On the other hand, it would be correct tosay that families, [and] whole tribes exist which only just possess[but] do not have property.
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24 Matching Annotations
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www.cambridge.org www.cambridge.org
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www.cambridge.org www.cambridge.org
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common plan
russia 5 year plan and china
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Communism deprives no one of the power to appropriate prod-ucts in society; it merely removes the power to subjugate the labourof others through this appropriation.
“Communism deprives no one of the power to appropriate products in society” → Under communism, people can still use and enjoy things — you still get to “appropriate” (take for yourself) the things you need or want: food, clothes, a home, etc.
It doesn’t mean everyone loses personal possessions. You still get the products of society — you just don’t own them at the expense of others., cant' exploit other peoples' work to get rich
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wage-labou
Wage labour means working for someone else in exchange for a wage (money) — instead of directly producing things you own yourself.
So, under capitalism:
You don’t own the factory, tools, or land you work with.
You sell your labour power (your ability to work) to someone who does own them — the capitalist.
In return, you get a wage (enough to live on, ideally), but the value you produce is usually greater than your wage.
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Local file Local file
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Finally we get the following results from the conception of historypresented here: (i) In the development of the productive forces astage arises in which productive forces and means of interaction arecalled forth which, in the existing conditions, cause only harm, i.e.are no longer forces of production but rather forces of destruction(machinery and money). Another consequence, connected with this,is the emergence of a class that must bear all the burdens of societywithout enjoying its benefits; a class which is forced out of societyand into the most resolute opposition to all the other classes; a classwhich comprises the majority of all members of society and fromwhich emanates the consciousness of the necessity of a thoroughrevolution, communist consciousness, a consciousness which natur-ally can also form among the other classes able to appreciate theposition of this class
Development of productive forces: As society progresses, the tools, machinery, and ways of producing things (productive forces) improve.
Problem stage: Eventually, there comes a point where these productive forces—like advanced machinery or money systems—stop helping most people. Instead of being useful, they start causing harm. In other words, what used to help society produce wealth now can be destructive.
Emergence of an oppressed class: At this stage, a large group of people ends up bearing all the hard work and suffering, but they don’t enjoy the benefits of society. This group is pushed out of power and comfort and becomes opposed to the other, more privileged classes.
Revolutionary consciousness: This oppressed majority realizes that society is unfair and that the only solution is a big change—a revolution. They develop a “communist consciousness,” meaning they understand the need to transform society for everyone’s benefit. Some members of other classes might also come to understand this situation and support the cause.
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without however delud-ing themselves that it was the plan or the destiny of previous genera-tions to furnish material to them,
accept old generations didn't plan capitlaidsm to allow for future plansd eg, of communism
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upersession ofthe family
By this, Marx means that the traditional economic functions of the family—like producing goods, passing down property, and sustaining the household—become less central or obsolete.
Families no longer control production; capital and labor markets dominate.
Social reproduction (raising children, caring for the elderly) may still exist, but the economic basis of family power is reduced.
Essentially, the family is “superseded” as the primary unit of economic life.
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No. 2. Order must be brought to this dominance of thought, amystical connection demonstrated among the dominant thoughts thatfollow upon one another, which is accomplished by construing themas 'self-determinations of the Concept'. (This is possible becausethese thoughts are actually connected by the medium of their empir-ical foundation <and because understood as pure thoughts theybecome self-differentiations, differentiations effected by thinking
ideas don't just develop by themselves, they must be created and molded by societal and economic conditions
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Once the dominant ideas are separated from the dominant indi-viduals <and above all from the social conditions that issue from agiven level of the mode of production, > and thus once the notionarises that in history it is always ideas that dominate, it is very easyto abstract from these various thoughts * the Thought', <the Idea,>etc. as what is dominant in history, and to conceive all of these variousthoughts and concepts as 'self determinations' of the Concept whichis developing itself in history. <It is natural then that all humanrelations can be derived from the concept of man, man representedin thought, the essence of man, Man.>
- What Marx is criticizing
Marx is talking about a mistake in how people understand history:
Some thinkers separate dominant ideas from the people and social conditions that created them.
In other words, they treat ideas as if they exist independently, not as a product of society and its material conditions.
- What happens when you do that
People start to believe that history is driven by ideas themselves, rather than by the economic and social realities behind them.
Philosophers like Hegel did this: they treated ideas as if they were self-developing forces shaping history.
- Consequence of this way of thinking
If you focus only on “thought” or “the Idea,” you can end up thinking that all human relations and society come from ideas — like “Man” or “the essence of Man” — rather than from material conditions like class, work, or property.
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Because it does not explain praxis on the basis ofthe Idea but rather the formation of ideas on the basis of materialpraxis,
not practice on idea, but idea on practice (more 'real')
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This 'estrangement, to use a term understandable to the philo-sophers, can naturally be superseded only under two practical presup-positions. In order that it become an 'intolerable' force, i.e. a forceagainst which revolution is undertaken, it is necessary, on one hand,that it has created a mass of men entirely without property and atthe same time in contradiction to them an existing world of wealthand culture, which presupposes an enormous increase in the product-ive force, a high level of its development. On the other hand thisdevelopment of productive forces (together with which is given aworld-historical, instead of merely local, empirical existence of man)is therefore also an absolutely necessary practical presupposition,because without it scarcity would just become general, the need-drivenstruggle over necessities would recommence, and all the old crapwould inevitably return
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Estrangement (alienation) — people become alienated from their work, from what they produce, and from each other under capitalism.
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To get rid of this alienation (through revolution), two conditions must exist:
First condition:
There has to be:
a large group of people who own nothing (the working class, the “proletariat”),
and, in contrast, a world where wealth and culture are concentrated in the hands of a few.
This situation only appears when society’s productive power (technology, industry, organization of labor, etc.) has become very advanced — capitalism has created huge wealth but distributed it very unevenly.
The development of productive forces (technology, industry, science) must reach such a high level that there’s enough to go around for everyone.
If that’s not the case — if we try to have a revolution before society can produce enough for all — then:
everyone would still be struggling over scarce goods,
people would fight for survival again (“the need-driven struggle over necessities”),
and all the “old crap” (poverty, inequality, exploitation) would come back.
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that enjoyment andlabour, that production and consumption are distributed to differentindividuals.
can't enjoy labour under capitalist system
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productive force'
Productive forces: enables people to control their surroundings, including for instance technology and aspects of science
means and methods to produce goods and services
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The production of one's own life through labour
create objects necessary for being - first stage of history
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determinate
real
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www-cambridge-org.ezp.lib.cam.ac.uk www-cambridge-org.ezp.lib.cam.ac.uk
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Secondly, in labour it is the particular characteristic of my individual-ity that is affirmed, because it is my individual life that is affirmed.Labour here, therefore, would be true, active prope
- “In labour it is the particular characteristic of my individuality that is affirmed”
Normally, under capitalism, your work doesn’t reflect who you really are — it’s just a task to earn money.
But in true human labour, your work expresses your unique skills, talents, and personality — your individuality.
So, when you work freely and creatively, you are affirming yourself as a unique person.
- “Because it is my individual life that is affirmed”
Labour becomes meaningful because it reflects your life and your choices.
Your work is no longer just a job you must do to survive; it expresses who you are.
Think of it like painting a picture, writing a story, or making something with your own ideas — your work is a piece of yourself.
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produced as men
freely (creative expression)
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doubly affirme
strenghten yourself and other person
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The object is therefore something negative, something that cancelsitself out, a nullity. This nullity of the object has not only a negativebut a positive meaning for consciousness, for this nullity of the objectis precisely the self-confirmation of what is non-objective, theabstraction, consciousness itself. The nullity of the object has thepositive meaning for consciousness itself that it knows this nullity, theobjective being, to be its self-alienation, knows it to be the result ofits self-alienation alone [. .. ] The manner of being of consciousness,and of anything that is for consciousness, is knowing. Knowing isits only act. Something comes to be for consciousness insofar asconsciousness knows this something. Knowing is its only objective rela-tionship. - It now knows the nothingness of the object, i.e. the non-existence of the distinction between the object and itself, the non-being of the object for it, because it knows the object to be its ownself alienation, knows itself, knowing as object, because the object ismerely the semblance of an object, a self-imposed illusion whose beingis nothing other than knowing itself which has confronted itself withitself, and hence with a nullity, with something having no objectivityoutside of knowing; or knowing knows that in relating itself to anobject, it is only outside itself, alienates itself, that it itself appears toitself as object, or that what appears to it as object is only itself.On the other hand, says Hegel, another moment is also presenthere, namely that consciousness has in equal measure supersededthis alienation and objectivity and taken it back into itself, and so isat home in its other-being as such
The object is “nothing” outside consciousness.
Hegel says that objects, as we experience them, are really just reflections of our own consciousness.
They have no independent reality apart from how we know them. In that sense, they are “null” or “nothing” on their own.
This “nothingness” is actually meaningful.
Even though objects are “null,” this nullity helps consciousness understand itself.
By recognizing that the object is just a reflection of itself, consciousness confirms its own nature. So the object’s nullity has a positive role: it’s a mirror for self-awareness.
Consciousness only exists in knowing.
For Hegel, consciousness is defined by knowing.
Something exists “for consciousness” only if consciousness knows it. That’s why the object’s reality is tied to our awareness of it.
Objects are really “self-alienation.”
When we encounter an object, it seems separate from us. But Hegel says this separateness is illusory.
The object is just consciousness seeing itself as “other,” so in relating to the object, consciousness is interacting with itself in disguise.
Consciousness overcomes this alienation.
Finally, consciousness realizes that the object is only a reflection of itself.
It can “take back” this alienation—seeing that what appeared to be external is actually part of itself.
In this way, consciousness becomes “at home” with the object and with itself.
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Because
COME BACK TO THIS PARA
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Just as the being, the object appears to be a being of thought, sothe subject is always consciousness or self-consciousness', or rather theobject appears only in the form of abstract consciousness, and manonly in the form of self-consciousness, and hence the different formsof estrangement that come into view are merely different forms ofconsciousness and self-consciousness.
Marx is saying that in Hegel’s philosophy, everything real — people, things, the world — is treated only as ideas in the mind. The result is that human life and alienation appear only as mental or spiritual problems (forms of consciousness), instead of real, material conditions that people actually live through.
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Phenomenology
Phenomenology is a philosophical approach focused on the study of subjective, conscious experience and how the world appears to us.
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s negation of nega-tion,
What’s the “negation”?
In Marx’s dialectical way of thinking (influenced by Hegel), a negation means the denial or destruction of something.
Under capitalism, human life is “negated.”
People are alienated from their work, from each other, and from themselves.
Human potential and creativity are suppressed — so capitalism is a negation of true human life.
- What’s the “negation of negation”?
If capitalism is the first negation (it destroys real human freedom), then communism is the negation of that negation — it overcomes alienation and restores humanity.
So communism is not just tearing down capitalism — it’s affirming real human life again, by freeing people from alienation
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My universal consciousness is just the theoretical form of that totalitywhose living form is the real community, the social being - althoughat present, universal consciousness is abstracted from actual life andas such confronts it with hostility. That is why the activity of myuniversal consciousness, as the kind of activity it is, is also my theoret-ical existence as a social bein
✅ In short: Your understanding of society is a mental reflection of real social life; even if abstract, it is part of being socially human.
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