this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2025
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Question about petite bourgeoisie (small business owners) (lemmygrad.ml)
submitted 3 months ago by amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml to c/asklemmygrad@lemmygrad.ml
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Was thinking about the distinctions of this and wondering...

Would it be accurate to say that the petite bourgeoisie are on the same ladder as the bourgeoisie? Or to put it in more English terms, would it to be accurate to say that small business owners are on the same ladder as Jeff Bezos? Just on a much lower rung?

Versus, in this analogy, the proletariat (or working class), are not on the ladder at all.

The idea being that the small business owner is in a less organized stage of development toward the same thing as the conglomerate (if this is happening under capitalist rule). Whereas the working class cannot organically develop in that direction (I suppose a few could through stocks, but that seems like on the level of winning the lottery).

Want to make sure I have my metaphors straight.

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[–] darkernations@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

As a rule of thumb I consider that petite-bourgoisie are defined as those who are at risk of proletarianisation themsleves if they lose that relationship with capital ie the ability to extact surplus value from the proleteriat.

I would be careful of essentialising classes though. (Individuals of the) Proleteriat could become the petite-bourgoisie and even bourgoisie, and petite-bourgoisie may never become the bourgoisie. The proleteriat may never become bourgoisie but engage in class collaboration against other proleteriat through nationalism. The petite-bourgoisie could collaborate with the proleteriat against the bourgoisie in a national liberation struggle.

(The beauty of dialectics)

Having said there is still an objective reality from which we build praxis from.

(The beauty of materialism)