It is impossible to speak seriously about Marxism in the West without incorporating the role of Christianity in each social formation. “Western Marxism has taken a historic distance from the concrete experiences of socialist transition in the Soviet Union, China, Viet Nam, and Cuba.”
I would recommend reading this and sending this to any radlibs/DSA/anarchists you know
I think Marx's Capital is about the base, but modern capitalist mythology gains legitimacy through being a mythos actualized through its connection with the base, but isn't actually referential to the base as such.
Like in the era after Marx you have this era of people like Max Weber and so on trying to take what Marx says and bend it in a way that isn't antagonistic to the social relations that are connected to the base, but the social relations of capitalism inherently form an antagonistic contradiction that is simply papered over by liberal/conservative myth making.
Also when I said isn't referential to the base I meant explicitly referential. Although free markets and private property are foundational to liberalism it's rarely emphasized.
Well, I didn't state it explicitly, but my point is that the superstructure, Christianity, interacted with the base, capital, to create new superstructure, liberalism, related to the older superstructure, but shaped by the base.
As a side note, Mao also said that the superstructure can take a dominant role over the base as well, but that it's an exception.
"Some people think that this is not true of certain contradictions. For instance, in the contradiction between the productive forces and the relations of production, the productive forces are the principal aspect; in the contradiction between theory and practice, practice is the principal aspect; in the contradiction between the economic base and the superstructure, the economic base is the principal aspect; and there is no change in their respective positions. This is the mechanical materialist conception, not the dialectical materialist conception. True, the productive forces, practice and the economic base generally play the principal and decisive role; whoever denies this is not a materialist. But it must also be admitted that in certain conditions, such aspects as the relations of production, theory and the superstructure in turn manifest themselves in the principal and decisive role." -Mao On Contradiction
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I think Marx's Capital is about the base, but modern capitalist mythology gains legitimacy through being a mythos actualized through its connection with the base, but isn't actually referential to the base as such.
Like in the era after Marx you have this era of people like Max Weber and so on trying to take what Marx says and bend it in a way that isn't antagonistic to the social relations that are connected to the base, but the social relations of capitalism inherently form an antagonistic contradiction that is simply papered over by liberal/conservative myth making.
or something.
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Also when I said isn't referential to the base I meant explicitly referential. Although free markets and private property are foundational to liberalism it's rarely emphasized.
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Well, I didn't state it explicitly, but my point is that the superstructure, Christianity, interacted with the base, capital, to create new superstructure, liberalism, related to the older superstructure, but shaped by the base.
As a side note, Mao also said that the superstructure can take a dominant role over the base as well, but that it's an exception.
"Some people think that this is not true of certain contradictions. For instance, in the contradiction between the productive forces and the relations of production, the productive forces are the principal aspect; in the contradiction between theory and practice, practice is the principal aspect; in the contradiction between the economic base and the superstructure, the economic base is the principal aspect; and there is no change in their respective positions. This is the mechanical materialist conception, not the dialectical materialist conception. True, the productive forces, practice and the economic base generally play the principal and decisive role; whoever denies this is not a materialist. But it must also be admitted that in certain conditions, such aspects as the relations of production, theory and the superstructure in turn manifest themselves in the principal and decisive role." -Mao On Contradiction
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