Law and Marxism 800 years since Magna Carta

Marxist Theory · 1890-10-27

Core Argument¶

The article argues that Magna Carta was not a foundational document of liberty, but a reflection of the material balance of forces between competing factions of the feudal ruling class in thirteenth-century England. Its central thesis is that law — including the Charter — is not an expression of abstract justice or moral progress, but a crystallisation of class relations and intra-ruling class tensions. The Charter's real significance lies in being an early example of the ruling class using formal legal rights to stabilise its own internal contradictions, while simultaneously reinforcing the subordination of the peasantry. The article further contends that the abstract form of law, once established, develops a partial internal logic that can sometimes be turned against its creators, but only within limits set by the underlying class structure.

Theoretical Grounding¶

The analysis is rooted in the classical Marxist theory of the state and law, drawing directly on Marx and Engels's formulation in The German Ideology that "the ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relations." It applies historical materialism to a specific legal document, treating the Charter not as a text with autonomous meaning but as a superstructural expression of the economic base — specifically the contradictions within English feudalism after the Norman Conquest.

The article also deploys Engels's letter to Conrad Schmidt (1890) on the relative autonomy of law, which explains how legal forms, once established, develop according to their own internal logic while remaining ultimately constrained by economic conditions. This allows the author to account for the Charter's unintended consequences — such as extending certain protections to free peasants — without falling into legal idealism.

Lenin's State and Revolution provides the framework for understanding bourgeois democracy as the "best possible political shell for capitalism," with Magna Carta presented as an early, undeveloped precursor to this shell. The analysis sits firmly within the Marxist tradition that treats law as an instrument of class rule, while acknowledging its complex, mediated relationship to economic forces — a position associated with Evgeny Pashukanis and the Soviet legal theorists, though the article does not cite them directly.

Conjunctural Relevance¶

The article was published in 2015, the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, at a moment when the British ruling class was engaged in extensive myth-making around the Charter. The Magna Carta 800th Committee, chaired by Robert Worcester, was orchestrating a year of celebrations that presented the document as the foundation of British liberties and a symbol of the "rule of law." The article intervenes directly against this ideological offensive.

The conjuncture is also defined by the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis and the austerity policies imposed across Europe. The article draws explicit connections between the Charter's limitations and contemporary attacks on workers' rights — specifically the Conservative government's anti-trade union legislation, the eviction of squatters by property developers, and the contrast between harsh sentences for rioters (2011) and impunity for MPs' expenses fraud. The reference to SYRIZA's capitulation to the Troika in Greece (2015) grounds the argument in the most recent demonstration that bourgeois democratic forms cannot protect working-class interests when capitalism's needs require their suspension.

Where the Argument Continues¶

This article is a relatively self-contained theoretical intervention, but its themes are developed across several other IDOM texts. The relationship between law, the state, and class struggle is explored more systematically in the series on The State and Revolution and in articles on the nature of bourgeois democracy. The specific question of how legal forms can be used tactically by the workers' movement — while never substituting for revolutionary strategy — is taken up in pieces on trade union law and human rights litigation.

The article's treatment of the relative autonomy of law and its internal logic points toward broader Marxist debates about legal fetishism and the commodity form, which are addressed in IDOM's theoretical education materials on dialectical materialism. The historical method deployed here — tracing a legal document back to the balance of class forces — is applied to other constitutional moments in articles on the English Civil War, the American Revolution, and the French Revolution.

Connections¶

Marx and Engels, The German Ideology — The theoretical foundation for the relationship between ruling ideas and material relations.
Engels, Letter to Conrad Schmidt (27 October 1890) — The classic statement on the relative autonomy of law and its internal drive toward coherence.
Lenin, The State and Revolution — The analysis of bourgeois democracy as the optimal political form for capitalism.
John Arden, Left-Handed Liberty — A Marxist play about Magna Carta that the article draws on extensively for its dramatic representation of the Charter's contradictions.
Evgeny Pashukanis, The General Theory of Law and Marxism — The most developed Marxist theory of legal form, though not cited, provides the theoretical backdrop for the article's treatment of law's abstract character.
William Morris, A Dream of John Ball — Another Marxist literary treatment of the medieval period, addressing the same class dynamics from the peasant perspective.

Key Quotes¶

"Far from being the product of baronial minds ablaze with liberal philosophy, Magna Carta is the product of the 'practical vital forces' — or living forces as we would say today — which existed in England in 1215."
"The explicit recognition that English government was based on a balancing act between permanent tensions within the ruling class represents the embryo of individual rights as we understand them today."
"Magna Carta is an example, and probably the first example, of how the logic of the legal form can cause certain laws to develop beyond the limits of what the ruling class, whose interests the law fundamentally reflects, would wish to be the case."
"From the point of view of the ruling class, the law is nothing more than words on a piece of paper, which can be a useful hypocrisy with which to lecture the exploited classes sometimes, but at other times it will be swept aside if the defence of their interests requires it."
"In codifying the balance of forces between the various classes and factions in England in 1215, the charter was simply stating facts. The charter reflects the progressive development of wage labour — as compared to feudalism — and the rise of the town-dwelling merchant class, as well as the reactionary attempts of the lords to maintain their power over the peasants."
"Marxists must be as sharp as Arden's King John in exposing 'good government under secure law' for what it really is."