Karl Marx

(1818-1883)

QUOTATION

“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit
of spiritless conditions. It is it the opium of the people.” – Karl Marx [13] (Respectfully disagreed
on this quote)
This quote is commonly misinterpreted because many people believe that Marx was against
religion; on the contrary, he believed that religion was an outlet for people to find solace. But, in
a capitalist society, religion is forced to take a different form. The capitalist system oppresses and
alienates the working class which causes them to look to religion to find solace. Marx criticizes
capitalism for co-opting religion as a way to distract the working class from their exploitation. In
summation, Marx is not “against religion, but the system which requires religion.[13] This quote
ultimately expresses Marx’s criticisms of capitalism.

CONTEXT

Karl Marx was born in Trier, Prussia on May 5, 1818 to a Jewish, middle class family that later
converted to Protestantism. In 1841 Marx received his Doctorate in philosophy from the University
of Berlin where he was highly influenced by Hegel and the young Hegelians. “On June 19, 1843
he married Jenny Von Westphalen and they had seven children together.”[17]That same year,
Marx moved to Paris, where he was exposed to new political activity and met Friedrich Engel, a
significant colleague. Marx also wrote the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts which details
Marx’s transition in Paris from Young Hegelian to historical materialist.[11] Because of his
theories and association with the social thinkers invested in public advancement and order, Marx
was expelled from France to Brussels by 1845. He was writing during a time in which both the
industrial revolution and “a revolution in social thinking were occurring.”[14]

In 1848, after moving to London and participating in a worker’s revolution where he saw the
downfalls of the Industrial Revolution, Marx and Engels published Marx’s most famous work, The
Communist Manifesto. In 1864, Marx became involved with a movement of workers, The
International and three years later, published Capital. Towards the end of Marx’s life, he was
recognized as an acclaimed thinker and was consulted by intellectuals from all over Europe.[4]
Marx died on March 14, 1883.[13]

CONNECTIONS

Vladimir Lenin expressed that Marx cannot be understood without the influence of G.W.F Hegel
and his concept of the dialectical method. While the dialectical method is not Hegel’s alone,
Hegel’s concept of the method “uses the idea of contradiction to understand historical change.”[13]
Hegel believed that history was propelled by contradictions; Marx also accepted this idea and
detailed it through the contradictions between the proletariat, the bourgeoisie, and the labor
produced.[13] Marx collaborated with Friedrich Engel on many works beginning in 1844,
including The Holy Family, The German Ideology and most importantly The Communist
Manifesto. Marx is also closely connected with Neo-Marxism, a movement to preserve critical
theory and the communist movement as well as other Marxist ideas.6 Some Neo-Marxists include
Vladimir Lenin, Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Herbert Marcuse, Antonio
Gramsci, and Jurgen Habermas.[9]

PERSPECTIVE

Marxist Tradition. The basic principles which fall under Marxism have been based in many
progressive points in time.[1] Alienation occurs in the labor process when the working class loses
control over production and the product. Economic determinism is the result of the alienation of
labor and is the alienation of human productivity. Marxism also addresses the class society, which
is separated by the economic base and the superstructure; the economic base includes technological
and social relations of a product and superstructure includes the state, culture and religion. Social
change occurs when economic base and superstructures conflict. Marx described that class struggle
is the result of stratified classes: the working class must sell their labor power and provide the
production to the capitalist class. Classes were created through the exploitation of the working
class.[10]

THEORETICAL CONTRIBUTIONS

Historical Materialism.

Historical materialism is the theory which Marx created in order to explain the reasons for human
alienation, oppression, suffering, and the possibility of attaining emancipation.[6] It states that
“economic relations are the basic cause of social phenomena.”[16] Marx’s theory begins with the
idea that man’s history and main project is the production of “material life” because humans have
needs which can only be met through labor.[6] Human productive activity includes the use of raw
materials from nature, technology, and human labor.
Within modes of production, forces of production continue to grow as long as they fall within the
limitations of the relations of production. These modes are made up of the dominant and working
classes, which represent the disparities in power, economic and class relations. The relation of
production also explains the super-structural institutions, and the realm of consciousness, which
both act as stabilizers of society. Stabilizers of society are considered ideology that is formed out
of the capitalist society. Ideology to Marx often alienated people and created loss of freedom.[6]
This occurs because thoughts are naturally created from everyday life, and because capitalism
creates ideology which masks the hardships experienced by the working class daily.[6]

Capitalism and Commodity Fetishism.

Marx’s studies on human nature and alienation led him to the study capitalism. He saw capitalism
as a system of power and unequal “economic relations.”[13] One main problem with capitalism is
the exploitation of the labor from the laborer in order to increase surplus.[4] Marx divided society
into two economic groups based on this: those who those who create the labor are the proletariat,
and those who pay wages to the proletariat and “own the means of production” are the capitalists,
or the bourgeoisie.[13] As a result of the labor process, commodities are created which are then
assigned “exchange value.” By giving commodities a value, the worship, or fetishism, of
commodities occurs. This is an example of the creation of an ideology. Human beings give value
to money; physically this is only a piece of paper, but symbolically it has value. Marx believed
that capitalism must be overcome in order for people to achieve their full creative, human potential
that was stifled by labor and exchange. Although Marx highly criticized capitalism, he did believe
that it could benefit humanity by opening up the possibility of modernity and freedom for the
worker.[13]

Alienation.

Alienation is a concept which can be found in many of Marx’s works. Most directly it can be
linked to the capitalist society. This concept can be described as a circumstance in which a person
is controlled by the forces of his own product which confront him as an “alien power".[7]
Alienation is performed through objectification which can occur with money, religion or in the
workplace. In the workplace, alienation occurs during production because those in the working
class do not dictate their work.[3] Marx argues that because labor os not our own, it can no longer
transform us and instead we are alienated from our labor and therefore alienated from our human
nature.[18] Man becomes less social as he is separated from those around him and ultimately from
his own humanity. The alienation of labor removes creativity and human thought from
production.[5] Man can only escape the alienation when he realizes that he is artificially
imprisoned by his own production.[4]

Class Theory.

Marx believed that history has always told a story of the quest for class gain between the
bourgeoisie and the working class. A person’s ability to attain a higher class is based on production
and ability to obtain limited resources and power. This creates a greater divide because resources,
power and production are not all equally distributed. Marx believed that the working class is
dominated by the bourgeoisie because the working class provides the labor for the bourgeoisie to
keep the capitalist economy working. By providing the bourgeoisie with the cheapest labor
possible, the working class allows production to be cost effective for the capitalist economy. Marx
also feared that mechanization of the laborers would occur as the working class was relegated to
simple operations. This could lead to a revolution as masses of people become factory workers
and share their agony.[13] If the working class recognizes its commonalities, “unites in solidarity...
and becomes aware of the alienation… the bourgeois reign is doomed,”[3] and the class structure
can be broken.[13]

MAJOR WORKS

The Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts (1844). The 1844 Manuscripts include a range of
subjects including a critique on Hegel, private property, communism, money and most importantly
alienated labor. Under capitalism, a person in the working class suffers from four overlapping
categories of alienated labor, which Marx believed built on each other. First, in production, a
person loses the creation he has made; this creates the first type of alienation by the product. The
second category of alienated labor is productive activity, because working is a torment when goods
are taken away. Third, alienation occurs from species being because humans cannot act freely
“with their own human powers.”[15] Lastly, people are alienated by other human beings “when
the relation of exchange replaces the relation of mutual need.” Using the four types of alienated
labor, Marx depicted how the bourgeois economics can be developed. Marx also addressed how
non-alienation can be achieved when a person enjoys his creation and produces it in order to meet
a certain need.[15]

The Communist Manifesto (1848). “Marx began his most famous work, The Communist
Manifesto Party, witht the following line, ‘There is a spectre haunting Europe, the spectre of
communism.’”[18]The Communist Manifesto, which was created between Marx and Engels, was
a result of Marx’s ties to various Communist unions and was published in 1848, as the communist
revolutions occurred. As they wrote this, Engels and Marx were both in their late twenties.[19]
The first section of The Communist Manifesto, titled “Bourgeois and Proletariats”, details the
advance of industrial capitalism and “predictions for its future.”[2] There are only two classes and
the bourgeoisie and has political control and created the industrial revolution. The proletariat “sold
themselves piecemeal to the bourgeoisie and becomes the “pauper” as the conditions of the
proletariat, or working class, deteriorate.

The second section’s, Proletariat and Communists, main idea is the “abolition of private property
and also includes reforms that communists would assume, such as the institution of a “heavy
progressive” tax.2 Marx and Engel criticize reactionary, conservative or bourgeois, and utopian
socialism in the third section, Socialist and Communist Literature. The last section, Position of the
Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties, asserts that communists
support a revolution in order to overthrow other social orders through Europe. The proletariat has
the “world to win” with the communist revolution.[2]

Through The Communist Manifesto, Marx shed light on the plight of the working class and gave
them a voice instead of being ignored. It is an extremely important work which even today is still
relevant.[12] The Communist Manifesto concludes by saying, “The Proletarians have nothing to
lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Working men of all countries, unite!”[19]

Capital (1867). Capital: A Critique Of Political Economy, discusses economic institutions and the
division of labor.8 It indicates Marx’s connections with the economic theorists Adam Smith and
David Ricardo.5 Within Capital, Marx recreated the “labor theory of value” that Smith and Ricardo
used, detailing that “human labor was the source of the value of produced goods” while also adding
that there was a distinction between work and labor.[5] Labor power was enumerated and
commodified. Therefore, labor was bought with capital without treating the laborers as human
beings. “Surplus value,” when removed from labor by “paying workers less than their
contributions,” causes capital to grow.[5] Through Capital, Marx showed how “capitalist
productive capacity would outstrip purchasing power.”5 Marx also believed that profit rates would
fall as a result of automation diminishing “the contribution of exploitable living labor to the
production process.”[5] Marx also demonstrates that within a class, labor can be divided even
further. This creates an ever-changing class structure in society.[7] After finishing capital, marx
intended to, but never completed, the “synthetic political theory” as the complement to it.[5]

CRITICISMS

Many theorists criticize that Marx left out the role of consumption in his study on the economy
and production. This argument sets forth that consumption provides an entrepreneurial role with
room for creativity, creating jobs which are considered non-alienating. When only focusing on
production, Marx leaves out the possibility for a role of these non-alienating jobs.[13] Another
criticism is that Marx loses sight of natural resource depletion in his acceptance of “Western
conceptions of progress.”[13] Marx felt that man should be able to use nature for production needs
which is seemingly dangerous especially in modern times.

Lastly, Marx is criticized for the failure of communism in modern times because it did not create
an exact plan for the creation of communism; but rather, a critique of capitalism and plan for
revolution.[13] Also, when looking at the economy Marx focused only on the production side of
the economy and ignored the consumption side of it.[18] However, Marx’s priority was not
necessarily to create the ideal economic system, but rather to critique the current one, capitalism.

IMPACT

Marx’s largest impact on the world of social sciences is increasing society’s understanding of
capitalism. By developing his theory on capitalism, Marx opened up a world of ideas such as
freedom, alienation, and Marxism. Marx’s work is still widely used and many schools of thought
continue to “claim to be the true inheritors of Marxist tradition.”[10] Marx also had many political
and social movements named after him as well.[18] Marx also laid the foundation with his class
theory for critical theory and interpretation of the social structures of society today based on
capitalism. Class theory is widely used to interpret the class, race and gender structures and how
people are oppressed by their social standing. Marx’s class theory, used in conjunction with
religion and the reading of the bible, is also widely referenced in liberation theology. Liberation
theology also focuses on the struggles of the working class and the revolution for justice, as Marx
does.[13] At one time in the world, one-third of the world’s population was lived under states that
were inspired by Marx and his teachings.[18]