The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

960 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Max weber karl marx

The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

The Communist Manifesto, written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, outlines how a society should be run under communism. The document provides truths to what is wrong with society; what causes these wrongs; how they can be fixed; and how this relates to humans and nature. Marx was a political philosopher of German ancestry. Marx and Engels split the document up into four sections: Section 1: Bourgeois and Proletarians, section 2: Proletarians and Communists, section 3: Socialists and Communist literature, and section 4: Positions of the Communists in relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties.

The first section, Bourgeoisie and Proletarians, focuses on the struggle between the classes created in society. Marx refers back to the Middle Ages to show how complicated the class system was. “In the Middle Ages, feudal lords, vassals, guild-masters, journeymen, apprentices, serfs…”(1) all made up different stratas of society. With all of these groups of different trades and economic stability, oppression was bound to happen. Society did not contain many groups and classes as in the middle ages. Society was formed from two basic groups, the Bourgeoisie and Proletarians. The bourgeoisie was a class constructed of people who owned property. These people were the wealthier half of society. The proletarians were those of the lowest class of society. Marx discusses how the bourgeoisie came to be such a strong member of society. This happened through the occurrence of the Industrial Revolution. New machinery changed all of industrial production. With these new advances, Marx describes that the middle class was destroyed and industrial millionaires resu...

... middle of paper ...

...ss…”

The fourth and final section, Positions of the Communists in relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties, talks about how communists work with different parties. Marx describes their relationship by stating that they try to find parties that hold similar beliefs. Communists try to find parties that believe in power to the working class and believe in the overthrowing of the bourgeoisie. Marx concludes by saying that the working class must unite and use force to overcome oppressors.

The Communist Manifesto, presents the basic beliefs of communism. Marx puts strong emphasis on the struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletarians. Marx believes that the proletarians must come together by recognizing that they are all alike and fight the bourgeoisie. Once this happens, then such oppressors will not hold down society as the bourgeoisie.

Show More
Related

  • The Communist Manifesto, by Karl Marx

    872 Words  | 2 Pages

    Marx’s ideals of communism were drawn from the realization that the cycle of revolutions caused by the class struggles throughout history lead society nowhere. Society as a whole was more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes that were directly facing each other—bourgeoisie and proletariat. According to Marx, in order for society to further itself a mass proletarian revolution would have to occur. The bourgeois, who were the employers and owners of the means of production, composed the majority of the modern capitalists. It was these individuals that controlled the capitalist society by exploiting the labor provided by the proletariats. For example, the bourgeoisie make property into a right because they are the ones with the property. However, without their power force of labor behind them, the bourgeoisie class would crumple. To accomplish a revolution, the workers (proletariats) would need to rise up against the bourgeoisie and take back the factors of production. Marx believed that after the inevitable revolution of the proletariats against the oppressive force of the bourgeoisie, a communistic form of government would take hold.

    Read More

  • Compare Marxism And How Did The Bourgeoisie

    529 Words  | 2 Pages

    The bourgeoisie are particularly important because not only did they modernized society but industrialized it as well. They took revered occupations and turned them into paid wage-labor, for example being a physician or poet. Marx’s view on the bourgeoisie is that they emerged after numerous revolutions involving modes of production as well as exchange. They create the world according to their image, which strips society

    Read More

  • The United States Constitution Compared to the Communist Manifesto

    833 Words  | 2 Pages

    Both the Communist Manifesto and the United States Constitution share some common ideas. They are documents that strive for ideas that in opposition to one another. The Communist Manifesto and The Constitution of the United States both include what the relationship between an individual and society should be about. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels wrote the Communist Manifesto. Marx and Engels talked about in the Communist Manifesto what they thought to be the way to solve the problems in the world during that time. Those problems dealt with society, but mainly the poor. They thought that people during those times were too dependent on money and how much of it they made. They wrote the manifesto in hopes to change society. The form of government they used to do this was by way of the Communist Party. "The Communists, therefore, are on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country"[i] Within the Communist Party everyone is equal, and all property belongs to the state.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Karl Marx's Writing Of The Communist Manifesto

    2472 Words  | 5 Pages

    Karl Marx 's writing of ‘The Communist Manifesto’ in 1848 has been documented by a vast number of academics as one of the most influential pieces of political texts written in the modern era. Its ideologically driven ideas formed the solid foundation of the Communist movement throughout the 20th century, offering a greater alternative for those who were rapidly becoming disillusioned and frustrated with the growing wealth and social divisions created by capitalism. A feeling not just felt in by a couple of individuals in one society, but a feeling that was spreading throughout various societies worldwide. As Toma highlights in his work, Marx felt that ‘capitalism would produce a crisis-ridden, polarized society destined to be taken over by

    Read More

  • The Communist Manifesto Essay

    1604 Words  | 4 Pages

    From the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century major historical events such as the Industrial revolution had occurred. During this period of time Europe was switching into an economy that is focused mostly on the industrial field. From this emerged two social-economic classes, the rich bourgeoisie and the poor proletariats. Furthermore, tension brewed between the two groups since the bourgeoisie source of wealth was from the exploitation of the proletariats. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels’ book

    Read More

  • The Communist Manifesto

    561 Words  | 2 Pages

    Karl Marx is living in a world he is not happy with, and seems to think that he has the perfect solution. I am a strong believer in his ideas. We are living in a time period with a huge class struggle. The Bourgroise exploits and the proletariat are being exploited. Marx did not like the way this society was and searched for a solution. Marx looked for “universal laws of human behavior that would explain and predict the future course of events" (36). He saw an unavoidable growth and change in society, coming not from the difference in opinions, but in the huge difference of opposing classes. He speaks of his ideal society and how he is going to bring about this utopia in his book The Communist Manifesto. I am going to share with you more on his ideas of this “world-wide revolution” (36) that would put an end to social classes and allow people to live with equal sharing which would result in a harmonious and much peaceful world.

    Read More

  • Communism: Marx and Engels' Solution to Class Struggle

    1628 Words  | 4 Pages

    Communist Manifesto written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels is their attempt to explain the goal of communism. They explained that class struggling or when one class exploits another is a result that is motivated by historical development. Their solution to all the exploitation and class struggle is communism. Where, the proletariats rise up against the bourgeoisies. Relationship in each class is defined by their source of production. Nevertheless, they end up not being compatible with the force of production they being placed with. Then, this end up with a revolution that will occur at this point and a new class appears and becomes the ruling class. Class conflicts in the society were characterized between the proletariat and bourgeoisie.

    Read More

  • Why The Ideas Of Karl Marx Were So Radical To Society

    744 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Communist Manifesto, written in 1848, provided the views of Karl Marx on humans and nature. For the time in which the document was written, the ideas of Marx were very radical to society. The ongoing struggle between the Proletarians( the working class) and the Bourgeois( the owners) prompted Marx to develop a solution to this social problem. His solution to this historical problem was to create a capitalist nation, which in the end would result in a Communist nation. He wanted to help the social status of the working class, because he felt that they were being taken advantage of by the owners. The document also discusses the role of humans and their interaction with nature.

    Read More

  • The Struggle Between The Working Class And Communism In The Communist Manifesto?

    724 Words  | 2 Pages

    In The Communist Manifesto written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, the two German philosophers saw history as the struggle between the working class and the Bourgeois, or middle class (textbook 708). The Communist Manifesto was written in 1848, during the peak of the Industrial Revolution, a time when the Bourgeois made huge profits in manufacturing at the expense of the working class. According to Marx and Engels, the fruits of the Industrial Revolution created a new class of the oppressed modern working class, the Proletariat, which had never before existed because it was neither like serfdom or slave hood in that it was dependent on the Bourgeois to hire them for wage labor. This was the class the two philosophers envisioned would set off a revolution that would overthrow capitalism to end the perpetual class struggle and create a fair society known as Communism.

    Read More

  • Wealth and Poverty: Karl Marx

    1702 Words  | 4 Pages

    Marx, in The Communist Manifesto, exposes these five factors which the bourgeoisie had against the communist, and deals with each one fairly. As for the proletariat class, Marx proposes a different economic system where inequality between social classes would not exist. The bourgeoisie class was the class in control in the Gilded Age, yet Marx's views exposed the flaws in their social system and gave the proletariats a new social order. As the Gilded Age progressed, the bourgeoisie became more powerful and thus the proletariat class declined in their status.... ...

    Read More

  • Kuyper Against Marx

    1801 Words  | 4 Pages

    In Marx’s opinion, the cause of poverty has always been due to the struggle between social classes, with one class keeping its power by suppressing the other classes. He claims the opposing forces of the Industrial Age are the bourgeois and the proletarians. Marx describes the bourgeois as a middle class drunk on power. The bourgeois are the controllers of industrialization, the owners of the factories that abuse their workers and strip all human dignity away from them for pennies. Industry, Marx says, has made the proletariat working class only a tool for increasing the wealth of the bourgeoisie. Because the aim of the bourgeoisie is to increase their trade and wealth, it is necessary to exploit the worker to maximize profit. This, according to Marx, is why the labor of the proletariat continued to steadily increase while the wages of the proletariat continued to steadily decrease.

    Read More

  • Marx 's Theory Of Class Conflict

    1079 Words  | 3 Pages

    According to Marx class is determined by property associations not by revenue or status. It is determined by allocation and utilization, which represent the production and power relations of class. Marx’s differentiate one class from another rooted on two criteria: possession of the means of production and control of the labor power of others. The major class groups are the capitalist also known as bourgeoisie and the workers or proletariat. The capitalist own the means of production and purchase the labor power of others. Proletariat is the laboring lower class. They are the ones who sell their own labor power. Class conflict to possess power over the means of production is the powerful force behind social growth.

    Read More

  • The Impact of the Communist Manifesto During the Late 1800s and Early 1900s

    1053 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Communist Manifesto made the oppressed people aware of their status and called them to unite. It did this by outlining the history of classes and class struggle. The Communist Manifesto stated that society and history are shaped by class struggles and that two classes were present in 1848, the bourgeois and the proletariat. The document goes on to state that the bourgeois had created capitalism and were oppressing the proletariat.[1] Marx defines the proletariat as “an appendage of the machine”. [2] He recognized how the proletariats were being exploited and he brought it to the attention of the public. Not only does the Communist Manifesto point out that the proletariats were being exploited, it went a step further and called the proletariats to action. He called the working class the revolutionary class and told them that they had the power to fight the bourgeois.[3] The Communist Manifesto forced the Proletariats to recognize their exploitation. As a result the attitude of the proletariat was changed. Proof that the proletariats attitudes were changed comes from the widespread uprising of revolutions in Europe that followed the publication of the Communist Manifesto.

    Read More

  • Critical Analysis Of The Communist Manifesto

    1432 Words  | 3 Pages

    Marx outlines the goals that the Marxists should strive toward. He states that they do not form a separate party from the other working class parties and serves only to protect the interests of the proletariat. Marx states that the only differences between the Communist party and other working class parties are that Communists serve the proletariat regardless of nationality and that Communists must always represent the movement as a whole. This way, Communists are the most driven of the working class parties because they have a clearly defined goal and standard operating procedure. This goal is the same as all other proletariat parties, as Marx

    Read More

  • The Political Philosophy of Karl Marx

    2291 Words  | 5 Pages

    He developed the socio-political theory of Marxism. One of his most famous works is The Communist Manifesto, which he co-wrote with Friedrich Engels. In The Communist Manifesto, Marx discusses his theories on society, economics and politics. He believed that “all societies progress through the dialectic of class struggle”. He criticized capitalism, and referred to it as the "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie".

    Read More

More about The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

Open Document