Cubalast
"Bourgeois and Proletarians":
Capitalist Power, Nation-State and the World Economy
John Milios1
1. The theoretical actuality of the Manifesto
When dealing with the Communist Manifesto, one has to comprehend what makes this text preserve its hermeneutic and ideological power a whole 150 years after its first publication. The answer to this question is to be found in its revolutionary-scientific character, i.e. to the fact that it constitutes an analysis of the typical features of the capitalist mode of production, as it emerged from the history of class-struggles, and was consolidated into a system of class power and class exploitation with historically unique structural characteristics. This scientific character of the Manifesto, its ability to reveal the real character of a social order which presents itself as a regime of “freedom” and “human rights”, makes it also an ideological weapon in the hands of the working class, i.e. all those who are subjected to capitalist power and exploitation. And as Louis Altusser argued, "It is absolutely necessary for one to have adopted proletarian class positions, in order, very simply, to see and understand what is happening in a class society. It is based on the simple finding that (...) one cannot see everything from everywhere. One can discern the texture of this reality of conflict only if one adopts within the conflict itself, certain positions and not some other ones, because to passively adopt some other positions means that she/he has caught up in the logic of class illusions, which shall be named ruling ideology. Naturally this pre-condition opposes the entire positivist tradition -through which the bourgeois ideology interprets the practice of natural sciences" (Althusser: “Für Marx und Freud”, in Louis Althusser: Ideologie und ideologische Staatsapparate, Hamburg/Westberlin, pp. 89-107, 1977). The Manifesto demonstrates the element of class antagonism, of the conflicting interests between the two main
Capitalist Power, Nation-State and the World Economy
John Milios1
1. The theoretical actuality of the Manifesto
When dealing with the Communist Manifesto, one has to comprehend what makes this text preserve its hermeneutic and ideological power a whole 150 years after its first publication. The answer to this question is to be found in its revolutionary-scientific character, i.e. to the fact that it constitutes an analysis of the typical features of the capitalist mode of production, as it emerged from the history of class-struggles, and was consolidated into a system of class power and class exploitation with historically unique structural characteristics. This scientific character of the Manifesto, its ability to reveal the real character of a social order which presents itself as a regime of “freedom” and “human rights”, makes it also an ideological weapon in the hands of the working class, i.e. all those who are subjected to capitalist power and exploitation. And as Louis Altusser argued, "It is absolutely necessary for one to have adopted proletarian class positions, in order, very simply, to see and understand what is happening in a class society. It is based on the simple finding that (...) one cannot see everything from everywhere. One can discern the texture of this reality of conflict only if one adopts within the conflict itself, certain positions and not some other ones, because to passively adopt some other positions means that she/he has caught up in the logic of class illusions, which shall be named ruling ideology. Naturally this pre-condition opposes the entire positivist tradition -through which the bourgeois ideology interprets the practice of natural sciences" (Althusser: “Für Marx und Freud”, in Louis Althusser: Ideologie und ideologische Staatsapparate, Hamburg/Westberlin, pp. 89-107, 1977). The Manifesto demonstrates the element of class antagonism, of the conflicting interests between the two main