Stages of Consciousness As the struggle develops, new history-making ideas can be gripped by the masses. Vladimir Lenin, in his path-breaking work What Is To Be Done? describes the level of consciousness of the Russian working class at the time. Despite the widespread nature of the spontaneous movement, and despite the “flashes of consciousness” and the formation of definite demands, the revolts then under way were simply the resistance of the oppressed; simply trade union struggles. They marked the awakening of the workers, but consciousness of the contradiction between their interests and the whole of the political and social system was not yet there. Lenin concluded that class consciousness had to be brought from the outside to the workers. This lesson holds true despite the epochal differences and the limitations of that moment. The consciousness that the working class has to go through develops in stages – social awareness, social consciousness, and class consciousness. The first two stages develop more or less objectively or spontaneously. The latter stage develops subjectively or consciously, from the introduction of new ideas by the thinkers and conscious revolutionaries. Generally, the level of consciousness today is social awareness — the becoming aware of what society is as it really is. The next stage is social consciousness, where the workers understand that they are members of a class and that they need class solidarity. They understand their class is exploited and that they must fight that exploitation. This stage is generally expressed in the formation of some kind of political party of the workers. It is important to note that the American mass has never achieved even the stage of social consciousness. There was a moment following the Civil War when people came close to it. A certain level of unity existed around the abolition of slavery and for integrating the Freedmen into society. With the murder of Abraham Lincoln and the assumption of power by Andrew Johnson, a counterrevolution was launched and the moment was lost. Class consciousness is where the workers grasp the necessity of taking political power in order to expropriate the expropriators and bring the class struggle to an end. These stages should not be viewed categorically. The development of consciousness is a process, which reflects the stages of development and interaction of the economy and the social response of the masses. Ideas are constantly in formation, and the stages of development of consciousness interpenetrate one another. rallycomrades.lrna.org/2012/05/consciousness-of-societys-ills-fuels-u-s-upsurges/
Posted on: Wed, 10 Sep 2014 16:29:54 +0000
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