Marx and the Middle Classes Pt.1

“The internal enemy” of the proletarian Russian Revolution is constituted first and foremost by the lower middle classes. The expropriation of the expropriators being carried out at present does not represent the most serious obstacle in the path of proletarian dictatorship. In the path of the expropriation of capital the obstacles are of a purely objective nature. The small group of large capitalists has not the masses on its side, and therefore speedily becomes powerless in face of the armed proletariat. The lower middle classes of society, on the other hand, represent a considerable section of the population, especially in Russia — to say nothing of the propertied section of the peasantry. To reckon with the wishes of these lower middle classes would mean the halting half-way of the work of the Revolution: it would mean an end of the aspirations towards the destruction of capitalism.

Exactly because the lower middle-class mass is numerically large, it has retained an influence over the working-class movement. But every concession to this influence represents a departure from the Marxian standpoint, because it was precisely Marx who freed Socialism from lower middle-class adulterations.

The behaviour of the middle-class Socialist parties during the opening encounters and the final decisive struggle of the proletarian revolution doubly imposes on us the duty of recalling, on the occasion of the centenary of the birth of our first teacher, what his views were on the subject of the lower middle classes. And, though the representatives of various shades of lower middle-class Socialism are constantly referring to Marx, in reality there is no greater sacrilege than this.

I

After the revolution alike in Marx’s philosophical world-concept and in his views on the material conditions of social production, he shook himself free of the last vestiges of Liberalism.

“The Poverty of Philosophy,” from the economic aspect, and “The Communist Manifesto,” from the political aspect herald the final liberation of Socialism from the last lower middle-class swaddling clothes.

The founders of scientific Socialism had not had as yet the experience of a revolution, but by the path of theoretical analysis they had even then succeeded in establishing the fact that, in the progress of the revolutionary movement, the dower middle-class can display itself only as a reactionary and Utopian factor.

This lower middle-class — as “The Communist Manifesto” proclaims — “stands half-way between the proletariat and the capitalist class. Being a necessary complement of capitalist society, this class is constantly being reborn.” Composed of extremely mixed elements of the pre-capitalist epoch — the so-called “toiling intelligentsia,” the lackeys of the capitalist class — this class was to be found, in France, in Switzerland, and to a certain extent in Germany, at the advanced posts of the revolution of 1848. According to “The Communist Manifesto,“ the Communists were to support the various party groupings of these elements, while the latter were in opposition, understanding clearly, however, that if the representatives of the lower middle-class were really revolutionary in sentiment, it was only when faced with their immediate descent into the ranks of the proletariat.

These hopes of the lower middle-class, little sanguine though they were, nevertheless were completely shattered. The revolution of 1848 clearly revealed the political bankruptcy of the revolutionary section of the bourgeoisie. That revolution laid bare not only their weakness, but also how dangerous they were to the work of the revolution. During the French revolution of that year, the proletariat was crushed, not by the capitalists, but by this very lower middle-class. “The small shopkeeper,” wrote Marx in “The Class Struggle in France,” “rose up and moved against the barricades, in order to restore the movement from the street into his shop. And when the barricades had been destroyed, when the workmen had been defeated, when the shopkeepers, drunk with victory, turned back to their shops, they found their entry barred by the saviours of property, the official agents of financial capital, who met them with stern demands: ‘The bills have become overdue! Pay up, gentlemen! Pay for your premises, pay four your goods.’ The poor little shop was ruined, the poor shopkeeper was undone!”

The lower middle-class is not fit to wield power, and a long government by it is unthinkable. This, first and foremost, for economic reasons: the small shopkeeper is the debtor of the great capitalist, and must remain in dependence on him as long as there exists the system of credit — which cannot be destroyed while the domination of private property continues.

The Imperialist era of capitalist production has fully justified this view of Marx’s. If the democratisation of capital by means of joint stock companies — the wild dream of the distorters of Marxism — were an economic possibility, even then the majority of the lower middle-class shareholders would be powerless to govern society.

The roots of the dilemma created by Imperialism are to be found in the economic relations on which Imperialism is based. There are only two classes capable of governing: the class of great capitalists, and the proletariat.

Every compromise with the upper bourgeoisie is treachery to the proletarian revolution. Every compromise with the lower middle-class after the victory of the revolution would mean the restoration of the supremacy of the upper bourgeoisie — the restoration of capitalist rule.

The experience of the revolution of 1848 completely confirmed Marx in his conviction that the revolution can blazon on its banner these watchwords only: the complete overthrow of all sections of the capitalist class, and the dictatorship of the proletariat.