u/NOTTallestEgg

i have no idea if this is the right sub to ask this type of question but i figured there's no harm in posting

Ferdinand Lassalle was one of the biggest figures of state socialism, who among other things advocated that the existing state should be used to bring about socialism - Marx critiqued this approach in Critique of the Gotha Programme

However when most people think of socialism, they think of Lassalle's ideas - the state having heavy management roles in the economy - and not Marx's own ideas that attacked using the existing state to bring his goals. This is mostly because (and this is from an American standpoint) socialism and capitalism are taught as a spectrum between market and government ownership - instead of who owns the means of production, the existence of commodity production, production for use instead of profit, among other things.

Is there any reasoning for leaving out Ferdinand Lassalle and conflating his ideas with Marxism beyond cold-war demonization of Marxism in general?

Ferdinand Lassalle was one of the biggest figures of state socialism, who among other things advocated that the existing state should be used to bring about socialism - Marx critiqued this approach in Critique of the Gotha Programme

However when most people think of socialism, they think of Lassalle's ideas - the state having heavy management roles in the economy - and not Marx's own ideas that attacked using the existing state to bring socialism. This is mostly because (and this is from an American standpoint) socialism and capitalism are taught as a spectrum between market and government ownership - instead of who owns the means of production, the existence of commodity production, production for use instead of profit, among other things.

Is there any reasoning for leaving out Ferdinand Lassalle and conflating his ideas with Marxism beyond cold-war demonization of Marxism in general?

idk if this is a better post for r/askphilosophy or this sub, so i asked in both places

Ferdinand Lassalle was one of the biggest figures of state socialism, who among other things advocated that the existing state should be used to bring about socialism - Marx critiqued this approach in Critique of the Gotha Programme

However when most people think of socialism, they think of Lassalle's ideas - the state having heavy management roles in the economy - and not Marx's own ideas that attacked using the existing state to bring socialism. This is mostly because (and this is from an American standpoint) socialism and capitalism are taught as a spectrum between market and government ownership - instead of who owns the means of production, the existence of commodity production, production for use instead of profit, among other things.

Is there any reasoning for leaving out Ferdinand Lassalle and conflating his ideas with Marxism beyond cold-war demonization of Marxism in general?

idk if this is a better post for r/AskHistorians or this sub, so i asked in both places

To my understanding the word "working class" should simply mean if one works at their company in contrast to the people who own the company (ie, the board of directors). However in America we usually use it to denote people who either a) aren't college educated b) makes a certain income level or c) works at a blue collar job regardless if they own the company they work at or not.

What caused the term to evolve this way? Please let me know if I ought to be asking this question somewhere else

To my understanding the word "working class" should simply mean if one works at their company in contrast to the people who own the company (ie, the board of directors). However in America we usually use it to denote people who either a) aren't college educated b) makes a certain income level or c) works at a blue collar job regardless if they own the company they work at or not.

What caused the term to evolve this way? Please let me know if I ought to be asking this question somewhere else