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Dictatorship in politics is a form of dominance of people/group of people/political parties/classes over others via economic, politics, laws, and especially violence. Dictatorship is an inherent part of class society.
Often used in propaganda as an opposition to democracy, to describe a type of government in a country “b” where all or the majority of control over the country, its political and economical life, or even lives of people belongs to a single person, in a contrast with democratic government of country “a”.
Although this description might be correct in some cases such simplification serves as a mere smokescreen as well as painting it permanently negative, which hides the main definition of dictatorship in politics, specifically the factor of dominance of one over others. Thus the stereotyped definition may not let people see the dictatorship behind the most democratic facade, the dictatorship of not just a single person, but one group of people over other group of people, one class over another.[1]
Historical background[edit | edit source]
With the formation of early class societies in the early bronze age, and later when the effectiveness of human labour increased to create a surplus product big enough to feed more people than actually required in the production of the necessities, people were separated into two groups: exploiters and exploited. Thus the state was created, a tool to direct the will of the dominant class, through ownership of the means of production, onto the growing masses of people. Thus was the creation of the first dictatorships centuries before the first spoken concept of democracy and modern conflicts between democracy and dictatorship in common parlance. It is a misconception that dictatorship is a relatively new concept.
The state is a special organization of force: it is an organization of violence for the suppression of some class.[2]
— Vladimir Lenin The State and Revolution. Chapter II. The Eve of Revolution
Using historical materialism and dialectics, Marxists discovered the class nature of dictatorship, and the fact that dictatorship of one class over another does exist despite the claims of politics regarding the freedom in their state. They called it the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and found the dialectical counterpart for it as a form of dictatorship of ones being oppressed by said dictatorship - workers\proletariat, who do not possess means of production big enough to exploit others, and they called it the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Marxists say that the path to a real democracy for a majority of people does not stop with some human rights to vote and speak that has been given them with bourgeois revolutions across the world and following installation of liberal ideas as the leading ones. Ones that in reality only covered the new form of dictatorship that took place over the dictatorship of landlords. They saw it through the use of the same methods but in favor of masses: directing the will of the majority of society onto the current ruling class, and applying the dictatorship of masses against bourgeoisie to turn the dictatorship of bourgeoisie into the dictatorship of proletariat.[3][4]
The group which directs a dictatorship is considered a ruling class. In a capitalist society, the bourgeoisie is the ruling class, and their government forms a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.
See also[edit | edit source]
References[edit | edit source]
- ↑ Hal Draper (1987). The ‘Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ in Marx and Engels: '1. Short Sketch of ‘Dictatorship’'. [MIA]
- ↑ Vladimir Lenin. The state and revolution: '2'. [MIA]
- ↑ “The state is a machine in the hands of the ruling class for suppressing the resistance of its class enemies. In this respect the dictatorship of the proletariat does not differ essentially from the dictatorship of any other class, for the proletarian state is a machine for the suppression of the bourgeoisie. But there is one substantial difference. This difference consists in the fact that all hitherto existing class states have been dictatorships of an exploiting minority over the exploited majority, whereas the dictatorship of the proletariat is the dictatorship of the exploited majority over the exploiting minority.”
Joseph Stalin (1924). The Foundations of Leninism: 'IV THE DICTATORSHIP OF THE PROLETARIAT; 2) The dictatorship of the proletariat as the rule of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie.'. [MIA] - ↑ Joseph Stalin (1924). The Foundations of Leninism: 'IV THE DICTATORSHIP OF THE PROLETARIAT; 1) The dictatorship of the proletariat as the instrument of the proletarian revolution'.