How to understand that "the movement of the proletariat is an independent movement of the overwhelming majority of the people, for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of the people"?

Question: Yao Fei, Secretary of the Feidong County Party Committee of Hefei City, Anhui Province

In his speech at the 15th collective study session of the Political Bureau of the 19th CPC Central Committee, General Secretary Xi Jinping quoted a passage from the Communist Manifesto: "All movements in the past were movements of a small number of people, or for the benefit of a small number of people. The movement of the proletariat is an independent movement of the overwhelming majority of the people, for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of the people. How do you understand that "the movement of the proletariat is an independent movement of the overwhelming majority of the people and for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of the people"?

Interpretation: Li Shuangtao, professor of the School of Marxism of the Central Party School (National Academy of Administration).

Academics generally refer to this sentence as the idea of "two vast majorities". To understand this sentence, it is necessary to understand several key concepts such as "the movement of the proletariat", "the overwhelming majority of the people", and "profit-seeking", as well as the relationship between them, and to understand these cannot be separated from the article "The Communist Manifesto". Therefore, we understand this sentence mainly on the basis of the Communist Manifesto, supplemented by other texts of Marx and Engels.

"The movement of the proletariat" refers to the revolutionary movement in which the proletariat is engaged

The idea of the "two majorities" mentioned in the first chapter of the Communist Manifesto, "The bourgeoisie and the proletarians", is the context in which this sentence is proposed. Marx and Engels analyzed the situation of class struggle in class society, especially capitalist society, from the viewpoint of class struggle, and they held that the history of human society since the disintegration of primitive society is the history of class struggle. Before capitalist society, society was divided into different classes, and class divisions were relatively hidden. In capitalist society, class antagonism is simplified, and society as a whole is increasingly divided into two classes that are directly opposed to each other: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.

From the perspective of the history of human society, the bourgeoisie has played a very important historical role. For example, the rule of the bourgeoisie has impacted and disintegrated the feudal system and feudal patriarchal concepts and ideas, and "the bourgeoisie has destroyed all feudal, patriarchal and idyllic relations where it has already gained rule." It has ruthlessly severed the feudal fetters of all stripes that bind people to natural superiority"; the rule of the bourgeoisie has given impetus to the tremendous development of the productive forces, and "the bourgeoisie has created more productive forces in less than a hundred years of its class rule than all the productive forces of all previous generations"; the bourgeoisie has opened up the world market and promoted the process of human society moving from regional history to world history, and it "has driven the bourgeoisie to run around the world by constantly expanding the market for its products." The bourgeoisie has expanded the breadth and depth of human intercourse, and "the state of local and national self-sufficiency and self-isolation of the past has been replaced by the intercourse and interdependence of all nationalities".

But the inherent contradictions of capitalism are insurmountable. In The German Ideology, written in 1845-1846, Marx had already put forward the materialist view of history, and he believed that the fundamental driving force for the progress of human society was the contradictory movement of the productive forces and the relations of production. From this point of view, capitalist society "has become so strong that it cannot adapt to this relation, and it has been hampered by it". In the process of the bourgeoisie's domination and the development of capitalism, "the bourgeoisie has not only forged the weapon of its own death; The proletariat is the class that accompanies big industry, and "of all the classes now antagonistic to the bourgeoisie, the proletariat is the only class that is truly revolutionary." The rest of the classes are declining and perishing with the development of big industry, but the proletariat is the product of big industry itself".

Therefore, it is the historical mission of the proletariat to unite to overthrow the rule of the bourgeoisie, that is, to carry out the proletarian revolution, that is, to carry out the "movement of the proletariat". The "movement of the proletariat" mentioned here includes not only the political revolution that seizes political power, "the proletariat must first gain political domination" and "the first step of the workers' revolution is to elevate the proletariat to the ruling class and win democracy"; it also includes the social revolution with the development of the productive forces and the transformation of the relations of production, and "the proletariat will use its political rule...... to increase the aggregate of productive forces as quickly as possible" and "the communist revolution is the most radical break with traditional relations of ownership".

The main body of the "movement of the proletariat" is the "overwhelming majority of the people", and the aim is "for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of the people"

From the perspective of the main body of the "movement of the proletariat", in the era in which Marx lived, the proletariat accounted for the overwhelming majority of the population, and Marx believed that the movement of the proletariat was the overwhelming majority of the people, which showed Marx's concept of mass history.

Focusing on the answer to this question, there are two views of history in the history of human thought: one is the heroic view of history, that is, the view that history is created by emperors, generals, and a small number of outstanding figures, and that ordinary people, who account for the overwhelming majority of the population, can only be enslaved and oppressed, and become the tools of a few people to seek their own interests; and the other is the concept of mass history, that is, the masses of people are the creators of history.

Marx and Engels adhered to the concept of mass history, and they expressed their views on many occasions around the concept of mass history. In "The German Ideology", Marx and Engels pointed out that the starting point of their view of history is the "realistic individual". Engels also pointed out that historical evolution "is not so much the motive of individual figures, even the most outstanding ones, as the motive of the broad masses, of the whole nation, and, in the midst of each nation, of the whole class of the whole into action". Engels also put forward the idea of "the theory of historical synergy" on how the broad masses influence history, and he believed that everyone will play a role in the evolution of history, but the role will be different in magnitude, and finally converge into a resultant force through the parallelogram law of force. It can be seen that the "movement of the proletariat" does not depend on a small number of people, but on the overwhelming majority of the working masses, and the main body of the revolution is the proletariat and the masses of the people.

In terms of the purpose of the "movement of the proletariat", this movement is a movement of the proletariat itself "for the benefit" of itself. The "movement of the proletariat" has a clear aim, that is, to work for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of the people, and "what the proletarians have lost in this revolution is only chains." What they will gain will be the whole world". Marx said that everything that people strive for is related to their interests. All the activities of the exploiting class in history have served the minority, and they have all been activities to realize the interests of the minority through the exploitation of the majority. In contrast, the movement of the proletariat aims at the vast majority of the people. Seeking the liberation of mankind for the fundamental interests of the overwhelming majority of the people is the "movement of the proletariat" and the value goal, starting point, and ultimate goal of Marxism. This is the reason why it is said that Marxism is a theory of the people and that Marxism has the character of the people. "Seeking the interests of the overwhelming majority of the people" is a goal established by Marxism and for which all communists should strive for.

From the perspective of the relationship between "movement subject" and "movement value", the two are inseparable and are a unified whole. The value goal of the "movement of the overwhelming majority of the people" is to "seek the interests of the overwhelming majority of the people", and the main body of "seeking the interests of the overwhelming majority of the people" is the "movement of the overwhelming majority of the people", and the fundamental reason for "seeking interests" is that the main body of the historical movement is the "overwhelming majority of the people". The view of denying the "overwhelming majority of people" and "seeking the interests of the overwhelming majority of the people" is not historical materialism, nor is it historical materialism the view of severing the ties between them. Utopian socialists see the miserable fate of the proletariat and the necessity of "seeking benefits for the vast majority of the people", but they regard certain designs and utopians of their own as means to "seek benefits for the vast majority of the people", and "social activities must be replaced by their personal inventive activities, and the historical conditions of emancipation must be replaced by the conditions of fantasy." They fail to see that only the "movement of the overwhelming majority" can achieve the goal of "working for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of the people", and as Marx and Engels criticized, "they do not see any historical initiative on the part of the proletariat". In his Manuscripts on the Philosophy of Economics of 1844, Marx pointed out that communism is "the real appropriation of the essence of man through and for man". Here, Marx uses the word "and" to link "through man" with "for man".

The idea of "two overwhelming majorities" is the theoretical source of the CPC's people's stand

To study Marxism, it is necessary to study not only the current tide of theory, but also the source of theory, and still more the integration of the tide of theory with the source of theory. The Communist Party of China adheres to the position of the people, and in different historical periods, the party leaders have made important expositions, such as Mao Zedong proposing "serving the people wholeheartedly", Deng Xiaoping proposing the "three advantages" standard, and General Secretary Xi Jinping proposing "people-centered" since the new era. From the perspective of the exploration of the theoretical source, the people's position includes two meanings. First, the main body of the people. The foundation of the Communist Party of China lies in the people, its blood is in the people, and its strength is in the people. The people are the creators of history, the people are the subjects of history, and the people are the masters of history. General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized: "The people are the creators of history and the fundamental force that determines the future and destiny of the Party and the country. "The second is the supremacy of the people. General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed: "Every Communist Party member must understand that the Party has no special interests of its own except the interests of the people, and all the work of the Party is to realize, safeguard and develop the fundamental interests of the broadest masses of the people." Of course, around the people's position, there are other views such as people's sharing, people's standards, people's testing, etc., but these views are rooted in the people's subject and the people's supremacy, and the theoretical source of the people's subjectivity and the people's supremacy is the idea of "two vast majorities".