Bourgeois Individualism
How a Marxist analysis exposes individual-freedom as an exploitative practice under capitalism
Written by Harsh Trivedi
A common argument against progressing towards a socialist mode of production is rooted in the so-called ‘critique’ that it impedes on ‘individualism,’ which is upheld by the capitalist, free-market system.
Proponents of this uphold the view that capitalism operates on, and even promotes, the principles of individual freedom, non-violent voluntary association, and equal market access based on personal productivity. This they believe also ensures that capitalism promotes self-reliance and personal responsibility.
This view can be represented by the neoliberal notion of ‘radical free enterprise’ whereby a human is considered to be first and foremost a consumer living in a market that offers a range of choices. Hence they oppose socialist economic transformation on the basis that collective action violates their individual freedom.
A Marxist analysis of reality will show why these views are not only falsely defined in a capitalist system, but also how appealing to these ideals becomes a weapon in the hands of the capitalist class against the process of human emancipation, against attempts to create socialist societies.
To believe that one enjoys ‘individualism’ in its ideal sense under capitalism is to mistake appearance for reality.
Marxist thought, developed on the basis of historical (dialectical) materialism, focuses on the ‘material means’ instead of notions of ‘ideal rights’. For Marx, in the material sense, humans are ‘free not through negative power to avoid this or that, but through the positive power to assert true individuality.’
Marx, in The German Ideology, describes the conditions that create supposed ‘universal ideals’ such as that of ‘individualism’ as promoted by the capitalist class in its epoch of dominance. He explains how the dominant ideas of a certain era are inseparable from materialist class relations of the time:
The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance… Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch[.]
If now in considering the course of history we detach the ideas of the ruling class from the ruling class itself and attribute to them an independent existence, if we confine ourselves to saying that these or those ideas were dominant at a given time, without bothering ourselves about the conditions of production and the producers of these ideas, if we thus ignore the individuals and world conditions which are the source of the ideas, we can say, for instance, that during the time that the aristocracy was dominant, the concepts honor, loyalty, etc. were dominant, during the dominance of the bourgeoisie the concepts freedom, equality, etc. The ruling class itself on the whole imagines this to be so. This conception of history, which is common to all historians, particularly since the eighteenth century, will necessarily come up against the phenomenon that increasingly abstract ideas hold sway, i.e. ideas which increasingly take on the form of universality. For each new class which puts itself in the place of one ruling before it, is compelled, merely in order to carry through its aim, to represent its interest as the common interest of all the members of society, that is, expressed in ideal form: it has to give its ideas the form of universality, and represent them as the only rational, universally valid ones. The class making a revolution appears from the very start, if only because it is opposed to a class, not as a class but as the representative of the whole of society; it appears as the whole mass of society confronting the one ruling class.(Emphasis added by me)
Individualism of the bourgeois kind is one such ideal promoted by the ruling class as a ‘universality’ that is considered to be representative of the whole of human society as it serves the class interest of the capitalist. To believe that one enjoys ‘individualism’ in its ideal sense under capitalism is to mistake appearance for reality. One cannot attain true freedom to be oneself while being oppressed by capital and the state. The few who get to enjoy bourgeois individualism get to do so at the cost of slavery for the rest of the world.
One can be relatively more individualistic in their lifestyle depending on their social relations to the means of production. But that comes at the cost of oppression of the majority population that in no way can enjoy this “individualism”, an ideal held so dearly by promoters of capitalism. It is capitalism that destroys any semblance of universal individualism.
If you are structurally oppressed due to your working conditions and social relations to the means of production, you cannot experience individualism in material reality. In this sense, appealing to individualism as a virtue of capitalism is rooted in a falsehood of ideals and does not correspond to material reality.
Individualism is propagated as a positive ideal of capitalism but in reality is denied to most people living under it.
“Freedom in capitalist society always remains about the same as it was in ancient Greek republics: Freedom for slave owners” — Lenin
The argument of ‘equal access to markets’ promoting individual freedom also can be seen through this lens as a bourgeois conception used to maintain class domination. What it does is create a hyper-individualized ideological point that serves to deviate the individual from understanding their conditions as arising from structural inequalities in favor of viewing it as a matter of personal responsibility. This serves as a tool to restrict the spread of class consciousness.
“As long as human labour power, and consequently life itself, remain articles of sale and purchase, of exploitation and robbery, the principle of the ‘sacredness of human life’ remains a shameful lie, uttered with the object of keeping the oppressed slaves in their chains” — Leon Trotsky
The state, under capitalism, is composed of and functions primarily for the ruling class. It exists to sustain the dominant mode of production and the social relations that exist in the status quo. Some proponents of the ‘free enterprise’ view argue that the state impedes on the ‘free markets’ and that if only markets themselves were given free reign without interference from the state, the market would as it were sort out the best possible arrangements.
What this argument fails to consider is, simply put, reality. The state is the machinery of the dominant class, and it exists under capitalism to uphold the rights of private property. The state assists markets and creates protection for domestic industries to develop into large businesses. Without the state to grant property rights to capitalists, free enterprise would not exist.
“In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the living person is dependent and has no individuality.” — Karl Marx
The state uses its apparatus to maintain social order and existing social relations. It employs an actively violent arm in the form of the military and police to maintain this order. To seriously consider that capitalist relations are non-violent and voluntary, we must answer the following question. When a worker sells their labour-power to a capitalist for a wage, is it a “voluntary exchange”? The answer, as will be revealed, is no.
Workers under capitalism occasionally have the freedom to choose whether to sell their labour-power to this capitalist or that capitalist, so the worker appears to have a choice. But can they choose to not sell their labour power (and therefore portions of their life) altogether?
In reality, if a worker weighs this option, they discover that the choice isn’t a choice at all, but comes down to this: work (for the capitalist class) or face starvation and homelessness.
For the worker whose only source of income is the sale of their labour-power, the choice has been removed beforehand, especially if they have families or loved ones who also depend on their incomes.
This amounts to coercion: the practice of persuading someone to do something by the use of force or threats. In this case, workers face the threat of losing their means to survival. They don’t experience this threat from one particular capitalist, but from the entire capitalist class.
One may find someone arguing “But haven’t people always had to work for their survival?”
Of course, Nature compels us to work in order to fulfill our needs. Work has always been and is still essential to our survival. It’s also essential to the expression of who we are as individuals, and inseparable from our nature as a species.
Socialists are not at all opposed to working or being compelled to work by nature; they are opposed to being compelled to work under the direction and rule of a dominant and exploitative class. In capitalist societies, that dominant and exploitative class is the capitalist class.
By privately owning the means of production, the capitalist class exploits our need to work for survival for their own benefit, to ensure that we’re compelled to work for them.
Rather than have workers labour for the benefit of the wealthy, socialism seeks to liberate workers so that they can work under their own rule, through democracy, so that the full value of their labour benefits themselves, their loved ones, their communities, and society as a whole.
We all have to work to survive. We do the best work when we work together, and we all live better when we work to fulfill the needs of every person.
The core of socialism is collectivism. Socialism seeks to democratize work, production, and distribution so that workers and communities are empowered to make decisions over their own lives rather than be subjected to the dictatorial decisions of individual owners of the means of production (capitalist employers).
In this way, the collectivism of socialism offers greater freedom than the individualism of capitalism.
When workers come together to make the decisions that affect their lives, they don’t decide to endanger themselves, to eliminate their livelihoods, to shut down the facilities that support their communities, or to damage the environment in which they and their families and loved ones live.
Socialism emphasizes the shared interest of all workers and the whole of human society. Socialism is about real democracy.
Using collective action to achieve the goal of a communist society is precisely so that all forms of oppression can finally be unmasked and humans can truly enjoy freedom and individualism.
Socialism, which is a step towards creating a communist society, uses collective ideals to create a stepping stone in the progress of human emancipation in the course of history. As we saw from the passage from Marx above:
“the class making a revolution appears from the very start, if only because it is opposed to a class, not as a class but as the representative of the whole of society; it appears as the whole mass of society confronting the one ruling class.”
The proletariat therefore, viewed as the revolutionary class from a Marxist perspective, conceptualizes its own ideals as the shared ideals of human society. Since Marxist thought is based on the realisation of history as class struggle, its ultimate goal is not to replace one class with another, but to eliminate class society altogether. Collective action is a tool that works towards the destruction of domination of one class by another, of one human being by another. It paves the way for the classless society to take shape, for humanity to flourish.
“The proletariat acquires power for the purpose of doing away forever with class culture and to make way for human culture” — Leon Trotsky
