Karl Marx
May 10, 2023•1,061 words
1818 - 1883
Life
Context
- Industrial revolution
- Large factory worker population
- More apparent wealth inequality
- Undesirable working conditions for many
- French revolution
- Inspired social reforms, belief in the peasant revolution
- German revolution wanted a single state, with a liberal democracy (1848)
Romanticized
- Feeling of social estrangement from one another
- Industrialization was a large change
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Family
- Born in Trier
- Eldest surviving son of nine children
- Jewish parents from a line of rabbis, mother from Holland
- Father was a successful lawyer and man of the Enlightenment
- He was baptized in the Evangelical Established church to pursue his career
- Interested in poetry and theatre
Education
- Educated from 1830 to 1835 in Trier, under police surveillance for suspicion of harboring liberal teachers and pupils
- 1835-1836: Studied at the University of Bonn, exclusively the humanities: Greek and Roman mythology and the history of art
- Political rebellion was part of the culture
- Became president of a drinking club, arrested for public drunkenness
- Father consequently removes him for that institution
- 1826: Enrolled at the University of Berlin to study law and philosophy
- Introduced to Hegel
- Prussian government tried to drive Hegelians from universities
- Submitted his doctoral dissertation to the university at Jena (more relaxed academic requirements) and received his degree in 1841
Career
- Works for newspaper Rheinische Zeitung, pressured by censorship
- Moved to Paris, center for socialist thought
- Became a revolutionary and communist
- Collaboration with Engels
- Kicked out of Paris for participation of the 1848 rev and Brussels
- Moved to London
Philosophy
History
Historical materialism
- History is the result of material conditions, not ideas
- Religion, morality, social structures and other things are all rooted in economics
- Human history is economically determined
Historical materialism
- Hegel: history of mankind is a constant movement of ideas
- Historical materialism: history of mankind is a struggle over control for the means of production
- Marx believed religion was the opium of the people, used to keep people submissive
- Society is moving through different phases:
- Tribal: pre-historical, primitive communism, work divided more equally, property shared
- Ancient: Transfer to agriculture, land is means of production, there are slaves, Rome falls
- Feudal: Serfdom, there is a hierarchy, leads to French rev
- Industrial: Proletariat is exploited by the bourgeois, ended in worker’s revolution
- Socialist: Gets rid of bourgeois system, transfer of ownership (dictatorship) of the proletariat
- Final phase, classless, propertyless, stateless society
- There are revolutions that usher in this different ages
- Writes his book in the time of the industrial phase
Capitalism
- Accumulation
- Accumulation: Owners reap the benefits of labor
- Smaller group becomes richer and richer
- Industries go bankrupt, the labor market is flooded and lowers demand of labor and wages
- Will collapse under its own weight
- Growth will stagnate, everything becomes unaffordable
- Verelendung
- Poor working conditions
- Alienated from their work
- Only do small part, less connection
- However:
- Not in capitalist’s interests to maintain poor conditions
- Led to increase in wages
- Increased their living conditions
- Undesirable labor has, though, been outsourced
Economics
- Price theory
- There are laws governing the value of commodities as represented by the social relationship of wages and price
- Employers cannot raise or lower wages merely at their whim, nor raise their price at will to make up for lost profits resulting from wage increase
- Value-added theory is equal to the sum of gross wage income and gross profit income
- Surplus value is equal to the new value created by workers in excess of their own labor, which is appropriated by the employer
- Products
- Values appear to result from the nature of the products, but it is labor that gives a product its value
- Workers
- Increasingly removed from their work
- Proletariat are those that have the working power
- Sees an alienation in society
- Deaminized by capitalism
- Owners of production exploit their labor for their own profit
- Conditions will get worse until workers unite and overthrow the upper class
- Alienation
- Heavily influenced by romanticist sentiment
- Marx believed that industry and capitalism both cause alienation
- Workers do not see themselves in their product, work should be enriching and fulfilling
- Communist critique
- Did not like the theoretical work of his contemporizes
- Favored revolution rather than utopia
- Phases of communism
- Rising of the workers
- No more competition
- Abolition of private property, since it gives power to men over one another
Impact
Communism and socialism
- Considered the father of these systems
- Criticized contemporary socialists
- Modern socialists see themselves as the descendants of Marx
- Became enemies for a time, had the same goal but different methods to achieve it
- Communism
- Changes through violent action and revolution
- Used by those that desired violence and rapid change
- Used as a means for authoritarianism
- Saw socialists as traders to the cause for cooperation with the bourgeoise
- Presented as a true alternative or successor to capitalism and democracy
- Socialism
- Uses institutions in place: evolution rather than revolution
- Became known as social democrats because they used government
- Wanted to achieve universal suffrage
- Cooperation with liberals
- Parties had strength in the second half of the 20th century
- Creation of the welfare state
Legacy
- Totalitarianism
- Several regimes built on this system
- Massive loss of life and starvation
- Irreversible tyrannical structures
Positives
- Draws attention to the poor working conditions
- Attention towards equality and distribution of wealth to the needy
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Why communism lost its appeal
- Practical
- Unable to compete with capitalism
- Central planning was not as effective as capitalist individualist management
- Consumer goods were inferior in communism
- Meritocracy ensures higher quality of product at a competitive price
- Especially could not compete with the technological revolution
- Moral
- Always a tyrannical police state
- Massive loss of life
Ideological
- Communists states had become capitalist
- They never achieved stateless, classless society
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