Marxism

Define: Marxism is the analysis of capitalism and its roots of exploitation, poverty, and alienation of people from the political, religious, and economic arenas. Marxism asserts that capitalism is not a sustainable model of economics and the increasing wage gap (class struggle) between the workers (proletariats) and the capitalists (bourgeoisie) will lead to a revolution.

Source: Robbins, S., Chatterjee, P., & Canda, E. (2012). Contemporary human behavior theory: A critical perspective for social work (3rd ed., p. 62-65). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Apply: Community organization largely revolves around working with the poor-working classes of our society, except for the case of the "rich people's social movement" of Citizens United. Capitalism is a system that can work for all, if heavily regulated, but has increasingly become a system by many, for few. We should be critical of the capitalist economic model to ensure that our social justice reformations have lasting impact and cannot be bought off in the current or in the future.

Adapt: For more ethical business practices and for the sake of preventing a workers' revolution, businesses should adapt ideals of Marxism for more equitable pay for labor. This is evidenced by the profits and worker satisfaction that CostCo enjoys (Cooperstein, 2013).

Cooperstein, P. (2013, November 22). Why Employees Love Working For Costco. Retrieved November 18, 2015, from http://www.businessinsider.com/why-employees-love-working-for-costco-2013-11