Marxist Philosophy of Praxis: Social Change & Human Action
Marxist Philosophy of Praxis
The superstructure (the set of intellectual and spiritual aspects of societies, including moral values and social institutions such as marriage and education) influences the base, not the other way around.
In the Marxist analysis of human action, another interesting idea emerges: human action is not only a question of will. It is not enough to want something. There needs to be an objective analysis of the specific conditions of production and work. One must understand the mechanisms that underlie social change to utilize them for the benefit of the working class. Thus, Marx insists on the need for workers to organize before their liberation. A “practical” action has no social value if it is not a revolutionary practice. It cannot come from isolated individuals but from a class with common goals. The philosophy of praxis becomes the theoretical foundation in the objective condition of the liberation of the proletariat from capitalist oppression.
In short, Marxist theory reverses the traditional view of social change: ideas do not move the world but are the product of the material conditions of production of any society. Ideas arise as a result of transformation, although it is true that thinking, especially when applied to the production of technological means, in turn acts on the material base, helping to transform it. Thought will prove most valuable when it is treated as another productive force, not when it remains outside the real world of men and their production relationships.
The key to the Marxist philosophy of praxis is that philosophy is not knowledge foreign to social change or the real world but must be linked to the transformation of this world. For Marxism, “practice” is:
- 1. A transformation process during which a new result appears (a new mode of production).
- 2. This transformation is determined by organized collective action and class consciousness. It is not blindly changing things but following a scientific and objective analysis of the conditions of change (Marxism as a scientific understanding of the evolution of societies, scientific socialism).
- 3. The transformation is not an abstract quality; there is more to thought: it is an objective process carried out by specific individuals who are real; they are the true subjects of history (real people, not the “Spirit” or “Idea,” as in Hegel).
The philosophy of praxis, the Marxist project, unifies criticism of the material conditions of existence, knowledge of reality, and human emancipation or liberation from oppression. According to Marx, to understand reality, one must be involved in transforming it. And transformation, in the historical context in which Marx writes, is achieved by revolution, casting the bourgeois model into the abyss and replacing it with an egalitarian social model of communism. Therefore, the philosophy of praxis is global, holistic, and not reductionist.
The philosophy of praxis combines various functions into one comprehensive model:
- 1. Epistemological function: knowledge and understanding involve capturing the essence of historical change and understanding the truly transformative nature of man, their social being.
- 2. Critical function: Social praxis serves as a betrayal of the social conditions of oppression, as the dialectical antithesis, since it shows the contradictions of the dominant mode of production in each historical period.
- 3. Political function: Practice leads to the abolition of the dominant institutions (at the time of Marx, the bourgeois), starting with its conception of property and ending with its political system.
- 4. Social-prophetic function: Revolutionary praxis introduces a new mode of society, so, according to Marx in the Communist Manifesto, it is logical that a new society corresponds to new values. Thus, patriarchal institutions based on custom, hypocrisy, and alienation of consciousness: education, marriage, morality, and religion should be abolished and replaced by a secular ethic centered on equality among all human beings in social and equitable ownership.