Class conflict, also referred to as class struggle and class warfare, is the political tension and economic antagonism that exists in society because of

socio-economic Socioeconomics (also known as social economics) is the social science that studies how economic activity affects and is shaped by social processes. In general it analyzes how modern societies progress, stagnate, or regress because of their local ...

competition among the

social class A social class is a grouping of people into a set of Dominance hierarchy, hierarchical social categories, the most common being the Upper class, upper, Middle class, middle and Working class, lower classes. Membership in a social class can for ...

es or between rich and

poor Poverty is the state of having few material possessions or little

income< ...

. The forms of class conflict include direct violence such as wars for resources and cheap labor, assassinations or revolution; indirect violence such as deaths from poverty and starvation, illness and unsafe working conditions; and economic coercion such as the threat of unemployment or the withdrawal of investment capital ( capital flight); or ideologically, by way of political literature. Additionally, political forms of class warfare include legal and illegal lobbying, and bribery of legislators. The social-class conflict can be direct, as in a dispute between labour and management such as an employer's industrial lockout of their employees in effort to weaken the bargaining power of the corresponding trade union; or indirect such as a workers' slowdown of production in protest at perceived

unfair labor practices An unfair labor practice (ULP) in United States labor law refers to certain actions taken by employers or unions that violate the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (49 Stat. 449) (also known as the NLRA and the Wagner Act after NY Senator R ...

, low wages or poor workplace conditions. In the political and economic philosophies of Karl Marx and Mikhail Bakunin, class struggle is a central tenet and a practical means for effecting radical sociopolitical changes for the social majority, the working class.

Usage

In political science, socialists and

Marxists Marxism is a left-wing to far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand class relations and social conflict and a dialectic ...

use the term ''class conflict'' to define a

by its relationship to the means of production, such as factories, agricultural land, and industrial machinery. The social control of labor and of the production of goods and services, is a political contest between the social classes. The anarchist Mikhail Bakunin said that the class struggles of the working class, the peasantry, and the working poor were central to realizing a

social revolution Social revolutions are sudden changes in the structure and nature of society. These revolutions are usually recognized as having transformed society, economy, culture, philosophy, and technology along with but more than just the political syst ...

to depose and replace the ruling class, and the creation of libertarian socialism. Marx's theory of history proposes that class conflict is decisive in the history of economic systems organized by hierarchies of social class such as capitalism and feudalism. Marxists refer to its overt manifestations as class war, a struggle whose resolution in favor of the working class is viewed by them as inevitable under the plutocratic capitalism.

Oligarchs versus commoners

Where societies are socially divided based on status, wealth, or control of social production and distribution, class structures arise and are thus coeval with civilization itself. This has been well documented since at least European classical antiquity such as the Conflict of the Orders and Spartacus, among others.

Thucydides

In his ''History'', Thucydides describes a civil war in the city of Corcyra between the pro- Athens party of the common people and their pro- Corinth

oligarchic Oligarchy (; ) is a conceptual form of power structure in which power rests with a small number of people. These people may or may not be distinguished by one or several characteristics, such as nobility, fame, wealth, education, or corporate, r ...

opposition. Near the climax of the struggle, "the oligarchs in full rout, fearing that the victorious commons might assault and carry the arsenal and put them to the sword, fired the houses round the market-place and the lodging-houses, in order to bar their advance." The historian Tacitus would later recount a similar class conflict in the city of

Seleucia Seleucia (; grc-gre, Σελεύκεια), also known as or , was a major Mesopotamian city of the Seleucid empire. It stood on the west bank of the Tigris River, within the present-day Baghdad Governorate in Iraq. Name Seleucia ( grc-gre, Σ ...

, in which disharmony between the oligarchs and the commoners would typically lead to each side calling on outside help to defeat the other. Thucydides believed that "as long as poverty gives men the courage of necessity, ..so long will the impulse never be wanting to drive men into danger."

Aristotle

In his treatise ''Politics'', Aristotle describes the basic dimensions of class war: "Again, because the rich are generally few in number, while the poor are many, they appear to be antagonistic, and as the one or the other prevails they form the government.". Aristotle also commented that "poverty is the parent of revolution." However, he did not consider this its only cause. In a society where property is distributed equally across the community, "the nobles will be dissatisfied because they think themselves worthy of more than an equal share of honor's; and this is often found to be a cause of sedition and revolution." Aristotle thought it wrong for the poor to seize the wealth of the rich and divide it among themselves, but he also thought it wrong for the rich to impoverish the multitude. Moreover, he discussed what he considered a middle way between laxity and cruelty in the treatment of slaves by their masters, averring that "if not kept in hand,

laves Laves may refer to: * Fritz Laves (1906-1978), a German mineralogist and crystallographer, best known for his description of the intermetallic Laves phases. * Georg Ludwig Friedrich Laves Georg Ludwig Friedrich Laves (17 December 1788 – 30 ...

are insolent, and think that they are as good as their masters, and, if harshly treated, they hate and conspire against them."

Socrates

Socrates was perhaps the first major Greek philosopher to describe class war. In Plato's ''Republic'', Socrates proposes that "any city, however small, is in fact divided into two, one the city of the poor, the other of the rich; these are at war with one another." Socrates took a poor view of oligarchies, in which members of a small class of wealthy property owners take positions of power in order to dominate a large class of impoverished commoners. He used the analogy of a maritime pilot, who, like a powerholder in a polis, ought to be chosen for his skill, not for the amount of property he owns.

Plutarch

Plutarch recounts how various classical figures took part in class conflict. Oppressed by their indebtedness to the rich, the mass of Athenians chose Solon to be the lawgiver to lead them to freedom from their creditors.

Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (; ; 27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a German philosopher. He is one of the most important figures in German idealism and one of the founding figures of modern Western philosophy. His influence extends a ...

believed that Solon's constitution of the Athenian popular assembly created a political sphere that had the effect of balancing the interests of the three main classes of Athens: * The wealthy aristocratic party of the plain * The poorer common party of the mountains * The moderate party of the coast Participation in Ancient Greek class war could have dangerous consequences. Plutarch noted of King Agis of Sparta that, "being desirous to raise the people, and to restore the noble and just form of government, now long fallen into disuse, eincurred the hatred of the rich and powerful, who could not endure to be deprived of the selfish enjoyment to which they were accustomed."

Patricians versus plebeians

It was similarly difficult for the Romans to maintain peace between the upper class, the patricians, and the lower class, the

plebs In ancient Rome, the plebeians (also called plebs) were the general body of free Roman citizenship, Roman citizens who were not Patrician (ancient Rome), patricians, as determined by the capite censi, census, or in other words "commoners". Both ...

. French

Enlightenment Enlightenment or enlighten may refer to: Age of Enlightenment * Age of Enlightenment, period in Western intellectual history from the late 17th to late 18th century, centered in France but also encompassing (alphabetically by country or culture): ...

philosopher Montesquieu notes that this conflict intensified after the overthrow of the Roman monarchy. In '' The Spirit of Laws'' he lists the four main grievances of the plebs, which were rectified in the years following the deposition of King Tarquin: * The patricians had much too easy access to positions of public service. * The constitution granted the

consuls A consul is an official representative of the government of one state in the territory of another, normally acting to assist and protect the citizens of the consul's own country, as well as to facilitate trade and friendship between the people ...

far too much power. * The plebs were constantly verbally slighted. * The plebs had too little power in their assemblies.

Camillus

The Senate had the ability to give a magistrate the power of dictatorship, meaning he could bypass public law in the pursuit of a prescribed mandate. Montesquieu explains that the purpose of this institution was to tilt the balance of power in favour of the patricians. However, in an attempt to resolve a conflict between the patricians and the plebs, the dictator Camillus used his power of dictatorship to coerce the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

into giving the plebs the right to choose one of the two consuls.

Marius

Tacitus believed that the increase in Roman power spurred the patricians to expand their power over more and more cities. This process, he felt, exacerbated pre-existing class tensions with the plebs, and eventually culminated in a civil war between the patrician Sulla and the populist reformer Marius. Marius had taken the step of enlisting '' capite censi'', the very lowest class of citizens, into the army, for the first time allowing non-land owners into the legions.

Tiberius Gracchus

Of all the notable figures discussed by Plutarch and Tacitus, agrarian reformer Tiberius Gracchus may have most challenged the upper classes and most championed the cause of the lower classes. In a speech to the common soldiery, he decried their lowly conditions:

"The savage beasts," said he, "in Italy, have their particular dens, they have their places of repose and refuge; but the men who bear arms, and expose their lives for the safety of their country, enjoy in the meantime nothing more in it but the air and light; and having no houses or settlements of their own, are constrained to wander from place to place with their wives and children."

Following this observation, he remarked that these men "fought indeed and were slain, but it was to maintain the luxury and the wealth of other men." Cicero believed that Tiberius Gracchus's reforming efforts saved Rome from tyranny, arguing:

Tiberius Gracchus (says Cicero) caused the free-men to be admitted into the tribes, not by the force of his eloquence, but by a word, by a gesture; which had he not effected, the republic, whose drooping head we are at present scarce able to uphold, would not even exist.

Tiberius Gracchus weakened the power of the Senate by changing the law so that judges were chosen from the ranks of the

knights A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...

, instead of their social superiors in the senatorial class.

Julius Caesar

Contrary to Shakespeare's depiction of

Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...

in the tragedy ''

'', historian Michael Parenti has argued that Caesar was a populist, not a tyrant. In 2003 The New Press published Parenti's ''The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome.'' ''Publishers Weekly'' said "Parenti ..narrates a provocative history of the late republic in Rome (100–33 BC) to demonstrate that Caesar's death was the culmination of growing class conflict, economic disparity and political corruption." ''Kirkus Reviews'' wrote: "Populist historian Parenti... views ancient Rome’s most famous assassination not as a tyrannicide but as a sanguinary scene in the never-ending drama of class warfare."

Coriolanus

The patrician Coriolanus, whose life William Shakespeare would later depict in the tragic play '' Coriolanus'', fought on the other side of the class war, for the patricians and against the plebs. When grain arrived to relieve a serious shortage in the city of Rome, the plebs made it known that they felt it ought to be divided amongst them as a gift, but Coriolanus stood up in the Senate against this idea on the grounds that it would empower the plebs at the expense of the patricians. This decision would eventually contribute to Coriolanus's undoing when he was impeached following a trial by the tribunes of the plebs. Montesquieu recounts how Coriolanus castigated the tribunes for trying a patrician, when in his mind no one but a consul had that right, although a law had been passed stipulating that all appeals affecting the life of a citizen had to be brought before the plebs. In the first scene of Shakespeare's ''Coriolanus'', a crowd of angry plebs gathers in Rome to denounce Coriolanus as the "chief enemy to the people" and "a very dog to the commonalty" while the leader of the mob speaks out against the patricians thusly:

They ne'er cared for us yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act established against the rich, and provide more piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and there's all the love they bear us.

Landlessness and debt

-era historian Edward Gibbon might have agreed with this narrative of Roman class conflict. In the third volume of '' The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'', he relates the origins of the struggle:

e plebeians of Rome ..had been oppressed from the earliest times by the weight of debt and usury; and the husbandman, during the term of his military service, was obliged to abandon the cultivation of his farm. The lands of Italy which had been originally divided among the families of free and indigent proprietors, were insensibly purchased or usurped by the avarice of the nobles; and in the age which preceded the fall of the republic, it was computed that only two thousand citizens were possessed of an independent substance.

similarly states that the 'severity of the patricians their creditors, the debts due to whom they had to discharge by slave-work, drove the plebs to revolts.' Gibbon also explains how Augustus facilitated this class warfare by pacifying the plebs with actual bread and circuses. The economist

Adam Smith Adam Smith (baptized 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the thinking of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as "The Father of Economics"——— ...

noted that the poor freeman's lack of land provided a major impetus for Roman colonisation, as a way to relieve class tensions at home between the rich and the landless poor.

described the same phenomenon happening in the impetus to Greek colonisation.

Masters versus workmen

Writing in pre-capitalist Europe, both the Swiss ''philosophe'' Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the

Scottish Enlightenment The Scottish Enlightenment ( sco, Scots Enlichtenment, gd, Soillseachadh na h-Alba) was the period in 18th- and early-19th-century Scotland characterised by an outpouring of intellectual and scientific accomplishments. By the eighteenth century ...

philosopher

made significant remarks on the dynamics of class struggle, as did the

Federalist The term ''federalist'' describes several political beliefs around the world. It may also refer to the concept of parties, whose members or supporters called themselves ''Federalists''. History Europe federation In Europe, proponents of de ...

statesman James Madison across the Atlantic Ocean. Later, in the age of early industrial capitalism, English political economist

John Stuart Mill John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, Member of Parliament (MP) and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of classical liberalism, he contributed widely to ...

and

German idealist German idealism was a philosophical movement that emerged in Germany in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It developed out of the work of Immanuel Kant in the 1780s and 1790s, and was closely linked both with Romanticism and the revolutionary ...

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel would also contribute their perspectives to the discussion around class conflict between employers and employees.

Rousseau

It was with bitter sarcasm that Rousseau outlined the class conflict prevailing in his day between masters and their workmen:

You have need of me, because I am rich and you are poor. We will therefore come to an agreement. I will permit you to have the honour of serving me, on condition that you bestow on me the little you have left, in return for the pains I shall take to command you.

Rousseau argued that the most important task of any government is to fight in class warfare on the side of workmen against their masters, who he said engage in exploitation under the pretence of serving society. Specifically, he believed that governments should actively intervene in the economy to abolish poverty and prevent the accrual of too much wealth in the hands of too few men.

Adam Smith

Like Rousseau, the classical liberal

believed that the amassing of property in the hands of a minority naturally resulted in a disharmonious state of affairs where "the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of many" and "excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade he rich man'spossessions." Concerning wages, he explained the conflicting class interests of masters and workmen, who he said were often compelled to form trade unions for fear of suffering starvation wages, as follows:

What are the common wages of labour, depends everywhere upon the contract usually made between those two parties, whose interests are by no means the same. The workmen desire to get as much, the masters to give as little, as possible. The former are disposed to combine in order to raise, the latter in order to lower, the wages of labour.
Adam Smith Adam Smith (baptized 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the thinking of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as "The Father of Economics"——— ...

''An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations''
Book I, Chapter 8. Project Gutenberg.

Smith was aware of the main advantage of masters over workmen, in addition to state protection:

The masters, being fewer in number, can combine much more easily: and the law, besides, authorises, or at least does not prohibit, their combinations, while it prohibits those of the workmen. We have no acts of parliament against combining to lower the price of work, but many against combining to raise it. In all such disputes, the masters can hold out much longer. A landlord, a farmer, a master manufacturer, or merchant, though they did not employ a single workman, could generally live a year or two upon the stocks, which they have already acquired. Many workmen could not subsist a week, few could subsist a month, and scarce any a year, without employment. In the long run, the workman may be as necessary to his master as his master is to him; but the necessity is not so immediate.

Smith observed that, outside of colonies where land is cheap and labour expensive, both the masters who subsist by profit and the masters who subsist by rents will work in tandem to subjugate the class of workmen, who subsist by wages. Moreover, he warned against blindly legislating in favour of the class of masters who subsist by profit, since, as he said, their intention is to gain as large a share of their respective markets as possible, which naturally results in monopoly prices or close to them, a situation harmful to the other social classes.

James Madison

In his Federalist No. 10, James Madison revealed an emphatic concern with the conflict between rich and poor, commenting that "the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. Those who hold and those who are without property have ever formed distinct interests in society. Those who are creditors, and those who are debtors, fall under a like discrimination." He welcomed class-based factions into political life as a necessary result of political liberty, stating that the most important task of government was to manage and adjust for 'the spirit of party'.

John Stuart Mill

Adam Smith was not the only classical liberal political economist concerned with class conflict. In his ''

Considerations on Representative Government ''Considerations on Representative Government'' is a book by John Stuart Mill published in 1861. Summary Mill argues for representative democracy, representative government, the ideal form of government in his opinion. One of the more notable id ...

'', John Stuart Mill observed the complete marginalisation of workmen's voices in Parliament, rhetorically asking whether its members ever empathise with the position of workmen, instead of siding entirely with their masters, on issues such as the right to

go on strike Strike action, also called labor strike, labour strike, or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to Labor (economics), work. A strike usually takes place in response to grievance (labour), employee grievance ...

. Later in the book, he argues that an important function of truly

representative government Representative democracy, also known as indirect democracy, is a types of democracy, type of democracy where elected people Representation (politics), represent a group of people, in contrast to direct democracy. Nearly all modern liberal democr ...

is to provide a relatively equal balance of power between workmen and masters, in order to prevent threats to the good of the whole of society. During Mill's discussion of the merits of

progressive taxation A progressive tax is a tax in which the tax rate increases as the taxable amount increases.Sommerfeld, Ray M., Silvia A. Madeo, Kenneth E. Anderson, Betty R. Jackson (1992), ''Concepts of Taxation'', Dryden Press: Fort Worth, TX The term ''progre ...

in his essay '' Utilitarianism'', he notes as an aside the power of the rich as independent of state support:

People feel obliged to argue that the State does more for the rich than for the poor, as a justification for its taking more
n taxation N, or n, is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''en'' (pronounced ), plural ''ens''. History ...
from them: though this is in reality not true, for the rich would be far better able to protect themselves, in the absence of law or government, than the poor, and indeed would probably be successful in converting the poor into their slaves.

Hegel

In his '' Philosophy of Right'',

expressed concern that the standard of living of the poor might drop so far as to make it even easier for the rich to amass even more wealth. Hegel believed that, especially in a liberal country such as contemporary England, the poorest will politicise their situation, channelling their frustrations against the rich:

Against nature man can claim no right, but once society is established, poverty immediately takes the form of a wrong done to one class by another.

Capitalist societies

The typical example of class conflict described is class conflict within capitalism. This class conflict is seen to occur primarily between the

bourgeoisie The bourgeoisie ( , ) is a social class, equivalent to the middle or upper middle class. They are distinguished from, and traditionally contrasted with, the proletariat by their affluence, and their great cultural and financial capital. They ...

and the

proletariat The proletariat (; ) is the social class of wage-earners, those members of a society whose only possession of significant economic value is their labour power (their capacity to work). A member of such a class is a proletarian. Marxist philo ...

, and takes the form of conflict over hours of work, value of wages, division of profits, cost of consumer goods, the culture at work, control over parliament or

bureaucracy The term bureaucracy () refers to a body of non-elected governing officials as well as to an administrative policy-making group. Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments staffed with non-elected offi ...

, and economic inequality. The particular implementation of government programs which may seem purely humanitarian, such as disaster relief, can actually be a form of class conflict.

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) led the U.S. as president from 1801 to 1809 and is considered one of the founding fathers. Regarding the interaction between social classes, he wrote:

Max Weber

Max Weber Maximilian Karl Emil Weber (; ; 21 April 186414 June 1920) was a German sociologist, historian, jurist and political economist, who is regarded as among the most important theorists of the development of modern Western society. His ideas profo ...

(1864–1920) agreed with the fundamental ideas of Karl Marx about the economy causing class conflict, but claimed that class conflict can also stem from prestige and power. Weber argued that classes come from the different property locations. Different locations can largely affect one's class by their education and the people they associate with. He also stated that prestige results in different status groupings. This prestige is based upon the social status of one's parents. Prestige is an attributed value and many times cannot be changed. Weber stated that power differences led to the formation of

political parties A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or pol ...

. Weber disagreed with Marx about the formation of classes. While Marx believed that groups are similar due to their economic status, Weber argued that classes are largely formed by

social status Social status is the level of social value a person is considered to possess. More specifically, it refers to the relative level of respect, honour, assumed competence, and deference accorded to people, groups, and organizations in a society. Stat ...

. Weber did not believe that communities are formed by economic standing, but by similar social prestige. Weber did recognize that there is a relationship between social status, social prestige and classes.

Twentieth century

In the U.S., class conflict is often noted in labor/management disputes. As far back as 1933 representative Edward Hamilton of the Airline Pilot's Association, used the term "class warfare" to describe airline management's opposition at the National Labor Board hearings in October of that year. Apart from these day-to-day forms of class conflict, during periods of crisis or revolution class conflict takes on a violent nature and involves repression, assault, restriction of civil liberties, and murderous violence such as assassinations or death squads.

Twenty-first century

Financial crisis

Class conflict intensified in the period after the 2007/8 financial crisis, which led to a global wave of

anti-austerity protests The anti-austerity movement refers to the mobilisation of street protests and grassroots campaigns that has happened across various countries, especially in Europe, since the onset of the worldwide Great Recession. Anti-austerity actions are var ...

, including the Greek and Spanish Indignados movements and later the Occupy movement, whose slogan was " We are the 99%", signalling a more expansive class antagonist against the financial elite than that of the classical Marxist proletariat. The investor,

billionaire A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least one billion (1,000,000,000, i.e., a thousand million) units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. The American busin ...

, and

philanthropist Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...

Warren Buffett, one of the wealthiest people in the world, voiced in 2005 and once more in 2006 his view that his class, the "rich class", is waging class warfare on the rest of society. In 2005 Buffet said to CNN: "It's class warfare, my class is winning, but they shouldn't be." In a November 2006 interview in '' The New York Times'', Buffett stated that " ere’s class warfare all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning." In the speech "The Great American Class War" (2013), the journalist Bill Moyers asserted the existence of social-class conflict between democracy and plutocracy in the U.S.

Chris Hedges Christopher Lynn Hedges (born September 18, 1956) is an American journalist, Presbyterian minister, author, and commentator. In his early career, Hedges worked as a freelance war correspondent in Central America for ''The Christian Science Mon ...

wrote a column for '' Truthdig'' called "Let's Get This Class War Started", which was a play on

Pink's Pink's Hot Dogs is a landmark hot dog restaurant in the Fairfax District of the city of Los Angeles. It is on North La Brea Avenue, across the street from the Hollywood district on the east. History Pink's was founded by Paul and Betty Pin ...

song " Let's Get This Party Started." In a 2022 piece "America’s New Class War", Hedges argues that increased class struggle and

strikes Strike may refer to: People *Strike (surname) Physical confrontation or removal *Strike (attack), attack with an inanimate object or a part of the human body intended to cause harm *Airstrike, military strike by air forces on either a suspected ...

by organized workers, often in defiance of union leadership, is the "one last hope for the United States." Historian Steve Fraser, author of ''The Age of Acquiescence: The Life and Death of American Resistance to Organized Wealth and Power'', asserted in 2014 that class conflict is an inevitability if current political and economic conditions continue, noting that "people are increasingly fed up ..their voices are not being heard. And I think that can only go on for so long without there being more and more outbreaks of what used to be called class struggle, class warfare."

Arab Spring

Often seen as part of the same "movement of squares" as the Indignado and Occupy movements, the Arab Spring was a wave of social protests starting in 2011. Numerous factors have culminated in the Arab Spring, including rejection of dictatorship or absolute monarchy, human rights violations, government corruption (demonstrated by

Wikileaks diplomatic cables The United States diplomatic cables leak, widely known as Cablegate, began on Sunday, 28 November 2010 when WikiLeaks began releasing classified cables that had been sent to the U.S. State Department by 274 of its consulates, embassies, and d ...

), economic decline, unemployment, extreme poverty, and a number of demographic structural factors, such as a large percentage of educated but dissatisfied youth within the population. but class conflict is also a key factor. The catalysts for the revolts in all Northern African and

Persian Gulf countries The Arab states of the Persian Gulf refers to a group of Arab states which border the Persian Gulf. There are seven member states of the Arab League in the region: Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. ...

have been the concentration of wealth in the hands of autocrats in power for decades, insufficient transparency of its redistribution, corruption, and especially the refusal of the youth to accept the status quo.

Socialism

Marxist perspectives

Karl Marx (1818–1883) was a German born philosopher who lived the majority of his adult life in London, England. In '' The Communist Manifesto'', Karl Marx argued that a

class Class or The Class may refer to: Common uses not otherwise categorized * Class (biology), a taxonomic rank * Class (knowledge representation), a collection of individuals or objects * Class (philosophy), an analytical concept used differentl ...

is formed when its members achieve class consciousness and solidarity.Blackwell Reference Online.

'. Retrieved 24 November 2008. This largely happens when the members of a class become aware of their Exploitation of labour, exploitation and the conflict with another class. A class will then realize their shared interests and a common identity. According to Marx, a class will then take action against those that are exploiting the lower classes. What Marx points out is that members of each of the two main classes have interests in common. These class or collective interests are in conflict with those of the other class as a whole. This in turn leads to conflict between individual members of different classes. Marxist analysis of society identifies two main social groups: * ''Labour'' (the

or workers) includes anyone who earns their livelihood by selling their labor power and being paid a wage or salary for their labor time. They have little choice but to work for capital, since they typically have no independent way to survive. * ''Capital'' (the

or capitalists) includes anyone who gets their income not from labor as much as from the

surplus value In Marxian economics, surplus value is the difference between the amount raised through a sale of a product and the amount it cost to the owner of that product to manufacture it: i.e. the amount raised through sale of the product minus the cost ...

they appropriate from the workers who create wealth. The income of the capitalists, therefore, is based on their

exploitation Exploitation may refer to: *Exploitation of natural resources *Exploitation of labour **Forced labour *Exploitation colonialism *Slavery **Sexual slavery and other forms *Oppression *Psychological manipulation In arts and entertainment *Exploita ...

of the workers (proletariat). Not all class struggle is violent or necessarily radical, as with strikes and lockouts. Class antagonism may instead be expressed as low worker morale, minor sabotage and pilferage, and individual workers' abuse of petty authority and hoarding of information. It may also be expressed on a larger scale by support for socialist or populist parties. On the employers' side, the use of union busting legal firms and the lobbying for anti-union laws are forms of class struggle. Not all class struggle is a threat to capitalism, or even to the authority of an individual capitalist. A narrow struggle for higher wages by a small sector of the working-class, what is often called "economism", hardly threatens the status quo. In fact, by applying the craft-union tactics of excluding other workers from skilled trades, an economistic struggle may even weaken the working class as a whole by dividing it. Class struggle becomes more important in the historical process as it becomes more general, as industries are organized rather than crafts, as workers' class consciousness rises, and as they self-organize away from political parties. Marx referred to this as the progress of the proletariat from being a class "in itself", a position in the social structure, to being one "for itself", an active and conscious force that could change the world. Marx largely focuses on the capital industrialist society as the source of

social stratification Social stratification refers to a society's categorization of its people into groups based on socioeconomic factors like wealth, income, race, education, ethnicity, gender, occupation, social status, or derived power (social and political). As ...

, which ultimately results in class conflict. He states that capitalism creates a division between classes which can largely be seen in manufacturing factories. The proletariat, is separated from the bourgeoisie because production becomes a social enterprise. Contributing to their separation is the technology that is in factories. Technology de-skills and alienates workers as they are no longer viewed as having a specialized skill. Another effect of technology is a homogenous workforce that can be easily replaceable. Marx believed that this class conflict would result in the overthrow of the bourgeoisie and that the private property would be communally owned. The mode of production would remain, but communal ownership would eliminate class conflict. Even after a revolution, the two classes would struggle, but eventually the struggle would recede and the classes dissolve. As class boundaries broke down, the state apparatus would wither away. According to Marx, the main task of any state apparatus is to uphold the power of the ruling class; but without any classes there would be no need for a state. That would lead to the

classless The term classless society refers to a society in which no one is born into a social class. Distinctions of wealth, income, education, culture, or social network might arise and would only be determined by individual experience and achievemen ...

, stateless communist society.

Soviet Union and similar societies

A variety of thinkers, mostly Trotskyist and

anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not neces ...

, argue that class conflict existed in Soviet-style societies. Their arguments describe as a class the bureaucratic

stratum In geology and related fields, a stratum ( : strata) is a layer of rock or sediment characterized by certain lithologic properties or attributes that distinguish it from adjacent layers from which it is separated by visible surfaces known as ei ...

formed by the ruling political party (known as the ''

nomenklatura The ''nomenklatura'' ( rus, номенклату́ра, p=nəmʲɪnklɐˈturə, a=ru-номенклатура.ogg; from la, nomenclatura) were a category of people within the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries who held various key admi ...

'' in the Soviet Union), sometimes termed a " new class", that controls and guides the means of production. This ruling class is viewed to be in opposition to the remainder of society, generally considered the proletariat. This type of system is referred by them as state socialism, state capitalism, bureaucratic collectivism or new class societies. Marxism was already a powerful ideological power in Russia before the Soviet Union was created in 1917, since a Marxist group known as the

Russian Social Democratic Labour Party The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP; in , ''Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)''), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist pol ...

existed. This party soon divided into two main factions; the Bolsheviks, who were led by Vladimir Lenin, and the Mensheviks, who were led by

Julius Martov Julius Martov or L. Martov (Ма́ртов; born Yuliy Osipovich Tsederbaum; 24 November 1873 – 4 April 1923) was a politician and revolutionary who became the leader of the Mensheviks in early 20th-century Russia. He was arguably the closes ...

. However, many Marxists argue that unlike in capitalism, the Soviet elites did not own the means of production, or generated

for their personal wealth like in capitalism as the generated profit from the economy was equally distributed into Soviet society. Even some Trotskyist like Ernest Mandel criticized the concept of a new ruling class as an

oxymoron An oxymoron (usual plural oxymorons, more rarely oxymora) is a figure of speech that juxtaposes concepts with opposing meanings within a word or phrase that creates an ostensible self-contradiction. An oxymoron can be used as a rhetorical devi ...

, saying: "The hypothesis of the bureaucracy’s being a new ruling class leads to the conclusion that, for the first time in history, we are confronted with a 'ruling class' which does not exist as a class before it actually rules."

Non-Marxist perspectives

One of the first writers to comment on class struggle in the modern sense of the term was the French revolutionary

François Boissel François () is a French masculine given name and surname, equivalent to the English name Francis. People with the given name * Francis I of France, King of France (), known as "the Father and Restorer of Letters" * Francis II of France, King o ...

. Other class struggle commentators include Henri de Saint-Simon,

Augustin Thierry Augustin Thierry (or ''Jacques Nicolas Augustin Thierry''; 10 May 179522 May 1856) was a French historian. Although originally a follower of Henri de Saint-Simon, he later developed his own approach to history. A committed liberal, his approach ...

François Guizot François Pierre Guillaume Guizot (; 4 October 1787 – 12 September 1874) was a French historian, orator, and statesman. Guizot was a dominant figure in French politics prior to the Revolution of 1848. A conservative liberal who opposed the a ...

, François-Auguste Mignet and

Adolphe Thiers Marie Joseph Louis Adolphe Thiers ( , ; 15 April 17973 September 1877) was a French statesman and historian. He was the second elected President of France and first President of the French Third Republic. Thiers was a key figure in the July Rev ...

. The

Physiocrat Physiocracy (; from the Greek for "government of nature") is an economic theory developed by a group of 18th-century Age of Enlightenment French economists who believed that the wealth of nations derived solely from the value of "land agricultur ...

s, David Ricardo, and after Marx, Henry George noted the inelastic supply of land and argued that this created certain privileges ( economic rent) for landowners. According to the historian

Arnold J. Toynbee Arnold Joseph Toynbee (; 14 April 1889 – 22 October 1975) was an English historian, a philosopher of history, an author of numerous books and a research professor of international history at the London School of Economics and King's Colleg ...

, stratification along lines of class appears only within civilizations, and furthermore only appears during the process of a civilization's decline while not characterizing the growth phase of a civilization. Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, in ''

What is Property? "Property is theft!" (french: La propriété, c'est le vol!) is a slogan coined by French anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon in his 1840 book ''What Is Property? or, An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government''. Overview By "pro ...

'' (1840) states that "certain classes do not relish investigation into the pretended titles to property, and its fabulous and perhaps scandalous history." While Proudhon saw the solution as the lower classes forming an alternative, solidarity economy centered on cooperatives and self-managed workplaces, which would slowly undermine and replace capitalist class society, the anarchist Mikhail Bakunin, while influenced by Proudhon, insisted that a massive class struggle by the working class, peasantry and poor was essential to the creation of libertarian socialism. This would require a final showdown in the form of a social revolution. One of the earliest analyses of the development of class as the development of conflicts between emergent classes is available in

Peter Kropotkin Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin (; russian: link=no, Пётр Алексе́евич Кропо́ткин ; 9 December 1842 – 8 February 1921) was a Russian anarchist, socialist, revolutionary, historian, scientist, philosopher, and activis ...

's '' Mutual Aid''. In this work, Kropotkin analyzes the disposal of goods after death in pre-class or

hunter-gatherer A traditional hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living an ancestrally derived lifestyle in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local sources, especially edible wild plants but also insects, fungi, ...

societies, and how inheritance produces early class divisions and conflict.

Fascists Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and th ...

have often opposed 'horizontal' class struggle in favour of vertical national struggle and instead have attempted to appeal to the working class while promising to preserve the existing social classes and have proposed an alternative concept known as class collaboration.

Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky, American linguist,

philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...

, and political activist, has criticized class war in the United States:

Libertarianism

Charles Comte François-Charles-Louis Comte (1782–1837) was a French lawyer, journalist and political writer. Biography In 1814, Comte, along with Charles Dunoyer, founded with ''Le Censeur'', a liberal journal. In 1820, he was found guilty of attacks again ...

and Charles Dunoyer argued that class struggle came from factions that managed to gain control of the State power. The ruling class are the groups that seize the power of the State to carry out their political agenda, the ''ruled'' are then taxed and regulated by the State for the benefit of the Ruling classes. Through taxation, state power, subsidies, Tax codes, laws, and privileges the State creates class conflict by giving preferential treatment to some at the expense of others by force. In the free market, by contrast, exchanges are not carried out by force but by the Non-aggression principle of cooperation in a Win-win scenario.

Relationship to race

Some historical tendencies of Orthodox Marxism reject racism, sexism, etc. as struggles that essentially distract from class struggle, the real conflict. These divisions within the class prevent the purported antagonists from acting in their common class interest. However, many Marxist internationalists and anti-colonial revolutionaries believe tha
sex, race and class
are bound up together. Within Marxist scholarship there is an ongoing debate about these topics. According to

Michel Foucault Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and how ...

, in the 19th century, the

essentialist Essentialism is the view that objects have a set of attributes that are necessary to their identity. In early Western thought, Plato's idealism held that all things have such an "essence"—an "idea" or "form". In ''Categories'', Aristotle sim ...

notion of the " race" was incorporated by

racists Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...

biologist A biologist is a scientist who conducts research in biology. Biologists are interested in studying life on Earth, whether it is an individual cell, a multicellular organism, or a community of interacting populations. They usually specialize in ...

s, and eugenicists, who gave it the modern sense of "biological race" which was then integrated into "

state racism Institutional racism, also known as systemic racism, is a form of racism that is embedded in the laws and regulations of a society or an organization. It manifests as discrimination in areas such as criminal justice, employment, housing, health ...

". On the other hand, Foucault claims that when

developed their concept of "class struggle", they were partly inspired by the older, non-biological notions of the "race" and the "race struggle". Quoting a non-existent 1882 letter from Marx to Friedrich Engels during a lecture, Foucault erroneously claimed Marx wrote: "You know very well where we found our idea of class struggle; we found it in the work of the French historians who talked about the race struggle." For Foucault, the theme of social war provides the overriding principle that connects class and race struggle.

Moses Hess Moses (Moritz) Hess (21 January 1812 – 6 April 1875) was a German-Jewish philosopher, early communist and Zionist thinker. His socialist theories led to disagreements with Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. He is considered a pioneer of Labor Zion ...

, an important theoretician and

labor Zionist Labor Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת סוֹצְיָאלִיסְטִית, ) or socialist Zionism ( he, תְּנוּעָת הָעַבוֹדָה, label=none, translit=Tnuʽat haʽavoda) refers to the left-wing, socialist variation of Zionism. ...

of the early socialist movement, in his "Epilogue" to "

Rome and Jerusalem ''Rome and Jerusalem: The Last National Question'' (german: Rom und Jerusalem, die Letzte Nationalitätsfrage) is a book published by Moses Hess in 1862 in Leipzig. It gave impetus to the Labor Zionism movement. In his ''magnum opus'', Hess argued ...

" argued that "the race struggle is primary, the class struggle secondary. ..With the cessation of race antagonism, the class struggle will also come to a standstill. The equalization of all classes of society will necessarily follow the emancipation of all the races, for it will ultimately become a scientific question of social economics."

W. E. B. Du Bois William Edward Burghardt Du Bois ( ; February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American-Ghanaian sociologist, socialist, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist. Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, Du Bois grew up in ...

theorized that the intersectional paradigms of race, class, and nation might explain certain aspects of black political economy. Patricia Hill Collins writes: "Du Bois saw race, class, and nation not primarily as personal identity categories but as social hierarchies that shaped African-American access to status, poverty, and power." In modern times, emerging schools of thought in the U.S. and other countries hold the opposite to be true. They argue that the race struggle is less important, because the primary struggle is that of class since labor of all races face the same problems and injustices.

Chronology

Riots with a nationalist background are not included.

Classical antiquity

* Gracchi Tribuneship * Social War, 91–88 BC * Gallic Wars and the assassination of

, according to Michael Parenti * Conflict of the Orders *

Roman Servile Wars The Servile Wars were a series of three slave revolts ("servile" is derived from "''servus''", Latin for "slave") in the late Roman Republic. Wars * First Servile War (135−132 BC) — in Sicily, led by Eunus, a former slave claiming to be a pr ...

Yellow Turban Rebellion The Yellow Turban Rebellion, alternatively translated as the Yellow Scarves Rebellion, was a List of peasant revolts, peasant revolt in China against the Eastern Han dynasty. The uprising broke out in 184 CE during the reign of Emperor Ling of ...

, 184–205 AD

Middle Ages

* Ciompi in Florence, 1378 * Peasants' Revolt in England, 1381 * Jacquerie in 14th-century France *

Saint George's Night Uprising Saint George's Night Uprising in 1343–1345 ( et, Jüriöö ülestõus, ) was an unsuccessful attempt by the indigenous Estonian population in the Duchy of Estonia, the Bishopric of Ösel-Wiek, and the insular territories of the State of the T ...

Modern era

German Peasants' War The German Peasants' War, Great Peasants' War or Great Peasants' Revolt (german: Deutscher Bauernkrieg) was a widespread popular revolt in some German-speaking areas in Central Europe from 1524 to 1525. It failed because of intense oppositio ...

since 1524 *

Shimabara Rebellion The , also known as the or , was an uprising that occurred in the Shimabara Domain of the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japan from 17 December 1637 to 15 April 1638. Matsukura Katsuie, the ''daimyō'' of the Shimabara Domain, enforced unpopular polic ...

, 1637–1638 * English Civil War, 1642–1651 ( Diggers) * French Revolution since 1789see Daniel Guérin, Class Struggle in the First French Republic, Pluto Press 1977 *

Old Price Riots The Old Price Riots of 1809 (also sometimes referred to as the O.P. or OP riots) were caused by rising prices at the new Theatre at Covent Garden, London, after the previous one had been destroyed by fire. Covent Garden was one of two "patent" t ...

, 1809 * July Revolution, 1830 * Canut revolts in Lyon since 1831, often considered as the beginning of the modern

labor movement The labour movement or labor movement consists of two main wings: the trade union movement (British English) or labor union movement (American English) on the one hand, and the political labour movement on the other. * The trade union movement ...

* June Rebellion, 1832 * Galician slaughter, 1846 * Revolutions of 1848 in France et al. * Newport Rising, political revolt in 1839 led by Chartists * Paris Commune, 1871 * Johnson County War, 1889–1893 * Coal Wars, 1890–1930 * Donghak Peasant Revolution in Korea, 1893/1894 *

1905 Russian Revolution The Russian Revolution of 1905,. also known as the First Russian Revolution,. occurred on 22 January 1905, and was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. The mass unrest was directed again ...

* 1907 Romanian Peasants' Revolt *

Mexican Revolution The Mexican Revolution ( es, Revolución Mexicana) was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from approximately 1910 to 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It resulted in the destruction ...

, 1910-1920 * October Revolution in 1917 * Limerick Soviet in Ireland, 1919 * Spartacist uprising in Germany, 1919 * Seattle General Strike of 1919 in Seattle * General Strike of 1919 in Spain * Winnipeg General Strike, 1919 * Ruhr Uprising in Germany, 1920 * Kronstadt rebellion, 1921 * Battle of Blair Mountain, 1921 *

Hamburg Uprising The Hamburg Uprising (german: Hamburger Aufstand) was an insurrection during the Weimar Republic in Germany as part of the so-called German October communist revolution attempt. It was started on 23 October 1923 by one of the most militant sect ...

, 1923 *

1926 United Kingdom general strike The 1926 general strike in the United Kingdom was a general strike that lasted nine days, from 4 to 12 May 1926. It was called by the General Council of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in an unsuccessful attempt to force the British governm ...

1934 West Coast waterfront strike The 1934 West Coast Waterfront Strike (also known as the 1934 West Coast Longshoremen's Strike, as well as a number of variations on these names) lasted 83 days, and began on May 9, 1934 when longshoremen in every US West Coast port walked out ...

* Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 *

Mass killings of landlords under Mao Zedong The Land Reform Movement, also known by the Chinese abbreviation Tǔgǎi (), was a mass movement led by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Mao Zedong during the late phase of the Chinese Civil War and the early People's Republic of China, ...

, 1947–1950 *

Communist insurgency in Myanmar The communist insurgency in Burma (present-day Myanmar) was waged primarily by the Communist Party of Burma (abbr. CPB; colloquially the "white flags") and the Communist Party (Burma) ("red flags") from 1948 to 1989. The conflict ended when th ...

, 1948–1988 * Uprising of 1953 in East Germany * Telangana Rebellion * Cuban Revolution, 1953–1959 * Hungarian Revolution of 1956, foundation of

worker's council A workers' council or labor council is a form of political and economic organization in which a workplace or municipality is governed by a council made up of workers or their elected delegates. The workers within each council decide on what thei ...

s * Poznań 1956 protests * Naxalite-Maoist insurgency, 1967–present * May 1968 in France * Battle of Valle Giulia in Italy, 1968 * Communist rebellion in the Philippines, 1969–present *

Wild cats The wildcat is a species complex comprising two small wild cat species: the European wildcat (''Felis silvestris'') and the African wildcat (''F. lybica''). The European wildcat inhabits forests in Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus, while the ...

in Western Germany, 1969 * Several strikes by coal miners in the United Kingdom **

1969 This year is notable for Apollo 11's first landing on the moon. Events January * January 4 – The Government of Spain hands over Ifni to Morocco. * January 5 **Ariana Afghan Airlines Flight 701 crashes into a house on its approach to ...

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, me ...

1974 Major events in 1974 include the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis and the resignation of United States President Richard Nixon following the Watergate scandal. In the Middle East, the aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War determined politics; f ...

** 1984–85 * Winter of Discontent 1978/1979 * Nicaraguan Revolution *

1993 Russian constitutional crisis The 1993 Russian constitutional crisis, also known as the 1993 October Coup, Black October, the Shooting of the White House or Ukaz 1400, was a political stand-off and a constitutional crisis between the Russian president Boris Yeltsin and t ...

1999 Seattle WTO protests The 1999 Seattle WTO protests, sometimes referred to as the Battle of Seattle, were a series of protests surrounding the WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999, when members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) convened at the Washington State Con ...

2006 Oaxaca protests The Mexican state of Oaxaca was embroiled in a conflict that lasted more than seven months and resulted in at least seventeen deaths and the occupation of the capital city of Oaxaca by the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO). The con ...

in Mexico * Bolivarian Revolution *

2008 Greek riots The 2008 Greek riots started on 6 December 2008, when Alexandros Grigoropoulos ( el, Αλέξανδρος Γρηγορόπουλος), a 15-year-old Greek student, was killed by a special officer in Exarcheia district of central Athens. The kill ...

* Kyrgyz Revolution of 2010 *

Egyptian Revolution of 2011 The 2011 Egyptian revolution, also known as the 25 January revolution ( ar, ثورة ٢٥ يناير; ), began on 25 January 2011 and spread across Egypt. The date was set by various youth groups to coincide with the annual Egyptian "Police ho ...

2011 England riots The 2011 England riots, more widely known as the London riots, were a series of riots between 6 and 11 August 2011. Thousands of people rioted in cities and towns across England, which saw looting, arson, as well as mass deployment of police ...

* World Social Forum * World Economic Forum * Occupy Wall Street, 2011 * Jasic Incident * Rojava Revolution *

Protests against Rodrigo Duterte Protests against Former President Rodrigo Duterte escalated on November 18, 2016, following Duterte's support of the burial of the late president Ferdinand Marcos. These series of protests are mostly conducted by progressive groups and other ...

in the Philippines, 2016-2022 * Yellow vests movement in France, 2018–present * 2019–2020 Chilean protests * 2019-2020 Hong Kong protests

References

External links

2008-2010 Study: CEOs Who Fired Most Workers Earned Highest Pay
– video report by '' Democracy Now!''
How a Real Class War, Like with Guns, Could Actually Happen
'' Vice'', 26 November 2018. {{authority control Anti-capitalism Anti-fascism Conflict theory Political science Social classes Social conflict Socialism