Oppressors–oppressed distinction

Oppressors–oppressed distinction or dominant–dominated opposition is a political concept. One of the first theorists to use it was Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, who wrote in his 1802 The German Constitution: "The Catholics had been in the position of oppressors, and the Protestants of the oppressed."[1] Karl Marx made the concept very influential, and it is often considered a fundamental element of Marxist analysis.[2] Some have judged it simplistic.[3] Many authors have adapted it to other contexts, including Marx, Friedrich Engels, Vladimir Lenin, Antonio Gramsci, Simone Weil, Paulo Freire, and others. It has been used in a variety of contexts, including discussions of the bourgeoisie and proletariat, imperialism, and self-determination.[4]

Imperialism and self-determination

The theory of oppressor and oppressed nations has been part of Vladimir Lenin's thought on imperialism, self-determination and criticisms of Social Democrats.[5] Lenin wrote:

That is why the focal point in the Social-Democratic programme must be that division of nations into oppressor and oppressed which forms the essence of imperialism, and is deceitfully evaded by the social-chauvinists and Kautsky. This division is not significant from the angle of bourgeois pacifism or the philistine Utopia of peaceful competition among independent nations under capitalism, but it is most significant from the angle of the revolutionary struggle against imperialism.[5]

Criticism

The political philosopher Kenneth Minogue provides a criticism of the oppressors–oppressed distinction in his work The Pure Theory of Ideology.[6]

References

Footnotes
  1. Hegel 1999, p. 52.
  2. Derrida 1994, p. 55; Kauppi 1996, p. 61.
  3. Derrida 1994, p. 55.
  4. Gordon & Gordon 1991, p. 145; Halabi, Sonnenschein & Friedman 2004, pp. 59, 74–76.
  5. Lenin 1927.
  6. Minogue 1985.

Bibliography
  • Derrida, Jacques (1994). Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning and the New International.
  • Gordon, Ḥayim; Gordon, Rivca, eds. (1991). Israel/Palestine: The Quest for Dialogue. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books. ISBN 978-0-88344-731-4.
  • Halabi, Rabah; Sonnenschein, Nava; Friedman, Ariella (2004). "Liberate the Oppressed and Their Oppressors: Encounters Between University Students". In Halabi, Rabah (ed.). Israeli and Palestinian Identities in Dialogue: The School for Peace Approach. Translated by Reich, Deb. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. pp. 59–78. ISBN 978-0-8135-3415-2.
  • Hegel, G. W. F. (1999). "The German Constitution (1798–1802)". In Dickey, Lawrence; Nisbet, H. B. (eds.). Hegel: Political Writings. Translated by Nisbet, H. B. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. pp. 6–101. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511808029.006. ISBN 978-0-511-80802-9.
  • Lenin, V. I. (1927). "The Revolutionary Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination". Lenin Miscellany VI.
  • Minogue, Kenneth (1985). Alien Powers: The Pure Theory of Ideology. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. ISBN 978-0-297-78426-5.
  • Kauppi, Niilo (1996). French Intellectual Nobility: Institutional and Symbolic Transformations in the Post-Sartrian Era. Albany, New York: State University Press of New York. ISBN 978-0-7914-3143-6.


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