The Classics of Marxism: Volume Two¶

Author: Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, V I Lenin and Leon Trotsky

Core Argument¶

This second volume of Marxist classics assembles five foundational texts that collectively argue for the materialist conception of history as the only scientific basis for understanding capitalist society and its revolutionary overthrow. The central thesis, established in Marx's opening chapters, is that human society is fundamentally determined by the way people produce their means of subsistence—production is always a social relation, not merely a technical process, and the tension between the forces of production (tools, machinery, labour power) and the relations of production (property relationships, class divisions) constitutes the motor of historical development. From this premise flows the conclusion that capitalism, like all previous social orders, is historically transitory and must give way to socialism through conscious revolutionary action.

The volume further argues that the working class cannot achieve emancipation through purely economic struggles or parliamentary reforms alone. Marx's demonstration that wages and profit are inverse proportions, and that capital's natural tendency is to reduce wages towards the physical minimum, establishes the necessity of abolishing the wages system entirely. Lenin's polemic against ultraleft sectarianism insists that revolutionaries must work within existing mass organisations, including reactionary trade unions and parliaments, to reach backward strata—but always with the strategic goal of replacing the conservative slogan "a fair day's wage for a fair day's work" with the revolutionary watchword "abolition of the wages system." Trotsky's defence of the October Revolution completes the argument by showing that the Russian Revolution succeeded precisely because of Russia's backwardness, confirming the law of uneven and combined development, and that socialism is impossible within national boundaries—the struggle for socialism is necessarily international.

Overview¶

The volume opens with a theoretical chapter on production that establishes the materialist conception of history as the unifying framework for all that follows. Production is presented as necessarily social, dismissing the bourgeois fantasy of the isolated individual producer. The distinction between forces and relations of production, and the contradiction between them as the motor of history, is illustrated through the transition from feudalism to capitalism: the guild system and feudal land tenure eventually became fetters on the expanding forces of manufacture and commerce, necessitating bourgeois revolutions. This theoretical grounding polemicises against both bourgeois economists who treat capitalist relations as eternal and utopian socialists who imagine society can be reorganised by moral persuasion alone.

The introduction to the volume situates the collected works within the three interconnected parts of Marxist theory: Marxist economics, dialectical materialism, and historical materialism. It presents the current global crises—war, mass unemployment, capitalist decay—as the death throes of a reactionary order, and positions the volume as a weapon for those who would hasten its overthrow. The collection is dated London, 23 September 2015, placing these classical texts in direct relation to the 2008 crash and subsequent capitalist instability.

Marx's Wage Labour and Capital, presented in Engels's corrected 1891 edition, resolves a contradiction that had stumped classical political economy. Engels's crucial revision—replacing "labour" with "labour-power"—demonstrates that the worker sells not labour but labour-power, a peculiar commodity whose use-value is the capacity to produce more value than it costs. The pamphlet establishes that capital is not a thing but a social relation, that wages and profit are inverse proportions, and that the most favourable condition for wage-labour—rapid growth of productive capital—merely means the worker forges the golden chains by which the bourgeoisie drags it forward.

Value, Price and Profit presents Marx's mature theory in its most accessible form, written to refute the claim that general wage increases are futile. Marx systematically demonstrates that national production is not a fixed quantity, that the division between wages and profits can vary, and that surplus value arises from the distinction between labour and labouring power. The value of labour-power contains both a physical element (subsistence) and a historical or social element (a traditional standard of life), and between the physical minimum of wages and the physical maximum of the working day lies an immense scale of variation settled by continuous class struggle.

Lenin's Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder addresses the sectarian positions threatening to isolate the revolutionary vanguard from the masses in Western Europe. Lenin insists that certain features of the Russian Revolution possess international significance, though he cautions against exaggerating this. The Bolsheviks' victory required iron party discipline, full working-class support, and correct political leadership verified by mass experience. Lenin defends the necessity of working within reactionary trade unions and parliaments, attacks the slogan "No compromises!" as a violation of Marxism, and argues that Communists must master all forms of struggle, old and new.

Trotsky's In Defence of October argues that the October Revolution succeeded in backward Russia not despite its backwardness but because of it, vindicating the law of uneven and combined development. Russia formed the weakest link in world capitalism, where peasant agriculture at a seventeenth-century level coexisted with the most advanced industrial concentration. The theory of permanent revolution held that the Russian Revolution was a bourgeois revolution in immediate tasks but could only be victorious as a proletarian revolution, and that socialism is not feasible within national boundaries. Trotsky rejects the notion that the Revolution's degeneration into Stalinism proves socialism's failure, arguing instead that it resulted from Russia's material backwardness and isolation.

The final chapter, Stalinism and Bolshevism, directly confronts the question of the Soviet Union's degeneration. It argues that Stalinism is not the legitimate product of Bolshevism but a Thermidorian negation of it. The Bolsheviks foresaw that without revolution in the West, the Soviet regime would degenerate; the bureaucracy's victory resulted from material weakness, not doctrinal failure. Genuine Bolshevism fights the Stalinist gendarmerie, and the present struggle is not between Stalin and Trotsky but between the bureaucracy and the proletariat. The Fourth International inherits Bolshevism's tradition of theory and practice.

Chapter Guide¶

Production — Establishes the materialist conception of history, arguing that the way people produce determines their social, political, and intellectual life, and that the contradiction between forces and relations of production is the motor of history.
Introduction — Positions the volume's five works as illuminating Marxist economics, dialectical materialism, and historical materialism, and declares the present capitalist crisis ripe for overthrow.
Wage Labour and Capital — Engels's corrected edition demonstrates that workers sell labour-power, not labour, resolving the contradiction that stumped classical political economy, and establishes that capital is a social relation, not a thing.
Value, Price and Profit — Marx's accessible exposition of Capital Volume I refutes the claim that wage increases are futile and demonstrates that surplus value arises from unpaid labour, with the wages system masking this exploitation.
"Left-Wing" Communism: an Infantile Disorder — Lenin attacks ultraleft sectarianism, insisting revolutionaries must work within reactionary trade unions and parliaments, and argues that Communists must master all forms of struggle.
In Defence of October — Trotsky defends the October Revolution as vindicating the law of uneven and combined development, arguing that socialism is impossible within national boundaries and that the Revolution's degeneration resulted from material backwardness, not socialism's failure.
Stalinism and Bolshevism — Argues that Stalinism is a Thermidorian negation of Bolshevism, not its product, and that the struggle is between the bureaucracy and the proletariat, with the Fourth International inheriting Bolshevism's revolutionary tradition.

Key Concepts¶

Forces of production — Tools, machinery, raw materials, and human labour power that constitute the material basis of production.
Relations of production — Property relationships and class divisions arising from control over the forces of production.
Labour-power — The capacity to work, which the free worker sells to the capitalist as a commodity whose use-value exceeds its cost.
Surplus value — The value created by unpaid labour, the basis of capitalist profit, decomposed into rent, interest, and industrial profit.
Socially necessary labour time — The labour time required to produce a commodity under average conditions of production, determining its value.
Uneven and combined development — The law explaining how backward countries can combine archaic and advanced forms, creating revolutionary possibilities absent in more developed nations.
Permanent revolution — The theory that in backward countries, the bourgeois revolution's tasks can only be accomplished through proletarian victory, which then proceeds towards socialism as part of the world revolution.
Thermidor — The historical process by which a revolutionary regime degenerates into counter-revolution, applied by Trotsky to Stalinism's negation of Bolshevism.

Chapters¶

7 chapters