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Liberalism and Marxism in 19 th Century The rise of Liberalism and Marxism in 19 th century is result of two major socio-political developments, which signify modern times the decline of Christianity and the decreased biological quality of people in industrialized societies. Liberalism is essentially the ideology of egoism, brought to the whole new level. The Communism is much worse it is active promotion of slave mentality, which main purpose was to substitute aging Christian doctrine with new set of ideas that would appeal to peoples lowest instincts. Therefore we cannot say that the essence of these two political doctrines is new. Nevertheless, it was 19 th century that theories of universal equality and individual liberty began to gain popularity among great many people. Nowadays Socialism, as theory, is being closely linked with Marxism, but apparent similarity between Marxism and Socialism can be only found on the level of unions activity, with foundations of each theory being based on different metaphysical principles.
This is why we cannot refer to Marxism and Socialism in this paper as having the same properties, because it would mislead us to the wrong conclusions in the long run. Let us analyze the fundamental nature of Marxism and Liberalism, so it would be easier to answer the question about which political ideology is less despicable. The roots of modern Liberalism can be traced back to the philosophy of John Lock, Montesquieu, Emanuel Kant, Adam Smith and Thomas Jefferson. Their worldviews were marked with the idea of individual values prevalence over the social values. The post- revolutionary France was the first country in the world to incorporate many liberal ideas in its constitution. The freedom of religious expression, the protected rights of private ownership and political liberty also defined the American democracy to a large degree.
Nevertheless, in many respects liberal ideas resemble Anarchism, which insists on elimination of all social institutions, in order for the individual to attain the maximum of personal freedom. Therefore, it is wrong to associate Liberalism with democracy, as modern Medias try to convince us. If brought to its logical conclusion, the Liberalism will inevitably result creating social chaos, which has nothing to do with classical principles of democracy. As it was being said earlier, the Liberalism is a philosophy of egoism, which can be highly appealing but hardly moral. Despite many of its negative qualities, Liberalism, as political theory, resulted in bringing down feudal traditions that ruled the public institutions in many European countries in 19 th century.
In this respect, the historical role of Liberalism appears to be positive, since it helped to eliminate obstacles on the way of social progress. The irony lies in the fact that in post-industrial societies this political theory itself became an obstacle. This is why todays Liberal politicians express so much intolerance towards their opponents. We can talk of Liberalism as political movement in transition. While in 19 th century it stood out to defend peoples liberties, now it turned out to be the ultimate tool in securing their comfort. It started out as anti dogmatic theory but now it engages in suppressing alternative political movements by labeling them as fascist.
The liberty and social freedoms is the last thing that comes to ones mind today when Liberalism is mentioned, now it is closely linked with promoting homosexuality and enforcing affirmative action. In the first part of 20 th century Liberalism has proved to be ineffective political movement, as it failed to offer any effective resistance to Nazism or Communism. Still, comparing to Marxism, Liberalism appears to be much more favorable. So far, Liberals hadnt participated in mass killings of its political opponents, although it can be explained by the fact that they havent had a chance to do it yet, rather by their high moral standards.
Let us say a few words about Communism. Among its early proponents we can name utopia socialists like Charles Fourier, Robert Owen and Saint-Simon, who based their visions of universal equality on the assumption that the rich people would voluntarily give up their possessions and political privileges so that they could join with the rest of humanity in the frenzy of brotherly love. The history has proven the cheer naivety of such theories long ago. Sill, it was Marx and Engel that started the whole show of absurd, presently known as Communism.
In 1848 Karl Marx and Frederic Engel published a so-called Communist Manifesto, which stated that all people in the world are divided on bourgeoisie and proletariat. These are the biggest enemies and there can be no reconciliation reached between them. They predicted that historically, bourgeoisie is doomed to physical annihilation, to prevent it from exploiting proletariat any further. Marx and Engel suggested that there is no other purpose of ones existence, but materialistic one. If person isnt hungry all his needs are satisfied. The reason why so many people were strongly opposed against Communism is because it openly proclaims its immediate goals: The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all other proletarian parties: Formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat in the whole world. (Communist Manifesto, part 2).
Up until the collapse of the Soviet Union, its symbol used to be a hammer and the sickle over the globe. Soviet constitution openly stated that USSR only temporarily consists of 15 republics, but it is only the matter of time before all the countries in the world will become part of it. There are many left-wing intellectuals in our time that try to convince us that Marx's ideas were being wrongly interpreted and that theyre essentially beneficial to mankind. Id like to refer them to the only time when Communist ideas were being deployed in its purest form Cambodia, during regime of Pol Pot in 1975 - 1978. Marx wouldve been proud of this bloody dictator for exactly following his recipes that were written in 19 th century: abolition of family women are shared whether they want or not, 12 hours a day working for food without holidays, making everyone to wear the same gray ropes to emphasize their equality.
The price of this paradise on Earth was 5 million people killed and starved to death. The main antagonists of Marxists and socialists were always the old aristocracy and bourgeoisie. It is quite explainable these were privileged classes and they rightly feared that they could lose their social status, if Marxist theory was to be applied in their countries. At the same time, there were considerations of maintaining social order, on their part, as well. The intellectual elite were well aware that the proponents of Marxism would not only promote the idea of social equality, but they would also enforce it, as soon as they would gain enough political influence. Instead of believing in childish concepts of universal equality, aristocracy and bourgeoisie believed in power of universal corruption.
Marxism is contradictory concept, because it proclaims the priority of individual values, on one hand, but on another, it regards such individual as social nucleus. It strives for the integral functioning of society, but it can only be accomplished if powerful bureaucratic authority is established. But then, the social progress in every Communist society becomes stagnant, as bureaucracy is not concerned with anything else but pursuing its own secular agendas. The significance of Marxism, as political philosophy, can be compared to the significance of Christianity, as the religion of death and decay, which helped to seal the fate of Roman civilization. Both are based on the denial of scientifically proven fact of natural inequality between men and the practical implications of both doctrines resulted in enormous amount of suffering among people.
The Marxism prepared the ground for Communism, which almost succeeded in destroying Western civilization. I feel more comfortable with Liberalism but not because I think that it is a superior political philosophy but because it is less totalitarian. It is also closer to the original principles of democracy, with which Marxism is simply incompatible. Bibliography: Communist Manifesto. Marxism Page. (2001). October 8, 2005 web History of Socialism (2003).
Absolute Astronomy. com. October 8, 2005 web Liberalism. (2005). Wikipedia. October 8, 2005 web Marx, Karl Capital. A Critique of Political Economy trans.
by Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling. New York: Random House. 1995
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Research essay sample on Liberalism And Marxism In 19th Century
