ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a basic overview of the Marxist position. Conflict theories assert that at the heart of the social bond there is a fundamental conflict. In the case of Marxism, the conflict exists between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, and the consequent rift situates the two differently within a general ideology or worldview. Louis Althusser introduced some new insights and thereby extended Marx’s more basic theory of ideology. Marx’s more simplistic theory described the “means of production” as comprising those essential tools that are required for the extraction of surplus value by the bourgeoisie out of the proletariat. Marxist feminists, such as Nancy Fraser, maintain that gender conflict is anchored to a fundamental class antagonism. Marxist gender theorists are actively seeking to articulate gender and patriarchy as relatively autonomous sites of antagonism that nonetheless intersect with and exacerbate class conflict.
