Comparison of Marxs Notion of Liberation and Mills Notion of Liberty - Assignment Example

 Though they have a common root, the words Liberation and Liberty mean different things the way Karl Marx and John Stuart Mill use them. Marx writes that government should be overthrown to liberate people. Mill talks about the individual rights of men and women. But they are both Humanists because they both see the importance of freedom. In Marx’s call for Liberation and Mill’s definitions of individual liberty are ideas about European civilization that George Sand writes about in her novel, Indiana. Marx and Mill would have admired it and George Sand. The Communist Manifesto and Liberation The first sentence of Part I (Bourgeois and Proletarians) of Marx’s Manifesto says, “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.” As we discussed in class, the bourgeois created a superstructure to keep the lower classes from understanding their reality. (class notes: 3.3.07) To change this, Marx and Engels were like the English Chartists (1839-1848) who wanted to redistribute property. Marx went further, though: “. . . the theory of the Communists [is] . . : Abolition of Private Property.” (CM, Part II, parag. 14) Doing this would liberate the proletariat from being slaves to capitalism. But the Communist Manifesto is not clear on just how this would work. For example, he says that “The immediate aim of the Communist is . . : Formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat.” (CM, Part II, parag. 8) What is not clear is how this would make the state wither away, which is what Marx wanted. (class notes: 5.3.07) This becomes clearer when Marx states the aims of Communism. (Part II – Proletarians and Communists: near the end). The “Abolition of Private Property” may seem liberating but “confiscation of emigrant and rebel property” could make problems. Who decides who is a rebel, for instance? State monopolies of banking, communication and transportation are odd. Because it is only letting the proletariat become the bourgeois. “Abolishing the distinction between town and country” by “redistributing” people seems cruel. Why can’t a person choose where they want to live themselves? I wish he made more clear how Communism would work. So it doesn’t seem that Liberation in Marx’s Communist Manifesto is really Liberation, only another kind of government. On Liberty John Stuart Mill wrote On Liberty in 1869. This was the Age of Industrialism in England and Europe. He saw problems in society that were like what Karl Marx saw. But Mill does not want to overthrow government the way Marx does. He wants to define how a person has Liberty. He thinks people should be free to do what they want to do as long as they do not harm other people. For instance, in Chapter V he says, “. . . the individual is not accountable to society for his actions, in so far as these concern the interests of no person but himself.” (paragraph 2) Mill felt that to understand the world is to be free, that a person cannot be a prisoner of tradition or religion and if you do not understand reality you are not free. (class notes: 27.2.07) He wrote “On the Subjugation of Women” and in it said that it was irrational for men to dominate women. (Ibid.) He was accused of undermining the bond of marriage and of being an atheist. He criticized Christianity. (Ibid) He was also afraid of majorities because they could do harm just because they had more votes. This is where his support for Individual Liberty is clear. He begins On Liberty by saying that the subject of the essay is, “The nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual.” (OL, Ch.1, parag. 1) Marx and Mill Marx and Mill were both Humanists and had read the works of Hegel (1790-1830), a philosopher who felt that only history (time) changes society, not revolution. (class notes: 27.2.07) They both saw ills in society and wanted to end them. But they tried to do so in different ways. Marx wanted to change the structure of the state. Mill wanted to define the power of the state, especially its effect on individual freedom. Some of their beliefs are similar and some are not. They both were atheists. They both questioned the bond of marriage. They both felt that the desire to dominate others is irrational. (class notes: 27.2.07) But Marx and Mill had differences. Marx wanted to abolish property (see above) and give the proletariat power. Mill was not for that. He focused on Liberty, not Liberation. He thought that people should be free as individuals, not just as a class. Marx thought so, too, but he wanted the proletariat to become the ruling class, which is different. Mill was afraid of the majority, unlike the Chartists and Marx. He thought that good can come only through free will. (class notes: 20.2.07) In On Liberty he makes individual liberty most important – more important than class struggles and more important than rule by majority. But Marx wanted the proletariat to be the majority so that they would have more power than the bourgeois. Though they are both Humanists and wish good to people, Marx and Mill are not the same. Marx focuses on the liberation of a class of people. Mill focuses on individual liberty. George Sand, Marx and Mill George Sand wrote Indiana in 1832. She was an idealist and romantic, a product of the French Revolution. (class notes: 12.2.07) At that time, the patriarchal system ruled. Men controlled the system. In Chapter 2 of Indiana, Sand has her heroine say this to a male friend: “I am here alone against the two of you, so I must make up my mind never to be right.” (parag. 10) What she means is that a woman in that society should not or cannot contradict what men say. Sand herself wrote in the Preface to the 1832 edition that Indiana “. . . is a woman . . . whose mission is to represent passions repressed or . . . suppressed by the law . . .” Marx and Mill would have understood what Sand means and, I believe, admired her for it. Like Mill who believed that liberty means freedom to do whatever one pleases so long as it does not harm others, Indiana says to her husband, “. . . I will never obey anyone but myself.” (3rd to final parag. of Ch. XXI) And this is not the only example of George Sand sounding like Mill. On page (Ch. X, parag 15), Sand writes, “Society punishes only those acts which are injurious to it; private life is beyond its jurisdiction.” Of course, Mill wrote On Liberty thirty-seven years after Indiana was published, so maybe he was influenced by her. Atheist Marx and Mill might even agree with what Indiana writes in a letter to Ramiere: “Yours is the God of men . . ; mine is the God of the universe, the preserver and the hope of all creatures.” (Ch XXII, 3rd to last para. of letter; also class notes) This is not atheism, but it is a rejection of traditional religion that Marx called the ‘opium of the masses.’ It also says something about how Sand saw men as equaling civilization and women equaling nature.(class notes, 12.2.07) By writing what she does, she is undermining the patriarchal system of the time and exposing the gap between men’s and women’s rights. Once again, the spirit of Indiana is similar to Marx’s and Mill’s beliefs. In class the conflict between Sand the writer and the book she wrote was discussed. This conflict comes from many places of those times, from philosophers like Hegel and Rousseau and events like the French Revolution, Industrialization, the rise of the middle class and the American Bill of Rights. George Sand wrote Indiana before Marx wrote The Communist Manifesto and Mill wrote On Liberty. But all three were influenced by the times they lived in. If Marx and Mill did not actually read George Sand’s novel, they were influenced by many of the same events and philosophies as the French woman. It seems to me they would definitely have admired her book. Works Cited Mill, John Stuart. On Liberty: www.bartleby.com Sand, George. Indiana: www.digital.library.upenn.edu/women/sand/indiana Marx, Karl and Frederick Engels. The Communist Manifesto: www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/classics/manifesto Dear Client, As per one of my first messages to you, I made it clear that I was consulting on-line editions of these works. Consequently, I recommend you consult the on-line texts I reference and then find those page numbers in your hard texts when inserting citations in the body of the essay. This may take a little time, but you have plenty – which is one of the reasons I wanted to get this to you ASAP. I hope my parenthetical citations make this relatively easy for you. As for the Works Cited page, I assume you will create your own, which should take all of 5 minutes. Also, you will note on page 1 that I have left proper spaces for you to insert your name, class, etc. in MLA Style. Finally, this is not quite the essay I would have written, but then I am 58, have a BA in English, a partial MA in Education and am a published novelist. I have tried to approximate what I consider your style by consulting your class notes as well as the Tom Paine essay. Moreover, I see no reason why this paper would be criticized for plagiarism because I have scrupulously sought to reference every citation. I hope you are pleased with what I’ve put together and feel that it at least comes close to representing you. But you are, of course, welcome – even encouraged – to rewrite portions of this in your own words as you use them and as your teacher is familiar with them. Best wishes. Read More