Woodrow Wilson Department of Politics

 

 

PLPT 4031                                                                                                          G. Klosko

Marxism and Its Critics                                                                           381 Gibson; x3092

Spring 2016                                                                                               gk@virginia.edu

Hours: Wednesday 1:00 - 3:00

     and by appointment

 

Books have been ordered at the University Bookstore.  Marx and Engels and Lenin should be purchased.  Other books should be purchased as well, if possible.  All books are on reserve in Clemons Library.  Shorter readings are on the class collab page.  Mosca is unfortunately out of print and is only on collab.

 

Marx and Engels:  R. Tucker, ed., The Marx-Engels Reader, Second Edition (Norton, paper)

 

    Group I, pages:  3-6, 469-500, 146-200, 143-145, 203-217, 294-302, 361-6, 417-442,

681-2, 760-68, 218-20, 522-24, 700-17;

 

     Group II, pages: 53-65, 525-541, 66-105 (106-125), 586-617,683-700, 725-27;

     with Group II: K. Popper, "Science: Conjectures and Refutations," in Popper, Conjectures and Refutations (Harper, paper) (on collab)

     with Bernstein:  556-573;

     with Baukunin:  542-548; 728-33;

     with Lenin's State and Revolution, 618-652  (esp. 629-42);

     with Two Tactics of Social Democracy, 501-511.

     with Stalin: Materialism: Dialectical and Historical, 694-700.

E. Bernstein, The Preconditions of Socialism (Cambridge, paper)

M. Bakunin:  Bakunin on Violence (collab)

Selections, in M. Schatz, ed., The Essential Works of Anarchism (collab)

V.I. Lenin:  R. Tucker, ed., The Lenin Anthology (Norton, paper)

     State and Revolution;

     Two Tactics of Social Democracy;  

     What Is To Be Done? (pp. 12-91)

     Imperialism: The Highest State of Capitalism

     Later Political Theory: pp. 438-76, 550-70, 661-76, 703-6.

 

J. Stalin, Foundations of Leninism (International, paper)

             Materialism: Dialectical and Historical (paper)

G. Mosca, The Ruling Class (McGraw‑Hill, paper) pages:  1-7, 50-87, 119-152, 172-221, 253-337,

 (collab)

M. Weber: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Scribner, paperback)

Weber, From Max Weber:  Essays in Sociology, eds. H. Gerth and C. W. Mills (Oxford,

paper): Selections:  to be announced

 

Requirements: 

1. Midterm: in classs, March 15; Final Exam, May 10.

 

2. Paper of 10-12 pages, analytical or research, on a topic of your choosing. Paper is due on   Tuesday 26 April.  Late papers will be penalized; incompletes will not be given. 

    

3. You must do the reading, come to class, and be prepared to discuss it.  Class participation is taken into account and weighed heavily in grading.   Excessive, unexplained absences are grounds for being dropped from the class.

 

4. Grading: Midterm exam counts 25%; paper and final exam each count 37.5%.  Class participation will figure in on top of this, with good participation significantly helping your grade.

 

Recommended Secondary Sources:

There is an enormous literature on Marx and Marxism.  A few helpful general works (which I have placed on  reserve) are:

 

G. A. Cohen, Marx's Theory of History: A Defence (Princeton, 1978)

L. Kolakowski, Main Currents of Marxism, trans. P.S. Falla, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1978)

G. Lichtheim, Marxism: An Historical and Critical Study  (London, 1961)

G. Lichtheim, A Short History of Socialism (New York, 1970)

D. McLellan, Karl Marx (New York, 1973)

D. McLellan, Marxism After Marx (Boston, 1979)

 

On Lenin and Leninism:

N. Harding, Lenin's Political Thought, 2 vols. (in one, in the paperback edition)

A. Ulam, Stalin (1973)

A. Ulam, The Unifinished Revolution, 3rd ed. (Boulder, 1979)

 

Also recommended: if you do not have this already, some acquaintance with European history in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.  Basic sources you can consult are R.R. Palmer and J. Colton, A History of the Modern World; and  P. Gay and J. Garraty, eds., The Columbia History of the World.  In my experience, Wikipedia is a highly useful and generally reliable source.