this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2025
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[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

in a marxist framework, the revolutionary period is something that cannot be extended or terminated at will, it is produced by material conditions, and the duration is not decided by any leaders, but rather by whether or not class antagonism persists.

societies develop through contradictions between productive forces and relations of production and when they become unsustainable, things intensify until the ruling class is overturned. marx would argue that such a state cannot legitimize itself forever by rhetoric alone, because political superstructures ultimately depend on material relations, and if the proletariat no longer exists as a class, the state loses its function and withers away, if the state persists, that indicates unresolved class structures, not a valid permanent transition, essentially eternal revolution is impossible under the correct material conditions

That logic defines the Revolution by its outcome rather than by how it's conducted, so it's one big No True Scotsman Falacy were the One True Socialist revolution is the one which yields a state were all class structures are resolved and there is no state, and you only know that's the case when you get that outcome: per that theory is perfectly possible to have a Revolution were the "rulling class is overturned" following a period of "contradictions between productive forces and relations of production" "becoming unsustainable" resulting in there being "no state" and yet there still being at least in part "unresolved class structures" and a "proletariat as a class".

In fact both the Soviet Union and "Communist" China both quickly showed that their "Revolution Of The Proletariat" wasn't really The One Socialist Revolution as after the initial period of "no state" during the initial stage a "state" once again arose (which is, for example, what managed how food was grown and distributed) and there were clearly people who worked and got some benefit alongside other people who "led" and even got greater benefits (i.e. there was a "working class" and a "ruling class") thus showing that the "no state" phase of the Revolution was reached with"unresolved class structures" hence was not the true Socialist Revolution.

All of this feeds into my original point: Socialism is not a plan to successfully reach Communism, it's more of a Manifesto which basically says that amongst many ways (possibly an infinite number of ways) which are not correct, there is a correct way to have a Revolution that results in Communism, though one has to somehow "resolve all class structures" including eliminating a "proletariat as a class", and how to do that is exactly the hard part to figure out which is left for others to do, which is such a typically way to "pass the hot potato" rather than address the devil in the details.

It's funny because I have a background in Science and one in Engineering and that stuff is like Alcubierre coming up with a Mathematical proof that one can travel faster than light and leaving the hard details (namelly how to transform a planet the size of Jupiter into energy to actually power said Alcubierre drive) to somebody else - yeah, sure, nice to know it's possible, but without the actual details of how to make it happen it's totally useless.

[–] communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz 1 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

you are fundamentally misunderstanding what marx set out to do, marx was not proposing a system of government or an executable plan. he was analyzing history in order to explain the forces that drive social change and to make conditional predictions about the future. within that kind of analytical framework, outcomes are how the categories are defined.

this is standard practice in historical and social analysis, which you seem unfamiliar with, you likely haven't read any primary sources on this. a process is usually identified by what it produces, and a capitalist economy is one based around wage labor and capital accumulation. A feudal system is one organized around landed aristocracy and serfdom

and in Marxist terms, a socialist revolution is one that actually produces socialism. A revolution that claims the label but reproduces class domination has not achieved that outcome.

That does not make this a no true scotsman situation, that's when definitions are arbitrarily narrowed to protect a belief. in this case, the definition is fixed in advance by structural criteria. If those criteria are not met, the category simply does not apply. this is no different from saying that an attempted overthrow of a feudal monarch that fails is not a successful revolution. that does not expose a flaw in anti-feudal ideology, it just reflects how we use words.

your criticism also assumes marx failed to provide a plan, which he never attempted to provide, this is like criticizing darwin for not designing ecosystems.

the project was explanatory, not prescriptive. he analyzed why capitalism arises, how it functions, and why he believed it generates conditions that eventually make class society untenable.

marx’s claim about socialism and communism is therefore conditional, not magical: if material conditions develop in certain ways, class antagonisms intensify and if class antagonisms are resolved, tthe state loses its function, where those conditions are absent or prematurely forced, domination reappears under new forms.

we as socialists are engaged in the practical task of trying to build a future that resolves those contradictions, but marx himself did not “fail” by not delivering an engineering blueprint, he never attempted to do what you are demanding of him. rejecting this because it's not an instruction manual is a misunderstanding of the assignment in the first place.

every argument you've posed has been based in a misunderstanding of the reading and you should REALLY read some primary sources, here's some:

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface.htm

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/soc-utop/

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1884/origin-family/

i think these would be the most helpful readings for you.