>>> James Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com> 09/02/99 12:33PM >
Therefore, it seems apparent that for Gramsci it was not sufficient
that intellectuals like Marx or Kautsky or Lenin bring a socialist
consciousness to the working class. Such a consciousness could
not be expected to take root within the working class without
the development or organic intellectuals within the working class.
Jim F.
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Charles: I agree with this. Marxist-Leninist Party theory assumes that not only is socialist consciousness brought, but it must be received. If I look I can probably find passages of Lenin which are the equivalent of Gramsci's organic intellectual concept. I have already mentioned that Lenin used a rule of thumb for ratio of intellectuals to workers in the Party of 1 to 20. Those workers in the Party are organic intellectuals. Lenin certainly didn't mean that the intellectuals in the Party would be all from the exact strata from which Marx, Engels and Lenin came. They all wanted to develop WORKER-intellectuals. Engels and Marx were happy to mention Dietzgen, a worker, had codiscovered their theory. Lenin did not have an intellectual elitist concept or practice of the Party compared to Gramsci's.
On another aspect, it is a Leninist approach that the organic intellectuals would be modifying their ideas based on communication and exchange with workers. The working class has to bring concrete-based working class consciousness to the petit bougeois intellectuals. The Party is the cite of intellectual struggle and exchange. Lenin listened and interacted with workers more than most intellectuals who criticize him.
Charles Brown