Lumpenproletariat

The term lumpenproletariat (trans. 'ragged proletariat' or 'lumpen masses') was introduced in The German Ideology by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels describing the lowest level of the proletariat, including vagrants, homeless, the unemployed, welfare recipients, and criminals. According to Marx the lumpenproletariat would have little motive for taking part in revolution and would in fact wish to maintain their class structure as they often depended on the higher classes. Marx thought of the lumpenproletariat as a counterrevolutionary threat to the idea of Marxist revolution. Lumpenproletariat were often the target for arrest, detention, and forced labor in concentration camps set up by Vladimir Lenin shortly after the October Revolution in the newly created Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.