. Marxism This
6615-457: The Comintern. As a result the sections of the Comintern have been thrown into isolation, chaos, and confusion, and the best and most experienced revolutionists driven out and expelled to be replaced by incapable politically bankrupt 'new leaderships.' * * * Against the revision of Leninism, against the destruction of our parties and of their mass influence it becomes the duty of all Communists, of all revolutionary workers to fight. The officers of
6750-413: The Communist International. We call upon the workers to support the Communist Party ticket as an expression of their agreement with the fundamental aims of Communism but to remember that the dangerous tactics of the official leaders of the Communist Party, which are doing such harm to the cause of Communism, are not the traditional tactics of the world Communist movement. The Lovestoneites remained loyal to
6885-715: The Communist Party (Majority Group), of the Trotsky group [the Communist League of America ], of the IWW , and of the Socialist Party have been smashed by the wild rowdyism and gangsterism of the Communist Party bureaucrats. It seems that the Party leadership intends that every meeting in the coming election campaign which is not an official Communist meeting must not be permitted to take place: either it must be 'turned' into an official Communist meeting or else it must be smashed! Particular grievous
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#17328589731177020-510: The Communist Party and its youth section, the Young Communist League , but also included non-party students. Indeed, the Workers School was envisioned not only as a training center but as a means of recruiting talented and sympathetic individuals into the Communist Party. Students at the school were mostly of working-class origin and were often immigrants to the United States. Workers in shoe, garment, and jewelry manufacturing as well as
7155-431: The Communist Party in 1929. The Workers School was dissolved through merger in 1944, becoming part of the CPUSA's Jefferson School of Social Science . Over the course of the spring and summer of 1919, the Socialist Party of America divided into competing Socialist and Communist wings. In the aftermath of this bitter split, the electorally-oriented Socialists retained control of a number of key public institutions of
7290-473: The Congressional and State candidates of the CPUSA in the 1930 elections. An editorial in the party's official organ declared: ...When we call upon the workers to support the Communist Party ticket in the elections we do not do so on the basis of agreement with the Party tactics or the Party's present election platform; we do so because of our agreement with the fundamentals and aims of the Communist Party and
7425-581: The Indian revolutionary M. N. Roy . On April 3, 1932, Rivera lectured under the auspices of the Communist Party (Opposition) on "Trends in Modern Art", with his friend Bert Wolfe handling the task of translation. In the summer of 1932 the Communist Party (Majority Group) made a strong protest about the use of violence by the official Communist Party against its soapbox speakers on the street corners of New York City. The Lovestoneites charged that Street meetings of
7560-546: The Industrial Revolution which undermines the democratic agency of citizens. Marxists differ in their positions towards democracy. Types of democracy in Marxism include Soviet democracy , New Democracy , Whole-process people's democracy and can include voting on how surplus labour is to be organised. According to democratic centralism political decisions reached by voting in the party are binding for all members of
7695-478: The International Communist Opposition. Only two issues were produced. The party's Harlem branch, in which Edward Welsh played a key role, additionally published a mimeographed sheet, Negro Voice from 1935 to 1936. At least two issues of a mimeographed magazine for the group's youth section called Youth Frontier were also published in 1938 and 1939. The Lovestoneites also represented
7830-480: The Lovestone movement has speculated that "perhaps the Communist Opposition leadership itself did not know the exact number of members at any given time." Benjamin Gitlow, an early Secretary of the organization who later broke with communism, declared in his 1940 memoir that "the Lovestonites did not attain a membership in excess of three hundred and fifty throughout my connection with the group." Another estimate of
7965-512: The New York Workers School. The facility was first located at 48–50 East 13th Street. It moved to Communist headquarters at 28 East 14th Street on Union Square . In January 1934, the New Masses magazine advertised its address as 35 East 12th Street. The facility moved yet again to a permanent home located at 35 East 12th Street — a building said by one FBI informant to be so "dingy, makeshift, and old" that it "should have been condemned". As with
8100-542: The Republicans and Democrats "stand for this cursed system", while the Socialists "frequently support the conservative union leaders who are doing their best to paralyze the struggles of the workers and to hand them over to the tender mercies of the bosses." On July 17, 1938, Lovestone's Manhattan apartment at London Terrace, 410 West 24th Street was broken into. Extensive collections of his correspondence, his passport and
8235-652: The Right Opposition in Canada. As in the US, an opposition-inclined group had been elected at the Communist Party's latest convention, in June 1929, but the factional differences were still salient. The tendency led by Chairmen Jack MacDonald , William Moriarty and Michael Bushay accepted the new Moscow line, but only grudgingly. Within a few months the Montreal party leadership complained to
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#17328589731178370-512: The Socialist Party. Advertised in mid-November 1929 for a December 2 opening and described in an article in mid-December 1929, the Communist Party (Majority Group)'s institute was initially called the "Marx-Lenin School", with Bert Wolfe as director and D. Benjamin (real name, Ben Davidson ) as assistant director. Instructors included Jay Lovestone, Ben Gitlow, Charles "Sasha" Zimmerman, Will Herberg, Bert Miller, Herbert Zam, and others in addition to Wolfe and Benjamin. The Marx-Lenin School held
8505-598: The U.S. Government. But, despite the rhetoric of direct action , and student-staff willingness to apply communist doctrines on the streets, on picket lines, or in union struggles, there is no evidence that would suggest that the Workers School, or any other party educational enterprise, was some U.S. equivalent of the Smolny Institute , the academy from which the Russian Bolsheviks made their successful armed seizure of state power in 1917." The New York Workers School
8640-498: The USSR as "basically wrong" with the matter a "decisive question of fundamental principle." Gitlow presented his views to the 2nd National Conference of the CPUSA(O), which "decisively rejected" them "by a large margin." Soon thereafter, Gitlow submitted his resignation from the organization. He was joined by Lazar Becker in his defection and the pair formed a tiny new grouplet calling itself
8775-421: The Workers School every weekday evening although most met only once or twice per week, with Tuesday being the night of the lightest course offerings. By 1927 the number of courses offered by the school had tripled, including courses on "Citizenship and Naturalization", labor journalism, and the creation and operation of shop newspapers, among others. The school's "core course", entitled "Fundamentals of Communism",
8910-452: The administration of General Secretary Joseph Stalin , a great emphasis was placed on the adoption of Marxist archaeology throughout the country. These theoretical developments were subsequently adopted by archaeologists working in capitalist states outside of the Leninist bloc, most notably by the Australian academic V. Gordon Childe , who used Marxist theory in his understandings of the development of human society. Marxist sociology, as
9045-459: The analysis of crisis in capitalism, the role and distribution of the surplus product and surplus value in various types of economic systems , the nature and origin of economic value , the impact of class and class struggle on economic and political processes, and the process of economic evolution . Although the Marxian school is considered heterodox , ideas that have come out of Marxian economics have contributed to mainstream understanding of
9180-414: The awareness—of itself and the social world—that a social class possesses and its capacity to act rationally in its best interests. Class consciousness is required before a social class can effect a successful revolution and, thus, the dictatorship of the proletariat . Without defining ideology , Marx used the term to describe the production of images of social reality. According to Engels, "ideology
9315-499: The behest of the Lusk Committee and the Justice Department . With the country in the throes of the First Red Scare , the various organizations of the Communist movement eked out a furtive underground existence. At the end of 1921 a decision was made by key party leaders, approved and driven ahead by the Communist International , for the Communist Party of America (CPA) to emerge from its underground existence of secret meetings and pseudonyms and to attempt to re-establish itself as
9450-538: The benefit of the Communist movement's largely immigrant membership, as well as courses on "speech improvement" (the elimination of accents) and " platform speaking ". Courses were conducted at night so that workers could remain on the job without interruption of their lives and financial loss. Workers School class announcements from the 1930s indicate that two successive class blocks ran each night, one running from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm, followed by another group of classes meeting from 8:40 pm to 10:10 pm. Classes were offered at
9585-456: The building trades were particularly well represented, as were students having jobs in restaurants and retail shops. Participation topped the 1,000 student mark in the fall of 1926. Annual attendance at the peak of the CPUSA's educational effort was approximately 5,000 students. Eventually the Workers School would open up satellite schools in the Bronx , Harlem , Brooklyn , and in several New Jersey industrial towns across from New York City on
9720-417: The capitalist system. In Marxism, political economy is the study of the means of production, specifically of capital and how that manifests as economic activity. Marxism taught me what society was. I was like a blindfolded man in a forest, who doesn't even know where north or south is. If you don't eventually come to truly understand the history of the class struggle, or at least have a clear idea that society
9855-415: The complex dynamics of modern society." Influenced by the thought of Karl Marx , Marxist sociology emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. With Marx, Max Weber and Émile Durkheim are considered seminal influences in early sociology . The first Marxist school of sociology was known as Austro-Marxism , of which Carl Grünberg and Antonio Labriola were among its most notable members. During
9990-399: The concept that "the fastest possible growth of productive capital " was best for wealthy capitalists and workers because it provided them with employment. Exploitation is a matter of surplus labour —the amount of labour performed beyond what is received in goods. Exploitation has been a socioeconomic feature of every class society and is one of the principal features distinguishing
10125-545: The course of the organization, as well as other branches in Austin, Texas , Philadelphia, Wilkes Barre , Fredericktown-Millsboro, Pennsylvania , Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Kokomo, Indiana , Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Lansing , Muskegon , Pontiac , St. Louis, Boston, New Bedford , Hartford , San Antonio , Los Angeles, Troy, New York , Baltimore, Passaic, New Jersey , Fall River, Massachusetts , and Buffalo . By no means did all of these local units exist simultaneously, but
10260-843: The defining characteristics of Marxism have often been described using the terms " dialectical materialism " and "historical materialism", though these terms were coined after Marx's death and their tenets have been challenged by some self-described Marxists. As a school of thought, Marxism has had a profound effect on society and global academia. To date, it has influenced many fields, including anthropology , archaeology , art theory , criminology , cultural studies , economics , education , ethics , film theory , geography , historiography , literary criticism , media studies , philosophy , political science , political economy , psychoanalysis , science studies , sociology , urban planning , and theatre . Marxism seeks to explain social phenomena within any given society by analysing
10395-493: The doctrine that "man is the measure of all things"—that humans are essentially different to the rest of the natural order and should be treated so by Marxist theory. According to a 2007 survey of American professors by Neil Gross and Solon Simmons, 17.6% of social science professors and 5.0% of humanities professors identify as Marxists, while between 0 and 2% of professors in all other disciplines identify as Marxists. The theoretical development of Marxist archaeology
10530-490: The documents to prove that Lovestone was behind Martin's attempt to purge them. Years later the FBI found out further information about the incident while conducting another investigation. The employees at the building apparently belonged to a small Communist dominated union and one of the maids was commissioned to keep tabs on Lovestone's mail. Communist Party agents then rented an apartment above Lovestone's and burglarized it when he
10665-425: The economic base that conditions both the superstructure and the dominant ideology of a society. Conflicts between the development of material productive forces and the relations of production provoke social revolutions , whereby changes to the economic base lead to the superstructure's social transformation . This relationship is reflexive in that the base initially gives rise to the superstructure and remains
10800-408: The end of class society, which Marx saw as the fundamental division of all hitherto existing history. Marx saw the fundamental nature of capitalist society as little different from that of a slave society in that one small group of society exploits the larger group. Through common ownership of the means of production, the profit motive is eliminated, and the motive of furthering human flourishing
10935-405: The failure of socialist movements to resist the outbreak of World War I , led to renewed theoretical effort and valuable contributions from Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg towards an appreciation of Marx's crisis theory and efforts to formulate a theory of imperialism . Karl Marx criticised liberal democracy as not democratic enough due to the unequal socio-economic situation of the workers during
11070-624: The fall of 1929 the Communist Party operated a "Bronx Branch of the Workers' School", located at 2700 Bronx Park East. A total of 60 students began the fall term at that location. In the late 1920s, the Workers School advocated for issues including the Sacco and Vanzetti trials, "Hands-Off-China" (for Shanghai Massacre ), and "Passaic Relief" (for the Passaic Textile Strike ). In 1949, FBI undercover agent/informer Angela Calomiris testified during
11205-526: The first number under the new title appearing on the 16th of that month. In addition to its main periodical, the Lovestoneites launched a short-lived Yiddish periodical, Jewish Monthly Bulletin , in December 1929. At that same time was announced the forthcoming launch of a paper called Revolutionary Youth for its "Young Communist League (Majority Group)" youth section. The organization took another stab at
11340-491: The forms and pedagogical processes of capitalist and communist education, such as Tyson E. Lewis, Noah De Lissovoy, Gregory Bourassa, and Derek R. Ford. Curry Malott has developed a Marxist history of education in the U.S., and Marvin Gettleman examined the history of communist education. Sandy Grande has synthesised Marxist educational theory with Indigenous pedagogy, while others like John Holt analyse adult education from
11475-482: The foundation of a form of social organisation . Those newly formed social organisations can then act again upon both parts of the base and superstructure so that rather than being static, the relationship is dialectic , expressed and driven by conflicts and contradictions. Engels clarified: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave , patrician and plebeian , lord and serf , guild -master and journeyman , in
11610-405: The future in a similar manner as with capitalism. Marx distinguishes social classes based on two criteria, i.e. ownership of means of production and control over the labour power of others. Following this criterion of class based on property relations, Marx identified the social stratification of the capitalist mode of production with the following social groups: Class consciousness denotes
11745-544: The global economy. Certain concepts of Marxian economics, especially those related to capital accumulation and the business cycle , such as creative destruction , have been fitted for use in capitalist systems. Marxist education develops Marx's works and those of the movements he influenced in various ways. In addition to the educational psychology of Lev Vygotsky and the pedagogy of Paulo Freire , Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis' Schooling in Capitalist America
11880-538: The group's numerical strength is provided by Will Herberg, a top leader of the organization throughout its history, who pegged the membership of the Lovestone organization at between 1,000 and 1,500. In the view of the leading scholar of the ILLA and its predecessors, the historian Robert J. Alexander, "Will Herberg's estimate of Lovestoneite membership would seem nearer the facts than that of Gitlow." The Lovestoneites had as many as nine functioning branches in New York City over
12015-399: The history of the trade union movement, and the history of the revolutionary youth movement in America as well as classes in intermediate and advanced English. Over 400 people were claimed to have registered for the first classes offered by the school, which began in January 1930. The facility was initially located at 37 East 28th Street, 8th Floor, in New York City. In the fall of 1930 it
12150-450: The international schools that have been run over the years under various names by the international Communist movement. In the estimation of one historian, for all its advocacy of political militance by the staff of the New York Workers School, the actual outcome was mild: Anticommunist ideologues entertained lurid fantasies of party cadres stepping right out from a classroom discussion of one of Lenin's pamphlets and violently assaulting
12285-463: The last of which, as he explains was: ... for the purpose of putting a final hardness, understanding from the party's point of view, toughness, on the Communist who is already approaching top leadership positions ... The third type of training consists of a network of schools, full-time party schools, from the local level — section schools — through district schools, to national schools, and finally to
12420-550: The latter claiming that Marx himself was a libertarian Marxist. Marxist humanism was born in 1932 with the publication of Marx's Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 and reached a degree of prominence in the 1950s and 1960s. Marxist humanists contend that there is continuity between the early philosophical writings of Marx, in which he develops his theory of alienation , and the structural description of capitalist society found in his later works, such as Capital . They hold that grasping Marx's philosophical foundations
12555-519: The left background and scenes of militarism and police repression in the background right. Unsurprisingly, enormous controversy began to flare up, with the New York World-Telegram opining with an April 24, 1933 banner: "RIVERA PAINTS SCENES OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITY AND JOHN D. JR. FOOTS BILL.". Nelson A. Rockefeller was quick to quash the controversy by pulling the plug on the almost-completed work, paying off Rivera and immediately covering
12690-426: The level of class struggle . Under the capitalist mode of production , this struggle materialises between the minority who own the means of production (the bourgeoisie ) and the vast majority of the population who produce goods and services (the proletariat ). Starting with the conjectural premise that social change occurs due to the struggle between different classes within society who contradict one another,
12825-421: The massive mural before destroying it early in 1934. After paying for his supplies, the wages of his assistants, and a commission for obtaining the work, Rivera found himself with $ 7,000 of "Rockefeller money" remaining. He determined to leave New York with a particularly provocative example of his work. He chose the location of the Lovestoneites' New Workers School on West 14th Street, putting up movable walls in
12960-570: The material conditions and economic activities required to fulfill human material needs. It assumes that the form of economic organisation, or mode of production , influences all other social phenomena, including broader social relations, political institutions, legal systems, cultural systems, aesthetics and ideologies. These social relations and the economic system form a base and superstructure . As forces of production (i.e. technology ) improve, existing forms of organising production become obsolete and hinder further progress. Karl Marx wrote: "At
13095-534: The memory of C. E. Ruthenberg , the former leader of the faction who had died suddenly of acute appendicitis on March 3, 1927, holding public "Ruthenberg Memorial Meetings" in his memory each year and eulogizing him in the party press. Among those boosted in the pages of The Revolutionary Age and its successor, The Workers Age were the German oppositional communist August Thalheimer , the Mexican artist Diego Rivera , and
13230-407: The necessities of life. The worker's entry into such employment is voluntary because they choose which capitalist to work for. However, the worker must work or starve. Thus, exploitation is inevitable, and the voluntary nature of a worker participating in a capitalist society is illusory; it is production, not circulation, that causes exploitation. Marx emphasised that capitalism per se does not cheat
13365-511: The objective laws governing the development of the system of social relations. ... in the second place, the earlier theories did not cover the activities of the masses of the population, whereas historical materialism made it possible for the first time to study with scientific accuracy the social conditions of the life of the masses and the changes in these conditions. — Russian Marxist theoretician and revolutionary Vladimir Lenin , 1913 Society does not consist of individuals, but expresses
13500-445: The official Communist Party once again, declared that "the turn in tactics must be accompanied by a movement for the unification of the Communist movement, now split up and divided." For all its aspirations of united action and reintegration into the regular CPUSA, the Lovestone oppositionists began to have ever more serious misgivings about the nature of the regime in the Soviet Union as the " Cult of Personality " began to take root in
13635-431: The organization named in 1929 included an 11-member Central Committee headed by expelled General Secretary Lovestone and including such former CPUSA stalwarts as Ellen Dawson , Benjamin Gitlow , William Kruse , Bertram D. Wolfe , and Charles S. Zimmerman . The new group also included its own "Young Communist League", headed by an 8-member National Executive Committee, to parallel the official Young Communist League of
13770-521: The other side of the Hudson River . The school launched its own magazine, The Student-Worker , in February 1927, with members of the Student Council serving as the editorial staff of the publication. Content of the magazine's first issue included a contribution by Bertram D. Wolfe, Director of the Workers School, as well as material produced by students on the aims of the school, teaching methods, and
13905-557: The party, including the Rand School of Social Science , a trade union and party training facility located in New York City. (Historian Marvin E. Gettleman makes clear that the Workers School was seen by the Communists as the "historic successor" of the Socialists' Rand School.) The revolutionary socialist Communist wing, on the other hand, was rapidly driven underground by successive raids throughout late 1919 and early 1920 conducted at
14040-530: The party. Classical Marxism denotes the collection of socio-eco-political theories expounded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels . As Ernest Mandel remarked, "Marxism is always open, always critical, always self-critical." Classical Marxism distinguishes Marxism as broadly perceived from "what Marx believed." In 1883, Marx wrote to his son-in-law Paul Lafargue and French labour leader Jules Guesde —both of whom claimed to represent Marxist principles—accusing them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and denying
14175-548: The payment of modest salaries to the part-time teaching staff. The cost of a 12-week course meeting once a week at the time of the Workers School's launch in 1923 was $ 3.50. This fee was raised to $ 4 in 1927, with twice-weekly classes in English-language instruction priced at $ 6 for the 12 week term. Reduced fees were available to trade unions and various other fraternal organizations seeking to sponsor students on scholarship. A core teaching staff taught between 10 and 15 classes
14310-434: The population's living standards due to its need to compensate for the falling rate of profit by cutting employees' wages and social benefits while pursuing military aggression. The socialist mode of production would succeed capitalism as humanity's mode of production through revolution by workers. According to Marxian crisis theory , socialism is not an inevitability but an economic necessity. The term Marxism
14445-500: The product enslaves first the producer, and then the appropriator, is replaced by the mode of appropriation of the products that is based upon the nature of the modern means of production; upon the one hand, direct social appropriation, as means to the maintenance and extension of production—on the other, direct individual appropriation, as means of subsistence and of enjoyment." Marxian economics and its proponents view capitalism as economically unsustainable and incapable of improving
14580-429: The regular Communist Party. At the time of the name change, the Communist Party (Majority Group) noted that "every one of its teachers was formerly a leading teacher of the old Workers School", an institution which "thanks to the wrong line at present prevailing in the Party, is revising and falsifying Leninism and hence no longer serving the purposes for which it is founded." The second year of classes were headlined by
14715-414: The rented building and creating the mural with his assistants at his own expense. The work, entitled "Portrait of America", included 21 panels in all, occupying 700 square feet (65 m ) of wall space. The group issued a periodical during its existence, known as The Revolutionary Age in its first incarnation, a tip of the hat to a periodical of the same name which served as the first official organ of
14850-432: The rival Rand School of Social Science, the Workers School attempted to train trade union activists as well as key party cadres as part of what Gettleman has called "a systematic effort to mobilize learning to support the workers' side in the class struggle ". The teaching staff took pains to stress a close connection between learning and action, with a view to a hastening of the overthrow of capitalism . The Workers School
14985-450: The roster to teach a course on "The Liberation of American Literature" in the fall of 1932. Courses cost $ 2.50 per class, with tickets to the headlining presentations by Jay Lovestone available on a single admission basis for 25 cents. In 1934, the New Workers School was immortalized in American art history by the Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. In 1932, Rivera had been commissioned to paint
15120-481: The selection of course topics. In the fall of 1929 participation was estimated at "over 1200", of whom about 20 percent were enrolled in basic English classes and the rest taking courses in history, politics, or other party training courses. This represented a new record enrollment for the institution. It was noted in October 1929 that the New York Workers School also maintained a Ruthenberg Library and reading room, which
15255-467: The shadow of his celebrated brother, Liam , the author of The Informer and The Assassin . He drank heavily, and I have sometimes seen him lying, stiff and foul, in front of the Workers Center on Union Square. New Workers School The Lovestoneites , led by former General Secretary of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) Jay Lovestone , were a small American oppositionist communist movement of
15390-420: The sheer number and geographic spread of organized branches seems indicative of an organization with more than a few hundred adherents. The Lovestoneites placed extremely high emphasis upon educational activities. The Lovestone organization was quick to establish its own party school akin to the training institutes of the rival official Communist Party's Workers School and the Rand School of Social Science of
15525-415: The social classes. The power of one social class to control the means of production enables its exploitation of other classes. Under capitalism, the labour theory of value is the operative concern, whereby the value of a commodity equals the socially necessary labour time required to produce it. Under such conditions, surplus value —the difference between the value produced and the value received by
15660-603: The society) would abolish the exploitative working conditions experienced under capitalism. Through working class revolution, the state (which Marxists saw as a weapon for the subjugation of one class by another) is seized and used to suppress the hitherto ruling class of capitalists and (by implementing a commonly owned, democratically controlled workplace) create the society of communism which Marxists see as true democracy. An economy based on cooperation on human need and social betterment, rather than competition for profit of many independently acting profit seekers, would also be
15795-474: The study of sociology from a Marxist perspective, is "a form of conflict theory associated with ... Marxism's objective of developing a positive ( empirical ) science of capitalist society as part of the mobilisation of a revolutionary working class ." The American Sociological Association has a section dedicated to the issues of Marxist sociology that is "interested in examining how insights from Marxist methodology and Marxist analysis can help explain
15930-412: The sum of interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand. Marxism uses a materialist methodology, referred to by Marx and Engels as the materialist conception of history and later better known as historical materialism, to analyse the underlying causes of societal development and change from the perspective of the collective ways in which humans make their living. Marx's account of
16065-599: The theory is in The German Ideology (1845) and the preface A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859). All constituent features of a society ( social classes , political pyramid and ideologies ) are assumed to stem from economic activity, forming what is considered the base and superstructure . The base and superstructure metaphor describes the totality of social relations by which humans produce and re-produce their social existence. According to Marx,
16200-526: The time of its 15th anniversary in 1938, the Workers School had developed its own pedagogic method, forsaking the traditional academic format of lecture and recitation for a variation of the Socratic method in which short lectures were made with a view to posing of key questions for joint discussion by students. This teaching method, borrowed from a small set of elite liberal arts colleges in the New England region,
16335-484: The value of reformist struggle. From Marx's letter derives Marx's famous remark that, if their politics represented Marxism, ' ce qu'il y a de certain c'est que moi, je ne suis pas Marxiste ' ('what is certain is that I myself am not a Marxist')." Libertarian Marxism emphasises the anti-authoritarian and libertarian aspects of Marxism. Early currents of libertarian Marxism, such as left communism , emerged in opposition to Marxism–Leninism . Libertarian Marxism
16470-432: The worker. Alienation ( German : Entfremdung ) is the estrangement of people from their humanity and a systematic result of capitalism. Under capitalism, the fruits of production belong to employers, who expropriate the surplus created by others and generate alienated labourers. In Marx's view, alienation is an objective characterisation of the worker's situation in capitalism—his or her self-awareness of this condition
16605-517: Was a street corner meeting held July 8 in Brownsville, New York at the corner of Hopkinson and Pitkin Avenues, which had been attacked by "official 'Communist' hooligans who brandished knives, iron knuckles, and other weapons." Despite being subjected to such violence, the Lovestoneites nevertheless once again endorsed the electoral ticket of the official Communist Party in the election of 1932, declaring
16740-530: Was absorbed by the Jefferson School of Social Science in 1944 — a parallel Communist Party adult educational institution. Each term at the school began with publication of an "Announcement of Classes". The school launched in the fall of 1923 with a total of 12 courses as part of its curriculum, including Marxism , the history of international workers' movement, tactics of the Communist International , as well as " Biologic and Social Evolution ." In addition, courses in elementary and advanced English were offered for
16875-404: Was emulated by the Communist Party on a smaller scale in other key American industrial cities during the period of its greatest strength, the late 1930s and early 1940s. Former Soviet spy Whittaker Chambers mentioned the Workers School (which he called the "Workers Center") in his memoirs: Behind Comrade Angelica sat Comrade Tom O'Flaherty . He was a big, unhappy Irishman, who lived sadly in
17010-401: Was first developed in the Soviet Union in 1929, when a young archaeologist named Vladislav I. Ravdonikas published a report entitled "For a Soviet history of material culture"; within this work, the very discipline of archaeology as it then stood was criticised as being inherently bourgeois, therefore anti-socialist and so, as a part of the academic reforms instituted in the Soviet Union under
17145-570: Was held on December 16 and 17, 1930 in Berlin. The Lovestone group reacted with shock and a sense of urgency to the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis in Germany. The organization urged international unity among labor and radical groups against the Nazis' "express-train speed" efforts to "consolidate their grip on the country and wipe out the labor movement without leaving a trace." The organization clearly continued to hold out hope that it would be invited into
17280-424: Was intended to shift the responsibility for learning to the students themselves. Joseph R. Brodsky had an as-yet-undefined affiliation with the school. Members of the advisory council included: Many prominent leftists taught there, including: In the estimation of the leading academic expert on the New York Workers School, the institution was largely self-supporting, with student tuition providing funds for
17415-410: Was moved to 63 Madison Avenue, 1st Floor, near 27th Street. By the "Special Summer Term" of 1932 the school had found new quarters once again, this time at 228 Second Avenue, on the corner of 14th Street. The name of the party's institute was later changed in the fall of 1930 to "The New Workers School" as part of an effort to contrast itself to the Workers School, the successful training program run by
17550-497: Was not endorsed by the leadership Zam and his co-thinkers went into the left wing of the Socialist Party of America. At no point in its history did the Independent Labor League of America or its predecessors publish membership figures. The size of the group no doubt fluctuated over time and the organization lacked the rigid discipline and regimentation of the official Communist Party USA, to the point that one historian of
17685-610: Was open nightly from 6:30 until 9:30 pm. A campus newspaper was also launched at that date, Workers' School Journal, which was to be run under student management and to publish contributions made by students at the school. Branches opened in the New York City area: the Bronx, Harlem, Brooklyn, and towns in New Jersey. Although the bulk of the New York Workers School's operations were conducted at its main facility, small branch campuses were periodically added in order to improve accessibility. In
17820-524: Was out, taking the bags of correspondence to the other apartment so no one would see them. Finally, in a letter in the Comintern archive in Moscow, dated Oct 19, 1938 Comintern representative Pat Toohey reported that Lovestone's "entire archive" had come into possession of the Party. After initially lending critical support to the Communist International , in the fall of 1930 preparations began to be made for
17955-693: Was popularised by Karl Kautsky , who considered himself an orthodox Marxist during the dispute between Marx's orthodox and revisionist followers. Kautsky's revisionist rival Eduard Bernstein also later adopted the term. Engels did not support using Marxism to describe either Marx's or his views. He claimed that the term was being abusively used as a rhetorical qualifier by those attempting to cast themselves as genuine followers of Marx while casting others in different terms, such as Lassallians . In 1882, Engels claimed that Marx had criticised self-proclaimed Marxist Paul Lafargue by saying that if Lafargue's views were considered Marxist, then "one thing
18090-487: Was purged from the Soviet leadership, his supporters in various countries, known as the Right Opposition , were also expelled or left the various national parties. In the United States this tendency was led by Jay Lovestone , former General Secretary of the Communist Party. The group began as the Communist Party, USA (Majority Group) in the fall of 1929, following the expulsion of Lovestone and his factional cohorts from
18225-426: Was taught in six different classes, including a day course for workers on the night shift. By the middle 1930s, as many as 50 sections in this key course were offered at the Workers School and in satellite classrooms around New York City. The school occasionally published its own cheap editions of Marxist "classics" or issued its own textbooks, including one by leading Yiddish-language Communist Moissaye Olgin . By
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