The Communist Manifesto By Karl Marx and Frederick Engels

A Book Review for Political Science 11

Submitted by: TADLE, Frauline C. 2011-04813

September, 2011

SUMMARY
The Communist Manifesto is the book bearing the combined fruits of Frederick Engels in his pursue to write a draft for the cathechism for the Communist League where he was elected and was assigned to do so as well as that of Karl Marx who was, at that time, has been commissioned by the league united his ideas along with Engelss The Condition of the Working Classman in England. This manifesto focused on the constant opposition of different classes especially between the ruling class or the bourgeoisie and the working- class men or proletariats. Modern bourgeois sprouted from the ruins of the feudal society and established new classes, mainly composed of middle-class men, new conditions of oppression and new forms of struggle in place of the old one as the feudal lords can no longer suffice the dramatic increase of demand of the market. Ignited by the discovery of America, this rise of bourgeoisie introduced steam and machinery which revolutionized industrial production and simplified class antagonisms as it continued to split the whole society into two classes: Bourgeoisie and Proletariats. Millionaire industrialists or modern bourgeois completely controlled the Modern Industry which provided the market an over-whelming development to commerce, extended to railways and increased the capital for the bourgeois. It has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal and idyllic relations. Because of this, the bourgeoisie, during its rule of scare one hundred years, has created more massive and more colossal productive forces. Although, due to this, produced a chain of revolt of modern productive forces against the modern means of production. This modern productive force is popularly known as the proletariats.

The revolution of the proletariats is deeply rooted from the conversion of modern industry from a little workshop into a great factory of industrial capitalist funded of course by bourgeoisie. Because of the modernization brought by this class, the amount of manual labor exerted becomes the basis of modernization. If there is less manual labor, manes theres an increase in modernization and there is a cancellation of differences between age and sex to be validated for the working class, thus, men, being the most number of manual labourers are superseded by women. Proletarian revolution undergoes various stage of development: individualwork people of the factory- operators of one trade. They direct their attacks not against the individual bourgeoisie who exploits them but against the instruments of production that snatches and compete with them in their labours. The collisions between a bourgeoisie and a proletariat gradually became a class between two opposing classes; workers begin to form Trade Unions against the bourgeois to keep up the rate of wages. Modern industry brought by the upper class become a fundamental weapon of the proletariats for communication to expand their influence for conducting riots to the point of building their own political party to whom the bourgeois asked for their help thus opened a way for them to enter the world of politics which supplies them greater power to fight against the upper one. From this onwards, every form of society has been based on the antagonism of oppressing and oppressed classes. The abolition of bourgeoisie is the most distinguished feature of Communismhe most advance and resolute section of the working class parties which pushes

forward all others. Communist have been reproached with desire of abolishing the right of personally acquiring property; deprives no man of the power appropriate the products of society; have not invented the intervention of society in education, instead, to rescue education from the influence of the ruling class; a desire to introduce an openly legalised community for women. With this, in proportion as the antagonism between classes within the nation vanishes, the hostility of one nation to another will come to an end. Analysts have gone against arguing that communism abolishes eternal truths, all religions and all morality instead of constituting them on a new basis, therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experiences; that the communist revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional property relations.

Commentators give emphasis on the steps of such revolution: raise the proletariats to the position of the ruling class, the proletariat will centralise all instruments are its supremacy and then an association in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all. Marx also focuses on Feudal Socialism, Petty-Bourgeois Socialism, German Socialism and Conservative Socialism which mainly discussed regarding the most probable cause of a proletarian revolution against the oppressors; the adaptation of an old socialism into their own ideology and the desire to preserve the culture despite of such movement. Finally, Marx proposed his hypothesis that the movement will start in Germany because of still existing aristocracy which compressed the bourgeoisie in its position while developing gradually the proletariats. He presented his support to

any proletarian movement and advocates the abolition of private property to attain the desired equality. His final words were: "Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. WORKING MEN OF ALL COUNTRIES, UNITE!

REACTION
First of all, I wanted to indicate that I was persuaded by this manifesto such that it main concern was to achieve the desired equality through a revolutionary approach in order to abolish the class antagonism. But then, as I gradually took a deeper understanding regarding its perspective, Ive realized that may lead to abolition also, of one of the chief reason of leaving- improving. Due to his belief that history follows a certain stages of events of which will end up leading to the so-called Utopian endpoint where and when you can attain the paradise in the earth. Thus, Marx confidently believed that he can predict depending upon the projectile of events presented by history. His belief is that, capitalism will be abolished sometime and communism will rise into power. This is properly observed during the fall of the aristocracy in Russia by the people, led by Lenin, which one of those who formed the Communist Party. Such change was brought by an engine called class antagonisms. Class antagonisms were resulted from the giving birth of a class to another class. In such way, the rise of bourgeoisie to power from the ashes of feudalism gives birth to the class of proletariats who were the working forces that is needed by the bourgeoisie for production. This can be taken that economics plays a vital role to the rise of a class struggle, or more probably, a revolution. The French Revolution can be taken into account in this statement because of the economic problem and famine experienced by the peasants or the common people lead them to a revolution to over throw the existing rule. Marx underestimated the capacity of human to put up innovation in the process. He neglected or probably, he never saw

the impossibility that history shall end in the fall of capitalism, which isnt true. History is great evidence on this flaw Marxs manifesto because it presents a great number of rises and fall of classes, ideas, political rule, etc. from the entire world which can make up an endless cycle. One of the most fundamental principles introduced by Marx in his manifesto is the abolition of private property to achieve community equality. This first move of Marx implies that bourgeois system of property does not provide any property for the worker though; it is hard to see the connection since inequality in distribution does not need private property to be abolished. Marxs political program seems to be secured by the dialectical method he uses like his belief that the main reason in ruining the class lies deep into its core which is composed of contradictions such that bourgeois shall fail due to the contradictions of the proletariats that will make who will destroy them. Testing his claim that capitalism can exist only as long as workers do not accumulate property matches the economic evidence by taking into account the contemporary issue: The relation of government in the economy as Marx believed that government must be either laissez-faire or in complete control of the economy. However, we can see that the government has already intervened in the economy in favour of the workers. And while there is still some debate as to the ideal nature of these interventions, there is little doubt that they have actually advanced economic development in the long run by creating and sustaining a secure and healthy workforce, a workforce without which business could not develop. This is especially true as the physical demands of labour have decreased greatly since

Marxs time. The above changes have occurred without a full scale socialization of the economy. Improving the lot of workers, then, by allowing them to acquire property has not destroyed capitalism. Marxs fundamental problem with capitalism is moral. He believes that a system of exchange based on money causes us to view our fellow humans as things of value and not as moral beings. Once the means of labour has been taken from us, it seems that it has alienated us from our means of living. Marxs treatment of the charge of idleness is more interesting than his glib answer would indicate. If you what you receive does not depend directly on your labour, then there is an apparent incentive to do nothing. This is a common criticism of modern welfare systems, for instance. All of his assumes that there is something objectionable about work. Marx would likely respond that this view of labour is itself the product of capitalism and so the free-rider problem will fade as the vestiges of capitalism fade. Consistent with Marxs theory of alienation, labour will become ennobling and people will not avoid it. Ultimately, it is hard to assess this claim since no such society has such existed. One would have to take Marxs conjecture on faith. In relation to this, the idleness charge may be better interpreted as a claim that state monopolization of the economy will reduce the incentive to innovative. This could minimize the development of goods and technologies that augment the well-being of humankind. There are three major criticisms that Marx offers against rival bands of socialism. First, they use the present misery of the working class as a reason to

restore older methods of social organization; that is, it is backward-looking rather than forward-looking. It is notable that Marx not only thinks that moving backwards is not only unwise, he thinks it impossible. History moves only into one direction and one cannot return into the past. It is important to recognize that this criticism does not undermine its object since one must provide a theoretical basis for this. Marx does provide a justification which without it, it is certainly an open question as whether the problems of the present can be solved by looking back into the wisdom of the predecessors. Marx second criticism is that many of his contemporaries look forward to a new society but do not appreciate the extent to which change is needed. Marx believed that only blood can cleanse the world in which, the problem here is that Marx pointed out a necessity of proletarian revolution. Perhaps here is extrapolating the events of French Revolution when they tasted the blood of King Louis XIV and his family to find the contentment they want. Marxs third criticism is that other forms of socialism do not appreciate the truly classist character of the conflict. The philosophized socialism denies the significance of class altogether while the bourgeois socialism does no realize that the only significant action must come the oppressed and not from the elites of the upper classes. Marx concluded the manifesto is short and meaty way such that forcing to restate the political purposes of the communism. The processes of its birth may not process in the same rate but the approach that shall be taken most likely will be common as cited by the different time frame of communism in many parts of the

world, like China, Russia and Latin America. As the cold war ended and the remaining communist states are transforming its ideologies and political system, we cannot ignore the fact that Marx exposed to us how the products of societies came about due to oppressions and gave us the idea a possible society that is radically different and a better alternative.