SİYASAL DÜŞÜNCE

Marx believed that humans express their creativity, develop their humanity, and fulfill themselves through work. Work, in other words, is a form of self-creation. However, work under capitalism causes alienation. Alienation is the process through which the workers become foreign to their labor, species, and themselves. workers became a part, a gear of the machine they operate.

The three aspects of alienation can be summarized as followings (Cuff et al, 2013, p. 24-6; Baradat, 1991, p. 157-8; Swingewood, 1998, p. 86-97):

In his surplus value theory, Marx adopts Ricardo’s iron law of wages. Ricardo asserted that the fundamental motivation of capitalists is to make profit and accumulate capital. Therefore, they would pay wages just enough for the survival of the workers, because this wage is enough for the workers to come back to work the next day. The function of this subsistence wage is to prevent workers from accumulating enough capital to gain independence from the production process. Marx considers that capitalism enslaves workers because they have to work in order to survive, and the means of productions are owned by a small group of capitalists. In short, workers are wage slaves in capitalism, and “their masters pay them only the most meager wages” (Baradat, 1991, p. 159). Under Ricardo’s iron law of wages, the workers’ intrinsic value is the money just enough to feed themselves and their families. However, workers are forced to produce value which is greater than their intrinsic value. The value that workers produce above their wages, which is at the survival level, is called surplus value that is appropriated by capitalists as their profit.

As also understood form the information given, all of the statements related to the surplus value in the options are correct, so the correct answer is E. For instance, if a worker has to work five hours to produce the supplies for the survival of him/herself and his/her family, and s/he is forced to work 12 hours, yet paid only subsistence wage, it means that the capitalist seize seven hours of surplus value. Marx asserts that any profit that the capitalists make from the labor of their workers is exploitative, because the surplus value can be produced only by the worker and it belongs to the laborer. Marx did not condemn profit itself, but he argued that the profit should not become a private property of capitalists. He thought that capital, which was produced by all, should be owned by all. In other word, private citizens should not be allowed to monopolize the means of production and seize the surplus value. In capitalism, however, capitalist is “a villain, a parasite who lives by sucking the economic lifeblood of the proletariat, and must be erased from society” (Baradat, 1991, p. 160).

Dialectical materialism is the scientific foundation of Marx’s theory. The roots of dialectical materialism lie in the dialectic method of Hegel, who developed a theory of history focusing on change. According to Hegel, the world moves toward a goal, which is predetermined by God. He called this goal as “idea” and believed that people could not understand, change or escape from it. The history for Hegel is the process of change brought on by a struggle that only ends when the idea is fulfilled. Until then, the existing state of affairs, or any “thesis” is to be challenged by a new idea that is known as the “antithesis” in his perspective. Then, a conflict occurs between the thesis and antithesis, which is called the “dialectic process”, and results in a “synthesis” that consists of all the good parts of both. The synthesis then becomes a new thesis, and the dialectic process continues as such. In short, history for Hegel was unavoidably progressive, today’s reality would become a part of a better tomorrow, and each new era would exceed and improve the former one. Marx accepted and adopted the dialectic as the essential logic of history. But, he did not accept the metaphysical assumptions of Hegel. Like Hegel, Marx also considered the dialectic as a means of accomplishing historical progress through struggle; yet he changed it since, for Marx, it was materialism which inspired the dialectic, not spiritualism. Marx claimed that the dialectic was a conflict among worldly interests, and ideas were the results of such conflict (Baradat, 1991, p. 152-4). According to Marx, class differences caused conflict among human beings. What ended a historical era and caused the rise of a new era so far has been the struggle between opposing social classes. Humans have passed through four historical stages, all of which had particular economic (the foundation) and political (superstructure) systems. These stages are the primitive communism, slavery (empire), feudalism and capitalism. The antithesis of every stage emerged within that stage itself. For example, private property emerged in the era of primitive communism and created social classes.

As also understood from the information given, all of the statements related to dialectical materialism in the options are correct, so the correct answer is E.

According to Marx, there are two basic parts in every society, these are the substructure and the superstructure. The economic system is the foundation of the society. In other words, it is the substructure, or material base. The substructure is divided into two factors, the means of production and the relations of production. The means of production are the resources and technology that a society makes use of. Means of production include tools, machinery, factories, materials and land; and together with labor power, they constitute productive forces. The relations of production between social classes are determined by the affiliation between humans and the means of production. The ruling class in every society consists of people who own the property of the means of production. Therefore, in a pastoral animal breeding society, the owners of the most of the livestock is ruling class. In an agricultural society, the ruling class consist of people who own most of the land and agricultural implements such as the ploughs. In industrial society, the capitalist class, namely those who own the factories and productive machines, rule the society. The superstructure of the society is composed of all of the non-material institutions in the society such as religion, government, law, education, art, values, ideology and so forth. It is determined by the foundation of the society; and every institution it includes is arranged to suit the ruling class. In every society, the social institutions in the superstructure justify the economic system as well as the power inequality in society through values and norms. Institutions, such as laws, ideologies, education and religion, create and maintain sympathetic, positive attitudes towards the economic and the political system. In addition, in political regimes such as representative democracy, there is an illusion that masses have control over the governments. However, the governments are in fact led by the leading capitalists. Hence, the superstructure ensures the domination of the ruling class.

As also understood from the information given, the statements related to the substructure and the superstructure in the options II, III, IV and V are correct, so the correct answer is E. The statement in the option I is not correct because of the fact that the economic system is the foundation of the society. In other words, it is the substructure, or material base, not the superstructure.

Marx’s thoughts on social classes in general include the following notions (Haralambos and Holborn, 1995, p. 33):

As also understood from the information given, Marx’s thoughts on social classes in general include all of the notions in the options, so the correct answer is E.

Although there is a middle class, Marx considers that capitalism tends to condense the capital in the hands of fewer capitalists, to push the middle class towards being proletariat and transform every kind of labor into paid labor. This process is called the polarization of the classes. There are mainly three steps in this process:

Through these three ways, the social classes would gather at two sides; and two main classes would remain. This means that capitalism itself creates the masses that would overthrow it.

As also understood from the information given, the correct answer is E. The statements in the options I, II, III and IV are related to the polarization of the classes according to the political theory of Marx. The statement in the option V is related to the three antecedents or preconditions for the revolution in relation to economic factors, social factors and the creation of class-consciousness for the proletariat.

Anarchy is typically defined as a society without state. Anarchism aims to eliminate the state and liberate people from political domination and economic exploitation. The roots of anarchism can be found in the thoughts of Taoists in ancient China, Greek philosophers, rioters in Middle Age Europe, and the leftists in the English Revolution. But it has become a clear ideology only after the collapse of feudalism. As an ideology “which combined the Renaissance’s growing sense of individualism with the Enlightenment’s belief in social progress”, anarchism emerged at the end of the 18th century (Marshall, 2008, p. 4). Roots of Anarchism as a term lie in the Greek word arché, which means ruling power. An-arche (anarchy) is being without a ruling power, ruler or chief. As also understood from the information given, all of the statements related to anarchism in the options are correct, so the correct answer is E.

Keeping in mind that anarchism is not a homogeneous ideology, there are some notions that Anarchism and Marxism share in common. These are:

As also understood from the information given, all of the statements in the options related to the notions that Anarchism and Marxism share in common are correct, so the correct answer is E.

Pacifist anarchists have a lot of differences among themselves, but they share an important notion of pacifism. All of the pacifist anarchists believe that the use of violence is not a viable way for social change, violence and war are unjustifiable, indefensible and all changes should be made with peaceful means. However, they have different ideas about what these ways should be.

The main difference between the social anarchists and the individualist anarchists is related to individual freedom. Social anarchists aspire for the elimination of the government because they were in belief that government limits the freedom of the people. They are not interested in the freedom of the individual in particular. This is because, according to them, individuals are interrelated and are responsible to each other to some degree. On the other hand, individualist anarchists reject any kind of obligation upon the individual, including this kind of a responsibility as a group norm. Indeed, they do not attain much value to the relationships of individuals with each other.

As also understood from the information given, all of the statements in the options related to the prominent anarchists in the 19th century are correct, so the correct answer is E.

Marx believed that humans express their creativity, develop their humanity, and fulfill themselves through work. However, working conditions in the 19^th century were very difficult for the workers but they had to work to earn their living.

All of the causes and the result alienations are accurate.

They all reflect Marx’s view on surplus value.

For Marx, it was materialism which inspired the dialectic, not spiritualism.

The substructure and the superstructure are the two basic parts of societies. The substructure is the economic system and the material base of a society. The two components of the substructure are the means of production and the relations of production. The means of production are the resources and technology that a society makes use of. The superstructure of the society is composed of all of the non-material institutions in the society (for example religion, government, law, education, art, values and ideology). In every society, the social institutions in the superstructure justify the economic system (the substructure) through values and norms.

In the state of capitalist societies, capitalists do not rule the government themselves, the state and government protect the interests of the capitalists and the capitalist system.

All are part of middle class except those who do not own the means of production and sell their labor to capitalists as they are part of the working class

In popular culture, anarchy is superficially understood as chaos, disorder, the collapse of order, confusion due to lack of state, or violent disorder. However, these are not the aims of anarchists.

Both Marxism and anarchism support the views presented in (b) through (e). The difference between the two views is given in (a). According to Marxism, political organization and political leadership are necessary for working class. However, according to anarchists, political leadership is also a source of oppression such as state itself.

Only (a) correctly reflects Proudhon’s view. In the other choices, the names and the views do not match.