The reason Marx's (and here we have to divide between Marx as economic
scientist and Marx as political agitator) "predictions" about
capitalism didn't work, is that Marx's theories in itself (his
economic analysis of capitalism at this paticular time in history was
actually pretty accurate - if you disregard his political aims) made
it possible to act in other ways... When Bismarck introduced social
welfare as a way to diminish some of the worst misery among the
proletariat.. all Marx's predictions went down the toilet, more or
less ...
And since that marxist analysis of politcal and economic realities
struggle more and more to adjust to the "scientific" part of Marx, a
situation most of them can't see, as they believe in dialectic
materialism, which says it is the productive factors that determine
the superstructure... however Marx's theories in itself has become a
superstructure that changed the reality of the very same productive
factors... So what StarMan calls marxism, is in every sense incredibly
non-marxist ... while the ones who stick to the scientific part of
marxism, his objective analysis is the ones who abandon dialectic
materialism and the political aims of Marx, and today is employed by
the neoliberal think-thanks promoting a victorian english
manchesterschool capitalism (the one Marx analysed) - nearly everyone
working in the think-thank "timbro" ((a cosponsered project of the
Swedish Employeers Association and the neoconservative/liberal party
"Moderaterna"), a cultural counterattack on the dominance of
leftliberalism in academia and media during the seventies here in
Sweden)) was active in extreme marxist (conservative version -
Stalinist, Maoist, Hoxhaist) movements in the 60'ties .. they
basically still is economic scientific marxist, but instead of
anti-capitalist, they are pro-capitalist ... the conservative values
didn't have to change.
So there's a need for a revitalized non-marxist left .. to abandon Marx,
let the neoconservative think-thanks have their marxists promoting 19th
century capitalism (mercantile-materialism) for themselves. That's
pretty much the onliest thing Marx can be used for today. (well ever
since 1848)
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