The
proletariat is the social class of wage-earners, those members of a
society whose only possession of significant economic value is their labour power. A member of such a class is a proletarian. Marxist philosophy considers the
proletariat to be exploited under capitalism, forced to accept meager wages in return for operating the means of production, which belong to the class of
business owners, the
bourgeoisie. Marx argued that this
oppression gives the
proletariat common economic and political interests that transcend national boundaries, impelling them to unite and take over power from the capitalist class, and eventually to create a
communist society free from class distinctions.
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Marx used the term
proletariat in his socio-political theory (Marxism) to describe a progressive
working class untainted by
private property and capable of
revolutionary action to topple capitalism and abolish
social classes, leading
society to ever higher levels of prosperity and
justice. Marx defined the
proletariat as the social class having no significant ownership of the means of production and whose only means of subsistence is to sell their labor power for a wage or salary.
Lumpenproletariat refers to the underclass devoid of class
consciousness. It may be used in an informal disapproving manner to describe people who are not clever or well educated, and who are not interested in changing or improving their situation.
The colors black and red have been used by anarchists since at least the late 1800s, though generally used by anarcho-
communists. The
flag was used as the symbol of the anarcho-
syndicalists by the
CNT during the Spanish Civil
War. The black represents
anarchism and the red represents leftist and socialist ideals. George Woodcock writes that the bisected black-and-red
flag symbolized a uniting of "the spirit of later
anarchism with the mass appeal of the First International"
Syndicalism is a current in the labor movement to establish local, worker-based organizations and advance the demands and rights of workers through strikes. Major
syndicalist organizations include the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), the General Confederation of Labor in
France, the National Confederation of Labour in Spain, the Italian
Syndicalist Union, the Free Workers' Union of
Germany, and the Argentine Regional Workers' Federation. A number of
syndicalist organizations were and still are to this day linked in the International Workers' Association.
Syndicalists advocate
direct action, including working to rule, passive
resistance,
sabotage, and strikes, particularly
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strike, as tactics in the class struggle, as opposed to indirect action such as
electoral politics. The final step towards
revolution, according to
syndicalists, would be a general
strike. Labor unions were seen as being the embryo of a new
society in addition to being the means of struggle within the old.
Syndicalists generally agreed that in a free
society production would be managed by workers. The state apparatus would be replaced by the rule of workers' organizations. In such a
society individuals would be liberated, both in the economic sphere but also in their private and social lives.
Communism is a philosophical, social, political, and economic
ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of a
communist society, namely a socioeconomic order structured upon the ideas of common ownership of the means of production and the absence of
social classes,
money, and, in some cases, the state. As such,
communism is a specific form of
socialism.
Communism includes a variety of schools of thought which broadly include Marxism and
anarcho-communism as well as the political ideologies grouped around both, all of which share the analysis that the current order of
society stems from capitalism, its economic system, and mode of production, namely that in this system
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social classes, the relationship between these two classes is exploitative, and that this situation can only ultimately be resolved through a social
revolution. The two classes are the
proletariat (the
working class), who make up the majority of the population within
society and must work to survive; and the
bourgeoisie (the capitalist class), a small minority who derives profit from employing the
working class through private ownership of the means of production. According to this analysis,
revolution would put the
working class in power and in turn establish social ownership of the means of production which is the primary element in the transformation of
society towards
communism.
After 1917, a number of states were identified as
communist: these states espoused Marxism?Leninism or a variation of it. Along with social
democracy,
communism became the dominant political tendency within the international socialist movement by the 1920s. In practice, the model under which these nominally
communist states operated was, in fact, a form of state capitalism or a non-planned administrative-command system and not an actual
communist economic model in accordance with most accepted definitions of ?
communism? as an economic theory.
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