Has anyone in history made some valid criticism against Marxist ideology? And I’m not talking about the CIA propaganda no iPhone vuvuzela shit. But like, someone must’ve made some good point somewhere along the line?
I don’t want this to be a bash marxism thread. Just curious. Debates with people usually tend to incorporate the usual stuff that can be debunked easily.
Disclaimer: I haven’t read the book (yet), only going by what I’ve seen comrades here speak of it
I think I recall seeing a comrade say that Caliban and the Witch criticizes Marx for glossing over reproductive labor and it’s social relations. With that said, while criticizing Marxism, the author by no means rejects Marxism, and even develops it. The work, as I understand, is supposed to be a really good example of historical materialism.
I urge any comrades that have actually read it to correct anything I may have gotten wrong.
I’ve read the book, and you’re correct. I’m not sure where people got the assumption that Federici is out to disprove Marxism, because that isn’t the case. She’s more out to illuminate one of the areas ignored / glossed over by Marx and Marxist historians, and in doing so, she helps develop and apply Marxism to women’s historical oppression.
edit: btw, here’s a link to Dessaline’s recording of that as an audiobook.
Yeah, she is an anarchist but she pretty much does a Marxist analysis of the whole situation, and she never disproves anything. Basically what Marx/Engels didn’t have into account was the role played by women in the accumulation of capital as reproducers of the work force that allowed the bourgeoisie to produce the series of revolution they committed. Basically the witch hunt was a process of enclosure of the womb similar to the one that occurred with other common goods where monogamy, birth control prohibitions, illegalization of sodomy, etc, that gave place for a stable and fast development of the work force in a Europe deeply weakened after the black plague, which then later also expanded thanks to the slave trade of African and American people.