Karl Marx 200th birthday: Tribute to a global citizen

For those who, like me, belong ideologically to the left, yesterday was a historic day. May 5 marked the bicentenary of the birth of a global citizen whose name strikes fear in the hearts of capitalists, reactionaries, fake liberators, counter revolutionaries and traitors all over the world.

Karl Marx was born on May 5, 1818 in Trier, Prussia (modern Germany). Marx, a Hegelian turned social scientist, lived much of his life in exile in France, Belgium and Britain where he died on March 14, 1883 at 64. He is buried at London’s Highgate cemetery. On his tombstone is engraved, “Workers of all lands unite”.

Marx was a philosopher, historian, economist, journalist and an author. His best known works are: The Communist Manifesto published in 1848 and Das Kapital whose first volume was published in 1867. Two other volumes were published posthumously by his colleague, Friedrich Engels.

Marx’s ideas and writings have had a profound impact on world politics and modern intellectual thought. Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter has compared Marxism to religion with Karl Marx as its “prophet.”
Marx’s ideas (Marxism) provided the foundation of communism and scientific socialism which some fake liberators, pseudo revolutionaries and pathological liars laid claim to when they stormed Kampala on January 25, 1986 carrying the banner of socialism. Marx studied at the universities of Bonn, Berlin and Jena. He was a supporter of revolutions that rocked Europe in 1848, which is reflected in the opening paragraph of the manifesto.

Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto together with Engels and developed a philosophy of man, history and politics, which energised the struggle of communists in the 19th Century.
The ideas Marx developed have undergone many changes and mutated, inter alia, into Marxism-Leninism, Maoism, Nkrumaism and neo-Marxism. In its original form Marxism consisted of three distinct, but interdependent components which deal with human nature, history and economics. According to Marx, human nature is not immutable, but historical and changes in accordance with social and economic conditions.

The prime mover of history is man and through labour man can remake the world in his own image.
The nature of man, therefore, depends on the conditions under which he works. Private property creates divisions between classes in society and a condition Marx calls “alienation,” which can be overcome by overthrowing the reactionary institutions which create alienation. With the abolition of private property, human beings cease to be mere clients, objects or means of production (as in Uganda) at the disposal of a small, greedy and mercenary ruling class.

Abolition of private property restores the dignity of human beings as subjects and masters of their destiny. Men and women become free again, divisions among people are removed, social relations become classless and the class struggle ceases.
With regard to history, Marx developed the idea of the “historical essence of man” which was recast in subsequent writings, notably in Das Kapital, as “historical materialism” – a scientific argument concerning the evolution of human societies.

In a nutshell, the argument is that all social forms have a function which explains their existence, survival and destruction. Marx argued that history is propelled by productive “material forces”. These productive forces compel the creation and destruction of successive systems of production relations between human beings.
These systems form the material base of society upon which production relations are built. Such production relations include feudalism, capitalism, socialism and communism.

In 1986 when NRA guerillas grabbed power, they preached and promised Ugandans socialist production relations. Some NRM ideologues dishonestly continue to use socialist language, but what the ruling clique has practised for the last 25 years has been naked capitalism. Truth be told, some NRM bigwigs increasingly behave like 19th Century feudal chiefs akin to King Mswati of Swaziland who dominates and owns almost everything in that poor and unhappy country.

On economics, Marx advanced a radical version of the “labour theory of value” according to which the accumulation of “surplus value” is due to extortion of unpaid labour. The primitive accumulation of capital and wealth by a few people, predominantly from one sub-region, which has been happening in Uganda, is partly a result of oppression and exploitation of wananchi who have been denied minimum wage by a corrupt, decadent and tribal regime.

I encourage Uganda’s youth to get acquainted with literature on Marx which will open their eyes about the sharpening contradictions unfolding tragically Uganda. Aluta continua!

Mr Acemah is a political scientist and retired career diplomat. [email protected]