Example research essay topic: Means Of Production Karl Marx - 978 words

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Marxism in the XX Century Socialism granted a powerful language for the working-class to express their interests. Many workers, who were enfranchised in the latter portion of the century joined political parties espousing this doctrine. Socialism existed before Karl Marx presented himself to the scene. In fact, Marx drew from the theories of the foremost prophets of socialism: Henri de Saint-Simon and Charles Fourier in France, and Robert Owen in Great Britain. However, he gave these theories his own style, and in the end his form became the dominant idea of socialism. Karl Marx, the son of a lawyer, grew up in an industrializing area that was particularly open to political ideas and agitation.

The Rhineland, in western Germany, had been influenced by ideas of the French Revolution and was primed for political radicalism. Marx, as a young man, studied philosophy at the University of Berlin and joined a group known as the Young Hegelians, self-declared disciples of idealist G. W. F.

Hegel. Marx showed an early interest in political liberty and socialism. Marx and Engels published the Communist Manifesto, in 1848. This pamphlet was an appeal to the working classes of the world, written specifically for the Communist League, a group of Germans living in exile. The pamphlet was too late and too obscure to influence the revolutions of 1848.

However, it laid out Marx's basic principles, urging the proletariat to rise, proclaiming, You have nothing left to lose but your chains. Marx's pen birthed numerous political and polemical works, but most went unpublished during his lifetime. The first volume of, Capital, his major work, was published in 1867. Marxism, the body of Karl Marx's thought, is complex and often contradictory.

The style it was written in is obscure, difficult to penetrate. But throughout there are certain basic concepts that shine, which were understood and embraced by Marx's followers. As Hegel believed that the goal of human history was the realization of the world spirit; Marx embraced the theory and believed it was the abolition of capitalism, the victory of the proletariat, the disappearance of the state, and the ultimate liberation of all humankind. Marx insisted that material conditions determined the governance of the world. Following Hegel, who said that truth evolves by a dialectic method, Marx called his own philosophy dialectic materialism. He posited a world of change but stated that it was embedded in material conditions, not in a clash of ideas.

To Marx, ideas were merely a reflection of the material world. Based on their relationship to factories and machines (the means of production), Marx grouped human beings into classes. Capitalists were one class, because they owned the means of production. Workers were a separate class, the proletariat, because they did not own any of the means of production and their income came only from their own hands. Because these two classes had differing relationships to the means of production, they had antagonistic interests and were destined to engage in class struggle, according to Marx.

Unlike his contemporaries, who lamented the increasing hostility between workers and capitalists, Marx perceived the conflict as a necessary factor in the advancement of human history. He, furthermore, sought to validate his thesis by the study of the past. He pointed out that in the Middle Ages the feudal class dominated society but eventually lost the struggle to the commercial classes. Now, in turn, the rising proletariat was destined to overwhelm the capitalists. Through studying history and economics, Marx found justification for, as well as irrefutable proof of the scientific foundation of his ideas. Capitalism itself was creating the forces that would supplant it.

The massive industrial plants necessitated an even greater work force with a growing sense of class interest. The competitive nature that capitalism inherited would inevitably bully a rising number of enterprises out of business. It was there, where a form of monopoly capitalism would emerge, abusive of both workers and consumers. Resulting from increasing savage competition, more businesses would fail, which would consequently lead to more cases of unemployment. Frustrations and anger would develop; workers would then overthrow the system that had been abusive for such a long period: The knell of private property has sounded. The expropriators will be expropriated.

The proletariat would gain power and temporarily practice the dictatorship of the proletariat to solidify its rule. Once this has occurred, the state would disintegrate to nothing. The history of class war would end and the ideal society would prevail with proletariat coming to power. Ironically, Marx, who spent his life writing about the nature and history of social change, envisaged a time when change would cease, when history, as it were, would stop. While many protested the evils of industrialism, Marx described economic change in dramatic terms as a stage that was necessary for humankind to traverse on toward liberation. The suffering of the worker was not without purpose; rather, it was a significant process, part of the drama that would finally bring forth human emancipation.

Marx accepted industrialism and perceived it as part of the path that history was destined to choose, unlike some of the utopians who deplored it. In studying economics and history, Marx became convinced that the coming of socialism was not only desirable, but more importantly it was inevitable. The laws of history dictated that capitalism would collapse, having created within itself the means of self-destruction, specifically the proletariat uprising. Marx provided his ideology with the boost it needed to become the faith of millions, through proclaiming his own brand of socialism as scientific. In the nineteenth century, when science was regarded with respected glorification, declaring ideas scientific was solid way to gain popularity and a following. Words: 940 Bibliography: See S.

Avineri, The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx (1968); J. Enter, An Introduction to Karl Marx (1986); B. Mazlish, The Meaning of Karl Marx (1987)

Research essay sample on Means Of Production Karl Marx