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66-452: During the 1960s, Mao's view of class struggle focused on two distinct dimensions. One level was class struggle within society to avoid revisionism , a process which required socialist education. The second level was struggle within the Party itself to address bureaucratism and the fear that Party bureaucrats might become a new bourgeoisie. Thus, the goal of the socialist education movement

132-708: A fine for showing up, or a simple refusal of clocking in on the time clock . For these reasons, lockouts are referred to as the antithesis of strikes. Lockouts are common in major league sports . In the United States and Canada, the National Football League , Major League Baseball , the National Basketball Association , and the National Hockey League have all experienced lockouts. A lockout

198-405: A fellow worker. When Marxists speak of class struggle, they define a class primarily in economic terms, i.e., by its relationship to the means of production . When anarchists like Bakunin speak of class struggle, they have a broader definition of "social class" which encompasses "notions of domination and privilege" in the political and cultural spheres as well as the economic. Bakunin believed

264-516: A large scale around the world during and after industrialization. Some of the lockout incidents are historically significant. The Dublin Lockout was a major industrial dispute between 20,000 workers and 300 employers in Dublin . The dispute lasted from 26 August 1913 to 18 January 1914, and is often viewed as the most severe and significant industrial dispute in the history of Ireland . Central to

330-570: A lockout of all domestic employees in the face of ongoing union industrial action . That cancelled all flights, grounding the entire fleet for several days. On August 15, 2005, 5,500 employees of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation , a Canadian public broadcaster were locked out by CEO Robert Rabinovitch in a dispute over future hiring practices. While services continued during the lock-out, programming consisted mainly of repeats, with news coverage being provided by

396-435: A lockout. In September 2016, Long Island University became the first institution of higher education to use a lockout against its faculty members. On 8 April, 1998, stevedoring company Patrick Corporation sought to restructure its operations for productivity reasons. In an industrial watershed event , it sacked all its workers and imposed a lockout on wharves around Australia. On 29 October 2011, Qantas declared

462-413: A necessary result of political liberty, stating that the most important task of government was to manage and adjust for 'the spirit of party'. In his Philosophy of Right , Hegel 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,

528-673: A small wage increase as compensation. The term lock-in refers to the practice of physically preventing workers from leaving a workplace. In most jurisdictions, it is illegal, but it is occasionally reported, especially in some developing countries. Lock-ins should not be confused with a sitdown strike , like the Flint sit-down strike between the United Automobile Workers and General Motors Corporation . More recently, lock-ins have been carried out by employees against management, which have been labeled ' bossnapping ' by

594-481: A strike. For the above reasons, many American employers have historically been reluctant to impose lockouts and instead try to provoke a strike. However, as American unions have increasingly begun to resort to slowdowns rather than strikes, lockouts have become a more common tactic of many employers. Even as strikes are on the decline, lockouts are on the rise in the US. In 1892, after several wage cuts and disputes with

660-568: A technique described as "turning away the spearpoint," local cadres often sought to blame problems on former landlords or those who had been criticized during the 1957 Anti-Rightist Campaign . The Socialist Education Movement is regarded as the precursor of the Cultural Revolution . Mao became frustrated with resistance to the Socialist Education Movement and the experience further developed his view that

726-432: Is a work stoppage or denial of employment initiated by the management of a company during a labor dispute . In contrast to a strike , in which employees refuse to work, a lockout is initiated by employers or industry owners. Lockouts are usually implemented by simply refusing to admit employees onto company premises, and may include changing locks or hiring security guards for the premises. Other implementations include

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792-425: Is a great property, there is great inequality. For one very rich man, there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy to invade his possessions. It is only under the shelter of the civil magistrate, that the owner of that valuable property, which

858-531: Is a pattern that has repeated since at least European classical antiquity as illustrated in the Conflict of the Orders and the slave revolt led by Spartacus . 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 opposition. Near the climax of the struggle, "the oligarchs in full rout, fearing that

924-407: Is acquired by the labour of many years, or perhaps of many successive generations, can sleep a single night in security. He is at all times surrounded by unknown enemies, whom, though he never provoked, he can never appease, and from whose injustice he can be protected only by the powerful arm of the civil magistrate, continually held up to chastise it. Writing The Wealth of Nations , Smith's concern

990-474: Is generally an attempt to enforce specific terms of employment upon a group of employees during a dispute. It is often used to force unionized workers to accept new conditions, such as lower wages. If the union is asking for higher wages, better benefits, or maintaining benefits, a manager may use the threat of a lockout – or an actual lockout – to convince the union to relent. Far from all labour disputes involve lockouts (or strikes), but lockouts have been used on

1056-614: The BBC on TV and wire-service feeds on radio. The lock-out ended on October 11, 2005. On 2 April 2013, the Danish Union of Teachers ( Danish : Danmarks Lærerforening ) and the National Union of Municipalities ( Danish : Kommunernes Landsforening ) declared a lockout for more than 60,000 primary school teachers across the country. Over 600,000 students were also affected by the lockout and could not go to school. The dispute

1122-572: The National Basketball Association in the 1995 offseason , the 1996 offseason , and the 1998–99 and 2011–12 seasons , the National Hockey League in the 1994–95 , 2004–05 and 2012–13 seasons, and the National Football League in the 2011 offseason . The controversial 2012 NFL referee lockout involved referees, not players. In 2005, the NHL became the first major professional sports league in North America to cancel an entire season due to

1188-511: The Senate into giving the plebs the right to choose one of the two consuls. 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

1254-459: 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 , instead of their social superiors in

1320-445: The ox-demons and snake-spirits working against socialism. During the Socialist Education Movement, higher level cadres were sent around the country to investigate the relationships between local cadres and the people. Urban young people were also encouraged to visit rural areas during breaks from school to learn about the conditions of rural people. Approximately 3.5 million officials and students were sent into rural China to implement

1386-534: The socioeconomic hierarchy. In its simplest manifestation, class conflict refers to the ongoing battle between rich and poor . In the writings of several leftist , socialist , and communist theorists, notably those of Karl Marx , class struggle is a core tenet and a practical means for effecting radical sociopolitical transformations for the majority working class . It is also a central concept within conflict theories of sociology and political philosophy . Class conflict can reveal itself through: In

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1452-402: 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

1518-475: The "violence of the great lords" : In order to understand this, it must be remembered, that, in those days, the sovereign of perhaps no country in Europe was able to protect, through the whole extent of his dominions, the weaker part of his subjects from the oppression of the great lords. Those whom the law could not protect, and who were not strong enough to defend themselves, were obliged either to have recourse to

1584-437: 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 conflict by pacifying the plebs with actual bread and circuses . The economist Adam Smith 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

1650-563: The European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of law, & restrains morals as powerfully as laws ever did anywhere. Among the latter, under pretence of governing they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves & sheep. I do not exaggerate. This is a true picture of Europe. Cherish therefore the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them. If once they become inattentive to

1716-515: The Socialist Education Movement resulted in 77,560 deaths, with 5,327,350 people being persecuted. A positive outcome of the campaign was that urban youth gained greater experience with the conditions of life in rural China. Class struggle In political science , the term class conflict , or class struggle , refers to the economic antagonism and political tension that exist among social classes because of clashing interests, competition for limited resources, and inequalities of power in

1782-405: 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

1848-469: The aristocrats, the mass of Athenians chose Solon to be the lawgiver to lead them to freedom from their creditors. The philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel said that Solon's constitution of the Athenian popular assembly created a political sphere that balanced the competing socio-economic interests of the social classes of Athens: Participating in a war among the social classes of Ancient Greece

1914-400: 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

1980-426: The discussion around class conflict between employers and employees. 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

2046-492: The dispute was the right to unionize . In the United States , under federal labor law , an employer may hire only temporary replacements during a lockout. In a strike, unless it is an unfair labor practice strike, an employer may legally hire permanent replacements. Also, in many US states , employees who are locked out are eligible to receive unemployment benefits , but they are not eligible for such benefits during

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2112-410: The economic sphere, class conflict is sometimes expressed overtly, such as owner lockouts of their employees in an effort to weaken the bargaining power of the employees' union ; or covertly, such as a worker slowdown of production or the widespread, simultaneous use of sick leave (e.g., " blue flu ") to protest unfair labor practices , low wages, poor work conditions , or a perceived injustice to

2178-563: The employers at the Homestead Steel Mill in Homestead, Pennsylvania , the union called for a strike after the company stopped discussing its decisions with the union. Henry Clay Frick shut down the plant and locked out all workers, preventing them from entering the mill. Recent notable lockout incidents have been reported in professional sports, notably involving Major League Baseball in the 1990 and 2021–22 offseasons,

2244-467: The extravagant consumption of the aristocracy, he remarked that: All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind. In the third book of The Wealth of Nations , Smith explains that in the medieval period , after the fall of the Roman Empire, governments were unable to protect commoners, and their property, from

2310-591: The first sentence of Chapter 1 of the Communist Manifesto reads: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles." Marxists view the struggle's resolution in favor of the working class to be inevitable under plutocratic capitalism. 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. The rise of class structures eventually leads to class conflict. It

2376-414: The form of disputes over hours of work, amount paid in wages, division of profits, culture in the workplace, cost of consumer goods, cost of rent, control over parliament or government bureaucracy , and economic inequality . Even a seemingly benign humanitarian program such as government-provided disaster relief can exacerbate class conflict if the relief is seen as being unequally distributed depending on

2442-443: The government.". Aristotle also commented that "poverty is the parent of revolution", but did not consider poverty to be the only cause of revolution. In a society where property is distributed equally throughout the community, "the nobles will be dissatisfied, because they think themselves worthy of more than an equal share of honors; and this is often found to be a cause of sedition and revolution." Moreover, Aristotle said that it

2508-455: The hands of too few men. Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) led the U.S. as president from 1801 to 1809 and is considered one of America's Founding Fathers . Regarding the interaction between social classes, he wrote: I am convinced that those societies (as the Indians ) which live without government enjoy in their general mass an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who live under

2574-460: 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. Hegel similarly states that

2640-466: The large social class of impoverished commoners; and used the analogy of a maritime pilot , who, like the power-holder in a polis , ought to be chosen for political office for his skill, not for the amount of property he owns. The historian Plutarch recounts how the Greek people participated in the class conflict between the aristocrats and the common folk. Financially oppressed by their indebtedness to

2706-509: The mainstream media. In France during March 2009, 3M 's national manager was locked in his office for 24 hours by employees in a dispute over redundancies. The following month, union employees of a call center managed by Synovate in Auckland locked the front doors of the office, in response to management locking them out. Such practices bear some resemblance to the gherao in India. It

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2772-558: 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

2838-524: The movement. In rural China, mobile film projectionist units showed films and slideshows that emphasized class struggle and encouraged audience members to discuss bitter experiences onstage. Films termed "emphasis films" were released to support the aims of the Socialist Education Movement, and the film version of The White-Haired Girl was re-released to coincide with the campaign as well. The campaign had immediate difficulties. Higher level cadres often did not want to be sent to rural areas of China. In

2904-444: 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

2970-465: 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." In the Politics , Aristotle describes the basic dimensions of class conflict: "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

3036-402: 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

3102-487: The poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and there's all the love they bear us. Enlightenment -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: [T]he plebeians of Rome [...] had been oppressed from the earliest times by the weight of debt and usury; and

3168-427: 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. Class conflict is most commonly described as occurring within capitalist societies. The conflict manifests itself as clashes between the capitalist class and working class, and takes

3234-462: The protection of some great lord, and in order to obtain it, to become either his slaves or vassals; or to enter into a league of mutual defence for the common protection of one another. The inhabitants of cities and burghs, considered as single individuals, had no power to defend themselves; but by entering into a league of mutual defence with their neighbours, they were capable of making no contemptible resistance. Lockout (industry) A lockout

3300-464: The public affairs, you & I, & Congress & Assemblies, judges & governors shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions; and experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the governments of Europe, and to the general prey of the rich on the poor. In his Federalist No. 10 , James Madison revealed an emphatic concern with

3366-443: The recipient's class. Like Rousseau, the classical liberal Adam Smith believed that the amassing of property in the hands of a minority naturally resulted in a disharmonious state of affairs. He said that "avarice and ambition in the rich, in the poor the hatred of labour and the love of present ease and enjoyment, are the passions which prompt to invade property", requiring a government to protect property rights: Wherever there

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3432-530: The relationship between cadres and the people needed to be improved. When the Cultural Revolution began, rural regions had not yet completed the Socialist Education Movement, and the committees in charge of it converted into Cultural Revolution leading groups. Following the Socialist Education Movement, the relationship between Mao and Chinese President Liu Shaoqi , Chairman Mao's potential successor, deteriorated. Some Chinese sources state that

3498-611: The rich and the landless poor. Hegel described the same phenomenon happening in the impetus to Greek colonisation . Writing in pre-capitalist Europe, the Swiss philosophe Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the Federalist statesman James Madison across the Atlantic Ocean made significant remarks on the dynamics of class struggle. Later, German idealist Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel would also contribute his perspective to

3564-511: The senatorial class. Contrary to Shakespeare's depiction of Julius Caesar in the tragedy Julius Caesar , 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

3630-595: 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 . 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

3696-411: The successful struggle of the dominated classes would achieve a revolution to depose the ruling elites and create a stateless or libertarian socialism , and that a prerequisite for successful revolution is class solidarity . Marx's theory of history asserts that in the history of economic systems such as capitalism and feudalism , class struggle is "the central fact of social evolution." Indeed,

3762-408: 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 , in which disharmony between the oligarchs and the commoners would typically lead to each side calling on outside help to defeat

3828-406: Was a dangerous political endeavour. In his book Parallel Lives , Plutarch wrote of two Spartan kings, Agis and Cleomenes , who "being desirous to raise the people, and to restore the noble and just form of government, now long fallen into disuse, [they] incurred the hatred of the rich and powerful, who could not endure to be deprived of the selfish enjoyment to which they were accustomed." It

3894-495: Was about whether teachers should have extra working time, as the Local Government Association (KL) wanted. The Danish Union of Teachers (DFL) was against it and could not find a solution. After 24 days of being locked out, the teachers lost the labour dispute on 25 April 2013, with a government intervention to end the lockout. The government chose to apply all of KL's main demands, and the teachers received

3960-446: 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

4026-487: Was similarly difficult for the Romans to maintain peace between the upper class, the patricians , and the lower class, the plebs . French Enlightenment 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 Senate had

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4092-415: 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." The patrician Coriolanus , whose life William Shakespeare would later depict in the tragic play Coriolanus , fought on

4158-483: Was the first Greek philosopher to describe class conflict. In the Republic , by Plato , Socrates said that "any city, however small, is in fact divided into two, one the city of the poor, the other [the city] of the rich; these [cities] are at war with one another." Socrates disapproved of oligarchies , in which members of a small class of wealthy property owners take positions of political power in order to dominate

4224-426: Was the welfare of the ordinary workers who make up society and provide for it: No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable. It is but equity, besides, that they who feed, clothe, and lodge the whole body of the people, should have such a share of the produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well fed, clothed, and lodged. Regarding

4290-468: Was to "purify politics, purify economics, purify the organization, and purify thought" in opposition to revisionism. Mao sought to make Communist Party cadres closer to the people and to increase revolutionary consciousness among younger people who had grown up after the founding of the People's Republic of China. He described the movement as "lifting the lid" on class struggle in rural China and exposing

4356-472: Was wrong for the poor to seize the wealth of the rich and divide it among themselves, but he said that it is wrong for the rich to impoverish the multitude. Moreover, Aristotle further discussed a middle way, between laxity and cruelty, in the treatment of slaves by their masters, averring that "if not kept in hand, [slaves] are insolent, and think that they are as good as their masters, and, if harshly treated, they hate and conspire against them." Socrates

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