Philosophical Thought of Trotsky & Marx

Leon Trotsky, or to be more precise, Lev Davidovich Bronstein, was a pragmatist and interpreter of the doctrines of Marxism. From an early age, he espoused the revolutionary doctrine of change in Russia, and eventually became one of the preeminent figures in Lenin's Bolshevik Party. In brief, after successfully reorganizing the Red Army during Russia's Civil War after the 1917 Revolution, Trotsky more vocally espoused the doctrine of "Permanent Revolution." This led to conflict with Josef Stalin, and Trotsky's eventual ouster from the Soviet Union and assassination in 1940 (Payne, 1977).

This paper will analyze Trotsky's philosophical thought in comparison with that of Karl Marx. It will be divided into two major sections, the first dealing with Marxian thought, the second on Trotsky's interpretation of Marx. Since Marx wrote such a voluminous amount of material, this paper will concentrate on Wage-Labor

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e must be a balance (in a capitalistic system) which determines value itself. "At the moment when supply and demand equilibrate each other, and therefore cease to act, the market price of a commodity coincides with its real value . . .." This is in complete contradiction to the assertion that the prices of commodities are regulated by wage demands, instead positing that "the value of commodities is determined by the value of labour" and "the value of labour is the general measure of value." Marx makes the difficult point that value is quite relative, at least in the sense that the value of a commodity will remain the same, with the only change the rate or type of currency. In this he means that the exchangeable value of things is more a social function, but that the real value of the product is its inherent measure of "labour power"--the amount of labor it took to make or prepare the product. Thus, the productive powers of labor depend on the natural conditions of labor and the relationship that man has between his labor power and capital. "Every one of your relations to man and to nature must be a specific expression, corresponding to the object of your will, of your real individual life" (Marx, 1976, p. 28; Tucker, 1978, p
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Approximate Word count = 3458
Approximate Pages = 14 (250 words per page)