LP: > The concept of a dictatorship of the proletariat seems fairly
central to Marxism, doesn't it?
CB: > When a phrase can be applied so universally, might it lose its
scientific precision ?
To Marx, "dictatorship of the proletariat" was synonymous with "proletarian democracy." What we have currently is a "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie" -- or "bourgeois democracy." (See Hal Draper's book on Karl Marx's Theory of Revolution.) Neither term (D of P, D of B) can be applied universally, since they refer to different kinds of modes of production. However, this language seems very "19th Century" in style. -- Jim Devine / "War is the statesman's game, the priest's delight, / The lawyer's jest, the hired assassin's trade, / And, to those royal murderers, whose mean thrones / Are bought by crimes of treachery and gore, / The bread they eat, the staff on which they lean." -- Percy B. Shelley
