Engels’s Irish research barely altered Marxian doctrine on the proletariat

Evidence

Neither Marx nor Engels were unaware of the proletariat’s failure to become a universal class. Both studied the Irish Question closely, were active in the attempt to resolve its destructive impact on the historical processes of English working-class formation, and commented on its import for future proletarian organization. Nevertheless, the impact of their experience with the English proletariat on their theory of the proletariat’s historical role appears to have been slight. Shlomo Avineri observes that: — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 268

Categorization

Category: Factual Claims

Related

• Marx observed proletarian division but did not revise his theory (similarity 0.91)
• Experience with the Irish Question did not alter Marx’s universal-proletariat theory (similarity 0.90)
• Marxism was a theory about the proletariat, not a theory produced by proletarian intellectuals (similarity 0.84)
• Haitian slaves were not a Marxian proletariat yet shared its historical formation (similarity 0.83)
• The European proletariat was not history’s sole revolutionary subject (similarity 0.83)
• Marx’s novelty lay in siding with the proletariat, not in analyzing exploitation (similarity 0.82)
• Marxist theory was built by bourgeois thinkers studying bourgeoisies, not proletarians (similarity 0.81)
• Haitian plantation slaves were closer to a modern proletariat than any workers then (similarity 0.80)
• Marx’s novelty was siding with workers, not recognizing class exploitation (similarity 0.80)
• Marx treated the proletariat and class struggle as ideological constructs (similarity 0.80)
• Slave revolts obeyed the same historical laws as the European factory proletariat (similarity 0.80)
• English racialism predated and shaped the proletarianization of the Irish (similarity 0.80)
• Plantation slavery’s gang labor approximated proletarian conditions for revolution (similarity 0.79)
• Marx’s choice of the proletariat was disguised faith in philosophy. (similarity 0.79)
• Marx saw English and Irish workers divided into hostile national camps that strengthened capital. (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Haitian slaves were not a Marxian proletariat yet shared its historical formation #complicates (0.55) — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 1284