State, Politics, and Social Classes: Theory and History

ISBN-13: 9783031220456 / Angielski / Twarda / 2023

Armando Boito

Opis

This book offers a reassessment politics against the predominating economicist approach to historical materialism within contemporary Marxism. Boito draws on the structural interpretation of Marxism inspired by Althusser’s works of the mid-1960s and, especially, by Poulantzas’ Political Power and Social Classes. The volume aims to demonstrate the role of the political dimension (together with the economy) and, to a further extent, to contribute to renew contemporary Marxist political theory. The chapters cover topics such as: the nature of political power; the structure and functions of the state; the role of politics in historical change; political crises; and the political formation of the working class. The book highlights the role of political structures and practices in the reproduction of economic and social relations and also in the process of historical change. The aim of the book is to contribute to the renewal of Marxist thought, breaking with the economicist conception that dominated it throughout the last century, and finally meeting the demands of the socialist struggle in the 21st century.

Spis treści

Preface

First part: State, social classes and historical change

Chapter 1. The capitalist state at the center: criticism of Michel Foucault's concept of power

Chapter 2. The place of politics in Marxist theory of history

Chapter 3. State and transition to capitalism: feudalism, absolutism and bourgeois political revolution

Chapter 4. State and transition to socialism: was the Paris Commune a workers' power?

Chapter 5. The concept of revolutionary crisis: 1789

Chapter 6. Political scene and class interests in capitalist society: Marx's analysis

 

Second part: Politics and economics in the formation of the working classes

Chapter 7. Pre-capitalism, capitalism and worker resistance: notes for a theory of union action

Chapter 8. The (difficult) formation of the working class

Chapter 9. The constitution of the class proletariat in the Communist Party Manifesto

Chapter 10. The exhaustion of the 20^th century revolutionary cycle

Chapter 11. Middle class and unionism

Chapter 12. Citizenship and social classes

 

O autorze

Armando Boito is Professor of Political Science at the State University of Campinas, Brazil. He is editor of the Brazilian journal Crítica Marxista. Among other books, he has published Reform and Political Crisis in Brazil:Class Conflicts in Workers' Party Governments and the Rise of Bolsonaro Neo-fascism (2021).

Blurb

This book offers a reassessment politics against the predominating economicist approach to historical materialism within contemporary Marxism. Boito draws on the structural interpretation of Marxism inspired by Althusser’s works of the mid-1960s and, especially, by Poulantzas’ Political Power and Social Classes. The volume aims to demonstrate the role of the political dimension (together with the economy) and, to a further extent, to contribute to renew contemporary Marxist political theory. The chapters cover topics such as: the nature of political power; the structure and functions of the state; the role of politics in historical change; political crises; and the political formation of the working class. The book highlights the role of political structures and practices in the reproduction of economic and social relations and also in the process of historical change. The aim of the book is to contribute to the renewal of Marxist thought, breaking with the economicist conception that dominated it throughout the last century, and finally meeting the demands of the socialist struggle in the 21st century.

Armando Boito is Professor of Political Science at the State University of Campinas, Brazil. He is editor of the Brazilian journal Crítica Marxista. Among other books, he has published Reform and Political Crisis in Brazil: Class Conflicts in Workers' Party Governments and the Rise of Bolsonaro Neo-fascism (2021).