Jan Wacław Machajski

Jan Wacław Machajski (pseudonym A. Wolski (A. Vol'ski), often corrupted in Russian as Makhaev; 27 December 1866 – 19 February 1926) was a Polish revolutionary whose methodology drew from both anarchism and Marxism whilst criticising both as being products of the intelligentsia.

Life Machajski was born on 27 December 1866 in Busko-Zdrój. The son of a poor Polish official, Machajski was briefly attracted to Polish nationalism as a student, but abandoned it for internationalism and socialism. Here he assumed the name Jan Kizlo and had low-paid work as a copyist. He and his wife also received financial support from his brother. He was also involved in revolutionary activity with Max Nomad. since the unproductive labour of intellectuals depended upon preserving a hereditary monopoly on education at workers' expense. Rather than put their hopes in political revolution, manual workers needed to concentrate upon pressing their economic demands through a mass general strike, until their wages equalled those of the intellectual worker and there could be a socialization of knowledge. Revolution would consist of a violent revolt of the unemployed worker-peasant.

Machajski thus attempted a theoretical synthesis of anarchist political critique and Marxist political economy and theory of history (historical materialism), by applying the Marxist critique of class-dominated ideology to Marxism itself. Machajski theorised a "state capitalist" moment of social development, approximating the seizure of power by intellectuals of the state apparatus, and the oppression of the working class by intellectuals acting to further capitalism in its dying days. In comparison, Machajski theorised socialism as the direct political control of economic institutions by the working class itself. Machajski's contributions foreshadowed the debate over the nature of the Soviet Union and the Soviet-style societies, including the critiques of Leninism, Stalinism and Maoism.

Works Machajski wrote predominantly in Russian. His writing is more available in Polish or French than English, though commentary on his ideas exists in English.

Scientific Socialism (1899) The Evolution of Social Democracy (1899) The Intellectual Worker (1905) An Unfinished Essay in the Nature of a Critique of Socialism