Paper Topic:

Critical Review of the Communist Manifesto

Running Head : COMMUNIST MANIFESTO

Communist Manifesto

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Communist Manifesto

Introduction

Written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels for the Communist League , The Communist Manifesto has become a classic formulation of socialist political ethics . The authors base their work on the ethical belief that all people should live in a condition of equality and democracy . They contend that all previous societies have been marked by class struggle This conflict between different social classes is rooted in the classes economic relationships to the means of

production . Classes themselves are seen as an inherent result of the institution of private property Thus , for Marx and Engels , some people have always owned property while forcing those without to work for them . Although the form of this exploitative relationship has changed over time from master /slave to lord /serf and then bourgeois /worker , the inequality has remained present . This injustice has led world history to be the history of class struggle

With the rise of capitalism , the new ruling class (the bourgeoisie constantly revolutionizes the way things are produced and exchanged . As capitalism grows , the need for a constantly expanding market causes the bourgeoisie to expand bs until capitalism has engulfed the world In the process of this ever-growing expansion , there is , of necessity more economic and political centralization . This centralization of economic and political power further reduces the actual power of the majority of the population

Marx and Engels note that this expansion is by no means a smooth process and is constantly beset with crisis . Since workers as a whole produce more in value than they are paid in wages , there are periodic periods of overproduction . These crises of overproduction take the form of business downturns or depressions that the bourgeoisie can overcome only by mass destruction of productive property (such as war ) or by conquest of new markets (imperialism . Even when a crisis has been surmounted , the seeds of a future disaster remain within the very nature of capitalist society

Communist Manifesto

One of the more enigmatic features of the Manifesto is that the first quarter of the text (thirty-nine pages in bourgeoisie . The account that is given is , moreover , far from being uniformly condemnatory . It has accomplished wonders for surpassing the wonders of the ancient and mediaeval worlds (Marx Engels , 1976 : 487 it 'has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have the preceding generations together (Marx Engels , 1976 : 489 ) It has subjected the whole world to its sway , driving canals and railroads transporting its cheap goods to every comer of the world to bring all nations into the maelstrom of modem civilization (Marx Engels , 1976 488

It is not until page ten of the narrative that 'the modem working class--the proletarians ' make their first substantial appearance and their origins , current situation and organizational development are dealt with in the following seven pages . In this brief account Marx (for he uniquely authored the Manifesto ) adds little to the accounts that he and Engels had...

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