Karl Marx

Karl Marx was born in 1818 in Germany. He was a German philosopher, sociologist, historian, political economist and theorist, journalist and revolutionary socialist. He developed the socio-political theory of Marxism. He was born to Jewish parents and coverted to Lutherism. His ideas have played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement. He has published many books throughout his lifetime, his most significant being The Communist Manifesto which he wrote with fellow German revolutionary socialst, Friedrich Engels.

In 1849, Marx fled to London with his wife, Jenny Von Westphalen, where he lived until his death on 14th March 1883. His Tombstone read:

"Workers of the world unite" and "The philosophers have only interpreted the world - the point, however, is to change it."

Marx was interested in, and critical of, Hegel. He became involved with a group of radical thinkers known as the Young Hegelians. They were critical of Hegel's metaphysical assumptions, but still adopted his dialectical method in order to criticise established society, politics and religion. Marx sought to rewrite dialectics in materialist terms arguing for the primacy of matter rather than idea. Hegel saw the spirit as driving history, however Marx saw this as unnecessary mystification, obscurring the reality of humanity and its physical actions shaping the world.

He said that "Hegelianism stood the movement of realisty on its head, and that one needed to set upon its feet."

Marx believed that you could explan everything about a society by analysing the way econmic forces in shape social, religious, legal and political processes.

Marx achieved a fusion of:

1. Hegelian philosophy (especially the philosophy of history and dialectics).
2. British empericism (especially econmics of Smith)
3. French Revolution politics (especially socialist politics, Man is born free but everywhere is in chains).

Marx's most significant work, The Communist Manifesto, was a short book published in 1848. It has since been recognized as one of the most influential political manuscripts. It was Commissioned by the Communist Party, and laid out the Party's purposes and program. Rather than a prediction of Communism's potential future forms, the book presents an analytical approach to the class struggle and the problems of Capitalism.

The Manifesto contains Marxist theories about the nature of society and politics, they say: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles." The book was written and published at the time of the Capitalist society, and they discuss how eventually the Capitalist society will be replaced by socialism, and then eventually communism.

The text begins with "A spectre is haunting Europe -- the spectre of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Pope and Tsar, Metternich and Guizot, French Radicals and German police-spies." This suggests that Marx and Engels know that governments and society have a fear of communism.
Their passion is to advise communists about how to continue promoting their cause, despite those who are against it, as they go on to say: "It is high time that Communists should openly, in the face of the whole world, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies, and meet this nursery tale of the spectre of communism with a manifesto of the party itself."

The Communist Manifesto talks of class differences and struggles. The Manifesto argues that the class struggle under capitalism is between those who own the means of production, the ruling class or bourgeoisie, and those who labour for a wage, the working class or proletariat.