p Since different classes occupy different economic positions in society and live under dissimilar conditions, their interests cannot be the same. For example, the bourgeoisie has a vested interest in cutting the workers’ wages, as this would bring them bigger profits, while the workers want quite the opposite; during general elections to legislative organs, both the capitalists and the proletariat are anxious to get their own representatives elected; the bourgeoisie is 380 interested in consolidating private property, since it is the economic basis for its domination, while the proletariat wants private property to be abojishedj the bourgeoisie does its best to perpetuate the exploitation of man by man, while the proletariat is anxious to abolish it and create conditions precluding the possibility of anyone making a living at the expense of other people’s labour, etc.

p Pursuing opposite interests, the antagonistic classes wage a continuous, never ending, struggle which at a definite stage results in the restructuring of the entire social organism and society’s transition from one stage of its development to the next. “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”  [380•1 

p In the first place, the class struggle affects the development of the productive forces. In particular, it speeds up the improvement of the means of labour. For instance, the workers’ struggle for shorter working hours compelled the capitalists to introduce improved technology enabling them to produce a larger surplus value. Marx emphasised that the workers’ strikes in many instances gave an impetus to the design and introduction of new machines.

p The influence of the class struggle on the development of the productive forces can also be traced, in a somewhat different form, in other socio-economic formations. In feudal society, in 381 particular, the class struggle of serfs promoted the replacement of corvee by a quit-rent, and later on a transition from the quit-rent in kind to a quit-rent in cash.

p Apart from influencing the development of the productive forces, the class struggle also affects that of production relations. Obsolete production relations are not automatically changed under the impact of the productive forces that have developed within their framework, for the historically doomed but still ruling class, which is bent on staving off impending changes, supports the old production relations. So a force powerful enough to overcome this resistance is required. It is the activities of progressive classes, aimed at changing the existing state of affairs, reflected in the class struggle, that represent this force.

p Only the struggle of society’s progressive forces against the historically outdated ruling class can culminate in the establishment of new production relations corresponding to the level of development attained by the productive forces. This is why the class struggle is a motive force for progress in antagonistic society.

p The class struggle has a long history. Its forms, aims and nature have changed from one period of history to another. Thus, in slave-owning society, for instance, the class struggle of the exploited against the exploiters was not spearheaded against the existing mode of production. By fighting the slave-owners, the slaves tried to liberate themselves from slavery, rather than to abolish it altogether. Even so, their uprisings 382 undermined the slave-owning social system and finally compelled the slave-owners to bind the slaves to the land and undertake certain other measures facilitating the economic transformation of the slave-owning system and its replacement by feudalism.

p In feudal society the exploited peasants started to connect their struggle with changes in social relations, in particular, serfdom, private property in land, and so on.

p While fighting oppression, the peasants usually became politically dominated by the bourgeoisie and obeyed it. The scope of the peasants’ struggle was, therefore, usually limited by the interests of the bourgeoisie. Even so, the peasants’ struggle against exploitation played a positive role, since it promoted the abolition of feudal production relations and brought nearer the victory of the capitalist mode of production.

p Although they fought exploitation and oppression, the working masses of feudal society could not achieve this goal, for they themselves were property-owners and could not objectively oppose private property. They opposed feudal ownership of the means of production but supported capitalist property and capitalist production relations. As a result their struggle led in practice to the replacement of one form of exploitation by another.

p The situation changed radically when the industrial proletariat became an independent political force. It is the proletariat’s economic position that impels it to press consistently for the abolition of private property and exploitation 383 of man by man. In the very course of the development of capitalist production, the proletarians unite, become organised and turn into a migthy force confronting the exploiters.

p The proletariat started its class struggle with spontaneous attacks by isolated groups of the working class against individual capitalists who were the most notorious oppressors of workers. This struggle centred strictly on economic issues and was directed against intolerable exploitation and oppression, the causes of which were initially seen in some individual capitalists’ brutality and lack of human feeling.

p Economic struggle is the first historical form of the proletariat’s class struggle, ft grows spontaneously out of the economic plight of the working class and is waged mainly for improvements in the terms for selling labour power, rather than for the complete abolition of such conditions. The importance of the economic struggle is, however, great, since it gave rise to the first class organs of the proletariat-the trade unions.

p Later on the working class becomes convinced that the economic struggle can neither radically improve its position nor abolish exploitation. It begins to realise the relation between the bourgeoisie’s economic domination and state power, as well as the fact that the latter safeguards the exploitative system. As sofci as the working class realises that both its economic and political interests are diametrically opposed to those of the bourgeoisie, the proletariat’s class struggle becomes conscious and purposeful.

p Socialist ideology and its alliance with the workers’ movement has a great role to play in developing the class struggle from a spontaneous, economic movement into a conscious and political one. The communist party performs the task of disseminating the socialist ideology in the working-class movement. It is Communists who wage the ideological struggle against bourgeois jmd petty-bourgeois views. While expressing the lundamental interests oFthe working class, the communist party theoretically substantiates the goals of the proletariat’s struggle and defines the ways and means of attaining them.

p The class struggle of the proletariat thus develops in three directions: economic, political and ideological, with the political struggle playing the decisive role, since only political domination of the working class can ensure a radical transformation of the economy and the building of the classless communist society.

p A major feature of the proletariat’s class struggle against the bourgeoisie today is the fact that it is intensifying. This is associated with the aggravation of all social conflicts in the epoch of imperialism and with the emergence and successful development of the socialist world system which graphically demonstrates the ways for abolishing the exploitation of man by man.

p Another important feature of the present-day struggle of the proletariat is the stronger link between the economic and political struggle. Workers’ strikes increasingly acquire a political nature and are accompanied by political 385 demands and all kinds of political demonstrations.

p In view of the growing heterogeneity of the working class (under the conditions of monopoly rule its ranks are rapidly being replenished by members of the petty bourgeoisie who have failed to withstand competition) and the systematic corruption by the bourgeoisie of the upper strata of workers (the so-called workers’ aristocracy), the working class movement is lacking in unity. Some of its sections follow Communists, while the others support opportunists who, in effect, voice the interests of the bourgeoisie. One of the most important tasks of the present-day revolutionary working-class movement is thus the struggle for unity of action.

p Another specific feature of the class struggle of the proletariat in modern conditions is its close alliance with various democratic movements fighting against monopoly domination and for peace, national independence and sovereignty. Though the participants in these movements do not pursue the aim of transforming the capitalist system into a socialist one, their struggle, nevertheless, greatly contributes to the proletariat’s struggle for socialism. “General democratic struggles against the monopolies,” says the Programme of the CPSU, “do not delay the socialist revolution but bring it nearer. The struggle for democracy is a component of the struggle for socialism".   [385•1 

Speaking of the connection between the class struggle of the proletariat and the present-day 386 democratic movements, we must take into account that today these movements have somewhat different goals than in the pre-monopoly period of capitalism. Whereas in the past they were mainly directed against the vestiges of feudalism, today these movements in the industrialised capitalist countries are directed against the domination of the monopolies that express, in the most concentrated form, the essence of modern capitalism. In the industrialised capitalist countries the present-day democratic movements are therefore linked in one way or another with the struggle against capitalism, against some of its most reactionary aspects. As for the developing countries, the democratic movements there are still spearheaded against feudalism, which hampers their progress, and against the foreign capital that has taken root in these countries and is doing its utmost to retain its position. In these countries, too, there is a possibility of setting up an alliance of the working class led by the communist party with the peasantry, the urban petty bourgeoisie and the revolutionary-minded national bourgeoisie-an alliance which would fnrrn^a .basis for the transition to socialism by-passing the capitalist system.