Sociology by Upendra Gaur Sir

KARL MARX INTRODUCTION

Karl Marx is one of the most important and most controversial of the sociological thinkers, who has
been often misunderstood. The sociological importance of Marx lies in the fact that his ideas have
contributed to the development of a new approach for the study of social phenomenon. At the same
time, Marx himself was partly responsible for the controversy and misunderstanding that surrounds
his works. His writings were too voluminous, lacked precision and were not writes with the objective
of building a new science of society, rather they were dedicated to the revolutionary cause of
building a humane and just society. Only later day sociologists have discovered ideas of sociological
relevance in his writings and have presented them in a systematic manner. Given lack of precision in
the original works, there has been a scope for multiplicity of interpretations and even
misinterpretations. The ideas presented below are based upon recent interpretations which are
generally deemed as more balanced

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Karl Marx was born in 1818 in Trier, Germany. His parents were Jews who had converted in to
Protestantism to avoid discrimination and loss of civil rights and, in particular, to protect his father's
law practice Marx also began to study law. However, at the University of Berlin, he became
fascinated by the philosophy of Hegel, who interpreted the whole of history as the process by which
"spirit (and consequently humanity) progressed towards complete self-knowledge and a rational and
free society. Marx became a Young Hegelian, one of a group of young philosophers who questioned
many parts of the master's techniques while remaining beholden to his approach. Indeed, in later
years, Marx came to see his own writings as upending Hegel's, replacing Hegel's (incorrect) emphasis
on mind as the crucial determinant of history with his own (correct) materialist philosophy which
demonstrated that material factors determined events. He also became an anti-religious radical, and
after completing his thesis, he worked as a writer and publicist in Paris and Belgium. During this
period he wrote the Communist Manifesto, which sets out a programme for a revolutionary
government and outlines his theory of social structures and social change. When the revolution of
1848 broke out in Germany, he returned to edit a radical newspaper. After the revolution failed, he
went into exile again and settled in London, his home for the rest of his life.

During much for this period, Marx and his family were extremely poor, help from his friend, Friedrich
Engles, a socialist textile manufacturer, was vital. Nonetheless, his theories became increasingly
well-known and influential especially outside England. He was consulted more and more frequently
by Russian and German radicals and revolutionaries, and since his death, "communist parties have
developed all over the world. Their dogma is the analyses of Marx and Lenin, who led the first
communist revolution.

SOCIAL CONDITIONS

Marx grew up and matured in times of profound change and turmoil in Europe. Europe of that
period was above all else the product of two great historical transformations. First, the explosive
growth of modern factory and industry and the associated expansion of the world market and the
second, the French Revolution of 1759 followed by Napoleonic wars, which swept through all Europe
and effectively dealt the death-blow to absolute monarchies and the remnants of feudal power,
even if latter's death agony was somewhat prolonged in Germany, the Eastern Europe and Russia. To
the men and women of Europe who lived in 19th century, the world had undergone in two
generations a series of transformations, so profound, that it was almost impossible to grasp them.
Great cities, far surpassing anything in the past had sprung up, and were expanding at break-neck
speed. Watt's steam engine had made possible, location of factories in those centres. The increasing
stream of newly invented machines scattered in factory-towns, eliminated many thousands of
independent craftsmen and small workshops and disrupted the equilibrium between the agricultural
and handicrafts in the village and country towns.

At the same time, hundreds and thousands of small family farms were ruined by the enclosures of
the 18th century (to take advantage of the new improved agricultural techniques, landlords
concentrated production in large farms and for this purpose they took over the animals). The new
factory towns were therefore, soon flooded with destitute small farmers and their families. Here
was the mass of the cheap labour which the new factory owners needed. In cities, the individual and
women lived a life unlike that of any earlier historic period, the old community of the village, the
solidarity of the craft guild in the traditional towns, the old ties of the ownership group and the
extended family, had gone, and the individual was cast adrift into the mass His life and social
relations at work in the factory or in commerce-were separated off from his experience of home and
neighbourhood Traditional loyalties, mutual obligations and the solidarity of community and kin
were everywhere replaced by the isolation and individuality of the citizen. Thuss new industrial class
of wage earners with no attachments to the land and free to sell their labour for wages was coming
into existence everywhere, much more quickly in some countries than in others. At the same time,
the brilliance of the scientific and technical achievements stimulated a widespread optimism and
belief in unlimited progress among the middle classes, despite the mass poverty, starvation and
appalling conditions of life in the cities.

Believing that the age of reason, science and enlightenment had dawned, many thought that the
evils of the life under the new capitalist system were just temporary blemishes lifted from the old
picture which showed through the poetry, novels and writing of men like Baudelaire, Victor Hugo
and Thomas Carlyle. Marx was also a witness to this era. From his self-assumed position of a
marginal man, he wrote about the crushing out of individuality by the exploitation and operation of
the masses in the new factory system. The individualism of capitalist era, meant for a vast majority,
only isolation and alienation from their fellow men. At the same time, Marx himself being a product
of 19th century Europe shared the optimism that emergence of a just and humane "Communist
Society was inevitable. In fact, he even believed that such a society was round the corner.

HISTORICAL MATERIALISM

This was the term used by Plekhanov (Lenin's mentor) to refer to a set of assumptions, Marx made
about the nature of social reality and its development. These assumptions serve as Marx's basic
world view or perspective, and at the same time they constitute the methodology for analysing
social reality. With historical materialism, Marx tried to create a philosophical view point which
synthesised elements from two opposite views on the nature of reality, Hegelian idealism' and the
18th century Materialism'.
Idealism was an attempt to explain the nature of society in terms of the development of human
consciousness or ideas For Hegel, society was guided by, and had limits placed in its development by
the human spirit society being the outward projection of the spirit. Spirit develops in a dialectical
manner, each set of ideas producing their opposite ideas or anti-thesis, the conflict between the two
being resolved in the form of a synthesis, which in turn becomes the new thesis. Thus for Hegel, the
social reality is the result of an interaction between matter and consciousness in which primacy has
been given to consciousness Marx thought that such a view leaves some basic question unanswered.
Firstly, where does the spirit come from? And secondly, how could the claims made by Hegel be
substantiated? Thus it was pure meta-physical speculation that could not be scientifically
investigated.

So Marx, in his famous phrase, 'made Hegel stand on his feet’, by inverting his ideas. He assumed a
materialistic outlook whereby the material world is characterised by its own independent existence
and is not simply a result of human thinking. In fact, it existed even before there were humans to
think. However, having given primacy to matter, Marx differs from 18th century materialists in that,
they considered man as only the passive recipient, through the senses, of his material world. Marx
insisted that men and women do not confront the world just with their senses, automatically
reflecting it, as it were. Ruther, men have always been compelled to act on the world, in order to
live. Only by changing the world through their labour have men survived and developed. In order to
understand how human knowledge reflects the external world, we must start from the fact that
men are creators of the world they live in while at the same time being shaped by that world.
When Marx says that being determines consciousness, then what he meant was that man was not a
passive "being' but an active being involved in a constantly changing relationship with nature and
other social beings. Through this active relationship they make their own history, but under
conditions which are not of their choice. These conditions are the constraints placed by the external
material and social world. It is only due to this conception of man as interacting with the external
material world which he shaped and by which he gets shaped, that Marx's materialism is called
Historical Materialism.

Further, Marx borrowed from Hegel a dialectic view of nature and synthesised, it with his materialist
stand point. Instead of seeing the world only as a quantity of fixed things or objects, defined and
distinguished from one another by their external characteristics, dialectics views the world as a
series of mutually interconnected processes. All phenomena are in a process of changes, and such
change is rooted in what Marx called a unity and conflict of opposites. Each social formation (thesis)
develops its own anti-thesis, finally leading to a conflict between the two which is resolved with the
emergence of a new synthesis, having elements of both and which in turn becomes the new thesis.

Having viewed man as essentially a creative being who is distinguished from other species by his
capacity to produce socially, Marx finds the basis of society in the need for cooperation to carry out
production which is the most fundamental condition of human existence. Unless a society is able to
organise the production of its subsistence needs, there would be no society at all. Hence, according
to Marx, the way production is organised determines human existence in the last analysis.

Furthermore, Marx refers to the productive organisation of the society as the mode of production. It
consists of the forces of production, and the relations of production. The former consists of the
scientific and technical knowledge, machinery and raw materials, etc., while the latter includes the
social relations which people enter into, in order to carry out production. These social relations are
inevitable because production being essentially a social activity, can never be carried out in isolation.

For the purpose of understanding and explaining society and its development, Marx views it at made
up of two interconnected parts viz., "base and superstructure. Base consists of the total productive
organisation or the sphere of economic activity in its broadest sense. While superstructure includes
ideological elements of a society and other social institutions like political institutions, law, religion,
kinship, etc. Any analysis of society must begin with an analysis of the base because in the last
analysis superstructure is determined by the base. Here, the extent to which base has a
determining influence over superstructure, has been the subject of intense controversy. One set of
Marxists led by Engels, Lenin and later Althusser, etc. have taken determinist position whereby, base
is seen as the sole determining cause of the superstructure. But latter-day interpretations of
Marxism, taking into account some of the recently translated works of Marx like Grundrisse, have
taken a more balanced position. According to this view, Marx simply postulated a correspondence
between the superstructure and base or economic sub-structure. He never sought to establish a
causal connection between the two. Rather he postulated a mutual interdependence between the
superstructure and the sub-structure. According to him, human beings do shape the development
of their society but in this they do not have complete freedom, instead they are constrained by the
conditions of the sub-structure. Thus, the role of sub-structure is restrictive and not prescriptive.

Explaining change in society, Marx starts with an assumption about human nature, viz, Man is
constantly struggling for supremacy over nature and thus constantly tries to improve upon the
forces of production. Hence forces of production are inherently dynamic in nature. Society being
made up of inter-connected parts, a change in the forces of production necessitates a corresponding
change in the relations of production, sooner or later, lest the existing relations of production should
become a hindrance to further development in the forces of production. It is to be noted here that
there is no one to one correspondence between changes in the forces of production and those in the
relations of production. The forces of production may go on developing without producing a
corresponding change in the relations of production Only when the existing relations of production
become fetters to the further development in the forces of production, that the relations of
production and the superstructure have to be overhauled by cataclysmic change When, both forces
of production and relations of production have changed, the whole economic substructure is
transformed leading to corresponding transformation in the superstructure too. Changes in the
forces of production are gradual and evolutionary while those in the relations of production and
superstructure are intermittent and revolutionary because they come to be valued for their own
sake and tend to resist change.

Further, analysing historical developments in European society, according to the methodology of

historical materialism. Marx identified four stages, viz. (i) Primitive communism (ii) Ancient society
(iii) Feudal society and (iv) Capitalist society. Primitive communism represents the earliest stage
where forces of production were extremely simple and were commonly owned. Next stage was
represented by ancient Greece and Rome where the society was divided into masters, those who
owned the forces of production, and slaves, who were themselves owned by the masters Feudal
society was essentially an agrarian society consisting of land owning nobility and the landless serfs
who enjoyed the right to work in the lord's land. Finally, capitalist society emerged fully with the
growth of industrial mode of production and consisted of bourgeoisie who owned the forces of
production and the proletariat who contributed their labour. According to Marx, capitalist society
was inherently unstable and would eventually transform into a communist society. The foregoing
analysis of historical materialism can be summarised as follows, clearly highlighting the assumptions
which constitute Perspective and Methodology.

PERSPECTIVE
1) The world, including the social world, is better characterised by flux and change rather than by
stability or permanence of phenomena
2) In the social world, as in the world of nature, change is not random, but orderly that uniformities
and regularities can be observed and therefore, scientific findings can be made about them.
3) In the social world, the key to this pattern of change can be found in men's relationship in the
economic order Subsistence, the need to make a living, must be achieved in all societies How
subsistence is achieved affects crucially, the whole structure of any society.

4) Society can be viewed as an interrelated system of parts with the economy influencing the other
parts.

5) Men in a society are shaped in both attitude and behaviour by its social institutions Marx believed
that underlying all the different kinds of the social man' which are produced by different types of
societies-primitive, ancient, feudal, oriental and capitalist is a basic and essential human nature. For
Marx, man is essentially rational, intelligent and sensitive, but these qualities can be warped and
changed into their opposites if the social arrangements of a society are so badly designed as to allow
some men to pursue their own interest to the detriment of others. This creates conditions for the
conflicts between the deprived and their exploiters.

METHODOLOGY
1) Social reality being an external reality, with its own independent existence, is amenable to sense
perception and therefore methods of positive science can be employed. However, mere empiricism
is not adequate in knowing the essence of human behaviour therefore, empirical data have to
interpret from historical materialist standpoint.

2) Change is a characteristic feature of human society and it takes place in an ordered fashion Thus
laws governing change can be discovered.

3) Change in the relations of production and the superstructure is normally preceded by conflict
between groups having mutually opposed interests.

4) Conflict and changes in society must be explained in the light of the forces operating in the
economic structure.

5) Man's thinking and attitudes are shaped by the nature of society he lives in especially, by the way
he participates in the process of production, therefore it is very difficult to study one's society in a
detached and dispassionate manner as is required of science. Some men can, however succeed in
being objective. Marx considered himself to be such a man.

ILLUSTRATION
"Historical Materialist' approach of Marx is best illustrated in his own analysis of transition from
feudalism to capitalism Europe and the analysis of the nature of capitalist system. Some examples
can also be cited from Industry society as well as contemporary developments in other societies.
According to Marxian approach, all Institutions values, ideas and literature tends to serve the
interests of those who dominate the economic sub-structure. Thus we find in India, land owning
castes are generally considered upper castes and their life-style is admired. Religious doctrines like
Karma theory, tend to justify their superior position vis-a-vis the landless lower castes and have
helped in keeping these castes in perpetual subjugation. Similarly, the liberal ideology which
developed in Europe and America during 18th and 19th century, can be seen as a legitimisation of
the interests of the emergent bourgeoisie who had come to dominate the economic sub-structure.

Its defence of the right to property, which was legally sanctified, could help only the rich and gave no
succour to the property less workers. Similarly, principles of equality and liberty meant the rising
bourgeoisie would be treated by law on par with the landed aristocracy and that bourgeoisie would
enjoy unbridled freedom in the pursuit of their economic interests. Thus we find that superstructure
tends to suit interests of those who dominate the sub-structure.

In order to have greater efficiency and modernisation of the economy, the economic sub-structure
needs the liberalise and restructure, this in turn has created the needs for liberalisation and reform
of the political system. Similar situation is to be found in China where recent liberalisation of the
economic sub-structure along capitalist lines has generated a demand for political democracy a
characteristic of capitalist societies, as can be seen from the students led protest movements.

However, the above mentioned examples show only one side of the relationship between economic
substructure and the superstructure. They only support the orthodox Marxist view as to how the
sub-structure shapes the superstructure. But there is other side too viz., the superstructure can
change sub-structure. For example, the Russian revolution and subsequent industrialisation were
changes which were rooted in the superstructure. Similarly planned economic development in India
is a case of superstructure led change. Thus we see that the relationship between economic sub-
structure and superstructure in a two way relationship. According to latter-day interpretations, Marx
also viewed it in the same way as is evident from Grudrisse and from his disowning of those Marxists
who believed in pure economic determinism. However, Marx did over emphasise the importance of
the sub-structure but perhaps that was meant to draw attention towards the role of the economic
factors.

CLASS AND CLASS CONFLICT

The concept of class is one of the central concepts in Karl Marx's theory of social change. It has been
used as one of the basic tools for analysing inter-group dynamics and changes in society. However,
Marx never developed a systematic analysis of class. What, then, does Marx mean by the term
class? A survey of his works shows that he uses the term in two different ways-in sociological sense;
and in a descriptive sense.

In the sociological sense class is viewed as a group sharing same relations to the means of
production Viewed in this sense, all societies except the most primitive have had two main classes,
namely, that consisting of the owner of the means of production, and that consisting of non-owners.
These class divisions result as a consequence of the development of the institution of private
property. It is this view of class which was crucial to Marx's theory of social change. However, in
some of his writings, Marx has used the term class in a purely descriptive sense too. Here, it serves
simply as a classificatory device that is he classified people in society into various categories
according to some relevant criteria. Thus in Revolution and Counter Revolution in Germany. Marx
distinguishes 7 classes - the feudal landlords, the bourgeoisie, the petty bourgeoisie, the rich and
middle peasants, the poor peasants, the proletariat and the lumpen proletariat. And in The Class
Struggle in France he refers to the bourgeoisie, the peasants, the proletariat and the lumpen
proletariat. But, the second meaning of class is not important in Marx's scheme because Marx was
not interested merely in describing the stratification system of a society. Also, he never tried to
produce a theory of stratification. His major concern was in building a theory of social change.
Therefore, he examines society for those key groups which either appeared to have a strong interest
in maintaining the existing social system or which had a strong interest in trying to change it.

He found that the class that owns the means of production would have a vested interest in
preserving the existing social relations and institutions, so that it can perpetuate its dominance.
While, those who are deprived of the right of ownership of 'means of production or those who
represent the emerging means of production would be interested in transforming the existing social
relations. And it is the conflict between these two interests that will manifest itself as class conflict
and would act as the mid-wife of change. Thus it is the sociological meaning of class in Marx's
writings which is crucial for understanding the theory of class and class conflict.

Origin of social class: Social classes arise out of the relations of production, that is, the way, the
production is organised in society. This in turn depends upon the level of development of the means
of production. In "primitive communism', the means of production are communally owned, and
hence there are no class divisions because all members share same relations to the ‘means of
production’.

However, with the development of agriculture, surplus becomes available and the institution of
private property or private ownership of the means of production comes into existence. As a result
of this, some people come to own and control the means of production to the exclusion of others,
thus class divisions emerge hereafter, all stages of social development are characterised by a two-
fold class division. For example, there are masters and slaves' in "Ancient society", "feudal lords and
serfs in the feudal society. The relations between these two classes are antagonistic and exploitative.
The antagonism between these classes is not confined to their economic interest alone, but also
manifests itself in social and political relations, because according to Karl Marx, the class which
dominates the economic substructure by virtue of the ownership of the means of production also
dominates the political institutions and becomes the ruling class. Other social institutions too sub
serve the interest of this class and help in perpetuating its domination over the non-ownership class
with the continuous growth of the means of production the deprived class gradually acquired on
awareness of its class interest and resort's to political action to achieve those interests. Such an
active group was termed by Marx as class for itself (Class without the awareness of its interest was
termed "class in itself Thus overt conflict ensues between the deprived class which becomes
progressive and demands change, on the one hand and the dominant class which tends to be
reactionary and wants to preserve the existing social order, on the other. This conflict may often
become violent leading to profound changes in society. Thus, according to Marx, class conflict is the
primary vehicle for social change. This is evident from the opening sentence of the Manifesto of the
Communist Party:
"The history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of class struggles.

Marx applied this theory of social change to explain the transition from feudalism to capitalism in
Europe and also on the basis of this theory, he predicted the breakdown of capitalism and
emergence of the communist society. Following is the brief summary of his analysis: The feudal
system was fundamentally based on agriculture, Land was owned by the nobility while serf
contributed their labour The relationships between the serfs and their lords were hereditary and
non-contractual Gradually with the decline of feudal system and the growth of trade and commerce
in towns the wealthy bourgeoisie came into existence. These bourgeoisie were the forerunners of
the capitalist system. They attracted men from the countryside to work for them in producing goods
to be sold in widely expanding markets.

In this and other ways, they acted in opposition to the predominant feudal arrangement that
confined serfs to the areas of their birth. Finding themselves hampered with feudal laws, the
bourgeoisie endeavoured to change them and thus entered into a political struggle with the
aristocracy. They justified their actions by appealing to a new ideology according to which
aristocratic distinctions based on family connections and control, that restricted the movement of
men and trade, were in opposition to the natural order of individual freedom and equality. As the
new methods of production and the new modes of life that went with them were extended; a new
order of society was gradually formed within the old. New type of production and trade had been
adopted that could come to fruition only if the laws and customs that hampered them were
abolished. When, therefore, the bourgeoisie were strong enough, they took political action to
achieve this goal and gained political power by a series of revolutions.

The French revolution of 1789 is one such example. Thus bourgeoisie played the role of a
progressive class, but soon after capturing power through revolutions they themselves became the
ruling class and developed a vested interested in preserving the new society which emerged,
namely, the capitalist society, With the rise of capitalism a new class, namely, the proletariat came
into existence who sold their labour in return for wages to the capitalist employers. According to
Marx the antagonism between the interest of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat becomes
inevitable with the growth of the capitalism, because capitalist system is primarily geared
continuous generation of profits which is possible only through progressive exploitation of the
proletariat Capitalist system by its very nature is an exploitative system where the majority of
people, namely, the proletariat are exploited by a few capitalist. In their incessant drive for greater
and greater profits the capitalists tends to drive wages down to a minimum level- the bare level
required for a worker's existence. The conditions of the workers become even worse during times of
slumps which become more frequent and protracted as the capitalist system grows. Thus growth of
capitalism renders the workers into paupers and leads to polarisation of society into two hostile
camps. One consisting of a few monopoly capitalists and the other consisting of the exploited
proletariat. As part and parcel of the polarisation process, individuals within each of the two main
camps, the capitalist and the labourers, become more and more alike or homogenous in several
crucial respects.

The labourers become more homogeneous in terms of their new skills dictated by the rapidly
changing machinery in the factories. They also become homogenous in respect of their dependence
on the capitalist factories for work and subsistence. While, the development of monopoly capitalism
brings about greater homogenization in the capitalist class.
The increasing pauperisation, homogenisation and the consequent polarisation of capitalist society
may contribute to the development of class consciousness among the workers and they become the
new progressive class, who will find it necessary to wrest the control of the state form the capitalists
in order to bring capitalism to an end. The proletariat will be the only class and the class divisions
will come to an end. In the absence of class conflict, politics and the state will become redundant
and a social order will arise in which production will be carried out without coercion, for the good of
all. Such a society was termed by Marx as a "Communist society".

The above mentioned theory of class and class struggle propounded by Marx has generated an
intense debate. One of the sociologists who criticised the Marxian view of class was Max Weber.
Firstly, Weber views class, like Marx, in economic terms but he differs from Marx while rejecting the
idea that classes existed in all stages of social development except in primitive communism'. He
argues that classes developed in market economies only, in which individuals compete for economic
gain. He defines a class as a group of individuals who share a similar position in the market economy
and by virtue of this fact they receive similar economic rewards'. Thus in Weber's terminology the
present class situation of an individual is basically his market situation. Those who share a similar
class situation also share similar life chances. Further, Weber rejects the Marxian view that there
would be only two main classes in the capitalist society. According to Weber, there will be important
differences in the market situation of the property less group in societies. Thus based on the market
situation, Weber identifies the following four classes in the capitalist society.

1. Propertied upper class,

2 Property less white-collar workers.

3. Petty bourgeoisie and

4. Manual working class

Weber sees no evidence to support the Marxian idea of class polarisation. Although, he sees some
decline in the number of petty bourgeoisie - the smaller propertied owners due to competition from
large companies, he argues that they enter the white-collar class or skilled manual workers rather
than being depressed into the ranks of the unskilled manual workers. More importantly, Weber
argues that the white collar middle class expands rather than contracts as capitalism develops. He
maintains that capitalist enterprises and the modern nation-state require a national bureaucratic
administration which involves large numbers of administrators and clerical staff.

Thus Weber sees a diversification of classes and an expansion of the white-collar middle class rather
than class polarisation. Weber rejects the view, held by Marx and some Marxists, of the inevitability
of the proletarian revolution. He sees no reason why those sharing a similar class situation should
necessarily develop a common identity, recognise shared interests and take collective action to
further those interests. For example, Weber suggests that the individual manual worker who is
dissatisfied with his class situation may respond in a variety of ways. He may, grumble, work to rule,
sabotage industrial machinery, go on strike, or he may attempt to organise other members of his
class in an effort to over throw capitalism. Thus proletarian revolution is only one of the possibilities,
in fact a rare possibility. Increasing social mobility and rise of the welfare state in modern industrial
societies have dampened the revolutionary fervour of the industrial workers and therefore Weber's
views have been vindicated.

Finally, Weber rejects the Marxian view that political power necessarily derives from economic
power. And that the distribution of class inequalities corresponds to distribution power inequalities.
Similar views are echoed by C.W. Mills in his work "The Power Elite". Mills finds the Marxian idea
that "the ownership class would automatically become the ruling class" as rather simplistic, in fact in
modern industrial societies, power comes to be exercised by a small and cohesive group of elites,
rather than, the propertied class as a whole. Even Robert Dahl maintains that economic notables do
not necessarily become political notables and that wealth is only one of the resources needed for
acquiring political power, others being organisational and oratorical skills.

The underlying cause of revolutionary movements conflicts of the interests, principally between
social classes as argued by Marx. Taking the view from here, various writers have shown that many
other social elements like ethnic and religious difference, national sentiments may impinge on the
process. Crane Brinton has argued that revolutionary movements may develop only under special
circumstances like bitter class antagonisms, desertion of the ruling class by the intellectuals,
inefficiency and corrupt government machinery and a politically bankrupt ruling class.

Looking at the situation in industrially advanced countries one finds that although antagonism
remain, the situation is nowhere near what Marx predicted. Thus some of the sociologists have
attempted a substantial revision of Marx's theory to adapt it to advanced industrial societies. Ralf
Dahrendorf work is one of the most notable in this context. According to Dahrendorf Marxian theory
of class and class conflict was largely correct in the context of the 19th century capitalist society. But
todays's capitalism has undergone certain fundamental changes and hence Marxian theory needs to
be reviewed. Dahrendorf has termed the contemporary industrial societies as "post-capitalist
societies. One of the important features of the post-capitalist society is that the link between
ownership and control has been weakened. For example, the modern joint stock companies are
owned by a large number of shareholders who do not have a say in the day to day running of the
company while, the control has passed into the hands of the technically qualified managerial class
who do not necessarily own the organisations they work for. Dahrendorf calls this phenomenon as
the 'decomposition of capital. Second important feature of the post-capitalist society is that the
working class has become highly differentiated and has got divided into numerous categories like
skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled. Thirdly, the middle class consisting of people from diverse
occupations has come to occupy an important position. Dahrendorf calls this phenomenon as the
'decomposition of labour. Fourthly, increasing opportunities for social mobility and decline of social
and economic inequalities have rendered a revolutionary movement unthinkable. However,
Dahrendorf believes that the conflict of interest’s remains but conflict is largely centred on
authority. An example is the labour-management disputes.

Thus, class still remains an important conceptual tool to analyse conflict in modern industrial
societies, but, today class should mean any faction or group centred on common interest which
actively participates in the pursuit of that interest. However, due to increasing institutional
autonomy in modern industrial society. Conflicts tend to be insulated, i.e., conflict in one sphere
shall not necessarily lead to conflict in other spheres Hence, there is no possibility of a general
conflagration as envisaged by Marx.
Regarding the class situation, other sociologists also support the views of Weber and Dahrendorf.
Various studies have shown that in advanced industrial societies the middle class is increasingly
becoming more numerous with no change of polarisation. Some sociologists have pointed out a
trend towards "embourgeoisement" of workers in modern industrial societies. However Marxian
ideas still appear relevant for the analysis of Third World societies.

ALIENATION

Alienation is a socio-psychological condition which denotes a state of Estrangement of individuals

form themselves or from others. This concept gained currency in the writings of Hegel and was
developed by Feuerbach before Marx adopted it in his early writings. In his later writings, he showed
a preference for the term Exploitation instead of alienation.

According to Hegel, the world is a result of human creation but it acquires its objective existence
only as a result its alienation from the spirit and stands opposed to it. For Hegel, alienation was a
meta-physical concept. Marx transformed it in to a sociological one in his Economic and
Philosophical Manuscript (1844). Marx saw human estrangement as rooted in the nature of society
which destroys the essential human nature.

Man in the early stage of his development was alienated from nature because he finds himself
helpless before a hostile nature. In order to snatch his livelihood from nature man develops the
forces of production and the division of labour increases. This enables him to control nature and
overcome his alienation from nature. However, with increase of division of labour, alienations
transferred to the social sphere. In the capitalist society division of labour and the institution of
private property develop to their highest level and relations become contractual, consequently
alienation also reaches the highest level.

According to Marx, man is essentially a creative being who realises his essence and affirms himself in
labour or production a creative activity carried out in cooperation with others and by which the
external world is transformed. The process of production involves transformation of human creative
power into material objects or objectification of human creative power. This process of
objectification under the specific historical circumstances of capitalism, leads to alienation because
in capitalism the means of production are owned and controlled by a few capitalists while the
workers have no control.

Alienation manifests itself in four ways:

1) the worker is alienated from the product of his labour, since what he produces is appropriated by
the capitalist and the worker has not control over it.

2) The worker is alienated from the act of production because all decisions as to how production is
to be organised are taken by the capitalist. For the worker, labour ceases to offer an intrinsic
satisfaction and instead becomes only a means for survival. It becomes a compulsion forced from
without and is no more an end in itself. In fact, work becomes a commodity to be sold and its only
value to the worker is its saleability.

3) Man is distinguished form the animal by his creative ability to do labour but due to above
mentioned aspects of alienation, man loses his distinctly human quality and gets alienated from his
real human nature or his species-being Prevalence of religion and belief in God as an independent
power are the result of this self-estrangement of man. "The more man puts into God, the less he
retains of himself. The capitalist system. Stratifies man, destroys the human qualities and renders
man to a state worse than animal. No animal has to work for its survival at other's bidding while man
has to do that in a capitalist system.
4) Further, the worker in a capitalist system is also socially alienated, because social relations
became market relations in which each man is judged by his position in the market, rather than his
human qualities. Capital accumulation generates its own norms which reduces people to the level of
commodities. Workers become merely factors in the operation of capital and their activities are
dominated by the requirements of profitability rather than by their human needs.

Marx believed that men can be freed from his alienated existence only with the emergence of a
communist society wherein each man shall work to affirm himself rather than working for self-
destruction. Since Marx, 'alienation' has undergone a lot of change of meaning, though it has
become one of the important concepts in mainstream sociology, especially in the writings of the
American sociologists of 50's and 60's.

Max Weber disagreed with Marx regarding the factors leading to alienation, and believed that
alienation was an inevitable feature of modern industrial society irrespective of whether the means
of production are owned privately or collectively. For Weber the cause of alienation lies in the
rationalisation of social life and predominance of bureaucratic organisations in modern industrial
societies. The compulsive conformity to impersonal rules in bureaucratic organisations renders
people into mere cos'in giant machines and destroys their human qualities. The American
sociologists after World War II haver further changed the meaning of alienation to adapt it to
contemporary advanced industrial societies.

According to C.W. Mills, the growth of the tertiary (service) sector in modern industrial societies has
contributed to self-alienation among the white-collar (non-manual) workers. In these societies, skills
with things have been replaced by 'skills with persons' which the non-manual workers have to sell
like commodities. Mills calls this a personality market' since aspects of personality at work are false
and insincere. Mills gave the example of a girl Woking in a department store, smiling, concerned and
attentive to the whims of the customer. He states that the sales girl becomes self-alienated in the
course of her work, because her personality becomes the instrument of an alien purpose. At work
she is not herself.

Similarly, Herbert Marcuse, talking of work and leisure in advanced industrial societies, says than
both work and leisure alienate people from their true selves. Work is "stupefying' and 'exhausting
while leisure involves modes of relaxation which only soothe and prolong this stupefaction and it is
largely a pursuit of false needs.

Seaman has tried to define alienation in, a comprehensive way. He argues that alienation could be
decomposed into five separate elements; powerlessness, meaninglessness, normlessness, isolation
and self-estrangement. However, Seaman simply treats them as subjective dispositions which can be
measured with the help of attitude scales. Robert Blauner has further developed four of these
conditions and has related them with different type of technology. He has plotted and relation
between technology and alienation in the form of an inverted U-curve. According to him, level of
alienation is lowin craft industries like printing but it increased to a high level in assembly-line
industries of mass production like automobile industry, but in process industries with high degree of
automation, alienation tends to decline further because workers feel more involved and responsible.
However, as can be seen from the foregoing analysis the latter-day meaning of alienation has
undergone change, it is no longer based upon objective conditions rather it has come to be
identified with subjective dispositions.
AN ASSESSMENT
Karl Marx never saw himself in the role of a sociologist, his prime concern being to bring about s
revolutionary transformation in the then contemporary European society. Nevertheless, ideas of Karl
Marx have greatly contributed to the development of modern sociology. In fact, he is the founder of
the conflict tradition in modern sociology and his ideas have stimulated a lively debate which has
enriched and discipline.

His contribution can be briefly summarised as follows:

1) He contributed a new perspective and a new approach to the study of social phenomena. He
highlighted the role of economic factors in shaping various institutions of society. This has been
accepted as an academic methodology in social science.
2) His theory of class and class conflict, though no longer relevant to a present day society, has been
an immensely valuable contribution. It has stimulate further debate and research which enriched
sociology as a discipline. Ralf Dahrendorf bas modified the Marxian theory of class and class struggle
to make it applicable to contemporary industrial societies.

3) In Marx's ideas, one can also find a theory of social change. Although, Marx's predictions
regarding the future of capitalist societies have been largely disproved by the developments of
history in 20th century yet, Marx's theory of social change, if shorn of the prophetic elements,
remains a valuable contribution.
4) Marx's study of alienation is another important contribution of sociology. The concept of
alienation is another important contribution to sociology. The concept of alienation was further
developed by other sociologists like C.W. Mills and Herbert Macuse, etc. to adapt it to contemporary
societies.

5) Marxian ideas have influenced the thinking of many sociologists. Prominent among them being
C.W. Mills and the critical theorists of Frankfort School namely, Adomo, Habermas, and Marcuse.
The 'critical theorists have aimed to restore the philosophical dimensions of Marxism. They have
developed a series of concepts intended to go beyond Marx to interpret the changes that have taken
place in the world since his death. These consists mainly in adding the dimensions of social
psychology to Marx's work and emphasising the basic proposition that, if society is increasingly
under the artificial control of technocrats, any purely empirical approach to social reality must end
up as a defence of that control In Eros and Civilization. Marcuse attempted a synthesis of Freud and
Marx But it was One Dimensional Man which made Marcuse famous, particularly when some of its
ideas seemed to offer an interpretation of the student revolts of the late 1960's. Marcuse's
pessimism about the revolutionary potential of a proletariat dominated (along with the rest of
society) by an all-pervasive technocratic ideology led him to place his faith in the substratum of the
outcast and the outsiders, the exploited and persecuted minorities such as students and blacks
which would involve a meeting of the most advanced consciousness of humanity and its most
exploited force.