Reading theory*
*Latest fad
My Read Theory, Darn It! introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list, for anyone that wants it! Making some edits to it though.
“Yeah, I read the Communist Manifesto one time when I was a teenager. It sounded nice in theory, but b but muh human nature and all that.”
Some Marxist literature can be difficult to follow to be fair, especially as a lot of the classics are over 100 years old and translated from German or Russian.
I agree, though a lot of it is easier than you’d expect. I also made an intro ML reading list to help ease people into theory, and I’m far from the first to do so!
Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy is pretty easy, good bones, but Marx revises a lot of his views later, by Capital he’s abandoned concepts like “Lumpen Proletariat” and the idea that socialism can only be achieved after a capitalist developmental phase.
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific by Engels is one of the best intro Marxist works: comprehensive, practical, and easy to follow.
Wage Labor and Capital is another short and pretty digestible work by Marx that lays out a lot of the economic ideas without a deep dive such as Capital. But “economic Marxism” is kind of its own kind of confusion, and Capital shouldn’t be read to understand his economic ideas but his actual methods.
Marx wrote for the workers, not the academy, his works can be difficult but they make more sense as someone trying to learn more to understand about their lived experiences of exploitation, than an academic view that only wishes to compete in an intellectual marketplace, rather than empower the working class to liberate ourselves and each other.
But Marxism isn’t a book to be studied or a method to be applied. You can be a Marxist without ever picking up one of his works, I think there are a lot of “organic” Marxists who know through experience but doubt through shame and misinformation. Marx ultimately wanted to teach us to understand material conditions, but without the various distortions that have been introduced by bourgeois philosophers (some of them even considered themselves Marxists!)
Put yourself in touch with people who can get you involved in actual work in your city and community, doing real social work with the people who need supported. You’ll get an education from the work and take your time with the written works of Marx and Marxists to let it enrich your actual work, not define your idealistic beliefs.
After all, “The philosophers have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it.”
Marxism is the unity of theory with practice, practice without theory turns a blind eye to revolutionary experience and the knowledge gained through past struggle, while theory without practice leads to “Marxologists” that wish to critique society without changing it. There can be good comrades that ignore theory, but they will always stand to gain from reading theory and using it to guide their practice.
Do fully agree about getting organized, that’s arguably step 0.
I wouldn’t disparage people for anything that brings them to socialism though I def agree, but the question of how theory is practice gets neglected quite often. There’s a dialectical relationship between the two, Marxism is what gives us the capability of fully fusing theory with practice, subject with object, individual with the social. We can read theory and commit to practice and learn nothing, accomplish nothing, because we still have the insidious dualist mindset. Everything we learn gets categorized and atomized. We learn words and phrases to signal understanding to others, but understand very little. Feeling accepted is perhaps the first step for the stubborn individual to let go of individualism and embrace socialization, so its natural for new comrades to want to make themselves sound radical, and they should be accepted by cadre and celebrated for their achievements. But of course radical talk and radical action can be quite distinct, and experienced cadre should know how to tell the difference, and challenge comrades to continually improve and fix themselves. I’ve seen people able to be very inspiring and educated in speeches, but opportunistic reformists in practice. This must not be how comrades develop, this is not self actualization, it is bourgeois affect.
Theoretical study opens up many avenues to understand material conditions, through practical analysis, discussion and criticism. Then, once the actual conditions have been assessed we can take action – but based on material conditions and not theoretical abstractions. Taking action changes conditions, changing conditions requires more analysis and critique, which may require deeper understanding of theory in order to assess conditions accurately. Once assessed, we act, rinse, repeat. Evaluate and take action, reevaluate, and take another action.
I’ve seen too many comrades trying to apply the tactics of 1910s Russia to american struggles. They quote Lenin on a particular tactic or strategy, when Lenin was often changing tactics, and rhetoric, in order to most effectively address changing conditions. Too many comrades read Engel’s 3 rules of Dialectical Materialism and apply them like an orthodoxy, but have never closely studied Theses on Feuerbach nor unveiled the human spirit that thrives within Marx’s works.
So I’m not contradicting you, or I don’t mean to, but theory and practice is not necessarily our objective. Marx explicitly called for theory in practice, which means our theory must itself be practical. Theory helps us to see through the illusions, it must not be made into yet another illusion. But IMO therein is the most important benefit of surrounding ourselves with good cadre, they’ll call me out on my shit, and help me up when I stumble. Anyone who encourages us to be better, to be more practical, to center the human perspective in our work is following the same spirit as Marx, and it doesn’t matter what they’ve read if they’ve read anything at all.
But also, its no coincidence that good cadre Marxists are also exceedingly comradely, good natured, fair and fearless. The practice transforms us, so we can transform the world, together.
Sure, my point is that both theory and practice are necessary to be united, each sharpens the other, without the other they are dull or directionless.
Yes its definitely the major pitfall most comrades make. Fortunately, we also have the most comprehensive theory of change! Today, for example, a local leader in our city who we would only have described as a moderate socialist for many years, someone who once told me “i wouldnt read theory i read enough theory books in school” is pitching hard into Marxism, consuming large amounts of theory and history, and making radical demands for radical action. Very interested to see where he will be in like 6 months. Another comrade who once mocked my “ideological” views has become one of my closest cadre comrades. Honest good comrades learn from experience that we Marxists are consistent in our beliefs and fight the most important struggles, time after time, changing everything around us. The time we live in is so dangerous and frightening, and yet the movement is growing rapidly, and sloughing off opportunism and reformism for revolutionary principles. “Decades where nothing happen, weeks where decades happen,” hits pretty hard in this period of struggle.
Anyway thanks for letting me dump, I think I’m just eager to get back to an essay I began a couple days ago!
No worries! Good luck on your essay!
Read The Fucking Manifest
I personally like The Principles of Communism more for an intro piece, but the manifesto is always great!
Ah, I remember my 20’s.
Liberals and baseless condescension, name a better duo. Forget that the overwhelming majority of practicing Marxists are working adults, the stereotypical minority of Marxists as represented by well-meaning college students is somehow more relevant.
Not in my experience. Please, continue to tell me my reality.
Your anecdotal, presumably western experience doesn’t outweigh the fact that by far the largest number of practicing Marxists are working adults. The CPC alone has 96 million members, and the vast majority of Marxists overall are in the global south. Even then, in parties like PSL and FRSO, membership trends to working adults onwards. Genuinely, do you presume reality perfectly reflects the random chance that your individual myopic experience would imply, in all cases?
"Your anecdotal, presumably western experience "… I’m Russian. smh.
I said “presumably” because I figured it wasn’t a sure bet, not because I required it to be true for my point. Support for the Soviet Union is higher among older generations, while KPRF membership is surging even among younger people. Again, the CPC has 96 million members, and working class orgs tend to be filled with those that work! Who woulda thought?
Again, though, you just have this entirely unearned smugness, and no actual point to back it up other than personally knowing Marxists in their 20s. That isn’t a substitute for data and statistics, if you simply extrapolate your personal anecdotes for everything and refuse to believe hard data, then going through life must be a nightmare.
Everything you have said is presumptuous. It;s your signature temperature.
The only thing I presumed was that you were western, as you had a viewpoint very common to westerners. Everything else was based on reality. Or are you trying to say, for example, that the CPC doesn’t have 100.4 million members as of 2024?
Says you, having just told everyone that they’re in their twenties regardless of the actual reality of their age
Yep, just a bunch of guys in their 20s…
